[wordup] The End of America? Naomi Wolf Thinks It Could Happen

[Adam Shand]

I actually haven't read this article yet, but it was in the queue to  
be read and possibly be sent out ... and I needed something to test  
the new home of lists.spack.org.

Hopefully this all goes according to plan!

Happy New Year everybody!

Adam.

Source: http://www.alternet.org/story/68399/

The End of America? Naomi Wolf Thinks It Could Happen
By Don Hazen, AlterNet
Posted on November 21, 2007
If you think we are living in scary times, your worst fears may be  
confirmed by reading Naomi Wolf's newest book,The End of America:  
Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot. In it, Wolf proves the old axiom  
that history does repeat itself. Or more accurately, history occurs in  
patterns, and in order to understand where our country is today and  
where it is headed, we need to read the history books.

Wolf began by diving into the early years leading up to fascist  
regimes, like the ones led by Hitler and Mussolini. And the patterns  
that she found in those, and others all over the world, made her hair  
stand on end. In "The End of America," she lays out the 10 steps that  
dictators (or aspiring dictators) take in order to shut down an open  
society. "Each of those ten steps is now under way in the United  
States today," she writes.

If we want an open society, she warns, we must pay attention and we  
must fight to protect democracy.

I met with Wolf to discuss what she learned while researching this  
book, how the American public has received her warnings, and what we  
can do to squelch the fascist narratives we are fed in this country  
each day.

Don Hazen: Let's take up a big question first -- your fears about the  
upcoming U.S. presidential election and what the historical blue print  
about fascist takeovers shows in terms of elections.

Naomi Wolf: We would be naive given the historical patterns to have  
hope that there's going to be a transparent, accountable election in  
2008. There are various ways the blueprint indicates how events are  
much more likely to play out. Historically, the months leading up to  
the national election are likely to be unstable.

What classically happens is either there will be a period of  
provocation, and we have a history of this in the United States --  
agitators who are dressed as or act like activist voter registration  
workers, anti-war marchers ... but who engage in actual violence,  
torch property, assault police officers. And that scares people.  
People are much less likely to vote for change when they're scared,  
and it gives them the excuse to crack down.

In addition, I'm concerned about the 2007 Defense Authorization Act,  
which makes it much easier for the president to declare martial law.

DH: Are you saying that they keep on adding coercive laws for no  
apparent reason?

NW: Yes. Why amend the law so systematically? Why do you need to make  
martial law easier? Another thing historical blueprints underscore is  
the hyped threat; intelligence will be spun or exaggerated, and  
sometimes there are faked documents like Plan Z with Pinochet in Chile.

DH: Plan Z?

NW:Yes, Plan Z. Pinochet, when he was overthrowing the Democratic  
government of Chile, told Chilean citizens that there was going to be  
a terrible terrorist attack, with armed insurgents. Now there were  
real insurgents, there was a real threat, but then he produces what he  
called Plan Z, which were fake papers claiming that these terrorists  
were going to assassinate all these military leaders at once.

And this petrified Chileans so much that they didn't stand up to fight  
for their democracy. So it's common to take a real threat and hype it.  
And close to an election it's very common to invoke a hype threat and  
scare people so much that they will not want to have a transparent  
election.

Americans have this very wrong idea about what a closed society looks  
like. Many despots make it a point to try to hold the elections, but  
they're corrupted elections. Corrupted elections take place all over  
the world in closed societies. Ninety-nine percent of Austrians voted  
yes for the annexation by Germany, because the SA were standing  
outside the voting booths, intimidating the voters and people counting  
the vote. So you can mess with the process.

One current warning sign is the e-mails that the White House is not  
yielding about the attorney general scandal. The emails are likely to  
show that there were plans afoot to purge all of the attorneys at  
once, like overnight. And then to let the country deal with the shock.

Now that's something that Goebbels did in 1933 in April, overnight. He  
fired everyone, focusing on lawyers and judges who were not a  
supporter of the regime. So you can still have elections ... in an  
outcome like that. If that had happened, if the bloggers and others  
actually hadn't helped to identify the U.S. attorney scandal, and they  
had been successful and fired them all, our election situation would  
be different.

Basically we'd still have an election, but it is possible the outcome  
would be predetermined because it's the U.S. attorneys that monitor  
what voting rights groups do, what is legal and who can decide the  
outcome of elections.

