History Repeats Itself

As someone who dabbles in history, the look at the stories of our past, I often find myself troubled with things I see in the present. I was taught as a junior in high school that: “ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny.” Ultimately, this is a fancy way of saying that history repeats itself. For years, I doubted this. I grew up and continue to believe that people can learn from their mistakes. Furthermore, they can grow from witnessing the mistakes of others, including their parents. In fact, I must say that I believed this type of education was an essential part of being human- a vital aspect of our ever-evolving collective humanity. But when I first laid my eyes on the following letters and numbers, I scarcely could believe my eyes:

NSPD 51 and HSPD-20

These little letters and numbers will effectively mark the end of the Republic if the citizenry of the United States of America fail to rise up and peacefully overwhelm its rhetoric and those who would see it through.

These little letters and numbers are acronyms for two documents entitled "National Security Presidential Directive/NSPD 51" and "Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD-20."

Under these documents, President Bush has ordered up a plan for responding to a catastrophic event within the borders of our Nation. This sounds harmless enough. We are, after all, in a Post-9/11, Post-Katrina world. It would make sense to have in place a modus operandi, a way to cut through the niceties of government in order to rapidly address a variety of disasters. Let there be no doubt, if the mainstream media ever gets a hold of this, this will be the spin we are force-fed on the 6 o’clock news. In the reality-based world, however, the content of NSPD-51 and HSPD-20 suggest a far more dangerous, perhaps outright nefarious design is at work. At this time, it is now clear to me that history is again repeating itself. The year I look to for reference is 1933.

The document’s subject is euphamistically titled, “National Continuity Policy.” In it, the President states that, given the right conditions, he alone will be given the final say in “ensuring Constitutional government” during a “catastrophic emergency.” The document states that a “catostrophic emergency” is "any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government function," and includes "localized acts of nature, accidents, and technological or attack-related emergencies."

Just in case you missed something in the last paragraph, this document explicitly states: ”The President shall lead the activities of the Federal Government for ensuring constitutional government." It negates any appearance of the three coequal branches of government by proclaiming there will be "a cooperative effort among the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of the Federal Government," which will be "coordinated by the President, as a matter of comity with respect to the legislative and judicial branches and with proper respect for the constitutional separation of powers." The President, in this scenario, would be granted the power to oversee the “coordination” of the three branches in order to "provide for orderly succession" and encourage an "appropriate transition of leadership."

Allow that to resonate in your head for a moment. George W. Bush has proclaimed that, in an emergency, he has the power to disband the Legislative and Judicial branches of the U.S. government. There is a clear parallel here between NSPD 51 and HSPD-20 and the Enabling Act of March 23, 1933. The problem is that the former legally granted dictatorial powers to Adolf Hitler.

I once thought that comparing anyone to Adolf Hitler was a stretch, an act of hyperbole. No more. Anyone who proposes this parallel now has my full attention and likely will see my head nodding in approval. I am not agreeing with them based on my political beliefs, my positions on the “Long War” (the so-called “War on Terror”), or my position on the U.S. governments support of torture. Though they surely factor into this, they are not the crux of my argument. I base my assessment simply on the facts in front of me and on other past failures of humanity. If I seem totally off base, let me make one more parallel available here. Read it, and then make your own decisions on the validity of my ideas.

On February 28, 1933, twenty-three days before the Enabling Act, the Reichstag Fire Decree was signed into law. It read:

§ Articles 114, 115, 117, 118, 123, 124 and 153 of the Constitution of the German Reich are suspended until further notice. It is therefore permissible to restrict the rights of personal freedom (habeas corpus), freedom of opinion, including the freedom of the press, the freedom to organize and assemble, the privacy of postal, telegraphic and telephonic communications, and warrants for house searches, orders for confiscations as well as restrictions on property, are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed.

Go through and list all that was suspended by the Reichstag Fire Decree. Check off which of these rights we have already lost in this country. And after that, I dare you to tell me I’m wrong. God, I wish this were the case.