Freedom Blocked at the “Freedom 250” Grand Prix

The Indy Car Series event, held on August 23, 2026 in Washington, D.C. to celebrate the 250^th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence by delegates from the British colonies then officially in rebellion, ironically gave people visiting or living in the federal capitol a visceral experience of freedom blocked by governmental police and military authority. For not only the Mall, but also the entire route of the race was blocked by military and local police during the race such that public viewing was blocked. Entire city blocks separated the route from where tourists and local residents alike could drive and walk. Whether the federal government excessively pushed security at the expense of Americans being able to view the race without the luck of a lottery draw in advance for a ticket to be able to see the race at the Mall (roughly, between the Capitol building and the Washington Monument) is one question; the irony of being in such a visual, even overwhelming, militaristic police-city during a celebration of political freedom is more definite.

The public could not access the race route, or even get close enough to see the cars passing. That the entire race course, rather than just the designated fan areas on or near the Mall, was blocked raises the obvious question of why even to have a race if people are blocked from watching it. To be sure, free general-admission tickets were issued by lottery in advance but this process did not allow people in the city on the day of the race to spontaneously see the race, and the fact that a lottery had to be resorted to means that the demand for tickets exceeded the supply, which in turn may have been artificially restricted by security proponents in the government. Around the route, even surrounding streets were blocked off even from foot traffic. Even some museums near the Mall required a Grand Prix ticket for entry. High temporary fences along the Mall between it and the museums kept even people going to the latter to even glimpse the race.

To be sure, blocking visuals of the viewing stands, where ticketed seats were not free, could be justified on security grounds because President Trump was present there, but that rationale does not justify blocking the entire route, especially given the legitimate countervailing public interest to attend a celebration of the Declaration of Independence. In other words, a strong public interest existed but was wholly denied.

The sheer mass of local police, including their cars with emergency lights on, and the militias from the member states, including formidable military trucks, was arguably visually so oppressive as to be a turn-off to freedom-loving Americans. In other words, even if access to the route but not the viewing stands were possible, the experience of so many uniformed people with guns could be enough for a preference to leave the city that day.

Moreover, seeing so much military and police could prompt people to wonder just how much freedom still existed in the United States. The visuals could perhaps be likened to how daily life in Berlin in Nazi Germany may have looked. The presence of the military may have been especially startling to Americans not used to how much Washington, D.C. had changed since the twentieth century.

On the governmental side, the penchant for security can take on a life of its own, such that proponents unknowingly lapse in the sort of healthy judgment that is capable of balancing security interests with others. Such balance goes by the wayside as a republic transitions itself into a police state, and the change can be so gradual that reversal is almost impossible. Like a frog in a pot of water that is gradually being heated, citizens of a republic may not notice even that a transition has been underway. To be sure, American tourists in Washington on August 23, 2026 may have been stunned by the fresh sight of so many military troops, trucks, police employees, and police cars so concentrated blocks from the route and even farther into the city itself.

History may record the transition from the Roman republic to the Roman Empire as sudden, but in the daily life of the Romans, the increased visuals of weaponized troops may have been gradual. Perhaps some educated tourists in Washington during the race may have thought of what Rome may have been like when gladiator contests were going on in the coliseum—celebrations of Roman political power accompanied by a formidable military presence in the vicinity, given the typical attendance of the emperor at the games. Americans could benefit from the insight that even if their empire is a “city on a hill,” as President Reagan referred to the U.S., it is not immune from the rise and fall of empires that has gone on throughout history. A domestic presence of military forces even in the midst of a lot of local police present may be an indication that a republic is in transition to something else, and this transition could be part of the more general decline of empires.

On Democratic Accountability in a Republic: The Pentagon Papers

The publication of portions of the Pentagon Papers despite President Nixon’s threats of treason highlighted the fact that four presidents successively lied to the American People on build-up of U.S. involvement in Indochina (most notably, Vietnam) and the Nixon administration lied on the prospects for victory in the Vietnam War—a war that had not even been declared by Congress. Clearly, democratic accountable extends to foreign policy at least in broad outline, such as in whether or not to continue an active engagement militarily in another region of the world. Even in U.S. presidents being able to get away with effectively declaring war even as one of their roles is that of commander-in-chief—a huge conflict of interest!—democratic accountability by the popular sovereign, the People—is important, even vital should the legislative and judicial branches fail as checks in the separation-of-powers feature of the U.S. Constitution.

The first article in the New York Times reported that the Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson administrations “built up the American political, military and psychological stakes in Indochina, often more deeply than they realized at the time, with large‐scale military equipment to the French in 1950; with acts of sabotage and terror warfare against North Vietnam beginning in 1954; with moves that encouraged and abetted the overthrow of President Ngo Dinh Diem of South Vietnam in 1963; with plans, pledges and threats of further action that sprang to life in the Tonkin Gulf clashes in August, 1964; with the careful preparation of public opinion for the years of open warfare that were to follow; and with the calculation in 1965, as the planes and troops were openly committed to sustained combat, that neither accommodation inside South Vietnam nor early negotiations with North Vietnam would achieve the desired result.”[1]

Meanwhile, the American electorate was being kept in the dark—lied to—in spite of the fact that the People in a republic are tasked with holding the elected representatives and their respective appointees accountable.

“The Pentagon study also ranges beyond such historical judgments. It suggests that the predominant American interest was at first containment of Communism and later the defense of the power, influence and prestige of the United States, in both stages irrespective of conditions in Vietnam.”[2] The U.S. Government’s defense of the escalation, however, was limited to the containment of Communism such that it would not take over the world as Marx had foretold and thus threaten even the U.S. itself. During the Johnson and Nixon administrations, American troops were being killed and taken prisoner increasingly for the prestige of the United States and irrespective of the intractable conditions on the ground in Vietnam. Crucially, these administrations kept the American people in the dark on these points, such that no electoral correction could be effected. Ironically, the administrations were claiming to protect democracy even as they were undermining it by using power to subvert democratic accountability by the popular sovereign (i.e., the electorate).

