“The End of America”: Feminist Social Critic Naomi Wolf Warns U.S. in Slow Descent into Fascism

http://www.democracynow.org/2007/11/28/the_end_of_america_feminist_social

In her new book, “The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot”, Naomi Wolf says the United States is on the road to becoming a fascist society, right under our very noses. Wolf outlines what she sees as the ten steps to shut down a democratic society and argues that the Bush administration has already implemented many of these steps. Wolf is the author of several books including the 1990s feminist classic, “The Beauty Myth.” [includes rush transcript]

Naomi Wolf joins me now in the firehouse studio.

Naomi Wolf, Social critic, feminist, and author of ‘The Beauty Myth.” Her latest book is called “The End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot.”

AMY GOODMAN: Today, we’re joined by a special guest who has just written a book. The United States is on the road to becoming a fascist society, right under our very noses. That’s the premise of the new book by feminist social critic Naomi Wolf. It’s called The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot, and it’s already on the New York Times bestseller list.

Naomi Wolf outlines what she sees as the ten steps to shut down a democratic society. She argues the Bush administration has already implemented many of these steps. Naomi Wolf is the author of several books, including the ’90s feminist classic, The Beauty Myth.

Critics describe her latest book, The End of America, as a wake-up call to Americans to heed the lessons of history and fight to save their democracy before its too late.

Naomi Wolf joins us in our firehouse studio. Welcome to Democracy Now!

NAOMI WOLF: Thank you, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s good to have you with us. Start off with the stories that you tell in your book.

NAOMI WOLF: Well, they’re the stories of societies that were systematically closed down by would-be despots, would-be dictators, whether they were on the left or the right, who essentially developed a blueprint in the first part of the twentieth century to crush democracies or to crush democracy movements. So they’re also individual stories of how people react as a democracy is being closed down.

But I guess the book really began with a very personal story, because I was forced to write it, even though I didn’t really want to, by a dear friend who is a Holocaust survivor’s daughter. And when we spoke about news events, she kept saying, “They did this in Germany. They did this in Germany.” And I really didn’t think that made sense. I thought that was very extreme language. But finally she forced me to sit down and start reading the histories, of course, not of the later years, because she wasn’t talking about German outcomes, ’38, ’39; she was talking about the early years, 1930, ’31, ’32, when Germany was a parliamentary democracy, and there was this systematic assault using the rule of law to subvert the rule of law.

And once I saw how many parallels there were, not just in strategy and tactics that we’re seeing again today, but actually in images and sound bites and language, then I read other histories of Italy in the ’20s, Russia in the ’30s, East Germany in the ’50s, Czechoslovakia in the ’60s, Pinochet’s coup in Chile in ’73, the crushing of the democracy movement in China at the end of the ’80s. And I saw that there is a blueprint that would-be dictators always do the same ten things, whether they’re on the left or the right, and that we are seeing these ten steps taking place systematically right now in the United States.

AMY GOODMAN: Lay them out.

NAOMI WOLF: Well, they’re not happy. The first step is that all would-be dictators or would-be despots, which is what the founders of our country who foresaw exactly this kind of possibility would call them—all would-be dictators invoke a terrifying internal and external threat. And often it’s a real threat, which they will hype or manipulate. For instance, Stalin spoke about sleeper cells, which is one of those phrases that are being recirculated now by the Bush White House. And this was an invention. He said there were capitalist secret agents who were hiding among good Soviet citizens and who are going to rise up at a signal and create terrorist mayhem—fake story, but it worked to frighten citizens.

Pinochet talked about a real threat: armed insurgents. There were armed insurgents, but he hyped it using fake documents. And we saw—we see this a lot in the historical blueprint, that a would-be dictator will fake documents. His were called Plan Z. He claimed they were going to bomb infrastructure, assassinate leaders. We saw fake documents used by the White House to hype of a terror threat when they used the fake yellowcake documents to claim that Iraq was trying to secure yellowcake uranium. And remember the famous sound bite—“We can’t wait for the smoking gun to come in the form of a mushroom cloud”—to drive us into an illegal war with a nation we were not at war with.

AMY GOODMAN: You also talk about the language, like the Department of Homeland Security.

NAOMI WOLF: That is where I, as a social critic and a student of language, get really scared. It’s scary enough to see these ten steps, but what is terrifying to me personally is how many actual phrases are being recycled, and tactics. “Homeland security”—“heimat”—became popularized by the National Socialists. Goebbels developed the practice of embedding journalists. Leni von Riefenstahl was embedded, for instance, in Poland. And we’re seeing embedded—

AMY GOODMAN: She’s the famous German filmmaker.

NAOMI WOLF: Filmmaker. If you look at the sequence of, you know, Hitler descending in an airplane in von Riefenstahl’s famous Triumph of the Will and being greeted by the uniformly armed paramilitary sort of surrounding their leader and him saying, “Help us accomplish our mission,” and then you look at other famous images from this administration—

AMY GOODMAN: Like George Bush on “Mission Accomplished.”

NAOMI WOLF: “Mission Accomplished,” exactly right. You look at how, you know, Hitler said we have to invade Czechoslovakia because they’re a staging ground for terrorists and they’re abusing their ethnic minorities—again, a country that we’re not at war with, when the WMD charge vanished, the White House said we have to invade Iraq because they’re a staging ground for terrorists and they’re abusing their ethnic minorities. On and on and on.

