reply to post by Copernicus
The Secretary of Defense shall determine the military-unique capabilities needed to be provided by the Department of Defense to support civil
authorities in an incident of national significance.
Any additional capabilities determined by the Secretary to be necessary to support the use of the active components and the reserve components of the
armed forces for providing military support to civil authorities.
This goes well beyond the Warner Act. The Secretary of State, not just the Commander in Chief will now be able to use any branch of the military in
any manner deemed necessary for any event or situation that could be argued in front of an appointed judge to be "significant". It seems from this
language that it does not need to be a national emergency or even an issue of national security.
This seems more than a small power shift, and IMO due to the ease with which this power can be wielded by the Secretary of State, basically guarantees
military use in many parts of the country sooner or later. Since people with little time left in office feel it is important to pass this now, I
suspect it will mean sooner.
I do not intend to alarm anyone, just might as well paint a picture of a reality we likely face, something we should accept or change as a nation of
citizens.
Imagine leaving your house in the morning, and in place of or in addition to seeing neighborhood police every once in a while, you see military units
from nearby forts, equipment and technology, stationed in your neighborhood whenever there is an "event of national significance".
I have talked to a fair number of people to get their opinions on this. It seems pretty clear...
All experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms
to which they are accustomed.
The words of The Declaration of Independence, endorsed by all of the United States' Founding Fathers, the very people responsible for creating our
great country seem to be true.
From what I have gathered, almost all people I've talked to would likely act in whatever way they believed would help if they truly believed we were
headed for the eventual human suffering of a true police state. Most either seem not to consider the idea as possible, despite the unprecedented
expansion of power in the executive branch, or do not want to believe because of the required change in their world view and potential responsibility
to add more to their already full plate that it would require.
I have personally seen and known innocent people minding their own business on their way to work subjected to tear gas by choosing the wrong route.
That hasn't been common while we've had respected, constitutional checks and balances in place.
I suspect people will wake up when the first humvees roll into their town for some significant event, sporting the new 95GHz microwave "non-lethal",
cooks 1/64th inch of skin causing searing pain and an uncontrollable desire to duck and cover, wide-beam crowd dispersion devices already developed
and now approved for use in Iraq.
While we're on the subject, just some advice in case that does happen and you end up exposed to it -- close your eyes. You don't want to cook the
top layer of tissue on your eyes. There are debates on whether or not the devices can easily blind people, but no need to find out. The good news is
that if these preferred new military crowd dispersion devices do come to your neighborhood, good sunglasses will probably prevent anything more than
temporary searing flesh on all of your nerve endings and maybe slightly burned skin when it's over.
It'll heal.
[edit on 10-11-2007 by lifestudent]