The Fight of Our Lives
The battle to beat back the NSA – and restore our old republic
The idea that this country is on a fast track to fascism was never taken very seriously by Americans, and for a very good reason: we have a Constitution that, whatever problems we’ve had living up to it, has generally been a bulwark against the imposition of anything resembling authoritarianism in these United States. Although at certain points in our history we’ve come awfully close to losing it, the constitutional order seemed to survive the many attempts to subvert and even overthrow it since the Founders put it in place as the centerpiece of our system. That is, until the dawn of September 11, 2001….
The blizzard of draconian legislation enacted in the wake of that fateful day – the PATRIOT Act and accompanying legislation – effectively destroyed the legal basis of the Fourth Amendment. Recognizing this, the Bush administration moved on a number of fronts to create the foundations of a comprehensive system of surveillance – not just of our enemies, but of all of us, here in the US. We didn’t know the details – although some, like the ill-fated "Total Information Awareness" project, leaked out – but no one in Congress at the time looked into the matter too strenuously. Better left unsaid what everyone in Washington assumed to be fact: that the US government is spying on its own people.
Back in those days, a few commentators (and, of course, Ron Paul) saw what was coming – what had, indeed, already come – but they were speaking in a vacuum. In 2005, in a column discussing the question of how fascism might come to America, I wrote:
"From the moment the twin towers were hit, the fascist seed began to germinate, to take root and grow. As the first shots of what the neocons call ‘World War IV’ rang out, piercing the post-Cold War calm like a shriek straight out of Hell, the political and cultural climate underwent a huge shift: the country became, for the first time in the modern era, a hothouse conducive to the growth of a genuinely totalitarian tendency in American politics….
"The Republican Party’s response to 9/11 was to push through the most repressive series of laws since the Alien and Sedition Acts, starting with the ‘PATRIOT Act’ and its successors – making it possible for American citizens to be held without charges, without public evidence, without trial, and giving the federal government unprecedented powers to conduct surveillance of its own citizens. Secondly, Republicans began to typify all opposition to their warmaking and anti-civil liberties agenda as practically tantamount to treason. Congress, thoroughly intimidated, was silent: they supinely voted to give the president a blank check, and he is still filling in the amount…"
We didn’t know, at the time, what the exact amount was: today we are learning, to our growing horror, what we paid for ignoring Jefferson’s admonition about eternal vigilance being the price of liberty. We have learned that, ever since the Bush era – and continuing, with renewed vigor, into the Age of Obama – our government has imposed a wide-ranging dragnet on the information highway. They’ve been collecting our meta-data, reading our emails, and tracking our location, all in the name of a never-ending "war on terrorism." The protections previously afforded by the Constitution and the long tradition of American jurisprudence were abolished – behind our backs. It was all done in the dark, with even the court proceedings "legalizing" this anti-constitutional coup kept secret – not for any valid "security" reason, but plainly because such brazen chicanery could never stand the light of day.
Snowden’s gift to the American people was to unveil this covert palace revolution. Not that such a signal event had gone entirely unnoticed. Bob Woodward, writing in Plan of Attack (2004), reported:
"[Colin] Powell felt Cheney and his allies – his chief aide, I. Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz and Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Douglas J. Feith and what Powell called Feith’s ‘Gestapo’ office – had established what amounted to a separate government."
Seymour Hersh put it more colorfully: in his view the War Party "overthrew the American government. Took it over. It’s not only that the neocons took it over but how easily they did it – how Congress disappeared, how the press became part of it, how the public acquiesced."
That they "overthrew the American government" is precisely correct: once the "legal" foundations of the coup were in place with the passage of the Patriot Act, the stage was set for the creation of a covert Surveillance State. The first steps of this extra-legal end-run around the Constitution were taken by the Bush administration. Go back and look at An End to Evil: How to Win the War on Terror, the 2004 neocon manifesto co-written by Bush speechwriter David Frum and the then-ubiquitous Richard Perle: even as they were advocating the creation a comprehensive national database containing a complete dossier on all US residents, the administration they served in was illegally engaged in doing just that.
When the country elected Barack Obama, they thought they had kicked the coup plotters out of the White House and out of power. Yet the neocons left their legacy, which stayed intact: the secret Panopticon they built was inherited and expanded by Obama & Co. Indeed, Obama’s Justice Department has gone far beyond the Bush administration in their fierce prosecution of whistle-blowers and their brazen intimidation of the media – spying on Fox News and Associated Press reporters who had their phones and emails placed under surveillance.