I mean, this one scare’s me to death. You know, Mussolini developed—again, a parliamentary democracy, Italy was, in the teens and into 1920. He developed the Blackshirts, which were these paramilitary thugs that beat up newspaper editors, terrorized the population, and they intimidated people counting the vote in Milan. And then Hitler studied Mussolini, so many things were repeated by Hitler. Stalin studied Hitler, Hitler studied Stalin. But Hitler developed the Brownshirts, the SA, who intimidated people counting the vote in Austria. So 90% of them voted for their own annexation, because they were the Brownshirts. And you saw this scene of identically dressed Republican staffers in Florida in 2000 intimidating people counting the vote.

So things like that are really chilling. And they’re more and more chilling as—I think right now people are kind of ramping up their awareness of these echoes, and what you also see predictably, because the blueprint is predictive, is that the White House is ramping up its implementation of some of the scariest aspects of its crackdown.

AMY GOODMAN: You began with these stories back in the summer of 2006 of headlines from a two-week period. Give some of those examples.

NAOMI WOLF: Well, 2006 seems so long ago and so innocent a time, considering how swiftly we’ve zoomed along implementing this blueprint or we’re suffering this implementation. In 2006, a blogger was jailed in San Francisco. In 2006, people in Alabama couldn’t get a fair hearing for protecting voter rolls. There was the beginning of the Military Commissions Act of 2006, in which the state basically legalized torture, which is one of these crucial turning points as an open society closes down.

AMY GOODMAN: You talk about Christine Axsmith, the computer security expert working for the CIA, who, what, wrote—posted a message on a blog site on a top-secret computer network, criticizing waterboarding—

NAOMI WOLF: Waterboarding.

AMY GOODMAN: —saying waterboarding is torture, and torture is wrong.

NAOMI WOLF: And then she lost her security clearance. She’s one of many, many whistleblowers, key individuals, who have tried to take a stand against some of these positions and who have faced—again, in a closing society this is what happens. This is step seven: target key individuals. They face job loss, character assassination or worse. Valerie Plame’s bolts were taken away from her back deck, fifty feet off the ground. She has two toddlers. People are being put on the watch list for criticizing the government, for engaging in antiwar protest. Their kids are being put on the watch list. But, yeah, back then, all she said was it’s wrong. And now we’ve just confirmed an attorney general who pretends not to know what waterboarding is, because if he acknowledged that it’s against US and international law, he’d be confirming the fact that there are criminals in the White House right now who have already staged a coup.

AMY GOODMAN: You say step three is establishing secret prisons.

NAOMI WOLF: That’s right. You establish secret prisons, and what I mean by that is unaccountable prisons where torture takes place. And often there will be a military tribunal system set in place. Lenin pioneered that. Mussolini developed the confino system. Hitler again studied Mussolini and developed the People’s Court.

And what starts to happen is—and this is what’s so scary about Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib and these black sites around the world—apart from the moral issue—and your interview just now with the Palestinian representative brought me to tears, because when he said it’s not just the Palestinians he’s concerned about, it’s the Israelis who lose their souls by this kind of occupation—it’s not just the often-innocent prisoners in Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib and these black sites around the world we should be concerned about, it’s our own American souls that are at stake. But just for purely personal reasons, we should be afraid when the state starts to torture people that it sees as at the margins or that citizens see at the margins: brown people on an island in Guantanamo with Muslim names, whatever. That’s what they did in Germany in ’31, ’32: anarchists, communists, Gypsies, Jews, whatever, homosexuals, whatever. You know, people didn’t care, because they were seen as at the margins. People knew about the torture cellars in Germany.

But then, what always happens, always—you can’t name a society in which this doesn’t happen, Amy—is that there’s a blurring of the line. And once the state legalizes torture of people at the margins, inevitably it will begin to direct state abuse at people at the heart of civil society, and it’s always the same cast of characters: journalists, editors, opposition leaders, outspoken clergy and labor leaders. And when that starts to happen, society can close down in a heartbeat, because people start to sensor themselves.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s interesting. During the lead up to Nazi Germany, American reporters were fired by their American editors, pulled back from Germany, because they were sounding the warning. They were saying, “We’re seeing a fascist society build.” And they were told that they were biased, they were not understanding the circumstances in which Hitler was rising up, people were concerned about their economy, they had been devastated, and that they were being alarmist.

NAOMI WOLF: Interesting. That’s really interesting. I mean, I’m immediately thinking, as you say that, which I actually hadn’t known, that—thinking of a lot of books I’ve been reading lately about deep US involvement. Some corporations were deeply involved in Nazi Germany, making millions, like IBM. How did they round people up so quickly, you know, in Germany when they were rounding up the Jews so fast? It’s because IBM had developed this prototype of a punch card system, and they were secretly working with the Nazis. Prescott Bush, Bush’s grandfather, was making millions in consolidation with Krupp, Thyssen, and it’s very interesting to me, because in the Nuremberg trials they went after these industrialists like Krupp, and so there was a moment at which the Nuremberg trial was about to identify supporters of these war crimes who were US collaborators.

AMY GOODMAN: But they didn’t.

NAOMI WOLF: But they didn’t. But I think it’s interesting that there is that historical memory in the family.

AMY GOODMAN: It’s the question of who controlled the trials, right? It’s the question of who controlled the trials and not wanting their own people to be involved.

NAOMI WOLF: I see.

AMY GOODMAN: You talk then—four, developing a paramilitary force and surveiling ordinary citizens. Those are the fourth and fifth steps.

