A hoary truism teaches us that crisis reveals character, rather than shaping it. To the extent the word “character” applies to the government ruling us, that maxim certainly applies with respect to the state of permanent crisis we have experienced since 9-11. The tyrannical practices and powers associated with Homeland Security — from aggressive war to torture — are not a novelty of the "post-9-11 era." The open-ended “war on terror” simply provided an opportunity for the State’s agents to institutionalize official crimes that had been committed on a more informal basis prior to The Day Everything Changed. At the … Continue reading Sentence First, Trial Never