BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Dec 05 - 05:59 AM

Òpermanent emergencyÓ

they're back!

(directly cut and pasted for a test!)

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Peter T.
Date: 20 Dec 05 - 12:42 AM

From Sulla to Charles I of England, the plea was for extraordinary powers in a time of emergency in defence of public safety -- indeed the Committee on Public safety of the French Revolution took its name from the very concept. The ability to name such a time of emergency and the ability to extend it indefinitely at will was at the heart of the first English Revolution against such powers -- for Hampden and Cromwell and the rest realized that such power meant that the ruler was essentially able to suspend law when he chose; indeed, that the ruler was above the law.

In the waning years of the 20th century, the Òpermanent emergencyÓ of the Cold War, which had done so much to increase the military influence on American life and given rise to the Imperial Presidency, dissolved with the end of the enemy.   The defining of terrorism as a new state of warfare after 9/11 re-generated the permanent emergency and gave it both a new open-endedness -- there would always be those disaffected by the empire who would resort to the weapons of clandestine struggle -- and a new ability to cast a net over the homeland.   This had been available during the Cold War from time to time as various ÒscaresÓ over home infiltration were promulgated; but advances in technological espionage and the vast national security apparatus naturally gravitated towards the use of potential conspiracy in America as the justification for the breaking of the flimsy laws that had held the executive power back.

With the Emperor now able to define the nature of evidence without recourse to the legal system, to be judge, jury, and executioner himself, under the classic rationale of the need for speed and efficiency in defence of public safety, he had essentially freed himself from the law. It was therefore only a matter of time before those complaining of this situation were themselves brought under suspicion of treason, beginning with the press, and extending into the feeble halls of the Senate itself!

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Peter T.
Date: 18 Dec 05 - 08:40 PM

Oh, yeah? Apologies -- I have not had any such thing happen before, and I have been cutting and pasting on Mudcat for forever.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Little Hawk
Date: 18 Dec 05 - 01:26 PM

Just for that, Peter, I am going to get William Shatner to visit you over the entire flippin' holidays! Ya twit. He will be coming with 18 suitcases. You telling me you can't see the large capital "O" with the accent mark above it that is inserted all over the place in your essay, rather like the letter 9's that jOhn from Hull used to put all over in his postings???

Well if you can't, then come to Orillia and look at it on MY computer, and you will see them. Yes, they are everywhere where there should be quotation marks. Quite distracting.

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Dec 05 - 09:25 AM

so the Senate is now the enemy?

Surely the Senators will not stab Ceasar,

nor Ceasar attack Rome.

http://www.angelfire.com/md2/customviolins/total.jpg

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: wysiwyg
Date: 18 Dec 05 - 09:03 AM

Peter, if you composed this offline and then pasted it in, you may have gotten some weird stuff in there that your browser can't see as wrong, but others' can. For example, I'm using IE; I see accented, capital O in place of quotation marks.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: mack/misophist
Date: 18 Dec 05 - 08:39 AM

If the marks are something besides letters abd punctuation, They're probably formatting commands that your browser can't handel. Odd.

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Peter T.
Date: 18 Dec 05 - 08:30 AM

On earth, we refer to these as letters, they go together to make words, L.H. There are also things called punctuation marks, which keep the letters from running amuck.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Little Hawk
Date: 17 Dec 05 - 06:21 PM

Why are all the weird symbols occuring in the text?

Otherwise, very good.

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Amos
Date: 17 Dec 05 - 06:13 PM

(Dear Gawd, Peter. What troubles me most about your scenario is that it is only a hair's breadth from the truth on the ground.)


A

Subject: RE: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Dead Horse
Date: 17 Dec 05 - 05:36 AM

...learn french and join a cajun band?

Subject: BS: The Moment of Imperial Crisis, Chapter 7
From: Peter T.
Date: 17 Dec 05 - 03:18 AM

The Moment of Imperial Crisis: Chapter VII

In the early years of the twenty-first century, as the Empire wrestled with the last remnants of its Republican heritage, the time came, as it always must, when the claims of liberty finally came up against the claims of executive power to determine the fate of the Empire.   The demands of imperial warfare in new provinces and the reluctance among the old provinces to contribute to their own repression, continually tempted the executing arm of the government to bring the tools of foreign occupation home. The more the Empire had become used to torture and spying among other peoples, the flimsier were the barriers to turning these tools against their own people; thus fatally corrupting the very values they were supposed to be defending.   So it was in Rome; so it was in America.

When the American Senate, deeply corrupt, but still possessed of a dim memory of faded powers, balked at the widespread abuses and incompetence of the Emperor, the stage was set for the final struggle.   The revelation that the Emperor had completely ignored the laws of the land, and was engaged in spying on his own people, and claimed it as a defence of the same people, put into motion yet once more the mechanism of impeachment. Unwieldy as it was, it had begun to appear more and more often,   being as it was the ultimate method of reining in the vagaries of the Emperors -- as one wag put it, in American slang: Òhitting the donkey with a 2x4 to get his attentionÓ.

The refusal to reaffirm The Patriot Act, a measure that had been passed in the shadow of the attacks on the World Trade Centre, and which used the images of patriotism to undermine the patriotic liberties of the nation, was the moment when the Emperor and his satraps determined that the fate of the Empire was at stake.   While it took some time to fully unfold,   the demands of Empire had to come first. Before a handpicked audience of senior military figures and his supporters, and against a backdrop labelled ÒVictory Imperilled!Ó the Emperor accused the legislative branch of government of becoming an obstacle to the defence of America.   ÒAlthough they mean well,Ó he thundered, Òthey are undermining our military, and putting the rights of terrorists before the rights of Americans!Ó He called upon the military to......