Creeping Fascism: Lessons From the Past
“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….”
These are the words of Sebastian Haffner (pen name for Raimund Pretzel), who as a young lawyer in Berlin during the 1930s experienced the Nazi takeover and wrote a first-hand account. His children found the manuscript when he died in 1999 and published it the following year as “Geschichte eines Deutschen” (The Story of a German). The book became an immediate bestseller and has been translated into 20 languages-in English as “Defying Hitler.”
I recently learned from his daughter Sarah, an artist in Berlin, that today is the 100th anniversary of Haffner’s birth. She had seen an earlier article in which I quoted her father and emailed to ask me to “write some more about the book and the comparison to Bush’s America…this is almost unbelievable.”
More about Haffner below. Let’s set the stage first by recapping some of what has been going on that may have resonance for readers familiar with the Nazi ascendancy, noting how “odd” it is that the frontal attack on our Constitutional rights is met with such “calm, superior indifference.”
Goebbels Would be Proud
It has been two years since top New York Times officials decided to let the rest of us in on the fact that the George W. Bush administration had been eavesdropping on American citizens without the court warrants required by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978. The Times had learned of this well before the election in 2004 and acquiesced to White House entreaties to suppress the damaging information.
In late fall 2005 when Times correspondent James Risen’s book, “State of War: the Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration,” revealing the warrantless eavesdropping was being printed, Times publisher, Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., recognized that he could procrastinate no longer. It would simply be too embarrassing to have Risen’s book on the street, with Sulzberger and his associates pretending that this explosive eavesdropping story did not fit Adolph Ochs’ trademark criterion: All The News That’s Fit To Print. (The Times ‘ own ombudsman, Public Editor Byron Calame, branded the newspaper’s explanation for the long delay in publishing this story “woefully inadequate.”)
When Sulzberger told his friends in the White House that he could no longer hold off on publishing in the newspaper, he was summoned to the Oval Office for a counseling session with the president on Dec. 5, 2005. Bush tried in vain to talk him out of putting the story in the Times. The truth would out; part of it, at least.
Glitches
There were some embarrassing glitches. For example, unfortunately for National Security Agency Director Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander, the White House neglected to tell him that the cat would soon be out of the bag. So on Dec. 6, Alexander spoke from the old talking points in assuring visiting House intelligence committee member Rush Holt ( D-N.J.) that the NSA did not eavesdrop on Americans without a court order.
Still possessed of the quaint notion that generals and other senior officials are not supposed to lie to congressional oversight committees, Holt wrote a blistering letter to Gen. Alexander after the Times, on Dec. 16, front-paged a feature by Risen and Eric Lichtblau, “Bush Lets U.S. Spy on Callers Without Courts.” But House Intelligence Committee chair Pete Hoekstra (R-Michigan) apparently found Holt’s scruples benighted; Hoekstra did nothing to hold Alexander accountable for misleading Holt, his most experienced committee member, who had served as an intelligence analyst at the State Department.
What followed struck me as bizarre. The day after the Dec. 16 Times feature article, the president of the United States publicly admitted to a demonstrably impeachable offense. Authorizing illegal electronic surveillance was a key provision of the second article of impeachment against President Richard Nixon. On July 27, 1974, this and two other articles of impeachment were approved by bipartisan votes in the House Committee on the Judiciary.
Bush Takes Frontal Approach
Far from expressing regret, the president bragged about having authorized the surveillance “more than 30 times since the September the 11th attacks,” and said he would continue to do so. The president also said:
“Leaders in Congress have been briefed more than a dozen times on this authorization and the activities conducted under it.”
On Dec. 19, 2005 then-Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and then-NSA Director Michael Hayden held a press conference to answer questions about the as yet unnamed surveillance program. Gonzales was asked why the White House decided to flout FISA rather than attempt to amend it, choosing instead a “backdoor approach.” He answered:
“We have had discussions with Congress…as to whether or not FISA could be amended to allow us to adequately deal with this kind of threat, and we were advised that that would be difficult, if not impossible.”
Hmm. Impossible? It strains credulity that a program of the limited scope described would be unable to win ready approval from a Congress that had just passed the “Patriot Act” in record time. James Risen has made the following quip about the prevailing mood: “In October 2001 you could have set up guillotines on the public streets of America.” It was not difficult to infer [[ http://www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/60/19945 ]] that the surveillance program must have been of such scope and intrusiveness that, even amid highly stoked fear, it didn’t have a prayer for passage.
It turns out we didn’t know the half of it.
What To Call These Activities
“Illegal Surveillance Program” didn’t seem quite right for White House purposes, and the PR machine was unusually slow off the blocks. It took six weeks to settle on “Terrorist Surveillance Program,” with FOX News leading the way followed by the president himself. This labeling would dovetail nicely with the president’s rhetoric on Dec. 17:
“In the weeks following the terrorist attacks on our nation, I authorized the National Security Agency, consistent with U.S. law and the Constitution, to intercept the international communications of people with known links to al-Qaeda and related terrorist organizations…. The authorization I gave the National Security Agency after September 11 helped address that problem…”[emphasis added]
And Gen. Michael Hayden, who headed NSA from 1999 to 2005, was of course on the same page, dissembling as convincingly as the president. At his May 2006 confirmation hearings to become CIA director, he told of his soul-searching when, as director of NSA, he was asked to eavesdrop on Americans without a court warrant. “I had to make this personal decision in early Oct. 2001,” said Hayden, “it was a personal decision…I could not not do this.”
Like so much else, it was all because of 9/11. But we now know…
It Started Seven Months Before 9/11
How many times have you heard it? The mantra “after 9/11 everything changed” has given absolution to all manner of sin.
We are understandably reluctant to believe the worst of our leaders, and this tends to make us negligent. After all, we learned from former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill that drastic changes were made in U.S. foreign policy toward the Israeli-Palestinian issue and toward Iraq at the first National Security Council meeting on Jan. 30, 2001. Should we not have anticipated far-reaching changes at home, as well?
Reporting by the Rocky Mountain News and court documents and testimony in a case involving Qwest Communications strongly suggest that in February 2001 Hayden saluted smartly when the Bush administration instructed NSA to suborn AT&T, Verizon, and Qwest to spy illegally on you, me, and other Americans. Bear in mind that this would have had nothing to do with terrorism, which did not really appear on the new administration’s radar screen until a week before 9/11, despite the pleading of Clinton aides that the issue deserved extremely high priority.
So this until-recently-unknown pre-9/11 facet of the “Terrorist Surveillance Program” was not related to Osama bin Laden or to whomever he and his associates might be speaking. It had to do with us. We know that the Democrats who were briefed on the “Terrorist Surveillance Program” include House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) (the one with the longest tenure on the House Intelligence Committee), Congresswoman Jane Harman (D-CA) and former and current chairmen of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Bob Graham (D-FL) and Jay Rockefeller (D-WVA). May one interpret their lack of public comment on the news that the snooping began well before 9/11 as a sign they were co-opted and then sworn to secrecy?
It is an important question. Were the appropriate leaders in Congress informed that within days of George W. Bush’s first inauguration the NSA electronic vacuum cleaner began to suck up information on you and me, despite the FISA law and the Fourth Amendment?
Are They All Complicit?
And are Democratic leaders about to cave in and grant retroactive immunity to those telecommunications corporations-AT&T and Verizon-who made millions by winking at the law and the Constitution? (Qwest, to it’s credit, heeded the advice of its general counsel who said that what NSA wanted done was clearly illegal.)
What’s going on here? Have congressional leaders no sense for what is at stake? Lately the adjective “spineless” has come into vogue in describing congressional Democrats-no offense to invertebrates.
Nazis and Those Who Enable Them
You don’t have to be a Nazi. You can just be, well, a sheep.
In his journal Sebastian Haffner decries what he calls the “sheepish submissiveness” with which the German people reacted to a 9/11-like event, the burning of the German Parliament (Reichstag) on Feb. 27, 1933. Haffner finds it quite telling that none of his acquaintances “saw anything out of the ordinary in the fact that, from then on, one’s telephone would be tapped, one’s letters opened, and one’s desk might be broken into.”
But it is for the cowardly politicians that Haffner reserves his most vehement condemnation. Do you see any contemporary parallels here?
