Editors Note:  that should have been US Senate passed ...

Congress passed the bill earlier.  Obama, on the passing in the Congress, proclaimed he would veto the bill, it now looks like he won't.

Here is the link to the article discussed in the video that Jason Leopold wrote:

Obama's "Twisted Version of American Exceptionalism" Laid Bare
 

On Wednesday, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama's senior advisers would recommend to the president that he should not veto the bill, as Obama had promised to do, because Congress made minor changes Monday to the provisions in the legislation related to the treatment of terrorism suspects with which the administration is now satisfied.

When the US voted in favor of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, it promised to uphold several ideals, including one that said, "no one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention, or exile."

Kenneth Roth, the executive director of Human Rights Watch, said if Obama signs the bill, he will "go down in history as the president who enshrined indefinite detention without trial in US law."

Future generations will mark December 15, 2011 as a sad day in American history - that is if they are permitted to express dismay at the loss without fear of detention.

In Canada our parliament already has the power to circumvent Habeas Corpus rights see Library of Congress Habeas Corpus Rights: Canada.  The most flagrant use was during the October Crisis.  However the premise of that authority was also used during the G8 protests in Toronto where thousands of Canadian citizens were summarily detained on little or no evidence and denied representation for a period of time.
 

Whether American politicians have ever respected the Bill of Rights or not, this shift in American law is significant.  The Bill of Rights itself is a symbolic beacon of light around the world.  It is a governmental document that clearly states that citizens, the people, have the right to be protected from a zealous authority.

The US Bill of Rights set the world stage for arguments against systemic discrimination.  In Canada, sleeping beside that legal giant, we followed suit even though our laws did not, do not, grant us the same protection.  All democratic nations have stumbled at times, none have been perfect, but ultimately the ideal of freedom against autocratic rule, abuse of authority and legal protections won out.

Those rights are being lost, slowly, insidiously, one protection at a time.  Most frightening of all, the people who need them most are not fighting for them.

Governments and corporations do not need protection.  They have power, money and armies to protect them.  The average citizen has nothing but the Law to preserve their freedoms.  If the Law is diluted the average citizen is at risk.

Most people have a cynical yet idealized view of how the law works.  They believe, because they are good, honest, patriotic, that the law will protect them.  They equally believe that the only reason to fear draconian laws is because 'you must be guilty'.  What they miss in this viewpoint is that Law is blind and therefore bad laws are the most dangerous to the good, honest, innocent.

Laws against "indefinite detention" and habeas corpus were created in response to abuses by authorities from the Spanish Inquisition to Nazi Germany to our own October Crisis.  These laws were a response to the innocents caught in the net of authoritarian paranoia and persecution.  They were created to protect us; to ensure our freedom to think, believe and protest any abuse of power without fear of persecution.

Since 9/11 democratic countries - led by the birth place of the Bill of Rights - have been eroding those rights.  People living in those countries really have to start questioning our political leaders.  We, Canada and other democratic countries, supposedly went to war against other nations because those national governments were violating civil rights - yet we are now doing the same.

All this says to me is that we may have won the battle but we are losing the war.  We are giving up our basic freedoms to a threat and even if that threat was real it is not worth sacrificing our fundamental rights and legal jurisprudence.

People tend to rise up against the threats they personally discern or experience, which is why TSA procedures have sparked more public outcries than torture. Many post-9/11 abuses, like blacklisting and ubiquitous surveillance, are invisible. Others, like summary imprisonment or torture, are generally directed at unpopular minorities -- immigrants and Muslims, as well as the occasional high profile terrorism suspect. And when repression targets other people, in the ersatz interests of "our" security, it can pass perversely as freedom. As Rudy Guiliani famously remarked, "Freedom is about authority." Libertarians have to hope that Americans will recognize the illusiveness of such freedom and the harsh realities of post-9/11 authority before it's turned implacably against them.

      Wendy Kaminer, The Atlantic, Dec 15, 2011

There is another danger about the erosion of sanity within the Republican party - and our counterpart the Conservative party - and that is that it reduces democratic participation.

In the US the problem is more glaring because, despite independent candidates and fringe parties, there really are only two choices for the American people.  The lack of choice leads to apathy where the rational voter chooses not to vote and the irrational voter does - thus electing irrational politicians, creating a vicious downward cycle.

For a very concise history on the demise of the Republican Party check out this article Why the Republican Crackup Hurts America

The term silent majority has been bandied about for decades and they  have become more silent to the detriment of our political process.  People do not speak out against the most egregious political acts and this permits even more, worse, political behaviour.

The average person has come to believe that the government does what the government wants to do and, guess what, because the majority of average people believe this so do the politicians.  In our collective silence we have created the monster and it will only be by our collective voices that the monster will be put back in the cage.

People have to get beyond the concept of "personal" freedom and recognize that what this boils down to is responsibility and accountability.  It is not just about one person or one group, Us or Them, but about all of us collectively.  Citizens have a responsibility to force elected officials to be accountable to the people of a nation or community, not the other way around.

We would not allow our children to behave this way; so why do we reward politicians who lie, cheat, and abuse?

Noise is relative to the silence preceding it. The more absolute the hush, the more shocking the thunderclap. Our masters have not heard the people's voice for generations, Evey and it is much, much louder than they care to remember.
       Alan Moore, V for Vendetta

Once again our forefathers spoke wise words....

Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.
      Friedrich Nietzsche (1844 - 1900)

An update, Obama signed the Defense Bill today in Hawaii, apparently after securing some amendments including the provision of Habeas Corpus to American - not anybody else - citizens...

Obama Signs Military Spending Bill

If "con" is the opposite of pro, then isn't Congress the opposite of progress?

     Jon Stewart, America (The Book):

       A Citizen's Guide to Democracy Inaction