I rode the train from Illinois back east to Massachusetts over the previous weekend. I still fight Lyme related fatigue and this trip was not so good in that regard, but I did manage a diary for Chronic Tonic and I got a chance to read Naomi Wolf's The End Of America.
Wolf's exploration of the ten inflection points a democracy crosses on its way to fascism are all too familiar to those of us who lived the Bush years. This diary's title is the same as that of the last chapter; Wolf's call to action is irresistible to those who've read and grasped the meaning of this little book.
Wolf reminds us of our heritage in the opening quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson.
American was opened after the feudal mischief was spent. We began well. No inquisitions, here, no kings, no nobles ...
Well began, aye, but we appear bent on ending in the same sort of ruin that befell Europe and drove our founders here. Religion rather than rational decision making now drives a significant fraction of our population and entertainment caters to the world view that we face an imminent apocalypse. Dumbed down and distracted by this, we permitted the following to come to pass:
1.The invocation of threats, both external and internal
2.The creation of secret prisons
3.The creation of a paramilitary force
4.Surveillance of ordinary citizens
5.Infiltration of citizen groups
6.Arbitrary detention
7.The targeting of the leaders of dissent
8.Restriction of the press
9.Equating dissent with treason and criticism with espionage
10.The subversion of the rule of the law
During the Clinton years we faced international and domestic terrorism. The U.S.S. Cole was suicide bombed. The first World Trade Center bombing occurred. The Oklahoma City federal building was destroyed and that event remains the largest homegrown terrorist attack ... thus far.
When the 9/11 attack came to pass through a mix of determination on the part of al Queda and incompetence on the part of the Bush administration the language describing such situations ... changed. Criminal? Nope. Terrorist? Nope. The perpetrators were evildoers. And evil isn't a matter for law enforcement or foreign policy; this elevated an ugly foreign policy issue into the realm of religion, guaranteeing escalation rather than a rational handling of the problem.
Wolf goes over the United States' progression in exacting detail, pulling examples primarily from the failure of Weimar Germany, Italy before them, Pinochet's Chile, and occasionally from other democratic failures. Lacking from the tight, well written tome, are diagnostics attributing the source of this change, which I've touched on a bit here, and the only prescription for the resolution of the problem is a short appendix regarding the American Freedom Campaign.
I don't mean to find fault in Wolf's writing; Thomas Paine would have worded the pamphlet differently, but he'd have instantly understood the sentiments it contained. But like a seed crystal in a supersaturated solution this book is just the beginning of something, and it's something with uncertain outcomes.
Thursday evening I sat in Ms. Wolf's living room, chatting with Vince Bugliosi about the need for accountability; the Bush administration most certainly, and in financial markets, and he was horrified to here the uphill battle we Lyme victims face due to the despicable Infectious Disease Specialists Association, which is entirely on the payroll of the health insurance companies. Corruption is everywhere.
Two hours later we were at the 92nd Street Y on Manhattan's upper east side, listening to Vince, Naomi, and Charlotte Dennett expound on the value of what they are calling the ACCOUNTABILITY MOVEMENT.
Yes, capital letters and bold, this is not some passing theory. If we are not a nation of laws and men and women who must adhere to them, we are nothing at all and we deserve to fail.
Let me make this absolutely clear. I said "WE DESERVE TO FAIL". If we can't bring a rogue administration to justice in our own country we're already done and whatever we appear to have is kept in place by inertia. If your person isn't safe from your government, and Wolf's book makes the facts behind this matter painfully clear, then your property will be next. We're already so victimized by asset stripping positioned as 'investment' by Wall Street that it may be too late, but it can very well go to a new level where locals who attend the right church, or pay off the right official, will be able to rob and rape with impunity.
I'm not leaving this mess for my kids. No way. Members of their grandparents' generation jumped out of C-47s, waded ashore from landing craft, and looked out the waist windows of a B-17; in each case with someone with a heavy machine gun was shooting back at them. They went about the business of defeating the fascist menace that overtook Europe two generations ago, scrimping at home, catching bullets or shrapnel over seas, and they didn't complain.
Are we not the children and grandchild of those men who utterly snuffed out fascism sixty five years ago? We can, each and every one of us, get organized and take sensible, focused action on the problems our country faces. Go contribute to Peanut Butter PAC. Go hunt up the Blog Workers Industrial Union and find out how you can help. Get over to Twitter and get connected with the Progressive community there. There's work to be done and leaders are already in action ...