DH: Well there's a lot of activity currently in terms of the Justice  
Department aimed at purging voters ... reducing voter rolls ... that's  
an ongoing battle to try to keep voters eligible. Conservatives are  
always trying to reduce the electorate. By the way, are you familiar  
with Naomi Klein's book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster  
Capitalism?

NW: Yes, and it all makes a lot of sense. And its certainly  
historically true. We're in this post-9/11 period when there is a lot  
of potential for these kind of "shock therapy" things to happen, but  
virtually everything ... has happened previously in history in  
patterns. It's just the blueprint. It's not rocket science.

I could tell last fall when a law was passed expanding the definition  
of terrorists to include animal rights activists, that people who look  
more like you and me would start to be called terrorists, which is a  
classic tactic in what I call a fascist expansion.

DH: Don't look at me -- I'm not a vegetarian. Just kidding.

NW: (Laughs) Right. It's also predictive ... according to the  
blueprint, that the state starts to torture people that most of us  
don't identity with, because they're brown, Muslim, people on an  
island. They're called an enemy.

That there will be a progressive blurring of the line, and six months,  
two years later, you're going to see it spread to others. ...  
According to the blueprint, we're right on schedule that this kid  
recently got tasered in Florida, I gather, for asking questions.

There was a study by people who pioneered tasers, and the state  
legislature supported it; a Republican legislator put pressure on the  
provost, who put pressure on the university, and then the police at  
this university implemented the taser use. So unfortunately, it's  
likely that we're going to see more demonstrators, typical society  
leaders, in a call to restore "public order," leading up to the  
election. You put all those cases together ...

DH: I want to shift gears a bit and ask you to talk about what the  
response to the book, what kind of people have heard you speak, and  
what kind of reactions have they had?

NW: I'm really gratified by the response to the book. I have found,  
with the book's publication, though I'm not following everything  
that's been written about it, that most of America gets it -- people  
across the political spectrum.

All kinds of people, including very mainstream people. Republican  
people. Progressive. Libertarian. Very moderate people. Very  
conservative people. They are basically saying to me, "Thank you for  
confirming our fears and showing us how these things fit together, and  
what we can do about them."

DH: I'm also interested in your process of deciding that you were  
comfortable in using words like "fascism," "Nazism," "Hitler,"  
"Mussolini." Michael Ratner talks about it in the jacket of your book,  
when he writes: "Most Americans reject outright any comparisons of  
post-9/11 America with the fascism and totalitarianism of Nazi Germany  
or Pinochet's Chile. Sadly, what Wolf calls the echoes between those  
societies and America today are too compelling." At some point you  
must have come to this turning point in terms of the language -- how  
far am I going to go, how am I going to talk about this? Was it a  
difficult decision?

NW: It was hard emotionally but it was unavoidable intellectually. The  
book actually got started with the influence of a holocaust survivor  
-- a dear friend, who's the daughter of two holocaust survivors from  
Germany. She basically forced me to start reading history.

Not the end or outcome. She was talking about the early years and the  
effects on rights groups, gay rights groups, and sexuality forums and  
architecture, At first I didn't even want to draw conclusions, but my  
hair was just standing on edge.

When I saw that, then I went and read other history books, and looked  
at Stalin and Hitler, a real "innovator." I thought, if people want an  
open society, they need to pay attention.

You see the same things happening again and again and again. And  
historically people were really mislead and just reading kind of  
teaches us the blueprint. People use the same approach all over the  
world because it works. This is what they do.

Now we've just seen it in Burma. It is like clock work: monks in the  
street ... and because I know the blueprint, how long before they  
start curtailing free assembly, shooting monks, and cutting off that  
communication? And two days later ... you know what happened.

So intellectually I couldn't avoid using the language. Now in terms of  
the word "fascist," it's a very conservative usage in the book. I used  
the dictionary definition. There are many definitions of fascism. And  
even fascists disagree with other fascists. It's kind of like the  
Germans thought the Italian fascists weren't butch enough.

DH: So the Italians were wussier fascists than the Germans?

NW: Exactly. It gets better. The definition is pretty straightforward:  
"When the state uses violence against the individual to oppose  
democratic society." And that's what we're seeing.

