Yes, in these days, various political tendencies are troubling. The combined effects of the USA Patriot Act and the Homeland Defense Act are disturbing, and have been criticized by people on various sides of the political spectrum, on the left by Phil Donahue and on the right by people like Bob Barr.

It is now clearly stated and reinforced in legislation that information can be collected on American citizens, secretly, and the regular court system may not even know about it, and may be able to do little to protect you from abuses; our judicial hopes are in a Supreme Court ruling in our favor against these provisions. Without knowing about a search and what was found, without recourse to conventional courts, it is difficult to challenge the manner of its collection, or the nature of the evidence... courts may not be able to challenge it even if they do know in some cases. Now the government has expanded ability to arrest and detain citizens without sufficient reason, all in the hands of the President, prided that he determine them "enemy combatants," and there is no clear guideline as to when someone is put on or off this list. Book stores can be required to furnish information on the books bought by their preferred readers, check, or credit card customers, and John Poindexter is advocating a national database of personal information on any citizen in the hands of the Pentagon.

Some may wonder that this is not Fascism, is not even full-blown McCarthyism (see McCarthyism Watch)... yet.

The potential for abuse and corruption just went up a hundred or a thousand times, this is true. But it is another matter how public opinion, protests, critical media personalities like Chris Matthews and Donahue, dissenting politicians and judges (from Bob Barr to Al Gore), counter act the flowering of abuses and expose hints of corruption, before these tendencies become more entrenched and grow. Every letter to the editor that gets published in protest, every dissenting voice that makes it to the public through either mainstream or unconventional media, checks the power of these sweeping legislative actions to some extent.

It is not going to be easy to check a Republican president with a Republican House, a Republican Senate, and Republican judges, but some Republicans are critical of the potential problems in various policies... because there is a huge difference between acting on conservative principles and grabbing power reactionarily to use against scapegoats or political enemies.

A strict constructionist conservative may have some reactionary tendencies, desiring to turn back the clock to the "good ole days" when people presumed Christian supremacy and no hand outs from the government, and states could ride over various new "so-called" rights (Miranda, affirmative action, etc.), but the fact that they want to keep the constitution in sacred honor, as it was intended at the time it was written, will make them extremely concerned about these tendencies if they are consistent and have some insight.

Right now our check against power consist of: the formal separation of powers that tradition that necessitates debates and votes in Congress, and allows for judicial challenges; voting; public dissent; protest; exercising of our rights to assemble, speak, own guns, etc.

Unfortunately, with a majority in each constitutional branch of the Federal government, the formal separation is not as effective as it might be if one particular party machine wasn't reinforcing hegemony. With no parties, or two or more parties capable of checking each other, the play of individual interests competes and balances power, but with one party machine the check of individual members of the party may be suppressed (true of either Democratic or Republican party machines if either has each branch under its control).

Also, the para-constitutional branch of bureaucracies are influenced by Senate-approved and Presidentially-chosen cabinet members, and the new Homeland Defense Department brings together a lot of people from the old department bureaucracies, with the President having more power to hire and fire for personal or political reasons down to lower levels. Previously this level of management was reserved for people within the bureaucracies and labor negotiation. There have been certain standards designed to reduce the manipulation of bureaucracies by political opportunists. Many checks within the bureaucracies have been abolished by the Homeland Security Act. A Republic may tend to be inefficient, but rule by tyranny can be deadly effective, whether that tyranny be a mob of "the people" and autocrat, the wealthy, or a state system.

The nightmare is more possible now, but has not come to pass completely. The formal checks are still there. Full erosion of Legislative, Judicial, and Bureaucratic checks against the President, Executive branch, or the reigning party, has not yet occurred.

It is crucial that these checks be utilized as time moves on, to expose and counter abuses, corruption, and consolidation of power in the executive branch. Otherwise we need to keep our ears to the ground about arrests, disappearances, surveillance, governmental intimidation, and crackdowns on dissident voices. This is our barometer, now.

If the checks fail and the snowball keeps rolling downhill, we will be fighting tyranny. But for things to snowball downhill the President, top Republicans, or else key aids and advisors behind the scenes, will need the will, the vision, and the right climate to get away with it. If their will or vision is simply not quite totalitarian, it may be left to a future administration, or perhaps to an insider in the Pentagon or FBI, to take advantage of the possibilities. It is a dangerous stage that someone could use for their own ends, and it might not be a President (current or future) -- this is something to keep in mind.

Official state Fascism involves disbanding legislatures as inefficient and relegating everything to state agencies that bow to the Leader's wishes, and courts loyal to the Leader, constitution be damned, foreigners and dissenting citizens be screwed. In comparison, what we have right now is a set of dangerous tendencies towards tyranny...

