Unbeknownst to most Americans, the United States Coast Guard has been attempting to 'cross the Rubicon' for decades, and actually achieved that goal in a silent coup in 2003 when it was moved from the Department of Transportation into the newly-created Department of Homeland Security. This change was not merely bureaucratic; it allows the Coast Guard to now openly declare itself "one of the five armed forces of the United States and the only military organization within the Department of Homeland Security." The problem is that the Coast Guard is now attempting to straddle the line between a civil service agency (as it was set up to be and indeed has always been, except during times when it was specifically placed in the service of the Navy) and a branch of the military, conforming to the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
For those who understand how the United States military has been set up, and the laws and prohibitions against military personnel engaging in the policing of civilians, the fact that the Coast Guard wants to act as a maritime police agency at the same time as it declares itself a branch of the military is a clear indication that the United States is now officially under martial law.
In 1878, Congress passed a law known as Posse Comitatus that prohibited the use of military personnel or assets in domestic law enforcement. At the time, it was clear that the act was an attempt to prohibit the military from policing civilians on U.S. soil, as happened in the South under Reconstruction. What has been taking place in earnest since 9/11, however, is an attempt to erode the spirit and the substance of Posse Comitatus so that the Executive branch can effectively 'cross the rubicon' and use military personnel in domestic policing operations.
And perhaps the most important question of all: When will the American public, and the peoples of the other Western powers, realize that the Rubicon has long since been crossed and that they are already living in a military dictatorship?