If anything like that had happened during the Bush years, Nancy Pelosi would’ve been at the head of a massive San Francisco demonstration where speaker after speaker would’ve denounced the "fascist" Bush "regime." Today Pelosi is leading the charge against the efforts of Republican congressman Justin Amash to rein in the NSA.
The natural skepticism – and optimism – of Americans causes them to look at doomsayers with a jaundiced eye. One conjures this image of a man on a street corner wearing a sign: "The End is Nigh!" As you try to hurry past him, he thrusts a crudely printed leaflet in your hand. You take it, and then, a block or so safely distant, you throw it in the nearest trashcan. No writer wants to become such a caricature, especially as he or she gets on in years, when the tendency to acquire odd obsessions becomes most pronounced.
And yet there is such a thing as the canary in a coal mine, signaling a point reached and passed. One might argue that in spite of the shocking scope of the NSA’s reach, we still have the means to change the law: our democracy, they argue, is still intact, and it’s just hyperbole to imagine we’re anything close to a police state. This is supposed to reassure us, but on the other hand what kind of a message is the NSA sending when they refuse to deny they’re conducting surveillance of American lawmakers? Asked by Senator Bernie Sanders if the NSA is spying on members of Congress, the NSA replied:
"NSA’s authorities to collect signals intelligence data include procedures that protect the privacy of US persons. Such protections are built into and cut across the entire process. Members of Congress have the same privacy protections as all US persons. NSA is fully committed to transparency with Congress. Our interaction with Congress has been extensive both before and since the media disclosures began last June.
"We are reviewing Senator Sanders’s letter now, and we will continue to work to ensure that all members of Congress, including Senator Sanders, have information about NSA’s mission, authorities, and programs to fully inform the discharge of their duties."
The headlines (e.g. in the Guardian and the Washington Post) frame it in terms of the NSA refusing to deny they spy on Congress, but it’s more like they’re openly proclaiming that yes indeed they do. If "members of Congress have the same privacy protections as all US persons," then – according to the stories we’ve been reading in the Guardian, the Washington Post, and elsewhere – that means they are in fact collecting congressional meta-data and scooping up congressional emails "incidentally" albeit persistently and often.
So the NSA’s answer is clearly: Yes, we’re spying on you, too. Did you think you were any different from the man on the street? And what’re you gonna do about it anyway?
We are fast entering what is in effect the post-democratic era, one in which even the usual holes in the armor of the political class are closed up, and the thin veneer of the "rule of law" is stripped away to reveal the lawless essence of all States everywhere. When they openly proclaim their contempt for democratic institutions, that’s when people should really begin to worry and fear for the future.
Another canary in the coal mine is the government’s assault on a fundamental American right – again in the name of the "war on terrorism" – and that is the right to travel. I’ve written about the difficulties encountered by Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras in traveling to and from the United States. Glenn is a US citizen, and yet he cannot come back to the country without the possibility of being met at the airport by Homeland Security goons who will spirit him away to the gods know where. What kind of a country are we living in?
And if you think it just happens to "dissidents" like Greenwald, take a look at what happened to Rahineh Ibrahim, a doctoral candidate at Stanford, who had lived in the US for many years. She was married in the US, her daughter is an American citizen, and she was here on a valid student visa. One day in 2005, she tried to board a San Francisco flight to Kona to attend an academic conference: she was denied a boarding pass, although they let her board the next day. She went to Malaysia after the conference, and when she tried to return home found her US visa had been revoked. Effectively exiled from her family in the US, Dr. Ibrahim – who finished her doctorate by completing online courses – is taking the US government to court.
The trial is happening right now, but there’s little coverage of it in the mainstream media. Yet the right to travel is what supposedly set us apart from those bad old Commies during the cold war era. The Berlin Wall was meant to keep East Berliners from escaping to the West. Now we’ve set up a wall that keeps dissident journalists and some just plain ordinary people out. It doesn’t matter if they’re American citizens, like Greenwald and Poitras, or legal residents, like Rahineh Ibrahim: the "war on terrorism" trumps all rights, all Constitutions, and is itself above the law.
All the elements of a police state are in place: universal surveillance, arbitrary restrictions on travel, and, most importantly, the increasingly radical and aggressive political pushback by the NSA and its supporters in Washington – up to and including the open acknowledgment that they’re fully aware of the online habits of whatever members of Congress are foolish enough to get in their way.
