fascist america: step five, the enemy is among us

McCarthyism died years ago. . . or so some thought. Since the events of 9/11 and the actions that followed, the scare of another terrorist 'attack' has led many in the US to look in every direction for the next one, even to their friends. Conservative organizations have begun a battle cry that Islamo-facism is taking over the U.S. and we should be very afraid. McCarthyism made black lists of citizens, now they just disappear into the black sites or secret prisons talked about in Step Four. In New York the problem of targeting Muslims as radical and dangerous has produced terrible effects. A law-abiding Muslim woman announced that she planned on starting a public school where 'ambassadors for peace' would be cultivated. The Khalil Ghabran International Academy has seen a sour turn for the worse as students are suspended for carrying guns and Arab-American teachers are taunted as "terrorists." The principal, Ms. Almontaser, was forced by the Mayor's Office of New York City to resign.

"In newspaper articles and Internet postings, on television and talk radio, Ms. Almontaser was branded a “radical,” a “jihadist” and a “9/11 denier.” She stood accused of harboring unpatriotic leanings and of secretly planning to proselytize her students. Despite Ms. Almontaser’s longstanding reputation as a Muslim moderate, her critics quickly succeeded in recasting her image." - NYT 04/28/2008

This has been called just the beginning of the battle by Conservative watch groups as all Muslims, many who are seeking to advance in their regular American lives, are decried as terrorists who will soon use lawful ways to implement Sharia law and force their radical religious and political ideologies on children. What happened to Debbie Almontaser seems to have been just the beginning of the battle spurred by the aftermath of the events of 9/11. As so-called "lawful-Muslims" launch a "soft-jihad" I can only hope that we see the downfall of an ignorance that is costing our very children the education and open-minded teaching that today's world requires.

5. Harass citizens' groups

The fifth thing you do is related to step four - you infiltrate and harass citizens' groups. It can be trivial: a church in Pasadena, whose minister preached that Jesus was in favour of peace, found itself being investigated by the Internal Revenue Service, while churches that got Republicans out to vote, which is equally illegal under US tax law, have been left alone.

Other harassment is more serious: 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 its 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 organisations engaged in peaceful political activities: Cifa is supposed to track "potential terrorist threats" as it watches ordinary US citizen activists. A little-noticed new law has redefined activism such as animal rights protests as "terrorism". So the definition of "terrorist" slowly expands to include the opposition.

This is a current reminder to the actions of COINTELPRO. COINTELPRO is known for its work in disrupting the Ku Klux Klan as well as the "New Left" of the 1960s. The four principles that govern its actions are:
1. Infiltration by agents to discredit and disrupt
2. Psychological warfare from the outside - planting false media stories, leaflets, etc. to undermine progressive movements
3. Harassment through the legal system
4. Extralegal force and violence - threaten, instigate, break-in, vandalize, and assault

The group may no longer be a secret (circa 1971), but it is very clear that they still operate covertly with the intent to disrupt movements for social justice and end dissent.

The little known act that has been instituted in the name of terrorism, not surprisingly a top recommendation of the 9/11 Commission Report, is called the REAL ID Act. The Act faced great opposition, numerous protests, and countless testimonies against the constitutionality of the Act before the Senate committee. The Act was snuck through as a rider on a military spending bill (H.R. 1268)with no debate. Who would vote against giving our troops more funding in time of conflict? The provisions of the Act were not new and were actually outlined in the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which was not yet in effect. While the Act is promoted as a way to consolidate the driver's license and Social Security card, a cross-border ID, and a general way to identify the "good guys" from the "bad guys" in an easy manner. However, what you are not told is that although your state may choose not to comply with the new Act and continue to issue their own driver's license, you will not have a valid federal ID, which is required for air travel. Thirty-eight states, including the District of Columbia, have passed or are working to pass legislation in opposition to the REAL ID Act. Another unseen effect of the Act is important to protesters. At many events with designated "protest areas," there is separate security scanners. With the REAL ID it would be simple for the government to get all information and identify protesters, who are now deemed 'terrorists.' The Act redefines 'terrorist activity' to include,

"any activity which is unlawful under the laws of the place where it is committed (or which, if committed in the United States, would be unlawful under the laws of the United States or any State)."

