"Excessive Force Is Common in This Country"

"But here are a few measures, beyond video cameras, that would improve policing:

Decisions about when to charge officers should be made by independent prosecutors, not regular district attorneys, who rely on police to testify in most of the cases they bring. That gives these district attorneys a perverse incentive to refrain from aggressively prosecuting misconduct.

Police unions should be able to negotiate salary, benefits, and nothing else. Firing an abusive police officer should be easy.

All police departments should have strong civilian oversight.

The War on Drugs should end.

Most military-grade police equipment should be returned to the federal government or destroyed.

Civil asset forfeiture should be reformed.

No-knock raids should stop in almost all cases."

Conor Friedersdorf at The Atlantic calls for police reform.

"Pot and Slots"

"But both have been made possible by the same trend in American attitudes: the rise of a live-and-let-live social libertarianism, the weakening influence of both religious conservatism and liberal communitarianism, the growing suspicion of moralism in public policy.

"And both, in different ways, illustrate the potential problems facing a culture pervaded by what the late sociologist Robert Bellah called 'expressive individualism' and allergic to any restrictions on what individuals choose to do."

 

Ross Douthat in The New York Times links the rising popularity of legalized marijuana and casino gambling.

"To Understand Edward Snowden's Motivations, Look to Aaron Swartz"

"Snowden’s mindset seems similar to me. He told The Guardian that, as a teenager, he considered the Internet 'the most important invention in all of human history' because it connected him to 'people with all sorts of views that I would never have encountered on my own.' But, as an adult, he increasingly worried that surveillance was destroying the Web. The same invention he believed could liberate mankind was becoming a tool of oppression."

Noam Scheiber at The New Republic reacts to the National Security Agency leaks.

And Alec MacGillis "welcomes the uproar."

A Liberaltarian Moment?

"But while it shouldn't be overstated, there is a real significance here that also shouldn't be overlooked. Rachel Maddow last night pointed out that there is a split on the Right--at least a rhetorical one--between what she called 'authoritarian conservatives' and 'libertarian conservatives.' At some point, the dogmatic emphasis on limited state power, not trusting the Federal Government, and individual liberties--all staples of right-wing political propaganda, especially Tea Party sloganeering--has to conflict with things like oversight-free federal domestic surveillance, limitless government detention powers, and impenetrable secrecy (to say nothing of exploiting state power to advance culture war aims). Not even our political culture can sustain contradictions as egregious as (a) reading reverently from the Constitution and venerating limits on federal power, and then (b) voting to vest the Federal Government with extraordinary powers of oversight-free surveillance aimed at the American people."

Glen Greenwald in Salon wonders if a bipartisan faction can hold together to defend civil liberties.