Good news, America. Thanks to the bill passed by the House yesterday (and sure to be passed by the Senate and soon to be signed by the President), we now live in a police state. The administration now has the Congressional seal of approval to detain and torture "enemy combatants" (which means anyone the administration says is an "enemy combatant," a classification that includes those giving money to charities deemed to be supporting terrorism), even American citizens, pretty much at will.

In other words, all it took was a single terrorist attack to undo our entire system of due process. Congress meekly lined up and gave Bush total power to shuffle whoever he pleases off to secret torture prisons.

I never thought America was so fearful, so spineless, so completely lacking in confidence in its own ideals, history and purpose as to abandon all pretense to justice so quickly and completely, without significant opposition. I thought enough people -- at all points on the political spectrum -- thought "freedom" was more than a meaningless mantra that they wouldn't throw it away so easily. I thought we were, you know, better than the tinpot Third World juntas and Stalinist megastates.

I thought wrong.

Enjoy your dictatorship, America. You asked for it. Here is how you were sold tyranny:

"The Global War on Terror is different from any war we have ever known. As a country we must understand that adaptation to these new situations is critical in order to achieve victory over those who seek to hurt us as a nation." -- Dennis Hastert

"Let's bring justice before the eyes of the children and widows of Sept. 11." -- James Sensenbrenner, Jr.

"It is outrageous that House Democrats, at the urging of their leaders, continue to oppose giving President Bush the tools he needs to protect our country." -- John A. Boehner