In the elections of March 4, 1933, shortly after the Reichstag fire, the Nazi party garnered only 44 percent of the vote. Only the “cowardly treachery” of the Social Democrats and other parties to whom 56 percent of the German people had entrusted their votes made it possible for the Nazis to seize full power. Haffner adds:
“It is in the final analysis only that betrayal that explains the almost inexplicable fact that a great nation, which cannot have consisted entirely of cowards, fell into ignominy without a fight.”
The Social Democratic leaders betrayed their followers-”for the most part decent, unimportant individuals.” In May they sang the Nazi anthem; in June the Social Democratic party was dissolved.
The middle-class Catholic party Zentrum folded in less than a month, and in the end supplied the votes necessary for the two-thirds majority that “legalized” Hitler’s dictatorship.
As for the right-wing conservatives and German nationalists: “Oh God,” writes Haffner, “what an infinitely dishonorable and cowardly spectacle their leaders made in 1933 and continued to make afterward…. They went along with everything: the terror, the persecution of Jews…. They were not even bothered when their own party was banned and their own members arrested.” In sum:
“There was not a single example of energetic defense, of courage or principle. There was only panic, flight, and desertion. In March 1933 millions were ready to fight the Nazis. Overnight they found themselves without leaders…At the moment of truth, when other nations rise spontaneously to the occasion, the Germans collectively and limply collapsed. They yielded and capitulated, and suffered a nervous breakdown…. The result is today the nightmare of the rest of the world.”
This is what can happen when virtually all are intimidated.
Our Founding Fathers were not oblivious to this; thus, James Madison:
“I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations…. The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.”
We cannot say we weren’t warned.
Ray McGovern works with Tell the Word, the publishing arm of the ecumenical Church of the Saviour in Washington, DC. A former Army officer and CIA analyst, he worked in Germany for five years; he is co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity.
This article appeared first on Consortiumnews.com.
OK, so now we know why Pelosi has worked so hard to take impeachment off the table. Turns out she’s a (so far) unindicted co-conspirator.
Too many Fascists and fellow travelers in both major parties. Time to clean house, top to bottom. If the red party and the blue party can’t or won’t vigorously cleanse themselves in the next few months, vote green.
What is wrong with our legislators? Are a majority of them also responsible for this chaos? Is Representative Wexler and Representative Inslee the only people we can rely on? Of course this problem has been building for years. Nixon was a fascist, Reagan was a fascist and this entire administration is Fascist! Is it going to take a revolution to bring democracy back to this country?
There are better writers out there than I, please give us something to grab on to.
“Fascism in America won’t come with jackboots, book burnings, mass rallies, and fevered harangues, nor will it come with black helicopters or tanks on the street. It won’t come like a storm—but as a break in the weather, that sudden change of season you might feel when the wind shifts on an October evening: Everything is the same, but everything has changed. Something has gone, departed from the world, and a new reality will have taken its place. All the old forms will still be there: legislatures, elections, campaigns—plenty of bread and circuses. But “consent of the governed” will no longer apply; actual control of the state will have passed to a small and privileged group who rule for the benefit of their wealthy peers and corporate patrons.
To be sure, there will be factional conflicts among the elite, and a degree of debate will be permitted; but no one outside the privileged circle will be allowed to influence state policy. Dissidents will be marginalized—usually by “the people” themselves. Deprived of historical knowledge by a thoroughly impoverished educational system designed to produce complacent consumers, left ignorant of current events by a corporate media devoted solely to profit, many will internalize the force-fed values of the ruling elite, and act accordingly. There will be little need for overt methods of control.
The rulers will act in secret, for reasons of “national security,” and the people will not be permitted to know what goes on in their name. Actions once unthinkable will be accepted as routine: government by executive fiat, state murder of “enemies” selected by the leader, undeclared wars, torture, mass detentions without charge, the looting of the national treasury, the creation of huge new “security structures” targeted at the populace. In time, this will be seen as “normal,” as the chill of autumn feels normal when summer is gone. It will all seem normal.”
— November 10, 2001
Moscow Times (English Edition)
Mussolini defined fascism as the alliance of government and business.
Since he was its first official proponent, I think we should take his definition as the basis for discussion, and put aside niggling and quibbling about how many basic rights have been tramped on and who knew about all that.
Eisenhower–who was not a progressive leader nor the brightest bulb in the geopolitical box, told the people of the US to beware of the military/industrial complex.
Apparently everybody was too busy pursuing the “American Dream” to listen to the guy.
And apparently, the largest portion of the population is still out there shopping instead of stopping and evaluating how they found themselves in the prison of a totalitarian state.
This is not NEW. It has been a gradual progression over much of the twentieth century, and simply went into turbo at the beginning of the twentyfirst.
Just one example: I remember when freedom of the press became a thing of the past: April, 1986. The same night that Reagon sent the bombers to Libya to kill Ghaddafi–in what turned out to be a practice run for Panama 3 and a half years later. After Reagan’s annoucement on television that the US had bombed Libya–despite no state of war existing (the gringos don’t need no stinkin’ international law)–and all the sycophants of the US press said, “Yeah, bravo, what a great idea”, and one lone guy from the BBC said “Just a minute, it was not a great idea, and let me tell you why: There will be repercussions in the Arab world for years…” at which point he was summarily given The Big Hook and that was it.
Any further news we had to get on short wave from Europe or Latin America.
I was not the only one who found that moment to be a turning point. In early 2004, when the House of Commons was debating what to do about BBC shakup and its aftermath, the leader of the opposition indicated that what was to be FEARED and AVOIDED was the loss of a free press like that which occurred in the US in April of 1986 after the bombing of Libya….
That’s just one tiny example of the US solidifying and institutionalizing fascism. There has been plenty of writing on the wall, but it’s been more convenient for folks to declare that it’s just graffiti, and keep on shopping.
Frank Lieb: This is probably NOT what you want to hear, but what’s wrong with your legislators is that they represent the collective YOU–a nation of self-congratulating, racist, bellicose, materialistic sheep and ostriches–soon to be declared the lemmings of history as they rush over the cliff to its abyss.
Just as the German Social Democratic Party “was dissolved”, the US Democratic Party is rapidly dissolving.
In addition to enabling the neocons, many “prominent” Democrats are actively working against the Democratic Party.
A glaring example is Bill and Hillary Clinton actively campaigning for independent Joe Liebermann against Democrat Ned Lamont. Now Joe has endorsed John MCCain in New Hampshire.
There is a significant difference between the spineless surrender of the Weimar politicians opposing Nazi rule and the collaboration of the leading Democratic politicians in the United States in ending Constitutional protections.
Hitler had already attempted a violent overthrow, in the so-called Beer Hall Putsch of (I believe) 1922, of the constitutional government of Weimar Germany. While serving time in prison because of his leadership in that attempted revolt, he wrote and published “Mein Kampf” [My Struggle] which explicitly laid out his plans for a Germany ruled not by democratic election, but by a fascist leader, as Italy was then being led by Benito Mussolini.
Exactly the opposite is the case for the fascist take-over in the United States in the last decade.
Bush decried activist judges. deficit spending, and efforts by the United States military to import democratic institutions: he opposed efforts, he said, at “nation-building” (such as had characterized Clinton’s interventions in Somalia and Haiti). He opposed the federal efforts to shore up the lot of the homeless, the unemployed, and the mentally unstable, promising a “faith-based” effort for their assistance. He was, he said, a “compassionate conservative.”
All of those domestic promises were transparent lies. Planning for war began immediately,as — your post provides important substantiation — the transformation of the government into a centralized, leader-based, militarized tyranny.
Co-operation by the non-Nazi politicians in the take-over of the Weimar constitutional order was done in full public view, pressured by the actual confrontation with a large Communist movement pledged to overthrow of the system of private property. The collaboration by the leading Democratic politicians in Washington in the fascist coup d’etat we have witnessed in this country is of a different order, surreptitious and hypocritical. At every step the Democrats claimed to be protective and supportive of civil liberties; all the while they in fact supported the stripping of Constitutional protections and imposition of quasi-military rule in its stead.
I, too, plan to vote green.
The well-known political scientist, Bertram Gross authored a controversial book in 1980, “Friendly Fascism: The New Face of Power in America.”
Gross was a well awarded social scientist and he was the author of Hubert Humphrie’s Full Employment Bill (the government would be the employer of last resort).
Because he was such a big name, his book was published but censored (parts were expurgated).
Eventually, the complete book was published by a Cambridge-based Left-wing publishing house: Southend.
Read it and nod your head in amazement when concluding how prescient Gross was.
