Posse Comitatus Act

Chad Garrison‘s critique of the news that the Army is driving military vehicles through the streets of St. Louis, Missouri, is typical of the media response to this outrageous event – a local television station’s coverage “really ignited the crazies” in the same way Orson Welles’ War of World radio broadcast did in 1938, Garrison chides.



Posse Comitatus Act

Garrison, who writes for the River Front Times, neglected to note that Welles’ drama was pure fiction, whereas the troops on the streets of St. Louis are real.

In addition to lambasting Zero Hedge and other sites covering the deployment, Garrison singled out Alex Jones who he sarcastically states produced the video below “from a basement bunker.”

Mr. Garrison’s inability to understand the significance of troops on the streets is sadly normal behavior on the part of the establishment media (and much of the alternative media, as the River Front Times is billed as a St. Louis “alternative”).

In fact, we note today, many residents in St. Louis are praising troops on the streets. According to a Fox 2 St. Louis report, “people who live and work in the area think the army training is a good idea.http://fox2now.com/2012/06/21/us-army-training-in-st-louis-city-streets/

Abhorrence to standing armies is spelled out in the Declaration of Independence, a document many Americans unfortunately do not know and would not understand if they bothered to read it.

“A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty,” James Madison warned during a speech delivered at the Constitutional Convention in 1878. “The means of defense against foreign danger, have been always the instruments of tyranny at home. Among the Romans it was a standing maxim to excite a war, whenever a revolt was apprehended. Throughout all Europe, the armies kept up under the pretext of defending, have enslaved the people.”http://thecommonroomblog.com/2009/10/james-madison-on-a-standing-army-2.html

In a letter to Madison penned in 1787, Thomas Jefferson lamented the fact that the Bill of Rights does not include a restriction on standing armies. “The following [addition to the Bill of Rights] would have pleased me,” he wrote. “All troops of the United States shall stand ipso facto disbanded at the expiration of the term for which their pay and subsistence shall have been last voted by Congress.”http://famguardian.org/Subjects/Politics/ThomasJefferson/jeff1480.htm

“The spirit of this country is totally adverse to a large military force,” he wrote to Chandler Price in 1807.

The “training” conducted in St. Louis is yet another example of the state conditioning us to the presence of a standing army in our midst. It has little to do with al-Qaeda or phantom terrorists. It is, as Madison noted, an instrument of tyranny designed to enslave the people.