The US federal government has made strong preparations for "continuity of government" in the event of a national catastrophe. A full army brigade is now on active duty within domestic borders, and the Bush administration has issued a directive which allows the president to coordinate all three branches of the federal government in such an event. The Real News spoke to Bruce Fein. BioBruce Fein is the founder of the American Freedom Agenda, that works to restore constitutional checks and balances. He served in the US Justice Department under President Reagan and has been an adjunct scholar with the American Enterprise Institute, a resident scholar at the Heritage Foundation, a lecturer at the Brookings Institute, and an adjunct professor at George Washington University. He is an adviser to Ron Paul. Comments from Registered Members | (Register or log in to make your comment.) | Uhlinger 2008-12-01
(continuation of comment below) is basically useless against the vast and sophisticated military that's been created in our name. The type of armed revolution that installed our ostensibly current government over 200 years ago could never happen, at least without mass defections from the military. Which, I'm sure, has been considered and by the top brass, and any such attempts have been well planned for, and I'm sure, would prove futile. No--I'm afraid we'll just all along for the ride, and basically all we can do is pray that things go well enough because we really seem to have no other real influence. | Uhlinger 2008-12-01
You know, for a guy who once referred to the constitution as "just a piece of paper," and who basically said who cares about history because "we'll all be dead by then," it's easy to get the impression that he does, now, care a bit about what's thought about him. But it is to no avail. Bush is simply an errand boy who will do as he's told if a 2nd false flag incident is executed. Bush didn't have what it takes to implement the first one, 9/11. That's what Cheney was for, and even he has a keeper somewhere. No, we'll all be lucky if an incident isn't staged, but make no mistake, this secret government, which has been reported on far and wide, from Eisenhower to Bill Moyers, and many in between, will continue to do as they see fit while giving us the illusion of democracy and freedom because we are basically more compliant that way. But they will do hat they feel they have to do. And our second amendment, which was added in order to prevent just such a situation we are in now | Jeff Tundis 2008-12-01
Oh, stop with "The One" nonsense. Obama is a politician, he was always a politician, and this type of rhetoric just makes you look foolish (and loses elections, apparantly).
Bush/Cheney have been eroding the Constitution for years. It has been Cheney's political mission for a long, long time to attempt a re-structuring of the government to put more power in the hands of the Executive branch.
The reason this current action is so troublesome is that sets up a situation where a terrorist act can be faked, and the President can then suspend the transfer of power on January 20th.
Personally, as much as I loathe Bush, I don't think this will be the case. He seems very eager to get out of office and have a peaceful and efficient tranfser of power, so there is at least *something* positive to his legacy. | georgeb.martin 2008-12-01
I’m sure Obama will speak out against the unconstitutional usurping of power that Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan, Carter, Ford, Nixon, Johnson, Kennedy, Eisenhower, Truman, and Roosevelt have undertaken since the 1930s. Remember, he is for change. Even though he is appointing the old guard, and they have been part of the problem, he sees them as part of the solution. Or, maybe he will just put the move toward the Directorate in high gear. Obama spoke out against this……well, maybe he hasn’t, but I’m sure that being The One he will be a good and wise dictator. |
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US prepares for "continuity of government"
ZAA NKWETA, TRNN: With recent warnings of potential terrorist attacks coming from US authorities, civil liberty proponents are growing increasingly concerned about preparations the federal government is making for a potential emergency situation. As of October, a full army brigade is on active duty within the United States to deal with civil unrest and crowd control. According to a late-September Army Times article, the brigade will be under the control of Northern Command as a federal response force for natural or man-made emergencies, including terrorist attacks. The Real News spoke to American Freedom Project founder Bruce Fein to discuss the constitutional significance of this development.
BRUCE FEIN, FOUNDER, AMERICAN FREEDOM AGENDA: The United States has had a long tradition of frowning on the use of the military for domestic law enforcement purposes, and that finds expression most vividly in what's known as the Posse Comitatus Act, passed in the late 1800s, which, generally speaking, makes it a crime to use the military for domestic law enforcement unless Congress has expressly authorized an exception to that prohibition. The most gaping hole created in the act was the provision sponsored by Senator John Warner, called the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2007. And it basically said Congress hereby creates an exception for Posse Comatatus any time that the president says there's a terrorist incident, a natural disaster, and then this open-ended loophole: "or other other conditions" that makes him conclude that state authorities are not sufficient to suppress insurrection, domestic violence, rebellion, or otherwise. So that statute now basically endows the president with authority, in his own unilateral discretion, to decide that he will use the military any time he wishes for domestic law enforcement purposes, and this brigade or this combat unit is certainly prepared to do such implementation at the president's beck and call.
NKWETA: In May 2007, President Bush signed the National Security Presidential Directive 51. The unclassified portion of NSPD 51 states that in the event of catastrophic emergency, a cooperative effort among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of the federal government coordinated by the president will replace normal governmental procedure.
FEIN: Combined with the Posse Comitatus Act, and now having that look more like [inaudible] than the rule against the military running the government, we have this National Security Directive 51 that is equally problematic. Number one, the greatest problem: it's not known to the American people, and after all, in a government by the people, of the people, for the people, the government has to tell the people what it's doing to know whether it has authorization to do so. Sovereignty is the people, not the government. But this directive purports to establish a regime that would take hold in the event of some kind of huge national disaster, where you're trying to ensure a continuity of the government when it's made impossible, because of an attack, for the Congress or the Supreme Court or even the president's cabinet to meet. This situation has never happened in the history of the United States. The Constitution does not contemplate any emergency other than an invasion or a domestic rebellion, whereby you could suspend habeas corpus. There's nothing in the Constitution that says we revert to a state of nature, and the president then can become all branches to himself in the name of keeping the country alive. And this secret national security directive—and we don't know all of it, because it remains classified—insinuates that it'll be the president opposed to the other two branches of government who will be the steward of the nation's sovereignty in the event of a crisis and would then direct other branches as to what their duties should be. And it's outrageous, in my judgment, that these ideas or plans for a continuity of government that would purport to have the force of law should occur in secret. You know, secret government is what you do in the old Soviet Union or in communist China, not in the United States of America where the people rule.
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