Ron Paul was right to sound a warning. Should the Clinton’s return to power there is no doubt that we will continue down this road to tyranny. Mrs. Clinton will not only not give up the powers she has helped Bush gain she will be in her glory. the danger signs are everywhere.
That’s an absolutely chilling quote, Gadfly … especially considering the source.
Fascism and most other totalitarian systems are most successful with a compliant monopoly controlled media.
Turn off your televisions. At least until our televisions converge with the internet.
television = monopoly
internet = democracy
it is as if evil just moved its headquarters over to america,after the fall of nazi germany…i believe evil has once again moved its headquarters,this time to dubai. (if any of you have time today,watch george bush sr.’s chilling speech on the ‘new world order ‘)…..not convinced,yet ??
mmeo:
I don’t see a lot of difference at all.
In Germany, the troublesome Communist Party folks were nuetralized by the nazis setting of the Reichstag Fire and their successfully blaming it on the Communists.
Any potential resistence to the last phase of fascism in the US was effectively nuetralized by Cheney pulling off 9/11 (motive, means and opportunity–which nobody else had).
There’s really no point in quibbling and niggling.
It’s over. And the Bad Guys won.
The “Good” American can now take his place in the history books next to the “Good” German.
Hoa binh
I agree with MMEO, It is’t over, the bad guys are very worried right now. They aren’t the only team in DC who know how to dance the Patomic two step.
Bush has lined up a lot of ducks, but he doesn’t have them all lined up yet. There is still time to stop him and his Cartel. Let’s see how the Congressional hearings and investigations go in January, when Jose Rodriguez testifies before the Judicial Committee. (Unless he has a unfortunate fatal accident.) Their Congressional pre-hearings last week looked very bad For Bush.
“the Bad Guys won.”
They are winning, but it’s not over yet.
“Vote Green” = Karl Rove’s dream to further Divide and Conquer
What’s really needed is a people’s movement of true Peace Candidates united to end the war. We don’t need millions of dollars, just a united front.
Peace Candidates
Dear Ray- you ought to be a leader of this movement to unite Peace Candidates in every state. Mr. McGovern- you ought to run for Congress.
…and the rest of you CommonDreamers - you ought to consider running too…. particularly the 30 somethings - quit waiting for the older generation to do it- most are stuck relying upon the failed system- it’s time to evolve, and it’s the younger generations that must lead the way.
great stuff, Ray. we must keep telling it like it is.
Apparently it’s too painful for folks to face the truth, that YES; IT IS OVER.
I have lived outside the US for 15 years and I CAN face the truth.
I believe it’s called “perspective”–or having an external point of reference.
There is absolutely nothing you folks can do to make meaningful change–short of a revolution.
And that will interfere with shopping.
Fascism is not coming to Amerikkka; it is here. Instead of the one Nazi party, we have the Demokkkrats and the Repulikkkans in colusion with each other.
I’ve had it. Today I switched my voter registration to Republican. I’m voting for Ron Paul. Fuck the Democrats. They’ve owned both houses of congress for a year and haven’t done a goddamn thing except to get down on their knees and perform fellatio on Bush every chance they get.
Tom: That’s not going to do it. Sorry.
Sadly, you may be correct, moon. The “American psyche” has indeed descended deeply into the darkness of fear and especially resignation, which goes along feeling marginalized. Hoverer, the solution to effective change may be as close as a mirror.
Today I switched my voter registration to Republican. I’m voting for Ron Paul. Fuck the Democrats. They’ve owned both houses of congress for a year and haven’t done a goddamn thing except to get down on their knees and perform fellatio on Bush every chance they get.
ROFL so you changed your affiliation to the party of bush????
tom joad and slimshady,you are men of my own heart…i did the same-i have INFILTRATED the mein-camp-de-bush,so i may vote in the primary for ron paul.let hillary and obama duke it out…they dont need me.
“ROFL so you changed your affiliation to the party of bush????”
Wake up sLiMsHaDy. Paul is the only real opposition to Bush that there is.
What isn’t going to do it moon is supporting an opposition party that provides NO opposition.
The American political system was murdered on November 22, 1963 with a warning to all future Presidents. The warning was reiterated on June 5, 1968. “American values” began in slavery, flourished in genocide, battened on empire, and died in conspiracy. Its funeral was conducted with a closed casket for reasons of “national security.” Until we have a theory of political economy that relies on thermodynamics instead of Adam Smith and his subscribers, which would include Karl Marx, we are in thrall to the “common sense” of Wall Street. Without a vision of where we should go, we are blinkered by the evasive and ambiguous blather of pundits.
You don’t need to bail out of the Democratic Party yet.
Dennis Kucinich has been trying to keep us from slipping into this Fascism for years. Unfortunately the main stream media know that he would work for the people rather than for corporations (as they do) and they aren’t covering his campaign — and now even Edwards was shut out of the USA Today article.
We can’t let corporations buy the presidency, we need to do the explorations on our own!
Take a look at the Kucinich view of the issues at http://www.dennis4president.com/go/issues/
Is that Cheney I hear laughing? The giggling is obviously (coming from) Bush.
Tom Joad:
Before you assume that I am a Democrat, try reading my posts on this thread, for example this one–just above yours:
“There is absolutely nothing you folks can do to make meaningful change–short of a revolution.”
I wouldn’t be caught dead voting for either the Tweedledee party or the Tweedledumb.
It does not matter who wins the election, it will be business as usual. This is the Nazi Party on mescaline. Leaders are but temporary incidentals. How many times of crisis have we faced in the last half of the last century only to be told that the solution was our due to the foresight of our founding fathers by way of the living framework of the Constitution. If you have just arrived at the party I have to tell you, “Due to executive order and clarification, the Konstitution has been suspended. The Bill of Rights have been retired for security reasons, and the Magna-Carta has its origins elsewhere, therefore it is unAmerican.” The solution to this problem lies with the people and not with their elected officials. A good start would be to organize a new Constitutional Convention.
infiltrating the party of bush…,equals= guerilla-warfare ( give them a healthy dose of their own medicine(tactics )oprah will take good care of obama and wall street will bolster-up hillary..they dont need me.i want to be where i might have the opportunity of making a difference…..douglas ames is probably right…but i have still have my boots on and a desire to kick some ass while i wade thru all the ‘bullshit’……
can’t we be a bit more hopeful here???
anyone who says they know what is going to happen or that the bell has already tolled, needs to ask theemselves: are you able to tell the future.
I think not. The future remains to be sensed…
Lets stop being so dismally self-fulfilling…
gracious, sometimes the conversations here are so ridiculous…honestly, it seems that way to me…
I’d rather be talking with folk who are hopeful….
some here are, but some are choosing to be woefull..
The most politically apathetic and ignorant population lead by the most immoral and crooked politicians (not leaders) has given rise to the present state of affairs. However, the politicians’ economic treachery where the second class in America is evaporating like an ice cube in hell is no less outrageous. It’s amazing how people let themselves be outsmarted by a clown.
Saila - we have not been outsmarted. Just you wait and see.
saila,you are of good intention and speak what is sad and very true…people were outsmarted by a clown…criminals hold all the highest offices in our government(and the world) america is indeed melting like an ice cube in hell….but what the hell,saila !!grab your boots and kick some ass or you can lay down and die,here in what’s left of america or as an ex-patriot in some other country that ‘hates’ americans………
Otherwise Saila, I want to say, I have very much appreciated all you have said…really, I mean it for what it matters..
buffalo:
You wrote:
“anyone who says they know what is going to happen or that the bell has already tolled, needs to ask theemselves: are you able to tell the future.”
That IS ridiculous.
If something has already happened, it is in the PAST.
No one needs to be able to tell the future in this case.
In precisely WHOM or WHAT are you placing your gratuitous hope?
“or as an ex-patriot in some other country that ‘hates’ americans………”
That leaves the whole planet outside the US borders as possible living space.
Works for me.
moonraven, i have much respect for you.
All I am trying to say is that no-one knows the future. The past informs what may be, but we never know for sure.
I choose to be hopeful.
Peace
bufflao:
Tell us what YOU are DOING to insure that future, and that peace.
BTW, there are folks who do know the future. You just aren’t one of them.
moonraven,
we should stop talking….
but if you want to know about me, then just click on my name.
Peace, and I meant it the first time I said it.
