On New Year’s Eve, President Obama signed into law the National Defense Authorization Act for 2012 (NDAA).
It is important legislation. But sections 1021 and 1022, titled “Counterterrorism,” gives the government frightening powers that are unconstitutional, outrageous, and dangerous. The Act appropriates Pentagon spending for 2012 that includes a pay raise for the Armed Forces. However, Congress amended the legislation to include changes in the law that leaders felt were necessary to combat counterterrorism. Those changes ominously allow military detention of American citizens without trial and the use of military force on U.S. soil.
In his signing statement, Obama said, “I have signed this bill despite having serious reservations with certain provisions that regulate the detention, interrogation, and prosecution of suspected terrorists.
“I want to clarify that my administration will not authorize the indefinite military detention without trial of American citizens. Indeed, I believe that doing so would break with our most important traditions and values as a Nation. My administration will interpret section 1021 in a manner that ensures that any detention it authorizes complies with the Constitution, the laws of war, and all other applicable law.”
However, that does not mean any future president would not abuse his or her power to imprison Americans indefinitely at one of its “black sites” or in places like Guantanamo without due process, or to use military forces to apprehend suspected terrorist including Americans within the United States.
Ron Paul submitted legislation that would repeal NDAA’s Section 1021. Former war correspondent and author Chris Hedges has filed a lawsuit against Barack Obama, challenging the legality of NDAA’s sections 1021 and 1022. And, in opposition to NDAA, Obama and Congress ignored the criticism of every leader responsible for national security: Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, CIA Director David Petraeus, FBI Director Robert Mueller, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, White House Advisor for Counterterrorism John Brennan, and DOJ National Security Division head Lisa Monaco.
A typical Republican response, albeit each would phrase it differently, came from Senator Lindsay Graham, who had the audacity on the Senate floor to say, “When they say ‘I want my lawyer,’ you tell them, ‘Shut up. You don’t get a lawyer.’”
Fear of terrorism is the driving force behind the abandonment of constitutionally protected rights and freedoms. So, despite preaching by Republicans of the importance of preserving our freedoms, it is deemed appropriate considering the dangers we face
Hedges writes, “Fear is the psychological weapon of choice for totalitarian systems of power. Make the people afraid. Get them to surrender their rights in the name of national security. And then finish off the few who aren’t afraid enough. If this law is not revoked we will be no different from any sordid military dictatorship. Its implementation will be a huge leap forward for the corporate oligarchs who plan to continue to plunder the nation and use state and military security to cow the population into submission.”
What America is fast becoming is a militarized and totalitarian state. It is perpetrated and nurtured by government, the private sector industries that supply military supplies and armaments, and those who subcontract with the military and private security industries associated with Homeland Security, who feed on America’s obsession with patriotism and their neurotic fear of terrorism.