Review - Bill of Wrongs

Bill of Wrongs is the last book written by Molly Ivins, the Texas liberal reporter who, after covering George W. Bush as governor of Texas, was perhaps the first to warn us as to what his Presidency would be like. She may have understated the case, as I don't believe the president ever invaded New Mexico while he was governor. Her co-author is Lou Dubose, who also wrote Bushwhacked and Shrub with Ms. Ivins, two books that savagely detailed the career of Bush.

I've always enjoyed those authors who are troublemakers, who gleefully flout convention and challenge accepted wisdom. If you looked at the letters to the Chicago Tribune that were written about Ms. Ivins during the time her column ran, the outrage would have convinced you that her column was worth reading. If you wanted to get the liberal slant on issues of the day, flavored with Texas down-home colloquialisms, to Ivins' column you would turn.

Bill of Wrongs looks at the Bill of Rights and how it has been abused under the Bush administration under the guise of war. The abrogation of the right to free speech and assembly, where a citizen cannot wear a T-shirt or hold up a sign anywhere the president might see it, or the right of habeas corpus, arbitrarily suspended without the government having to make a case to any other party, has become not just suspended in special cases, but a standard investigative tool. This book collects stories of people who have been hurt because these basic rights have been taken away. It is very well-reported; the arrogance of the government (of the people, by the people, for the people??) will astound you.

But who will read or care about this book? I read it because I already had these concerns, and was looking for real reporting to back up my feelings. I got that.

The average American, though, is pretty well unaware of these rights, what they mean, and against what they protect us. In the face of an external threat, even one that is not particularly pervasive, these rights, which have little perceived day-to-day value, are easily seen as optional.

Take the right to free speech, so oft misunderstood. The First Amendment only says that "Congress shall make no law...abridging the freedom of speech." Most people vaguely understand that they don't really have this right, because they have no access to the forums; I may be free to talk or write about foreign policy, but I'm still not going to be invited on the Charlie Rose show as often as Henry Kissinger (or ever). So I can speak, but there's no guarantee that anyone has to listen.

So we have a right that we can rarely exercise in any effective manner, circumscribed by private conduct laws that extend outside of their domain (the right does not extend to private conduct, so an employee can be fired for writing a blog, even if they do so only from their home on their own time). Is it any wonder that, for most Americans, the First Amendment is only a vague concept, not as important as the "right" to download music from the Internet?

The same logic applies to the other amendments discussed in Bill of Wrongs. If you're not a fund-raising Muslim, or a member of a school board that has voted to include "intelligent design" in the science curriculum, why should you care?

As Louis Armstrong said, "If you have to ask what jazz is, you'll never know." If you have to ask what your rights mean to you, Bill of Wrongs will not enlighten you. It pretty much requires you to walk in, outrage in hand. This is not a criticism. If schools can't or won't teach the Constitution, and parents won't, you can't expect a slim well-written book to do so. But this book might be used by enlightened people to demonstrate what happens when these rights are taken away.

[By the way, Thursday is the one-year anniversary of the passing of Molly Ivins - she is missed.]