[Yosemitest]

"To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions".

I'm not impressed, and question how this authorizes the President the "Right" to control TV and Radio.
After 26+ years in the military and knowing how the military "informs" it's members of recall (calling forth) to (bla, bla, bla ) ...
Security doesn't allow recalls without certain confirmation of authorization, security codes if you will.

Now, I've been retired for over 10 years now, and things change.
BUT ... I'm not buying that - Article 1, Section 8, Clause 15, Constitution of the United States to authorize this power grab.

[ctdonath2]

You're not impressed because you don't want to be impressed. You want to hold to the notion that the Obama is exceeding his powers, and this provides opportunity to "prove" it.

Your experience with the military was exclusively with the "organized militia", which has notification systems in place, and is designed for call-outs which assume response times longer than minutes.

My point covers the "unorganized militia", and allows call-outs in literal minutes.

This EBS does include confirmation of authorization. As another poster recalled, decades ago a national test of the EBS screwed up and _did_ use the confirmation codes (oops!), leading to a tense period where much of the country thought we were under attack. Yes, there are security codes as demonstrated & revealed by that screwup.

Methinks the hangup is on "control": AFAIK, broadcasters are not compelled (to wit, punished if they don't comply) to participate. It may be just this side of voluntary, but I have yet to discover any punishments which would be meted out if a broadcaster did not carry the message.

While the term "militia" may not explicitly be used, the legal definition of "unorganized militia" entails all able-bodied males 17+, the practical definition amounts to "all able-bodied citizens". The term "calling forth" may explicitly refer to particular organized military activity, but the spirit of the term is defense and protection of the population at large and the organization & property thereof.

It's not a power grab (or, at least not a new one). The system has been in place since the 1930s, just not updated and tested much since then. Considering the executive who is testing this does of course raise eyebrows, the timing is poorly chosen (prime daylight hour with widespread announcement, instead of low-key late-night testing), and OMGWTFBBQ if it is EVER used for any political purpose...