Therefore civil disobedience or refusal to leave a protest resulting in arrest could be deemed a 'terrorist activity.' Not to mention the President now has the power to name anyone an 'enemy combatant.' Organizations that also take part in such activities may be named 'terrorist organizations.' The provisions of this act make the very people of this country the enemy that the government needs to fight as opposed to external enemies, which we are made to think pose an extreme threat to our "homeland" security.

Needless to say we now operate in a lawless country. On November 13, 2001 the Presidential Military Order gave George W. Bush the power to detain any citizen or non-citizen suspected to be a terrorist or engaged in terrorist activity (enemy combatant). As many legal analysts and scholars contend, this order is in direct violation to habeas corpus. Habeas corpus is the commonly accepted law in many countries that ensure an individual their personal liberties against state infringements.

The US Constitution states:

The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion, the public safety may require it.

Are we seeing a case of rebellion or invasion? I think not and as such the very government that is charged with upholding the law has broken its own. To that statement we are now living in a lawless country. Any action taken by the government cannot be ensured of its legitimacy. If we are to live under a government that does not abide by its own laws, then what is the purpose of having a government? James Madison says in the Federalist Papers No. 51 that, "If men were angels, no government would be necessary." It seems the possibility of the government becoming the devil was not sufficiently balanced by past understandings of government.

Read Step One,Step Two, Step Three & Step Four.

fascist america: step four, invasion of privacy

Many people would rather not believe that the businesses that provide us with high speed internet and cell phone service would allow the government to step in a monitor what we are doing and saying over the optical lines of our latest technology. The fact is that there is clear and obvious evidence that in the business of citizen monitoring there is a lot of money to be made. We are not so free as we think, especially when it comes to checking your email or making that call home to mom.

4. Set up an internal surveillance system

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 neighbours to spy on neighbours. The Stasi needed to keep only a minority of East Germans under surveillance to convince a majority that they themselves were being watched.

In closed societies, this surveillance is cast as being about "national security"; the true function is to keep citizens docile and inhibit their activism and dissent.

You may say no way, but much of the general public does not know exactly what goes through the legislature by way of our government to be able to watch what we do in the name of national security. The Patriot Act, Homeland Security, CALEA, and other government devices have been implemented and strengthened in the name of fighting terrorism. Much of the following information has been gathered by concerned citizens and former and current employees of internet and service providers. Since I, myself, cannot cite them, this will have to suffice as their due credit for the comprehensive research and documentation of what has been called an "Orwellian" nightmare. All documents referred to were found via wikileaks.org.

The "Total Information Awareness" program received a great deal of opposition by civil liberties and rights groups, but it was later passed under the name, "Terrorism Information Awareness." The growing link between government agencies and the private sector for the purpose of eavesdropping on citizens is alarming. AT&T maintains secret rooms where only those with NSA clearance can enter (Mark Klein, AT&T). Reports have been uncovered about the difficulties and ways around tapping fiber optic transmissions, conferences are held to bring together law enforcement and communications technology providers, and increased measures are placed on the capabilities required of technology systems to allow them to be tap-able (CALEA Memo). A recent New York Times article does an excellent job of telling the full AT&T story and the following lawsuit filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) with Mark Klein as a party to the lawsuit since he had recovered documents and had personal accounts from working at AT&T. It is now a well known fact that under the auspices of terrorist threat, the general public is being wrongly watched and monitored through illegal eavesdropping on international phone calls to a key word search software for emails and internet searches. What is happening to our privacy, where are our rights?

Privacy is not a word used in the U.S. Constitution, however there are a lot of words not used in the Constitution including marriage, children, food, or books. Are we to then believe that we do not have a right to any of these since it is not listed? The Constitution is supposed to be a document that outlines what the government is authorized to do, what is not listed in the Constitution, the government has no power to do.

Amendment IX:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Amendment X:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The powers that are not listed in that great founding document of our country are our own to which no one else can lay claim. The Bill of Rights was an after thought because the framers felt that the Constitution laid out easily the limited powers of the government. It was later added when they were worried that there would be misunderstanding. That is why most of the amendments that comprise the Bill of Rights explain the few things the government can and cannot do.