On the McCarthyism scene, it is also worthwhile to consider the factors involved. Under McCarthyism a governmental panel, supported by local grassroots movements, routed out communists and atheists in entertainment industries, universities, and colleges, destroying careers and ruining the lives of citizens on a fairly large scale. Now this may happen to immigrants, particularly from Arabic nations, or to citizens who have been found in Arabic countries or helping Arabs who are connected to violent terrorist plots... This is not quite the same thing as full blown McCarthyism. Tendencies that counteract McCarthyist developments are the existence of people like Phil Donahue and Chris Matthews on the air, and Daschle, Gore, and others are dissenting publicly through the mainstream media, without a panel inspecting their patriotism or attempting to blackball them, at least not openly. People who are critical of official policy are not facing the kind of mob intimidation or trouble at work at the levels seen during the McCarthy era.

On the other hand, demagoguery has risen extremely after 9-11, and has continued. The continuous rants against “the evil doers”and buzzwords like “terrorism” used indiscriminately, and continual threats to Saddam, are the daily propaganda from the White House and the media. Critical people are charged by the administration and Fox News with not being loyal to the President or America, with giving comfort to the enemy (an implied treason charge), and Americans are encouraged to help the government with tips about suspicious neighbors by the government as well as large factions of the media.

Regarding McCarthyism, my analysis: watch out for Donahue all of the sudden being off the air or 'tamed', Chris Matthews playing less hardball about these tendencies or likewise removed, increases in violence against dissenting people or minorities like Arabs or non-Christians, intimidation campaigns against scapegoats, more calls to remove people from teaching positions, boycott or remove entertainment figures, etc. on the basis of politics, and words like "un-American" thrown at elected officials who disagree with the Homeland Defense, Patriot Act, or policies of the Administration. Things like that are the next big hurdle for McCarthyism. If these things happen and dissenters are searched for and fired from entertainment or teaching positions regularly, then we are in full blown McCarthyism. When this kind of scrutiny leads to elected officials being removed during their term for purely political or ideological reasons, things have gone to the deepest levels of McCarthyism and points beyond... If little to none of the above is happening, let's keep it that way and increase the expectation of a climate of tolerating dissenting voices. That expectation is hard for them to fight, and makes it difficult for them to justify a more hostile domestic climate.

Regarding Fascism, my analysis: first off, about two years from now let's see if there is still a majority in each elected branch of Republicans, or signs of tampering with the vote count or certain people getting to the polls, and look for signs of growing or solidified McCarthyist tendencies; in the meantime lets remain aware of how many people are arrested under the alternative "justice" system, and persecution of dissenters or critics of Bush (especially the popular ones that show up on TV and Cable and in print), and be aware of official programs targeted to different classes of citizens (religious, racial, sexual, etc.) limiting the rights of some and glorifying the others as "True Americans." Mob violence increases should be monitored, and also popularity of people like Pat Buchanan and Jerry Falwell. Watch Ashcroft. If the formal separation of powers and formal checks are eliminated, and demagoguery increases and a class of persecuted scapegoat citizens is intimidated officially, and dissent disappears, and everything rests in the hands of the President, that is more like the Fascism of the past.

Regarding Totalitarianism in General: see above regarding Fascism for the basic idea, but look for power consolidated in the hands of one party, the Pentagon, police agencies, etc., not necessarily in the President. Also there would be almost complete erosion of checks against power and a significant number of people designated as official internal enemies, a climate of fear that extends far beyond the fringe of politics or the most vulnerable groups of people.

Tyranny is the best word for what to be concerned with: whether tyranny of a mob or of a leader or state. Fascism and McCarthyism (Fascism's kid brother) are specific movements and not every tyranny has the same features or structure.

However, I would suggest we be very concerned about McCarthyism-like developments, and erosions of constitutional checks and balances, and also challenges to judicially determined or legislatively created checks and balances, instances of people being fired for political reasons, and of course any instances of mob violence or riots against scapegoats. It is from demagoguery (the way Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, and Falwell talk) and a tendency to consolidation of power, that the climate develops to support these tyrannies.

On the Threat to Freedom Alert System (TFAS), we are at code Yellow. Demagoguery is strong. We have seen some dangerous early or middle-stage McCarthyist tendencies. We do not yet have full blown McCarthyism, but the tendency is established and frightening, particularly to those who strongly disagree with the Administration's handling of domestic and/or foreign affairs. Formal checks and balances, protest activity, and informal public and private dissent is still feasible; these are definitely not encouraged by the majority of the media, and in many instances it is treated unsympathetically or may be grossly under-reported by the media. Power is being consolidated and yet separation of powers still slows down the descent to tyranny. It is important to continue monitoring the political actions and cultural tendencies that erode freedoms, consolidate power, undermine checks and balances, jump on scapegoats, and use buzzwords to create a hostile climate.

