See Burma.

Some of us have been talking about this since last October 17th. Generally, we were labeled TFH.

Cassandra redux.

looseheadprop @ 257

OK, so it’s not just me then?

WTF?

Military NOT involved in counter narc ops?

By GAWD man, what do you think Iran/Contra and many OTHER non narcotic ops were all about? DRUGS FOR WEOPONS FOR CASH and all the profiteering and laundering that goes with it.

…
Drugs. Guns. Cash.
…

The counter narc ops are a means to ENABLE the transport of narcs!! FOR PROFIT!

Freeway Ricky.

Sigh . . . .

Dark Alliance !!!!!

http://www.mega.nu:8080/ampp/webb.html

All very recognizable to a West Virginian.
Blackwater=Baldwin-Felts

They only way they were defeated last time was for local law enforcement, backed up by armed local citizens, to confront and fight them.

R

Matewan

Bustednuckles @ 47

Trying to think out loud a little down the road here.
What exactly is it that they hope to accomplish with this mercenary force?

They have two prime objectives in the United States.

1. Establish an Afganistan-to-America heroin funnel.

2. Crack down on medical marijuana.

Any para-military organization allowed to get away with murder will eventually take to smuggling guns and drugs.

Putting a murderous black market operator like Erik Prince in charge of “drug interdiction” is reminiscent of Nixon putting CIA thug Col. Lucien Conein in charge of US anti-drug efforts in the early 70’s.

Conein helped break the Corsican “French Connection” in order to facilitate the American-Sicilian crime families’ control of international heroin production and distribution.

Count on Erik Prince making a similar “Big Takeover” of US heroin distribution.

Talking about the American security state is important because exposure is the last thing they want.

thanks for saying it much better than i could. was just trying to support kirk’s reminder to be careful.

I have to confess that I have not had time to read them all. However, it seems to me that a philosophical discussion and thoughtful discussion of different responses is okay. And, I think that that is what Selise is saying. But, at the same time, words must be chosen carefully. Not to be making a judgment on comments on this thread.

However, in some ways, it reminds me of the problems surrounding discussion of the Israel/ Palestinian issue. At some sites, such discussion is totally banned because of its inflamatory potential. However, so far, it can continue at FDL, because commenters are able to frame the discussion in a reasonable way, even tho they are passionate in their comments.

That is what I would hope for in continuing this discussion. At first glance, Mike, it seems to me that you have put things in a sufficiently thoughtful way to allow this discussion to go forward.

That is quite different from some comments I have read here, which advocate gratuitous violence, in a totally unthinking way, and naturally, get taken out.

My 2 cents. fwiw.

I do not however see the need to retract.

no one asked you to retract. just to be careful about what you write…. so that we respect the wishes of jane and christy and don’t put them in a position of having to deal with any hassles we may create by what we write here.

that is all.

mike @ 251

I’m sorry to be so irredeemable and incorrigible. I’m sure there is more I could learn about nonviolent tactics.

I think, based on what I know of them, that they can be powerful and successful.

I have, although you might find it hard to believe, even contemplated the idea of going hard core nonviolent. I was unable to believe in that path, and I have come to believe that there are enemies against whom they will not succeed.

I also used to be a pure vegetarian, but am no longer. We grow, we gain new understandings, we change.

—-

Regarding, the person above who worries that I’m abusing the site by talking openly about the historical role of violence in opposing fascism…. please. I have considerably more respect for FDL and its owners than to imagine they would be bothered by this kind of free speech. They are free to email me if they have a problem with the ideas I’ve discussed here.

mike, if you have so much concern for FDL’s creators, perhaps you’d care to speak with them.

When Jane and I – over email – discussed this topic, I came away from the exchange with exactly the perspective I’ve set forth above.

I don’t pretend to speak for Jane – I speak only for myself.

Your comments about violence do not merely discuss history – your comments also discuss ande apparently advocate use of violence as a tool for political change in America in the future.

I hope you are less careless and more honest with weapons than you have shown yourself to be about your own words.

And mike – whose interests are most served by introducing violent political change as a topic for the Lake?

And mike – if you have had military training – who are you serving today by repeatedly pushing the topic here?

Law enforcement, the Pentagon, or Homeland Security, perchance?

