Civil Libertarians See a Hopeful Dawn in 2009 … or Not
Warrantless wiretaps. The Patriot Act. Presidential secrecy. For seven years, civil libertarians and open-government advocates have felt they've been wandering in the wilderness, with few allies in Congress and a White House that only gets bolder in its contempt.
But now, with "change" the watchword in both Democratic presidential bids, and top committee heads in Congress flexing forgotten oversight muscles, activists are daring to look to 2009 as the Promised Land, where a new president joins with a fed-up Congress to lead America into a new era.
"A lot are talking about the post-Watergate Congress of 1974," said Marc Rotenberg, who heads the Electronic Privacy Information Center. "There is a real feeling we may have proposals for the kind of sweeping government reform that Congress pushed through after the Nixon impeachment in July 1974."