If that isn’t an outright threat, I don’t know what is. Not only that, but they’re sharing raw metadata with the Israelis – who I’m sure would never make use of compromising information to influence votes, but, hey, you never know.
My 2005 warning, linked above, seems mild in retrospect. The whole piece was premised on the idea that we were on the verge of slipping into an authoritarian chasm and were only just hanging on by our fingernails due to the lack of a second 9/11-type terrorist attack. The next one, I averred, would push us over the brink. Little did I know that by 2005 we were already far down that slippery slope. Today I wonder when we’ll reach bottom, and fear that the latest edition of the Snowden files will reveal how I missed that one, too.
This all reminds me of one of my favorite Garet Garrett quotes.
"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."
Change the last line to "It went by in the Night of 9/11, singing songs to the war on terror," and you’ll have defined our predicament precisely.
Garrett, a prolific writer and editor of the Saturday Evening Post, was writing about the New Deal: his premise was that FDR and his Brain Trusters had effected a "revolution within the form," destroying the constitutional order from within by depriving it of its content and leaving just the dead husk intact. Now even that mummified corpse is being defiled, and cast aside, as America’s political class seeks to consolidate and defend an openly authoritarian regime.
It’s zero hour in America. Where is the leadership that will rise to the challenge? Who will take on the tyranny coalescing and solidifying even as I write? Rand Paul’s class action lawsuit against the NSA is a step in the right direction, but it’s going to take more than lawyers to beat the NSA and restore our old republic. Some days I’m optimistic, other days – not so much. Whatever happens, of one thing we can be sure: we’re in the fight of our lives.
NOTES IN THE MARGIN
You can check out my Twitter feed by going here. But please note that my tweets are sometimes deliberately provocative, often made in jest, and largely consist of me thinking out loud.
I’ve written a couple of books, which you might want to peruse. Here is the link for buying the second edition of my 1993 book, Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement, with an Introduction by Prof. George W. Carey, a Foreword by Patrick J. Buchanan, and critical essays by Scott Richert and David Gordon (ISI Books, 2008).
You can buy An Enemy of the State: The Life of Murray N. Rothbard (Prometheus Books, 2000), my biography of the great libertarian thinker, here.
Read more by Justin Raimondo
- The Snowden Effect and the Liberal Implosion – January 23rd, 2014
- Sean Wilentz – Court Historian, NSA Shill, and Lickspittle ‘Liberal’ – January 21st, 2014
- Down Mexico Way – January 19th, 2014
- A Note to My Readers – January 16th, 2014
- It’s All About Politics – January 14th, 2014
johnny in wi.
January 5th, 2014 at 11:27 pm
To think 1984 was just 30 years ago. Orwell got it right back in the mid forties. Garret also got it right about FDR. he was one of the first American fascists. Of course we could also include Wilson and Lincoln.
ian bell
January 6th, 2014 at 12:20 am
And how are we to fight, exactly?
sherban
January 6th, 2014 at 12:49 am
Lincoln?but he is not a "founder father"?Then the "first"signs of fascism didn't appear in 2001 how Justin clams but even to the founders,sorry Founders.
Ira Epstein
January 6th, 2014 at 3:21 am
I think you were correct to label the NSA and its dragnet of surveillance against the American people as a canary in a coal mine. The problem in not the dead canary but the lethal gas. The lethal gas being the all powerful USG. The growth of omnipotent government in the US calls into question the very idea of constitionionalism and the idea that words on a piece of paper can restrict the growth and power of government. The entire trajectory of the US government confirms the theory of Hoppe that as long as government exists, no matter what its form or constitution, it will grow more powerful and despotic. The NSA, torture, unlimited detention without due process of law, and wars of aggression are just more dead canaries. The solution is not a return to the old republic in which the lethal virus of government remains, but the complete elimination of goverment to be replaced by system of natural order.
Monster from the Id
January 6th, 2014 at 6:35 am
That "fascist" FDR saved capitalism. Without the New Deal, the desperate masses of the USA would have turned to REAL fascism, or else to Communism.
Or maybe about half would have turned to real fascism, and the other half to Communism, in which case we'd have had Civil War 2.0, only this time not drawn on geographic lines.
A vaccine uses dead or weak pathogens to teach the immune system to resist full-strength pathogens.