I told you so. Very strange isn’t it.
moonraven,it would work for me,as well…but i could never leave behind,those that i love.and they are the reason,i choose to keep my boots on.
buffalo,
You are WAAAY too noble for this species and this planet.
So long as the human species exists, there will never be peace.
I recommended an excellent book on another thread:
James Hillman’s A TERRIBLE LOVE OF WAR.
That love, unfortunately, runs deeper than anything you can create in its contra.
Dreams are wonderful, but reality has a way of making its presence known–sooner or later.
I am also a dreamer–in the tradition of William Blake–whose birthday I was born on–but if those dreams are based on denial, they’ll never get off the ground.
I repeat: A revolution is called for.
And not just in the US–here in Mexico folks are holding their breaths for two things:
1. The millions of tons of genetically manipulated corn that will flood across the border on January 1 and put the final nail in the coffin of alimentary sovereignty for this country, and
2. The revolution that loss will provoke in 2010. (In 1810, the revolution fcr independence and in 1910, the revolution against the great landholders.)
seraphicmom:
You could learn to expand your circle of loved ones, like I did.
And my boots are very much on–just in a different part of the planet.
moonraven,my circle of loved-ones,is all over this globe and i call them “humanity”…… (but),the children and grandchildren of my womb,i will not abandon, to face the dogs of war,alone.
Oh boy–here we go.
I consider that my daughter is no longer in my womb, but her own person, more than capable of making her own decisions. And she has not made me a liar.
Happily, one of those decisions was not to make me a grandmother.
Actually, when I am home in Mexico I live and have lived for 8 years with a campesino family who “adopted” me.
I am not into that possessive family stuff. Biological families are not all they are cracked up to be.
McGovern is ignoring a huge difference between the Germany of 1933 and the America of 2001-2002, let alone the America of 2007.
The German people were intimidated by the Nazis themselves and their brutality. They were in fear of the SA gangs and then of the Gestapo and SS and concentration camps.
Americans in 2001-2002 were in fear of terrorism. Americans today are not much in fear of terrorism anymore, and certainly not in fear of George W. Bush and the Republicans.
There are no huge concentration camps, there is no Gestapo. The NSA wiretaps have not resulted in mass arrests. If you’re named Osama or Husseini you may have been insulted and harrassed at an airport, you may even have had to fear arrest and detention in the various black holes. But the latter has affected very few people, and fewer still have been US citizens. Most of us are not afraid.
We just have not found our voice.
The Democratic leadership has been too cautious and pragmatic; they may be complicit in some of the worst excesses but they could easily pin the blame on Bush and Cheney and if they moved to impeach them being called hypocrites by the Republicans would hardly be so bad (in fact, coming from the Rs most people wouldn’t buy it). They just don’t think they’d win, and they haven’t the courage to try and to bet on coming out ahead.
We The People have not found found our voice, either. It’s easy to blame “the Democrats” but where is the mass movement demanding impeachment or even accountability? We’re dependent on the mass media to tell us what’s happening, and even whether we’re supposed to care.
So we wait for the next election. And that’s not devoid of hope, either. Imagine what it could mean if Barack Obama could be our next president, backed by a solid Democratic majority in both houses? AND pushed hard by a mass movement?
I think it’s way too soon to be talking about a “fascist takeover”. We already live under the effective control of the corporate media, outrageous inequality and a stagnated politics. Black boots are not needed to maintain order.
At the same time, throughout the nation and throughout the power structure there is a sense that we made a wrong turn and there is a yearning for a new direction. This surfaced dramatically in the Iran NIE, and you sense it in the ambivalence about Iraq, torture, civil liberties and the GWOT itself. Democracy has not been undone, and it is preparing for a major course correction.
I see hope ahead for a more positive direction.
” think it’s way too soon to be talking about a “fascist takeover”. We already live under the effective control of the corporate media, outrageous inequality and a stagnated politics. Black boots are not needed to maintain order.”
Once folks have embraced fascism, black boots are not necessary. They were not necessary in Italy, and they were not in Germany. Only in Spain was there an active resistance to the fascists in power. And it didn’t go anywhere–the stench of Franco still pervades Spain.
The reality is that the great majority of the US people embraced fascism years ago.
I think you are kidding yourself in regard to the “pendulum model” of self-correction.
my offspring are also free standing people…,,they still have hope for a tomorrow…mexico ?? how is the aquifer doing there ??are they really getting most of their fresh water from california ?or is that just a myth ? i agree that biological families are not all that there is and i think love is more often found in many different places….and as far as i know,i am my own ancestor.
Uh, Mexico is a big country, señora.
Which aquifer’s health are you concerned about?
CocaCola and Nestle have managed to grab most of the water here in Mexico, bottle and sell it to us.
The water that comes out of the tap here is not drinkable.
And then there are the thousands of indigenous villages where there is no running water….
Personally, I am very concerened about the world’s largest fresh water aquifer, in Paraguay on the borders of Brazil and Arengentina–since the gringos have more and more troops there chasing of all people: Osama Bin Laden and Hezbollah.
But you don’t need to worry about any of this stuff. You, your womb and its fruits are snug as bugs in a rug in Fortress America.
moonraven,that jab about ’snug as bugs’ and’ fortress america’…went over the line and betrayed your inclination to be mean-spirited and bitter,a tad below the belt.i wish you would save your vim and vinegar…for a more deserving foe……..
Moon Raven: I always like to hear your prospective from Mexico. I say that because you know that the Mexican people have already experienced first hand and personally what US corporate empire has wrought. The “people of the corn” have already experienced the “tortilla wars” because of corporatization and degradation to your main food supply. You have already experienced the literal death of your local farmers and the driving them for the land so that Mexicans can no longer sustain themselves. The fact is that Americans seem to still buy into the concept of “exceptionalism”. Most Americans seem to believe that those things can not happen here. Well, the fact is, that they have and they will.
Look folks, Ray has given us a window to look at the past and how it relates to the present. We are already a fascist state. Almost all the pieces are in place. Many of us seem to think that we still have time to “vote” this mess into remission. I don’t have a crystal ball, but I am not convinced that there will even be an election next year. And even if there is one, did your vote in ‘06 stop this snowball from hell? How do you think an ‘08 election is going to change things? In what realistic ways?
I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m going to go down screaming, with my boots on. I’ve become resigned to the fact that we are far too along on the path to fascism to really be able to stop it politically. But I’ll keep trying to get impeachment “on the table”. I’m going to support Cindy in her efforts to unseat Pelosi. And I will support and vote for Kucinich in the primaries. We also have a chance to unseat many of the incumbant Dimms and Repugs with progressive candidates. But none of this is going to stop the snowball from hell.
Even though I KNOW that I am spitting in the wind, at least I’m going to try to do the right thing. But I am also going to be prepared for what is going to come. Before the revolution can happen we are going to have to suffer through an economic meltdown that is going to wake the sheeple up. There won’t be anything for them to buy at the mall or the grocery store. Even if they had the money, which they won’t.
So, if you truely love your family and your country, you had better make friends with your neighbors - all of them. We are all in this sinking boat together and we had all better learn how to bail TOGETHER. Start stocking up on all the things you and your neighbors are going to need. And don’t forget the seeds and the community gardens you will need to feed yourselves. We all have a very diffecult time ahead of us. And time is running short to get ready.
And I want to thank Ray for the insight of how we got here. I just wish he had some answers about how we fix anything at this late date…..
Fine, then don’t smear your self-righteousness around on this thread–implying that I am a bad mother because I left the US after living the Native American experience there for almost 50 years.
I am not bitter, but I come from the country and I live in the country and I know horseshit when I see it.
If you don’t want it to be identified, don’t put it out there.
Moon Raven: Sometimes you need to pull in your horns. I know that is sometimes hard when the injustices served up are so hard to bear. But we are where we are. We need each other now more than ever. Let it go…..
Rebel,
I am glad to see that you recognize reality when you see it!
Interestingly, Winston Churchill (who suffered from black bouts of clinical depression throughout his lifetime) once said–or wrote–that he was an optimist because he didn’t see the benefits of the other option.
I subscribe to his view.
The problem with most of the folks who post on this site, however, is that they are so caught up in their gringo-centered world view that they cannot imagine that someone could be pessimistic about the US and optimistic about a different part of the planet: Venezuela, for example.
And I am really getting tired of mentioning that the US–although it squanders most of the planet’s resources and contributes the biggest share of substances that have caused Global Warming–is a small portion of the planet.
