NEW PAGES:

JFK and the Moon Race

JFK and the Unspeakable
includes audio files

DOTS TO CONNECT:

• Peak Oil
• Climate Change
• 9/11
• World War IV
• Media
• Homeland Security
• Fake Elections

RELATED WEBSITES:

Global Permaculture.org
Permatopia.com

Friendly Fascism or Full Strength?
sneaky steps toward the final solution against liberties

say it in German: Fuehrer

"The illusion of freedom will continue as long as it's profitable to continue the illusion. At the point where the illusion becomes too expensive to maintain, they will just take down the scenery, pull back the curtains, and you will see the brick wall at the back of the theater."
-- Frank Zappa

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, a few hours before the Supreme Court's 2001-2002 session, said that Americans are "likely to experience more restrictions on our personal freedom than has ever been the case in our country."

"I did not like fascists when I fought them as a diplomat for 23 years and I don't like them now in my own country."
retired American diplomat Joe Wilson (smeared by the Bush gang)
see interview at www.dailykos.com/story/2005/2/9/94615/61143

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither"
-- Benjamin Franklin

-- close up -->

Roman "Fasces" on the wall behind the Speaker's Podium
US House of Representatives chamber, United States Capitol

The "Fasces" was a symbol of imperial power in ancient Rome.
A bundle of sticks bound together, it represented the "many bound together as one."

"Fasces" is the root where the term "fascism" comes from.

"Of all the enemies to public liberty war is, perhaps, the most to be dreaded because it comprises and develops the germ of every other. War is the parent of armies; from these proceed debts and taxes. And armies, and debts, and taxes are the known instruments for bringing the many under the domination of the few. In war, too, the discretionary power of the Executive is extended. Its influence in dealing out offices, honors, and emoluments is multiplied; and all the means of seducing the minds, are added to those of subduing the force of the people. The same malignant aspect in republicanism may be traced in the inequality of fortunes, and the opportunities of fraud, growing out of a state of war...and in the degeneracy of manners and morals, engendered by both. No nation could preserve its freedom in the midst of continual warfare."
-- James Madison, April 20, 1795

"A clique of U.S. industrialists is hell-bent to bring a fascist state to supplant our democratic government and is working closely with the fascist regime in Germany and Italy. I have had plenty of opportunity in my post in Berlin to witness how close some of our American ruling families are to the Nazi regime. They extended aid to help Fascism occupy the seat of power, and they are helping to keep it there."
-- William E. Dodd, U.S. Ambassador to Germany, 1937

www.politicalstrategy.org/2003_09_23_weblog_archive.php

No one knows the Bush extremists better than Ray McGovern, a former senior CIA officer and personal friend of George Bush senior, the President's father. In Breaking The Silence, he tells me: "They were referred to in the circles in which I moved when I was briefing at the top policy levels as 'the crazies'."
"Who referred to them as 'the crazies'?" I asked.
"All of us... in policy circles as well as intelligence circles... There is plenty of documented evidence that they have been planning these attacks for a long time and that 9/11 accelerated their plan. (The weapons of mass destruction issue) was all contrived, so was the connection of Iraq with al Qaeda. It was all PR... Josef Goebbels had this dictum: If you say something often enough, the people will believe it." He added: "I think we ought to be all worried about fascism (in the United States).

www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18960.htm
Creeping Fascism: History's Lessons
By Ray McGovern, 2007-12-28

"There are few things as odd as the calm, superior indifference with which I and those like me watched the beginnings of the Nazi revolution in Germany, as if from a box at the theater. ... Perhaps the only comparably odd thing is the way that now, years later...."

www.prorev.com/fascisthints.htm
CLUES THAT YOUR COUNTRY MAY BE TURNING INTO A FASCIST STATE

www.maebrussell.com/Garrison/Garrison%20Playboy%20Intvw%202.html
also archived at www.oilempire.us/reichstag-fire.html
Jim Garrison, New Orleans District Attorney (subject of Oliver Stone's film JFK)
"fascism will come to America in the name of national security."

