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To: TobagoJack who wrote (41929)	11/22/2003 5:21:58 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Respond to of 74559

Jay, that's not TeoTwawki. Those are just the ramblings of an old hammer who thinks the world looks very like a nail. Of course he thinks a military solution with military intelligence is the way to run our wild and wacky world. He is obviously not so enamored with democracy as shown by his dismissal of it as some recent experiment. Everything is an experiment. A real-time, no going back, experiment. Life is not a rehearsal. It's happening now and we are in it. Every night is opening night and the script is never repeated although things might look similar sometimes. The only permanence is the law of nature and even that changes more than people think. Relativity understanding changed nature's law, which was really just people's understanding of it. CDMA breached the laws of physics according to a Stanford physics professor, but QUALCOMM did that. Of course it really only breached human understanding of what's possible. Just as happens every day in many ways 6 billion people battle nature. One day, we'll run entropy will NOT always increase. Gravitons will spin backwards. Down will be up. Backwards will be forwards. General Franks, as with all old generals, is fighting the last war. It's comfy back in the good old days before all the new-fangled stuff came along. I saw him mistakenly refer to Iraq as Vietnam about a year ago. Giggle. I heard Bernie Schwartz, at the launch of Globalstar service at Telecom99 twice refer to satellites as aeroplanes [and he wasn't joking or making a metaphorical reference]. Wars to Franks are Vietnam again. Social systems run better with military precision in Tommy's book. Tommy is not misunderestimating the genius which is George. Mqurice

To: TobagoJack who wrote (41929)	11/22/2003 6:10:36 PM
From: AC Flyer	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 74559

>>is this story true on all different levels?<< Well, I can see you are your usual provocative self, Jay. I'll bite, nonetheless. Interesting story. The Cigar Aficionado (does this really count as journalism?) reporter chose to headline General (retired) Frank's most outlandish comment and to make it look as if it represents some kind of official policy. It looks to me like just one more attempt to demonize the United States of America - in this case, to invoke the specter of some future bizarre rogue militarized nation state. In response to your questions: >>Did Tommy Franks say what he supposedly did say?<< I don't know. Possibly. A close reading of the article reveals that Franks expressed a personal fear of a further curtailment of civil liberties in the US in the event of another major terrorist attack - i.e. an attack with a nuclear biological or chemical weapon causing large numbers of casualties. Franks did not make a prediction imo, though the reporter, who did not print Frank's comments verbatim but printed an extensively edited version, clearly wished to promote that interpretation. Another budding Michael Moore (i.e lying sack of s**t) wannabe perhaps? >>Is his prediction founded on any real possibilities?<< It depends what you mean by "martial law". This means something very different to the black helicopter crowd , to which, by and large, it means a full-blown military dictatorship with all the trimmings - concentration camps for dissidents, etc. To the more rational, it means a declaration of a national emergency and the kind of measures that were undertaken by the US government in WW2. Well, we already have the declaration of national emergency: whitehouse.gov. What we'd likely get from a second major terrorist attack is Patriot Act II and a much greater public willingness to kick terrorist ass. Of course, we'd still have the problem of identifying the terrorists, but somebody's ass would get kicked for sure. But no concentration camps. >>Can it all be?<< All what? >>In other words, is this TeoTwawKi?<< No. The world is very far removed from TEOTWAWKI. Just ask anyone who remembers the Cuban missile crisis.

To: TobagoJack who wrote (41929)	11/22/2003 9:06:08 PM
From: pezz	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74559

Jay 20yrs ago there wuz sucha paranoia in this country about Communism that many expected the Chinese to march across the pacific into Los Angles. I see a similar fear over terrorism today. It wuz then and is now especially expressed by the military... Franks duzn't know what the hell he is talkin about.

To: TobagoJack who wrote (41929)	11/22/2003 11:43:02 PM
From: que seria	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 74559

Jay, AC: I didn't see Franks endorsing that response, just predicting it. I infer he's not talking about a coup, but a public demand for less political governance and civil liberty, and more security-consciousness. Sadly, I think his point is well taken, although I disagree we would shuck our grand experiment after one WMD attack. What would likely happen is a permanent change in public, executive, legislative and judicial attitudes toward the desirability and permissibility of (1) admitting Muslims and Arabs into the U.S.; (2) monitoring any potentially hostile persons and cargo or other delivery systems (broadly defined--or not defined at all) by any means necessary; (3) shutting down many or even all mosques or other Muslim centers as enemy outposts; (4) renouncing citizenship of, and evicting, Muslims already here; and (5) preemptive nuclear strikes on the nuclear capacity of any Muslim state; and (if that does not prevent a repeat) (6) destroying Muslim cities and holy places in retaliation and for prevention (i.e., specific deterrence). It would be error to assume that a military takeover of the U.S. government will be necessary to the nation taking such steps. Instead, there would be a massive response of the body politic against which no politician could stand (and stay in office, unimpeached and alive), demanding the blood of the enemy that did the deed. Frustration would be great, given the nearly invisible enemy, and in that situation all or some of actions 1-5 above would unfold amid criticism of any less aggressive responses. The problem for Muslims with Al Quaeda declaring jihad and being willing to murder thousands of innocents to change U.S. foreign policy is that Al Quaeda may succeed. They're just mistaken about what the new foreign policy will be. Then again, maybe they don't care how many of their compatriots die (see Allah early) in a U.S. response. They may, even now, imagine the U.S. will play by Marquis of Queensbury rules while they make WMD attacks on U.S. civilians. All they will do is convince the U.S. that it is seeing the Muslim version of a holy war. The American people won't then blame U.S. foreign policy for the horror, and certainly won't (as Al Quaeda directs) abandon their predominantly Judeo-Christian religion. They will demand their government do what the old Crusaders did, but this time with less mercy, more broadly, and with far more devastating results. This will have nothing to do with Jesus and everything to do with revenge and survival. The retaliatory response is engraved in the national psyche. Only Al Quaeda's (and others') avoidance of extreme provocation will prevent such a TEOTWAWKI event. The only people I see in a position to prevent such an eventuality are moderate, freedom-loving Arabs who inform on Al Quaeda to prevent it. I doubt that will happen. I expect most such persons can't bear to turn over their Muslim brothers to the U.S., and in any event imagine themselves safe from the U.S. response. If U.S. cities are destroyed, the U.S. will morph before their eyes. None of this implies any endorsement of past or current U.S. foreign policy, especially in the Middle East. Current internal criticism of or reservations about our foreign policy would have absolutely no effect upon the national consensus about how to respond to a WMD attack. The response would be to rally 'round the flag, but no longer in a post-9/11 sort of way. The next time the flag being rallied 'round will be battle colors.