Sleepwalking Into Tyranny: How Power Is Silently Being Seized
“This is what militaries do during coups: you capture the major targets, with government buildings high on the list, and you take over communications and other systems.”—Ruth Ben-Ghiat, historian on fascism and authoritarian leaders
How something is done is just as important as why something is done.
To suggest that the ends justify the means is to launch oneself down a moral, ethical and legal rabbit hole that leaves us in a totalitarian bind.
We are already halfway down that road.
Whatever the justifications for discarding, even temporarily, the constitutional framework and protocols that have long served as the foundations for our republic (national security, an economic crisis, terrorists at the border, a global pandemic, etc.), none of them are worth the price we are being asked to pay—the rule of law—for what is amounting to a hostile takeover of the U.S. government by an oligarchic elite.
This is no longer a conversation about stolen elections, insurrections, or even the Deep State.
This has become a lesson in how quickly things can fall apart.
This is what all those years of partisan double standards and constitutional undermining and legislative sell-outs and judicial betrayals add up to: a coup by oligarchic forces intent on a hostile takeover.
The government’s past efforts to sidestep the rule of law pale in comparison to what is unfolding right now, which is nothing less than the complete dismantling of every last foundational principle for a representative government that answers to “we the people.”
This shock-and-awe blitz campaign of daily seizures, raids and overreaching executive orders is a deliberate attempt to keep us distracted and diverted while the government is remade in the image of an autocracy, one in which privacy, due process, the rule of law, free speech, and equality will all be contingent on whether you are worthy of the privilege of rights.
I have long insisted on the need to recalibrate the government, but this is not how one goes about it.
The issue is not whether the actions being taken by the Trump Administration are right or wrong—although there are many that are egregiously wrong and some that are long overdue—but whether the Executive Branch has the power to unilaterally override the Constitution.
If we allow this imperial coup to move forward without pushback or protest, we will be just as culpable as those signing the death warrant for our freedoms.
Power corrupts.
And absolute power corrupts absolutely.
However, it takes a culture of entitlement and a nation of compliant, willfully ignorant, politically divided citizens to provide the foundations of tyranny.
For too long now, America has played politics with its principles and allowed the president and his colleagues to act in violation of the rule of law.
“We the people” are paying the price for it now.
Since the early days of our republic, we have operated under the principle that no one is above the law.
As Thomas Paine observed in Common Sense, “In America, the law
Article from LewRockwell
LewRockwell.com is a libertarian website that publishes articles, essays, and blog posts advocating for minimal government, free markets, and individual liberty. The site was founded by Lew Rockwell, an American libertarian political commentator, activist, and former congressional staffer. The website often features content that is critical of mainstream politics, state intervention, and foreign policy, among other topics. It is a platform frequently used to disseminate Austrian economics, a school of economic thought that is popular among some libertarians.
