“Billions of dollars are made in shredding the Constitution.
Not a single penny is made in restoring the Constitution.”

Naomi Wolf - January 17, 2009
Big Picture Theater - Mad River Valley, Vermont

Author, feminist and social critic Naomi Wolf has written one of the most important books of our time. Short, accessible, and deeply disturbing, The End of America: Letter of Warning To A Young Patriot (Chelsea Green, 2007) lays out the ten steps required for an open society (read: a democracy) to move towards a closed society (read: a dictatorship).

I remember reading the book when it first hit the streets – and upon a recent reread in the wake of Mr. Obama’s election, I still find The End of America a seminal work in shaping my own thinking about the constitutionality of and need for nonviolent secession, with the once and future republic of Vermont leading the way.

Wolf’s conclusion? In comparing the coming of closed societies in other countries, notably Stalin’s Soviet Union, Hitler’s Nazi Germany, and Mussolini’s Fascist Italy, Wolf concludes that all ten steps already have been taken here in the 21st century United States.

It might be worth reading that last sentence again. Let it settle a bit.

Don’t like to read?

Well, fortunately, a new film version of her End Of America book brings her written arguments to life with visual evidence that supports the book’s conclusions: news snippets, interview clips, and on-the-ground footage, edited together with Wolf’s warm, witty, wise and charismatic stage presence – all of which strengthen her written case quite dramatically.

How do democracies get shut down, transformed into dictatorships?

Let Wolf’s analysis of this step-by-step process be submitted to a candid world

Step #1: Invoke an External and External Threat

What does the USA PATRIOT Act stand for? ((It is an acronym, oh yes – the film does a funny Penn and Teller bit with this.) To wit: “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism.” Passed in the immediate wake of 9/11 with nary a peep from Congress (who actually wrote the several hundred page document, and why it was ready for passage so quickly in mid-September 2001 is a matter of no small interest, one ignored by the film), the USA PATRIOT Act, Wolf concludes, essentially guts much of the Bill of Rights (you know, that little add-on to the U.S. Constitution that “guarantees” citizens the rights to press, speech, assembly, gun-carrying, trial by jury – little stuff like that), as well as eroding critical pieces of the Constitution (I won’t bore you with the details.)

Step #2: Create Secret Prisons Where Torture Takes Place

For years, Wolf observes, the U.S. government has denied that it tortures individuals. Not true. Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, and “extraordinary rendition,” the process by which the U.S. government captures and transports “detainees” (known in the new legalese as “enemy combatants”, a term that the president can now apply to anyone at will) to other countries where the U.S. Constitution has no jurisdiction, solely for the purpose of torturing them, offer undeniable proof. The U.S. government doesn’t call it “torture, though. Nope. “Enhanced interrogation techniques” is the phrase de jour, and, by the way, the Geneva Convention and other international systems for protecting citizens simply don’t apply. And the Military Commissions Act (October 2006) strips detainees of the right to even see the evidence against them.

Step #3: Develop a Paramilitary Force

I’ve got one word for you. Blackwater. Wolf explains that this private for-profit corporate mercenary organization, operated by Eric Prinz and engaged in hiring professional soldiers from around the world, operates at the behest of the U.S. government in global “hot spots,” including Iraq, and, as it turns out, New Orleans and other places around the United States. U.S. law has shielded Blackwater “employees” from government investigation – the State Department has been less than forthcoming in giving Congress any specific information about the cozy relationship between Blackwater and the executive branch. (As an aside, journalist Jeremy Scahill’s recent book Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army is a must-read for anyone interested in what’s going on in this arena.)

Step #4: Surveil Ordinary Citizens

You can’t close an open society, Wolf observes, unless you are able to “listen in” on the private conversations of ordinary citizens and intimidate, even silence, those who are most vocal in their criticism of the government. Naomi Wolf speaks to her own personal experience as an air traveler with a quadruple X designation, indicating that she is “on the watch list.” A well-meaning young airport guard clued her in after several successive flights in which she was singled out and detained for extra questioning. Might want to check your ticket next time you fly. Bottom left.

Step #5: Infiltrate Citizen Groups

Anyone who understands the history of COINTELPRO in the United States, Wolf explains, understands how this works. The FBI sends agents to infiltrate, spy on, and harass citizen groups. Congress passed laws against this sort of behavior after the Vietnam War – those laws have since been undone.

Step #6: Detain and Release Ordinary Citizens

Another intimidation tactic, Wolf notes – designed to strike fear into the general population. ‘Nuf said.

Step #7: Target Key Individuals

Wolf notes that Hitler’s propaganda minister Josef Goebbels proved particularly adept at this, according to Wolf. She points to the repercussions that followed Dan Rather and the Dixie Chicks’ criticism of the Bush administration (See the documentary “Shut Up And Sing”) as two high-profile examples, but there are many others.

