“It is plausible to argue that these three points have sedimented weight, not as remnant ideology, but rather as ballast for common-sense notions of everyday dangers and alternatives to them. In particular, I believe they help to explain the promotion and acceptance of expanded punishment and the attendant apparatuses of criminal justice in the contemporary period, according to the following scheme. First, the legitimate domestic US state is the national security, or defense, or warfare state. Second, the local world is, and has always been, a very dangerous place: indeed, at the very moment when the nation is basking in foreign victory, the domestic turns hostile. Finally, the key to safety is aggression.”