[ExI] Fascist America, in 10 Easy Steps

[Olga Bourlin]

From: Natasha Vita-More
To: ExI chat list
Sent: Saturday, September 29, 2007 8:54 AM

> I think The End of America (Wolf 2007) is playing off The End of History 
> (Fukuyama 2006).  I also think that Wolf is running in a pack with others 
> (Moore (Sicko), Gore (An Inconvenient Truth) who are marketing their ideas 
> by emphasizing big implications.

And "marketing" is the operative word.  I agree with this.

> Here is the issue:  Are American's critically minded enough to discern 
> accuracy from hedging?  If "we" are foolish enough not to know that 
> America has become a fascist country, then are "we" not foolish enough to 
> be fooled into believing anything that gets promoted?

"We" do seem to be that foolish enough.

Observe:  Dubya.  "We" voted (loosely speaking) for him twice.  As Bush once 
tried to say: "Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me."

(I know you all know that what Bush actually said turned out to be one of 
his all-time classic Bushisms, but for the record, it went something like 
this: "There's an old saying in Tennessee - I know it's in Texas, probably 
in Tennessee - that says, fool me once, shame on - shame on you. Fool me - 
you can't get fooled again.")

Or, as Dan Quayle would have put it - and who, as it turned out, made an 
unwitting prediction with his all-time classic Quayleism: "What a terrible 
thing to have lost one's mind. Or not to have a mind at all. How true that 
is."

Olga