CONTINUAL WAR AS A TOOL

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Mon, 06 Feb 2006 19:49:30 -0500

CONTINUAL WAR AS A TOOL

 

 

 

COMMENTARY:

The Constitution Is At Stake

by Thom Hartmann

 

George W. Bush has attached more than one hundred " presidential

signing statements " to legislation passed by Congress, with the goal

of inflating presidential power and inserting himself into the

lawmaking process—a strategy developed in part by Samuel Alito

himself.Samuel Alito is a big booster of presidential power. Other

" constitutional scholars " have been less sanguine.

On April 20, 1795, James Madison, who had just helped shepherd through

the Constitution and Bill of Rights, and would become President of the

United States in the following decade, wrote:

 

" Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be

dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War

is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes. And

armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing

the many under the domination of the few. "

Reflecting on the ability of a president to use war as an excuse to

become a virtual dictator, Madison continued his letter:

" In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive [President] is

extended. Its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments

is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to

those of subduing the force of the people. The same malignant aspect

in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the

opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war...and in the

degeneracy of manners and morals, engendered by both.

" No nation, " our fourth President and the Father of the Constitution

concluded, " could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare. "

 

Since Madison's warning, " continual warfare " has been used both in

fiction and in the real world.

In the novel 1984 by George Orwell, the way a seemingly democratic

president kept his nation in a continual state of repression was by

having a continuous war.

 

Cynics suggest the lesson wasn't lost on Lyndon Johnson or Richard

Nixon, who both, they say, extended the Vietnam war so it

coincidentally ran over election cycles, knowing that a wartime

President's party is more likely to be reelected and has more power

than a President in peacetime.

 

And, as George W. Bush told his biographer in 1999:

 

" One of the keys to being seen as a great leader is to be seen as

commander in chief. My father had all this political capital built up

when he drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and he wasted it. If I have a

chance to invade, if I had that much capital, I'm not going to waste

it. I'm going to get everything passed that I want to get passed and

I'm going to have a successful presidency. "

Similarly, Adolf Hitler used the 1933 burning of the Reichstag

(Parliament) building by a deranged Dutchman to declare a " war on

terrorism, " establish his legitimacy as a leader (even though he

hadn't won a majority in the previous election).

" You are now witnessing the beginning of a great epoch in history, " he

proclaimed, standing in front of the burned-out building, surrounded

by national media. " This fire, " he said, his voice trembling with

emotion, " is the beginning. " He used the occasion— " a sign from God, "

he called it—to declare an all-out war on terrorism and its

ideological sponsors, a people, he said, who traced their origins to

the Middle East and found motivation for their " evil " deeds in their

religion.

 

Two weeks later, the first prison for terrorists was built in

Oranianberg, holding the first suspected allies of the infamous terrorist.

 

Within four weeks of the terrorist attack, the nation's now-popular

leader had pushed through legislation, in the name of combating

terrorism and fighting the philosophy he said spawned it, that

suspended constitutional guarantees of free speech, privacy, and

habeas corpus. Police could now intercept mail and wiretap phones

without warrants; suspected terrorists could be imprisoned without

specific charges and without access to their lawyers; police could

sneak into people's homes without warrants if the cases involved

terrorism.

 

To get his patriotic " Decree on the Protection of People and State "

passed over the objections of concerned legislators and civil

libertarians, he agreed to put a 4-year sunset provision on it: if the

national emergency provoked by the terrorist attack on the Reichstag

building was over by then, the freedoms and rights would be returned

to the people, and the police agencies would be re-restrained.

 

He then expanded his personal security service (the Stosstrupp) into a

nationwide police force (the SchutzStaffel), answerable only to him,

and thus with virtually unlimited powers of arrest and imprisonment.

 

Now George W. Bush is the most recent " leader " to claim vast and wide

powers during time of war, that those powers trump the constitution,

and that the war he has started will go on " for generations " to come.

 

To this end, has attached more than one hundred " presidential signing

statements " to legislation passed by Congress, with the goal of

inflating presidential power and inserting himself into the lawmaking

process—a strategy developed in part by Samuel Alito himself.

 

In the new reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act—legislation almost

certain to eventually come before the Supreme Court—Section 3605

expands the Secret Service (SS) from a Presidential protection detail

to a national police force with the power to designate anyplace where

people are meeting in the USA as a SENS (Special Event of National

Significance).And in the new reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act—a

piece of legislation almost certain to eventually come before the

Supreme Court—Section 3605 expands the Secret Service (SS) from a

Presidential protection detail to a national police force with the

power to designate anyplace where people are meeting in the USA as a

SENS (Special Event of National Significance).

 

Once a SENS is established—anywhere, anytime, at the sole discretion

of the SS (and it's not even necessary that the President or any other

Executive Branch member be present)—the SS shall have the power to

(quoting the new PATRIOT Act provisions) " carry firearms " and " make

arrests without warrant for any offense against the United States

committed in their presence, or for any felony cognizable under the

laws of the United States if they have reasonable grounds to believe

that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing such

felony. "

 

Samuel Alito not only would support such expansions of Presidential

power on the Supreme Court, he was the author and/or principal

proponent of several of the devices used today by Bush to secure such

power (including the argument that the power of the Presidency is

" unitary " ).

 

The vote this week about Samuel Alito was not a vote about Republicans

versus Democrats. It was a vote about the future of democracy in the

United States of America.

 

Do we accept Madison's vision of a nation in search of peace and with

personal privacy intact, or do we embrace Samuel Alito's vision of

questionable elections, spying on citizens to create an atmosphere of

fear and uncertainty, repression of women's and minority rights, and

war without end?

 

We must carefully note the positions our legislators took on this

vote. Their oath of office is not to the President or even to " protect

the people, " but to the Constitution. And it is the Constitution—and

the future of our democratic republic—that is at stake.

 

 

--

 

Thom Hartmann [thom] is a Project Censored

Award-winning best-selling author and host of a nationally syndicated

daily progressive talk show syndicated by Air America Radio.

thomhartmann.com His most recent book is What Would Jefferson Do?.

This commentary was originally published prior to the Senate's

affirmation of the nomination of Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court; it

has been slightly edited to reflect the outcome of that vote.

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The Constitution Is At Stake

Baltimore Chronicle & Sentinel Mon, 06 Feb 2006 5:49 AM PST

Samuel Alito is a big booster of presidential power. Other

" constitutional scholars " have been less sanguine. " Of all the enemies

to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it

comprises and develops the germ of every other.