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 enlarge | Author: Naomi Wolf
Publisher: Chelsea Green Publishing
Category: Book
List Price: $13.95
Buy New: $8.13
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Avg. Customer Rating:  180 reviews
Sales Rank: 205
Media: Paperback
Edition: 1st
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 192
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 8.1 x 5.3 x 0.6
ISBN: 1933392797
Dewey Decimal Number: 323.490973
EAN: 9781933392790
ASIN: 1933392797
Publication Date: September 5, 2007
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| Customer Reviews:
 Incisive, Within Limits September 3, 2008
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Naomi Wolf has written an alarming book that takes a hard look at the hard-right turn made by the Bush-Cheney administration.
She makes the truly salient point that fascism doesn't have to arrive in a cataclysmic shock, but can creep up, piece by piece and law by law to erode rights and instill fear by violence.
She details how the Bush-Cheney crew have done this at every turn, with few obstacles put in their path by the spineless Democrats.
However, her perspective is limited to politics.
Yes, there has been a catastrophic erosion of political rights under Bush-Cheney.
But this is simply the culmination of a decades-long process of military domination of the economy. This domination happened without firing a (domestic) shot: after WWII, both parties, afraid of a return of the Depression, and seeing how military spending buoyed the economy, embarked on a perpetual war-footing--demonizing communists and shackling every district in the country to military spending.
No one dared to question this, even when communism evaporated. To question it was to put oneself and one's community out of a job.
But all this military spending resulted in the subjugation of many, many countries (the installation and/or support of dictators and thugs), and now it has simply brought the same authoritarian domination home.
Bush-Cheney have taken this to its logical conclusion. They have installed (or begun to install) the same sort of government-by-decree we have so long foisted on others.
 Bold September 2, 2008
She gets over the top here and there. But she makes several points that need to be heard. Needs to be read by all.
Is this really happening to America? August 17, 2008
I never expected reading such a book. I was educated in the United States, and always looked upon the US as the ideal country for an individual's freedom of rights and free speech. You were innocent until proven guilty, and even criminals had rights that made them difficult to apprehend by the authorities. In a nutshell, I was living in a society where my friends and I, whether Americans or foreigners, felt safe and protected.
According to Naomi Wolf, things have changed, and I found this shocking. Who ever thought the Soviet Union would collapse? It did. Who ever thought the US might collapse one day? I never dreamt of such a day, but many today think it is already happening, and Naomi Wolf aptly names her book, `The End of America.'
I also found it shocking that she compares the present administration to Hitler's administration. Recall that Bush used to refer to Saddam Hussein as Hitler. What's going on?
I actually liked Naomi's book as `a point of view' book, and the way she compares the present administration to fascist governments throughout history. In Germany, for example, Hitler slowly stripped his citizens of their rights. First, Hitler imprisoned the enemies of the state, but soon those enemies became the citizens themselves. Politicians and journalists alike were imprisoned and tortured. According to Naomi Wolf, Bush's administration is doing the same to its US citizens. People are being arrested with no trial, and without being given the reason for their arrests. A new law Bush passed allows the government to spy on its citizens. In a way, according to Wolf, all are now guilty until proven innocent, if they ever are given the chance to prove their innocence.
There is now a blacklist issued by the US government, and many US politicians and journalists are on that list. Naomi Wolf is on that list. Whenever she travels by air, the security officers at the airport scrutinize her. Do they actually expect she might hijack an airplane? Whatever happened to freedom of speech and thought?
The way this administration works today, explains Wolf, is that you are either with the administration or against it. Period. If you speak ill of this administration, then you are against it and immediately placed on a black list. This does not sound like the US I once knew.
According to Naomi Wolf, this administration does not have any regards for the Geneva Convention on war prisoners. Prisoners are routinely tortured and ill treated by the US military. Sometimes, prisoners are flown out of US territory where torture laws are inexistent.
I was quite taken aback by how many terms used by fascists states have been repeated by this administration.
The following are the ten points that make up a fascist state:
1. Invoke an external and internal threat or enemy, such as a political party (e.g. communist party etc.) or a religious group (in Germany it was the Jews. Today it is the Muslims).
2. Establish secret prisons, such as Guantanamo and other US prisons located abroad. Prisons located outside of US territories do not fall under US laws, and thus torture can be freely exercised.
3. Develop a paramilitary force. According to Wolf, the US has today the largest and most powerful mercenary army in the world, and large corporations with deep pockets back it. This mercenary army does not fall under the rules, laws, or regulations of the US military forces. They can basically commit war crimes without ever being charged! According to Wolf, dismantling such an army will be near to impossible. We'll have to see what the next US president will do about this mercenary army.
4. Spy on the citizens. New bills passed by the Bush administration allow Big Brother to listen to phone conversations and read emails.
5. Infiltrate citizens' groups.
6. Arbitrarily detain and release citizens to instill fear.
7. Target key individuals, such as politicians, scientists, and journalists.
8. Control and censor the press (note: if this was really the case, why was this book allowed to be published?).
9. Criticism and dissent become treason.
10. Change the rule of law (changing the constitution and the bill of rights).
Is this really happening to America? If so, this book should never have been allowed to be published in the first place. Or is this just the beginning? Will Naomi Wolf be eventually jailed for her book one day? If so, she would have proven her point (and God forbid that should ever happen).
How much of this book is true? Either time will tell, or just more research...if you have the time, and care enough!
 Crying Wolf at the Wine And Cheese Party August 5, 2008
9 out of 22 found this review helpful
When you get to be my age, you can almost predict the appearance of the dire warnings from the utopian encampments in Vermont and Oregon. When I was in college some thirty years ago, there was always a table set up at Cody's bookstore on Telegraph Ave. in Berkeley devoted to warnings, usually much like this: "Coming Fascism," "Friendly Fascism," "Reagan and Hitler," "Eichmann's Friend Spiro Agnew," and so on. Then there were the conspiracy theorists, who were able to connect the death of Caesar to that of JFK, Pearl Harbor, and the closing on Broadway of the "Pajama Game." To listen to it, and I did, you'd have thought the world was at the brink. Time gives one a little perspective. On the other hand, the warning business is good business, so why not write a manifesto. You get to be considered a hero and you get to keep the royalties. The Constitution is coming to an end at the hands of the Party that took the USSR to the Helsinki Conference. When human rights activists like the now-deceased Solzhenitsyn came to America, they wanted to meet Reagan and Ford, not Carter, Mondale, Clinton, or any other of the self-appointed do-gooders. To hear Berkeley's Sproul Plaza sun-bathers tell it, the Constitution came to an end a long time ago, when Presidents started to lie to Congress, with the exception of the time Roosevelt lied to Congress to get Lend-Lease passed, because according to these same high-minded protesters, lying for a worthy cause is justifiable. If you can sort this all out, you will be a better man than I. Yes, Ms Wolf, it is all over for us. Thank God, you, Nancy Pelosi, and the grandkids are guarding our rights, what little may be left of them.
Great read August 1, 2008
1 out of 4 found this review helpful
Well organized, step-by-step explanation of how and why sovereign citizens forfeit their liberty to the government. Very, very good read. Highly recommended.
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