I suggest a Threat to Freedom Alert System (TFAS), as follows. Please use it or modify it to suit your understanding or to make it more useful as a tool. We have been in need of one for some time. For more on McCarthyism and Fascism see 'McCarthyism and You,' in the opposite column.

Blue — There is no current threat to freedom. Power is distributed and separated sufficiently, with appropriate checks and balances in place. There is no significant active movement, political or cultural tendency, to undermine the distribution, separation, check, or balance of power. Every person in the society is granted basic rights. It is worth looking for examples of societies functioning and thriving at close to this lowest level of threat to freedom.

Green — Power has been consolidated significantly, though not totally, and/or checks and balances have continued to erode or are not regularly used effectively. A climate of ignorance of the principles that safeguard freedom from those with power, or the government, is significant and/or growing. In complex modern societies there may be Big Government and Big Business working together, huge beurocracies, large police or military agencies that are becoming unwieldy and difficult to monitor against abuses or corruption, abuses by the powerful (wealthy, prestigious, privileged, etc.), yet many checks and balances still exist, and separation of powers still serves to prevent quick erosion of freedom or and retards the growth of tyranny. If these tendencies continue, however, an accelerated decline in freedom possible. At this stage, there is no immanent threat, and the political climate supports the most basic freedoms and expects government to serve the people, although the majority may at times abuse its power against minorities. If the majority denies equality to minorities, the majority still expects freedom for itself. Educating about the importance of principles that protect freedom, and protest activity or using the channels to correct abuses, imbalances of power, and strengthen freedom, are helpful. More vehement protest may be called for in certain situations, to prevent a cancer from taking root.

Yellow — The stage is being set for serious danger to freedom and increasing potential for corruption and abuse of power. Public dissent is still a possibility, although demagoguery is used to create an climate of intimidation, and dissenters in particular feel the chilling effect. Examples of "setting the stage for serious danger to freedom" includes sweeping legislation or a continuing trend of legislation, judicial interpretation, and executive orders which consolidates formerly separate agencies and gives them increased power to investigate citizens, and allows for erosion of checks, balances, limits, and established boundaries designed to protect citizens from the government. There may be some strong and pervasive early or middle-stage McCarthyist tendencies, but not yet full blown McCarthyism. Formal checks and balances, protest activity, and informal public and private dissent is still feasible though probably under-reported by the media. Power is being consolidated and yet separation of powers still slows down the descent to tyranny. It is important to continue monitoring the political and cultural tendencies that erode freedoms, consolidate power, undermine checks and balances, jump on scapegoats, and use buzzwords to create a hostile climate. Networking and organizing at any scale, to spread a dissenting message, engage in protest activity, investigate abuses, and to exercise every existing right, is crucial at this stage to reversing the trends or even to keep the threat to freedom from growing.

Orange — Serious danger to freedom is entrenched. For example, there is full blown McCarthyism, grass roots intimidation and scouting for scapegoats, rampant demagoguery, and official support for denying the rights of citizens who dissent, although the basic form of constitutional checks and balances still exists, and elections continue for the majority. Scapegoated individuals are "blackballed" from holding various types of jobs, and there are be congressional panels to investigate a large number of citizens for ideological or political reasons, while dissenting media personalities or entertainment figures are removed from positions of influence, and certain elected officials may be removed or forced to resign at the latest stages, for ideological reasons alone. Tendencies in this direction are currently being monitored by McCarthyism Watch and similar websites. Opposition needs to be strategic.

Red — Immanent Fascism or Totalitarianism in any of their forms. The situation has gone beyond movements like McCarthyism. Power is nearly fully consolidated, checks and balances are basically ineffective, and any "legislature" and/or constitution may be disbanded, the government serving to support the leader or party and intimidate those who dissent as its primary purpose. Freedom is either severely limited or practically non-existent for the majority of people, who are at the mercy of those in control. Those who simply disagree with the powerful or are scapegoated may face imprisonment, death, or torture. The climate of fear and the justification of control is pervasive. There is no protection from abuse, corruption, and brutality except that given at the whim of those in power. Fifth column infiltration and sabotage, covert violent resistance, underground railroads to get members of scapegoated groups of people out of the country, and intervention from outside forces, are the primary means used to combat this.

... On this Threat to Freedom Alert System (TFAS), Early December 2002 is at code Yellow: we haven't seen full blown McCarthyism yet, but see serious dangerous tendencies; formal checks and balances, and protest activity as well as informal dissent is still feasible though under-reported by the media; the threat of code Orange is serious.