Prepared Broadside Or Thoughtless Remarks?
A wise and genteel Daddy Warbucks should invade and benevolently occupy the United States and thereby defend its constitutional guarantees of liberty and democracy - just as The Freedom Bringer busily promotes them in Iraq. It might relieve four-star General Tommy Franks' fear of a U.S. Government suspending the Constitution.
The recently retired, nearly 40 year US Army veteran, former commander of Centcom, Iraq war leader and household name, speculates in a men's lifestyle magazine on the consequences of a weapons of mass destruction terrorist attack against the West: "The Western world loses its freedom and liberty . . . it causes our population to question our own Constitution and to begin to militarize our country in order to avoid a repeat of another mass, casualty-producing event. Which in fact then begins to unravel the fabric of our Constitution." Another 9-11 attack means a discarded Constitution and a militarized government? Constitution scrapped, dictatorship imposed? What's the esteemed general smoking?
But in fairness, the reverentially interviewed General Franks doubts the U.S. Constitution will survive a WMD attack, and says it where? Cigar Aficionado, a men's fashion magazine. Typically, Cigar Aficionado's destructive weapons fare is opulently pictured panatelas and robustos. The magazine's explosives inspectors rate these for draw, wrapper color, and hints of vanilla or cinnamon flavors. Gleaming nick knacks for up and coming aristos - gold toothpicks, Lamborghini accessories, and finely crafted leather products so costly they should never be more than smelled, fumigate the magazine's cigar descriptions. Surely, the excellent general more likely inhaled or went into an AARP pipe dream for bored supreme-commander types than mean Saddam on the Potomac.
That's all it was; had to be. One of the highest ranking, best known and respected officials in government openly suggests that if the event the entire U.S. public sector readies daily for actually happens, The Constitution of The United States may be scrapped, and the item appears below reports of the damage President Bush's Secret Service inflicted on The Queen of England's rose garden during the recent Presidential State Visit.
In the interview, General Franks exhales personal regret, if after a major terrorist attack,
"The free world loses what it cherishes most, and that is the freedom and liberty we've seen for a couple of hundred years in the grand experiment that we call democracy." Unfortunately, if America's reaction to their trashed civil rights by Patriot Acts I & II is any guide, surrendering constitutional protections should be okay as long as the Commander in Chief of a military dictatorship with absolute powers protects the rights to corpulence and 87 cable TV channels.
But really, one must get a grip. The U.S. isn't pre-liberation Iraq (No, all the men there own automatic weapons). The FBI only monitors some demonstrations and collects information on only certain protestors. When was the last time agents entered the home or read the mail of citizens engaged in unpatriotic political speech? Unknown, they needn't inform anyone. No warrant? Don't need one: Nixonion scrutiny of otherwise constitutionally protected civil liberties now only requires a "suspicious" tag.
The call throughout the homeland advises that in the interest of fighting terrorism, loyal Americans should willingly accept some curtailment of their constitutional rights. In the fight for homeland defense, only extremist elements oppose reductions to their liberties. Why fear government command? The reassuring embrace of a benevolent generalissimo succors some of America's best allies. The intentions of enlightened leaders such as Attorney General Ashcroft, Vice President Cheney and the President rest on virtues pure as the driven snow. Surrendering to them after a red alert assures success against evildoers and harm. To even question their judgment tarnishes the shinning badge of freedom and liberty they received from high on a mountaintop shrouded in dark clouds, struck by Olympian light.
No, the U.S. is not the United Kingdom; where sweeping new laws allow the British Government over-ride of civil liberties should the Government proclaim an emergency. The Government may then restrict citizen's movements, confiscate property, suspend parts of their Human Rights Act with nary a Parliamentary vote, ban travel and prohibit assemblies, including street demonstrations.
No, Washington is not London; democracy's capital needs no Civil Contingencies Law to scrap the Constitution. The president, presumably at the mass behest of terrified minions can simply suspend it. The way General Franks puts it, after another terrible terrorist attack, Americans fall begging on hands and knees, "Please, Mr. President, Mr. Ashcroft, terrorists everywhere. Dear sirs, please enslave us. Lock us in our homes, block our roads, read our mail, but please, kind sirs, please save us." How much of their constitutional rights should Americans surrender in the fight against terrorism? Nothing. Not an inch, not a word, not a syllable, not a hair's breadth that brings closer the winnowing of their sovereignty to the winds of despotism.
It's the sensational in General Frank's comments that prevail, not his message's unofficial medium. That the old warhorse offers his provocative statements in-between flicking his Bic and shaking his stogie's ash dampens nothing he says. To the contrary, it's the nonchalance of his bombshell that reverberates, the hollow response from media that rattles.
Is believing that General Frank's remarks are no accident, callow, or is it cagey? Maybe only a wacko thinks the General's statements were calculated or that they weren't the imprudent ramble of a man at ease, retired from statements for the record. That they appeared in so unofficial an organ as a dilettante's journal makes the suspicion more credible than risible.
To fanciers of intrigue, General Franks' remarks suggest a feeler, a testing the waters of press sensibilities for how far a White House contemplating a bloodless constitutional coup might go without meeting vocal resistance. An inference of the kind General Franks ventures, published in a hobbyist's monthly dedicated to the proposition that all men should pursue happiness, doesn't trigger questioning from a Congressional Committee.
Land sakes, the guy's just giving an opinion! Probably all it is, a guy blowing smoke rings; however, General Frank's forecast, planted or unplanned, and the green light its media reception suggests, recommends to an opportunist government in crisis a forbidden act as tempting as teenage smoking or preemptive war - if it looks like they can get away with it. Hopefully, if a constitutional trashing comes, a liberal democracy's spirit will eventually occupy the United States and restore a constitutional republic in democracy and limited government. Whatever his intentions, thanks to General Franks for the heads up; but he could have generated more heat by simply lighting up at any smokeless New York eatery.
November 29, 2003