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It's a very small step from this to disappearing and torturing dissidents at home. With The View calling for Tucker Carlson to be tried for treason by a milita

It's a very small step from this to disappearing and torturing dissidents at home. With The View calling for Tucker Carlson to be tried for treason by a military tribunal, I think we're approaching that point. Then when we get there and someone disappears (say, a colleague, a friend of a friend), some will think and even say "they must have done something". How do I know? Because that is what happened in Argentina during its Dirty War. Oh, I know, most of you will say "that could never happen in my country because we're a first-world Western nation", but Argentina very much was and still is a Western country, complete with rule of law ("Estado del Derecho"), and it was much wealthier then relative to the rest of the world, and had been truly first world in 1950. So, yes, these things very much can happen here in the U.S., and in Canada, and in the UK, and in France and Germany and Spain and Italy and Netherlands and Belgium and Norway and Sweden and so on. It takes a very small number of men to do most of the torturing and killing domestically. Sure, lots more are needed to do the arresting (disappearing) of victims. But not very many need to get down and dirty. Just ten men killing 150 victims/year would have covered the majority of the killings in the Dirty War over six years.

halfnormalform 5y ago
Excusing your whataboutism, it isn’t hard to argue he’s a foreign agent.
- cryptonector 5y ago
  Carlson, a foreign agent? It's just as easy to accuse you of shilling. Please be serious. And if you are, then we're in deeper trouble than I'd thought.
- libraryatnight 5y ago
  He seems more like an unscrupulous jackass than a foreign agent. Rachel Maddow seems just as ridiculous and stupid, but she seems far less dangerous and I'm not sure why that is. All the 24 hour news stations are FUD engines, but Fox and Carlson in particular have this urgency to everything they say - it's always the end of the world, an agenda, everyone is out to get you all the time. It's exhausting. That said he doesn't seem like a foreign agent, just a typical Fox News personality.
- StanislavPetrov 5y ago
  It isn't hard to argue a lot of things that are blatantly false and absurd because, unfortunately, in this day and age so many lack basic critical thinking skills and the capacity to make and understand logical arguments.
lesuorac 5y ago
> With The View calling for Tucker Carlson to be tried for treason by a military tribunal Isn't that the exact opposite of disappearing? I think the examples you're looking for are DHS hotel/detention centers [1] and Chicago's hidden detention centers [2]. [1]: https://abcnews.go.com/Business/marriott-choice-hotels-serve-detention-centers-ice-raids/story?id=64291249 https://abcnews.go.com/Business/marriott-choice-hotels-serve... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homan_Square_facility https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homan_Square_facility
- cryptonector 5y ago
  > Isn't that the exact opposite of disappearing? Asking for a civilian to be tried for treason by a military tribunal for saying... the same things that a government official has said, but in a way that makes the government look bad, is the same thing as abandoning the rule of law. We've only ever done such things during the Civil War, and even then Lincoln only suspended Habeas Corpus in limited places as needed. And Lincoln violated the Constitution in that case, as suspension of Habeas Corpus is, by its location in Article I of the U.S. Constitution, clearly only something Congress can do (though Article I, section 9(2), does not actually say so), and Chief Justice Taney correctly concluded as much in Ex Parte Merryman. (That said, I think Lincoln by and large did the right thing.) Yes, we've had wartime restrictions on speech that sucked and were not constitutional and should not have been used at all, both in WWI and WWII. But we didn't treat such speech as Treason, nor did we have military tribunals for those speakers, nor did we suspend Habeas Corpus at any time other than during the Civil War. And those were declared wars. Trial of civilians by military tribunals is really only something you'd expect in a civil war, and only when the constitutional order has fallen apart.
  - LadyCailin 5y ago
    Why is a military tribunal so bad? And if they’re bad, why are they used for military personnel? I can’t recall anything in the constitution suggesting that military personnel are exempted from having constitutional rights.
    - 5y ago
emilsedgh 5y ago
You don't need hypothetical Tucker Carlson situations in a world where Julian Assange and Ed Snowden are alive. I live in the US now but I come from a third world country (Iran) where such atrocities are commonplace. And let me tell you. What is happening to Assange shows that when it matters, the intelligence community is above the law and not that different from those bizarre authoritarian regimes. It's just that their propaganda machine is just more successful at "spinning the stories" and making people believe Ed Snowden and Julian Assange are anything but heroes.
- cryptonector 5y ago
  Snowden was a government employee, so he's not as good an example as Assange, but otherwise, yes, I agree. The point about Carlson is that things are getting dicier now -- not that it's surprising, mind you. I don't mean that I care more about Carlson than Assange -- I mean that what is being threatened regarding Carlson is much beyond what was done to Assange.
nkmnz 5y ago
> So, yes, these things very much can happen here in the U.S., and in Canada, and in the UK, and in France and Germany and Spain and Italy and Netherlands and Belgium and Norway and Sweden and so on. These things not only „can happen“, they happened in the not too distant past - much less than a generation ago: 1. There is strong evidence that the CIA ran - and maybe still runs - black sites across Europe used to kidnap people and bring them to Afghanistan or Guantanamo for torture. 2. At least half of Germany used to be a socialist dictatorship until 1990. People disappeared on a regular basis - and those responsible for kidnapping, torturing and killing dissidents still live among us, as our neighbors, as businessmen or members of parliament.
- cryptonector 5y ago
  Yes, and "those people probably did something" :(
kerryoco 5y ago
the rhetoric on all sides has been hyperbolic for years - I imagine if we could graph the use of "treason" or "lock [X] up" in public discourse we would see an explosion around 2014 and continuing straight to today. What gives me hope is: a) McCarthyism (surely that was worse, yet we made it through) b) this language is happening on privately funded cable news that approx 5% (I believe) of Americans watch on a daily basis. That's a far better place than coming from government officials.

