Posted on 04/22/2013 9:07:31 PM PDT by Katechon
The Constitutional rights of an entire town were violated Friday, April 19, 2013. The Constitution was put out of order, deactivated by an undeclared state of exception, -- complete with "papers please" searches and seizures and military hardware and weapons all over the streets.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
-- The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution
Since there was no "hot pursuit," no argument was available to Law Enforcement Officers allowing searches of private property without consent or a warrant.
The exception to the rule has become the rule under Obama -- to an unprecedented extent.By effectively occupying a part of the Boston metro area, law enforcement officers made a mockery of the 4th Amendment.
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
-- The Fourth Amendment (Amendment IV) to the United States Constitution
Since there was no "hot pursuit," no argument was available to Law Enforcement Officers allowing searches of private property without consent or a warrant.
The exception to the rule has become the rule under Obama -- to an unprecedented extent. The Obama régime has been systematically institutionalizing arbitrary decision.
The very distinction between peace and war, and between foreign and civil war, is impossible where the emergency becomes the rule. This began under Bush, with the Patriot Act. But it has been consolidated by the Obama administration.
1) Obama appeals to the principle of the state secret to block any judicial oversight of “enhanced interrogation techniques.”
2) Obama asserts an exception for suspects considered terrorist threats.
3) Obama institutionalizes trial by military commission on domestic soil for individuals deemed “unlawful combattants” -- in order to lower the bar of what constitutes admissible evidence and to restrict a suspect’s rights to legal defense.
4) Obama expands the system of secret “black sites” into which unlawful combattants disappear without a trace, whilst extending the mandate of the CIA (beyond information gathering) to military special-operation interventions. 
Source
Obama has made the CIA becomes a full-spectrum paramilitary force unto itself, carrying out the shadowy war games of the régime under the cover of secrecy provided by its black sites. Obama also issues secret Executive Orders giving the Pentagon’s US Special Operations Command CIA-like surveillance capabilities. Perpetually poised for instant delivery of extralegal action on demand, the USOC reports directly to the president personally.
5) The practice of targetted assassination has expanded significantly under Obama. The régime has even extended targetted assassination to US citizens.
6) Obama used the national security rationale to institute exceptions to constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure. And he has expanded the high-tech surveillance system by invoking state secrets to prevent judicial oversight. 
Obama has also declared war on whisle-blowers, prosecuting with draconian zeal individuals who leak government and military information.
7) Obama deployed the military in Libya without consulting Congress — and never went back to Congress for its rubber stamp.
The use of extralegal powers is becoming the norm. The exception is becoming the norm. And that’s why a hot war is inevitable. THE EXCEPTION is now THE NORM, and peace cannot be distinguished from war any longer. The Consitution is out of order, inoperative, neutralized.
The Constitution and the State of Exception Article 1 of the Constitution establishes that "the Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it" -- but does not specify which AUTHORITY has the jurisdiction to decide on the exceptional suspension.
Another passage of Article 1 declares that the power to declare war and to raise and support the army and navy rests with Congress, BUT Article 2 states that "the President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States."
Let's just look at a few precedents:
During the Civil War (1861–1865), Lincoln acted counter to the text of Article 1 (on April 15, 1861) by proclaiming that an army of seventy-five thousand men was to be raised and convened a special session of Congress for July 4. In the ten weeks that passed between April 15 and July 4, Lincoln acted de facto as a total dictator. On April 27, Lincoln authorized the General in Chief of the Army to suspend the writ of Habeas Corpus whenever he deemed it necessary along the military line between Washington and Philadelphia. Furthermore, on February 1862, Lincoln imposed censorship of the mail and authorized the arrest and detention in military prisons of persons suspected of "disloyal and treasonable practices".
In the speech he delivered to Congress July 4 1861, President Lincoln justified his actions as the holder of a supreme power to violate the Constitution in a situation of necessity:
"Whether strictly legal or not, [the measures he had adopted had been taken] under what appeared to be a popular demand and a public necessity" in the certainty that Congress would ratify them. Those exceptional measures were based on the conviction that even fundamental, natural law could be violated IF the very existence of the union and the juridical order were at stake:
"Are all the laws but one to go unexecuted, and the Government itself go to pieces lest that one be violated?"
