Chilling, But Unsurprising

Maria Allwine writes a first-hand account for Buzzflash on the surge of hatred on the streets that signals a rising tide of fascism amongst right-wing anti-healthcare protesters in the US.

How America Destroyed Itself

The fact is finally dawning on the press and the American people that terrible things happen when fascists are allowed to take over your country.

And make no mistake: they were allowed to take over and destroy the Constitution because the vast majority of people either actively supported Bush and his gang of criminals; were cowed into deference through the fear of terrorist boogeymen or the ridicule of Fox News and the Rush Limbaugh blackshirts; didn't have the moral courage to stand up and say "No more!"; or, probably most often, were lost in a make-believe world of American Idol and Monday Night Football.

Even if we can escape the nightmare and restore the Constitution and the rule of law, what will we tell future generations about the shame and horror of the last eight years? How will we explain doing nothing of consequence in opposition while two presidential elections were stolen via massive-but-targetted electoral fraud and a war of aggression was waged in our name?

Ashcroft as a Moderating Influence?

Surely there is no greater - or more damning - illustration of the degree of right-wing extremism within the Bush administration than the fact that John Ashcroft once found himself serving as the voice of semi-moderation in a battle with then-White House counsel Alberto Gonzales over the use of torture in prisoner interrogations.

Fascists Undermine U.S. Democratic Primaries

If further proof was ever required that the most rabid hardcore Republicans in the US have no respect for democracy or its values, one need only look to Rush Limbaugh's so-called 'Operation Chaos' for the latest example of the right's electoral sabotage of the democratic process.

The next time an American conservative commentator accuses anyone from the political center leftwards of acting in a "divisive" or even treasonous manner, consider who really is threatening the republic by openly stoking discord amongst society at a time of grave national peril and then bragging about it over the national airwaves.

Tellin' it like it is!

To Mr. Olberman: THANK YOU!!!

"War On Terror" Even More of a Sham Than We Thought?

This article by investigative reporter Kristina Borjesson certainly raises some disturbing - and all-too-plausible - possibilities about what the criminal, fear-mongering, fascist government of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and their allies may have been up to over the past six-and-a-half years of their supposed "War On Terror".

An Emerging Democratic Majority, But Will It Matter?

The Washington Post features an op-ed piece on an emerging Democratic majority throughout US politics. While this kind of thing gives hope that the great national nightmare brought on by the era of Republican fascism may be coming to a close, renewal will only be possible if the Democrats finally, and improbably, grow a collective spine and reverse the policy of appeasement that has been so shamefully apparent under the "leadership" of Harry Reid in the Senate and Nancy Pelosi in the House of Representatives.

Here's to a thorough national political fumigation in 2008 and beyond!

House of Cards?

Buzzflash are certainly on a roll these days in terms of quality interviews. One of the best can be found here, an interview with investigative author Craig Unger on his latest book, The Fall of the House of Bush: The Untold Story of How a Band of True Believers Seized the Executive Branch, Started the Iraq War, and Still Imperils America's Future. Check it out!

Fascism American-style and the Death of US Constitutional Democracy

Naomi Wolf's disturbing-yet-excellent The End Of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot will be discussed in more detail in future posts. In the meantime, here is an excellent-yet-disturbing (spot the trend?) interview with Ms. Wolf that really lays out just how serious and imminent the threat of real - not rhetorical, but genuine - fascism is to US Constitutional democracy.

The hour is late: stand up against Bush, Cheney, the Republican Party, Rush Limbaugh, Pat Robertson, Fox News and the Democratic appeasers in Congress before the flame of liberty is extinguished forever.

Or, as an increasingly-obscure early-to-mid-'80s Californian right-wing (oh, the irony!) New Wave band once said: "WAKE UP! IT'S NINETEEN-EIGHTY-FOUR!"

Sieg Howdy!

The latest outrageous right-wing jingoistic hate-mongering campaign to hit the USA has begun, led by the usual suspects (Fox News, Coulter, Hannity, Horowitz, et al.). Happy Islamo-Fascism Awareness Week, readers!

Courage and Cowardice

It's a shame that, with the exception of the Dixie Chicks and punks like Fat Mike and Jello Biafra that nobody in the mainstream listens to, it seems to have fallen to a previous generation of musicians to tell it like it is about our fascist regime:





One sign of hope, however, is that this stuff actually appeared on CBS and NBC, which wouldn't have happened a few years ago when the Bush regime was in its ascendancy. No doubt, though, it will still be labelled by the usual suspects as "a cowardly attack on America/the troops/the 'Commander-in-Chief'/etc.".

On another note, the great Alexei Sayle once remarked on the bitter irony that mainstream Hollywood's "courageous" stand against the Vietnam war, as evidenced by films like Apocalypse Now, Full Metal Jacket and Platoon, only happened years after the war itself had ended. Information Landmine expects a similar avalanche of films illustrating the pointless madness of the Iraq misadventure to begin appearing circa 2013. Stock up on the popcorn in a few years' time.

The Fourth Reich is a product of the Third

Not exactly a new one, coming as it does from back in 2003, but this article from the always-excellent Counterpunch gives some background and insight into some of the connections between key figures in today's GOP and Germany's Nazi regime of 1933-45.

Don't say us lefties didn't warn you. Now if we could find the goods on a Tony Blair - Benito Mussolini connection (well, aside from the philosophical ones on authoritarianism and the corporate state), the circle would well and truly be complete.

Republican Party Reptiles

"Enough is enough! I have had it with these motherfucking Republicans on this motherfucking cruise ship!"

The Republicans: A Warning From History

Make no mistake about it: if you are a US citizen who votes for Republican candidates, or a citizen of any country who supports, aids, abets or otherwise casts an alliance with the Bush administration or the US Republican Party, this is what you are buying into.