tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7350427.post5649963246891825823..comments2023-09-23T05:13:34.139-07:00Comments on Home-Brewed Bulletins: Massacres and Martial LawDominichttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13678780593151305116noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7350427.post-64817296055933613052020-01-19T10:43:13.485-08:002020-01-19T10:43:13.485-08:00Thanks for this comment, I only saw it months late...Thanks for this comment, I only saw it months later. I definitely agree that many if not most government actions in the USA are "not what martial law looks like", and that we should be concerned about exceptions.<br /><br />To your other points on how closely tied the fortunes of Trump and the Republican party will be during the New Year, 2020, that starts with an impeachments and ends with an election - I certainly don't know what will happen!Dominichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13678780593151305116noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7350427.post-85430153745011121952019-02-15T09:36:04.871-08:002019-02-15T09:36:04.871-08:00It's nasty and authoritarian, as well as incom...It's nasty and authoritarian, as well as incompetent. Looking around the world, it is of a piece with what Orban is doing in Hungary and Erdogan is doing in Turkey. They are much further down the road of attempting to disempower and delegitimize all potential foci for opposition. Indeed, in Turkey, it was the opposition who declared martial law, and Erdogan who brought back "the civilian rule of law". What came back was not martial law, but also not something that anyone would want.<br /><br />On the positive side, the US civilian courts are still functioning, and can clearly act as a check on executive power if they want to. So is Congress, except that the current political calculus still makes Republicans more scared of Trump and his base than of anything else they can imagine. For the smarter ones, in order to achieve this state, they have had to subject themselves to a long-term process of self-administered imagination reduction therapy. As Trump unwinds, if they believe that he will not get a second term Republicans will desert him. Congressional oversight only in form will give way to actual Congressional oversight. This is not what martial law looks like.<br /><br />But even prior to Trump, there were far too many aspects of how the US works that are close to martial law. The FBI, the CIA and other lesser agencies, including the police, have de facto scope to do way more than a free democratic society should tolerate. The pernicious evil of civil forfeiture would horrify the Founders, and that's just one example.<br />Chris Brewhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15950294272852443488noreply@blogger.com