You think it could never happen in America that D.Trump could shut down the media he deems hostile and suspend our Constitutional rights. But it has happened in the past and it happened under more than one president.
President Adams in 1798 in response to a French threat had his Alien and Sedition Acts. One Federalist in Congress declared, there was no need to “invite hordes of Wild Irishmen, nor the turbulent and disorderly of all the world, to come here with a basic view to distract our tranquility.” It was described as: “No protesting the government? No immigrants allowed in? No freedom of the press. Lawmakers jailed? ”
President Lincoln: “On April 27, 1861, President Lincoln, fearful that Southern troops might overtake the capital, suspended the writ of habeas corpus and declared martial law in Maryland. . . . On May 26, 1861, Chief Justice Roger Taney, sitting circuit, ruled that Lincoln had acted unconstitutionally — only Congress could suspend the Great Writ. Lincoln ignored the order and continued to seize and hold adversaries without a hearing”
There’s more: “In March 1863, Lincoln appointed Gen. Ambrose Burnside to be the Union commander overseeing Ohio. In executing his duties, Burnside assumed the power to define lawful dissent. By his measure, any criticism of the president was treasonous. . . . Burnside went after anti-war protesters, most notably a former Ohio congressman, Clement L. Vallandigham. . . . [who called the war] “wicked, cruel, and unnecessary.” . . . Burnside then had Vallandigham arrested and charged him with uttering “disloyal sentiments and opinions, with the object and purpose of weakening the power of the Government in its efforts to suppress unlawful rebellion. The former congressman was convicted by a military tribunal and was sentenced to “close confinement” until the end of the war. . . . Later, Gen. Burnside issued another order, # 84, which provided: “ On account of the repeated expression of disloyal and incendiary sentiments, the publication of the newspaper known as the Chicago Times is hereby suppressed.””
Later Lincoln being displeased by two newspapers which printed what D.Trump would call fake news “ordered the two newspapers closed and their owners arrested and imprisoned. The Independent Telegraph System, which had transmitted the story, was seized by the military and its transmissions stopped.”
Lincoln was an educated man who read often and is considered one of our most brilliant presidents; imagine the same powers in the hands of D.Trump.
President Wilson: “A printable World War I article which appeared in the New York Times some four months after the American declaration of war reported that the United States Government was obligated to close all newspapers and magazines that called into question any effort to prosecute the war or support the British or French governments. The New York Times reported that the government was granted this power under “Title 1,section 1, 2, and 3 of Title 12 of the Espionage Act” (signed by President Wilson on June 13, 1917).”
Keep in mind none of these prior presidents had called the media “the enemy of the American people” but they still sought to curb freedom of press and shut down and arrest newspaper people. The Courts did nothing about it; Congress abetted it with legislation.
With Adams the French threat eventually subsided and the populace calmed down although in the late 1840s and 1850s an anti-Irish Catholic political party known as the Know Nothings came into existence which makes one shakes his head hearing Irish people demonizing newcomers to the country.
With Lincoln the prohibitions vanished with the end of the conflict; with Wilson within a year and a half after America’s entry into the war an armistice came about ending the fighting for the most part. Some American troops battled on in Russia.
When you have a war that does not end. When you have a D.Trump who not only does not teeter on the edge of truthfulness but wallows in the nadir of lies. When you have him unlike no other U.S. president defining the enemy as the media. When he can point to precedent during a “national emergency,” fake or otherwise, to muzzle the press which he has labeled a danger to America . Expect, as his first act after declaring the emergency the shutting down of all opposition press. This will be the beginning of the end of our democracy.
Bill, anti-Trumps are now “Jihadists”? Really? Isn’t that the flip-side of Trump supporters as “Nazis”? Such rhetoric.
Sessions said he may have misspoke—I’m fine with that but spinners are saying he answered the questions as presented–fine, if this was a trial. but it was hearing before a committee. He could have just told them about the meeting as an appropriate activity in his role as Senator. He would have been right. Even Shumer did not have a problem with that.
