-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: May 1, 2007 7:45:29 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Fwd: Blueprint for Dictatorship: Recent legislation sets
us up for tyranny
Senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Kit Bond (R-Mo.) are sponsoring
legislation that would repeal these provisions, but, as Sen. John
Warner
pointed out the other day, when the Insurrection Act was revised to
give
the president extraordinary powers, no one raised any objection. Now,
suddenly, the senators, including Warner, see some reason to regret
their hasty actions -- do they know something we don't?
I fear, however, that it may be too late. Bush will surely veto the
Leahy-Bond measure -- and, if necessary, declare America's governors,
who all oppose this brazen usurpation, an "unlawful combination,"
as the
Insurrection Act puts it. Then, he will be empowered to "disperse"
them, and the Senate, at will.
See what's free at AOL.com.
From: "Jim S." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: April 30, 2007 10:31:17 PM PDT
To: undisclosed-recipients:;
Subject: Blueprint for Dictatorship: Recent legislation sets us up
for tyranny
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=10895
*Blueprint for Dictatorship: Recent legislation sets us up for
tyranny* by Justin Raimondo
April 30, 2007
America is headed for a military dictatorship -- and recent
legislation makes this all but inevitable. Last September,
Congress passed the Defense Authorization Act, which empowered the
president to declare martial law with very little provocation,
namely in the aftermath of a "terrorist attack or incident."
Having determined that "the execution of the laws" is hampered by
the "incident," the president can unilaterally impose martial law
-- without the consent of Congress, which need only be informed of
the event "as soon as practicable." The only condition attached
instructs the president to report to Congress after 14 days, and
every 14 days thereafter. [[Actually, this was implicit in the
(alleged) 'Patriot' Act 1 and even Clinton's F.E.M.A.-restructuring
E.O.!!]]
This use of the military to enforce domestic order is a new
development in American history, one that augurs a turning point
not only in terms of law, but also in our evolving political
culture. Such a measure would once have provoked an outcry -- on
both sides of the aisle. When the measure passed, there was hardly
a ripple of protest: the Senate approved it unanimously, and there
were only thirty-something dissenting votes in the House. Added to
the Military Commissions Act [.pdf], this new brick in the wall of
domestic repression creates the structure of a new imperial system
on the ruins of the old constitutional order. George W. Bush and
his hard-core neoconservative henchmen may have lost the war in
Iraq, but they have won a virtually uncontested victory at home:
the conquest of the old republic by an emerging imperial order.
This recalls the opening of Garet Garrett's 1952 philippic, "Rise
of Empire," wherein he diagnosed the essential indeterminacy of the
transition:
"We have crossed the boundary that lies between Republic and
Empire. If you ask when, the answer is that you cannot make a
single stroke between day and night; the precise moment does not
matter. There is no painted sign to say: 'You are now entering
Imperium.'"
The usually prescient Garrett got it somewhat wrong here: The
single stroke between day and night can be fixed precisely in time,
at 8:45 a.m. EDT on Sept. 11, 2001, and the Military Commissions
Act and the disturbing changes in the U.S. Code outlined above are
the closest to painted signs we are likely to get. Waiting in the
wings, an infamous cabal took advantage of the 9/11 terrorist
attacks, moving with preternatural speed to consolidate a
dictatorship of fear. With the passage of more recent legislation,
they are now moving to consolidate their gains. Sinisterly, the
new legislation also alters the language of Title 10, Chapter 15,
Section 333 of the U.S. Code (the so-called Insurrection Act) in an
ominous manner:
"Whenever the president considers it necessary to use the militia
or the armed forces under this chapter, he shall, by proclamation,
immediately order the insurgents or those obstructing the
enforcement of the laws to disperse and retire peaceably to their
abodes within a limited time."
Why insert the bolded phrase -- unless your objective is to widen
the category of miscreants to include those exercising their First
Amendment rights? No one expects an insurgency to be launched in
this day and age in America, yet peaceably assembling to protest
government policies can easily be interpreted to include
"obstructionists" who might be "dispersed." As José Padilla
discovered, any American can be kidnapped and held without trial --
or even formal charges -- on the orders of the president, and the
granting of unprecedented power to rule by decree builds on this
neo-royalist theory. The Bushian doctrine of the "unitary
executive," which gives the occupant of the White House monarchical
power in wartime, has now been approved by the Democrats, who can't
wait to wield it themselves. Of course, they would exercise such
unholy power only in a good way -- say, if a state refused to
cooperate in enforcing or implementing federal legislation
instituting a draft, or, more likely, federalizing a state National
Guard unit to be shipped to the Middle East.
