re: What are the chances you see martial law in your lifetime?

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feds are like gingers

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Not. Cool. Bro.

He doesn't have much support among the ranks but unless those that left also took the weapons then it really isn't a issue. I don't think an uprising would even reach 10 million able bodied people.

You realize that the majority of the military aren't combat personnel, right? The majority are support personnel that hit up the range once a year for qualification.

Full blown martial law? I don't think we'll ever set it.

Implementing martial law is a bit like trying to take over the world. Why do you want to do it? Chances are it's much easier to get what you want with a more nuanced approach....you don't need to "rule the world" - just control the important bits and not even officially.

Same thing with martial law. The forces and groups that hypothetically would seek to implement it could and already do get what they want without it.

I expect we'll see something short of martial law but with many of the same effects:

-Increased or at least sustained imprisonment rates
-Increased militarization of the police
-Greater centralization of wealth and power
-Decreased social mobility and a general decline of the middle class
-Steeper income inequalities
-Further degradation of civil rights
-Worsening civic malaise and general political disinterest

Soldiers won't be needed at every street corner. Those conditions and an obese screen-addicted populace will make martial law completely unnecessary.

There will be no popular uprisings anytime soon. We made it through the 1890s-1920s without the German emigrants and anarchists tearing up the country, the 1930s without the Communists and unemployed rising up and the 1960s without a second secession...I think we'll get through whatever people think this is (it's nothing special) just fine.

u.s. military had a hard time controlling a country 2/3's the size of Texas - it's almost impossible to control a large, armed population like the u.s.

would be dumb to even try it

Many federal agencies are buying mass quantities of ammunition. Your concerns are justified.

Inverted totalitarianism:

is a term coined by political philosopher Sheldon Wolin in 2003 to describe the emerging form of government of the United States. Wolin believes that the United States is increasingly turning into an illiberal democracy, and he uses the term "inverted totalitarianism" to illustrate the similarities and differences between the United States governmental system and totalitarian regimes such as Nazi Germany and the Stalinist Soviet Union.[1][2][3][4] In Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt by Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco, inverted totalitarianism is described as a system where corporations have corrupted and subverted democracy and where economics trumps politics.[5] In inverted totalitarianism, every natural resource and every living being is commodified and exploited to collapse and the citizenry are lulled and manipulated into surrendering their liberties and their participation in their government by excess consumerism and sensationalism

LINK

Well wait a sec... the dollar collapses, which is leaning more towards probable than impossible, of course there's martial law in all major cities. So there must be a contingency plan for that. I mean, all those people collecting government assistance aren't going to become farmers overnight.

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Particularly when the population of the US is around 300,000,000 people and the entire US military only has about 2,000,000 people... the majority are support personnel.

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You haven't been paying attention.

Foreign troops have been trained on US soil for such an event.

You've got FEMA and Homeland Security armies, and you've got the UN.

Plus numbers aren't that important when one team has drones, tanks, planes, ect.

General comment to the thread.

Economic collapse, insane natural disaster (Yellowstone blowing up), WWIII, widespread killer virus ect are all game changing things that drastically alter what is possible.

To say that a Martial Law scenario is not possible, or only possible if Obama tried to become a dictator isn't taking into account the way certain events can change everything.