Have any of you folks been to Latin America? the Middle East? India? China? Indonesia? Russia? even to the EU?
Rebel,
Sorry, but if I were in the habit of “letting it go” I would not be who I am, and I would not be doing the work that I do.
moonraven,whoa now ! are you projecting or what ? back-up…where on this earth did you get any inkling that ‘bad mother’ was implied in any way ?? i know that you are a fine mom and a wonderful soul ! i just want you to save your passion for the foe,that is rubbing the face of america,in the shit !!
It is not over yet-politically. We blame the democrats and certainly they are not all we would hope for, but they only have a small majority in the Senate which is what has hurt their agenda for change, and there is no way a conviction in the Senate is possible on impeachment charges, so why waste time and political capital. The only thing that is overwith is the likelihood that civilization will persist as we have known it. That is over, but it just hasn’t penetrated the consciousness, because we are in denial of ourselves as an evolutionary fluke. On the way out as a species we could have a pseudo-democratic fascism in the U.S. which is about where we are at the moment with corporations buying our politicians. Even if we solve this one the problems are too massive and the overpopulation too great for a soft landing to happen.
Well, seraphicmom,
1. your handle pretty much indicates that you are running on the platform of being a militant supermom. If you look at the origin of the word, it contains fire–in Hebrew something on the order of fire-breathing flying serpent, I believe.
2. your comment that you would not leave the fruit of your womb to face the dogs of war alone certainly implies that you think you are a better mother than I am in the sense that you are going to protect your offspring while I have abandoned mine.
3. English is my first language, and I do read it quite well.
I would like to make a motion that no one be allowed to sling around the term “projecting or projection” on this site. No one who is not a psychologist understands its dynamic in either Freudian or Jungian aspects. I have written a fair amount back in the day about how it works from a Jungian perspective, but it’s a slippery term at best and is used WAAAY too frequently in Internet comments whenever someone disagrees with another person.
It has, in short, become just another ad hominem device used by the right wing and someone posting from a supposedly progressive posture should avoid using it.
It has become exactly the equivalent of the second grade playground taunt: I know you are, but what am I.
Now, yes, I am going to let it go.
And I am not going to take the bait on the “runbbing the face of America in the shit” image, as it smacks of that old racist fart Samuel Huntington.
In fact, I am going home to my hammock for the evening.
whatever,,,(sigh)…but your motion that no one be allowed to sling around some ‘word’ violates the amendment and would deny me my constitutional right..you should talk with misanthrope, ad nauseum….where were we ?oh yea,back to the creeping fascism at hand…..
Stop it you two! PLEASE….
Socialism is simply the middle ground between Capitalism and Communism, and when you vote, it is called Democratic Socialism, or a Social Democracy
Our country has been somewhat of a mix of Socialism-Democracy and Capitalism-Fascism since the New Deal. Most of our industries are cartels, banking, oil, etc. Free competitive markets in the US is a myth, except for establishments that sell drinks and food. Capitalists desire monopolies or cartels to maximize profits, not competition which reduces profits.
Capitalism at it’s height is Fascism. Or as Mussolini said, it is best to call it Corporatism. I think we are already there and have been for some time, we are not creeping toward anything in this regard.
Those necessary functions that are not profitable, or can not be trusted to corporations, they are filled by government, and are basically Socialist programs. Non-profit Education, Welfare, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, Military, Police, Firemen, etc.
So politically we are Fascist, controlled by Corporations. This is why economically, we are neo-liberal, since corprations dictate to government and pretty much have all the freedom they need or want, including to take capital earned in this country and move it to another country. Socially, we are neo-conservative, since the critters need to be controlled and keeping them poor helps do this. We fill the gaps that Capitalism leaves ever so reluctantly with socialist programs that do their best to profit the capitalists, or at least not hurt them.
Today we are in a soft kind of Fascism. Still have most of our liberties, freedom to travel, post anti-government messages, etc. However, if you look at the recent Laws and Executive Orders, not to mention Presidential Directives passed since 2001, heck, even back to Jimmy Carter with FEMA, you can see that the tools have been put in place allowing for a transition to hard fascism.
The hard, as in Nazi hard, is defined as fewer liberties (no criticism of the government), less rights (no habeus corpus), more intrusive government (spying, search and seizure), and increased use of violence to control dissent (tasers, etc), and the removal of the illusion of a Democracy.
The acceleration of the process does not bode well for the critters. Democrats are going along with it because for the last 30 years they have been participating in the looting of the American critter. Once the critter recognizes he has been robbed through a combination of taxes (almost 50% of his income in one tax or another), usury banking practices
(high interest on money created out of thin air), fraudulent CPI reporting that keep salaries and COLA’s from keeping pace, and the government incentives given to corporations to export capital and jobs out of the US, creating unemployment (real number is 12%)/underemployment, which also serves to increase our national debt and lower the value of the dollar;
then the critter might get mad and bite someone, no matter they be dems or repugs .
They fear the mad critter, and it is time for his awakening, and they have prepared for this.
It happened yestersay too Rebel, with another, it was far worse. Don’t sweat it MOM, she may be having a fever or sometthing, the water is bad there.
MIMI, that sound about right to me. It is also why we are on the verge of a depression and what Rebel Farmer posted sounds about right to me also.
As far as this Bush administration goes, I do see that the Congres is going to attempt to end the bull shit next moonth and if their hearings turn out like they should, the press will have to cover it. __ ~Watergate two~. I sure hope so. __We’ll see.
Hi Rebel, did you recieve any happy next year cards? ~~ Smiley face~~.
moonraven: “There is absolutely nothing you folks can do to make meaningful change–short of a revolution. ….but that would interfere with shopping”
Sarcasm at its very best!
Would you extend that observation to apply to the folks in Igloo-Hockeyland as well?
Little ships are cast in any direction by the wind. Big ships steer a steady course in any wind conditions. Rest assured that there are many big ships among us. They have lived long lives, withstood the storms, suffered the hardships, and they remain on course. Do not despair. There are Captains other than Captains of industry.
KEM: Nope, I didn’t get anything yet. I haven’t been too good about my e-mail lately though. Thanks for the headzup!
I’m all for government by the people, of the people, and for the people. I don’t care what you call it, just as long as it guarantees me and my fellow man life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And corporations aren’t people. That means that they are not intitled to any of those rights.
And I agree with MiMi. I think we are at the end stage of fascism here in America. Hold on to your hats folks!
P.S. KEM: I think you may be putting too much faith in the outcomes of hearings in January. Hope I’m wrong though….
Doom: Would you elaborate on who those big ships may be? Thanks…..
“There is absolutely nothing you folks can do to make meaningful change–short of a revolution.”
Well, moonraven, since you’re over there with all the perspective, maybe you could direct those of us who have decided to stay and fight.
What the Dems will do will have nothing to do with ‘ending this’. Can’t you tell from this article, and everything else we’ve learned (like the near unanimous votes on the Patriot Act and the fact that only one Senator (who needed hay for his faltering Presidential campaign) seems to have temporarily stopped the granting of immunity for this illegal spying) that the Dems are fully supportive and onboard with this policy.
If the Dems announce they’ll hold hearings, that just means they want some soundbites and headlines to help their campaign. It does not mean they’ll actually do anything. Doing something would entail …. not granting immunity …. launching impeachment investigations … using the same investigations to refer criminal charges …. insisting the Justice Dept follow through on charges, probably by naming an independent prosecutor … backing that up with threats to cut money from the Justice Dept budget if they don’t follow up (anyone see Charlie Wilson’s War, where as a committee member he tells the CIA they are going to loose a million dollars for every bit they delay on talking to him?).
Congress has the power to stop this. And the Dems have the votes. If the Republicans filibustered, the Dems could counter-fillibuster all budget money for the NSA and Justice. The writers of the Constitution deliberately gave Congress the power to control this. The Dems won’t use it. And they won’t use it because they like this policy as much as the Rethugs.
If you want to change this, stop voting Dem. When you vote Dem, you are voting to support this policy. Instead, kick Pelosi out of Congress (www.cindyforcongress.org), work with a real party that opposes this (www.gp.org).
And if you want to really find out how far into fascism we are, give it a test. Come to Denver next year for the DNC. Lets get several million concerned American citizens in the streets telling the Dems to their faces that this is not acceptable. (www.recreate68,org)
Moonraven:
I know you’ve left the “discussion” for now and just in time. Your eloquence, intellect, and obviously rich life experience was really starting to get to some of our omnipresent bloviators who really should start their own website and stop polluting this one.