--Lincoln
***
During World War One President Wilson assumed broader powers than those Lincoln had claimed. However, instead of ignoring Congress, as Lincoln had done, Wilson had those extraordinary powers delegated to him by Congress. Instead of declaring a state of emergency, he had exceptional laws issued. From 1917 to 1918, Congress approved a series of acts (from the Espionage Act of 1917 to the Departmental Reorganization Act of 1918) that granted the President COMPLETE CONTROL over the administration of the United States and not only prohibited disloyal activities (such as collaboration with the enemy and the diffusion of false reports), but even made it a crime to "willfully utter, print, write, or publish any disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language about the form of government of the United States" (from the Sedition Act of 1918).
***
Since the power of the President is grounded in the emergency linked to a state of war, the metaphor of war became a part of the presidential vocabulary whenever decisions considered to be of vital importance are being imposed.
In 1933, Franklin D. Roosevelt was able to assume extraordinary powers by presenting his actions as those of a Commander in Chief during a military campaign:
"I assume unhesitatingly the leadership of this great army of our people dedicated to a disciplined attack upon our common problems.…I am prepared under my constitutional duty to recommend the measures that a stricken Nation in the midst of a stricken world may require.…But in the event that the Congress shall fail to take [the necessary measures] and in the event that the national emergency is still critical, I shall not evade the clear course of duty that will then confront me. I shall ask the Congress for the one remaining instrument to meet the crisis—broad Executive power to wage war against the emergency, as great as the power that would be given to me if we were in fact invaded by a foreign foe."From the constitutional point of view, the New Deal was realized by delegating to the President (through a series of statutes culminating in the National Recovery Act of June 1933) an UNLIMITED POWER to CONTROL every aspect of the economic life.
--Franklin D. Roosevelt, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1933
The outbreak of World War Two extended these powers with the creation of a "Office of Emergency Management" [the ancestor of today's FEMA]. On September 7, 1942, FDR renewed his claim to TOTAL CONTROL during the emergency:
On February 19, 1942, the FDR administration proceeded with the internment of seventy thousand American citizens of Japanese descent who resided on the West Coast (along with forty thousand Japanese citizens who lived and worked there).
***
By constantly referring to himself as the "Commander in Chief of the Army" after September 11, 2001, President Bush's was attempting to produce a situation in which the emergency becomes the rule.
The logic of politics has become a logic of war.
Crime scene.
but but but
It can’t happen here!!
//sarc
Scarey? Yes.. The worst problem is that we the people continue to accept this kind of action by the Government.
Unfortunately, if this continues, we have lost the Constitution through negligence and it will only be understood well after the fact.
Are we now becoming infowars?
But then We The People have not been paying attention to Hisotry, by design that. Look what has become of public education! when inflation gets too out of hand, the global oligarchs pul a reset, using war and pestilence as the means to reset the sheep remaining alive after the slaughtering. we are at the precipice of the pestilence, at least, and likely the 'war' as waged for the oligrachs under the guise of forcing conversion to Is Slime.
I suspect that once the foolish moose limbs do the dirty work, the oligarchs will nuke their cities and put them down quickly as they are int he wqay of a world-wide global governance under the banking rulers who made their greatest star with the federal reserve, private banking control of America.
I’d suggest that in Watertown there were exigent circumstances.
'If you’re the president, member of congress, govt. agent, etc, the only reason why anyone should listen to what you say, is because you exercise power via the Constitution'.
'If the Constitution doesn’t count, you don’t have any legitimate power, and should be (forcibly) removed for trying to exercise power you don’t possess'.
It seems to me that the FedGov is picking and choosing which laws to respect and enforce, thereby setting the example for all of us.
“I’d suggest that in Watertown there were exigent circumstances.”
And how did this situation differ from other pursuits of “Armed & Dangerous” suspects? These idiots were under the noses of LEO for ages, even investigated, but LEO were clueless or too PC to do anything.
When Jihadists rampage, innocent bystanders are the ones persecuted.
(Yes, I went through TSA at the airport today, and am still ticked off!)
This one gets scored to the terrorists. It was an outrage all around, including the response by the citizenry. Sweet Caroline indeed!
You have that right.
If all the Watertown residents had a double-barreled shotgun, they could have opened the back door and fired two rounds and been safe...
Why does the terrorist have constitutional rights to a trial yet innocent citizens have no right to privacy? Violate the constitutional rights of dozens just to bring one man to justice and afford that man the contitutional rights you circumnevted in his capture?
It’s events like this, with the abuse of law-abiding citizens, that have the whole country arming itself for war. The tension just gets worse and eventually will explode.
Yes, yes and yes...
This a test...only a test...
Fascism.
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