Post by Adam on Oct 10, 2008 11:09:39 GMT -5
Dave comment: I suspect the following information could lead one to connect the dots on how the bad pork filled bail out bill was passed. Brute force?
Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA)
In this YouTube clip, Rep. Brad Sherman (D-CA) says some congresspeople were told in private briefings that if they did not pass the bailout bill, circumstances would soon force the federal government to "impose martial law."
www.boingboing.net/2008/10/06/us-congresspeople-to.html
Next link:
blog.beliefnet.com/crunchycon/2008/10/civil-unrest-and-martial-law-i.html
The Defense Authorization Act of 2006, passed on Sept. 30, empowers President George W. Bush to impose martial law in the event of a terrorist "incident," if he or other federal officials perceive a shortfall of "public order," or even in response to antiwar protests that get unruly as a result of government provocations.
The media and most of Capitol Hill ignored or cheered on this grant of nearly boundless power. But now that the president's arsenal of authority is swollen and consecrated, a few voices of complaint are being heard. Even the New York Times recently condemned the new law for "making martial law easier."
It only took a few paragraphs in a $500 billion, 591-page bill to raze one of the most important limits on federal power. Congress passed the Insurrection Act in 1807 to severely restrict the president's ability to deploy the military within the United States. The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 tightened these restrictions, imposing a two-year prison sentence on anyone who used the military within the U.S. without the express permission of Congress. But there is a loophole: Posse Comitatus is waived if the president invokes the Insurrection Act.
Section 1076 of the John Warner National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007 changed the name of the key provision in the statute book from "Insurrection Act" to "Enforcement of the Laws to Restore Public Order Act." The Insurrection Act of 1807 stated that the president could deploy troops within the United States only "to suppress, in a State, any insurrection, domestic violence, unlawful combination, or conspiracy." The new law expands the list to include "natural disaster, epidemic, or other serious public health emergency, terrorist attack or incident, or other condition"--and such "condition" is not defined or limited.
How about a condition brought about by, say, an economic collapse and what follows? IJS.
The important point here is not that a single brigade is going to be in the position of enforcing emergency military rule, a physical impossibility. The important point is that a line has been crossed in the law. The redeployment of this BCT is an outward sign of a legal transformation that happened while few of us were paying attention. As someone said to me this morning, "The scary thing is not so much that they've done it, but that they felt the need to do it at all."
