Joe Conason - It can happen here: authoritarian peril in the age of Bush

IT CAN
HAPPEN
HERE

Also by Joe Conason

The Raw Deal: How the Bush Republicans Plan to

Destroy Social Security and the Legacy of the New Deal

Big Lies: The Right-Wing Propaganda Machine

and How It Distorts the Truth

The Hunting of the President: The Ten-Year Campaign

to Destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton

(with Gene Lyons)

JOE CONASON

IT CAN
HAPPEN
HERE

Authoritarian Peril

in the Age of Bush

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS ST. MARTINS PRESS

New York

THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.

An imprint of St. Martins Press.

IT CAN HAPPEN HERE. Copyright 2007 by Joe Conason. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martins Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.thomasdunnebooks.com

www.stmartins.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Conason, Joe.

It can happen here : authoritarian peril in the age of Bush / Joe Conason. 1st ed.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-0-312-35605-7

ISBN-10: 0-312-35605-6

1. United StatesPolitics and government 2001-2. Authoritarianism United States. 3. Democracy United States. 4. Bush, George W. (George Walker), 1946 Political and social views. 5. Conservatism United States. 6. Big business Political aspects United States. 7. Right-wing extremists United States. I. Title.

E902.C658 2007

973.93 dc22

2006035643

First Edition: February 2007

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For Elizabeth

CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

To write a book accusing the president and his party of authoritarian ambitions is to invite equally pointed criticism and perhaps angry denunciation. In acknowledging those who helped in this endeavor, I want to express my gratitude without implicating anyone else in my errors or even my opinions. All the credit must be shared, but the blame is all mine.

Thomas Dunne, the publisher of this book as well as The Hunting of the President and Big Lies, once more conceived a clever title that challenged me to produce a compelling argument. I want to thank Mark LaFlaur, the editor who handled this manuscript with great care and professionalism, and Sean Desmond, my former editor, who left St. Martins Press while this project was under way. I also appreciate the contributions of assistant editor Benjamin Hart, production editor Kenneth J. Silver, production manager Eric Gladstone, text designer Nicola Ferguson, and jacket designer Jennifer Elaine Huntsman, as well as Mark A. Fowler of Satterlee Stephens Burke & Burke, whose thoughtful legal advice improved the text.

I am still fortunate enough to be represented by Andrew Wylie and Jeffrey Posternak of the Wylie Agency, my advocates and friends.

I must again express gratitude to my colleagues at Salon.com for their patience, encouragement, and general excellence, including editor-in-chief Joan Walsh, Michal Keeley, Kerry Lauer-man, and Mark Schone. For similar reasons I also owe thanks to my colleagues at the New York Observer, including editor Peter W. Kaplan, Tom McGeveran, Terry Golway, Josh Benson, Brian Kempner, and Barry Lewis. I remain especially grateful to former publisher Arthur L. Carter, who entrusted the stewardship of the newspaper he created to Jared Kushner as I was completing this book.

And I should extend appreciation to former colleagues at The American Prospect, where I had the pleasure for the past two years of working with my talented friend Michael Tomasky, who stepped down as the magazines editor last autumn.

As usual, many people graciously assisted with advice, research, clippings, and miscellaneous requests: Don Babets, Bill Babiskin, Tamara Baker, Peter Bloch, Dan Buck, Alan Gilbert, Linda Healey, Jesse Kornbluth and Karen Collins, Mark Karlin, Maria Leavey, Rob Levine, Mark Crispin Miller, Alfred Ross, Martin Rosenblatt, Julia Sneeringer, and Jay Winer. I owe special thanks to my former editorial assistant Evie Nagy. And I must also single out Scott Horton, the obscure New York attorney whose courageous defense of human and constitutional rights and spirited, erudite commentary on current events have been an enormous inspiration to me in recent years.

This book was informed by the work of many writers: Mike Allen, Jonathan Alter, Eric Alterman, William Arkin, Russ Baker, Jack Balkin, James Bamford, Alan Berlow, Duncan Black, Max Blumenthal, Sidney Blumenthal, Kristen Breitweiser, David Brock, Ron Brownstein, Frederick Clarkson, Steve Clemons, David Cole, Nicholas Confessore, David Corn, John W. Dean, E. J. Dionne, Robert Dreyfuss, Kevin Drum, Shadia B. Drury, Nina Easton, Thomas Edsall, James Fallows, Bruce Fein, Jamison Foser, Al Franken, Barton Gellman, Robert George, Alan Gilbert, Paul Glastris, Michelle Goldberg, Mark Green, David Greenberg, Jacob Hacker, Nat Hentoff, Hendrik Hertzberg, Stephen Holmes, J. Hoberman, Scott Horton, Mark Hosenball, Arianna Huffington, Michael Isikoff, Molly Ivins, John B. Judis, Fred Kaplan, Harvey J. Kaye, David D. Kirkpatrick, Paul Krugman, Howard Kurtz, Judd Legum, Gene Lyons, Joshua Micah Marshall, Jane Mayer, Harold Mey-erson, Mark Crispin Miller, Bill Minutaglio, James Moore, Anne C. Mulkern, David Neiwert, the late Jack Newfield, John Nichols, Timothy Noah, Robert Parry, Rick Perlstein, Paul Pier-son, Kevin Phillips, Walter Pincus, Sarah Posner, Dana Priest, Sam Rosenfeld, Laura Rozen, Charlie Savage, Robert Scheer, Kim Lane Scheppele, David Sirota, Wayne Slater, Paul Starr, Peter H. Stone, Andrew Sullivan, Cass R. Sunstein, Ron Suskind, Jeffrey Toobin, Craig Unger, Sean Wilentz, George Will, James Wolcott, Matthew Yglesias, and Markos Moulitsas Zuniga.

My research also benefited greatly from publicly available reports produced by the staff of Representative Henry Waxman, the remarkable California Democrat who may be the single most indefatigable public servant in the United States Congress; and from the indispensable library maintained by Thomas Blanton, Malcolm Byrne, Peter Kornbluh, and the staff and fellows of the National Security Archive at George Washington University.

I could not have completed this book without the warm support of family and friends. Gail Furman generously provided a beautiful place to think and write while I completed this book. She is a dedicated partisan of democracy whose friendship and counsel have become invaluable to me. For reasons that each of them knows very well, I am also deeply grateful to Wally and Celia Gilbert, Teddy Gross and Ruth Nass, Steve Jones, Andy Karsch and Nan Richardson, John and Symmie Newhouse, Julie Conason and Geoff Bryant, and John R. Wagley Sr. and Jean de la Poer.

Finally there is and will always be Elizabeth Wagleymy wife, my friend, my treasured critic, and my daily inspiration. While this project was under way we literally worked next to each other and have endured many things together during the past year. She surely understands why this book must be dedicated to her. So Im glad that she likes it.

November 2006

When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped