> I'm not sure that the presumption of innocence has eroded away in the popular consciousness
I'm certain the social media and sensationalist broadcast media have over time nudged people closer to mob justice. Further to that, some of the wins of civil libertarians against draconian law enforcement has been eroded away by giving law enforcement sweeping powers via circumventions on due process such as the Patriot Act and that which is detailed in the OP
> rather than taking their Internet-hard-man bloviation at face value?
I’ve been living in the world for long enough to see it change.
It doesn’t matter what you or I (or an impartial jury) think if law enforcement can just ignore due process. If people cared enough about civil liberties, legislation like the Patriot Act would have at least been repealed instead of extended, things like fraudulent civil forfeiture and the prison industrial complex would have been dealt with. Instead it has become accepted by everyday people that it’s okay to concede those liberties to reduce the burden of evidence for law enforcement in the name of whatever bogeyman the rabble rousers can invoke (e.g., war on drugs, terrorism, illegal immigration, being ‘tough on crime’). The OP article, along with a growing movement of decriminalization represents perhaps a turning of the tide in repealing this legislation, but even if that is true, you’ve got to wonder how we got here in the first place.
> It doesn’t matter what you or I (or an impartial jury) think if law enforcement can just ignore due process.
Sure. Agreed.
> If people cared enough about civil liberties, legislation like the Patriot Act would have at least been repealed instead of extended [and] things like fraudulent civil forfeiture.. would have been dealt with.
Nah. The average person has effectively zero input into what happens at the Federal level. It's not that they don't care. It's that they can't do shit about it.
> The average person has effectively zero input into what happens at the Federal level.
A lot of people cared about the Mexican border the last election, and it made a real impact on votes. For better or worse, Trump now has a mandate on border and immigration policy that he'll most likely put to use. That's not to say that election policy platforms are always followed through with (e.g., Obama doubled down on Iraq instead of ending the war, disillusioning many of his voters), but they often are. If people cared more about civil liberties as they did border immigration, a political party would tap into that sentiment, but I'm not seeing that.
> ...have over time nudged people closer to mob justice.
I dunno, man. Hang out with better people? Or maybe have a conversation with the ones you do hang out with to discover their actual opinions, rather than taking their Internet-hard-man bloviation at face value?
> ...by giving law enforcement sweeping powers...
What Congresscritters gives the cops has very little to do with what us little people think is important.