---

1. Neil Sheehan, “Vietnam Archive: Pentagon Study Traces 3 Decades of Growing U.S. Involvement,” The New York Times, June 13, 1971.

2. Ibid.

Obama and the War Powers Act: On Libya

In June 2011, a bipartisan group of members of U.S. House of Representatives objected to the refusal of the Obama administration to obtain Congressional approval in line with the War Powers Act of 1973 for the U.S. military’s continued involvement in Libya. On June 17, 2011, The New York Times ran a story which indicated that Barak Obama had gone against the views of the top lawyers at the Justice Department and the Pentagon in his decision not to seek Congressional approval.

“Jeh C. Johnson, the Pentagon general counsel, and Caroline D. Krass, the acting head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, had told the White House that they believed that the United States military’s activities in the NATO-led air war amounted to ‘hostilities.’ Under the War Powers Resolution, that would have required Mr. Obama to terminate or scale back the mission after May 20 [2011].” The president went instead with the view of the White House counsel, Robert Bauer, and the State Department legal adviser, Harold H. Koh , “who argued that the United States military’s activities fell short of ‘hostilities.’ Under that view, Mr. Obama needed no permission from Congress to continue the mission unchanged.”

According to the Times, “Presidents have the legal authority to override the legal conclusions of the Office of Legal Counsel and to act in a manner that is contrary to its advice, but it is extraordinarily rare for that to happen. Under normal circumstances, the office’s interpretation of the law is legally binding on the executive branch.”

The U.S. House speaker, John A. Boehner, said. “The White House says there are no hostilities taking place. Yet we’ve got drone attacks under way. We’re spending $10 million a day. We’re part of an effort to drop bombs on Qaddafi’s compounds. It just doesn’t pass the straight-face test, in my view, that we’re not in the midst of hostilities.”

It is indeed difficult to imagine that dropping bombs does not constitute or contribute toward hostilities. To parse the War Powers Act as not applying to dropping bombs does not give one much faith that the president has much common sense (or aptitude as a constitutional lawyer). Also raising concern is the possibility that Barak Obama had succumbed to the lust for power. Furthermore, ethically speaking, it is troubling that he would be fine with the conflict of interest wherein the commander-in-chief has the power to decide whether the U.S. military and those of the states (i.e., the militias) will be drawn into a new action. The commander-in-chief has a power-interest in making the policy decision in a direction favoring military activity. The War Powers Act was designed to prevent this conflict of interest. “Hostilities” is simply one way of referring to the military doing what it is designed to do, whether as troops on the ground, ships, or planes (or drones). To split hairs like a micro-managing lawyer not only enables the conflict of interest, it also falls short of the big-picture presiding role of a U.S. president. In other words, Obama's parsing makes him look small and self-serving.

Much more statesmanlike would have been for the president to have addressed Congress in a joint session at the beginning of the involvement of the U.S. military in Libya and asked for a resolution. In other words, the War Powers Act should never have been allowed to become an issue. In standing for the Union, the president could have presided over the question by asking Congress for its yea or nay, proffering his view as a secondary consideration for the Congress. To be sure, acting on a human rights basis to stop a brutal dictator is a worthy cause. I can emphasize with the president for wanting to carry through this agenda. Even so, he should not have allowed what he wanted to eclipse his role in presiding and Congress’ role in forestalling his conflict of interest and representing the people.

I suspect that the typical American on the street read the story and concluded that Barak Obama had succumbed to the elixir of power—not an uncommon occurrence in official Washington. To get a president who is immune from this drug of choice, the Electoral College would have had to draft a duty-bound citizen into serving in the office for a term rather than select among the candidates chafing at the bit to get it. There is something unseemly about someone tooting his or her own horn in order to gain the office, particularly if a lot has to be done to get it. We ought not to be surprised, therefore, when such a candidate gets attached to the power while in office.

Source:

Charlie Savage, “2 Top Lawyers Lost to Obama in Libya War Policy Debate,” The New York Times, June 17, 2011.

Corporate Analogies: Money-Making as War-Games as a Sign of Boredom

What to do when analogies go over the top. As an aspiring writer, I was chastised by more than one writing tutor for mixing analogies. The device can add color to otherwise drab prose to be sure, but too many colors at once can be daunting to even a captivated reader. Consider, for example, the following passage from Larry McDonald about the management at Lehman Brothers:

“In a way, Lehman was run by a junta of platoon officers . . . I think of them as battle-hardened, iron-souled regulars”[1] (p. 89). Richard Fuld, Lehman Brothers’ former CEO, was “our spiritual leader and battlefield commander . . . surrounded by a close coterie of cronies, with almost no contact with anyone else. . . . I suppose that was fine so long as the place was chugging along without civil war or mutiny breaking out, and continuing to coin money, which is after all the prime objective of the merchant bank.”[2] Fuld “worked within a tight palace guard, protected from the lower ranks, communicating only through his handpicked lieutenants.”[3] 

The full essay has been incorporated into On the Arrogance of False Entitlement: A Nietzschean Critique of Business Ethics and Management, which is available in print and as an ebook at Amazon. 

1. Lawrence McDonald, A Colossal Failure of Common Sense: The Inside Story of the Colapse of Lehman Brothers (2010), p. 89.

2. Ibid., p. 90.

3. Ibid.