NAOMI WOLF: Yeah, that’s another big one. I just want to note about the blurring of the line why we’re in such a moment of danger right now. The President has said that he can say, “Amy Goodman, you’re an enemy combatant. Naomi Wolf, you’re an enemy combatant. This guy behind the camera, you’re an enemy combatant. A person walking down the street, enemy combatant. can be anyone. A person walking down the street, enemy combatant.” And it doesn’t matter that we’re innocent US citizens. I mean, we could be Republicans, we could be evangelicals. It doesn’t matter. He can take us, and if he says it’s true, that makes it true, because it’s a status offense, and he can put us in a ten-by-twelve-foot cell in a Navy brig in solitary confinement for three years, making it difficult for us to see our families, to contact an attorney, to get charges filed.

They can’t torture us yet, though I was chilled to learn that an adviser to the White House was reported in a British newspaper yesterday as not ruling out waterboarding against US citizens. However, psychologists know that prolonged isolation makes sane people insane. That’s what happened to Jose Padilla. So, you know, when I say everyone’s got their moment at which they start to silence themselves, the day I read in the New York Times that someone I identify with has been named an enemy combatant and is sitting in a Navy brig in isolation, that’s when I’m going to stop talking in a context like this, because that’s when I will become too afraid.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re talking to Naomi Wolf. Her book is The End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot. Number six in these ten steps toward fascism: infiltrate citizen groups. Seven: arbitrarily detain and release citizens. Eight: target key individuals. Infiltrate citizens’ groups, the evidence?

NAOMI WOLF: Well, the ACLU is suing many agents of the state for illegally infiltrating citizens’ groups. It’s not a new thing in the United States. COINTELPRO did it quite a lot. But it is a hallmark—it’s an extension of a surveillance society, and it’s a hallmark. It’s an extension of step number four, which was the surveillance apparatus. Now, you can’t close down a democracy without a surveillance apparatus aimed at ordinary citizens. And what many of us know is that there’s been a heightening of surveillance in the wake of 9/11.

But what we’ve got to understand is that our country is unique right now in directing the crackdown on civil liberties and surveillance at citizens. In countries like England and Spain, experienced the same terror attacks, the same kind of terror attacks by the same bad guys that we did, but they’re not using that as a pretext to strip citizens of civil liberties in the same way. And what is so terrifying—again, Italy had a surveillance apparatus, people were informing on each other; Germany, surveillance, the Stasi in East Germany. You couldn’t have a conversation with your neighbor without fearing that it was going to go into your file.

You can’t close down a society without a paramilitary force. We skipped over that one. It’s very important. Blackwater, the Blackshirts, the Brownshirts, that’s not answerable to the people, and surveillance.

So why am I petrified, you know, when I read about Blackwater and about surveillance? I was on the watch list for a year and a half, Amy, which means that every time I got on a plane, I got taken aside for extra searching, quadruple-S high-risk Naomi, you know. And I was told, “You’re on a list.” And I found out that many critics of the administration are on the list: ACLU staffers, Ted Kennedy, antiwar activists, David Altoon [phon.], a highly decorated Vietnam War veteran who was critical of the Iraq war. Not only is he on the list, but people who come to me in tears after my readings are more upset that now their kids are on the list if they write a letter critical of the Bush administration.

AMY GOODMAN: Have you been able to get off the list?

NAOMI WOLF: Well, I was off the list ’til this book came out, and now I’m back on the list. Why is this more than a sort of irritation? Or, you know, in a strong society, it’s just like whatever, you know, it’s a kind of compliment. But in a closing society, it gets very frightening. In February, the management of the list, which has swollen from 45,000 to 775,000 Americans—they’re adding 20,000 names a month, right? Where are they getting those names? Remember when I said, how do they round up people so quickly in a closing society? The management of the lists is going to go from the airlines to the government. And in February, unless we push back this regulation—it’s being slipped in very quietly—we are going to have to apply to the state to get an airline ticket to cross a border, which moves us from 1931 to about 1936.

AMY GOODMAN: Number nine and number ten of your steps toward fascism: restrict the press; cast criticism as espionage, dissent as treason. Subvert the rule of law is eleven. What is the patriot’s task, where you conclude?

NAOMI WOLF: Well, the patriot’s task is, first, wake up. I mean, all around the world, democracy activists who are familiar with these same ten steps are sort of waving their arms at us, going, “No! You know, recognize this.” You don’t make it easier for the President to declare martial law, as we just did with the 2007 Defense Authorization Act. You don’t make it easier for the President to lock up political opponents in a cell or strip people of habeas corpus. No, you don’t make it easier for the President to have a paramilitary force like Blackwater, composed of hand-selected torturers and murderers from countries like Chile and Nigeria and El Salvador, where they’re trained to torture their own civilians. You know, you don’t set them loose in Illinois and Southern California and North Carolina. No! Bad idea! So, first, you wake up. You see the blueprint.

AMY GOODMAN: We have ten seconds.

NAOMI WOLF: Finally, we have to—we started the americanfreedomcampaign.org. It’s a democracy movement to restore the rule of law. We’re calling for lawyers across the country and citizens to call for hearings, special prosecutor, identify the crimes, impeach and prosecute, and save the country.

AMY GOODMAN: Naomi Wolf, I want to thank you for being with us. Do you think Democratic candidates are raising these issues, for president?

NAOMI WOLF: Not enough. This is a transpartisan issue, and we all need to push them, hold their feet to the fire across the board.

AMY GOODMAN: Naomi Wolf’s book is The End of America. Thank you for being with us.

---

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

UN panel gives dire warming forecast

By ARTHUR MAX, Associated Press Writer2 hours, 5 minutes ago

Global warming is "unequivocal" and carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere commits the world to sea levels rising an average of up to 4.6 feet, the world's top climate experts warned Saturday in their most authoritative report to date.

