Of all the wreckage the Bush-Cheney administration left behind, nothing is more toxic than its wanton exploitation of popular anxiety after 9/11 to undermine basic civil liberties, and particularly the right to privacy.
These days, the whole country seems to be awash in second thoughts about everything from torture to warrantless eavesdropping. But back then, only a handful of stubbornly courageous people stood up when it was most perilous to resist and opposed the government's fear-greased slide toward authoritarianism. Among the most unlikely and the most significant were the scientists at La Canada Flintridge's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, who sued the government to block its attempt to coerce them into agreeing to unconscionable intrusions into their private lives as the price of keeping their jobs.
That institution, by the way, is one of this open society's altruistic glories. The laboratory, operated on behalf of the government by Caltech, is the epicenter of man's exploration of space. This is where Neil Armstrong's and Buzz Aldrin's famous promise is renewed week in and week out: "We came in peace for all mankind."
Or at least we did until a little more than a year ago, when the security obsessed Bush-Cheney administration demanded that the laboratory's scientists and staff consent to a draconian inquisition into the most intimate details of their personal lives if they wanted to keep their jobs. Absent such agreement, the scientists and support staff would be denied the identification badges required to continue their work.
As The Times noted in January of last year, the government demanded that the scientists fill out questionnaires on their personal lives and waive the privacy of their financial, medical and psychiatric records. The government also wanted permission to gather information about them by interviewing third parties. At one point, JPL's internal website posted an "issue characterization chart" -- since taken down -- that indicated the snoops would be looking for a "pattern of irresponsibility as reflected in credit history ... sodomy ... incest ... abusive language ... unlawful assembly." It also said homosexuality could be a security issue under some circumstances.
