Riptide of the brownshirts
CounterPunch
by Paul Craig Roberts
09/12/05
Readers have insisted to me that Bush administration incompetence, even at the level of criminal negligence, cannot explain the New Orleans disaster. They insist there must have been willful intent as the disaster is too large and was too predictable to be the result of mere incompetence. Readers cite the following circumstantial evidence in behalf of their views: The response of federal emergency management was delayed until survivors desperate for food and water (and some for a drug fix) began looting. In keeping with James Q. Wilson's 'broken window' analogy, looting for survival quickly spread into general lawlessness on the part of some elements. ... The lawlessness provided cover for the federal government to violate the Posse Commitatus Act and send in regular military troops to police civilian populations .... Lawlessness, the eruption of which was guaranteed by delayed relief, provides cover both for martial law, which suspends constitutional protections, and for the confiscation of legally owned private firearms in violation of the Second Amendment to the US Constitution. ... These suspicions are widely held. They demand careful investigation both by Congress and the news media. If there are valid grounds for the suspicions, our remaining liberties are at risk. Even if the suspicions are groundless, they are highly corrosive of many Americans' belief in their system of government... [Editor's note: By George, I think he's 'got it' - MLS]
http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts09122005.html
Informant: Thomas L. Knapp
by Paul Craig Roberts
09/12/05
Readers have insisted to me that Bush administration incompetence, even at the level of criminal negligence, cannot explain the New Orleans disaster. They insist there must have been willful intent as the disaster is too large and was too predictable to be the result of mere incompetence. Readers cite the following circumstantial evidence in behalf of their views: The response of federal emergency management was delayed until survivors desperate for food and water (and some for a drug fix) began looting. In keeping with James Q. Wilson's 'broken window' analogy, looting for survival quickly spread into general lawlessness on the part of some elements. ... The lawlessness provided cover for the federal government to violate the Posse Commitatus Act and send in regular military troops to police civilian populations .... Lawlessness, the eruption of which was guaranteed by delayed relief, provides cover both for martial law, which suspends constitutional protections, and for the confiscation of legally owned private firearms in violation of the Second Amendment to the US Constitution. ... These suspicions are widely held. They demand careful investigation both by Congress and the news media. If there are valid grounds for the suspicions, our remaining liberties are at risk. Even if the suspicions are groundless, they are highly corrosive of many Americans' belief in their system of government... [Editor's note: By George, I think he's 'got it' - MLS]
http://www.counterpunch.org/roberts09122005.html
Informant: Thomas L. Knapp
Starmail - 13. Sep, 11:56