"Only urgent, global action will do," said U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, calling on the United States and China — the world's two biggest polluters — to do more to slow global climate change.

"I look forward to seeing the U.S. and China playing a more constructive role," Ban told reporters. "Both countries can lead in their own way."

Ban, however, advised against assigning blame.

Climate change imperils "the most precious treasures of our planet," he said, and the effects are "so severe and so sweeping that only urgent global action will do. We are all in this together. We must work together."

According to the U.N. panel of scientists, whose latest report is a synthesis of three previous ones, enough carbon dioxide already has built up that it imperils islands, coastlines and a fifth to two-thirds of the world's species.

As early as 2020, 75 million to 250 million people in Africa will suffer water shortages, residents of Asia's large cities will be at great risk of river and coastal flooding, according to the report.

Europeans can expect extensive species loss, and North Americans will experience longer and hotter heat waves and greater competition for water, says the report from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which shared the Nobel Prize with Al Gore this year.

The panel portrays the Earth hurtling toward a warmer climate at a quickening pace and warns of inevitable human suffering. It says emissions of carbon, mainly from fossil fuels, must stabilize by 2015 and go down after that.

In the best-case scenario, temperatures will keep rising from carbon already in the atmosphere, the report said. Even if factories were shut down today and cars taken off the roads, the average sea level will reach as high as 4.6 feet above that in the preindustrial period, or about 1850.

"We have already committed the world to sea level rise," the panel's chairman, Rajendra Pachauri, said. But if the Greenland ice sheet melts, the scientists said, they could not predict by how many feet the seas will rise, drowning coastal cities.

Climate change is here, they said, as witnessed by melting snow and glaciers, higher average temperatures and rising sea levels. If unchecked, global warming will spread hunger and disease, put further stress on water resources, cause fiercer storms and more frequent droughts, and could drive up to 70 percent of plant and animal species to extinction, according to the panel's report.

The report was adopted after five days of sometimes tense negotiations among 140 national delegations. It lays out blueprints for avoiding the worst catastrophes — and various possible outcomes, depending on how quickly and decisively action is taken.

"The world's scientists have spoken clearly and with one voice," Ban said, looking ahead to an important climate conference in Bali, Indonesia, next month. "I expect the world's policy makers to do the same."

The report is intended to both set the stage and serve as a guide for the conference, at which world leaders will begin discussing a global climate change treaty to replace the 1997 Kyoto Protocol.

That treaty, which expires in 2012, required industrial nations to reduce greenhouse gases and a smooth transition to a new treaty is needed to avoid upsetting the fledgling carbon markets.

"This report will have an incredible political impact," Yvo de Boer, the U.N.'s top climate change official, told The Associated Press. "It's a signal that politicians cannot afford to ignore."

The United States opted out of Kyoto in 2001, arguing that the science was unproven and that the burden of mandatory emission cuts was unfair since it excluded fast-growing China and India.

Chief U.S. delegate Sharon Hays said doubts have been dispelled. "What's changed since 2001 is the scientific certainty that this is happening," she said in a conference call late Friday. She did not indicate that Washington would abandon its policy of voluntary emission cuts.

China and India have said any measures impinging on their development and efforts to lift their people from poverty were unacceptable — a point likely to be heeded at the Bali talks.

The report offered dozens of measures for avoiding the worst catastrophes if taken together — at a cost of less than 0.12 percent of the global economy annually until 2050. They ranged from switching to nuclear and gas-fired power stations, developing hybrid cars, using more efficient electrical appliances and managing cropland to store more carbon.

Ban said a new agreement should provide funding to help poor countries develop clean energy resources, adapt to climate conditions and give them the technology to help themselves.

He said he witnessed the devastation of climate change in disappearing glaciers of Antarctica, the deforested Amazon and under the ozone hole in Chile.

"These scenes are as frightening as a science fiction movie," said Ban. "But they are even more terrifying because they are real."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071117/ap_on_sc/climate_change_conference

Hate Crimes -- Symbolic and Violent -- on Rise Across U.S.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/14/1438201

Hate Crimes -- Symbolic and Violent -- on Rise Across U.S.

Wednesday, November 14th, 2007

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/14/1438201

Noose incidents and violent attacks illustrate an alarming increase in overt racist symbolism and violence across the country. We speak to Malik Shabazz, lawyer for an African American woman in West Virginia who was kidnapped, tortured and raped by six white captors. We’re also joined by Luz Marquez of the National Organization of Sisters of Color Ending Sexual Assault, and activist, teacher, author, and journalist Herb Boyd. [includes rush transcript]

---

We turn now to a discussion on the alarming increase in overt racist symbolism and violence across the country. As the case of the Jena 6 entered the national spotlight, cities and towns across the United States have witnessed a spate of copycat noose hangings in public places. Diversity Inc magazine reports at least 45 noose incidents since October 30.

We begin, however, with a story that has received less media attention than the noose incidents. This September, a 20-year-old African American woman in West Virginia was kidnapped, raped, tortured and held captive for over a week by six white men and women. I’m talking about Megan Williams. This is an excerpt of how she described her ordeal to the Associated Press in late October.

• Megan Williams, speaking to reporters last month.

Local authorities say she was kept captive in a shed, tortured, beaten, forced to eat rat, dog and human feces, and raped by six white men and women who taunted her with racial slurs. Prosecutors have charged the six suspects with rape and kidnapping, but not hate crimes.

Early this month, hundreds descended on Charleston, West Virginia for a march to persuade prosecutors to charge the suspects with committing a hate crime against Megan Williams.