"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism,
since it is the merger of state and corporate power."
- attributed to Benito Mussolini
(researcher Chip Berlet claims Mussolini never said this
but it is accurate whether the dictator said this or not)

www.commondreams.org/views06/0828-23.htm
Published on Monday, August 28, 2006 by CommonDreams.org
Reclaiming The Issues: Islamic Or Republican Fascism?
by Thom Hartmann

In the years since George W. Bush first used 9/11 as his own "Reichstag fire" to gut the Constitution and enhance the power and wealth of his corporate cronies, many across the political spectrum have accused him and his Republican support group of being fascists. ....
It was actually Italian philosopher Giovanni Gentile who wrote the entry in the Encyclopedia Italiana that said: "Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power." Mussolini, however, affixed his name to the entry, and claimed credit for it.

www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/britt_23_2.htm

The 14 Defining Characteristics Of Fascism
By Dr. Lawrence Britt
Free Inquiry Magazine  / Spring 2003

Fascism Anyone?
Laurence W. Britt

The following article is from Free Inquiry magazine, Volume 23, Number 2.

Free Inquiry readers may pause to read the “Affirmations of Humanism: A Statement of Principles” on the inside cover of the magazine. To a secular humanist, these principles seem so logical, so right, so crucial. Yet, there is one archetypal political philosophy that is anathema to almost all of these principles. It is fascism. And fascism’s principles are wafting in the air today, surreptitiously masquerading as something else, challenging everything we stand for. The cliché that people and nations learn from history is not only overused, but also overestimated; often we fail to learn from history, or draw the wrong conclusions. Sadly, historical amnesia is the norm.
We are two-and-a-half generations removed from the horrors of Nazi Germany, although constant reminders jog the consciousness. German and Italian fascism form the historical models that define this twisted political worldview. Although they no longer exist, this worldview and the characteristics of these models have been imitated by protofascist1 regimes at various times in the twentieth century. Both the original German and Italian models and the later protofascist regimes show remarkably similar characteristics. Although many scholars question any direct connection among these regimes, few can dispute their visual similarities.
Beyond the visual, even a cursory study of these fascist and protofascist regimes reveals the absolutely striking convergence of their modus operandi. This, of course, is not a revelation to the informed political observer, but it is sometimes useful in the interests of perspective to restate obvious facts and in so doing shed needed light on current circumstances.
For the purpose of this perspective, I will consider the following regimes: Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, Franco’s Spain, Salazar’s Portugal, Papadopoulos’s Greece, Pinochet’s Chile, and Suharto’s Indonesia. To be sure, they constitute a mixed bag of national identities, cultures, developmental levels, and history. But they all followed the fascist or protofascist model in obtaining, expanding, and maintaining power. Further, all these regimes have been overthrown, so a more or less complete picture of their basic characteristics and abuses is possible.
Analysis of these seven regimes reveals fourteen common threads that link them in recognizable patterns of national behavior and abuse of power. These basic characteristics are more prevalent and intense in some regimes than in others, but they all share at least some level of similarity.

1. Powerful and continuing expressions of nationalism. From the prominent displays of flags and bunting to the ubiquitous lapel pins, the fervor to show patriotic nationalism, both on the part of the regime itself and of citizens caught up in its frenzy, was always obvious. Catchy slogans, pride in the military, and demands for unity were common themes in expressing this nationalism. It was usually coupled with a suspicion of things foreign that often bordered on xenophobia.

2. Disdain for the importance of human rights. The regimes themselves viewed human rights as of little value and a hindrance to realizing the objectives of the ruling elite. Through clever use of propaganda, the population was brought to accept these human rights abuses by marginalizing, even demonizing, those being targeted. When abuse was egregious, the tactic was to use secrecy, denial, and disinformation.

3. Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause. The most significant common thread among these regimes was the use of scapegoating as a means to divert the people’s attention from other problems, to shift blame for failures, and to channel frustration in controlled directions. The methods of choice—relentless propaganda and disinformation—were usually effective. Often the regimes would incite “spontaneous” acts against the target scapegoats, usually communists, socialists, liberals, Jews, ethnic and racial minorities, traditional national enemies, members of other religions, secularists, homosexuals, and “terrorists.” Active opponents of these regimes were inevitably labeled as terrorists and dealt with accordingly.

4. The supremacy of the military/avid militarism. Ruling elites always identified closely with the military and the industrial infrastructure that supported it. A disproportionate share of national resources was allocated to the military, even when domestic needs were acute. The military was seen as an expression of nationalism, and was used whenever possible to assert national goals, intimidate other nations, and increase the power and prestige of the ruling elite.

5. Rampant sexism. Beyond the simple fact that the political elite and the national culture were male-dominated, these regimes inevitably viewed women as second-class citizens. They were adamantly anti-abortion and also homophobic. These attitudes were usually codified in Draconian laws that enjoyed strong support by the orthodox religion of the country, thus lending the regime cover for its abuses.

6. A controlled mass media. Under some of the regimes, the mass media were under strict direct control and could be relied upon never to stray from the party line. Other regimes exercised more subtle power to ensure media orthodoxy. Methods included the control of licensing and access to resources, economic pressure, appeals to patriotism, and implied threats. The leaders of the mass media were often politically compatible with the power elite. The result was usually success in keeping the general public unaware of the regimes’ excesses.

7. Obsession with national security. Inevitably, a national security apparatus was under direct control of the ruling elite. It was usually an instrument of oppression, operating in secret and beyond any constraints. Its actions were justified under the rubric of protecting “national security,” and questioning its activities was portrayed as unpatriotic or even treasonous.

8. Religion and ruling elite tied together. Unlike communist regimes, the fascist and protofascist regimes were never proclaimed as godless by their opponents. In fact, most of the regimes attached themselves to the predominant religion of the country and chose to portray themselves as militant defenders of that religion. The fact that the ruling elite’s behavior was incompatible with the precepts of the religion was generally swept under the rug. Propaganda kept up the illusion that the ruling elites were defenders of the faith and opponents of the “godless.” A perception was manufactured that opposing the power elite was tantamount to an attack on religion.

9. Power of corporations protected. Although the personal life of ordinary citizens was under strict control, the ability of large corporations to operate in relative freedom was not compromised. The ruling elite saw the corporate structure as a way to not only ensure military production (in developed states), but also as an additional means of social control. Members of the economic elite were often pampered by the political elite to ensure a continued mutuality of interests, especially in the repression of “have-not” citizens.

10. Power of labor suppressed or eliminated. Since organized labor was seen as the one power center that could challenge the political hegemony of the ruling elite and its corporate allies, it was inevitably crushed or made powerless. The poor formed an underclass, viewed with suspicion or outright contempt. Under some regimes, being poor was considered akin to a vice.

11. Disdain and suppression of intellectuals and the arts. Intellectuals and the inherent freedom of ideas and expression associated with them were anathema to these regimes. Intellectual and academic freedom were considered subversive to national security and the patriotic ideal. Universities were tightly controlled; politically unreliable faculty harassed or eliminated. Unorthodox ideas or expressions of dissent were strongly attacked, silenced, or crushed. To these regimes, art and literature should serve the national interest or they had no right to exist.

12. Obsession with crime and punishment. Most of these regimes maintained Draconian systems of criminal justice with huge prison populations. The police were often glorified and had almost unchecked power, leading to rampant abuse. “Normal” and political crime were often merged into trumped-up criminal charges and sometimes used against political opponents of the regime. Fear, and hatred, of criminals or “traitors” was often promoted among the population as an excuse for more police power.

