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Hitler's Playbook: Bush and the Abuse of Power
by W. David Jenkins III and Sara DeHart July 4, 2002
"Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a
merger of state and corporate power." (Benito Mussolini, Encyclopedia
Italiana)
According to David Gergen (1999), the 2000 election was about raw
political power. He termed it a hinge point in history. The last time
the GOP controlled the White House and the Congress was when "Ike" was
in charge and he didn't want to rock the boat. "Conservatives have very
different ideas in mind if they can grab the helm now." What Gergen and
other members of the media didn't mention to the American people is that
if the Far Right could control the White House and Congress, they could
also control the judiciary and the fate and face of America for
generations to come. (Gergen, David (November 15, 1999). Editorial: A
Hinge Point in History. U.S. News and World Report)
And grab the helm they did, not by winning the White House by a
majority, but by Supreme Court fiat ( with at least two judges violating
several statutes of Title 28 Sec. 455 of the Judicial and Judiciary
Procedure). Even with the legitimacy of the Bush presidency in question,
the Conservatives -- those with the Far Right agenda -- grabbed the raw
political power that Gergen predicted would be the outcome of that
election. The abuse of power in the guise of pushing an agenda which the
majority of the electorate voted against would now become a perverted
rule of law. The Far Right transformed into the Far Reich. We need only
to look at Bush's nominations and appointments to fully appreciate this
tactic. Corporate America's cronies were placed in every powerful
position within the Bush administration. From Alcoa's O'Neil as
Secretary of Treasury to Enron's White as the Secretary of Army, this
administration represents Totalitarian Corporatism. And what precisely
does Totalitarian Corporatism look like and how does this play out in
the United States? Will the outcomes be any different for America than
they were for Germany?
When most people hear the word "fascism" they think of racism and
anti-Semitism, the hallmarks of the totalitarian regimes of Mussolini
and Hitler. But do not forget there is an economic policy component of
fascism known as "corporatism," an essential ingredient of economic
totalitarianism (DiLorenzo 1994). This is why corporate leaders played
key roles in financing Hitler as Chancellor and George W. Bush's run for
the White House. Corporate heads from the United States, England and
Germany financed Hitler's rise to power. These same powerful worldwide
forces from the Military-Industrial Complex, Oil, Energy, and Media
spent millions of dollars to influence the American 2000 election. And
when the election could not be bought, they used five members of the
United States Supreme Court to stop the Florida vote, thereby giving
election "victory" to the eldest son of George Herbert Walker Bush. Now
why was this election so important to the Far Right forces? And having
gained the White House, what -- besides greed and power -- motivates
them to change the face of America? Why would a political party
supposedly dedicated to "states' rights" use the Supreme Court to usurp
those rights? Why would a political party with slogans such as "get the
government off our backs" move to take over the government and all its
vast financial resources? There is only one explanation. Totalitarian
corporate industrial policy. From the Department of Energy to the
Departments of Justice and Defense, the Bush administration has worked
to establish policies that do not serve the interests of the people, but
serve the interests of rich and powerful corporations.
"Totalitarianism is a form of government in which all societal resources
are monopolized by the state in an effort to penetrate and control all
aspects of public and private life, through the state's use of
propaganda, terror, and technology. Totalitarian ideologies reject the
existing society as corrupt, immoral, and beyond reform. They project an
alternative society in which these wrongs are to be redressed, and
provide plans and programs for realizing the alternative order."
http://www.remember.org/guide/Facts.root.nazi.html
These ideologies are supported by propaganda campaigns and demand total
conformity on the part of the people. Can we honestly say that the Bush
Far Reich agenda is any different from that of Hitler's Third Reich when
it comes to this form of ideology?
Parallels Between Hitler's and Bush's Power Game Plan
As Chancellor, Hitler manipulated President Hindenberg into dissolving
the Reichstag to permit new elections. He sought a Nazi majority in the
Reichstag to rubber-stamp whatever laws the big corporations that
financed him wanted. Hitler abused democracy to establish his
dictatorship. Is this any different from the methods Mr. Bush used to
secure the presidency -- by Supreme Court fiat rather than an election
by the people? And then he used a slim Congressional majority to push
through legislation favorable to corporations.
Following his inauguration Vice President Dick Cheney was all over the
Congress and Senate imposing the Far Reich agenda. This is the "raw
power" that Gergen meant in his "Hinge Point in History" editorial.
Deals from energy to defense were made in secret in the Vice President's
office. Enron wrote Cheney's Energy Policy that cost Californians and
North Western citizens billions. Texas and international oil interests
had the entire country by the tail and a Republican majority in Congress
rubber-stamped everything from the tax cut for the wealthiest 2% to the
rape of the environment. And with few notable exceptions, the media were
silent. How very much like Hitler's Third Reich and his propaganda
machine.
Bush's cabinet was installed to serve the interests of corporations, not
the people. His actual disdain for regular American citizens is typified
by his quote about those citizens who objected to his administrative
choices. "My picks obviously activated the voices of a few, the fringe
people, the special-interest groups whose job is to make a lotta noise
in Washington, DC." If you are not with Bush, you are fringe. If you
want to stop global warming, you are fringe. If you object to any of his
policies, you are fringe. How very much like Hitler's marginalization of
the people, group by group.
And then came September 11, 2001, with the direct attack on America
followed by the counter-attack on Afghanistan. This unleashed a whole
new level of Far Reich control over the American people and the agenda.
To keep a population in line, both Hitler and Bush declared perpetual
war. Or in Hitler's words: "Another weapon I discovered early was the
power of the printed word to sway souls to me. The newspaper was soon my
gun, my flag-a thing with a soul that could mirror my own." But in this
case technology has moved light years ahead of Hitler's time and Bush's
Far Reich uses the power of television, controlled by a few corporate
heads, to control and sway. Following 911 the patriotism of the American
people was twisted to suit the purposes of the Far Reich Agenda just as
patriotism of the German people was twisted following the Reichstag fire
to suit the purposes of the Third Reich.