• Malik Shabazz. Megan Williams’s lawyer. He’s also the co-founder of Black Lawyers for Justice and the leader of the New Black Panther Party. He helped organize the hate crime awareness march in Charleston on November 3rd. Malik Shabazz joins us from Washington, D.C.

• Luz Marquez. Associate Director of the National Organization of Sisters of Color Ending Sexual Assault, also known as SCESA. She was at the march in Charleston and met with Megan Williams. She also helped organize a national campaign to draw attention to both Megan Williams, as well as other cases of assaults against women of color. The campaign is called Document the Silence. Luz Marquez joins us on the phone from Troy, New York.

• Herb Boyd. Activist, teacher, author, and journalist. He edits the online publication The Black World Today and writes for several publications including Amsterdam News.

---

RUSH TRANSCRIPT

This transcript is available free of charge. However, donations help us provide closed captioning for the deaf and hard of hearing on our TV broadcast. Thank you for your generous contribution.
Donate - $25, $50, $100, more...

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to a discussion on the alarming increase in overt racist symbolism and violence in this country. As the case of the Jena Six entered the national spotlight, cities and towns across the United States have witnessed a spate of copycat noose hangings in public places. Diversity Inc. magazine reports at least forty-five noose incidents since October 30.

We begin, however, with a story that’s received less media attention than the noose incidents. This September, a twenty-year-old African American woman in West Virginia was kidnapped, raped, tortured, held captive for over a week by six white men and women. I’m talking about Megan Williams. This is an excerpt of how she described her ordeal to the Associated Press in October.

MEGAN WILLIAMS: They were torturing me. They all passed a knife around that was -- and stabbing me. I was trying to get away as they were stabbing me, and they were holding me down and stuff. And they smothered me with a bag. That morning, I had a bag wrapped around my neck and everything. They choked me. They made me eat dog poop, rat poop and human. They made me drink their urine. And each time, they braided some switches together, and they were beating me across the back. They tore my clothes off me and everything.

And then they took me up to a lake. They said that was the place they were going to cut my throat and throw me in, and I was never going to come back and see my family again. They were just telling me that they were going to kill me.

And, you know, I was -- they made me take a bath in a trash can. They wouldn’t let me use the bathroom. I had to use the bathroom outside. I had to sleep outside. And they told me if they even remotely heard me once, that they would go out there and kill me. They poured candle wax in my hair. They pulled my hair out when they were cutting it with scissors. And, you know, they were just scary.

They had me tied up. I couldn’t go anywhere. Like the time when they left, they were going to go get some beer and stuff, and when they came back they said they were going to finish me off. And before they even got back, I had already got loose. I found a knife and cut myself loose.

I heard the police coming up to the driveway. When I’d seen the police, I just -- you know, I knew it was, you know, my chance to get out. And if I didn’t, I was going to die anyway. And then, that’s when they see me coming out there, and they thought -- they said I was going to lose my leg, when they see about the stabs. And I was scared. I didn’t know what to do. All I kept saying -- I was thinking about my momma, also wanting to come home. And every time I close my eyes, all I see is that knife, the one they kept stabbing me and stabbing me. It’s just -- you know, it’s a nightmare.

AMY GOODMAN: Megan Williams, speaking to reporters last month.

Local authorities say she was kept captive in a shed, tortured, beaten, forced to eat rat, dog and human feces, raped by six white men and women, who taunted her with racial slurs. Prosecutors have charged the six suspects with rape, kidnapping, but not hate crimes.

Early this month, hundreds descended on Charleston, West Virginia for a march to persuade prosecutors to charge the suspects with committing a hate crime against Megan Williams.

Malik Shabazz is Megan Williams’s lawyer. He is also co-founder of Black Lawyers for Justice, a leader of the New Black Panther Party, helped organize the hate crime awareness march in Charleston on November 3. Malik Shabazz joins us from Washington, D.C.

Welcome to Democracy Now! Can you tell us about the latest in the case of Megan Williams?

MALIK SHABAZZ: Yes. The latest in our efforts to secure justice for Megan Williams means that we're following up on our march. We don’t just have marches for symbolic reasons. We were able to raise $5,000 in our goal of raising $20,000 to help comfort her in this hour. We're continuing to fight for hate crime charges to be established in this case on a state and a federal level. There is some movement. We're continuing to provide legal assistance for her in other areas at this hour.

We’re also working with other groups in the community, working with groups, such as Sisters of Color Ending Sexual Assault, to provide really what Megan needs right now, and that’s wraparound help, wraparound services to help her to get better. And so, we’re fighting on various fronts to keep following up and fighting to raise the voice and the issue of this case, which is being swept under the rug.

AMY GOODMAN: Malik Shabazz, you spoke with the US attorney in the area, Charles Miller?

MALIK SHABAZZ: Yes.

AMY GOODMAN: What did he say?

MALIK SHABAZZ: He gave a lot of excuses of why hate -- federal hate crime charges, or what’s called conspiracy against constitutional rights, had not been filed in the Megan Williams case. He claims he tried, but he was being rebuffed by the Bush-led US Department of Justice Civil Rights Division. I can believe him on that point.

The United States Department of Justice -- we commonly refer to it as the United States Department of Injustice -- it vigorously attacks the civil liberties, civil rights, the human rights of those that they suspect of so-called terrorism. It advocates the wiretapping of private citizens, the intrusion of bank accounts. It advocates violating the rights of prisoners abroad and at home under the guise of fighting terrorism.