Who do you serve, mike with no last name?

Sorry that you interpret my words that way. I will retain my right to be semi-anonymous, but the blog owners can easily use my e-mail to determine my very public identity, and I suppose if they are alarmed by what I have said here they can report me to the the authorities. I think that would be outrageous, but, they can easily enough find out who I am and my entire fairly public life story. I assure you it is not that interesting!

Perhaps the basic beliefs of the FDL owners are more pacifist than I was aware. To my mind a full blown fascist take over our government would be akin to a foreign invasion. It would be a condition of war and we’d all have to decide which side we were on, and what means we chose (whether violent or nonviolent) to resist.

I have never spoken of violent political change. I spoke from the beginning, evidently too articulately, about meeting violence with violence, and about REestablishing democracy by violent means if it is violently overthrown.

To quote myself (for which I apologize in advance):

I’ve always wanted to believe that democratic means could defeat totalitarian plans…. but these days I find myself wishing for aggressive fighting progressives…. people with a plan to take over government if necessary, in order to “preserve democracy.” You KNOW that the fascists are planning to do that… to take over government in order to preserve corporate fascism with a democratic facade.

Now if that isn’t completely clear (and I see room for questions) I mean to say that a violent overthrow of legal government should be met by a violent reestablishment of constitutional government.

Where are the progressive think tanks and back rooms who are planning to use military force, dangerous and contradictory as the notion seems, to actually re-take democracy from the corporate mob?

Here I was clearer… “re-take” … I’m talking about a response to a military coup or a complete and violently enforced overthrow of democracy.

I fully understand the danger of that path… the contradiction between using undemocratic means to restablish a democratic end. The other side has the advantage of planning to use undemocratic means to establish an unddemocratic end — they have the advantage of consistency. But the defense of democracy may require living with the uncomfortable use of military power to re-establish a political order that is not based on military power. We may have to get comfortable with that compromise.

Again, I’m pretty clear here that I’m talking about re-establishing constitutional order after it has been undemocratically terminated.

I think I am also pretty clear that I consider that to be an inherently dangerous path… using a gun to establish the rule of law carries its own deep contradiction between means and ends. I’m pretty sure we can all agree on that.

The only place I left unfortunate room for misinterpretation was in that first paragraph. Sorry about that. The rest however should more than clarify what I was talking about.

If this discussion is too “meta” for a blog about the day to day to and fro of politics, I can see that. I’ll shut up. But I don’t see it as being beyond the pall in the larger progressive context. Thinking about boundary conditions is instructive. Naomi Wolfe invites us to think about boundary conditions.. about what we would all do in extremis.

—-

Finally, it is a commonplace on some but not all progressive boards to say that we “support the troops.” Being pro-military but anti-Iraq war, supportive of military violence in some circumstances but not in this one, is surely not something that rules a person out of the legitimate sphere of discusison.

For my part, I frequently state that I do not support the troops because, as volunteers in Iraq they have made a moral choice that I disagree with. But I do support the use of military violence for life saving and morally legitimate ends. MANY progressives do. I have pointed out that there are imaginable circumstances where that support may apply domestically as well. Naomi Wolfe has pointed out one path that might lead to that outcome. I don’t fully understand the resistance that that idea seems to have created. To me, the potential need for a violent response to a violent overthrow seems to be a necessary and important conclusion.

It is also a conclusion that the right in this country doesn’t hesitate to come to around guns. The fact that the right does it is no argument in favor of it, of course, but consideration of how the “people” might resist an overreaching central authority is a long standing stream in American politics, one that cuts across the right and the left. Again, why the alarm? All sorts of right wing folks are prepared to resist the incursions of an overbearing central government with their deer hunting rifles. Do we on the left have a different strategy if the regime in Washington DC turns violently fascist? Should we? I’m no gun owner. I believe that communities working together locally, not lone nuts in their hideaways, or fascistic local militias, are the way to resist central power, but I see no harm in considering what might happen and how communities might need to organize to resist.

Sure, sure, it’s all so unlikely, but Wolfe raises the question in my mind of “what if” and I plead guilty to thinking aloud about the answer. To the extent that my thoughts have offended, I apologize. I do not however see the need to retract.