Bush And Martial Law...

[DemocratSinceBirth]

I am starting to see threads on this board that Bush will cancel the elections if he fears he will lose....

I defer to no one in my contempt for Bush and the low regard I hold him in as you can see by my polls but I don't see Bush declaring martial law for several reasons:

1) As bad as I think he is I don't think he wants to go down in history as the man who destroyed America's small r republican form of government. For all America's flaws no nation or empire has ever achieved America's military, political, and economic strength.

2) The day he declares martial law the equities markets will drop by seventy five percent.

3) Foreign holders of American bonds will immediately sell them. Without foreigners financing the American debt through the purchase of Treasury Bills the American standard of living will drop precipitously.

3) America would get kicked out of NATO since it's membership is limited to "democratic" nations

4) Reactionary elements on the far left and the far right would use the resultant chaos to settle old scores

5) Those with means would flee the nation and take whatever capital they had with them.

Martial law.... I don't see it.... The elites who run this country depend on things to run smoothly... The last thing they want is wild in the streets or worse nobody in the streets....

The pregnant question

Do you think Bush will cancel the elections if he fears he will lose....

I vote NO

[fujiyama]

1. I vote yes...

simply because, I think they will find way to stall the elections if there is an attack on American soil before the election.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

4. I Don't See It...

I'll give the R's credit for one thing...

They're good biznessmen...

Any cost-benefit analysis demonstrates the costs of imposing martial law outweigh the benefits....

[R3dD0g]

11. But that assumes the bizznessmen are in charge.

I think they're just along for the ride and are becoming as concerned as the rest of us with the direction.

The real movers & shakers of this misadministration are the Religionistas. And they wouldn't give a shit about the market effects of cancelling an election.

[BootinUp]

6. But stalling is not cancelling

I will probably get flamed. But if we were to have another attack on the scale of 9/11 or worse, there should be a standard non-partisan contingency plan to deal with elections in the event the election process would be obviously disrupted in the areas of the attack. For instance, people in the affected area may not be able to vote if the election was held before the emergency had been dealt with.

Any suggestion that elections should be delayed due to political ramifications I reject out of hand.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

8. I Agree.....

Even I could come up with scenarioes for moving the election but they are rare...

[stopbush]

14. Uh, if they're thinking of contingency plans for the election

that take into account possible terror attacks before said election, why not issue absentee ballots to everyone beforehand and let people mail them back before October 1?

After all, if bushco could come up with $38m to send a useless letter to every taxpayer in the country announcing his first "advance payment on your coming tax return, er, rebate" back in 2001, how much would it cost to send out a ballot to the registered voters in this country (considering there are fewer registered voters than taxpayers)? It could be a single piece of paper with two choices, Kerry or bush.

[DenverDem]

2. Martial law will be preceeded by another "attack".

bushler cannot just cancel the election because he will lose. There will have to be another "attack" or series of black op incited civil disturbances to justify martial law.

[Bromd]

3. Bush

I don't think he'll do that, I'm much more inclined to believe that he'll instead just rig the election.

[Mistress Quickly]

5. I need to preface this

I listened to Hannity yesterday. Yes, that Inshanitty. I wanted to hear what Mel Gibson had to say about the doubts he had about Bush (BTW- I missed that, of course, anyone know the story on that?) OK, done with the preface, and the decon shower I had to take afterwards!

Anyway, he had Ted Koppel on, surprisingly enough. Ted said Bush and Kerry should decide now that if something like the Madrid bombings happened, should the election be postponed for a week or 2, but to vow that it would not be cancelled. The kicker? Shawn agreed with him.

That sounds like a good thing. They shoudl both pledge that if something happens like 9-11 or the Madrid bombing, or Bali or Turkey or any of the others, the election could be postponed 1-2 weeks, but then they WOULD have the election.

Maybe that way Bush, if he tried to declare martial law, would only succeed in causing a huge civil war, as it would be a lie the whole public would HAVE to see (unlike all the others they haven't)

My 2 cents.

[whistle]

7. BushCo wouldn't give a crap about any of these things...

...GW is only interested in winning. He and his cronies will hedge their bets before hand, just like they did before 9-11. So, I believe he would try to stop or at least delay an election that looks like it would vote him out. But, Bush is going to loose no matter what he tries to do, he will not be able to change that result.:donut:

[in_cog_ni_to]

9. He was also the first president

to take our election to the SCOTUS. He was also the first president to let the SCOTUS appoint him to office. He was also the first president whose brother purged 60,000 black voters from the voter rolls. He's also the first president to pre-emtively, unilaterally and illegally attack another country. I put NOTHING past these people and I mean NOTHING, including murder. If he's still down in the polls in Sept./ Oct.......we will see a terrorist attack and elections will be canceled and martial law declared. No doubt in my mind. These people are capable of anything.