halfnormalform 5y ago

Excusing your whataboutism, it isn’t hard to argue he’s a foreign agent.

cryptonector 5y ago
Carlson, a foreign agent? It's just as easy to accuse you of shilling. Please be serious. And if you are, then we're in deeper trouble than I'd thought.
libraryatnight 5y ago
He seems more like an unscrupulous jackass than a foreign agent. Rachel Maddow seems just as ridiculous and stupid, but she seems far less dangerous and I'm not sure why that is. All the 24 hour news stations are FUD engines, but Fox and Carlson in particular have this urgency to everything they say - it's always the end of the world, an agenda, everyone is out to get you all the time. It's exhausting. That said he doesn't seem like a foreign agent, just a typical Fox News personality.
StanislavPetrov 5y ago
It isn't hard to argue a lot of things that are blatantly false and absurd because, unfortunately, in this day and age so many lack basic critical thinking skills and the capacity to make and understand logical arguments.

lesuorac 5y ago

> With The View calling for Tucker Carlson to be tried for treason by a military tribunal Isn't that the exact opposite of disappearing? I think the examples you're looking for are DHS hotel/detention centers [1] and Chicago's hidden detention centers [2]. [1]: https://abcnews.go.com/Business/marriott-choice-hotels-serve-detention-centers-ice-raids/story?id=64291249 https://abcnews.go.com/Business/marriott-choice-hotels-serve... [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homan_Square_facility https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homan_Square_facility

cryptonector 5y ago
> Isn't that the exact opposite of disappearing? Asking for a civilian to be tried for treason by a military tribunal for saying... the same things that a government official has said, but in a way that makes the government look bad, is the same thing as abandoning the rule of law. We've only ever done such things during the Civil War, and even then Lincoln only suspended Habeas Corpus in limited places as needed. And Lincoln violated the Constitution in that case, as suspension of Habeas Corpus is, by its location in Article I of the U.S. Constitution, clearly only something Congress can do (though Article I, section 9(2), does not actually say so), and Chief Justice Taney correctly concluded as much in Ex Parte Merryman. (That said, I think Lincoln by and large did the right thing.) Yes, we've had wartime restrictions on speech that sucked and were not constitutional and should not have been used at all, both in WWI and WWII. But we didn't treat such speech as Treason, nor did we have military tribunals for those speakers, nor did we suspend Habeas Corpus at any time other than during the Civil War. And those were declared wars. Trial of civilians by military tribunals is really only something you'd expect in a civil war, and only when the constitutional order has fallen apart.
- LadyCailin 5y ago
  Why is a military tribunal so bad? And if they’re bad, why are they used for military personnel? I can’t recall anything in the constitution suggesting that military personnel are exempted from having constitutional rights.
  - 5y ago

emilsedgh 5y ago

You don't need hypothetical Tucker Carlson situations in a world where Julian Assange and Ed Snowden are alive. I live in the US now but I come from a third world country (Iran) where such atrocities are commonplace. And let me tell you. What is happening to Assange shows that when it matters, the intelligence community is above the law and not that different from those bizarre authoritarian regimes. It's just that their propaganda machine is just more successful at "spinning the stories" and making people believe Ed Snowden and Julian Assange are anything but heroes.

cryptonector 5y ago
Snowden was a government employee, so he's not as good an example as Assange, but otherwise, yes, I agree. The point about Carlson is that things are getting dicier now -- not that it's surprising, mind you. I don't mean that I care more about Carlson than Assange -- I mean that what is being threatened regarding Carlson is much beyond what was done to Assange.

nkmnz 5y ago

> So, yes, these things very much can happen here in the U.S., and in Canada, and in the UK, and in France and Germany and Spain and Italy and Netherlands and Belgium and Norway and Sweden and so on. These things not only „can happen“, they happened in the not too distant past - much less than a generation ago: 1. There is strong evidence that the CIA ran - and maybe still runs - black sites across Europe used to kidnap people and bring them to Afghanistan or Guantanamo for torture. 2. At least half of Germany used to be a socialist dictatorship until 1990. People disappeared on a regular basis - and those responsible for kidnapping, torturing and killing dissidents still live among us, as our neighbors, as businessmen or members of parliament.

cryptonector 5y ago
Yes, and "those people probably did something" :(

kerryoco 5y ago

the rhetoric on all sides has been hyperbolic for years - I imagine if we could graph the use of "treason" or "lock [X] up" in public discourse we would see an explosion around 2014 and continuing straight to today. What gives me hope is: a) McCarthyism (surely that was worse, yet we made it through) b) this language is happening on privately funded cable news that approx 5% (I believe) of Americans watch on a daily basis. That's a far better place than coming from government officials.