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Just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, the fall of an empire doesn’t occur in one fell swoop; it takes time for the pillars of a great society to erode to the point they will not sustain the weight of its continuity. That is where we in what was once called ‘Western Civilization’ stand today. In Britain, Canada, Australia, and at the heart of the Anglo-American Empire, the United States, the tenet of democracy, that thing that convinced us we epitomized the apex of achievement, that we were, as one premature pundit ejected, on the assumption to power of George W. Bush and his cadre of “Neo-Cons, at the “end of [political] history” is a corroded remnant, incapable of sustaining even the illusion of a free and fair society. From Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, and Bagram Airbase to the Homeland’s shredded constitutional protections, Democracy’s day is almost done.
Naomi Wolf is an American author, social critic, political activist and feminist. Her book ‘The Beauty Myth’ was a landmark moment for gender discourse in America, and was cited, when released in the early 1990’s, by the New York Times as “one of the most important books of the 20th Century.” Wolf’s latest book may prove too to be of equal value to the 21st Century, if in the future books of its nature are to be allowed reviewed in the Times, or anywhere else. ‘The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot’ is an urgent rallying cry to arms to all that would save American, and world democracy. Naomi Wolf in the first segment.
And; one of the essential elements needed to create a truly totalitarian state is: Surveillance. From the Nazi recruitment of children to spy on their parents, (and others) to the infamous system of citizens used to rat out their neighbours deployed in the so-called communist countries, the primary objective of the Totalitarian State is to instill fear in the populace, making them uncertain of who they can trust, and insecure in every facet of their lives. Today, technology has added some disturbing wrinkles to the surveillance society. Tim Shorrock is an American journalist whose work has appeared at the Nation, Salon, Mother Jones, Harper’s magazines, among other places, and his latest major piece is ‘Domestic Spying, Inc.’ a timely expose of the radical expansion of the surveillance of American society the Bush administration hopes to enact. Tim Shorrock and who’s watching who in the second half.
And; Janine Bandcroft will be here to bring us up to speed with all that’s good to do in and around Victoria in the coming week. But first, Naomi Wolf and counting down to democracy’s end.