I’m quoting you here, one of many fine observations tonight:
“what’s wrong with your legislators is that they represent the collective YOU–a nation of self-congratulating, racist, bellicose, materialistic sheep and ostriches–soon to be declared the lemmings of history as they rush over the cliff to its abyss.”
In admiration and respect,
Misanthrope
The global corporatist Empire hiding behind the facade of ‘Vichy America’ is just like the nazi Empire hiding behind the phony government of ‘Vichy France’ that it set up as a facade.
Except that this global corporatist empire of the 21st century has gotten much further in its take over of the whole world, is much more guileful than even Goebbels, and has set-up a full two-party vichy government and mainstream vichy media that is no where near as obvious as Vichy France.
Even Goebbels did not try to set up a phony two-party vichy facade in the fatherland. Today, he would roll over in his grave and shout:
“Mein Fuhrer, I failed you. I would never have envisioned that we could have set up such a complete (and complicit) two-party vichy scam in our own fatherland. Why, they don’t even know that they are in the belly of the beast! This ‘Vichy America’ is such a marvelously sophisticated propaganda that it could truly be the ‘thousand year Reich’ we only dreamed of.”
Getting lectured by a former high-ranking CIA official on fascism is a little like listening to the pot calling the kettle black.
Ray, if you want to get indignant over government-business alliances why don’t you tell us how the company (insider slang for the CIA–interesting irony there!) midwifed the overthrow of democraticaly elected governments in Iran, Guatamala, Chile, El Salvador, Nicauragua, the Congo, Angola, Vietnam, Laos, Yugoslavia, and a whole host of other places.
Tell us how in every case those democratically elected heads of government were executed, imprisoned, or run out of their country and were replaced by oligarchial business elites more to the liking of the IMF, World Bank, and their government toady the State Department.
Your CIA hands are just as dirty with the blood of innocent slain martyrs as the Nazi’s or KGB ever hoped to be Ray and your bitching about the Bush adminstration is just so much internicene political turf warfare. A plague on both of your houses.
For real, Doom, woould you elaborate on those big ships please?
As has been said before: the Democrats are controlled by cowards, the Republicans are controlled by fascists, and both are thieving corporate capitalist parties. The machine is broken and we are heading for a cliff. Drastic, courageous change is required if we are to survive. Otherwise, we are assisting global genocide. It’s our own choice, we cannot blame anyone else, and the rest of the world is waiting to help us. But…to once again paraphrase the Last Poets: “Liberals are scared of revolution.”
For the present Rebel, that’s the only thing going in the near future that shows promise.
I watched C-span a few days ago, the Judiciary Committee. They are zeroing in with determination on Cheney and Bush. I don’t remeber the Congressman’s name. A Billy someone? He is grinding the axe and it wasn’t for show. He’s pissed, there were three Congressmen and they were asking very tough questons about torture, the missing tapes and they were not accepting any bullshit from the trio of Costitutional lawyers they were questioning. And the lawyers didn’t press it, they spit out the truth and Bush looked very bad,___ of course he would look bad.
When Mr. Jose Gonzales testifies, and if he tells it all, watch the fur start to fly. I fully understand skepticism from any and all after what we have seen this past year. I do have my hopes up after watching that unrehearsed program. Valorie Plame and Joe Wilson have some powerful friends in the loop and friends who know where the bones are buried. I think dem bones are gonna get dug up and the full skeleton will be put together for the entire world to witness.
If it falls flat, you can tell me, “I told you so.”
“We have had discussions with Congress…as to whether or not FISA could be amended to allow us to adequately deal with this kind of threat, and we were advised that that would be difficult, if not impossible.”
Complete bullkaka, Gonzales. FISA did not NEED to be amended in the first place. FISA was well-designed to handle the terrorist scenario. Even if it needed improving that was easy to do.
What we have with the eavesdropping is very clearly a class war assault by the elites against the people. They are exploiting the people’s fear to take away the people’s freedoms and concentrate power in the hands of elites.
Good Germans, have a “SAFE” and Happy New Year of telephone, internet, postal mail, banking, and travel surveillance.
In a morbidly curious way, I wish I could gaze into a crystal ball on America and see just how “oppressible” we are. The government opens up the detention camps. The government revokes the First Amendment. The Second. The government has already done away with #4 in the digital age (freedom from warrantless searching).
But just how much would Americans tolerate until they began to recognize Gore Vidal’s “enemy within”, and took effective action?
There are many good people who have lived their lives with wisdom and honor. They have not been cast aside by events. They have maintained their purpose and they have carried the mail for the many who wrongly have chosen the path of weakness and self indulgence. They come in all races, colors, nationalities, faiths, genders, and socio-economic classes. They carry the seeds of the future with them. They are awakened and active and will not allow American Fascism or other extreme isms to become firmly established and to stand. They are the moral backbone of this Nation and are not fools or people to be toyed with. Their actions will be smart and unconventional. They will act when they can do the most good. They are decentralized and will act individually and in concert with others. They are the heart and soul of what is good about America and they are steady in their actions. You will increasingly feel their presence and they will not fail because they place your best interests above their own. They know how to confront evil and to put fear in it. Evil is backtracking now and you will see it’s false strength for what it is, weakness.
Stay positive, hopeful, and thankful. Better days are ahead.
Paul: The average American will tolerate almost anything as long as it is happening to “the other”. The other being anyone who is not in their sphere - racial, cultural, economic, etc. I can’t remember the whole poem, but it starts with “When they came for the Jews, I was not a Jew, so I said nothing” and ends with “When they came for me, there was no one else to speak for me” or something like that.
It is my belief that most Americans will not raise up in sufficient numbers until they personally feel the pain of what has happened to our country. And I also believe that that pain will be delivered with an economic collapse. To me it seems that this is the event that will force people to unite with community to survive the upheaval. I believe that the American people are basically good. I also believe that many have become brain dead in our consumer culture with an overlay of mind numbing propaganda.
I hope Doom & Gloom is right. I just have a feeling that the better days ahead are going to be preceeded by some pretty tough times.
From all the recent comments, I feel that I must point out that de_nile is more than a river in Africa. For those of us who endured the sixties and seventies realize that some battles can be won, but the revolution was lost amid large groups of people migrating toward individual causes with the belief that it was where they could do the most good. The Big picture was lost due to focusing on smaller incremental advancement of progressive change. The situation today is much more dire and dangerous due to a lack of organized resistence. It’s a warm fuzzy thing to ‘project’ that we are on an endless path, stopping to adjust our course of direction occasionally, but the cold hard facts are that we are all at the bottom of a dark and dirty well with only our instincts and resourcefullness to attempt to resurface. Character and Committment are our tools, and a whole lot of bravery is needed to fuel them. Wake up, Wake up. The dreams is over for now, time to deal with the nightmare at hand.
Rebel,
I have met many different walks of life in North America, and I believe you are correct. I’m most interested in seeing how this whole thing will eventually be resolved. Will voices of reason/ethics/vision get a chance to come to power and avert the otherwise inevitable? If things continue, our society must (not optional) eventually collapse. The question is whether it is a foreign power, or whether Americans themselves, that eventually lay waste to D.C.
I think Ray McGovern’s main purpose is to keep the establishment-left discussion on course, and away from 9/11 truth. Of course, he’s not the only establishment-left figure doing that, but with his experience he just might be writing the script for others to follow.
Doom n Gloom, thanks for the articulation.
Rebel Farmer, I agree and maybe more: with a deep and wide enough “economic collapse” we could/would be witness to the spark for the first revolution on Earth in a capitalist industrial economy.
now even for an atheist, that sounds worth praying for
Sinclair Lewis: How Fascism Will Come To America (1935)
“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.”
- Sinclair Lewis, It Can’t Happen Here.
I have been saying it for quite some time on posts here on CD, and Rebel and Kem reinforce it. The only time people in this country will rise up in protest is when the pain hits them in the pocketbook. No more flat screen television for watching Sunday Night Football. No more four bedroom house with a swimming pool and a three car garage. No more morning stops at Starbuck’s coffee on the way to work. Life will have to become financially difficult and inconvenient.
