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This separation of government from people, this widening of the gap, took place so gradually and so insensibly, each step disguised (perhaps not even intentionally) as a temporary emergency measure or associated with true patriotic allegiance or with real social purposes. And all the crises and reforms (real reforms, too) so occupied the people that they did not see the slow motion underneath, of the whole process of government growing remoter and remoter.
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The Historical Parallels are frightening if one looks at it in context with the present initiatives of our American Paranoia in the wake of 9/11:
- In 2007, Oklahoma State Representative, Randy Terrill, a Republican, pushed through a series of measures to try to drive out illegal immigrants, whom he blamed for economic hardship and lawlessness in his state. Many followed the call for reform of our immigration laws across the nation based upon this same belief.
2. In 1933, the Reich initiated internment camps for Habitual and Dangerous Criminals, which included beggars, the homeless, alcoholics, and the unemployed.
- The current push by the Right to cease current unemployment compensation payments, tougher sentencing for "habitual" criminals, which directly affected immigrants and the attempt by Marge Baker, a candidate for the Florida House of Representatives, told The Associated Press in 2010, that we needed to have camps because there are a lot of these people (illegal immigrants) roaming among us.Â
- The Rex 84 Program was established on the reasoning that if a "mass exodus" of illegal aliens crossed the Mexican/US border, they would be quickly rounded up and detained in detention centers by FEMA. Rex 84 allowed many military bases to be closed down and to be turned into prisons.
3. Â Â Â Â In 1937, Jews were banned from many professional occupations including teaching Germans, and from being accountants or dentists. They are also denied tax reductions and child allowances.
- In 2010, the Arizona Department of Education has told schools that teachers with "heavy" or "ungrammatical" accents are no longer allowed to teach English classes.
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One can easily see other founding principles of Fascism in our system:
- Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause
- Supremacy of the MilitaryÂ
- Controlled Mass MediaÂ
- Obsession with National Security
- Religion and Government are IntertwinedÂ
- Corporate Power is ProtectedÂ
- Disdain for Intellectuals and the ArtsÂ
- Obsession with Crime and PunishmentÂ
- Rampant Cronyism and Corruption
- Fraudulent Elections
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These are just a few of the similarities between the rise of the Third Reich's call to Patriots to protect the German Nation, and the current call for blind Patriotic support of our Government today. Yes, they are more subtle, more disguised, more executive, but to those who are aware they are signs of things to come. All one has to do to see the future is to compare the Reich timeline with our own emerging one.
These sentiments are not just isolated in the words of these few people, they are the same beliefs that have been emerging in the Republican Party, the Freedom Party and the Tea Party Patriots. These words may have been meant as protectionist statements, but so were the words of Hitler as felt by the Party and swallowed by a desperate people as a reaction to desperate times.
When a government set up as a beacon to those who have been downtrodden begins to extinguish not only the flame of Liberty but the very freedoms that this country was founded upon, it is time for a second look at reforming the very structure of that government. The people that back these initiatives speak of Patriotism, but they act with very different character of a real Patriot.Â
Milton Mayer finishes his book with the poignant words of his colleague:
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