The inherent structure of board governed non-profits is unstable and impractical. I would never work for one again.

I have been an ACLU member for decades. I was disgusted with the national organization after hearing the Wendy Kaminer interview, and then reading past NY Times archive articles. But I assumed the local branch was ok. Now I know better.

I am sure there is truth to both sides, but I just don’t get it.

The human talent for self deception often expresses itself in a confusion between self interest and benefit to a higher purpose; e.g., Nixon’s inability to distinguish between his political success and national interest. Individuals, organizations, and nations all tend down a path from idealism to self-justification to corruption. I recommend Michela Wrong’s excellent and heart-breaking book “In the Footsteps of Mr. Kurtz” for insight into this process in post-colonial Africa.

We all need to be vigilant in our own lives and in the organizations (and nations) that we identify with. Once we know we are right (and that the NRA/ACLU is right/true/good), our natural self deception tends to blind us to the possibility that we have gone astray from our original intentions.

The ACLU has always been timid, see its blacklisting of communists during the late forties and fifties,but it did serve some good functions. Now, the current board and romero have taken it down the path of support for government survelience, support for the use of what are basically loyalty oaths as a precondition for receiving grants and funds, extreme secrecy and dishonesty.

Your opposition speaker simply attacked kaminer as being overly pro-civil liberties and made general claims that the ACLU is wonderful and does wonderful work. But he did NOT respond to any of the specific and factual anecdotes that kaminer described in support of her claims.

By the way, kaminer certainly was vocal during the bush administration. It was the ACLU that chickened out and took a dive in those years.

I was disappointed with the show on the ACLU. That organization has a solid history of good works. The ACLU is needed now more than ever, as we see our civil liberties eroded and confused by recent political forces. I thought the argument was really too small a matter to spend an hour on, when so much needs to be looked at and discussed regarding the law and its execution at high levels of government and in foreign policy. When we use torture as official policy with our foreign enemies, we move closer to accepting it for domestic suspects. It’s as if we know better, but we have no power to stop this insidious fear-based decline. I am seriously more fearful of my own government than of a terrorist attack. Just contemplate the statistical probability of being injured by a terrorist vs. a thousand more common things and you realize that we’re paying a huge price for a negligible safeguard. What is more serious from the point of a citizen? ACLU in-house politics or the compromise of our Constitutional protections?

Please stop trying to be the replacement for the Connection and return to the seriousness of your origins – 9/11. We can get fun subjects a lot of other places, but where else can we get the in-depth news analysis that you provide for WBUR listeners. I realize Jack Beatty can be a little dramatic and zealous in speaking for progressive ideals, but some times I think he’s the only one on the show that realizes how seriously we’ve fallen as a polity

Thank you

The ACLU has been, is today, and will continue to be extremely important in the battle of protecting our civil liberties as our founding fathers wrote them out.

I would like to recommend the ACLU start doing one thing I don’t see – good marketing!

The ACLU has failed in this hands down.

I recently retired from the AF. I spent over 28 years as an officer and as an ACLU member. I felt like the token liberal amid a conservative hoard. When the ACLU came up the majority trashed it and all it did. I asked them about what they thought the ACLU did – help the liberal, help the criminal, help the trash of the earth, put REAL AMERICANS in the back seat, etc. I mentioned that the ACLU helped protect Christians’ rights and other conservatives and their desires and all loudly stated that was NUTS – No Way. I then asked them if they every looked into it and they all stated that the had not! I recommended that they do and see for themselves if it was true or not.

This should not be so. When I search the history of cases many are for the ones who bash the ACLU the most, but that never gets out to them – why?

Now on your show I hear they helped Rush L…. and some other conservative crusader. Why do I and many more of us hear it this way? Where is the marketing of the true(?) story – why keep it so hidden? Word of mouth works but only as a part, not the whole!

And ACLU, please, continue doing your critical job for this great nation! Thanks.

Plus, thanks Mr Ashbrook for your great show!

Steve King, Hampton Roads of VA

Ms. Kaminer came off almost like a jilted lover — lashing out at Romero with any stray thought that crossed her mind, and attributing impropriety and shadowy motives to him without a shred of support for her claims.

It’s unfortunate that On Point chose to dignify Ms. Kaminer with such a major platform.

The serious charge, though, is that the organization has been so totally compromised that the ACLU is no longer living up to its core mission. Although she raises important charges, I’m not sure that she is convincing here.

Often times local leadership is just a sad example of the “Peter Principal,” of loyal underlings rising to authority a step or two beyond their ability.

But absent the ACLU what organization do we have that will challenge tis humungous government that drains our vitality and reduces our liberties. Without the ACLU we are on a defenseless plain facing great and almighty power that can grind us to nothing.

The ACLU is not perfect but for many it is the only game in town.

Did the ACLU explain why they declined having a representative join the interview? Wouldn’t that have been supportive of their goals of transparency, clarity and truth?

Looks like the backroom operator and the person who was pulling Anthony D. Romero’s strings was actually ACLU President Nadine Strossen. Additionally there were serious disagreements between Strossen and Romero.

Moreoever, Romero was just pion, running day-to-day operations and were being told what to do. Strossen has stuffed the top 4-5 positions in ACLU with her own loyalists.

Recently, the state affiliate has taken over our bank accounts, demoted our board of directors to a “board of advisors,” and demanded pre-approval of any action we might take, no matter how trivial. Their demand for total control hinders our ability to respond quickly and appropriately at a local level.

At this point, the state organization seems far more concerned with central authority, organizational control, and bureaucratic structure than with civil liberties. We understand that many state organizations have the same complaints about the national organization that we have about the state level.

The right wing has long understood the importance and effectiveness of grass-roots activism. The ACLU had better learn that top-down authoritarianism will undercut their mission–or they will become a really well-organized dinosaur.

This institution used to represent all the principles and ideals that we stand for as America. Our principles was the most important reason why everybody on this planed respected us and wanted to be an American.

Thanks to Wendy, if you look at the core and the starting point of the corruption in ACLU was Ford Foundation and the pressure and bribes coming from defenders of Israel.

Is it possible that this woman called Lilya was right. We already lost our congress to AIPAC and we are losing our Civil Liberties, just because some of us have supported or defended the Civil Liberties of Palestinians.

What an irony, what a drama!

To bad like someone noted she couldnt speak out during the bush years.

I still think the aclu is still a benefit to us and for fighting for freedom and rights even if there is issues within its organaziation. Far greater than the NRA.

Police error all the time its only when a orgaination like (ACLU) or camara and recordings do police have to admit they broke the law themselves. otherwise they just lie and deny any wrong doing the majority of the time. u can youtube or google and find many cases of abuse by law enforcement.

The biggest problem we face today is global climate disruption. But mass immigration is going to make it extremely difficult to reduce our emissions by the goal of 80% by 2050, because our population is projected to grow nearly 50%, from 305 million to 438 million by then, 82% of that growth due to mass immigration according to the Pew Research Center. Since the average immigrant to the US increases greenhoiuse gas emissions four-fold upon coming to the US, this is a lose-lose for the US and the planet.