13. Rampant cronyism and corruption. Those in business circles and close to the power elite often used their position to enrich themselves. This corruption worked both ways; the power elite would receive financial gifts and property from the economic elite, who in turn would gain the benefit of government favoritism. Members of the power elite were in a position to obtain vast wealth from other sources as well: for example, by stealing national resources. With the national security apparatus under control and the media muzzled, this corruption was largely unconstrained and not well understood by the general population.

14. Fraudulent elections. Elections in the form of plebiscites or public opinion polls were usually bogus. When actual elections with candidates were held, they would usually be perverted by the power elite to get the desired result. Common methods included maintaining control of the election machinery, intimidating and disenfranchising opposition voters, destroying or disallowing legal votes, and, as a last resort, turning to a judiciary beholden to the power elite.

Does any of this ring alarm bells? Of course not. After all, this is America, officially a democracy with the rule of law, a constitution, a free press, honest elections, and a well-informed public constantly being put on guard against evils. Historical comparisons like these are just exercises in verbal gymnastics. Maybe, maybe not.

Note
1. Defined as a “political movement or regime tending toward or imitating Fascism”—Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary.

References
Andrews, Kevin. Greece in the Dark. Amsterdam: Hakkert, 1980.
Chabod, Frederico. A History of Italian Fascism. London: Weidenfeld, 1963.
Cooper, Marc. Pinochet and Me. New York: Verso, 2001.
Cornwell, John. Hitler as Pope. New York: Viking, 1999.
de Figuerio, Antonio. Portugal—Fifty Years of Dictatorship. New York: Holmes & Meier, 1976.
Eatwell, Roger. Fascism, A History. New York: Penguin, 1995.
Fest, Joachim C. The Face of the Third Reich. New York: Pantheon, 1970.
Gallo, Max. Mussolini’s Italy. New York: MacMillan, 1973.
Kershaw, Ian. Hitler (two volumes). New York: Norton, 1999.
Laqueur, Walter. Fascism, Past, Present, and Future. New York: Oxford, 1996.
Papandreau, Andreas. Democracy at Gunpoint. New York: Penguin Books, 1971.
Phillips, Peter. Censored 2001: 25 Years of Censored News. New York: Seven Stories. 2001.
Sharp, M.E. Indonesia Beyond Suharto. Armonk, 1999.
Verdugo, Patricia. Chile, Pinochet, and the Caravan of Death. Coral Gables, Florida: North-South Center Press, 2001.
Yglesias, Jose. The Franco Years. Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1977.
Laurence Britt’s novel, June, 2004, depicts a future America dominated by right-wing extremists.

On the road to Fascism
United States is taking on all the defining characteristics
Durango Herald -October 5, 2003
http://new.globalfreepress.com/article.pl?sid=03/10/10/1832217

