[S]ince September of last year - when Congress [...] passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006 - the president has the power to call any US citizen an "enemy combatant". He has the power to define what "enemy combatant" means. The president can also delegate to anyone he chooses in the executive branch the right to define "enemy combatant" any way he or she wants and then seize Americans accordingly."
Uhm. Can I get a reference on this? A chapter-and-verse section, or (ideally, in some closer-to-perfect-than-I'm-currently-expecting world) a clear explanation by someone as to what restraint is in place to prevent this from happening?
See the final text of the law here. (Click the version passed by both Houses.) Particularly the part under Beginning: Section 1: Sec. 2: Ch 47A: Subch. 1: Sec. 948a: Definition of "UNLAWFUL ENEMY COMBATTANT", and Sec. 942b in toto. Heck, read the whole subchapter, it's important.
Like so many laws, what it means in practice is hard to determine. I think the article spins it a bit as being more arbitrary than it is, but it's still rather too flexible as to what the Pres and Sec of Def can do for my taste.
I'm reading a lot of Barrington Moore recently, so when it comes to tyrannies I always look for partnerships: between urban radicals and reactionary peasants, between monarchists and anticommunists, etc. But are there any classes, in the technical sense, left in the USA to effect such partnerships? I don't think so, and hence I really don't buy the easy and uncritical comparison of modernist societies to postmodernist ones.
I certainly agree that we may end up seeng a far more brutal and sadistic set of foreign policies being initiated by the US than elsewhere across history, but where I disagree with Wolf is that in my view, these will be the self-enriching projects of conniving and predatory elites, rather than the framework of some scary, regime-creating social revolution. Westerners - by which I include Canadians, Brits, the whole shebang - are too fat, lazy and compacent to create New Totalitarianisms in our own back yards. We'd rather have lattes than Justice, and nobody ever denounced his or her neighbor to the Okhrana for a latte.
> But are there any classes, in the technical sense, left in the USA > to effect such partnerships?
What are you defining as classes in the technical sense? (Note your descriptions bring to mind a combination of "people enacting policies" and "people supporting policies", and I think you can find that in the US.)
I ask because it seems that you're arguing that the US doesn't have socioeconomic class distinctions. (Canada does, FWIW, and nothing I've seen in the states suggests it doesn't.)
> We'd rather have lattes than Justice,
Speak for yourself.
> and nobody ever denounced his or her neighbor to the Okhrana for a > latte.
Nor for coffee, nor for chocolate, nor for respect, nor out of fear, nor for cigarettes, nor for less beatings, nor to be thought useful by someone who had the power to punish you if *you* were denounced.
Right.
(You've gotta work on the subtle conveying of irony. You actually come across as if you're *seriously* saying no-one'd sell out a neighbour for a transient and tiny priviledge. Although I suppose arguing that lattes are more important than justice rather suggests it.)
For classes, I meant: social strata capable of defined collective action. One can impose such definitions typologically, from above - when I worked in market surveys we did it all the time - but that's putting the cart before the horse. The real issue is whether people have what Ibn Khaldun called asabiya: the capacity to organize. I don't see any such classes lying about in postmodern Western democracies, and I suppose only the hoariest of old Marxists would suggest that they ever existed: even in the Great Satan, less than 60% of the people vote. Hardly a population brimming with political verve.
As for the tiny and transient rewards, it seems weird to use use the worth of a cigarette in jail, say, to indicate its value to a dotcom billionaire. Beatings? How many groups are out there beating white suburbanites down on a regular basis?
My point is that the privileged sectors of western society - who are so privileged that they resemble the upper 1% of other societies elsewhere - are so turgid with satisfaction, so replete with pleasure and fulfilment, that their capacity to sustain the kind of mass psychology required for formal totalitarian revolution is lacking.
It's one thing to compare, as Wolf has done, the Nazis and Fascists to the contemporary Republicans, and I take many of her points. But their electorates are as alike as chalk and cheese, and her silence on the issue renders her insight more of a dinner-table curiosity than a sobering fact. Takes more than a fell government to make a regime, and it takes more than disapproval to oppose one.