Oh, you mean that's not so good? Just wait until the Democrats get
their hands on all that power: then you'll see the real collapse of
the movement to preserve civil liberties in America. Remember, it
was Hillary Clinton who said of the Internet: "We are all going to
have to rethink how we deal with this, because there are always
competing values. There's no free decision that I'm aware of
anywhere in life, and certainly with technology that's the case."
Yes, the technology is very "exciting," she averred, yet "there are
a number of serious issues without any kind of editing function or
gatekeeping function. What does it mean to have the right to
defend your reputation, or to respond to what someone says?"
The First Amendment is not big with Hillary and never has been.
She's power-mad, and every once in a while the frigid mask gives
way to the face of a real authoritarian, albeit a different one
than that of the red-state fascists, as Lew Rockwell describes the
anti-libertarian Right. Blue-state fascists trample on our civil
liberties "for the children," but the effect is the same:
bipartisan support for the abolition of our old republic and the
inauguration of a new era in American history: the Age of Empire.
With the neoconized "conservative" movement transformed into a
force fully committed to outright authoritarianism, and the
"liberals" defending the depredations of the Democrats in power,
who will be left to defend what's left of the Constitution? Just
Ron Paul and Alexander Cockburn. The rest will go with the herd
instinct of sheep threatening to stampede at the apparent intrusion
of a wolf in their pasture.
Under the terms of this legislation, who defines a terrorist
"incident"? The president. Who defines an "unlawful combination"?
The president. Who determines that a "conspiracy" is in progress,
one that threatens national security and domestic order? The
president of these United States -- which are to be united, in our
darkest future, by a super-president who can outlaw the opposition
with the stroke of a pen and is more a military leader than the
chief executive of an ostensible republic.
Stop, for a moment, and consider where we are in the spring of 2007.
On the home front, the representatives of the people have conceded
the last of their waning powers to the executive branch and paved
the way for the restoration of royalism in America. Overseas,
American troops are fighting a war of conquest -- there is no other
way to describe it -- in an effort to prop up a rapidly failing
puppet government in the Middle East. Meanwhile, U.S. forces are
gathering in the Persian Gulf for what looks to be a strike against
Iran.
The unpopularity of our foreign policy is increasingly a cause for
concern in the Imperial City, where both parties have colluded --
with surprisingly little dissent -- in ensuring a permanent U.S.
military presence in the Middle East. It is merely a question of
the size of our footprint that divides the two major parties on
this all-important question. The Democrats want to "redeploy" --
to Qatar and other neighboring countries. The Republicans won't
give up an inch of conquered Iraqi territory and instead want to
extend the battle into Iran, which is already the target of a not-
so-covert campaign aiming at "regime change." (The Iran Freedom
Support Act, authorizing millions in aid to "democratic" groups,
was supported by the leadership of both parties in Congress.)
Rising antiwar sentiment worries William F. Buckley Jr., who opines
that "There are grounds for wondering whether the Republican Party
will survive this dilemma." Given the authoritarian proclivities
of the Bush administration and the neoconized G.O.P., there are
grounds for wondering whether the republic will survive. We are
just a terrorist "incident," either real or imagined, away from a
declaration of martial law and all its attendant consequences.
Buckley grimly notes the polls are "savagely decisive" on the war
question, and he asks: "Beyond affirming executive supremacy in
matters of war, what is George Bush going to do?" The answer may
be contained in Title 10, Chapter 15, Section 333.
Senators Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Kit Bond (R-Mo.) are sponsoring
legislation that would repeal the changes, but, as Sen. John Warner
pointed out the other day, when the Insurrection Act was revised to
give the president extraordinary powers, no one raised any
objection. Now, suddenly, the senators, including Warner, see some
reason to regret their hasty actions -- do they know something we
don't?
I fear, however, that it may be too late. Bush will surely veto
the Leahy-Bond measure -- and, if necessary, declare America's
governors, who all oppose this brazen usurpation, an "unlawful
combination," as the Insurrection Act puts it. Then, he will be
empowered to "disperse" them, and the Senate, at will.
I'm back to Garet Garrett, who never fails to come up with some apt
aphoristic prognostication, this one being from his classic, "The
Revolution Was":
"There are those who still think they are holding the pass
against a revolution that may be coming up the road. But they are
gazing in the wrong direction. The revolution is behind them. It
went by in the Night of Depression, singing songs to freedom."
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