Limited government is good government. The ACLU’s efforts to limit government power, power that often denies rights of oversight, have been useful for America.

At the ACLU’s website, there’s a program entitled, “Actions for Restoring America,” listing steps a new federal administration can take on its first day, within 100 days, and beyond.

Here are their sound suggestions for the first day:

STOP TORTURE, CLOSE GUANTANAMO, END EXTRAORDINARY RENDITIONS

The next president will have a historic opportunity — on day one — to take very important steps to restore the rule of law in the interrogation and detention of detainees held at Guantanamo Bay, Iraq, Afghanistan, and in secret prisons around the globe. Every action taken pursuant to an executive order of President Bush can be reversed by executive order of the next president.

Therefore, on the first day in office, the next president should issue an executive order directing all agencies to modify their policies and practices immediately to:

Cease and prohibit the use of torture and abuse, without exception, and direct the Attorney General immediately after his or her confirmation to appoint an outside special counsel to investigate and, if warranted, prosecute any violations of federal criminal laws prohibiting torture and abuse;

Close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay and either charge and try detainees under criminal law in federal criminal courts or before military courts-martial or transfer them to countries where they will not be tortured or detained without charge;

Cease and prohibit the practice of extraordinary rendition, which is the transfer of persons, outside of the judicial process, to other countries, including countries that torture or abuse prisoners.

STOP TORTURE AND ABUSE

The next president should issue an executive order, on the first day in office, that orders all agencies to take immediate steps to ensure that torture and abuse is prohibited by the federal government, that no agency may use any practice not authorized by the Army Field Manual on Intelligence Interrogations, that no president or any other person may order or authorize torture or abuse, that all violations of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions are prohibited, that all persons being held overseas must be registered with the International Committee of the Red Cross in conformity with Defense Department practices, and that all intelligence interrogations must be video recorded.

In addition, the president should order all agencies to comply with requests from Members of Congress for unredacted copies of documents related to the development and implementation of U.S. interrogation policies. The president should also ask the U. S. Attorney General to appoint an outside special counsel to investigate and, if warranted, prosecute any violations of federal criminal laws prohibiting torture and abuse – focusing not just on crimes committed in the field, but also on crimes committed by civilians, of any position, in authorizing or ordering torture or abuse. Finally, the president should order the immediate closure of all secret prisons, and prohibit the CIA and its contractors from detaining anyone.

CLOSE GUANTANAMO AND RESTORE THE RULE OF LAW FOR DETAINEES

On the first day in office, the president should order the shutdown of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility and restoration of the rule of law for the detainees now held there. Specifically, the president should order the prompt shutdown of the detention facility, the transfer of any prisoners charged with a crime to a facility within the continental United States for trial in a federal criminal court or before a military court-martial, and the transfer of all uncharged detainees to countries where they will not be abused or imprisoned without charge.

END AND PROHIBIT THE PRACTICE OF EXTRAORDINARY RENDITION

The president should order all agencies, on the first day in office, to end and prohibit any rendition or transfer of any person to another country without judicial process. The president should prohibit the rendition or transfer of any person to another country where there is a reasonable possibility the person would be subject to torture or abuse or detained without charge. Any person subject to any transfer shall have a due process right to challenge any transfer before an independent adjudicator, with a right to a judicial appeal.

In each instance, the executive order should by its terms rescind any conflicting previous order – none of which have been made public and remain secret to this day.

Good recommendations, all.

Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr had this to say about Obama’s election victory:

It just illustrates the tremendous demographic changes, generational changes in this country. This really is a very different country, in some ways much better country, than it was several years ago.

Grandstanding septuagenarian crackpot independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader had a different prespective on Obama’s victory:

His choice, basically, is whether he’s going to be Uncle Sam for the people of this country, or Uncle Tom for the giant corporations.

Nader’s run for president quite a few times, and, it’s now evident, at least once too often. I am confident in declaring that one-hundred percent of the voters who supported Nader were Grade-A jackasses.

You may not have heard of Marshall Fritz, who passed away in California this week after a battle with pancreatic cancer, aged 65. Fritz was no ordinary Californian, or American — he was a proud member of the libertarian movement, having fought for its principles for over three decades decades since coming up from liberalism.

Fritz was author of the World’s Smallest Political Quiz, a measurement of political affiliation well-known, if not its author. (I posted the on the Quiz in August.)

Fritz was far more — he ran for Congress, fought to preserve a space for private education in a nation with a vast public-school lobby, was a scholar of comparative theology, traveler, and devoted parent.

A fine tribute to Fritz’s school-reform efforts may be found at “Marshall Fritz, R.I.P.:
Remembering one of the most devoted and principled school reformers of all time.”

He will be greatly missed. Others will carry on more easily having felt his encouraging influence.

Live from Barr Campaign Election Headquarters on Tuesday Evening — 11/4/08. It’s not the posh Phoenix Biltmore where the McCain campaign’s set up, nor the half of Chicago that the Obama campaign rented for its celebration, but it’s a place of clear principle.

Update — 8:06 PM — Characteristic of this year for the LP, the connection is loading only intermittently. One might say that’s a sign of popularity, and an underestimation of capacity needed. Alternatively, perhaps somewhere in transmission difficulty is the difference between the $1.2 million raised and the $20 million proudly expected this spring.

No matter — at least one of the major campaigns will find that millions more were still insufficient.

Update — 8:14 PM — Back up — can’t keep a good Party, and a good party, down!