We believe that the United States of America is drifting towards its own version of fascism.
Fascism, whatever its particular national characteristics, is inherently a destruction of the "old order" of a country its laws, its culture, its internal politics and its international relations. Fascists govern within existing systems until parallel systems are in place. Once those systems are in position, the evolution from national populism to fascism is unstoppable. Fascist states are internally destructive. When they become externally destructive, they are destroyed from outside.
Characteristics of fascist states include:
Fascist countries project that they are in a permanent or long-term state of war. (Example: We are in an endless war on terrorism.) Fascist countries invade other countries without provocation. (Example: pre-emptive war against Iraq.) We tried the Germans at Nuremberg for exactly this offense.
As Supreme Court Justice Robert L. Jackson, the chief U.S. prosecutor at the Nuremberg Tribunal, said on Aug. 12, 1945: "We must make clear to the Germans that the wrong for which their fallen leaders are on trial is not that they lost the war, but that they started it. ... Our position is that no grievances or policies will justify resort to aggressive war. It is utterly renounced and condemned as an instrument of policy."
Fascist countries violate their own treaties and international law. (Example: violation of the United Nations Charter by waging war against Iraq without UN approval.) Fascist countries lie to the general population, instilling fear and hysteria against mythological enemies, so they can go to war at will. (Examples: The 9-11 tragedy was used to generate hysteria through a massive government propaganda campaign based upon lies about Iraq; intimidation by color-coded terror warnings and provisions of the USA Patriot Act.)
Fascism is characterized by single-party rule, the destruction or transformation of the two-party system. (Examples: Colorado Gov. Bill Owens abolished the Colorado 2004 primary election; illegal attempts at redistricting driven by the White House; monetary corruption of the system resulting in voter apathy.)
Fascist governments demand unquestioning support otherwise you are a traitor. (Example: President Bush's statement, "You are either with us or against us.")
Fascist governments project an ideology that they are "right." (Example: President Bush, "I am right and I know I am right and history will prove me right.")
Fascist countries consolidate media control for propaganda purposes. (Example: Federal Communications Commission and corporate attempts at consolidation of the media.)
Fascism is characterized by legal parallelism. Fascist states create shadow agencies, shadow courts, separate prisons, thus destroying guaranteed constitutional rights. (Examples: Destruction of the guarantee of right to trial by jury; holding U.S. citizens without charge, without access to legal counsel and without the right to court appearance; intimidation of the judiciary by threats of blacklisting; intimidation of lawyers; degrading attorney-client privileges.)
Fascism is characterized by using torture, concentration camps and having major prison populations. (Examples: Guantanamo concentration camp; the FBI's description of how it "breaks" suspects with heat, cold, sound and sleep deprivation. The United States has the highest percentage of citizenry in prisons of any country in the world.)
Fascism is characterized by parallelism between the state and corporations. (Examples: Government and corporate overlap in certain industries oil, energy, military contractors and the media; massive corporate donations to both parties to assure connivance.)
Fascism, U.S. version, is characterized by the privatization of public services and the sell-off of public entities and resources for the benefit of the party faithful rather than the public at large. (Examples: Private profiteering on public services such as prisons, water, sewer, forest use, oil and gas; current order for appraisal of all post office buildings for contemplated sale.)
Fascism incorporates racism and attacks on the nondominant religion. (Examples: Imprisoning disproportionately one race for using a drug of choice other than that used by the dominant majority; Muslim profiling and harassment; denial of franchise to blacks under false pretenses in the Florida election.)
Fascism promotes conservative views of arts, literature, family culture, family planning and morals. (Examples: attacks on and decreased funding for National Public Radio, the Public Broadcasting System, the National Endowment for the Arts, any institution promoting family planning; school vouchers as the beginning of class-based private education and the destruction of the public education system; passing financial responsibility for Head Start to states that are near bankruptcy.)
Fascism takes religious symbolism and transfers the emotional and moral appeal to state symbols. (Examples: Aggressive and ostentatious God Bless America signs; the attempt to make the Pledge of Allegiance mandatory in Colorado schools; ostentatious flag waving and display; destruction of constitutional separation of church and state.)
We believe that the American tradition is in great peril.
Christine Eleanor Anderson, of Vallecito, is a businesswoman and a former law professor. Ross A. Worley is retired from Fort Lewis College. He lives in Durango. This was also signed by Jennifer Gehrman and Mark Seis, of Bayfield, and Greg Rossell, Charles Swift and Mary Lou Swift, of Durango.

Remarks by Senator Byrd
Delivered on March 1, 2005
Stopping a Strike at the Heart of the Senate

witness how men with motives and a majority can manipulate law to cruel and unjust ends. Historian Alan Bullock writes that Hitler's dictatorship rested on the constitutional foundation of a single law, the Enabling Law. Hitler needed a two-thirds vote to pass that law, and he cajoled his opposition in the Reichstag to support it. Bullock writes that "Hitler was prepared to promise anything to get his bill through, with the appearances of legality preserved intact." And he succeeded.
Hitler's originality lay in his realization that effective revolutions, in modern conditions, are carried out with, and not against, the power of the State: the correct order of events was first to secure access to that power and then begin his revolution. Hitler never abandoned the cloak of legality; he recognized the enormous psychological value of having the law on his side. Instead, he turned the law inside out and made illegality legal.