*grin* I submit that your equation of "Westerner" to "white suburbanite" (and the fact that you're speaking of the privileged sectors as the only things worthy of consideration and as necessary for a revolution) is itself indicative of a class distinction, as you clearly feel comfortable dismissing those who are not privileged and those who are not white suburbanites from your example.
There's some kind of sociocultural divide going on right there.
If you want a social strata capable of defined collective action: the moral majority, the anti-war protestors, the politically active Republicans, the politically active Democrats, and in fact any group that defines itself around a particular action, even if membership in that group is not necessarily the be-all and end-all of a particular members' identity.
(As to cigarettes in jail: hey, you're the one who (1) brought up lattes and (2) suggested they're more important than Justice.)
OK, define revolution then. Because if Democratic America was unwilling to even get to the polls in 2004, if Republican Ohio couldn't add 2 and 2 and realize the government is hitting their 'class' hardest in war cost and economic tanking, then I don't see them as particularly conscientized.
And the same goes for the rest of the Whiney West. It suits a lot of people to conceive of revolutions as internal, like you can shop at Whole Foods and drunk Pura Vida instead of Starbucks and thereby tell yourself you're making a difference. I, however, continue to define revolutions as involving revolutionary change.
That word you are using in a context which clearly indicates you are happy to have it cover the rise to power of an elected party which then radically changes (among other things) the sociopolitical regime, accepted freedoms, government accountability, and institutionalized persecution within a country.
> It's one thing to compare, as Wolf has done, the Nazis and Fascists to the > contemporary Republicans, and I take many of her points. But their > electorates are as alike as chalk and cheese,
Actually, I'm going to have to ask you to clarify.
In both cases, you've got people who are largely without economic security, convinced that their nation is facing an outside threat from an indefinite (mutable, sneaky, might-be-next-door) threat, learning that their enemy is morally evil, taught that a return to the fine old homeland values will save them, associating moral absolutes with the party, promoting the "kinder, kusche, kirsch" ideal, often ignorant of the world outside their country, accepting constraints on their liberty, and willing to accept prejudice and abuse ranging from creepy to horrendous as long as it's directed towards the members of the group perceived as the source of the outside threat.
What are you seeing as the core differences that give rise to the chalk/cheese distinction?
Point me at an American Vreikorps, literally using armored cars and machine guns to wrest control of the government from their enemies in a series of street battles in Washington, D.C. Point me at a sector of American society fresh from international dismemberment and the 'Betrayal of Versailles'. Explain where it is that median-income Americans are carting their body weight in devalued US dollars to the bread store every day because of quadruple-digit inflation. Repeat the process for Fascist Spain, etc.
I mean, seriously. The propaganda may look the same. The dudes in power may look the same. Hell, the gulags may look the same (another debate we've already had). The electorates, and the contexts in which they operate, just don't seem comparible.
> Point me at an American Vreikorps, literally using armored cars and machine > guns to wrest control of the government from their enemies in a series of > street battles in Washington, D.C.
...why is it my job to support your argument that a concentrated attempt from the electorate to gain political power through physical violence against the opposition is a *prerequisite* for a fascist society?
I mean, I will agree with you that to my knowledge, there has been no such attempt. But I don't see such an attempt as necessary to prove that a society can be sliding towards fascism, certainly not in a society where it's possible to take power by other means.
> Point me at a sector of American society fresh from international > dismemberment and the 'Betrayal of Versailles'.
Gee, you mean find you a segment of American society that doesn't feel responsible for starting the conflict, that had its perception of its security and standing in the global area brutally shattered, that sees people advocating peace and restraint as terrible traitors to the homeland, that rallied behind a leader who promised retaliation, and that resents or is willing to reject international rulings?
I think I can do that.
> Explain where it is that median-income Americans are carting their body > weight in devalued US dollars to the bread store every day because of > quadruple-digit inflation.
Carting their body weight? In a plastic society? No, the hyperinflation isn't there; I never said it was. I did say that there was a lack of economic security, and I maintain that this is really a pretty important concern to people and one which is likely to get them tense, miserable, and willing to turn to people who offer solutions and a source of blame.
If your argument is that the circumstances are not exactly the same (although the condition of economic uncertainty is a factor in both societies), I will happily grant you that. But right now you've pointed out that the inflation isn't as bad and that the tactics used are not the same.
