Codrea: An Early Warning?

From David Codrea:

An Early Warning?

US report predicts nuclear or biological attack by 2013

That's just one scenario. There are plenty of others, both natural and man-made, and at the risk of incurring ridicule, Reichstag fires to justify new "emergency" powers have been known to happen.

I wonder what government policy would be in a full-blown martial law national lock-down?

I wonder if law and order would completely break down in significant portions of the country and if we in the middle of it would be on our own?

I wonder if--Katrina lawsuit rulings notwithstanding--a military/police deployment would try to round up guns in some areas?

I wonder if gun owners would accept that?

I wonder what some would do once civil recourse via elections and lawsuits was indefinitely suspended?

I wonder how people would react to forced relocations?

I wonder why any talk of preparing for such eventualities is met with contempt and hostility by some? Are they saying the time to plan and prepare is after disaster strikes?

This may be much ado about nothing--standard preparations, they've been doing it since the Cold War.

But still, where in history is any civilization guaranteed stasis? Have not despotism and mass destruction plagued every civilization that preceded ours? Is it not, in fact, still commonplace throughout the globe? By what suspension of reality, by what denial of the observable and the probable, by what art, device or magic are we sheltered few immune from catastrophe? Are we certain, from our brief and privileged vantage point, that such things will ever remain headline curiosities?

Is it not just plain stupid to proclaim that our familiar way of life will forever be the norm, when everything that has gone before us shows we are, instead, the extremely lucky beneficiaries of a rare and fortunate convergence of circumstances; and one, by the way, that has only been preserved under force of arms?

[Via The Bitter Clinger]