The welfare state for the common citizen is a weak form of socialism which acts as a "vaccine", of sorts, against full-fledged socialism, by eliminating, or at least diminishing, the perceived need for radical change. Since welfare keeps unrest down, I think it would be cheap at twice the price.
(I said "for the common citizen" to distinguish it from welfare for the rich, aka "crony capitalism".)
Sam Lowry
January 6th, 2014 at 7:11 am
"That 'fascist' FDR saved capitalism."
This is ignorant garbage.
In 1913, the Federal Reserve was granted a government-enforced monopoly on bank-note issue. Previously, this was a monopoly privilege enjoyed by banks only at the state level. This monopoly privilege serves two purposes: First, it cartelizes banking, eliminating competition for trust, and facilitating the fraud otherwise known as "fractional-reserve banking." Second, it provided the government a means to 'borrow' money that doesn't really exist except as magic tokens that they enjoy the privilege of creating out of thin air.
The result was the biggest economic crash in U.S. history. FDR's response in 1933 was to issue an executive order outlawing the use of gold as money by the plebeian. This was not done to save the economy, it was done to save the New York banks at the expense of the economy.
But thanks to our K-thru-12 government indoctrination centers, people are so clueless about history and economics that they actually believe absurd government-issued mythology like "FDR saved capitalism from itself."
Monster from the Id
January 6th, 2014 at 7:41 am
OK, Mr. Lowry, what would YOU have done to pacify the terrified and enraged masses, and head off revolution?
outsider
January 6th, 2014 at 7:48 am
Ira, I don't understand your last sentence. Sounds far too utopian – and utopian visions always end badly. Witness Marxism, which dreamed of the eventual "withering away of the state." I much prefer Kirkpatrick Sales' idea that there should be another secession by states and that the US empire is far too big to function.
omop
January 6th, 2014 at 7:58 am
It may be that as one politically naive individual put it…with just "two" political parties only "one" can win but with several the chances of more than one winning are better and so is democratic representation.
But then what the heck does he know?
Leslie
January 6th, 2014 at 8:02 am
It is a pipe dream to think that Americans are going to vote themselves back to reasonable government. Western democracy was established on the premise that given enough time and real democracy people will create true freedom and a just state. Had Moses just waited a bit all that dancing around the Golden Calf would have turned into a just secular democracy; the wisdom of a thousand generations was as nothing compared to the wisdom of the herd.
Tomorrow I am scheduled to renounce my US citizenship in favour of another. No state is perfect, but did any other monstrous empire ever build a line of nuclear reactors all along the unstable Pacific rim? Has another state monster, even Rome or the Mongols, threatened the health of the entire planet and its climate? Who else has ever had its nose in private business everywhere?
Generalissimo X
January 6th, 2014 at 8:16 am
The natural skepticism – and optimism – of Americans causes them to look at doomsayers with a jaundiced eye. One conjures this image of a man on a street corner wearing a sign: "The End is Nigh!"
first off let's replace skepticism and optimism with willful ignorance and appalling stupidity. not to mention america is an nation of spineless, gullible fools of the highest magnitude possible.
and maybe it's high time we start listening to the above "lunatic" on the corner. many among us (and readers on this page) have seen all of this COMING FOR OVER A DECADE and our fears and ranting have fallen on the deafest of ears. it's time for americans to collectively pull their heads out of their a-holes and realize the obvious tyranny that has enveloped our republic. nahhhh, let's just keep watching reality tv and checking in on our fantasy football scores. and snowden, god love the guy, but he "revealed" what any person with a remote clue already knew in '05. i remember people saying to me "oh what are you going on about? you're either paranoid or stupid." yeh, i'm the one who's stupid.
and do you think these authoritarian tyrants are going to do or change anything? no. freakin. way.
Generalissimo X
January 6th, 2014 at 8:20 am
first, sam's post is completely factual. second, to answer your question, maybe he should have just let them revolt? just sayin'. at the very least he should have done away with fractional reserve banking and the patently illegal federal reserve act. this is one piece of legislation that has completely eviscerated our republic. the power to coin/mint money was given to congress, not a criminal syndicate of bankers.