I'd like a little more distinction between my chalk and my cheese.
> I'd like a little more distinction between my chalk and my cheese.
The awesomely yummy stuff is the cheese, and the ZOMG AMERIKKKA haruspicy is the chalk? ;-)
If this argument really relies on me defending the assertion that post-Weimar Germany electorates and those in contemporary Western societies (like the US) are substantially - not just superficially - different, then I'm afraid I must concede your point. Because it's so clear to me that I am at a loss of how to proceed any more emphatically.
Heh. Fair enough. But you understand how "I know they're different, but I can't explain how, and neither refuted any of your arguments on how they were similar, nor offered arguments for why those similarities should be considered superficial" is hard for me to give serious weight to, and that *that's* what's striking me as the argumentum ad verecundiam here?
(Post-Weimar Germany was cheesy? ...yeah, okay. :) )
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(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-24 07:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-24 07:42 pm (UTC)There is no restraint in place to keep this from happening.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-24 08:05 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-24 09:05 pm (UTC)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_Commissions_Act_of_2006
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-24 09:10 pm (UTC)Particularly the part under Beginning: Section 1: Sec. 2: Ch 47A: Subch. 1: Sec. 948a: Definition of "UNLAWFUL ENEMY COMBATTANT", and Sec. 942b in toto. Heck, read the whole subchapter, it's important.
Like so many laws, what it means in practice is hard to determine. I think the article spins it a bit as being more arbitrary than it is, but it's still rather too flexible as to what the Pres and Sec of Def can do for my taste.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-25 04:06 pm (UTC)I certainly agree that we may end up seeng a far more brutal and sadistic set of foreign policies being initiated by the US than elsewhere across history, but where I disagree with Wolf is that in my view, these will be the self-enriching projects of conniving and predatory elites, rather than the framework of some scary, regime-creating social revolution. Westerners - by which I include Canadians, Brits, the whole shebang - are too fat, lazy and compacent to create New Totalitarianisms in our own back yards. We'd rather have lattes than Justice, and nobody ever denounced his or her neighbor to the Okhrana for a latte.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-25 08:39 pm (UTC)> to effect such partnerships?
What are you defining as classes in the technical sense? (Note your descriptions bring to mind a combination of "people enacting policies" and "people supporting policies", and I think you can find that in the US.)
I ask because it seems that you're arguing that the US doesn't have socioeconomic class distinctions. (Canada does, FWIW, and nothing I've seen in the states suggests it doesn't.)
> We'd rather have lattes than Justice,
Speak for yourself.
> and nobody ever denounced his or her neighbor to the Okhrana for a
> latte.
Nor for coffee, nor for chocolate, nor for respect, nor out of fear, nor for cigarettes, nor for less beatings, nor to be thought useful by someone who had the power to punish you if *you* were denounced.
Right.
(You've gotta work on the subtle conveying of irony. You actually come across as if you're *seriously* saying no-one'd sell out a neighbour for a transient and tiny priviledge. Although I suppose arguing that lattes are more important than justice rather suggests it.)
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-25 08:53 pm (UTC)As for the tiny and transient rewards, it seems weird to use use the worth of a cigarette in jail, say, to indicate its value to a dotcom billionaire. Beatings? How many groups are out there beating white suburbanites down on a regular basis?
My point is that the privileged sectors of western society - who are so privileged that they resemble the upper 1% of other societies elsewhere - are so turgid with satisfaction, so replete with pleasure and fulfilment, that their capacity to sustain the kind of mass psychology required for formal totalitarian revolution is lacking.
It's one thing to compare, as Wolf has done, the Nazis and Fascists to the contemporary Republicans, and I take many of her points. But their electorates are as alike as chalk and cheese, and her silence on the issue renders her insight more of a dinner-table curiosity than a sobering fact. Takes more than a fell government to make a regime, and it takes more than disapproval to oppose one.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-25 09:27 pm (UTC)There's some kind of sociocultural divide going on right there.
If you want a social strata capable of defined collective action: the moral majority, the anti-war protestors, the politically active Republicans, the politically active Democrats, and in fact any group that defines itself around a particular action, even if membership in that group is not necessarily the be-all and end-all of a particular members' identity.
