A Republican congressman from Georgia said Monday he fears that President-elect Obama will establish a Gestapo-like security force to impose a Marxist dictatorship.Some counsel us that this is hyperbole, and such rhetoric is not helpful. It makes "us" look wacko.
I disagree. The way to make it more difficult for unmasked tyranny to become pervasive is to sound warnings when it's approaching the perimeter. All the structures are already in place. All that's needed is an event of sufficient magnitude.
Dismiss this as tinfoil hat black helicopters all you want. Point and laugh. Hell, invoke Godwin's Law if you like--even though national socialism is staring us all in the face.
Something I wrote a while back about the "insurrectionary theory" of the Second Amendment comes to mind:
And to those who feel this is too dangerous, that it is uncalled for, that it is unneeded because we have the vote, or the right to speak, that we have evolved beyond such crude reminders of our barbaric past, I must ask where in history is any civilization guaranteed stasis? Has not despotism and mass destruction plagued every civilization that preceded ours? Is it not, in fact, still commonplace throughout the globe? By what suspension of reality, by what denial of the observable and the probable, by what art, device or magic are we sheltered few immune from catastrophe? Are we certain, from our brief and privileged vantage point, that such things will ever remain headline curiosities? Is it not just plain stupid to proclaim that our familiar way of life will forever be the norm, when everything that has gone before us shows we are, instead, the extremely lucky beneficiaries of a rare and fortunate convergence of circumstances; and one, by the way, that has only been preserved under force of arms?But what do I know, paranoid absolutist "principles freak" that I am...?
[Via David H and Tommy S]
6 comments:
It's a little late for Obama to do that. The name "Committee for State Security," oops, I mean, "Department of Homeland Security" always makes me think of the KGB rather than the Gestapo.
I note that while Broun was so recently elected that he wasn't around for most of this, he did vote for HR 6304. If he didn't want Obama to have dictatorial powers, maybe he shouldn't have done what he could to given them to him!
It sure hasn't taken the Republican faction of the Boot On Your Neck Party long to stop the "one people, one nation, one president" rhetoric.
I expect that in the next few years we'll see universal amnesia among politicians who were in office during the Bushevik rule, with Republicans pretend that Obama isn't just using the powers that they gave him, and Democrats pretending that they always thought the president should have absolute dictatorial power.
So, now we have our own KGB, and Obama wants our own veersion of the Gestapo. Wonder-freakin'-ful!
The structures of tyranny were put in place in the wake of the last event of sufficient magnitude. A closer look at that day could preempt its sequel, and roll back the oppression of the last seven years.
Maybe if he does it, the 3% will increase to 6%, or start pushing back. It is past time, you know.
I actually think that Jeff Knox's estimate of .005% is much more likely. That's still plenty, though--just look at how tiny the IRA was...
". . . even though national socialism is staring us all in the face."
Staring us in the face? Isn't that an understatement David?
I'd say it's already here.
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