But when terrorism comes against our people here, and it’s continuously occurring, as in the case of Megan Williams and other cases, the United States Department of Justice Civil Rights Division has its hands tied. They won’t do anything. And they simply don’t care. So, yes, it’s coming out of Washington. I lay the responsibility on the President of the United States, George Bush, and his politically motivated United States Department of Justice, which simply does not care about our people and our rights and our calls for justice.

AMY GOODMAN: Luz Marquez is the associate director of the National Organization of Sisters of Color Ending Sexual Assault, also known as SCESA. She was at the march in Charleston, met with Megan Williams, also helped organize a national campaign to draw attention to both Megan Williams, as well as other cases of assault against women of color: the campaign called Document the Silence. Luz Marquez joins us on the phone from Troy, New York.

Welcome, Luz. Can you talk about this case and others you see are not getting the kind of attention they need?

LUZ MARQUEZ: Sure, sure. Good morning, Amy. Good morning, Brother Malik. Yes, there are several other cases that we are following. And I should tell you, sort of looking at a historical view of what happens to women of color when they’re violated sexually or victims of domestic violence in this country, there seems to be a discrepancy in the response by both law enforcement, media, as well as community support. And so, the callout that we did in West Virginia was successful, in that folks are no longer afraid or think that talking about sexual assault is taboo, that we need to talk about it to put an end to it.

But I do want to draw attention to Florida, as well as New Jersey. Florida, in the West Palm Beach area of what’s called Dunbar Village apartments, there have been, since June 18 of 2007, this year, there have been five rapes. The worst was of a Haitian woman and her son, who for three hours were raped and sexually assaulted by a gang.

Since that case has happened, we have seen little to no media attention of the issue of rape in hate crimes, as well as failure to protect. I think with all of these cases, what we see is there is a failure to protect, whether it be from the housing authority or from law enforcement, and what have you.

Since the rape of this Haitian woman and her child, who I should say they received torture and just unbelievable assault, there have been three other rapes of a fifteen-year-old in the middle of a day, of a forty-two-year-old just early in the evening, and then in New Jersey, very much similar to the Jena Six case, there were seven women of color lesbians who were walking in what they presumed to be a safe haven in the West Village of New York, a for-LGBT community. They were stopped and sexually harassed by a stand-byer who proceeded to tell them exactly what he was going to do to them sexually, how he was going to do it. He proceeded to follow them. They ignored him. They told him to stop, go away. He then proceeded to tell them specifically every detail of what he would do and then proceeded to touch one of them in her buttocks. And when she went to stop him, a fight brawled out.

And needless to say, four of these seven women are serving time in Bedford Women’s Correctional Facility in Upstate New York, which is a shame, because they were defending themselves. And so, what we see at the National Organization of Sisters of Color Ending Sexual Assault is a huge disparity amongst what happens when a woman of color is violated, whether or not she protects yourself, what happens, and an equal-to protection on behalf of folks who are supposed to protect them.

AMY GOODMAN: Luz, we’re also joined here in the firehouse studio in New York by activist, author, journalist, Herb Boyd, who edits the online publication Black World Today. Welcome to Democracy Now!, Herb.

HERB BOYD: Thanks, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: Your assessment of what is happening now, these situations and the coverage that they’re getting?

HERB BOYD: I think one of the things that we’re recognizing, Amy, is that we’ve had all these nooses, the prevalence of nooses, proliferation of nooses out here, we’ve gone from symbolism to action. I mean, the nooses is obviously a symbol of terrorism. I mean, if you put it in historical context, we go back to 1882 to 1951, something like 5,000 people were lynched in this country.

One of the difficulties with all of this, with the prevalence of nooses, is the separating the kind of racial predator, you know, from the kind of mischievous prankster. You know, to what extent is the copycat thing out there? But more than anything, we’re talking about a systemic malevolence here, you know, all across. I mean, each day we see a new incident of a noose finding. What is it all about? You know, it’s like people asserting their authority. You know, it’s just a way of like “We’re still in control of black bodies in this country.”

AMY GOODMAN: Malik Shabazz, as we wrap up, I asked you about the US attorney, Charles Miller, why they haven’t filed hate crimes charges against the six. What about the Logan County prosecutor, Brian Abraham, in West Virginia? According to the Amsterdam News, he has not ruled out state hate crimes charges, in addition to the kidnapping and first-degree sexual assault charges he’s already brought against the six white suspects.

MALIK SHABAZZ: And that’s why we continue our legal advocacy, and we’ll pursue it vigorously. We know that this is, at minimum, a state hate crime, and this must be established. West Virginia is a 98% white state; they’re 2% blacks. The filing of hate crime charges in this case will ensure the broader protection of blacks in the state.

And so, we will continue to fight vigorously, and I expect to see progress in that area and in general. I think we have to, and we will, from my perspective, and those that are with us and fight with others, because I believe that the hanging of nooses is a sign that there will be real bodies under those nooses very soon. I believe that this is just a first level of increased racial violence and violence against women.

AMY GOODMAN: Malik Shabazz, there is going to be a protest on November 16 in Washington, D.C. against racial violence?

MALIK SHABAZZ: There is. I think that’s Reverend Sharpton’s protest. And I think in order for him to be successful in general, he has to make a real effort to fight with those that are really fighting on the ground in that struggle. If he’s really going to make progress, and I hope he does, he has to seriously be sincere about working hand-in-hand with those that are fighting these issues of racist violence and gender violence.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you all for being with us, Malik Shabazz, attorney for Megan Williams, also the co-founder of Black Lawyers for Justice; Luz Marquez, associate director of the National Organization of Sisters of Color Ending Sexual Assault; and journalist Herb Boyd. Thanks so much for joining us.

