Could It Happen Here?

More importantly... has it already happened here?  As a correspondent recently pointed out to me, the phrase "drug lords" in the third paragraph below could easily be replaced with "Targeted Individual" or "scientist" or "journalist" or "writer" or "artist," etc.  What follows is a brief excerpt from an 8-26-16 Guardian report entitled "Philippines Police Chief Echoes President's Call to Kill Drug Traffickers":

"The Philippines’ police chief has called on drug users to kill traffickers and burn their homes, escalating the president’s deeply controversial campaign against drugs, which has claimed about 2,000 lives.

"'Why don’t you give them a visit, pour gasoline on their homes and set these on fire to register your anger,' Ronald dela Rosa said in a speech aired on television on Friday.

"'They’re all enjoying your money, money that destroyed your brain. You know who the drug lords are. Would you like to kill them? Go ahead. Killing them is allowed because you are the victim.'

"Dela Rosa was speaking on Thursday to several hundred drug users who had surrendered in the central Philippines. His comments followed those of the president, Rodrigo Duterte, which have sparked criticism from the United Nations and human rights groups.

"Duterte, 71, won May elections in a landslide on a vow to kill tens of thousands of suspected criminals in an unprecedented blitz that he claimed would eliminate illegal drugs in six months.

"He promised on the campaign trail that 100,000 people would be killed and so many bodies would be dumped in Manila Bay that fish would grow fat from feeding on them.

"Days after his election win, Duterte also offered security officials bounties for the bodies of drug dealers.

"When he took office on 30 June, Duterte told a crowd in Manila: 'If you know of any addicts, go ahead and kill them yourself as getting their parents to do it would be too painful.'

"The UN special rapporteur on summary executions, Agnes Callamard, said such directives 'amount to incitement to violence and killing, a crime under international law.'"

To read the rest of this article, click HERE.