Step #8: Restrict the Press

On the surface, an obvious tactic. One of Wolf’s weaknesses, however, is that she assumes the U.S. corporate press (yes, I am including the New York Times) is interested in providing a multi-sided picture of any story. With 90% of our media content ultimately owned by one of 6 multinational corporations, vital information rarely gets through the gatekeepers. If you don’t believe me, answer this simple question: How many Iraqis have been killed (estimated) since the 2003 U.S. Iraq invasion? This seems a number that should be on the tip of everyone’s brain. And yet, most Americans haven’t a clue, not because they are stupid, but because the U.S. media simply censors this sort of tough but necessary information. As a citizen of the most powerful Empire in the world, I think it is safe to say that we are generally clueless about what our own government is up to. “Disinformation” is the order of the day, if you read, watch or listen to mainstream news sources.

Step #9: Recast Criticism as Espionage and Dissent as Treason

In a closing society, Wolf suggests, you see more attempts to restrict free speech. U.S. history is full of examples, beginning with the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 (see John Adams). In our current era, the “T” word becomes more universally applied to any citizen who criticizes the U.S. government. (That’s “terrorist.”)

Step #10: Subvert the Rule of Law

More and more, Wolf suggests, the Executive branch (the President) simply ignores the Legislative branch (U.S. Congress) on those few occasions when Congress actually gets up the gumption to ask some tough questions or hold some public hearings. Have you heard about “signing statements?” Mr. Bush used them more than any other single executive in U.S. history, and they allow the president to simply reinterpret or ignore whatever Congressional laws he deems wrong-headed. Huh.

And Wolf ends the film by suggesting that a coup d’etat has occurred in October 2008, when the president deployed U.S. troops returning from Iraq to patrol U.S. soil, in direct violation of the posse comitatus act of the 1870s, designed to prohibit the president from ever using U.S. troops against U.S. citizens.

Only “the psychology of liberty” can save us, Wolf concludes, with the film suggesting we “write letters, blog, be vocal, and generally embrace a more critical form of patriotism.”

As hope for our constitutional future, this tastes like awfully thin gruel.

Maybe President Obama might save us.

But in the Q and A after the film, Wolf argued that “no American president is powerful enough to restore our Constitutional system by himself. Until every one of the laws is rescinded,” she concludes, “Our work is not done.” America’s “reverence for the law” is what is most admired globally, Wolf observed, and “the law is so fragile – it is a consensus, and if people say ‘fuck the law,’ it is difficult to restore it.”

Check out her new book Give Me Liberty for a blueprint for grassroots change.

Time will tell if Wolf’s optimistic vision of “a people’s army” rising up to reclaim our federal government and the “rule of law” comes to be reinstated.

I am not so sanguine.

No comments

The End of America? An Interview with Film Producer Avram Ludwig

Rob’s Quick Note: In his thought-provoking new movie, based on citizen activist Naomi Wolf’s book The End Of America: Letter of Warning To A Young Patriot (Chelsea Green, 2007) Ludwig suggests that the U.S. Constitution, and indeed democracy itself, is under siege here in the United States. His film “The End of America” will be featured at the Big Picture Café and Theater’s 2009 Mountain Top Human Rights Festival (running from Wednesday, Wednesday January 14 – Sunday, January 18) on Saturday, January 17 at 7:00 p.m., and again on Sunday, January 18 at 5:00 p.m.

Join Avram and best-selling author Naomi Wolf on Saturday night, January 17 at the Big Picture for a public dialogue (as well as good food, drink and conviviality).

For tickets, information, and a complete film festival schedule, visit www.bigpicturetheater.info.

Here, I interview Avram Ludwig about his film “The End of America.” While I take issue with his suggestion that the Barack Obama administration will actually be able to undo much of the legacies of the Bush/Cheny regime (an unpopular view in Vermont at the moment, I know), he has helped make one of the more important political documentaries of our time - and we are excited to host him in Waitsfield this coming week-end.

The End of America - INTERVIEW

Q. How did you come to make “End of America”?

A. I met Naomi at a Halloween Party, she was dressed as a sexy feminist and I knew if I wanted to get a date, I had to come up with a good pick up line. “Let’s make a movie out of your book.” But seriously, I’d been living the past eight years with this mounting sense of fury at my own powerlessness at my government’s almost daily shredding of the Constitution. I had been reading about the torture, the denial of habeas corpus, the copying of everyone’s email since 2005 by the NSA, Blackwater on the rampage in Iraq and New Orleans then pouring money into the coffers of the RNC, and the horrible strategic mistake of the war. All these things made me so angry, but when I read Naomi’s book, I could see a systematic effort of political intimidation of the press and the Democrats, and I knew I had to make the movie.

Q. In what ways, exactly, does your film suggest that “America” is “ending”?

A. George Washington and his comrades gave us a great gift when they set up the system of checks and balances and the protection of individual rights. Free speech, freedom to demonstrate, due process, protection from search without a warrant, separation of the military and police. Washington was offered more and more power throughout his career and instead of trying to keep it, he kept giving back when he was done with it. This is the essence of American Democracy, and it takes self-discipline and self-restraint to practice Democracy. Everyone has to abide by an objective set of rules. When politics is practiced as if it’s war, winning is everything. Democracy can’t survive that.