HERB BOYD: It’s a pleasure, Amy.

www.democracynow.org

Say No to Africom

Click here to return to the browser-optimized version of this page.

This article can be found on the web at
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20071119/glover_lee

---

Say No to Africom

by DANNY GLOVER & NICOLE C. LEE

[from the November 19, 2007 issue]

With little scrutiny from Democrats in Congress and nary a whimper of protest from the liberal establishment, the United States will soon establish permanent military bases in sub-Saharan Africa. An alarming step forward in the militarization of the African continent, the US Africa Command (Africom) will oversee all US military and security interests throughout the region, excluding Egypt. Africom is set to launch by September 2008 and the Senate recently confirmed Gen. William "Kip" Ward as its first commander.

General Ward told the Senate Armed Services Committee that Africom would first seek "African solutions to African problems." His testimony made Africom sound like a magnanimous effort for the good of the African people. In truth Africom is a dangerous continuation of US military expansion around the globe. Such foreign-policy priorities, as well as the use of weapons of war to combat terrorist threats on the African continent, will not achieve national security. Africom will only inflame threats against the United States, make Africa even more dependent on external powers and delay responsible African solutions to continental security issues.

The US militarization of Africa is further rationalized by George W. Bush's claims that Africom "will enhance our efforts to bring peace and security to the people of Africa" and promote the "goals of development, health, education, democracy and economic growth." Yet the Bush Administration fails to mention that securing and controlling African wealth and natural resources is key to US trade interests, which face growing competition from China. Transnational corporations rely on Africa for petroleum, uranium and diamonds--to name some of the continent's bounty. West Africa currently provides 15 percent of crude oil imports to the United States, and that figure is expected to rise to 25 percent by 2015.

Policy-makers seem to have forgotten the legacy of US intervention in Africa. During the cold war, African nations were used as pawns in postcolonial proxy wars, an experience that had a devastating impact on African democracy, peace and development. In the past Washington has aided reactionary African factions that have carried out atrocities against civilians. An increased US military presence in Africa will likely follow this pattern of extracting resources while aiding factions in some of their bloodiest conflicts, thus further destabilizing the region.

Misguided unilateral US military policy to "bring peace and security to the people of Africa" has, in fact, led to inflamed local conflicts, destabilization of entire regions, billions of wasted dollars and the unnecessary deaths of US soldiers. The US bombing of Somalia in January--an attempt to eradicate alleged Islamic extremists in the Horn of Africa--resulted in the mass killing of civilians and the forced exodus of refugees into neighboring nations. What evidence suggests Africom will be an exception?

In contrast, Africa has demonstrated the capacity to stabilize volatile situations on its own. For example, in 1990 the Economic Community of West African States set up an armed Monitoring Group (Ecomog) in response to the civil war in Liberia. At their height, Ecomog forces in Liberia numbered 12,000, and it was these forces--not US or UN troops--that kept Liberia from disintegrating. In another mission, Ecomog forces were instrumental in repelling rebels from Sierra Leone's capital, Freetown.

There are a range of initiatives that can be taken by the US government and civil society to provide development and security assistance to Africa that do not include a US military presence. Foremost, policy toward Africa must be rooted in the principles of African self-determination and sovereignty. The legitimate and urgent development and security concerns of African countries cannot be fixed by dependence on the United States or any other foreign power. Instead of military strategies, African countries need immediate debt cancellation, fair trade policies and increased development assistance that respects indigenous approaches to building sustainable communities. Civil wars, genocide and terrorist threats can and must be confronted by a well-equipped African Union military command.

American policy-makers should be mindful that South Africa, whose citizens overthrew the US-supported apartheid regime, opposes Africom. In addition, Nigeria and the fourteen-nation Southern African Development Community resist Africom. These forces should be joined by other African governments and citizens around the world, to develop Africa's own strong, effective and timely security capacities. Progressive US-Africa policy organizations and related civil society groups have not been sufficiently organized to bring this critical issue before the people of the United States. It is urgent that we persuade progressive US legislators to stop the militarization of aid to Africa and to help ensure Africa's rise to responsible self-determination.

Say NO to Africom!

Actor and Activist Danny Glover & TransAfrica Forum's Nicole Lee on the U.S. Militarization of Africa and Africom

Thursday, November 8th, 2007

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/11/08/1450204

"With little scrutiny from Democrats in Congress and nary a whimper of protest from the liberal establishment, the United States will soon establish permanent military bases in sub-Saharan Africa," write Glover and Lee in The Nation. "An alarming step forward in the militarization of the African continent, the US Africa Command (Africom) will oversee all US military and security interests throughout the region, excluding Egypt."

---

West African military chiefs added their voices Tuesday to a growing number of critics of a new US military command called Africom. Africom was established by the Department of Defense October and covers every country in Africa except for Egypt. It is expected to be fully operational within a year. But its already generating controversy and skepticism.

Several African countries including South Africa, Nigeria, and Libya, are opposed to Africom and late Tuesday West African military chiefs denounced the US approach to the project.

Africom officials claim the project will strengthen humanitarian and peacekeeping operations and is not about building more US bases. But critics allege that its a move to secure US access to natural resources and counter the growing Chinese presence across the continent. African nations supply the United States with more than 24 percent of its oil according to the US Energy Information Administration.

Actor, activist and TransAfrica Forum Board Chair Danny Glover and TransAfrica Forum Executive Director Nicole Lee wrote about Africom in the latest issue of The Nation magazine. Their article is called "Say No to Africom."