The Libertarian, Harry Browne, writes:

"There really are only two areas of the Constitution that every American should understand and understand well:

Article 1, Section 8 — which enumerates the areas in which Congress has the power to legislate. You'll notice that no power is given there for Congress to pass laws regulating health care or education or charities or agriculture or any of thousands of other areas in which politicians now tell us how we must act.

The Bill of Rights — which makes it plain that the government has no authority to do anything that isn't specified in Article 1, Section 8."

When the rights of citizens are disregarded and the "enemies of the state" are increasingly the people of that state, we have reached a dangerous compliance with facism. Increasing the war powers of a President or government are often what is seen as most important and shows support, but what we then forget to do is check those powers and question what is truly happening. Thankfully we have the few like Mark Klein who will assist in exposing the wrongs of the government in conjunction with those who would make money off of our collective insecurity. When has increased surveillance ever led to increased security?

England is years ahead in restriction of its citizens, let us hope that we do not go this far:


Read Step One,Step Two & Step Three.

fascist america: step three: rise of the police state

This is probably the most frightening step for the majority of people. Private security contractors roaming the streets with impunity to ensure the 'public good.' Along with that add the militarization of your local policeman as they begin wearing bullet proof vests and helmets and toting assault rifles. Over 2000 people have died in police custody in the last three years and the number of videos of blatant police brutality has become staggering. The police brutality is especially evident when dissent is expressed in the form of organized protest.

3. Develop a thug caste
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 terrorise 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.

After Hurricane Katrina, the Department of Homeland Security hired and deployed hundreds of armed private security guards in New Orleans. The investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill interviewed one unnamed guard who reported having fired on unarmed civilians in the city. It was a natural disaster that underlay that episode - but the administration's endless war on terror means ongoing scope for what are in effect privately contracted armies to take on crisis and emergency management at home in US cities.

Thugs in America? Groups of angry young Republican men, dressed in identical shirts and trousers, menaced poll workers counting the votes in Florida in 2000. If you are reading history, you can imagine that there can be a need for "public order" on the next election day. Say there are protests, or a threat, on the day of an election; history would not rule out the presence of a private security firm at a polling station "to restore public order".

This step is most evident when there are forms of peaceful protest or peaceful acts of civil disobedience that may step "out of line," but are in no way a threat to anyone. When the people become the enemy, then you know what democracy is dead.

May Day Immigration Reform Protest:


During this protest it was obvious, as the camera-man states, that the event was "set up for failure." The protest was contained in a park, an area easily surrounded and controlled by the massive police force. The police deemed the protest over when they wanted and began systematically forcing peaceful protesters of men, women, and children to leave. Firing rubber rounds into the crowds and knocking anyone out of their way. What was once a peaceful protest turned into a violent police oppression. Why? For what purpose is it necessary to violently silence peaceful voices?

UCLA Library Taser Incident

LA Police Arrest with Punches to Face

Police Crackdown on Young Skaters

New Orleans Police Bloody Brutalization of Old Man

Florida Police Arrests and Punches 15 Year-old Girl for Breaking Curfew

WTO Protests in Seattle

NYC Critical Mass Protest at RNC 2004

In November of last year 4000 young people protested police brutality in DC:


Blackwater in New Orleans

Just recently in New Orleans citizens protested the destruction of public housing at the City Hall meeting where they were denied access:


All of these incidents cut across the racial and class barriers of America. The majority are acts of violence against minority groups, but the police do not discriminate when it comes to dissent. White, black, hispanic, college-age, elderly, if you raise your voice in dissent (or if you say nothing at all) you will suffer the consequences - or at least that is what they want us to think. Long ago Patrick Henry spoke against the British tyranny saying, "Give me liberty or give me death!" On that fateful day that has given us such a historic quotation Patrick Henry also said this,

"We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that siren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged in a great and arduous struggle for liberty? Are we disposed to be of the number of those who, having eyes, see not, and, having ears, hear not, the things which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever anguish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth; to know the worst, and to provide for it."

We have shut our eyes and ears to the truth because we are told to do so. We are told there is a great terror threatening our land and so you must allow the power structure above you to make any and all decisions because they will be for your own good. We have seen our rights systematically taken away and we have left this issue to fester much too long with inaction. We may not be fighting for liberty from the oppressive crown, but what we are fighting is not that much worse. We are fighting for our personal and collective freedom. I will join the ranks with Patrick Henry and say, Give me Freedom or give me death! The rise of the police state in America is real and very much a step towards the development of a fascist state.