(As to cigarettes in jail: hey, you're the one who (1) brought up lattes and (2) suggested they're more important than Justice.)
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-26 02:39 am (UTC)And the same goes for the rest of the Whiney West. It suits a lot of people to conceive of revolutions as internal, like you can shop at Whole Foods and drunk Pura Vida instead of Starbucks and thereby tell yourself you're making a difference. I, however, continue to define revolutions as involving revolutionary change.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-26 03:49 am (UTC)That word you are using in a context which clearly indicates you are happy to have it cover the rise to power of an elected party which then radically changes (among other things) the sociopolitical regime, accepted freedoms, government accountability, and institutionalized persecution within a country.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-25 09:39 pm (UTC)> contemporary Republicans, and I take many of her points. But their
> electorates are as alike as chalk and cheese,
Actually, I'm going to have to ask you to clarify.
In both cases, you've got people who are largely without economic security, convinced that their nation is facing an outside threat from an indefinite (mutable, sneaky, might-be-next-door) threat, learning that their enemy is morally evil, taught that a return to the fine old homeland values will save them, associating moral absolutes with the party, promoting the "kinder, kusche, kirsch" ideal, often ignorant of the world outside their country, accepting constraints on their liberty, and willing to accept prejudice and abuse ranging from creepy to horrendous as long as it's directed towards the members of the group perceived as the source of the outside threat.
What are you seeing as the core differences that give rise to the chalk/cheese distinction?
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-26 02:44 am (UTC)Point me at an American Vreikorps, literally using armored cars and machine guns to wrest control of the government from their enemies in a series of street battles in Washington, D.C. Point me at a sector of American society fresh from international dismemberment and the 'Betrayal of Versailles'. Explain where it is that median-income Americans are carting their body weight in devalued US dollars to the bread store every day because of quadruple-digit inflation. Repeat the process for Fascist Spain, etc.
I mean, seriously. The propaganda may look the same. The dudes in power may look the same. Hell, the gulags may look the same (another debate we've already had). The electorates, and the contexts in which they operate, just don't seem comparible.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-26 04:14 am (UTC)> guns to wrest control of the government from their enemies in a series of
> street battles in Washington, D.C.
...why is it my job to support your argument that a concentrated attempt from the electorate to gain political power through physical violence against the opposition is a *prerequisite* for a fascist society?
I mean, I will agree with you that to my knowledge, there has been no such attempt. But I don't see such an attempt as necessary to prove that a society can be sliding towards fascism, certainly not in a society where it's possible to take power by other means.
> Point me at a sector of American society fresh from international
> dismemberment and the 'Betrayal of Versailles'.
Gee, you mean find you a segment of American society that doesn't feel responsible for starting the conflict, that had its perception of its security and standing in the global area brutally shattered, that sees people advocating peace and restraint as terrible traitors to the homeland, that rallied behind a leader who promised retaliation, and that resents or is willing to reject international rulings?
I think I can do that.
> Explain where it is that median-income Americans are carting their body
> weight in devalued US dollars to the bread store every day because of
> quadruple-digit inflation.
Carting their body weight? In a plastic society? No, the hyperinflation isn't there; I never said it was. I did say that there was a lack of economic security, and I maintain that this is really a pretty important concern to people and one which is likely to get them tense, miserable, and willing to turn to people who offer solutions and a source of blame.
If your argument is that the circumstances are not exactly the same (although the condition of economic uncertainty is a factor in both societies), I will happily grant you that. But right now you've pointed out that the inflation isn't as bad and that the tactics used are not the same.
I'd like a little more distinction between my chalk and my cheese.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-26 05:02 am (UTC)The awesomely yummy stuff is the cheese, and the ZOMG AMERIKKKA haruspicy is the chalk? ;-)
If this argument really relies on me defending the assertion that post-Weimar Germany electorates and those in contemporary Western societies (like the US) are substantially - not just superficially - different, then I'm afraid I must concede your point. Because it's so clear to me that I am at a loss of how to proceed any more emphatically.
(no subject)
Date: 2007-04-26 11:08 am (UTC)(Post-Weimar Germany was cheesy? ...yeah, okay. :) )