• Nicole Lee, Executive Director, TransAfrica Forum

• Danny Glover, actor and activist, Board Chair, TransAfrica Forum

www.democracynow.org

RELEARNING LESSONS OF FIRE AND FLOOD: PROPHECIES OF THINGS TO COME

Los Angeles Sentinel, 11-01-07, p. A-7
DR. MAULANA KARENGA

When James Baldwin chose the title of his book, The Fire Next Time, from a prophecy in one of our sacred songs that says “God gave Noah the rainbow sign, no more water the fire next time,” he meant it to be a prediction that the enraged Black masses, tired of being denied their freedom, would eventually rise up in rebellion in the Sixties and set the cities on fire. But he didn’t and couldn’t know that global warming would bring both greater flood and fire as real threats to our world and future. However, we who have seen and suffered the devastation of New Orleans and the Gulf by floodwater and fierce wind and the yearly increase in the intensity and duration of bush, field and forest fires, know there is more flood and fire to come. We know too that without check on global warming and disciplined development of and care for fire-prone and coastal areas, as well as protective measures in both, greater catastrophes can be predicted with certainty.

Also we know that without radical social change, the White and rich will always be more prepared and pampered and the poor and people of color will bear the brunt of natural disasters made more deadly and destructive by the willingness of those in power to disregard their welfare and sacrifice their well-being for a number of immoral and irrational reasons. Thus, the recent official response to the devastating fires in San Diego is not only a study in contrast to the official response to the natural disaster and human catastrophe in New Orleans, but also a promise and prophecy of things to come.

And behold, there was Bush in San Diego, trying to look presidentially somber, straining to seem concerned and on top of it, making appropriate pro forma offerings of prayer and rapid relief for “those affected.” He had already declared disaster for the region in record time and had quickly sent ahead federal funds, personnel and equipment to pave the way for a triumphant entry into the area of tragedy. This time he would land and look appropriately concerned and involved—no New Orleans flying around observing from on high, safely and sanitarily above the poor minions making it thru the water and waste the best way they could.

This time the head of FEMA would rapidly be there to deal with the emergency, instead of being delayed by the demands of dinner and the dismissive disregard of those Black, poor and relatively powerless. Even the head of Homeland Security was sent, apparently as a sign of serious concern, and perhaps, to remind the public of the possibility of terrorists behind every burning bush and tree, trying to set fire to our “freedom”. Some of us might not be able to make the leap of faith required to make this link. But there are always the true believers who are certain in the midst of their pimped and pandered to xenophobic fear and loathing that there is a real link out there somewhere, and if we just have faith we will find it.

Regardless of official rumors and press reports, Bush did not respond so quickly with money, material and skilled personnel in San Diego County because of any lingering consciousness of Katrina. Nor did he move swiftly because he remembers, feels remorse or is still reeling from the effects of his criminally negligent response to the Katrina catastrophe. That would require a moral conscience he doesn’t have; a strong political opposition from the Democrats that doesn’t exist, and an organized and powerful Black and progressive Movement still to be built. Bush responded the way he did because that’s the way the system works, based on race and class and the wealth, power and privilege that come from this.

So, there was the ingathering of the wealthy and well-to-do at Qualcom Stadium as citizens worthy of the city’s best attention and care in their hour of distress. There was for them cool and warm water, food of all kinds in a abundance, air-conditioning, acupuncture, ice cream and Starbuck’s coffee, massages and other creature comforts, clowns, games and various goodies, teachers and tutors, counselors, bedding befitting the worthy and special spaces for housing, caressing and comforting pets.

But as might be guessed, some among us did not fare as well. The Native Americans on the reservations were left a long time to fend heroically for themselves and to save as much as they could of lives, homes and priceless and irreplaceable art and artifacts of their culture. Also, Mexican workers were trapped in the hillsides and canyons, unable to understand orders to evacuate and afraid to come to relief stations or the stadium because of fear of deportation. Still for the White and wealthy, it was a high level of service at a terrible time, with local, state and federal governments coming quickly together to save and comfort them in their time of need.

However, it was not so in New Orleans where it took four days of unconscionable and disastrous delay to declare a state of emergency for the city, even though there is no comparison of the two disasters in terms of the extent of destruction, the number dead, injured, homeless and those left helpless, scattered and stranded in distant places unable to return and rebuild. Indeed, two years later, tens of thousands of Katrina victims have no home and are without work or means to rebuild their lives.

Furthermore, the press this time was so positive, full of praise for the first-responders, emergency workers and volunteers and for the patience and understanding of the victims. No alarmism here or indictment of the people for their own tragedy. Even when it came to talk of global warming, the lust for luxurious living in the so-called wilderness and the unchecked residential expansion into fire-prone areas, there was no condemnation or even criticism. Indeed, there was talk of the wealthy residents and us all being “accidental arsonists” who in our love for the beauty of the wilderness simply forget the hazards of fire and the costs that comes with endless and excessive consumption and waste.

It is willful illusions like these and those about the superiority of themselves and the sustainability of a wasteful and oppressive society that bode ill for us and the world. And we can only counter this by becoming floods and fires of righteous struggle ourselves thru which a new future is forged and the world is repaired, refreshed, renewed and transformed.

Dr. Maulana Karenga, Professor of Black Studies, California State University-Long Beach, Chair of The Organiza-tion Us, Creator of Kwanzaa, and author of Kwanzaa: A Celebration of Family, Community and Culture, [www.Us-Organization.org and www.OfficialKwanzaaWebsite.org].