Posted on 11/29/2011 9:29:32 PM PST by Kartographer
James Madison, father of the Constitution, warned, "The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become instruments of tyranny at home."
Abraham Lincoln had similar thoughts, saying "America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter, and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves."
During war there has always been a struggle to preserve Constitutional liberties. During the Civil War the right of habeas corpus was suspended. Newspapers were closed down. Fortunately, these rights were restored after the war.
The discussion now to suspend certain rights to due process is especially worrisome given that we are engaged in a war that appears to have no end. Rights given up now cannot be expected to be returned. So, we do well to contemplate the diminishment of due process, knowing that the rights we lose now may never be restored.
My well-intentioned colleagues ignore these admonitions in defending provisions of the Defense bill pertaining to detaining suspected terrorists.
Their legislation would arm the military with the authority to detain indefinitely - without due process or trial - SUSPECTED al-Qaida sympathizers, including American citizens apprehended on American soil.
I want to repeat that. We are talking about people who are merely SUSPECTED of a crime. And we are talking about American citizens.
If these provisions pass, we could see American citizens being sent to Guantanamo Bay.
This should be alarming to everyone watching this proceeding today. Because it puts every single American citizen at risk.
There is one thing and one thing only protecting innocent Americans from being detained at will at the hands of a too-powerful state - our constitution, and the checks we put on government power. Should we err today and remove some of the most important checks on state power in the name of fighting terrorism, well, then the terrorists have won.
Detaining citizens without a court trial is not American. In fact, this alarming arbitrary power is reminiscent of Egypt's "permanent" Emergency Law authorizing preventive indefinite detention, a law that provoked ordinary Egyptians to tear their country apart last spring and risk their lives to fight.
Recently, Justice Scalia affirmed this idea in his dissent in the Hamdi case, saying:
"Where the Government accuses a citizen of waging war against it, our constitutional tradition has been to prosecute him in federal court for treason or some other crime."
He concluded: "The very core of liberty secured by our Anglo-Saxon system of separated powers has been freedom from indefinite imprisonment at the will of the Executive
Justice Scalia was, as he often does, following the wisdom of our founding fathers.
As Franklin wisely warned against, we should not attempt to trade liberty for security, if we do we may end up with neither. And really, what security does this indefinite detention of Americans give us?
The first and flawed premise, both here and in the badly misname patriot act, is that our pre-911 police powers were insufficient to combat international terrorism.
This is simply not borne out by the facts.
Congress long ago made it a crime to provide, or to conspire to provide, material assistance to al-Qaida or other listed foreign terrorist organizations. Material assistance includes virtually anything of value - including legal or political advice, education, books, newspapers, lodging or otherwise. The Supreme Court sustained the constitutionality of the sweeping prohibition.
And this is not simply about catching terrorists after the fact, as others may insinuate. The material assistance law is in fact forward-looking and preventive, not backward-looking and reactive.
Al-Qaida adherents may be detained, prosecuted and convicted for conspiring to violate the material assistance prohibition before any injury to an American. Jose Padilla, for instance, was convicted and sentenced to 17 years in prison for conspiring to provide material assistance to al-Qaida. The criminal law does not require dead bodies on the sidewalk before it strikes at international terrorism.
Indeed, conspiracy law and prosecutions in civilian courts have been routinely invoked after 9/11, to thwart embryonic international terrorism.
Michael Chertoff, then head of the Justice Department's Criminal Division and later Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, testified shortly after 9/11 to the Senate Judiciary Committee. He underscored that, "the history of this government in prosecuting terrorists in domestic courts has been one of unmitigated success and one in which the judges have done a superb job of managing the courtroom and not compromising our concerns about security and our concerns about classified information."
Moreover, there is no evidence that criminal justice procedures have frustrated intelligence collection about international terrorism. Suspected terrorists have repeatedly waived both the right to an attorney and the right to silence. Additionally, Miranda warnings are not required at all when the purpose of interrogation is public safety.
The authors of this bill errantly maintain that the bill would not enlarge the universe of detainees eligible for indefinite detention in military custody. This is simply not the case.
The current Authorization for Use of Military Force confines the universe to persons implicated in the 9/11 attacks or who harbored those who were.
The detainee provision would expand the universe to include any person said to be "part of" or "substantially" supportive of al-Qaida or Taliban.
These terms are dangerously vague. More than a decade after 9/11, the military has been unable to define the earmarks of membership in or affiliation to either organization.
Some say that to prevent another 9/11 attack we must fight terrorism with a war mentality and not treat potential attackers as criminals. For combatants captured on the battlefield, I tend to agree.
But 9/11 didn't succeed because we granted the terrorists due process. 9/11 attacks did not succeed because al-Qaida was so formidable, but because of human error. The Defense Department withheld intelligence from the FBI. No warrants were denied. The warrants weren't requested. The FBI failed to act on repeated pleas from its field agents, agents who were in possession of laptop with information that might have prevented 9/11.
These are not failures of laws. They are not failures of procedures. They are failures of imperfect men and women in bloated bureaucracies. No amount of liberty sacrificed on the altar of the state will ever change that.
A full accounting of our human failures by 9/11 Commission would have proven that enhanced cooperation between law enforcement and the intelligence community, not military action or vandalizing liberty at home, is the key to thwarting international terrorism.
