The Mega Banana Republic formerly known as the US

[GrGr]

...Every day, Ashcroft and Bush work the country toward something like martial law, though the administration has suffered setbacks, like last week's rulings by two federal appellate courts in Padilla v. Rumsfeld and Gherebi v. Bush. Both of those decisions, for now at least, hamper the government's ability to simply lock up suspects indefinitely.

But the government has other targets and other ways of dealing with them. The most recent crackdown seems to be on the foreign press?the source of much of the substantial critique of its policies.

U.S. immigration authorities are detaining foreign correspondents on grounds they have not obtained special visas permitting them to operate here, reports the Associated Press. True, there is a law stipulating a special visa for journalists, but few have ever heard of it and it is seldom enforced. No more. No one ever told the visiting journalists it had suddenly been revived. As a result, immigration officials aren't allowing reporters from abroad to come in under ordinary 90-day tourist visa waivers.

Peter Krobath, chief editor for the Austrian movie magazine Skip, was seized and held overnight in a cold room with 45 others who landed without visas. Is he an Osama follower? A disguised fedayeen from Saddam's clan? No. He is guilty of flying to the U.S. to interview Ben Affleck.

Thomas Sjoerup, a photographer for the Danish paper Ekstra Bladet, had to give the American authorities fingerprints, a mug shot, and a DNA sample, and he was promptly sent back home anyway.

Six French journalists were marched across a terminal at Los Angeles International Airport in handcuffs, having had their belts and shoelaces removed. The International Press Institute, based in Vienna, along with the International Federation of Journalists, headquartered in Brussels, is protesting this treatment.

The U.S. response? An embassy official in Vienna insisted that the government was only acting in accordance with the letter of the law.

link

 

[ReiAyanami]

if they're not a terrorist yet our policies will turn them into one!!

 

[alchemize]

Can I point out anything about the source? Naah...

 

[heartsurgeon]

from the dictionary

banana republic
n.
A small country that is economically dependent on a single export commodity, such as bananas, and is typically governed by a dictator or the armed forces.

we are thethird largest populated country in the world, our economy is ranked number one in the world, we are a imported of bananas, not an exported, and we are a republic.

your analogy is marred by hyperbole and misinformation and faulty logic

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: heartsurgeon
from the dictionary

banana republic
n.
A small country that is economically dependent on a single export commodity, such as bananas, and is typically governed by a dictator or the armed forces.

we are thethird largest populated country in the world, our economy is ranked number one in the world, we are a imported of bananas, not an exported, and we are a republic.

your analogy is marred by hyperbole and misinformation and faulty logic

OK, Gorilla Republic as is King Kong sized. That better?

 

[heartsurgeon]

That better?

While i disagree with the premise,
i do believe it is a symantically more appropriate way to state it.

 

[dmcowen674]

Originally posted by: heartsurgeon

That better?

While i disagree with the premise,
i do believe it is a symantically more appropriate way to state it.

"While i disagree with the premise"

You think it is OK to jail American Citizens with No Due Process? Heil HS

 

[GrGr]

Originally posted by: heartsurgeon
from the dictionary

banana republic
n.
A small country that is economically dependent on a single export commodity, such as bananas, and is typically governed by a dictator or the armed forces.

we are thethird largest populated country in the world, our economy is ranked number one in the world, we are a imported of bananas, not an exported, and we are a republic.

your analogy is marred by hyperbole and misinformation and faulty logic

Unfortunately the analogy isn't mine but Norman Mailer's. Before the occupation of Iraq he wrote this little piece called: There's one way to protect democracy - send in the fascists

"My guess, though, is that, like it or not or want it or not, we are going to go to war because that is the only solution Bush and his people can see. The dire prospect that opens, therefore, is that America is going to become a mega-banana republic where the army will have more and more importance in our lives. It will be an ever greater and greater overlay on the American system. And before it is all over democracy, noble and delicate as it is, may give way. My long experience with human nature - I'm 80 years old now - suggests that it is possible that fascism, not democracy, is the natural state.

Indeed, democracy is the special condition - a condition we will be called upon to defend in the coming years. That will be enormously difficult because the combination of the corporation, the military and the complete investiture of the flag with mass spectator sports has set up a pre-fascist atmosphere in America already."


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