And then looking back at Italy and Germany, which were the two great  
examples of modern constitutional democracies that were illegally  
closed by people that were elected ... duly elected ... most Americans  
don't remember. Mussolini, a National Socialist, came to power  
entirely legally. And they used the law to shut down the law. So  
that's what I call a fascist shift.

DH: So let's talk about what could happen here. Is America in denial?  
Or is avoidance an attitude that seemed to be present in all  
historical examples? That people assume it's not going to happen to  
them. Does the Americans' denial at this point run parallel with the  
denial of Germans and Italians? Or do we have our own version of  
denial here?

NW: That's a really great question; both are true. It's really  
instructive to read memoirs and journals from Germany. People writing,  
"This can't last ... we surely will come to our senses"; "they can't  
gain any ground in the next election ... you know, we're a civilized  
country"; "this is ridiculous, they're a bunch of thugs; no one takes  
them seriously."

History is particularly instructive in the early days of the fascist  
shifts in Germany and Italy, when things were really pretty normal.  
People go about their business, just like we're doing now. It's not  
like goose stepping columns of soldiers are everywhere. It looks like  
ordinary life. Celebrities, gossip columns, fashion, before getting  
caught up in a snare. People kept going to movies, worrying about  
feeding the cat. (laughs) Even while you watch the sort of inevitable  
unfold.

DH: And now in America?

NW: Right. So in some ways it is human nature to be in denial ... but  
Americans have our own special version, which is profoundly dangerous.  
Europeans know democracies are fragile, and they could close. They had  
closed. Bismarckian Germany was not a democracy.

But here we're walking around ... we usually have that sense that  
somehow our air will sustain us, even when no one else's air does. And  
we don't have to do anything about it. We have this like bubble, that  
somehow democracy will just take care of us, and we don't have to  
fight to protect democracy.

They can mow down democracies all over the world, but somehow we'll be  
just fine. But what's so ironic about that is that the Founding  
Fathers drafted the Bill of Rights in fear. They knew that you had to  
have checks and balances, because it's human nature to abuse power, no  
matter who you are. They knew the damage that the army could do  
breaking into your home. ... they knew that democracy is fragile, and  
the default is tyranny. They knew that. And that's why they created  
the system of checks and balances.

DH: In your book, on page 36, you write in terms of the political  
environment we are in: "But we are not wracked by rioting in the  
streets or a major depression here in America. That is why the success  
that the Bush administration has had in invoking Islamofascism is so  
insidious. We have been willing to trade our key freedoms for a  
promised state of security in spite of our living conditions of  
overwhelming stability, security, affluence and social order."

How and why has it been so easy here in the U.S. in terms of taking  
away liberties?

NW: I assume you mean how did it succeed even though we don't have  
Bolsheviks rioting in the street? Yes. I mean it is incredible looking  
back, but in a way it's not. I mean 9/11 was a complete left brain  
shock. If we had had wars at home, experienced the kind of violence at  
home that other countries have, we would not have gone into shock ...  
not have been willing to trade in our heritage in exchange for a  
manipulated false sense of security.

DH: Most people were not affected directly by 9/11 except  
traumatically by seeing it on the screen.

NW: Yes, but you can't undercredit the incredible sophistication of  
the way the Bush administration manipulates fear. For example, the  
sleeper cells narrative, which is Stalin's narrative, was totally made  
up.

And I give lots of examples in the book of alleged sleeper cells that  
never turned out to be the creepy, scary, nightmare scenario that the  
White House claimed they would be.

DH: In the book you say that fascists have great skills at changing  
public opinion.

NW: That's correct. That's exactly right. They've been very skillful  
at creating extremely terrifying narratives. And this is why looking  
at Goebbels is so instructive. Our leaders have been busy creating  
footage and sound bites that can be petrifying, and as a result, some  
of us live in a state of existential fear.

In contrast, in England and Spain, where they were hit by the same bad  
guys we're fighting, they're going after terrorists, but the  
population isn't walking around in a state of existential anxiety.

Gordon Brown said it, "Fighting terror ... well, terror's a crime."  
You can't underplay how sophisticated the Bush team has been about  
manipulating our fears. And one reason we really can't ignore is our  
home-grown ignorance. We now have two generations of young people who  
don't know about civics. A study came out that showed that even  
Harvard freshmen really don't understand how our government works.