Thomas
January 6th, 2014 at 8:38 am
We LET them pull the wool over our eyes. Anyone who still believes the official story, with it's withheld portion……… is part of the problem. At every turn there were anomalies, details swept under the rug… and EVIDENCE DESTROYED…. the crime scene restricted, scrubbed and ultimately exported as scrap……. and extreme pressure from the highest levels for there to be NO investigation…. With so much high level pressure for no investigation, the inquiry the relatives of the victims were able to get was set up to misinform, to scapegoat and to implant the lessons that the administration wanted to IMPLANT…. The bush administration and their insiders who populated the farce investigation were allowed to write the final report on a mass murder crime which occurred on their watch….. thus setting the stage for their ongoing fascist production in America…… What is not to see? Disputed election..
In Germany: 1933, President Paul von Hindenburg names Adolf Hitler Chancellor. On December 9, in a controversial ruling[93] the Bush v. Gore case the Court reversed a Florida Supreme Court decision ordering a third count, and stopped an ordered statewide hand recount based on the argument that the use of different standards, thereby appointing bush.. Soon after the chancellor appointment they get Reichstad fire. Here it's 911… There new legislation, the Enabling Act. Here, the Patriot Act…… Then two wars, both places…. "We are at war" It's the fascist playbook……… It's getting late in the game, now… O.K. to kill American CHILDREN now…. NDAA ……… No due process, indefinite detention… As Mr. R says, "The Fight of Our Lives" And our children's lives too I fear…………..
Monster from the Id
January 6th, 2014 at 8:58 am
"maybe he should have just let them revolt? just sayin'"
Take it away, Captain…
http://i175.photobucket.com/albums/w131/drkarma/P…
bozhidar balkas
January 6th, 2014 at 10:16 am
it's true that the masses or 'lower' classes in US thought that each american, no matter her/his profession or wealth, had equal political power.
so, they were so happy to see that the two top classes always agreed with them on, say, wars against korea, s.e, asia, cuba, panama, iraq, afghanistan…
until just recently, say, 15 y ago, masses were very happy that the two top classes, MSM, network pundits, scholars never ever talked about equal healthcare for all.
but now more people talk about equal healthcare for all. if they obtain that, then, they'd most likely demand alos 'free' [nothing is free] education for all.
and then you'd have domino effect…. and flood gates fully open.
how to prevent it is the task of the libertarians and demorepubs!
bozhidar balkas
January 6th, 2014 at 10:30 am
yes, we may deem/call welfaring a kind of socialism. but how about the WELL FARE for a minority?
but by any name, the latter tastes butifully! or should, if we we would just stop bitching about it and spoiling it for the rich! ok, i 'promise' i'll never ever again complain!
however, the rich should stop rubbing it in!
bozhidar balkas
January 6th, 2014 at 10:47 am
if we would cease with using isms to depict US structure of society and governance and, in their stead, just describe the two structures, we can say that americans appear vastly unequal on political level. how the professional scribes of many colors [skin and mind] cannot see this fact, some other time.
one could call that fascism, but i prefer to describe the system of rule and the structure of society rather than labeling it.
so, the question is, is this inequality getting greater or not? statistics say, yes, inequality is growing!
bozhidar balkas
January 6th, 2014 at 10:50 am
if inequality on political level is growing this, then, bodes unwell–if i see libertarianism correctly– for the libertarians.
Hide Behind
January 6th, 2014 at 10:59 am
When was there not corruption within the halls of every edifice of US government, no matter where they stood; And DC was but the center of corruptionS Institutions and all their agency and committee decisions have never actually been debated on Congressional floors, as the preliminary arguments were decided in back room deal making.
We called it politics but it was no more than bribery, good old boy crony theft and activist of publishing money and abuse of public trust.
We let political hacks claim the mantle of Honorable when they did not deserve it and were just using that mantle of men whom were respected and Honorable in their dealings of public note from the past.
We let political and nationalistic memes stay in place knowing full well they were lies.
We cannot even discuss the p olicys put in place by all members of Congress and approved 4 times asn
NO WE and the facts that the american populace voted 4 times for FDR and thr vast majority of all elected remained in office those 16 years.
Corporatism has ruled our governing institutions from frderal to state since the mid 1880's so lets get off this party demagoguery and put the bull crap where it belongs pled in our back yards, because we sre do gnome stupid as to repeat the same mistakes.vote
Ira Epstein
January 6th, 2014 at 1:44 pm
I do not think I am being utopian. The entire history of the 20th century proves that indviduals have far more to fear from there own government than individual criminals. RJ Rummel in his book Death by Government estimates that over 175 million people were murdered by there own government. These persons killed do not include those who died in wars or criminals executed by due process of law. And the bloody World Wars that plagued the 20th century would not have been possible without the evil organizing force of powerful national governments. A world without government would have its own problems, but it is hard for me to believe that it could be much worse than a world with government. And if it does turn out to be worse, governments could always be reconstructed.