March 7, 2005
Columbus Free Press / Ohio
www.freepress.org/columns/display/7/2005/1084
Senator Byrd is Correct to Equate Bush With Hitler
by Harvey Wasserman

The U.S. Senate's senior Constitutional scholar has correctly equated Bush with Hitler, and the usual attack dogs are howling. But they are wrong, and Americans must now face the harsh realities of an increasingly fascist and totalitarian GOP.
Octogenarian Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia made the equation in the context of Bush's attack on Senate procedures which might slow or halt his on-going attempt to pack the courts with extreme right-wing fanatics. Byrd said Bush's moves to destroy time-honored Senate rules parallel Hitler's ramming fascist legislation through his gutted Reichstag. ....

While Bush advocates for "democracy" overseas, the GOP is crushing it at home. These judicial nominees mean to further solidify Republican control of the court system, which they have added to their grip on the Executive, both houses of Congress and the media. The GOP is also gutting safeguards within the FBI and CIA, turning them into a personal police force that could parallel Hitler's Gestapo.
Because the regime wraps itself in the rhetoric of our democratic roots, it's emotionally difficult for Americans to equate Bush with Hitler. He is not, after all, running death camps like the ones Hitler used to exterminate millions of Jews, Gypsies, gays, unionists, Jehovah Witnesses, the elderly and infirm, birth defected and handicapped. But the distinction may be lost on the tens of thousands of Iraqis who have died in the wholesale slaughter there, and whose land has been carpeted with radioactive depleted uranium which will kill for centuries.
Bush is now operating a classic concentration camp in Guantanamo. This infamous holding center operates entirely outside the rule of law, with prisoners held without charge, without evidence, without access to attorneys, family or the outside world. ....

Both Mussolini's Fascist's and Hitler's Nazis used acts of terror and alleged terror to grab absolute power. Ranting at Bolshevism as the GOP now does against Islam, the Nazis used the burning of the Reichstag much as the GOP has capitalized on the terror attacks of September 11. ....

Like Hitler, Bush believes he talks to and for God. He has said at least twice in public that he does not oppose dictatorship as long as he can be the dictator. His family has long, well-documented financial and political ties to the Nazi regime, as well as to Osama bin Laden and a long list of oil-rich Islamic fundamentalists.
Senator Byrd's invocation of the Nazis to describe the Bush regime may be considered impolitic. But it's folly to avoid the important parallels.
By all accounts American democracy is hanging by a thin thread which Bush/Rove is laboring mightily to cut.
Sen. Robert Byrd is a conservative, uniquely learned man. When he equates Bush with Hitler, he speaks with great sadness and scholarship -- and must be heeded.

"What happened was the gradual habituation of the people, little by little, to be governed by surprise, to receiving decisions deliberated in secret; to believe that the situation was so complicated that the government had to act on information which the people could not understand, or so dangerous that, even if people could understand it, it could not be released because of national security.
"The crises and reforms (real reforms too) so occupied the people that they did not see the slow motion underneath, of the whole process of government growing remoter and remoter.
"To live in the process is absolutely not to notice it -- please try to believe me -- unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us ever had occasion to develop. Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, 'regretted.'
"Believe me, this is true. Each act, each occasion is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next, and the next. You wait for one shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join you in resisting somehow.
"Suddenly it all comes down, all at once. You see what you are, what you have done, or, more accurately, what you haven't done (for that was all that was required of most of us: that we did nothing) ... You remember everything now, and your heart breaks. Too late. You are compromised beyond repair."
[An anonymous German college professor describing the coming of fascism. From 'They Thought They Were Free: The Germans 1939-1945', by Milton Mayer, a stunning and chilling account of ordinary people in extraordinary times.]

