dont ingnore The Dangerous Drift to Redefine Terrorism as Government.
Let’s not forget the internment of Japanese Americans during WWII. No protest or civil disobedience needed, just need to look a certain way.
"Stone also identifies what makes the difference between restraint and excess: political leadership willing to maintain legal discipline even under pressure, courts willing to enforce constitutional limits even when the public is fearful, and robust democratic discourse that allows dissenting voices to be heard."
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0 for 3. The U.S. is headed for a real rough patch.
More to the point, what we're seeing in the U.S. isn't really a response to public fears at all. Haitians were not eating pets. Illegal immigrants actually commit crimes at a lower rate than citizens, which should not be surprising given that they can be deported as the fallout of a traffic stop.
The crisis currently playing out in Minnesota and other states was not an undisciplined response to public fears. It's the deliberate creation of public fear using what amounts to a private militia.
> The U.S. is headed for a real rough patch.
I agree with everything you say, but I would say we're well beyond "headed for" at this point...
Laws define terrorism, not drifts. Don't do the crime if you can't do the time.
The thing is, often crimes aren't defined by laws.
In Sweden we do define terrorism and terrorist organizations by the laws, and what the government designates as one is irrelevant. Meanwhile, most countries just declare "X is a terrorist organization", with this being done by politicians and where the organization often has no practical legal recourse.
I think the US takes the second approach for the most part? You can't argue "X isn't a terrorist organization, it does violence, but it's an international armed conflict" or anything of the sort-- if the government thinks you support something they don't like they can get you by banning the group you're part of.
Laws are interpreted by humans, whose conception of "crime" most definitely drifts.