Read Step One & Step Two.

fascist america: step two, incarceration and torture

Inside or outside the rule of law our prison system is full of inequalities and discrepancies with our proposed democratic method.

2. Create a gulag
Once you have got everyone scared, the next step is to create a prison system outside the rule of law (as Bush put it, he wanted the American detention centre at Guantánamo Bay to be situated in legal "outer space") - where torture takes place.

This process took place in fascist shifts or anti-democracy crackdowns ranging from Italy and Germany in the 1920s and 1930s to the Latin American coups of the 1970s and beyond. It is standard practice for closing down an open society or crushing a pro-democracy uprising.

With its jails in Iraq and Afghanistan, and, of course, Guantánamo in Cuba, where detainees are abused, and kept indefinitely without trial and without access to the due process of the law, America certainly has its gulag now. Bush and his allies in Congress recently announced they would issue no information about the secret CIA "black site" prisons throughout the world, which are used to incarcerate people who have been seized off the street.

Secret prisons across Eastern Europe were used to interrogate some of the most important al-Qaeda suspects. Nearly four years ago the CIA established a secret prison system that spanned eight countries: Thailand, Afghanistan, a number of Eastern European democracies, and Guantanamo Bay. In Soviet-era buildings terrorist suspects disappear, what happens is still unknown. In White House, CIA, and Justice Department documents these secret prisons are referred to as "black sites." While it is unsure what happens at these locations, the increase in abuse by US military and other forces in Iraq and Afghanistan are reason for concern. Images of the abuse are disconcerting, but what have we really done about it? Congress is supposed to have oversight on such operations, but we seem to have a Congress that prefers to not live up to its mandates.

More recently controversy has arisen about the practices at the most more well known of these "black sites." Torture has become the defining activity of the current administration. Last week, the top Bush Administration officials met to sign off on torture tactics that were "ok" to use. The Bush Administration has signed off on torture. In an article from The Progressive one author can't believe that this news was so quickly out of the main stream media. I for one an not surprised, but the author makes a good point. We know that torture is happening, our government is ok with it, and somehow we have a democracy here?

Secret prisons across the world, one just off the coast of Florida, but what about the US prison system? Why has there been such a surge of inmates in recent years? Why is the US the only country and society in history to imprison more of its people in the name of security? A 1998 article in The Atlantic excellently explains the "prison industrial complex." The surge in the numbers of people in prison has been steadily rising. The number of minorities and those of 'lower' economic class are outrageously high.

During enslavement, Black people were severely punished according to the whims of the plantation owners, for "real or imaginary" crimes, such as running away, disobeying an order, or assaulting an overseer (Deason, 2005, p. 95). After the Civil War (1861–1865), a new form of enslavement was instituted when southern states needed to rebuild plantations and cities that had been destroyed during the war. Policies and laws crafted by southern lawmakers were designed to entrap homeless and hungry formerly enslaved Black people.

As of 2003, there are 2.2 million people incarcerated. However this is a surprising occurance since from 1923-1973 there was a stable level of about 110 in prison for every 100,000 people. The high numbers are equally disturbing since from 1992-2000 crime rates steadily declined. Racial minorities were also disproportionately represented in the prison system. Blacks, American Indians, and Latinos all had higher incarceration rates than whites. Minority youth make up 34 percent of all juveniles are 62 percent of those youth incarcerated. This is paired with a sharp rise in government spending on prisons and the idea that prisons represent an industry of safe jobs that will not be outsourced. Some of the harshest laws passed by Congress have been to crack down on crime and push the war on drugs forward. Shall we incarcerate the majority of our population to provide some jobs that cannot be outsourced and the powerful can financially benefit? As a way to strengthen the prison industrial complex, Congress has passed a number of harsh laws and acts to regulate crime and drug policy. I suggest reading the full article by Adolphus Belk Jr.

Read Step One.

fascist america: step one, exploiting fear

What happens when the voice of dissent sheds light on the truth and knocks on the door of the root of a problem? What grows when that level of dissent is directed at a powerful government structure run on the fumes of false fear? Why has there been such a sharp increase in the number of deaths while under police custody? Why do our local police now look like paramilitaries waiting to take over a town center from extremists? When people so much as question their government why does that become motive enough for arrest, beating, and detention? How can our government systematically take away our rights and grant themselves exemption? The questions as to where America is headed could go on for a very long time, but what is needed is an understanding and an answer to follow those questions.