"No truly sophisticated proponent of repression would be stupid enough to shatter the facade of democratic institutions.":
Murray B. Levin, Political Hysteria in America, 1971

http://keyholepublishing.com/index.html

The Unveiling of the National Security State (7/14/2004)

The Unveiling of the National Security State
by Richard M. Dolan
copyright ©2004 by Richard M. Dolan. All rights reserved.
All things change, including our time-honored system of government. We have entered into a new era, marked by the existence of an omnipresent state, controlled by the very few, bound by no law but its own. Welcome to the New World Order. A new American order is in place. Better get used to it. Or else.
Five centuries ago, Niccolo Machiavelli explained how to undertake a revolution from above without most people even noticing. In his Discourses on Livy, he wrote that one "must at least retain the semblance of the old forms; so that it may seem to the people that there has been no change in the institutions, even though in fact they are entirely different from the old ones."
That is, keep the old government structures, even while you make profound changes to the actual system, because the appearances are all that most people will notice.
So today, instead of seeing the corpse of a republic in which we live, we see merely the dead man’s clothing. Those clothes look the same as ever, albeit increasingly worn. We have had a quiet revolution that has not eliminated our Congressional representatives – it’s simply made them largely irrelevant.
It’s been a long journey to our current state of affairs. Not surprisingly, wars have been a major catalyst. Most wars fought by the United States have added power to the executive branch, while whittling power away from the legislature. This includes wars fought for high-minded purposes such as the Civil War and World War Two, mindless bloodbaths like World War One, and the dozens of undeclared wars over the past half-century.
I would select World War Two -- and its immediate aftermath -- as the real turning point when the American Dream went awry. This is ironic, since it was at that moment when America first sat atop the world at the pinnacle of power.
And therein lies the problem. For this was when the American republic began its transformation into a national security state. Or, to put it another way, into an Empire. ...

“As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances there is a twilight where everything remains seemingly unchanged, and it is in such a twilight that we must be aware of the change in the air, however slight, lest we become unwitting victims of the darkness.”

Creeping Fascism
It is becoming increasingly difficult to avoid the conclusion that conservatives, subtly but unmistakably, are fomenting violence against liberals for the 2004 election. And if they succeed in doing so, America will be facing what has always been considered unthinkable here: a serious manifestation of fascism.
... I concluded previously that it seemed likely that any manifestation of fascism was some ways off, perhaps as long as a generation, if these trends were left unchecked. Now it appears that the timetable is moving much faster than that -- and countervailing forces are so far slow in coalescing, in no small part because of the utter, Stalinist ruthlessness of their opponents.
http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/2003_11_09_dneiwert_archive.html#106873808557482314

Rush, Newspeak and Fascism: An exegesis
by David Neiwert
POSTED AUGUST 30, 2003 --
www.cursor.org/stories/fascismintroduction.php

prisonplanet.com/122203fascistamerica.html

PRISON PLANET.com
Juan Bosch: His Prophecy of a Fascist America
William Hughes

A long time ago, I remember reading a disturbing magazine article that was written by Juan Bosch. He was the former president of the Dominican Republic ...
Bosch, like any true son of a nation, stood with his people against the grasping Oligarchs. He favored modest land reform in his poverty-stricken country. That proved a little too much for the fat cat sugar plantation owners and the ambitious army generals. He was ousted after only seven months in office, in 1963, in a CIA-assisted military coup. In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson sent in 20,000 Marines, on the pretext that the Dominican Republic might go communist. He feared it was another Cuba in the making. Sure, LBJ! Bosch died in 2001.
Anyway, getting back to Bosch's commentary. He had predicted that America would one day look like a U.S. occupied Dominican Republic! His point was, and I'm sorry I can't remember his exact words, that America would be corrupted by its underhanded role in replacing his and other governments around the globe. He saw a time when the U.S. would have its soldiers patrolling its own cities, airports, railroad stations, ports, public buildings and its capital. And, also that its citizens' liberties would be unduly restricted by the federal government that had lost its moral compass. Sadly, that time is coming fast!