It Can't Happen Here By Rep. Ron Paul

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Rense.com It Can't Happen Here By Rep. Ron Paul 12-21-4 It

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Rense.com

It Can't Happen Here

By Rep. Ron Paul

12-21-4

 

It Can't Happen Here

 

Address:http://www.rense.com/general61/reee.htm

Tuesday, December 21, 2004

 

 

In 2002 I asked my House colleagues a rhetorical question with regard to

the onslaught of government growth in the post-September 11th era: Is

America becoming a police state?

 

The question is no longer rhetorical. We are not yet living in a total

police state, but it is fast approaching. The seeds of future tyranny

have been sown, and many of our basic protections against government

have been undermined. The atmosphere since 2001 has permitted Congress

to create whole new departments and agencies that purport to make us

safer- always at the expense of our liberty. But security and liberty go

hand-in-hand. Members of Congress, like too many Americans, don't

understand that a society with no constraints on its government cannot

be secure. History proves that societies crumble when their governments

become more powerful than the people and private institutions.

 

Unfortunately, the new intelligence bill passed by Congress two weeks

ago moves us closer to an encroaching police state by imposing the

precursor to a full-fledged national ID card. Within two years, every

American will need a " conforming ID to deal with any federal agency --

including TSA at the airport. Undoubtedly many Americans and members of

Congress don't believe America is becoming a police state, which is

reasonable enough. They associate the phrase with highly visible symbols

of authoritarianism like military patrols, martial law, and summary

executions. But we ought to be concerned that we have laid the

foundation for tyranny by making the public more docile, more accustomed

to government bullying, and more accepting of arbitrary authority -- all

in the name of security. Our love for liberty above all has been so

diminished that we tolerate intrusions into our privacy that would have

been abhorred just a few years ago. We tolerate inconveniences and

infringements upon our liberties in a manner that reflects poorly on our

great national character of rugged individualism. American history, at

least in part, is a history of people who don't like being told what to

do. Yet we are increasingly empowering the federal government and its

agents to run our lives.

 

Terror, fear, and crises like 9-11 are used to achieve complacency and

obedience, especially when citizens are deluded into believing they are

still a free people. The loss of liberty, we are assured, will be

minimal, short-lived, and necessary. Many citizens believe that once the

war on terror is over, restrictions on their liberties will be reversed.

But this war is undeclared and open-ended, with no precise enemy and no

expressly stated final goal. Terrorism will never be eradicated

completely; does this mean future presidents will assert extraordinary

war powers indefinitely?

 

Washington DC provides a vivid illustration of what our future might

look like. Visitors to Capitol Hill encounter police barricades, metal

detectors, paramilitary officers carrying fully automatic rifles, police

dogs, ID checks, and vehicle stops. The people are totally disarmed;

only the police and criminals have guns. Surveillance cameras are

everywhere, monitoring street activity, subway travel, parks, and

federal buildings. There's not much evidence of an open society in

Washington, DC, yet most folks do not complain -- anything goes if it's

for government-provided safety and security.

 

After all, proponents argue, the government is doing all this to catch

the bad guys. If you don't have anything to hide, they ask, what are you

so afraid of? The answer is that I'm afraid of losing the last vestiges

of privacy that a free society should hold dear. I'm afraid of creating

a society where the burden is on citizens to prove their innocence,

rather than on government to prove wrongdoing. Most of all, I'm afraid

of living in a society where a subservient populace surrenders its

liberties to an all-powerful government.

 

It may be true that average Americans do not feel intimidated by the

encroachment of the police state. Americans remain tolerant of what they

see as mere nuisances because they have been deluded into believing

total government supervision is necessary and helpful, and because they

still enjoy a high level of material comfort. That tolerance may wane,

however, as our standard of living falls due to spiraling debt, endless

deficit spending at home and abroad, a declining fiat dollar, inflation,

higher interest rates, and failing entitlement programs. At that point

attitudes toward omnipotent government may change, but the trend toward

authoritarianism will be difficult to reverse.

 

Those who believe a police state can't happen here are poor students of

history. Every government, democratic or not, is capable of tyranny. We

must understand this if we hope to remain a free people.

 

 

 

 

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