The Forgotten Value of Angry Mobs to a Functioning Republic

We were watching the fifth episode of HBO's John Adams last night (which I highly recommend to those of y'all who haven't seen it yet; a great exploration of the birth and infancy of this nation), and there was a moment when George Washington and John Adams are at the window of the White House, with an angry mob outside waving French and American flags, carrying torches and denouncing the government for signing a treaty with Britain over the new French Republic. It was an after the fact outpouring of anger with the government, but at least it was there, visible, audible, and felt by those in power.

Where are our mobs today? Where is the public outpouring of anger against the ongoing crimes and cover-ups of our government? What has this nation become? When George Bush claims Executive Privilege for the umpteenth time, once again to hide the lawbreaking (and downright low class operations) of his administration with regard to the Valerie Plame affair, and orders the Department of Justice to deny Congress access to information, where are the pitchforks and crowds? Or is America's Got Talent on again?

President Bush has asserted executive privilege to prevent Attorney General Michael Mukasey from having to comply with a House panel subpoena for material on the leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity.

A House committee chairman, meanwhile, held off on a contempt citation of Mukasey — who had requested the privilege claim — but only as a courtesy to lawmakers not present.

Among the documents sought by House Oversight Chairman Henry Waxman are FBI interviews of Vice President Dick Cheney.

They also include notes about the 2003 State of the Union address, during which President Bush made the case for invading Iraq in part by saying Saddam Hussein was pursuing uranium ore to make a nuclear weapon. That information turned out to be wrong.

Waxman rejected Mukasey's suggestion that Cheney's FBI interview on the CIA leak should be protected by the privilege claim — and therefore not turned over to the panel.

As an aside, it was also in that episode last night that the script had Thomas Jefferson delivering his famous statement that "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."