Vive la Résistance!

Naomi Wolf on resistance:

Today the New York Times reports that the State Department is not cooperating with Iraqi or FBI investigators into the matter of the Blackwater massacre of seventeen Iraqi civilians.

Pay attention to this. Readers who know `the blueprint’ will be horrified but not surprised. `Step Two’ in the closing down of an open society is for the State to showcase to civilians the fact that a paramilitary force is outside the rule of law. When SA began — still illegally — beating citizens in Germany, National Socialist strategists made sure that photographers and reporters were present. We must consider: if the State showcases to Americans the fact that it is protecting its own cadre of violent criminals in Iraq — will Congress be courageous in confronting Blackwater violence when Blackwater manifests its well-documented plans to deploy more aggressively here at home? Or will this penumbra of unaccountable, State-defended violence be enough to intimidate lawmakers — and the rest of us? Remember that Mussolini directed Blackshirts to intimidate Parlimentarians even before Italy was a dictatorship and Hitler used the same tactic in lining the halls of the still-functioning German Parliament with Brownshirts — paramilitary forces that had established a reputation for brutality against civilians. And that was enough to cow lawmakers even as the trappings of democracy were still intact.

Remember that under current arrangements, the Department of Homeland Security can deploy Blackwater in your town tomorrow.

With this kind of messaging about the State’s protection for what is its own paramility force of torturers and murderers, if Blackwater massacres seventeen civilians in Times Square — or turns their guns on protesters at an antiwar rally — in spite of the trappings of democracy, will anyone be brave enough to hold them accountable?’

It is clear yet that violent retribution, torture or maybe worse, seems to go right up this chain of command? Is it clear yet that these people are capable of anything? Is it obvious yet that criminals are at the helm of the nation and need to be not only ousted but held accountable for their crimes?

Is it treason yet?

This is an open invitation to honorable patriots on the Right and in the center to join this movement to restore the rule of law and confront this horror: this is not conservatism, it is a series of crimes against the nation and against the very essence of America. Join us, we need you. This movement must transcend partisan lines. The power of individual conscience is profound when people start to wake up. TK Comey said No; history will look at this torture and disgrace the torturers. A judge today ruled that the US can’t just ship prisoners out of Guantanamo to be tortured at will — she said No. The Center for Constitutional Rights is about to file a civil lawsuit — against Blackwater: they are saying No.

In Germany, according to historian Richard Evans, in 1931-1932, if enough Germans of conscience had begun to say No — history would have had an entirely different outcome. If we go any further down this road the tears will be those of conservatives as well as progressives. They will be American tears.

The time for weeping has to stop; the time for confronting must begin.