We brought Frank Wilkinson to speak
on 3 different occasions, to our conference
dealing with crimes committed by FBI agents.
https://books.google.com/books?id=p_0oY–onPoC&pg=PA403&lpg=PA403&dq=frank+wilkinson+roy+cohn&source=bl&ots=x9F6490Gq1&sig=RKoZ31Ltv5BUxdnGM1fhOLAVjwk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjznOL5p7nSAhVM1WMKHQ5GC3IQ6AEIIjAD#v=onepage&q=frank%20wilkinson%20roy%20cohn&f=false
Frank shut down the House Unamerican Activities Committee
in 1975
First Amendment Felon: The Story of Frank Wilkinson, His 132,000 …
Robert Sherrill – 2005 – Biography & Autobiography
The Story of Frank Wilkinson, His 132,000 Page FBI File and His Epic Fight for Civil Rights and Liberties Robert Sherrill
I agree with Tadzio that a great threat to the Republic comes from the Refuseniks who refuse to accept the results of the election and who work to undermine the President. A friend told me, “It’s obvious what’s happening: there’s a jihad against Trump and his administration by the Deep State, the Democratic Party and the Elite Media, all of whom want to maintain the status quo, the entrenched power structure in D.C.”
Tadzio: Great points about the Left’s suppression of speech.
Matt and Tadzio: Great historical points about government’s excessive intrusions upon the realm of free speech.
Now as the Red Scare and McCarthyism take hold in America, let’s be fair and investigate how many times Hillary supporters met with the Russians.
— Sen Claire McCaskill telephoned the Russian Ambassador Kislyak on August 6, 2015. McCaskill denied ever meeting or talking to him. She met him in 2013. She’s a top Democrat and was a strong Hillary supporter. Hillary had announced her candidacy in April, 2015; within months McCaskill was calling the Russians.
—John Kerry, another staunch Hillary supporter, met countless times with the Russians.
—Bill Clinton got paid off about $1 million from the Russians, before Hillary even announced her candidacy.
—Sergey Kislyak has been the Russian Ambassador to America since 2008. In 2013, he attended a conference in Lake Tahoe with Sens. Harry Reid and Diane Feinstein; the same year he met with Dem. Senator Jack Reed (R.I); he has also met with many other Senators and Congressman, including Congressmen Meeks and Sherman, to name a few. He even met with retired Congressman Leach of Iowa. In 2016, he met with the Democratic Senator from West Virginia, Joe Manchin. Perhaps that’s why Joe applauded Trump’s speech before Congress.
Red Scare Alert! Red Scare Alert! . . . . and total hysteria!
The three examples which you give of Presidents exceeding authority to suppress newspapers and criticism are all drawn from exigencies of war, undeclared and declared. There are more recent and more insidious examples of deadly assaults on the Fourth Estate.
In the 1930s Franklin D. Roosevelt through the offices of Bishop Francis Spellman, Joseph Kennedy and others brought pressure to bear to silence the voice of Catholic Social Justice, Fr. Charles Coughlin. Eugenio Pacelli, then Papal Secretary of State was enlisted but the heroic Bishop Gallagher of Detroit thwarted the strangulation. Later the same Roosevelt employed the Post Office to bankrupt the Radio Priest’s magazine by denying delivery rights to Social Justice in 1942.
In Boston, 1972, freedom of the press in Massachusetts was dealt a harsh blow when Channel 5 was stolen from the Herald-Traveler with a unique, original and never to be repeated decision barring a newspaper from owning the television licence. Channel 5 was the lifeblood of the Republican leaning paper. Behind the outrageous decision were the political machinations of slithering connivers Edward Kennedy and Thomas O’Neill. Some men murder Liberty with a gun, others, with a fountain pen.
Other than the fevered ruminations of a raucous herd of defeated Donkeys hellbent on provoking a civil war there is no evidence that our President Donald Trump has any inclination to deny any opinion the right to be published. This is not true of the recent Pooh-Bahs of the political ideology of Trump’s enemies.
On the premise that President Roosevelt, Senator Edward Kennedy and Speaker O’Neill are enshrined in your your personal pantheon of heroes the following accusation can be leveled: You are looking in a mirror, you see yourself and you are disgusted and fearful.
The American people have no sane reason to fear any threat to Liberty from from our President, Donald Trump. There is zero evidence of such. Any danger to that will arise to the precious heritage bequeathed to us in Philadelphia, 1787, comes from the hysterical election refuseniks seeking the overthrown of the Republic.
You lost, accept it, get on with your life. It seems you never heard a coach tell you: If you don’t know how to lose, you don’t deserve to win.
