When leaders who seek what I call a "fascist shift" want to close down an open society, they send paramilitary groups of scary young men out to terrorize citizens. The Blackshirts roamed the Italian countryside beating up communists; the Brownshirts staged violent rallies throughout Germany. This paramilitary force is especially important in a democracy: you need citizens to fear thug violence and so you need thugs who are free from prosecution.
Today we have private military firms such as Triple Canopy, and of course Black Water. These firms not only roam the streets of Baghdad, but have already roamed the streets of New Orleans. Accountable to no one except their share-holders, these firms employ their on mercenary army with their own rules of engagement and a history of shooting civilians for sport as Triple Canopy was accused of in 2006.
WASHINGTON - Shane Schmidt was a U.S. Marine for seven years, the leader of a sniper unit. Chuck Shepard spent seven years in the U.S. Army. After leaving the military, each found his way into the legions of heavily armed private security contractors working in Iraq.
The two were working together on July 8, 2006, when they claim they witnessed what they believe was a crime. They say another American fired, unprovoked, into two Iraqi civilian vehicles. They say it started during a mission to Baghdad International Airport, when their supervisor, who was leaving Iraq the next day and was in the vehicle with them, made a troubling remark.
"He'd made a comment that he was going to kill somebody today," says Schmidt. "Kill someone."
This new generation of Brownshirts are now all powerful and completely immune to U.S. Law and Iraqi Law as Ms. Wolf points out.
In Iraq, some of these contract operatives have been accused of involvement in torturing prisoners, harassing journalists and firing on Iraqi civilians. Under Order 17, issued to regulate contractors in Iraq by the one-time US administrator in Baghdad, Paul Bremer, these contractors are immune from prosecution.
4. Set up an internal surveillance system
Enter the Secret Police, watching everyone, hearing everything - and their most valuable agent just might be your next door neighbor.
In Mussolini's Italy, in Nazi Germany, in communist East Germany, in communist China - in every closed society - secret police spy on ordinary people and encourage neighbors to spy on neighbors.
In 2005 and 2006, when James Risen and Eric Lichtblau wrote in the New York Times about a secret state programme to wiretap citizens' phones, read their emails and follow international financial transactions, it became clear to ordinary Americans that they, too, could be under state scrutiny
Total Information Awareness, long thought dead has continued to re-emerge in new and more powerful forms. Tracking tens of millions of international domestic phone calls, emails and financial transactions without any judicial oversight. Clear and obvious violations of the FISA Law, the Pen and Trap restrictions and the 4th Amendment. No checks, no balance - just more paranoia, more fear, and more consolidation of power and influence.
5. Harass citizens' groups
And who better to watch than those peace-loving anti-war Liberals. Clearly they represent the most clear and present danger to the state (of perpetual war).
the American Civil Liberties Union reports that thousands of ordinary American anti-war, environmental and other groups have been infiltrated by agents: a secret Pentagon database includes more than four dozen peaceful anti-war meetings, rallies or marches by American citizens in it's category of 1,500 "suspicious incidents". The equally secret Counterintelligence Field Activity (Cifa) agency of the Department of Defense has been gathering information about domestic organizations engaged in peaceful political activities: Cifa is supposed to track "potential terrorist threats" as it watches ordinary US citizen activists.
Born and Bred in South Central LA. I spent 12 years working in the IT Dept. for federal contractor Northrop-Grumman on classified and high security projects such as the B2 Bomber. After Northrop I became an IT consultant with the state of California in Sacramento and worked on projects with the Dept of Consumer Affairs and CalTrans, as well as projects for Kaiser Permanente in Oakland. Now living in Los Angeles with my own independant web design company where I operate the Truth 2 Power Online Radio Station.
If she's not a witch, she has nothing to fear," said the good folk of Salem. But wait, some good folks of Salem in 1692 reported false information about their next door neighbors so they could get them executed and then get their adjoining farm. LadyBug (commenter on another thread) says (paraphrased) she doesn’t care if they know what novels she reads but she would care if she were plotting to blow up a building in Kansas. Now that she has mentioned a plot to blow up something in Kansas, she can be quoted out of context, and someone wishing her ill can have this information put in her file. Remember, even if she manages to find out about the false information in her file, she can’t have it removed. This is one type of situation that those who say they have nothing to hide, so nothing to fear do not take into consideration. I hope Lady Bug thinks this over. We must retain --or regain-- our Constitution and our legal rights.
by
Christie (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 145 comments)
on Saturday, September 22, 2007 at 2:04:07 PM
As a person whose parents survived the Stalin's Russia, whose relatives died in Nazi camps and who himself became a refugee and had to flee his own country I certify: All is true. Congratulations, suckers, you got your fascism. Eat your checkers.
Boy, I am sorry. It breaks my heart that this country to which I ran away from an incredible evil ( as I saw it) had embraced that very evil. I am so sorry.
by
Mark Sashine (44 articles, 19 quicklinks, 228 diaries, 3268 comments)
on Saturday, September 22, 2007 at 4:30:03 PM
Do not think for one single moment that this nation has embraced fascism. We are a people gone soft to be certain. We are smug in our pretenses of luxury and freedoms and mostly disinterested in the workings of government because this is the way we have been led to become.