And so we really don't know what democracy is anymore. I had to do a  
lot of learning to write this book -- I'm not a constitutional  
scholar. I'm just a citizen. And we've been kind of divorced from our  
democracy. We've let a pundit class take it over. Where the Founders  
wanted us to know what the First Amendment was and what the Second  
Amendment does for us.

So as a consequence we don't feel the kind of warning bell of "Oh, my  
God, arbitrary search and seizure! That's when they come into your  
house and take your stuff and scare your children! We can't have that!"

Because there's this class of politicians, scholars and pundits who do  
the Constitution for us, so we don't bother educating ourselves. It's  
hard to educate yourself now these days.

All of that plays into how easily we can be manipulated. We really  
don't read history in America, so we don't notice warning signals. We  
tend not to pay attention to the rest of the world or the past, so we  
don't know what the classic scenarios are.

DH: In terms of your personal narrative, the kinds of books you've  
written about feminism and gender like the Beauty Myth, Fire With Fire  
and Promiscuities ... this book seems pretty far a field. It seems  
like it would have to be a wrenching realization to lead you to read  
everything and produce the book. Was it traumatic?

NW: Well, I would say that it's been traumatic.

DH: Is it because you are out there on the front lines now?

NW: That's not the trauma. I feel like I'm living inside a  
consciousness of urgency and potential horrific consequences. And that  
is much more uncomfortable than living inside my prior being where I  
generally thought, "We're living in a democracy where there are some  
annoying people doing the wrong things" kind of mindset.

But I know that there's a "true consciousness" that we need to  
overcome the false consciousness. I know it's the right consciousness  
to get the facts. And I guess what's heartening is that a bunch of  
other people seem to be collectively entering this consciousness. They  
are saying: "My gosh, there is a real emergency here with very  
devastating stakes." That is traumatic but necessary.

It is a loss of innocence to see how easy it is to degrade democracy.  
I certainly walk around with kind of hyperawareness tuned into, for  
example, the toll in Guantanamo and those children in Iraq. It doesn't  
get covered well.

There's basically a concentration camp being established in Iraq with  
children in it. And no one appears to be digging in to it ...

DH: As we are coming to an end here, there are a couple of concepts I  
found particularly interesting in the book. One is when you talked  
about the "10 steps," or the "blueprint" that fascists have used time  
and time again to close down democracies. You say that that these  
factors, ingredients, are more than the sum of their parts, which  
suggests a kind of synergy, "each magnifies the power of the others  
and the whole," as you write.

You also write about the pendulum cliché, that we have this illusion  
through our history that the pendulum always swings back. But because  
of the permanent war on terrorism, that may not be true anymore. Can  
you say a little bit more about those two things, and how that might  
fit together?

NW: Well part of the illusion is created because it seems we are in  
two different countries, operating at home and abroad. For example,  
they can come at you, anyone and claim you're an enemy combatant. They  
rendered people in Italy ... they can render people all over the  
world. And they can put people like Jose Padilla in solitary  
confinement for three years, literally drive sane healthy people insane.

If the president can say, Well, "Don is an enemy combatant," there is  
nothing you can do. It's like "Tag, you're it!" To that extent we can  
not be innocent. And then someone is in jail for three years without  
being able to see their families or have easy access to a phone.

If they can do that, the pendulum can't swing, because after the first  
arrest, it generally goes in one direction, and according to the  
blueprint, the time has come for those first arrests. We're having  
this conversation now, before these arrests. But if tomorrow you read  
in the New York Times or the Washington Post that New York Times  
editor Bill Keller has been arrested, the staff will all be scared,  
others will get scared. And people don't understand that that's how  
democracy closes down. And when that happens first, it's the tipping  
point at which we think it's still a democracy.

DH: That is when the rules have changed?

NW: Yes, and people need to believe and realize that that kind of  
negotiation is pretty much over. And there's just the lag time, which  
is so dangerous, when people still think it's a democracy, even while  
the martial law steps have begun. And that's where we are at, unless  
we get it.

Because you know, Congress keeps saying, "Hello, we're Congress." You  
have to answer us when we ask for information. The president's like,  
"Sorry, I'm ignoring you!" It starts becoming thinking like an abused  
woman, like: "Surely he's going to do it right this time, surely he's  
not going to do it again." And he does.

Don Hazen is the executive editor of AlterNet.

© 2008 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.