Q. Why select Naomi Wolf as your “red thread” here - what qualities does she bring to the movie?

A. Naomi was able to put all the pieces of the puzzle together, how the government was making a systematic effort to undermine democracy. She’s also a fantastic communicator, a great rabble rouser and someone that people instinctively trust. Unlike a politician, she has nothing to gain from all this, and she always writes the story of her emotional connection to an issue, so you can read her social theory and social criticism and be incredibly moved.

Q. The book “End of America” is a critique of the eight years of the Bush/Cheney administration. With the election of Democrat Barack Obama to the U.S. presidency, doesn’t that weaken the film’s argument?

A. I think we dodged a bullet, without the economic meltdown, I think we would have had a very scary and much closer election. A lot vote stealing and vote suppression both illegal and legal was in place for implementation in the last election and was essentially called off. A closer election could have been stolen, but Obama was clever and had a lawyer in every polling place in the country. Also, PBS teamed up with YouTube to ask people to film and post anyone being denied the right to vote. Rove saw the writing on the wall and made statements the week before the election that if Obama didn’t win, there would be riots, and he was right. On October 1st, Bush moved a brigade specializing in crowd control back from Iraq to the US in violation of Posse Commitatus, the American legal tradition to strictly separate the Army from policing except in the event of insurrection. The day after the election, Bush brought two more brigades and now the plan is to bring 20,000 troops for use in the US by 2011. This is the greatest hallmark of a police state, and the most dangerous one. When the leader can start using the military at will, the constitutional checks and balances are meaningless.

Q. Will Obama really offer an alternative to the Bush/Cheney regime?

After he got elected, Obama went on 60 Minutes and reaffirmed his promise to close Guantanamo and stop torture - two major concerns in End of America - and he’s made nominations for the Presidential lawyers and Solicitor General and CIA Director that would make you think that the Bill of Rights will be respected.

The major question: is will Obama press to undo all the legislative damage done to the Constitution in the post 9/11 legislation? We have to think of the damage as a trap that has been set.

END.

No comments

First, the bad news.

I missed the New Year’s Eve Higher Ground show, in which the Nocturnals vamped as the Royal Tenenbaums.

The good news?

I caught Grace Potter and the Nocturnals’ (GPN) December 29 Higher Ground show, two days before, and what a show it was.

The popular Burlington venue was packed to capacity by the time the band took the stage at 10:15 p.m. With a quick welcome for the crowd – “Are you guys ready to have a good time tonight?” - Grace Potter, resplendent in knee high boots and a black mini skirt, promptly picked up her triangle-shaped cutaway electric guitar, laid down some growling blues chords, and lit into “Watching You,” backed by smoking riffs from fabulous-fingered Scott Tournet, the solid drumming of Matthew Burr, and the low-end speed bass of Bryan Dondero.

The evening took off from there.

All of the band’s best original rockers made the cut: “Mastermind,” “Treat Me Right,” and “Joey,” as well as a new tune I didn’t recognize, something about “Apples Off My Tree.” Sign me up.

My first thought, while listening: this is a band that has clearly been honing their chops with plenty of good hard touring on the road. The extended “road trip,” of course, as any traveling musician will tell you, is not nearly as glamorous as the movies and popular imagination make it out to be, but it is vital for a band seeking to cultivate a larger audience and a tighter musical groove. The Nocturnals sounded tighter and more together than they ever have, despite a few technical difficulties at various moments during the show.

My second thought: after several years of touring, Grace Potter has established herself as a multi-talented instrumentalist and stage performer. Throughout the course of the sixteen song Higher Ground set, she moved fluidly from one instrument to another - electric guitar, the Hammond organ and keyboard, the tambourine (a much harder instrument to play than it looks) the acoustic guitar and back again, comfortably and with a playful sense of the possible. Her voice has matured, as well – she channeled the blues, funk, soul and folk traditions with equal ease, though this listener would love a few more slow ballads mixed into the set – the “jam band” thing, which the band does well, could benefit from occasional more quiet interludes, which would also offer Grace a chance to show off both her voice and her remarkable word smithing chops. (For listeners who want to keep up with GPN’s exploits, check out the web site www.thisissomewhere.com - you can hear and watch some great live stuff, and you can find acoustic live versions of some of the band’s tunes, as well.)

All in all, the show proved spectacular. By the time the Nocturnals slipped into “Ah Mary” (their set’s ninth song and Potter’s most brilliantly lyrical – a critique of U.S. Empire disguised as an “out-of-control” woman story), I was hooked. They followed this up with the wonderfully hooky tunes “Some Kind of Ride” and “Stop The Bus,” but the band’s “come to Jesus” movement – a transcendental tour-de-force – came at the show’s climax, with “Big White Gate” and the “Water” double-shot from their “Nothing But The Water” project – masterful. Throw in a really funky cover of Steve Miller’s “Big Old Jet Airliner” to round things out, and the evening proved magical.

To top it off, as we left the theater, the snow started to come down, blanketing Burlington in some much-needed white stuff for the journey back to Mad River. The warmth of the music stayed with me and my companions, though, and I thought how fortunate we are to live in a place and in a community that nurtures and supports its young people as they spread their wings, in so many different ways. Here’s to more music in 2009!

No comments