You are with us or against us. In Germany if you were against Hitler and
the Nazis you were subjected to tribunal "justice." Civil rights were
discarded and many ended up in concentration camps. In Bush's America,
an unknown number of Arab detainees are being held in U.S. jails and the
Guantanamo Naval Base. They do not have access to legal representation.
Their resources are frozen, and the American public is assured that if
they are charged they will have access to legal representation. Though
their actual numbers and identities were kept secret, we were told that
these detainees were not American citizens. Now we learn that an
American citizen, Jose Padilla, is being held without legal counsel in a
catch-22 situation that is worthy of a Joseph Heller plot. (Heller,
Joseph (Reprint edition 1966). Catch-22. NY: Scribner Paperback)
Secrecy is the Far Reich Bush policy and if you question that policy,
you are unpatriotic. German citizens learned very early to keep quiet
and not ask questions. American citizens are learning the same painful
lesson. The Bush administration is the most secret in our recorded
history and those who dare question the administration's secrecy are
labeled "unpatriotic."
Fear and isolation are weapons. The German people were not stupid or
unaware. They saw their neighbors beaten and threatened. They saw them
disappear. And they did not want this to happen to themselves or their
families. Now we are seeing the same situation in the United States as
members of the FBI intimidate people who dare dissent. Those who choose
not to stand miles away in the "First Amendment Zones" whenever a Bush
official speaks in a public arena do so at risk to their freedom. This
happens and the media remains silent. The TV cameras focus on those in
agreement with Far Reich policies and ignore those who dissent. News
people who dissent lose their jobs. Professors who dissent are held up
to ridicule by university administrators. It did not take long for all
in the news business to realize that Bush praise is the secret formula
for survival in a tough competitive market.
Attack Intellectualism. Hitler's Playbook specified that Intellectualism
must be attacked and did so by book burning and destruction of news
sources unfriendly to the Third Reich. Goebbels presided over a
communications monopoly. Nazi youth groups heckled professors until
administrators forced them out of universities. We need go no further
than Lynne Cheney's American Council of Trustees and Alumni
(http://www.counterpunch.org/foley0522.html) to see the corollary of
Bush's Far Reich. "Lynne Cheney's right wing, not-for-profit, tax-exempt
organization collected "unpatriotic" utterances and issued its report,
"Defending Civilization: How our universities are failing America and
what can be done about it" (Foley, 5/22/02). Germany lost incredible
intellectual talent in the 1930s (e.g., Einstein, Freud). Will the
United States lose its most talented university people by 2004?
Closely allied with Cheney's ACTA is William Bennett's Americans for
Victory Over Terrorism (AVOT) project. According to their campaign
literature "AVOT is designed to combat those who would weaken the
nation's resolve and erode our commitment to end the international
menace of terrorism." One of their articles stated that "anti-war
ferment in America is growing." In other words, speak praise of Far
Reich policies or expect to be attacked. Will ACTA and AVOT grow so
powerful that we will be afraid to dissent? At what point will the media
notice that our right to free speech is gone?
The abuses of power before and, especially, after 9/11 by the Bush Reich
have been unsettling, to say the least. The world is watching us,
believing we all support the policies Bush and his thugs are pursuing.
They see the similarities. But our former main source of information,
television and the newspapers, seems silent in the face of such a threat
to what our founding fathers had in mind.
There has been no attention paid to the Metropolitan Detention Center in
Brooklyn where uncounted numbers of American citizens are being held
without charge while Ashcroft petitions the courts to allow their
deportation. The defense counsels of John Lindh, Zacarias Moussaoui,
Richard Reid and Jose Padilla have had their hands tied by the DOJ in
the name of "national security." If George and his gang decide to call
you a "hostile combatant" then you can just kiss your rights goodbye.
Some still argue that these people and others like them are proven
enemies of the country or just "very bad people," but how long will it
take before the precedent being set with these accused "terrorists"
trickles down to folks like you and me?
There is an ugly secret being kept from all of us. Some of us recognize
this -- especially those who see it from afar -- and then there are
those who continue to refuse to believe it could happen here. And there
lies the danger. Arthur Livingstone (2001) asked the question, "Does
history repeat itself?" and the answer, unfortunately, is yes.
(http://www.goodwriters.net/dhri1.html) We, in America, are seeing a
reincarnation of the Third Reich, and its name is Corporatism. If left
unchecked, the worst case scenario will be that Americans will be left
without liberty, justice or freedom. Thomas Jefferson saw the threat in
1816: "I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed
corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial
of strength and bid defiance of the laws of our country."
The only thing standing in the way of the Far Reich's goal of
corporatism is the American public. One stumbling block that Bush faces
that Hitler didn't have to contend with, is the vast amount of
information available with today's technology. The Internet has brought
a world together in ways never dreamed of in the days of WWII. It is
both a source of comfort that we are not alone and a source of
frustration as it causes us to wonder when will the rest of the country
catch up?
We all know that our European neighbors notice the similarities
discussed in this series. They wonder when we are going to finally wake
up. So many Americans have given their lives to defend that which makes
this country a unique and special place. Will we let the noble
experiment in democracy die in the 21st Century? Will we let it die at
the hands of George W. Bush's version of the Third Reich?
Note: This is Part III in a series.
Here is Part I: Now and Then- Preface
Here is Part II: Now and Then- The Propaganda Machine
Copyright 2001-2002 AmericaHeldHostile.com. All rights
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that
matter." - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
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