Would someone please explain this War Powers thing for me?

[Stephanie]

I really don't understand, and I bet I'm not the only one. What does it mean? What did Bush think he was going to do with "war powers" inside the United States? I assume he didn't plan to bomb NYC (again) or drive tanks through San Francisco, right? But what was the point of it? Thanks in advance!

Just before the Senate acted on this compromise resolution, the White House sought one last change. Literally minutes before the Senate cast its vote, the administration sought to add the words "in the United States and" after "appropriate force" in the agreed-upon text. This last-minute change would have given the president broad authority to exercise expansive powers not just overseas -- where we all understood he wanted authority to act -- but right here in the United States, potentially against American citizens. I could see no justification for Congress to accede to this extraordinary request for additional authority. I refused.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/22/AR2005122201101.html?sub=AR

[HysteryDiagnosis]

1. If he wasn't forced to make the choices he has made in the last

5 years.... he would not have aged 20 years in that amount of time.

[meti57b]

2. I'm guessing it means .....

they could break into our homes in the middle of the night and arrest us without warrants, drag us out in handcuffs without any concern that they had just let the cat get out the door and imprison us incommunicado for indeterminate amounts of time in secret gulags, where we would be tortured with methods similar to Abu Ghraib.

[Stephanie]

4. Seriously?

Is that why they wanted it?

[janx]

21. Consider how totally reactionary this government was

after 9/11. Everything was a response; there's very little imagination in the White House these days.

My guess is that yes, Cheney wanted the authority to go knock down some doors.

[librechik]

10. absolutely yes

There in fact was an executive order after 9/11 that supposedly does that anyway, and it's never been rescinded.

[Lerkfish]

3. are you being sarcastic?

can't tell.

but anyways, in case you're serious, here ya go:

every single disaster or calamity or fabricated threat has been immediately followed by statements of how the military are the only ones capable of saving us. Never mind that it used to be the national guard, under control of individual governors. No, it has to be under direct control of the commander in chief. Now why is THAT?

why, because you cannot use bird flu or whatever as justification for martial law if you have national guard troops in the way. They might actually PROTECT states rights or citizens from the occupation of america by its own armed forces.
this is why national guard was sent to IRAQ, but not regular military. He wanted to be able to invade his own country with the people directly under his authority. that's why they are HERE and the national guard is THERE.

Remember Katrina. Remember that Bush demanded to have the La. governor turn over complete control or no assistance. Remember that relief was being coordinated by Northcom.

connect the dots.

[bleedingheart]

5. seems like something straight out of the Handmaid's Tale

really freaky...

[Stephanie]

6. I am serious

And I remember that Karl was insisting that Blanco declare Martial Law. So you think including that language was intended to overturn posse comitatus (sp)? But why? To control dissent, protests, etc.? And what would be his public reasoning, if they had to explain to Congress or something?

[Lerkfish]

12. yes, yes, and yes. CONTROL to put it simply.

the whole purpose of martial law is to institute a dictatorship, or ultimate control.
So yes, it would be to quell dissent, yes, it would be to control protests, but that is small potatoes.
The neocons need to CONTROL three things to have world domination:

1. all branches of govt.
2. the domestic population, to prevent them from preventing the agenda
3. the rest of the world, starting with the middle east.


They know that if the people are empowered, they will stop them, but good. Therefore, they have whittled away our ability to vote them out (diebold and ES&S), they have stymied our ability to stop them legally, by padding the judgeships with loyalists. And, if they have martial law, they can prevent us from organizing a citizen's militia to fight them before its started.

connect the dots. What kind of a picture does it make? a portrait of fascist empire.

[librechik]

13. suppose they actually believed that 9/11 was a domestic attack

after all, they KNEW they had just stolen the election and they knew we knew it! They had every reason to believe that armed patriots might be coming after them!

They've been working for this for decades. They've used mind control and propoganda techniques to get most of the armed patriots on their side and against true liberty. yet, as any fascist will tell you what they really fear is an asymmetrical attack, a tiny bomb, a lone assassin. All the trillion dollar war equipment is just to enrich their campaign contributors---at the taxpayers expense.

With true totalitarian control of the populace, they wouldn't have to worry so much about the asymmetrical warriors. The Constitution doesn't allow it, though.

Well, the Constitution is just a goddamned piece of paper, to Shrub.

[Stephanie]

15. But they could never say that to Daschle.

What would they have told Daschle was the justification, had he considered allowing them to insert the language?