We should not have to sacrifice our Liberty to be safe. We cannot allow the rules to change to fit the whims of those in power. The rules, the binding chains of our constitution were written so that it didn't MATTER who was in power. In fact, they were written to protect us and our rights, from those who hold power without good intentions. We are not governed by saints or angels. Our constitution allows for that. This bill does not.
Finally, the detainee provisions of the defense authorization bill do another grave harm to freedom: they imply perpetual war for the first time in the history of the United States.
No benchmarks are established that would ever terminate the conflict with al-Qaida, Taliban, or other foreign terrorist organizations. In fact, this bill explicitly states that no part of this bill is to imply any restriction on the authorization to use force. No congressional review is allowed or imagined. No victory is defined. No peace is possible if victory is made impossible by definition.
To disavow the idea that the exclusive congressional power to declare war somehow allows the President to continue war forever at whim, I will also be offering an amendment this week to de-authorize the Iraq War.
Use of military force must begin in congress with its authorization. And it should end in congress with its termination. Congress should not be ignored or an afterthought in these matters, and must reclaim its constitutional duties.
The detainee provisions ask us to give up consist rights as an emergency or exigency but make no room for expiration. Perhaps the Emergency Law in Egypt began with good intentions in 1958 but somehow it came to be hated, to be despised with such vigor that protesters chose to burn themselves alive rather allow continuation of indefinite detention.
Today, someone must stand up for the rights of the American people to be free. We must stand up to tyranny disguised as security. I urge my colleagues to reject the language on detainees in this bill, and to support amendments to strip these provisions from the defense bill.
http://paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=390
I was looking for it in the article text posted above too.
It’s in the YouTube video link at the top of this thread. At 0:27, Senator Rand Paul says “Someone who has more than seven days of food in their house can be considered a potential terrorist”.
During the Civil War the right of habeas corpus was suspended. Newspapers were closed down. Fortunately, these rights were restored after the war.
***Having More Than 7 Days Of Food Makes You A Suspected Terrorist***
As a child, my Brother-in-law saw this in action during WWII. His family operated a ranch in West Texas and put up their own food for themselves and the hired hands.
One day the LAW swept down and confiscated every bit of food because someone had dropped a dime on them, claiming they were “food hoarding”.
How did they survive? They had another stocked cellar hidden way out in the hills that only the family knew about.
It's a backdoor Obama campaign plot to spirit away Mittens & Huntsman...Mormons are supposed to have a year's supply of food stored.
I have a fully stocked pantry & freezers that can be raided like that.
I also have food stored all over the ranch: deer, turkeys, fruit trees, squirrels, cottontails, berries, perennial veggies...and the means to harvest it.
BTW, I did end up making your mother's fruitcake as per directions (no adulterating embellishments) last winter and it was GREAT! I'll be making more this winter.
Firstly, there are lots of ways to lose fingers, including the use of explosives with no intent to hurt anyone, and, secondly, if they come to lock me up for having too much food or too many guns I will do more than intend them harm.
Possibly a nit, but this doesn’t sound like Abe, “America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter, and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves.”
The thought is exactly his, but I doubt the words are.
We cannot allow the rules to change to fit the whims of those in power - Remember, Chertoff and the SR 511 committee, including Hussein and Hillary, all agreed on the definition of NBC as TWO US CITIZEN PARENTS. Seems to me rules are changed every day in D.C. The usurper has thrown out the Constitution and acts on whims without the need for Congress.
What worked then isn't so easily accomplished these days. Most preppers don't have access to land as far as the eye can see. Many are stuck (yes, choice) on a tiny city lot or even if they're in the country have neighbors too close for comfort in such times. Rural today isn't the rural of just a few years ago. We used to hardly see a dozen cars on the drive to town but now it's constant traffic. Far too many people are moving in and crowding this neck of the woods.
They have the ability to view your spending in real time. Anything purchased with a check or credit card. Many companies collect your phone number as well, which allows them to track your purchases even if you pay cash.
I hope this does not pass. It is not Constitutional.
As far as the 7 days of supplies: this is beginning to sound like the start of the Ukrainian Famine. Not a good sign.
And quite frankly, the numbers of seditious families would be in the 10 of millions.
I wouldn’t be surprised in the least that homeschoolers would qualify under new federal guidelines, since we don’t fall in lock step with the system.
Ping as it is of general interest to homeschoolers.
I wondered how long this would take,
when the “prepping” movement has gained so much steam these days.
They, the elitists, DON’T WANT YOU TO BE SELF-SUFFICIENT.
They want you dependent and controllable.
To paraphrase Ernest Hollings,
“Dere’s too much preppin’ goin’ on out dere...”
Just as with your guns or other preps,
you should have your food hidden in multiple locations.
If they come beating on your door, give them the two buckets of wheat berries you have in your back closet,
THEN GET THE WORD OUT.
Just make sure your personal stash is hidden somewhere really good.
All of our survival food got lost in a boating accident last year.
Is it really choice to live in cities when economic policies have forced so many of us to live there. There simply are no jobs or ability to create wealth outside of the cities.
This week's "House" tv show featured a patient who had a secret stash of weapons for SHTF. The writers had the patient give up his guns and made a point that the one House has is bad, bad, bad. IOW, preppers are insane.
Could you add me to your preppers list? Thanks.
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