My grandparents fled Russia and came here, two by rather circuitous routes. Other of my relatives died in Nazi death camps as well so we share abit of a heritage. On the other hand I was born here as were my parents and I have a bedrock belief in the decency and courage of the American people.
There will come a time, and soon, when the public will have had enough. That time may not come as soon as many here would prefer but come it will. The history of this nation is plainly seen to be a swing between the populist and the conservative and the pendulum is never still.
Most labor under the myth that our government works for us, more each day are coming to understand that it does not and will , once convinced, make things right. You will see........
by
ardee D. (6 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 2388 comments)
on Saturday, September 22, 2007 at 8:10:03 PM
The leaders of fascism are the wealthy elite who control large multinational corporations. They have all ready taken control of our trade policies and have brainwashed many academics into accepting the dogma of free trade and globalization. Bush and other free trade believers think that big business is the center of our universe and should be in control of our lives and our government. Business should not be held accountable to laws or any regulations that might interfere with profits. If you look at Bushes family history you will understand why. The only thing government should provide is multimillion dollar bailouts to owners of corporations who made a bad business decision.
Special interests love fascism and are the ones who desperately want it in the United States, so they can milk our tax base for all its worth without any oversight or objection. The future Hitlers are our corporate CEOs and lobbyists. They want complete control of our federal government and have all ready accomplished much of this goal.
America is at a point in history much like it was in 1770, citizens are being taxed by a government who behaves much like the English did in those days, Taxation without representation is what its called. Its time the citizens of this country rebelled against our trade policies, unsecured borders and the hiring of illegals, and anti union laws and practices.
by
Gary Denson (2 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 197 comments)
on Saturday, September 22, 2007 at 4:49:25 PM
Sorry, I appreciate your hope but it is not well-founded. I have no faith in a good portion of the American people. They are quite ensorcelled.... or actually, mindlessly in support of fascism. Like the person referred to above. Lost in their well-orchestrated fear of the terrorism boogyman and their consensus trance. ...
Unless each of us DOES something. NOBODY else is gonna do it for us.
Our first 911 truth meeting in this bible belt town meets next week.... And it ain't just about 9/11 truth.
by
richard (0 articles, 3 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 667 comments)
on Saturday, September 22, 2007 at 8:41:16 PM
If you have such an embittered opinion of the Americanpeople, why work so hard to change things? Methinks thou doth protesteth overmuch......C'mon, 'fess up, you loooove us....
by
ardee D. (6 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 2388 comments)
on Monday, September 24, 2007 at 6:09:25 PM
This is an excellent article. The only exception I would make is that the citizenry has not answered with a 'yawn', but rather with a despair that is nearly as bad. When I talk with friends, that is what I hear. At first, I thought that it would be good to mobilize the Democratic Party, but it is hard to do that when the media will not make a point that it is not the Democrats in Congress -- it is the Republicans who refuse to cooperate.
Although I will admit, I was certainly angry over the Senate's response to the MoveOn ad. When is the Senate going to censure Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, etc., for going so far as to suggest that one should shoot a Democrat? That is certainly much worse than making fun of someone's name.
Shirley Bianchi
by
Shirley Bianchi (8 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 82 comments)
on Saturday, September 22, 2007 at 6:45:52 PM
On Digg site, I posted an article I did for OpEdNews and was accused, by a person of supporting "leftist fools". I replied in an calm manner "I can't know how old you are, but my article dealt with historical facts. Nixon-without any announcement of his plans, tried to turn the US of A into a Fascist state. Naomi Wolf's book, "The End of America: A Letter of Warning To A Young Patriot" shows the 10 steps and face it-W has accomplished all of them.I do know I'm no "leftist fool". I'm old enough to expect that the person I'm communicating with wants a dialogue, not name-calling. If you want to speak facts we can continue this debate. Otherwise let me say one last truth. I'm old enough that I know 43 is a hundred times more evil than "Tricky Dick"! As Cheney said "Be careful, be very careful, what you say". That is a threat he made against Congress. They threaten Congress, then the citizens should be wary."
by
winston (106 articles, 17 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 30 comments)
on Sunday, September 23, 2007 at 8:21:56 AM
It is an inaccuracy, in my opinion, to protray Bush as some "evil force". Not only does that give him far too much cachet but it avoids the reality of the man. That reality makes him far easier to oppose and gives heart to those who do so.
Bush is a ne'er-do-well son of a powerful man, a person who has failed at everything he has attempted, who has been rescued time and again from his failures by his father, and one who has tried mightily to step from beneath his father's shadow his entire life. It is sad but accurate I fear to see that this entire war is an attempt to do just that.
by
ardee D. (6 articles, 4 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 2388 comments)
on Sunday, September 23, 2007 at 10:50:45 AM