[rvgwinn]

10. The US CITIZEN

Does anyone think that the populace of the United States would sit back and actually let bush destroy this Country without a fight?

[in_cog_ni_to]

12. Yes, I do.

Look at how many people vote for Bush just because they "THINK" he is a "G-D fearing man". Oh yeah, the sheeple would just go along as they did with the Iraq invasion. If there is another terrorist attack....they will be behind the idiot-in-chief. They won't CARE that they can't vote....most of this country doesn't vote anyway. They won't care...period. If their "G-D fearing" president says we must suspend the election and declare martial law for the "saftey" of our citizens, they will sit back and let it happen.
Did you see the MILLIONS of anti-war protesters who were completely ignored by the media and this administration. They were going to attack Iraq come hell or high water and No One was going to stop them. The same will happen with our election.

[stopbush]

15. They sat back in 2000. What's your point? n/t

[Odallas]

17. The half of the population that doesn't vote would

and half of the remaining half would support bUSHCORP and half of the remaining quarter would really be pissed off but only half of them would have enough courage to fight so the resistance would only be half-assed and we will all be fully crushed. If the power goes out, thats another story.

[R3dD0g]

20. They sit back for 'first amendment zones' don't they? n/t

[Ready4Change]

24. Sigh...

I remember when people believed that all of the USA wasa Free Speech Zone.

[AntiCoup2K4]

22. What the Hell do you think they have done for the last 3 1/2 years?

Of course a lot of them are so goddamned brainwashed by FAUX/Corporatist News Newtork/MSRNC that they don't know any better, but the fact remains (as I pointed out in a similar thread) that the general population has tolerated a whole list of things that would have been completely unthinkable just a few years ago. Where would they draw the line? Well, first I thought it was the theft of the election. Then I thought it was the fact that the Bush Criminal Empire's "official story" of 9-11 had more holes than a 5 pound block of Swiss Cheese, and that they have continued to block any true investigation of the attacks and how they happenned. And then I thought that surely the American people would respond to the so-called "president" pissing off the entire world in order to invade a crippled country based on a case that was weak enough, even as it was presented, and turned out that even the weak evidence they presented was total lies, most of which came from a fugitive bank robber who only opposed the Hussein dictatorship because he wanted to be the dictator of Iraq himself (and will probably get the job if PNAC has their way.)

If you would have told me that any of this would have been possible 4 years ago, I would have laughed in your face. But it all did happen, and the "masses", the "sheeple", the "70% who believe Iraq was involved in the 9-11 attacks" still haven't drawn the line. Why would that suddenly change if Junior decided to cancel an election as a result of a staged terror event?

[cosmicdot]

13. but, will they close Wal-Mart and Starbucks?

will it all be televised?

if they don't care what we think, and warn us to not say what we think ... they don't care if we live or die as long as they have theirs, and 'they' have been siphoning this country's finances with abandon ... gosh knows what they would unleash upon the US Citizen ... the military police state infrastructure is in place and equipped with the latest and more in dealing with masses in the street ...

they don't care what about "founding principles" period

[stopbush]

16. Ha! Good one! "We've canceled the elections for this year. The best

way for the American public to support democracy in these troubled times is...to go shopping! And, the RNC is still up and running and accepting donations..."

[in_cog_ni_to]

19. Don't forget to stock up on that duct tape and plastic sheeting!

:grr:

[Ready4Change]

18. I voted "Yes, Here's my scenario..."

I voted this way not because I have a unique scenario. Those are all over this forum.

I voted this way because, should it be blatantly obvious that he's going to loose to such an extent that any vote fixing attempt will be seen right through, I think martial law and election delaying will at least be considered.

Whether it would actually be tried depends on if they think people would revolt against it.

[progressiverealist]

21. more and more, it appears that Bush will stop at nothing to stay

in power. Martial law? Hell yeah, he'd do it if he thinks he can get away with it.

The only thing is, he has crapped on the military so badly THEY might not go along with it.

[in_cog_ni_to]

23. That's our ONLY hope.

The only thing is, he has crapped on the military so badly THEY might not go along with it.

[zbdent]

25. Don't you think that the "terrorist attack" will somehow, strangely,

be directed to an area in which Kerry will be at?

If it's as close to the election as the Spain bombing was, there is no way that, if Kerry & whomever are taken out of the equation by the attack, we would be able to get the ticket to reflect it.

(I have a paranoid mind. Never been diagnosed clinically, just the way I grew up, with bullies chasing me. Funny thing was, I was among the popular types until 4th grade.)

Bush could "compassionately postpone the elections" until a later date, when the "Red Alert" is lifted (if it ever would be). Thus keeping him in power.