[librechik]

22. By then he had Al-CIAda as a convenient demon

Osama is hiding under your bed, Mr and Mrs. America, in Anytown USA! And we need to listen to whatever he might be doing while he's in there, see?

It doesn't matter. They are incompetent and none of their machinations works the wau it should. They just want to keep us intimidated and scared so we let them look at our bankbooks and library records.

[merh]

7. Well we know they justify the torture, illegal imprisonment and

cruelty that they inflict on Iraqi and other non-citizens by saying we are at war.

So I pressume it means they would do the same thing here if the language had been left in the bill.

Think about it, everything they are doing in Iraq they would be doing here. :scared:









p.s.: They may well be doing much of it here now, they just have to be sneaky because if they get caught they don't have the authorization in the resolution.

[Stephanie]

9. So "war powers" would just wipe out all laws?

I'm seriously confused.

How are you merh? Happy Holidays! :hi:

[merh]

11. Yes, war powers would have wiped out all laws.

They wouldn't have to worry about those silly civil liberites (they don't now, they are just annoyed with having to explain why violating them isn't against the law).



I'm well, thanks for asking. :hug: Happy Holidays to you and your mom, many thanks and big hugs to you both. :grouphug:

[Jim__]

8. It could be argued that this power gave him the authority to, say,

spy on American citizens. But, he already claims that the act, as passed, gives him that authority. He's acting as if he has complete dictatorial power in the US, although he's keeping some of his actions secret and classified. I believe, all these words would do, is make his arguments, that he has the authority, more credible when he is found violating the constitutional rights of American citizens.

[hwmnbn]

14. this may be an oversimplification....

But the War Power Resolution means he is authorized to take whatever military action he deems necessary to destroy an enemy of the US (Al Qaeda). He has free reign in Iraq and Afghanistan. Actually with the rendition program, he has free reign globally even to supersede the Geneva Convention. Think secret prisons and torture.

He asked for but was refused war powers inside the US. Regardless, if he concludes some of those "enemies" are inside the US, he now contends, because of the president's inherent powers, he has free reign to even supersede our constitution. Think spying without warrants, and imprisoning US citizens without charges, think Jose Padilla.

The BIG problem with that is if unchecked, he can at his discretion, designate political adversaries as "enemy combatants." It's done all the time in dictatorships, think China and the former USSR. THAT hasn't happened yet, but who's gonna stop him in case of another "attack" inside the US?

He wouldn't need much of an excuse to deem non-freepers a threat to america and order the appropriate military action against us, which would be "legal" by those inherent powers. It just would have been easier if congress had given him war powers inside the US when he asked for it in the first place.

We could become blue state Fallujahs. That would be the extreme scenario, or he might just declare martial law.

Maybe I'm wrong, but that's my take on it.

[Stephanie]

16. So you think he would use it in terms of arrests and imprisonment

I guess that's why I was confused - war powers to me means bombs and guns. You think he wanted to designate people inside the US "unlawful combatants" or something like that, arrest them and imprison them without a trial, send them to Guantanamo?

[EFerrari]

17. Yes, and having that power gives him a reserve of menace.

Most people aren't afraid of their door being kicked in right now and look at how supine the press is and how passive the Congress and how timid people have been about criticizing the Cabal?

[hwmnbn]

19. Not all people will be arrested.....

just the dangerous one who publicly disagree with him.

Political rivals will be the first to be "taken in for questioning", but the chilling effect of that will give everyone pause. If you and your neighbors resist his authority, he'll use appropriate force to quell the insurrection and maintain his order. This is where bombs and guns come into play.

There is an escape clause however. If he has the unflinching support of the military and police depts to enforce his martial law, we're screwed and America is dead. If they do not support the detaining and killing of american citizens under martial law, then the chimp is screwed.

It will be crunch time for our people in uniform. They'll decide ultimately which to defend, the Constitution they swore to uphold, or the president they're trained to obey.

[Just Me]

18. He was trying to impose martial law (military rule) through the back door.

Scary, huh. They didn't want the people to know they were seeking a way of suspending constitutional protections.

Why? My guess is that they anticipated a growing wave of dissent and civil disobedience and they wanted the means to control it, quickly. They also sought to squash political opposition.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

20. It's a way that congress can avoid responsibility.

The president can take the nation to war without the constitutional restraint of declaring war.

[Stephanie]

23. I meant the inclusion of "inside the united states" in the war powers act

that's what everyone's in an uproar about - adding in that language - it sounds like Bush wanted to declare war on US.