When Are We Going to Wake Up?

[jarandhel]

I really thought things couldn't get much worse at this point. I really thought we'd just about hit the bottom of the barrel as far as politics go in this country. Apparently, I was wrong.

US says it has right to kidnap British citizens

Comments

[silvaerina-tael.livejournal.com]

That's rather frightening. And with the more extreme the politics gets (one can't really say that it will for sure get better with a Democrat in office), the 'looser' the reasons will be for kidnapping.

To think that people are using old outmoded 'wild west' style vengeance ploys. Just goes to show that the 'good 'ole boys' really still haven't their heads around the concept that times have changed.

[jarandhel.livejournal.com]

Can they get much looser than kidnapping people from countries with which they already have extradition treaties?

[silvaerina-tael.livejournal.com]

I was more thinking what is determined as a 'crime', rather than the kidnapping itself (as ludicrous as even that notion is).

[jarandhel.livejournal.com]

Considering the US's behavior lately, I'm not even holding my breath that they actually have to tell you what they're charging you with if they kidnap you.

[silvaerina-tael.livejournal.com]

That's pretty much what I thought

[hasufin.livejournal.com]

Well, they don't - that's only explicitly a right for US citizens and/or on US soil (depending on your interpretation of the law.

So, if agents of the US government can kidnap foreign nationals from foreign soil, there's already existing precedent to hold foreign nationals on US property outside of the US - without legal recourse, without charges, etc.

From the US legal standpoint. In theory the other countries involved may take great exception to it.

[tlttlotd.livejournal.com]

They are kidnapping people from countries that they do not have extradition treaties with, also. It is not receiving much press time, if any because the people are too low profile.

[jarandhel.livejournal.com]

It actually bothers me more that they're doing this with countries they already have extradition treaties with, honestly. Because it would seem, to my point of view, that part of having an extradition treaty with a country would be the concession that one would not try to kidnap the citizens of that country to stand trial in ours rather than going through official channels and formally extraditing them.

[dogemperor.livejournal.com]

I'm not surprised the US is pretty much using treaties like this as toilet paper, sadly.

My ancestors could tell you all about how the US in general tends to treat various treaties that prevent the US from getting something they want...hell, my very ancestors could tell you just how well blowhard members of the Executive Branch tend to respect Supreme Court rulings not in their favour... :(

(For the record: The only President sitting in office to directly defy a Supreme Court order before Dubya got in office was Andrew Jackson--explicitly defying a Supreme Court ruling that the Cherokee were a sovereign nation and that the state of Georgia had illegally seized Cherokee lands. Andrew Jackson quipped "The Supreme Court has ruled; let them enforce it" and proceeded to start that lovely winter romp called the Trail of Tears, and my ancestors got to hide out as random jobbers and "Gypsies" and "Black Dutch" for the next hundred years or so being illegal fucking aliens in our own land. Yeah, I know *all* about how you can trust the government when you have a President in office who sees Constitutional rule as an impediment to a goal. :P)

[historychick49.livejournal.com]

Somehow I could see a foreign country using this to justify kidnapping Bush or Cheney to bring them to trial for war-crimes. It wouldn't happen, granted, but still.

[tlttlotd.livejournal.com]

I doubt that they would dare because the US would throw the kitchen sink (and probably some of the pipes) at whomever was responsible for doing so. One does not play "do animals kiss?" with a bull shark.

[shimizu-system.livejournal.com]

...
...yeah~.

[dogemperor.livejournal.com]

You thought the US had gone as low as it could? Oh, no, trust me...not even THIS is the bottom of the barrel.

You don't want to know what the bottom of the barrel really IS.

(And recent events--including proposed bills that would essentially criminalise all dissent against the US government as "promoting terrorism"--are making me look even more at countries willing to provide asylum...and more and more I'm thinking if I have to bail, I'll have to bail *soon*, whether or not hubby is willing. And I'm getting less and less trustful that we'll even *have* an election in 2008 at this rate... :P)

(Please tell me I'm being paranoid. PLEASE tell me I'm being paranoid rather than hypervigilant...)

[historychick49.livejournal.com]

Okay.... you're being paranoid. Mostly.

I don't think this country has gone far enough so that we won't have an election next year.

I might bail with you, though. I only have a year and a half left until I get my master's (if all goes well, of course), then I'm seriously considering emigrating to another country. A lot of it will, of course, depend on just *who* gets elected in a year and how much they can and are willing to change what's already been done.

[dogemperor.livejournal.com]

*nods* That's pretty much all that's keeping me here at this rate--that, and having no job and thus no money to independently move over :P (And as it is, that scares me to no end--the real possibility things will get worse and that I'll be stuck here a la Anne Frank et al.)

I am hoping I am being paranoid about the depths that things will sink to, to be honest. Unfortunately, I also grew up hearing plans for essentially takeover/hijacking of the US government most of my childhood that seem to be coming to horrifying fruition--and yes, there were some that were getting rather heavily into the "Christian Patriot" militia stuff and working on infiltrating both the civilian and military branches of government, and there are some scary indications they've had frightening success there, too.

I think even at this point it is going to take several generations to fix the country--and the badness I'm seeing now is, frankly, enough to trigger some *real* PTSD in me. One of the reasons I tend to be especially paranoid is that if a dominionist autocoup ever did occur (and yes, they've been talking about the possibility *in* dominionist circles for some thirty years, ever since Rios Montt proved it was possible in Guatemala and Reagan proved it was possible to get someone in office largely based on dominionist support) I'd be in some very, very serious trouble...not just for stuff I've written on the movement, for being a walkaway (and a bisexual, transgendered, pagan, very *vocal* walkaway at that).

Some days I'm not sure if I'm being paranoid or if it's the PTSD kicking up again, and there are some days I have to wonder if my hypervigilance and the country going to shit are mutually exclusive. :P

[shimizu-system.livejournal.com]

Come over here! We're moving on and off the Axis of Evil all the time anyway! ;)

~Duo

[dogemperor.livejournal.com]

If I could afford it right now, I would, seriously :D (What are the requirements for someone to attend college as an American student in Germany? :D Does leatherworking count as a special skill that could ease my chances of getting landed immigrant status? :D)

[jarandhel.livejournal.com]

I should rephrase that. I thought it had gone about as low as it could before people start to fucking notice.

[dogemperor.livejournal.com]

And I fear you may well overestimate the collective intelligence of humanity there. :P (There are...*how* many regimes that you'd THINK people would notice before horrible, horrible things started happening? Hell, I was disabused of people noticing nastiness under their nose back when televangelists were being busted left and right in the 80s. It will take a far, far worse shock to scare people out of complacency, I fear. :P)