By

There are people with more than half a brain. These people know that giving the U.S. military the power to detain and hold U.S. citizens indefinitely and without trial is a flagrant assault on the Constitution and, more specifically, the Bill of Rights.

Then there's Congress. Specifically, there are two U.S. senators from our humble state who, in voting to pass the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act - which grants the U.S. government the aforementioned invasive powers - sided with authoritarianism in an undeclared war on the abstraction of "terrorism."

Sen. Mark Udall of Colorado had introduced an amendment to remove the provision, which means that the provision and the overall spending authorization didn't have to go hand in hand. When this amendment came to a vote, Sen. Herb Kohl and 15 other Democrats voted specifically to keep the detainee rules in the act.

Only two Republicans voted against the detainee provision, including Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky. The other Republican wasn't Sen. Ron Johnson.

When the full National Defense Authorization Act - detainee provision and all - came to a vote on Dec. 1, 93 senators voted aye. Both Wisconsin senators were among them. Senators both on the far left (Bernie Sanders of Vermont) and right (Paul) voted nay.

As a general rule of well-footed cynicism, one expects to be two-timed by one's representatives in government. That's the unpleasant history of politics. But was I alone in hoping that Johnson, the tea party businessman from Oshkosh, would be more like the libertarian-leaning Rand Paul and less like John McCain? When I saw they were both freshman senators, I crossed my fingers in the hope Paul and Johnson would eat lunch together and hold hands during recess.

Johnson supporters will be quick to defend his other votes. But this was the big one. This was no offhand vote on Senate procedures or on obscure farming regulations. Ultimately, it was a vote for the expansion of government power at the direct expense of the same liberties that government power is supposed to protect. America is in a struggle against the atrophy of freedom; we need ideological muscle now more than ever.

The Republican Party, too, has long since veered from its rightful path; the current primary elections are essentially a contest to see which big-government conservative will take on the big-government liberal in November. Republicans named "Paul" are dismissed as fringe.

Yet their principles were once at the core of the Republican message. Consider Ronald Reagan's 1964 speech called "A Time For Choosing." He said:

"You and I are told we must choose between a left or right, but I suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There is only an up or down. Up to man's age-old dream - the maximum of individual freedom consistent with order - or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. Regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would sacrifice freedom for security have embarked on this downward path.

Kohl we've known for a while, and we've known for a while that he's not great. The real tragedy is that Johnson already has embarked on that same downward course.

Dan Kenitz of Milwaukee is a freelance writer. Email comments@dankenitz.com