In her book The End of America Naomi Wolf outlines 10 steps of how to turn a democracy into a fascist state. She tells us that there is a blueprint written by all the 'greats': Mussolini, Stalin, Hitler and followed by other smaller dictators like Pinochet and others. She writes that each of these 10 steps have been initiated in America. All blockquotes are from the above cited article of Naomi Wolf.

1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy
After we were hit on September 11 2001, we were in a state of national shock. Less than six weeks later, on October 26 2001, the USA Patriot Act was passed by a Congress that had little chance to debate it; many said that they scarcely had time to read it. We were told we were now on a "war footing"; we were in a "global war" against a "global caliphate" intending to "wipe out civilisation". There have been other times of crisis in which the US accepted limits on civil liberties, such as during the civil war, when Lincoln declared martial law, and the second world war, when thousands of Japanese-American citizens were interned. But this situation, as Bruce Fein of the American Freedom Agenda notes, is unprecedented: all our other wars had an endpoint, so the pendulum was able to swing back toward freedom; this war is defined as open-ended in time and without national boundaries in space - the globe itself is the battlefield. "This time," Fein says, "there will be no defined end."

Naomi notes that our government increased the fear factor of this event and used hyped language to push the beginning of their fascist agenda. However, Naomi agrees to the truth of this event and the real threat of Islamic terrorism. Is there really a threat of Islamic terrorism or is it really a state terrorism? Was 9/11 an inside job?

A conservative republican who could not reconcile with the fact that the explanation of the World Trade Center Towers' collapse was officially caused by impact and fire has made a documentary called 9/11 Mysteries. Watch the 12 part series on Youtube here as Brad's documentary uses science and history to prove the official collapse theory wrong and makes frightening discoveries that hint at an inside job, a fabricated terrorist threat. The corporate interests involved before and after the collapse are absolutely disgusting. "No steel-framed building before or since 9/11 has collapsed due to fire. What happened to the Twin Towers that caused them to come down? This video takes you through popular myth into science for a new understanding of the possibilities."

In the Spring of 2001, "reporting on terrorism surged dramatically,"notes the 9/11 Commission Report (204), "[...] none of these [reports] pointed specifically to possible al Qaeda action inside the United States - although the CSG [Counterterrorism Security Group] continued to be concerned about the domestic threat." This surge in threat reports came from none other than the Counterterrorist Center (CTC) established under the Reagan administration. The CTC collects information only abroad. What better place to fabricate a threat than the Counterterrorist Center? Another interesting note - the security firm, no longer in existence, that handled security at the WTC, Dulles Airport, and United Airlines was Securacom, where the youngest Bush son sat on the Board of Directors. Everything that we have been told about 9/11 makes no sense. The truth is slowly being uncovered.

I will follow Naomi Wolf's "ten steps" and provide my own research and analysis of what we might be seeing happen to the America that we used to know and love. Watch for the next steps coming soon. In the meantime be sure to do your own research, ask questions, and don't accept anything merely because you are told by your government or "authority."

"Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, or who said it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and your own common sense."
- Buddha

Civil Constraints

In today's public discourse, many mention "civil liberties" in their reporting and analysis of government activity. It seems to me that the term is obsolete.

From today's news:

Declassified memo that removes the President's accountability to the Rule of Law:
Memo: Laws Didn't Apply to Interrogators

A footnote in that memo references another (as yet unpublished) memo, authorizing the US military to ignore the Fourth Amendment when operating against citizens of the US:
Memo linked to warrantless surveillance

Spy satellites can now be used against US citizens by run-of-the-mill law enforcement (your local cops)...think about that for a minute:
DHS reckons US cops' access to sat-surveillance is go

The Federal Reserve took money directly from the American people to fund a few, very rich American people:
Bernanke Defends Use of Public Money to Rescue of Bear Stearns

Protected First Amendment activity is no longer protected, in fact, it is actively fought by the people we pay to uphold our right to participate in it:
No Real Threat: The Pentagon's Secret Database on Peaceful Protest