Ira Epstein
January 6th, 2014 at 2:09 pm
Mr. Lowry is correct. It is government manipulation of the money supply to lower the rate of money interest that causes the business cycle. What FDR should have done is drastically cut government spending, cut taxes, abolish the fed, reaffirm the US government's commitment to the gold standard, and have congress declare the US a free trade zone. It was government intervention in the economy that turned what promised to be a sharp but short business downturn into a great depression. The policies of FDR just further aggravated the problems of the US economy. It was not until AFTER WWII, in which the size and scope of government was reduced, that the economy recovered, and the American people enjoyed the fruits of an economy less hampered by government intervention.
charlesincharge59
January 6th, 2014 at 4:01 pm
This is a masterful essay, quite compelling in the inexorable logic it uses to reach its peroration. Although I come at life and politics from a far-left perspective, I am fully capable of understanding exactly the perils you depict.
To that end, I called my rep this morning (Maxine Waters) to demand that she support cutting off all funding whatsoever for the NSA. If the NSA was listening to that phone call, as your essay suggests well might be the case, so much the better. In the face of their perjury and utter contempt toward Congress, this may be the only constitutional recourse left, i.e., the power of the purse.
Again, though, my sincerest compliments on a well-wrought thought piece.
bozhidar balkas
January 6th, 2014 at 5:55 pm
once americans would have tasted equal healthcare for all and no jumping the line, just that one bit of justice would definitely open their appetite for more appetizing goodies; chief among them equal political power for each american.
now, you know why libertarians, D's, R's [possibly most liberals, progressives] would not allow 'free' healthcare for all!
but what a freedom just to obtain equal healthcare for all!
Monster from the Id
January 6th, 2014 at 6:46 pm
Lowry and Epstein live in an alternate reality of the mind, as do all True Believers in ANY ideology.
Once upon a time, when I was a young and silly teenager, I would have agreed with them, but I outgrew their ideology.
Sam Lowry
January 6th, 2014 at 8:11 pm
The sad part is that governments leverage crises they create to accumulate and centralize even more power—as long as they control perception of their causes, which is unfortunately most of the time. Grateful for the intertubes in general, and antiwar in particular.
JudgeMe
January 6th, 2014 at 10:18 pm
None of this is correct… it's like reading talking points actually
JudgeMe
January 6th, 2014 at 10:19 pm
I'm referring to Epstein's comment and Lowry for that matter… you're sources are coming from propaganda my friends
Thomas
January 6th, 2014 at 10:52 pm
Want to take a FREE history course with Phillip Zelikow at University of Va? You may learn more than they want…. Learn how here http://bit.ly/1dbDVY8
Thomas
January 6th, 2014 at 11:05 pm
Also included with the free online Modern History 14 week Phillip Zelikow University of Virginia course is a free commentary concerning the Genesis event which has brought us this brave new world that Mr. Raimondo (and I) consider 2B the fight of our life!
The Progressive Mind » It’s Zero Hour In The USA
January 6th, 2014 at 11:47 pm
[…] 06, 2014 “Information Clearing House – “Antiwar” -– The idea that this country is on a fast track to fascism was never taken very […]
musings
January 7th, 2014 at 2:48 am
I agree that 9/11 provided opportunity, but since then there have been enough fake terror events for a person to question how many really died the day three towers fell so efficiently and were hauled off so precipitously. Well, we all have our favorite theories of how it was done, but what it was able to accomplish based on fear is nothing short of a coup d'etat, and a fascist one at that. Right now, the majority of Americans are like slaves on one of the better plantations in Virginia, run according to humane principles where they don't sell you down the river unless they really, really have to (that would be our troops, and the victims of Katrina, for example, not to speak of hapless innocents used in Guantanamo to make a point about how dangerous the world is due to terror).
Until we get the rubble of 9/11 off us, this remains a nation in the gun sights of our captors. We are shuffling along as post-constitutional slaves.
Paul Revere
January 7th, 2014 at 7:46 am
EXCELLENT article. Thank you Justin Raimondo. Every American should be able to understand what is happening to this country and be prepared to ACT on (ACLU).