This is a great discussion, but I think I need to go to bed now. All I can add right now is:
Paul: I think it may be too late for reason and justice to come to power in time to turn this mess around. If impeachment doesn’t happen NOW, and I mean in January, there is no other avenue to “dethrown” the king and his jesters. Getting Cheney locked up is critical. I am Supporting Wexler’s efforts to bring impeachment hearings. I think many on the judiciary committee are really trying to make this happen. But of course, Nancy is standing in the way. And I don’t think that anybody has to lay waste to DC. When the financial shit hits the fan (I’m guessing that the unraveling will begin in earnest around March) everybody is going to go into survival mode. The people will disengage from the government and the corporations. The will develop local support systems. I haven’t a clue as to what the pols in DC will do. I suspect that marshal law will be declared.
miftin: I don’t know why you believe that Ray is part of the establishment. Even Chomsky doesn’t want to focus on 9/11 right now. Our whole democracy is in melt down right now. I’d really like to have a REAL investigation of 9/11, but there are other things on the front burner right now for me.
polsci: I share your sentiments. I gave up my fear of the inevitable collapse when I realized I couldn’t stop it. Not that I won’t keep trying. I’m still out here beating my pots and pans VERY loudly. But I am also resigned. And getting prepared in the best way I can. I can’t say that I’m looking forward to “the spark for the first revolution”, but I can see that some good can come from it when it comes. We, as a people, will once again pull together and rise from the ashes. Hopefully we will remember how we got here so that we never make the mistake again.
claudius: What’s coming is going to be a lot more than “diffecult and inconvenient”. We are going to see what Americans are really made of. These will be “times to try men’s souls”. But we’re in it together, and as long as we stay together, and help each other, we’ll make it through to the other side.
Peace
Yes claudius, I have been saying just that since the stolen elections and the appointment of the president by the supreme court back in 2000. Now it seems that reality is beginning to overcome media spin, and the American sheeple are finally waking up to the pain, and their opinions are starting to approach something like a critical mass.
Martial law may be declared, but it cannot possibly be enforced. These scoundrels walk a fine line between what they need, want, and what is possible. Many of our economic elite would protest — it would hurt commerce, consumerism, etc. But more to the point, it would be totally unenforceable and cause a backlash they couldn’t possibly contain.
douglas ames, I do appreciate your realism and I understand what you are saying. My thoughts come from a different place, a place of Spirit. It is Spirit that creates physical reality. The ways outside of Spirit have lead to a dead end. Now is the time to try to understand the power of Spirit and to embrace it. Those persons that I am speaking of have already done so. Even if one cannot embrace Spirit, it is important to remain positive, hopeful, and thankful. It is also important to avoid hate. Hate strengthens evil. We will prevail by trusting Spirit and the good within us. And to those who believe that a cleansing is upon us, you are correct, it is. We must work through the storm, all of us.
DOOM N GLOOM — I’m quite thankful that your appellation (D n G) is a humorous twist to our context of embracing the Spirit as source of ALL, and I am certainly empowered by your words.
I ‘know’ that declaration (as done in 1776) and sourcing of an unprecedented future is an act of courageous creation, that goes much deeper than just a re-awakened America.
We ALL need to share in this VISION, and as you say
May we all be blessed with the abundance to accomplish the crafting of our children’s future - where our belief, hope and faith - are far stronger in temper and endurance than mere physicality and acts.
I am always surprised how easily the American public is manipulated with:
Desire (for other’s goods)
Fear (of ‘terrorists’ e.g.)
Duty (Patriotism etc.)
These are the three well known temptations of the Buddah!
How easily we fall for them time after time.
Too bad Moonraven went to her hammock. I was really starting to enjoy that cat fight. Reeeyyyyowww!!!
… and this too shall pass …
Sorry, I left off the author’s name in my previous post. The quotation is by Chris Floyd of the Moscow Times, and it was written six years ago!
Prescient!
That’s what my wife said when she served the bean burritos Nspire.
COLDWARBABY. I have a couple of questions before I sign your website or E-mail petition.
I suppose I will have to use my true name and possibly an address for ANY petition to be valid. ___ Who all gets that information?
Wouldn’t that compromise those who use a code name here?
Geez, the level of anxiety here is giving me a headache, I read every post.
I think we have the means to deal with change if we keep our humanity. Vote your conscience and be prepared to live with your decision. I think we should have learned from the last seven years that we do not want another republican in the white house and if a democrate is elected it probably won’t be based on merit.
That is the way it is, like it or not. We are in trouble as a country and only good actions will make it better. The revolution was a right-wing revolution and it is about to collapse from it’s own weight.
Ray is not telling us the whole story.
Poet December 27th, 2007 10:31 pm,
Bravo, the most eloquently phrased statement of facts.
dumb, Why didn’t I think about that!?
You all here are discussing reform from the periphery inward, and do not realize that without understanding the INWARD, psychological dynamics–not just as an idea, but as a perception–we and the world are doomed to continue and repeat this destructive dance. The mystics both old and new have told man he is inwardly asleep and “knows not what he does.” That is why transforming yourself is the ONLY thing that will transform the world. When we simply work from an ideal, one side is “good,” and the other side “bad,” ever notice that? Consider that both sides are contributing to the same darkness by opposition within ignorance.
Peace and equality can NEVER be imposed from the outside; that’s akin to painting spots on a lion and not expecting it to attack! So I say work to awaken yourself, remembering that a tiny flame can turn into a blaze. Here an old rock song comes to mind by the Who: “Won’t Get Fooled Again.” Studying history alone will not prevent it from repeating itself [albeit in some slightly modified form] unless or until we understand the inward dynamics behind it.
Moonraven is right. Also, someone says, “it is as if evil just moved its headquarters over to america,after the fall of nazi germany…”
Actually it was before the actual end of the war. The fascist sympathizer John Foster Dulles brought over some “friends” from the Wansee division of the SS as advisors to the state department as they were consummate anti-communists (and we must remember that fascism in Germany was based on anti-communism). That influential SS cadre helped set up their friends in South America and elsewhere. Much of our “cold war” policy has been influenced and even guided by these SS and SS inspired people. The anti-communist (and labor . . .) propaganda that has permeated our media since the 50’s has been very successful in the Nazification of the American mindset.
claudius, you, Rebel, and Kem will be pleased with 2008 because this will be the year that the underlying economics will come to the forefront of motivation to confront the Empire.
Historically, empires only fall in one of two ways:
1. Massive war from the outside — or –
2. Massive economic pain internally
As Bill Murray might say of the economic pain that we will experience in 2008, “so at least we got that going for us.”
Unless the global corporatist Empire hiding behind this facade of ‘Vichy America’ manages to start WW III, which despite Bush’s crazy taunts is looking less likely, 2008 will be the year of the economic collapse of this Ponzi Palace.
Although massive economic pain would normally seem like a poor choice as a New Year’s wish, at least it is the one way that an empire can come to its just rewards in the nuclear age and still leave the resulting world ‘recoverable’.
I hope that most sentient beings would answer this SAT question with ‘B’.
“Please choose the best way to end a global empire:
A. Through a deck-clearing nuclear war?
B. Through an economic depression that motivates people to remove the empire and re-establish a real democracy?”
2 B or not 2 B. I choose B.
The 2 key ingredients are FEAR and DEGRADATION.
FEAR: Silence is support for the Government. Silence is also BELIEF, if only to the extent that one believes that “that’s just the way things are.”
DEGRADATION: Keep the masses in a state of degradation imbued with a feeling of individual inferiority and powerlessness. Then, create a POWER IMAGE of the leader, political party, corporate logo, etc. The masses will then want to associate with the POWER IMAGE. Their freedom becomes the instrument of their enslavement.
If someone questions the POWER IMAGE, then the mob will violently crush the heretic.
The formula is so simple that it’s terrifying.
ArbeitMachtFrei - Couldn’t it be argued though that the formula only works as long as “the mob” is uneducated? If “the mob” decides to throw off the shackles of fear, then I’d say the formula changes for the better.
Plus, this is why I agree with others here who encourage getting to know your neighbors who live in close physical proximity. My neighbors might think I’m a bit of a kook, but I have made an effort to be part of the neighborhood, and I suspect they know they could count on me to help out if there is a neighborhood need. Time will tell.
you need to go smokem peace pipe moonraven
Saila–I had some questions about Robert Gordon University. Could you write me at:
tlmac75@yahoo.com
so I could ask you.
