The US Government nearly passed a bill for Martial Law to take effect
 

Aww man, I read about this. I just can't exactly understand why anyone would be for something like this, or how it can be viewed as necessary :(

What exactly does this mean? I read the link you posted, and another one I looked up, but could someone explain it more simply?

George Orwell predicted this. When bread and circus is no longer enough to keep the masses docile, the boots will begin stomping the faces. I'm sure he's rolling in his grave right now.

Ironically, this is a product of the "small government" Republican Party. How's this for GOP small government?

Hopefully, but I have my doubts. This has been a pretty pro-authority court thus far.

Posted earlier today on the specifics of the Law, said from a Senator:

Weirder still, the bill’s chief architect, Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), tried to persuade skeptics that the bill wasn’t so bad. His pitch? “The requirement to detain a person in military custody under this section does not extend to citizens of the United States,” he said on the Senate floor on Monday. The bill would just let the government detain a citizen in military custody, not force it to do that. Reassured yet?

...

But there’s a reason this measure goes into the defense bill: Voting against the defense bill is usually considered political suicide. That’s why the bill will almost certainly pass tonight. If Obama backs down from his veto threat, get ready to see Americans at Guantanamo Bay. Source

It's odd how CNN hasn't caught this but every other news organization has. Coincidence?

This is why I don't like politics, because it's just a bunch of idiots running around trying to solve problems that they don't know anything about. Democracy has never truly worked, and the system that is in use these days is but a joke of the idea that people actually have any say about things that affect them.

We elect puppets to the throne to be controlled by puppeteers, and they call this democracy...

Here's my solution:

When we elect officials, we install them with the exploding slave collars like the ones from Fallout 3. The delegate must do the will of his/her district. If not, the people of that district will have a direct vote of whether or not to...well *pop* the politicians head like a tomato.

I wish. :P

You wish politics is that simple.

This isn't entirely the politicians' problem, although they certainly deserve a lot of the blame. This is more of the problem of American voting behavior and lobbyists. As a whole, American voters are rather shortsighted and don't make the most intelligent decisions (i.e. voting for something that will benefit their district or state the most without much regard for the bigger picture or the long term).

I really hope people here stop looking at these issues as black and white.

Senate approves indefinite detention and torture of Americans — RT

Anyone surprised?

In times like that one could go to that point, dont trust your government, only trust yourself.

Anyway, another sign like so many others these days that this world will for sure stay not long anymore....

No, not really. Though something like this does have partial use in some situations, America is in no state whatsoever to require indefinite detention and imprisonment for criminals. For one, crime isn't even a major problem. In comparison to some other, more pressing problems, at least.

Just to clear things up, its a clause in the yearly NDAA, this gets voted on every year and governs all things military including budget, and policy. There is language in the bill that could easily be interpreted to mean the US military can indefinitely detain citizens. So don't try to fight the bill, fight to change the language.

Thank you for a little sanity in this thread.

...oh, and more guns is not a solution, it's just an extra problem. Why else does the US have the highest rates of murder and armed robbery in the western world? It isn't even 'protection' - what do you think is going to happen to someone with a pistol against someone with an M16, helmet and body armour? They're going to get shot rather than arrested.

Because lots of other things are screwed up as well. Every male over 18 in Switzerland has a gun, but it also has one of the lowest murder rates.

Income inequality is the main reason. In countries where wealth disparity is high, so are rates of violent crime, and income disparity in the US is reaching 1920s levels. "The Spirit Level" is a good book on this.

I think this can't be stressed enough, as we are social community animals, we tend to get stressed out in situations that we know are unfair on a fundamental level. Then again only those who get the short end of the stick have any reason to complain, because it's not like people would go and complain that they have too much money. I guess greed is there to keep our mouths shut when the inequality is in our favour, as it has been for quite long time, but now things are starting to fall apart.

Hmm between this and SOPA I think things are about to get very bad, very fast.

Well looks like its time to head to Canada.

The gap is growing, and the number of us who get the short end is too. This could go so many different ways :hmm: