I cannot believe my eyes. From the Washington Post:

The United States and the European Union have agreed to expand a security program that shares personal data about millions of U.S.-bound airline passengers a year, potentially including information about a person's race, ethnicity, religion and health.... According to the deal, the information that can be used in such exceptional circumstances includes "racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership and data about an individual's health, traveling partners and sexual orientation.

Just last night I saw an episode of PBS's Now that demonstrated how the Republicans stole the 2004 election. Of course, I already witnessed how they, with the connivance of the Supreme Court, stole the 2000 election. The thief in charge made his first-ever, after five years in power, veto to prevent medical research that uses stem cells. Today he is promising to veto legislation continuing and expanding health insurance for children.

The war, the lying Attorney General, the national debt to foreign nations, our standing in the world - I am sickened. And we liberals, progressives, moderates - we sit tamely and wait, hoping, against all evidence to the contrary, that they will not steal the next election.

Even if they don't, even if we somehow manage to elect a Democratic President and larger majorities in Congress, the new leaders - even if they don't use their Republican-provided ability to gather this type of Big Brother information about people - they will not demolish the capability to do so. Then the next time the Thieves are in charge, they will expand their powers yet more, and soon enough they will have assured that they are ALWAYS in charge, or perhaps will occasionally allow a Lieberman-type to nominally be in charge.

This has been the most frightening week of my life. To watch the Attorney General of the United States, the person overseeing our entire legal system, to watch him lie baldly to the Senate, and feign forgetfulness, was profoundly shocking. How could I have been so naive?