Posted on 05/04/2020 10:26:58 AM PDT by Kaslin
It can’t happen here,” many Americans believe.
“It” is the Holocaust. “The Germans had a fatal flaw in their constitution,” these people argue. “Germany’s constitution had a special provision – article 48 – that allowed Hitler to assume emergency powers. The American Constitution, however, has no such provision.”
It turns out, though, that it doesn’t really matter what provisions the American Constitution has or doesn’t have. Over the last six weeks, virtually every single one of America’s 50 governors has assumed dictatorial powers, and barely any of us have said boo. They have shut down churches, closed schools, prohibited public assemblies of any kind – and nearly all of us have dutifully obeyed their orders. Indeed, we now snitch on neighbors who don’t toe the line.
The American Constitution (as interpreted for the last 150 years) places strict limits on government power – both federal and state. Barring citizens from attending church, operating a store, or swimming in the Pacific Ocean because of a medical emergency that isn’t widespread in many states is not among the prerogatives of legitimate government authority.
No matter. Governors have gone ahead anyways. In Elizabeth, NJ, last month, authorities deployed drones to warn residents to “move away from each other and separate.” These drones are prop #1 in any dystopian film plot. Now they’re being used in New Jersey with no sense of shame – or horror.
On Friday night, Fox News host Tucker Carlson asked what’s next. “What can’t politicians do in the name of public health?” he asked. “Could they intern people?” He went on: “You can dismiss the possibility of that if you’d like, but remember just a few months ago most of us would have dismissed as ludicrous the possibility that propaganda-spewing drones would be hovering above. Now we have them. So what’s next? What can’t they do?”
“Our Constitution will protect us from tyranny,” people believe. Will it? The Soviets had a glorious constitution, but it did little to protect ordinary Russians. Indeed, the late Justice Antonin Scalia once noted that the “bill of rights of the [USSR] was much better than ours.” It “guaranteed freedom of speech, of the press, of street demonstrations, and anyone who is caught trying to suppress criticism of the government will be called to account.”
Of course, it was all a joke because promises on paper mean nothing if ordinary citizens don’t protest in rage when government violates these promises. How many of us have stood up and declared that we refuse to let the government keep us under indefinite house arrest. At first, this house arrest was to be for only two weeks – to flatten the curve. Well, we’ve flattened it. Now what?
Now, we just wait, the governors tell us. Until… Well, it’s not clear until when. In the meantime, when chassidic Jews in Brooklyn try to pay their last respects to a revered rabbi, they receive a supercilious lecture from Mayor Bill de Blasio and summonses from the police.
From where does the mayor get the authority to order police to hound peaceful chassidic Jews? Nowhere. He doesn’t have the authority. He’s doing it anyway. If he ever read the Constitution or Declaration of Independence, it was probably back in elementary school.
Westerners often speak of the Holocaust, but they don’t seem to have learned some of its most basic lessons. Germany was a modern democracy. How did Hitler grab absolute power? Simple. By declaring an emergency. And it was an emergency. The German economy was in shambles. So the German people looked the other way while he barred Jews from German society (and later exterminated them).
“Emergency” is a magical word! Once an emergency is declared, everything is permitted. And who defines “emergency”? The politicians.
So what if the Democrats win back the White House in November and declare an indefinite state of emergency to save the planet from “harmful carbon emissions”? Will the mainstream media object? Most certainly not. They’ll cheer on this “bold” step just as much of German society cheered on Hitler’s power grab. After all, what greater emergency can there be than saving the planet?
The question is: What will we freedom-loving Americans do? What are we doing now?
It turns out, though, that it doesn’t really matter what provisions the American Constitution has or doesn’t have.
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We found that out in spades on Usurpation Day.
The USA should never have allowed a British subject/Kenyan national/Indonesian national to be President, either.
The exception clause for the founders had long since expired.
I wonder how hard it is to hit a drone with a shotgun?
Y’all need to be watching Hogan of Maryland.
He is loving his new jackboots and TV show appearances.
We’re never going to be let go.
If you can think of it happening, no matter how unlikely you think it is, it can happen.
If the government can suspend your rights anytime it deems something is a crisis, you don’t have rights. You have permissions.
That Governor of Michigan scares me. There’s no doubt in my mind she would hesitate to herd her enemies into the shower if she could find an “expert” willing to say it would be in the public interest.