Dick Cheney has been trying to put our country into totalitarianism since Nixon. It wouldn't surprise me if he is the ring leader behind this.
"Cheney's net worth, estimated to be between $19 million and $86 million, is largely derived from his post at Halliburton.His 2006 gross joint income with his wife was nearly $8.82 million.
He was also a member of the board of advisors of the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) before becoming vice president."
SING SNOWDEN SING. I hope Israel HATES Cheney before all is said and done.
bozhidar balkas
January 7th, 2014 at 8:03 am
with or without governance and governments, if we retain a classist society and cling to DISCRIMINATION and private ownership of resources, i think we can expect the hell on earth to continue!
after all, even a non-system is a system; so, a system we must have.
but who decides which one we would use? the present one [classist; thus discriminatory] had been imposed on us millennia ago by the clero-noble class and then maintained by the 'elites'.
we surely cannot let the 'elites' do that to us again!
bozhidar balkas
January 7th, 2014 at 8:11 am
it appears to me odder than an old cow's udder that people condemn the govts, but not the GOVERNANCE; ie, the system of rule.
why blame only the symptoms [govts] and not the cause? is it an oversight or deliberate effort to muddy the clear waters?
The Fight of Our Lives | The Falling Darkness
January 7th, 2014 at 2:52 pm
[…] See original article here: http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2014/01/05/the-fight-of-our-lives/ […]
ictus92
January 7th, 2014 at 4:44 pm
Justin is one of the very few commentators to position NSA surveillance in the context of totalitarian "legal" and operational capabilities created by several US Presidents and the military/government bureaucracy since 9/11. Only Ellen Brown and Paul Craig Roberts have published similar observations from sort a "respectable contrarian" position on the political spectrum. Still, the worst is yet to come. Justin can publish his views without too much fear (right now) of a knock on the door. That could change at almost anytime. It's coming soon enough.
Last Spring in Boston and immediate suburbs there was a test run for a martial law lock down of a major urban area… didn't take too much effort to induce lots of people to cheer on those demanding everyone stay off the streets.
It's not hard to see that by this time, another "terror spectacle" will suffice to turn martial law into permanent governance under military policing. Likely this go-round will entail some phony cyber war attack on civilian infrastructure taking a substantial death toll. As was the case in 9/11 such scenarios have been studied and rehearsed many times prior to the event itself by the military think tanks… a cyber attack seems to be the current favorite among this strata for launching a Post 9/11 USA totalitarian Dictatorship
People such as Snowden and Greenwald (and even critics of them such as Webster Tarpley) have yet to explain why such efforts and resources have gone into building a mass surveillance network. Sometimes they seem to imply the the NSA is simply "misguided" or "on the wrong path" but well meaning at heart. You never hear a word about the immediate perils we face. Good to have Justin around.
muggles
January 7th, 2014 at 9:37 pm
Given what Justin writes above and previously about the existing rise of police state behavior, and what is now being admitted here and there, often mumbled or conceded in obscure committee hearings or insincere letters to concerned Senators and Congressman, it is hard to shake the queasy feeling that this is all being orchestrated to a high degree to slowly condition the American public and especially the sometimes independent punditocracy that such tactics and methods have been here all along, or are only slightly worse than they were, say, a decade ago.
Yes, mumble-mumble-dissemble, we do that, kinda sorta, but hey, we've always been doing it. This is no different really, just a new app. Keeping up with the enemy, you know. And hey, all of those Alex Jones rumors about concentration camp plans or FEMA ammo stashing and body bag orders are just nuts, you know? Only right wing crazies worry about such things, and you know how they are!
With each new grudging semi admission, the psychological game is the same: why worry? Nothing bad has happened (yet)! No one is sent to the gulag, yet…
Americans are now accepting the fact that the NSA has and can pry into anything and everything save whispered comments in dark alleys. And even then… And stick stuff into your computer/cell phone/tablet without you knowing it. And even watch you while you use it! Cool!
And the dark lords of the laughably named Homeland Security just chuckle. Ed Snowden may have done them a favor. Now that it is seeping out one drop at a time into the sunlight, they'll just get used to it. After all, we have Oversight Committees and Secret Courts to protect everyone! All that yak about this old Constitution is just archaic survivalist paranoia. They will not only learn to accept Big Brother, but soon they will come to love him…
Snowden’s Impact Continues to Drive Change in 2014 | Techrights
January 10th, 2014 at 4:20 am
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