"...this country has gone so flabby that any gang daring enough

[HereSince1628]

and unscrupulous enough, and smart enough not to _seem_ illegal, can grab a hold of the entire government and have all the power, and applause and salutes, all the money and palaces and willin' women they want."

Recognize most of this? Does it sound ever so hauntingly like the influence of the NeoCons?

It's from the 12th paragraph from the end of chapter 8 of Sinclair Lewis' _It Can't Happen Here_. His 1936 book on the rise of fascism in the United States is a little book very much worth reading.

[laura888]

1. Been meaning to get a copy of that.

I wonder what he means by "flabby"??

:shrug:

[HereSince1628]

4. I think it means lazy but I could be wrong.

[murielm99]

11. This is what he means by flabby:

On page 224 of my copy, the main character, Doremus Jessup, is in jail for the first time. He is in jail because as a newspaper editor, he dared to criticize the new government. As he sits in his cell, he contemplates what has happened:

"The tyranny of this dictatorship isn't primarily the fault of Big Business, nor of the demagogues who do their dirty work. It's the fault of Doremus Jessup! Of all the conscientious, respectable, lazy-minded Doremus Jessups who have let the demagogues wiggle in, without fierce enough protest.

A few months ago, I thought the slaughter of the Civil War, and the agitation of the violent Abolitionists who helped bring it on, were evil. But possibly they had to be violent, because easy-going citizens, like me couldn't be stirred up otherwise. If our grandfathers had had the alertness and courage to see the evils of slavery and of a government conducted by gentlemen for gentlemen only, there wouldn't have been any need of agitators and war and blood.

It's my sort, the Responsible Citizens who've felt ourselves superior because we've been well-to-do- and what we thought was educated who brought on the Civil War, and the French Revolution, and now the Fascist Dictatorship. It's I who murdered Rabbi de Verez. It's I who persecuted the Jews and the Negroes. I can blame no Aras Dilley, no Shad Ledue, no Buzz Windriip, but only my own timid soul and drowsy mind. Forgive me, O Lord!

Is it too late?"

Doremus Jessup was talking about the sheeple. But he included himself and men of his background for not protesting strongly enough until it was too late. They all said It Can't Happen Here.

[patdem]

17. That book is online at gutenberg.net.au..not in amerika.here is a link:

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0301001h.html

Last year it was on gutenberg.org which is a great source of online books. I copy paste by chapter. I also copied Orwell's 1984.

Hope you find this hopeful.

Edit to add: you do not have to copy/paste by chapter, you can just open up and do file save as...a lot quicker on the front end.

[tanyev]

2. I recently read it.

I found it disturbing, but also comforting in a strange way. If they were so close in the 30's that Lewis could write such a book, but then managed to avoid it, maybe we will also find a way to turn the country back on the right course.

[HereSince1628]

6. Of course, few were awake to see the lights in the Old North Church

All of us engaged in the fight against the little band of beltway bandits need to read this, and encourage others to read it.

[uppityperson]

3. I'm reading this now.

It is interesting and scary and barely reassuring to know that it has happened before, will happen again and is really bad.

[HereSince1628]

7. The scary thing is it was written 70 years ago and yet is SO current

It's like the vast right wing conspiracy used it as a roadmap.

[Son of California]

5. thanks for the recommend

I'll be sure to pass it on to all my bookworm buddies.

[HereSince1628]

9. It's well worth the read.

I have to say I generally don't read real literature, but this one is a very rewarding read.

[tenshi816]

8. I'm reading it now too,

am about 1/3 of the way into it - it's astonishing how today's administration mirrors Buzz Windrip's, from the lust for war right down to the President's creepy and manipulative "personal secretary".

I wish it were required reading for Freepers, but then again they'd probably think Berzelius Windrip's policies were a good thing.

[HereSince1628]

10. Yeah, I see Rove when I read it

[RagAss]

13. Rove saw Rove when he read it...no doubt.

[tenshi816]

15. Oh yeah, absolutely!

The similarity between Buzz Windrip and the Dumbass is striking enough, but the addition of Sarason as the Rove counterpart just makes it all the more creepy.

I love Doremus Jessup and his daughter Sissy as the good guys - if they were real people, they'd be DUers for sure.

[Eloriel]

12. It's available on-line

E-book - It Can't Happen Here b y Sinclair Lewis
http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/l/lewis/sinclair/happen/
Also read: The Iron Heel by Jack London and
"Der Fuhrer" by Konrad Heiden and "The Plague" by Camus
discussed here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=104&topic_id=2344349#2344364



"Now and Then"- Part 1
by W. David Jenkins and Sara DeHart June 6, 2002
http://www.oldamericancentury.org/dave300019.htm
"Now and Then"- Part 2: The Propaganda Machine
by W. David Jenkins and Sara DeHart June 14, 2002
http://www.oldamericancentury.org/dave300020.htm
"Now and Then"- Part 3
Hitler's Playbook: Bush and the Abuse of Power
by W. David Jenkins III and Sara DeHart July 4, 2002
http://www.oldamericancentury.org/dave300021.htm

[HereSince1628]

14. Thanks,

Long time no see Eloriel...I guess our DU times are out of synch.
Hope your doing well.

[Hubert Flottz]

16. Here is another book from the past that makes perfect sense...

now, that we've seen the neocon's game plan for world domination, laid out in black and white!

The Rockefeller File
by Gary Allen

Snip>

The super rich in America enjoy power and prerogatives un-imaginable to most of us. Who can conceive of owning a private empire that includes 100 homes, 2,500 servants, untold thousands of luxuries, and untold millions of dollars? America has a royal family of finance that has known such riches for generations. It is, of course, the Rockefellers.

But if the Rockefellers were content with their wealth, if their riches had satisfied their desires, this book would not have been written. And I would not be urging you to read it. Money alone is not enough to quench the thirst and lusts of the super-rich. Instead, many of them use their vast wealth, and the influence such riches give them, to achieve even more power. Power of a magnitude never dreamed of by the tyrants and despots of earlier ages. Power on a world wide scale. Power over people, not just products.

The Rockefeller File is not fiction. It is a compact, powerful and frightening presentation of what may be the most important story of our lifetime, the drive of the Rockefellers and their allies to create a one-world government, combining super-capitalism and Communism under the same tent, all under their control.

For more than one hundred years, since the days when John D. Rockefeller Sr. used every devious strategy he could devise to create a gigantic oil monopoly, enough books have been written about the Rockefellers to fill a library. I have read many of them. And to my knowledge, not one has dared reveal the most vital part of the Rockefeller story: that the Rockefellers and their allies have, for at least fifty years, been carefully following a plan to use their economic power to gain political control of first America, and then the rest of the world.

Do I mean conspiracy? Yes, I do. ****** MORE...

http://www.mega.nu:8080/ampp/gary_allen_rocker/

The entire book is on line at the link above. Gary Allen wrote some other great books, but 'The Rockefeller File' is very scary now that we see the neocon's plans laid out in black and white.

[wli]

18. I'm not entirely convinced this is so great.

I'm also pretty sure some of the claims can be refuted.

He's also skipping over WWII without even mentioning Nazi Germany.