Hedges writes: "The lawsuit, Hedges v. Obama, challenges Section 1021(b)(2) of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). It was signed into law the last day of 2011."
Alexa O�Brien speaks to reporters during a news conference on March 29, 2012, in New York. (photo: AP/Mary Altaffer)
Fighting the Militarized State
31 March 14
he Barack Obama administration, determined to thwart the attempt by other plaintiffs and myself to have the courts void a law that permits the military to arrest U.S. citizens, strip them of due process and indefinitely detain them, has filed a detailed brief with the Supreme Court asking the justices to refuse to accept our petition to hear our appeal. We will respond within 10 days.
�The administration�s unstated goal appears to be to get court to agree that [the administration] has the authority to use the military to detain U.S. citizens,� Bruce Afran, one of two attorneys handling the case, said when I spoke with him Sunday. �It appears to be asking the court to go against nearly 150 years of repeated decisions in which the court has refused to give the military such power. No court in U.S. history has ever recognized the right of the government to use the military to detain citizens. It would be very easy for the government to state in the brief that citizens and permanent residents are not within the scope of this law. But once again, it will not do this. It says the opposite. It argues that the activities of the plaintiffs do not fall within the scope of the law, but it clearly is reserving for itself the right to use the statute to detain U.S. citizens indefinitely.�
The lawsuit, Hedges v. Obama, challenges Section 1021(b)(2) of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). It was signed into law the last day of 2011. Afran and fellow attorney Carl Mayer filed the lawsuit in January 2012. I was later joined by co-plaintiffs Noam Chomsky, Daniel Ellsberg, journalist Alexa O�Brien, Tangerine Bolen, Icelandic parliamentarian Birgitta Jonsdottir and Occupy London activist Kai Wargalla.
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I think that as long as most of the people in the world are people we don't know personally, we will be playing the game.
I discussed this on the OWS chat last year with two anarchists. After drilling down into their core, we found that what they really want is person-to-perso n management of our daily affairs, not impersonal authority doing that for us.
I wish I could envision a just society composed of anything other than small self-governing villages and nomadic bands of hunter-gatherer s, but I can't. Not as long as we are who and what we are.
What I can hope for is a stable system of checks and balances of power. We have never had a perfectly functioning system, but we have had one that worked better than this one does. I believe that TV-driven politics and the environment of ignorance that nurtures it are the core of the problem.
Same here, but I'm watching now as violent anarchists (not part of the Occupy Movement) are smashing windows and causing chaos in Seattle amid what should be a non-violent strike.
These people are all dressed in black and hooded and masked, as usual, and once they finished bashing in things, they disperse and remove their coverings and meld into the crowd of peaceful Occupy protestors.
Unfortunately, their violent actions deflect from the valid purposes for the strike and the overarching reasons for the Occupy Movement.
Will the violence EVER end in the US? Or will it escalate, and use a righteous movement to perpetuate it?
This saddens me deeply.
N.
excellent point FireFly
- using the power of government to get things by force that one normally can't voluntarily get from others is a huge magnet for those who are dishonest and uncaring of others and have no problem lying and pretending like they care to get the power that they want.
Complete disconnect from reality - people across the globe can read and comment on this foolishness within moments and that hard fact totally escapes you casting a huge shadow of doubt when you do stumble across some actual truth.
But in no way should people let up. We need to be heard and as Patrick Leahy just said. "KEEP THE PRESSURE UP." NOT VOTING IS NOT A SOLUTION. And having a Rove puppet as president is not the answer either.
When the producers - those who have "exploited" you with their goods and services like iPhones, and polar fleeces, and their gasoline, and their computers, their medicines, their cars and their best services for the lowest cost and you have "exploited" them with your money -- when they are over taxed and over regulated to the point of economic failure and THEY go on strike -- you better be ready to take care of your greedy selfish selves for once.
OCCUPY OCCUPY OCCUPY !
Gandhi style:
Step 1: Sit down and get arrested
PEACEFULLY
Step 2: When released a few hours later,
repeat Step 1.
Overload the whole system.
Where will they put all these people?
Guantanamo?
Concentration Camps?
and show their true face.
(google Gandhi and see how he managed)
It reminded me of a magnificent point made by Trevor J. Saunders, in the essay with which he introduces his translation of Plato's "Laws," in the Penguin Classics series. Writing on the institution of slavery, which, we are disappointed to obsserve, many great-souled people in antiquity could never quite get beyond (cf. the recent movie "Agora," which turns on the troubled relationship between the brilliant mathematician Hypatia and her slave), Saunders writes, "We [moderns]reject [slavery] utterly; yet it was as completely taken for granted in the ancient world as the employer-employ ee relationship today (which may itself in time come to be regarded with as much distaste [!] as slavery is regarded now."
And yet, it will never be easy to overcome the systemic evil of competitiveness , since we are sexually reproducing animals and social primates. Competitiveness , and zero care for the suffering of outsiders, is our original sin. The strikers today maintain a hope that we may yet overcome that sin. And for that, I love them, admire them, and stand with them.
Correction: Was intended to be a reply to the comment posted 2012-05-01 10:45 by Martintfre, not directed at the article's author Mr. David.
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I am reminded of the 'ask a bitter man' skit of years past.
I submit that there is a different 'Complete disconnect from reality', maybe from being stuck behind a computer only connecting (or being paid to connect) on comment boards.
When speaking of greedy selfish selves, do you mean all of those people who became rich by striking?
Randian-speak at its finest.
I used to be unable to deal with any criticism, now I look at criticism as an opportunity to turn anyones criticism of me right back at them! So instead of anonymous thumbs down, what is your solution to injustice?
Why did Monarvchy change or fall? Why did Communism change or fall? Why will NWO USA change or fall?
Same answer.... it's the reverse of your thinking..not exist to expand....expan d to exist is the Robyn Hoood idea when it crosses the National borders in war to sell more everything at homw and rid populations to destroy things to make more labor jobs and force the richest to pay more to the machine than the machine pays to them.
Unindustrial revolution your need, out with GMO weedicides etc, back with weeders labor, out with Combine harvesters for rice, back with paddyworkers. Out with I-pad, Iphone, back with I can walk postie labor etc. Out with digital billing back with book keepers.