Bush to declare state of emergency in the U.S.?
The US government is exploring the steps that would be needed to postpone the November election in the event of a major terrorist attack, Newsweek reported refering to the US counter-terrorism officials.
Last week the Department of Homeland Security asked the Justice Department to determine what the legal mechanism for calling a halt to a national election would be.
Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge last week warned al-Qaeda was planning to attack the US to disrupt the poll but conceded he had no precise information.
Along with other officials of the Bush Administration, Tom Ridge claims that he has no precise reports about the time or the way the terrorist act may be perpetrated. Nevertheless, the March railroad blasts in Madrid, which directly affected the elections in Spain, and the meaning of intercepted conversations between Al-Qaeda members, are showing that they terrorists were «planning to disrupt the elections», as one of the US officials put it.
Department of Homeland Security wants the Justice Department to give its evaluation of the letter that DeForest Soaries, the chairman of the newly created US Election Assistance Commission, forwarded to Tom Ridge.
In his letter, which urged Mr. Ridge to seek emergency legislation from Congress that would allow his agency to reschedule the vote in the event of an attack, Mr. Soaries points out that «the federal government has no agency that has the statutory authority to cancel and reschedule a federal election». Mr. Soaries has suggested Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge ask Congress to pass legislation giving Ridge the authority to make the call in the event al-Qaida follows through with its suspected desire to disrupt the elections.
There is a noticeable fact that the information leak about postponing presidential elections (which already would be unprecedented) came up right after various sources of information reported that Kerry-Edwards team got far ahead of the Bush-Cheney team, according to the polls conducted among the Americans.
After Kerry named Senator from North Carolina John Edwards as the candidate for a Vice President, 51 percent of the respondents were willing to vote for him at the elections. And 45 percent of the respondents said they would vote for Bush and Cheney.
If you imagine some hypothetical situation with several major terrorist attacks in the US (no matter who perpetrates them), and when the US Congress passes the law about emergency authorities that Department of Homeland Security will have, it will not be that hard to guess what will happen if Kerry will still be ahead of Bush. George W. will just declare the state of emergency in the country for an indefinite period of time and thereby transform his power into a classical type of dictatorial regime. So, there is almost no doubt that Bush may take such a step, once today's master of the White House concocted the Iraqi operation.
http://kavkazcenter.com/eng/article.php?id=2985
The US government is exploring the steps that would be needed to postpone the November election in the event of a major terrorist attack, Newsweek reported refering to the US counter-terrorism officials.
Last week the Department of Homeland Security asked the Justice Department to determine what the legal mechanism for calling a halt to a national election would be.
Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge last week warned al-Qaeda was planning to attack the US to disrupt the poll but conceded he had no precise information.
Along with other officials of the Bush Administration, Tom Ridge claims that he has no precise reports about the time or the way the terrorist act may be perpetrated. Nevertheless, the March railroad blasts in Madrid, which directly affected the elections in Spain, and the meaning of intercepted conversations between Al-Qaeda members, are showing that they terrorists were «planning to disrupt the elections», as one of the US officials put it.
Department of Homeland Security wants the Justice Department to give its evaluation of the letter that DeForest Soaries, the chairman of the newly created US Election Assistance Commission, forwarded to Tom Ridge.
In his letter, which urged Mr. Ridge to seek emergency legislation from Congress that would allow his agency to reschedule the vote in the event of an attack, Mr. Soaries points out that «the federal government has no agency that has the statutory authority to cancel and reschedule a federal election». Mr. Soaries has suggested Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge ask Congress to pass legislation giving Ridge the authority to make the call in the event al-Qaida follows through with its suspected desire to disrupt the elections.
There is a noticeable fact that the information leak about postponing presidential elections (which already would be unprecedented) came up right after various sources of information reported that Kerry-Edwards team got far ahead of the Bush-Cheney team, according to the polls conducted among the Americans.
After Kerry named Senator from North Carolina John Edwards as the candidate for a Vice President, 51 percent of the respondents were willing to vote for him at the elections. And 45 percent of the respondents said they would vote for Bush and Cheney.
If you imagine some hypothetical situation with several major terrorist attacks in the US (no matter who perpetrates them), and when the US Congress passes the law about emergency authorities that Department of Homeland Security will have, it will not be that hard to guess what will happen if Kerry will still be ahead of Bush. George W. will just declare the state of emergency in the country for an indefinite period of time and thereby transform his power into a classical type of dictatorial regime. So, there is almost no doubt that Bush may take such a step, once today's master of the White House concocted the Iraqi operation.
http://kavkazcenter.com/eng/article.php?id=2985