Thanks
i am glad to read a few hopeful posters..with some fight left in them.there is too much negative hopelessness,expressed here at cd.moonraven and misanthrope,it is you,who are the lemmings rushing headlong into the abyss,and you are trying to convince others to leap off the wall with you….you seem to hate yourselves and the whole human race that you belong to,you seem quite willing to throw the towel of the human race at the feet of the executioner….you make his job-too easy.(how will the angels defend mankind before god and accuse the ‘evil ones’ of being the authors of death,chaos and destruction ?)… (people such as you,make this a rough job,for the angels)….i am not your enemy..i am trying to fortify hope and tell you that there can be a tomorrow,if you try.do not consign the human race to the fire,get up and fight for your right to life.it does not matter if you believe in angels and devils..or not…take it as a metaphor..but push back against the darkness or it will push us over the wall.
Hi, guys. Many interesting coments.
Ray McGovern has come out for 9-11 truth. He has been on panels shown on FSTV.
Many American corporations supported Hitler and facism. Americans who fought the facists in Spain were called “premature anti-fascists and vilified.
Hitler was “appeased”, he was supported until he went too far for the American and British industrialists. But some, such as Bush grandfathers, Prescott and George Herbert Walker, continued to support Hitler until stopped by the Congress. Don’t think they changed their minds because of that.
The “ratline” set up by the Vatican and the Americans siphoned many facists to this hemisphere and the US sheep dipped other facists and put them back into power in Germany.
America fought the communists in Italy, Greece, France and other countries after WW11, although the most effective anti-facist resistance was the communists, as showed by the quote misquoted by Rebel Farmer, showing the power of the anti-communists in this country. It starts, “First they came for the communists” but Americans, including Gore (who I just heard misquote it last week), always say “First they came for the Jews”, because we have been conditioned to think that Hitler only targeted the Jews.
He didn’t. He targeted Communists (which is why he was supported by the industrialists), Socialists, trade unionists, Gypsies, homosexuals, mentally ill and retarded people, and any other “useless eaters” (Shades of anti-welfare Americans today)
I am sorry that Seraphicmom and Moonraven quarreled. I like them both, and Rebel Farmer and I do think that we should stick together.
Facism is here, but does it have to stay? It ain’t over until it’s over. Other countries have thrown off dictatorships, and so can we.
Wow, Gadfly…that quote from Chris Floyd in The Moscow Times is unbelievable! Or, unfortunately, it is WAY TOO BELIEVABLE…..
Thanks–I’ll be sharing that with everyone I know.
Sorry I didn’t proofread my comment.
I meant to say Hitler wasn’t appeased, he was supported.
It is commonly believed in this country that the ruling classes of America and England appeased Hitler.
This is used, as we all know, multiple times to justify unproked attacks on other countries. We all need to confront this belief with the truth.
The ruling class of America, at least, didn’t just appease Hitler, they supported him. The book is called “Trading With the Enemy” by Charles Higham
And thanks. I now remember seeing Ray McGovern sitting on a 9/11 truth panel on FSTV
“Fear and Degradation” — works well around this geographic area
I see a fair amount of chaff, as well as wheat, has been posted here since I bailed out on the Who’s the Greatest Soccer Mom and Cheerleader for the Empire contest and sought the much more civilized confines of my hammock, where I read the latest Milenio magazine articles on the death knell (don’t ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee) of Mexican agriculture and the end of individual human rights (proposed constitutional reform based on, oh prescient readers, the US Patriot Acts) and engaged in a bit of ironic self-flagellation for being such a lemming that I invite all others to accompany me over the cliff with me into the abyss.
Right.
That said, I think that this discussion is a microcosm which could and should be analyzed fairly thoroughly, as it reflects the dynamic of fatuousness and denial which continue to overwhelm the few reasoned members of the political left:
1. Lack of knowledge of the historical process of even the past 100 years (folks on the left who have never read a word of Marx, Engels, Hegel, Vico or Gramsci????) Shocking ignorance!
2. Smug self-satisfaction (None of this can apply to us because we vote(d) Democrat–without realizing that the Democratic Party is a party of the right, center-right at times but not recent ones and certainly not since FDR).
3. Name calling and accusations of extremism (not to mention sandbox ploys like NAAAA NAAA NAAA NAAA NAAA You’re a bad mother) toward anyone who doesn’t share the belief that the US is going through a bit of a rough patch but its innate perfection will cause it to correct itself without anyone having to really DO anyting.
4. The complete refusal to pull one’s head out of the sand and acknowledge the presence of the MAJORITY of folks on this planet who are being damaged, starved, kept in poverty and murdered by US foreign policy aimed at robbing them of their natural resources so that fat gringos can continue to drive to the mall in their SUVs, and
5. The related racism that dismisses the welfare of most of the folks on the planet as having no importance because they are not WHITE.
6. The foolish consistency, that was correctly identified by Ralph Waldo Emerson as being the hobgoblin of little minds, and that INSISTS, in spite of all evidence to the contrary (Mushrooms are poisonous, but I don’t believe it) that the ballot box is the ONLY way to make change–that the new Jim Crow policies in certain states, the obvious fixed elections and voting machines without paper trails to audit them, the spreading phenomenon of “The Dead of Rio Arriba County Are the Most Dedicated Voters” way beyond the region of Northern New Mexico, the never-counted absentee ballots (and folks wonder why I don’t vote??), ditto for the “provisional ballots”, the basic fact that the candidate who receives the most money from Corporate America ( read arms manufacturers, Monsanto, Alcoa, Big Oil, etc.) is the one who will prevail–come hell or high water (both of which appear to be edging closer to the front porches of Middle America).
7. The flagrant sloth and allergy to action which has its objective correlative in the fact that 67% of the US population is obese and spends most of its time in front of a tv screen.
There is no Left in the US. Which in itself is not all that unusual since The Left struggles to define its identity all over the planet–with particular emphasis on Latin America, the region where I live and work.
That reality makes it even more absurd that, at a time when at least SOME voices–including that of the author of the article that provoked this thread–are indicating that the iron grip of fascism has closed around the throat of the US people, others become hostile and even abusive and try to shout down those folks and beat the drum for THEIR solution: which is to vote for one of the right wing parties which control the political system!
It is precisely this irrational dedication to a fantasy of democratic process which makes this poster have absolutely NO HOPE for the folks of the US.
And why 15 years ago I committed myself to revive the Dream of Zapata in the much-denigrated Back Patio of the US Empire.
The person who indicated that Empires fall either from persistent wars externally or dramatic economic collapse from within should have also indicated that RIGHT NOW, both of those are happening in regard to the US.
CHESSGAMES56 — You generalize (6:53 am) that “You all here are discussing reform from the periphery inward … “, and yesterday you enigmatically state (4:24 pm) “the solution to effective change may be as close as a mirror”
What you suggest (INWARD=>OUTWARD) is shared by many posters herein, who are transformative thinkers, and distinctly are not satisfied with mere reforming of the ‘rows of deck chairs on the Titanic’, as the current societal context is as doomed as the unsinkable wasn’t.
The widespread denial and suppressed pain is how we’ve been gamed by nefarious and devious PYSOPS conditioning, which will provide little sustenance nor structure as the pervasive encroachments fuel greater and deeper pain and fear, and the chains of dominance slip off.
The context of SPIRIT (what is more INWARD?) and metamorphic change is pervasive in CD, where many are solidly understanding that re-arranging of the contents (e.g. deck chairs) is only superficial camouflage of a rank illusion, when the context (Titanic is sinking) is no longer sustainable.
How we BEcome and BE the change?
I encourage you to view comments from the following CONTEXT paradigm SHAKERS (here I go throwing abstract contents - names & postings - that hardly can reflect but a glimmer of the real truth of the human BE’ings behind the text, nor ALL who are our torch bearers):
DOOM & GLOOM (27th 11:52 pm), REBAL FARMER, BUFFALO KEN, ST. JOHN, and myself NSPIRE
Many herein are close to understanding the under-structure of the problems, while un-felt and real pain may be dulling their otherwise powerful perceptions toward needed changes in INTENTION and ATTENTION solutions.
It is through education and empowerment that more will become prepared for a spiritual transformation, of which your posts are part of the solution.
Thank you.
As one candle’s luminosity
is an onslaught onto the Darkness
You and others may find the following useful preparations for the coming storm (replace the • with a “.”):
_ _ _ _ _ R _ E _ F _ E _ R _ E _ N _ C _ E _ S _ _ _ _ _