And they said I was paranoid...

For the last four years, until January 20, I frequently expressed concern about the dictatorial ambitions of George W. Bush. Many people thought me paranoid, or crazy. After all, no American president would so brazenly flout the very Constitution he'd pledged to uphold, would he?

Well, yes, he would have. Given another terrorist attack, or perhaps even another natural disaster on a par with Hurricane Katrina, and he might have:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. military could have kicked in doors to raid a suspected terrorist cell in the United States without a warrant under a Bush-era legal memo the Justice Department made public on Monday.

The memo, from October 23, 2001, also said constitutional free-speech protections and a prohibition on unreasonable search and seizure could take a back seat to military needs in fighting terrorism inside the country.

It was one of nine previously undisclosed memos and legal opinions which shed light on former U.S. President George W. Bush's legal guidance as he launched a war against terrorism after the September 11 attacks.

They depict an administration apparently determined to expand the president's power after the shock of September 11, and add fuel to critics' charges that fundamental constitutional protections were threatened in the process.

"The current campaign against terrorism may require even broader exercises of federal power domestically," Justice Department officials John Yoo and Robert Delahunty wrote White House counsel Alberto Gonzales in the October 23 memo.

"We do not think that a military commander carrying out a raid on a terrorist cell would be required to demonstrate probable cause or to obtain a (search) warrant," they said.

The U.S. Supreme Court has held that the Constitution's Fourth Amendment ordinarily requires a probable cause and a warrant to execute a search. However, the memo said those requirements "are unsuited to the demands of wartime."

Furthermore, it said, "First Amendment speech and press rights may also be subordinated to the overriding need to wage war successfully."

When we think of all the "You're with us or you're with the terrorists" rhetoric, and the way antiwar nuns were put on the no-fly list, and Quaker peace groups were infiltrated and put under surveillance, and then you read this, it's hard not to become aware of just how close we came to the dictatorship that Bush had so often expressed he'd like to head.