Federalist #28 (Hamilton) excerpt
If the representatives of the people betray their constituents, there is then no resource left but in the exertion of that original right of self-defense which is paramount to all positive forms of government, and which against the usurpations of the national rulers, may be exerted with infinitely better prospect of success than against those of the rulers of an individual state. In a single state, if the persons intrusted with supreme power become usurpers, the different parcels, subdivisions, or districts of which it consists, having no distinct government in each, can take no regular measures for defense. The citizens must rush tumultuously to arms, without concert, without system, without resource; except in their courage and despair. The usurpers, clothed with the forms of legal authority, can too often crush the opposition in embryo. The smaller the extent of the territory, the more difficult will it be for the people to form a regular or systematic plan of opposition, and the more easy will it be to defeat their early efforts. Intelligence can be more speedily obtained of their preparations and movements, and the military force in the possession of the usurpers can be more rapidly directed against the part where the opposition has begun. In this situation there must be a peculiar coincidence of circumstances to insure success to the popular resistance.ML/NJThe obstacles to usurpation and the facilities of resistance increase with the increased extent of the state, provided the citizens understand their rights and are disposed to defend them. The natural strength of the people in a large community, in proportion to the artificial strength of the government, is greater than in a small, and of course more competent to a struggle with the attempts of the government to establish a tyranny. But in a confederacy the people, without exaggeration, may be said to be entirely the masters of their own fate. Power being almost always the rival of power, the general government will at all times stand ready to check the usurpations of the state governments, and these will have the same disposition towards the general government. The people, by throwing themselves into either scale, will infallibly make it preponderate. If their rights are invaded by either, they can make use of the other as the instrument of redress. How wise will it be in them by cherishing the union to preserve to themselves an advantage which can never be too highly prized!
They’re bigger than skeet.....
Bump
The question is: What will we freedom-loving Americans do? What are we doing now?
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Not much, really. Even in the face of violations of our rights that in many cases have no basis in either the Constitution or our laws.
A dangerous precedent has been established. And the authorities are taking note of their newfound powers.
I was very disappointed that Trump did not expound on this at yesterday’s town hall event. It was a golden opportunity for him to defend the sanctity of our God given rights and liberties. It could have been his finest hour.
A shotgun was the first point and click device.
Welp, given the NYT virtually never covered the Holocaust till US troops rolled into the German concentration death camps, don’t expect the NYT to cover a domestic ‘holocaust’ if one was to occur, kkthx. /s
Not again with Hithler.
I thought GHBush41 WAS Hithler, & he’s dead.
It HAS happened here.
It’s amazing what the politicians can do to us under the smokescreen of “This will only be for two more weeks.”
And then they extend it another two more weeks. Several times.
Most "regular" people go about their lives not seeking power over just about anything unless it directly affects them or their family. We depend on the humanity and integrity of the people to which we entrust power and authority by electing them (including trusting them to select unelected administrators, et al. who will not abuse the authority which is entrusted to them), and we depend on a common understanding of our founding principles and the provisions and guarantees contained in the U.S. Constitution. Naive? ... sure ... but trust is necessary to maintain a free society.
What we are experiencing today is a high-hard slap right across the face as we are subjected to an unfiltered look at why the Founders so distrusted power in any individual without that power being limited and checked.
As Thomas Jefferson wrote: "In questions of power, let us hear no more of trust in men, but rather bind them down from mischief with the chains of the Constitution."
The leadership of the federal government would be wise to consider Jefferson's warning.
Excellent post @18. Excellent.
I just wrote this on another thread, but it is applicable here as well -
You learn the real character of a person in times of stress.
I have little patience for many of my countrymen. I would like to say “they mean well” or “their heart is in the right place”, but I can’t.
Our media and half of our politicians dangle the shackles of tyranny over the nation and too many of our fellow citizens want to wear them. We cannot survive this. There is always a “reason” to give the government more power - social justice, climate change, fairness, etc etc. Now we have a “pandemic” and this has succeeded far beyond the other justifications.
Prior to this pandemic we were enjoying a reawakening of “freedom” and the prosperity it can provide. However, it may be nothing more than a speedbump and I am not sure it changes our trajectory.
It now appears that half of our nation is predisposed to willingly surrender our freedoms.
>>>Germany should have never allowed for Hitler a citizen of Austria to come into power in Germany and take over.<<<
America should have never allowed for JFK a dual citizen of American, but more importantly Rome, to come into power in the United States.
To accomplish the wishes of his true authority, JFK signed what he called “Executive Orders 10995, 10997, 10998, 10999, 1101, 1103, 11004, and 11005” which state that at any time, day or night, without any notice from any “law enforcement group,” that Federal (or FOREIGN) troops may enter your house, seize your property and goods, kidnap your children and send them to Federal “detention centers” in Montana, Wyoming, or Alaska, and send YOU (the parent) to a “detention center” in Michigan or Arizona.
All he would have to do was simply to “DECLARE AN EMERGENCY.”
Black is Beautiful by Dr. Peter S. Ruckman, 1995, pg. 15, 16.
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