Former US Attorney Pat Fitzgerald for special prosecutor, and, if you can’t get him, call up Preet Bahara. Put some edge on the investigation. Down with Glorious Leader, and, his traitorous cabal of compromised stooges. This is better than watching Nixon twist in the wind.
Matt:
As said, it’s good to review our history.
I’m not worried about censorship (except from the Politically Correct Leftists in Academia, the ACLU and Government; Europe already criminalizes “hate speech.”). No one’s looking to shut down the Presses; We’ve seen the Left prevent Condoleezza Rice and other conservatives from speaking at Campuses.
I’m more worried about a Red Scare, McCarthyism and Witch Hunts. I’m more worried about the Neo-Cons stoking the flames of war and American Imperialism and American-CIA-NATO Interventionism.
Too bad! I’d hoped under Trump we’d have detente with Russia.
2. The offensive parts of the Espionage Act have been deleted, although originally the Supreme Court in 1921 upheld convictions under it.
1917 ESPIONAGE ACT (abridged):
“Whoever when the (US) is at war, shall willfully make or convey false reports or false statements with intent to interfere with the operation or success of the military or naval forces of the (US) or to promote the success of its enemies, . . . or cause or attempt to cause insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny, refusal to duty . . . or obstruct recruiting or enlistment (in the armed forces) shall be subject to a fine of $10,000 or imprisonment for 20 years.”
Anyone who lived through Vietnam (“Hell no, we wont go!”) knows how viciously the war effort was attacked (ex: “Hanoi Jane”, cheerleader for the enemy; John Kerry comparing US forces to Genghis Khan’s); but interfering with recruitment/registration was still a crime (you couldn’t block Draft Offices); the Courts said you couldn’t even burn your draft card, and draft dodgers were imprisoned.
Espionage is still a crime. You still can’t take photos of secret military installations, submarines, etc, and transmit them to the enemy during war time. Today, you can’t even take photos of the inside of a sub, period!
3. As I’ve said, I’d like to see a drastic reduction in immigration, to allow recent legal immigrants to assimilate. Historically immigrants (the foreign born) have fluctuated between 5 and 15 percent of the population; we’re nearing 15%; we should pare back to 5% to assure we remain one nation, not a divisive polyglot Balkanized territory.
4. I hope NATO stops expanding.
John Kerry is a poor student of history. If the US forces were in fact like those of Genghis Kahn’s there would have been an outcome in their favor almost immediately.
I might point out here that I have a personal grudge with Horse Face and if I do meet him while walking the streets of D.C. you can be my friend and send me a cake with a file in it.
BAGHDAD: ISIS fighters launched a counterattack against advancing U.S.-backed Iraqi forces in western Mosul during an overnight storm, as the battle for control of the militants’ last major urban stronghold in Iraq intensified.
Explosions and gun fire rang out across the city’s southwestern districts in the early hours of Thursday. The fighting eased in the late morning, although a Reuters correspondent saw an airstrike and rebel mortar fire.
A senior Iraqi officer said ISIS staged its attack on units from the elite Counter Terrorism Service (CTS) when the storm hampered air surveillance and on-the-ground visibility.
He said some militant fighters hid among displaced families to get close to the U.S.-trained troops.
Iraqi forces captured the eastern side of Mosul in January after 100 days of fighting and launched their attack on the districts that lie west of the Tigris river on Feb. 19.
Defeating Islamic State in Mosul would crush the Iraqi wing of the caliphate declared by the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in 2014, from Mosul’s grand old Nuri mosque.
Residents reported that civilians were killed in air strike on an ISIS-run mosque on Wednesday, highlighting the perilous situation facing hundreds of thousands of Mosul residents as the allied forces step up their campaign.
Wa-llahi! Sounds like there’s lots of fight left in the DAESH. It’s hard to see how US troops can be up-front, and, not take casualties in a counter-attack. The DAESH are experienced, and, well-trained. Attacking under cover of a storm is a difficult maneuver. I’m looking for them to grab some American prisoners as bargaining chips. Last week, the DAESH forces were reported to number 3000 fighters. Today, that figure has jumped to several thousand. Civilians are being mowed down by both sides, by the DAESH, deliberately, and, by the Iraqis, as a consequence of the heavy fires they are laying down. Either way, the non-combatants are just as dead. Bad luck to be caught in a shit-storm. The US media black-out continues.