While I've certainly been disturbed by the authoritarian tendencies of the Bush administration, its hostility toward accountability and the rule of law and the general direction they are taking this country, I've never quite bought the argument that America is now a totally fascist state, even if there are some parallels. But you don't have to think that Bush is the second coming of Hitler, Franco or Pinochet to be disturbed by stuff like this.
A Colorado man named Steve Howards recounts his horror story of daring to tell the truth to Vice-President Dick Cheney's face.
"He [Cheney] was walking through the area shaking hands. Initially, I walked past him. Then I said to myself, ‘I can’t in good conscience let this opportunity pass by.’ So I approached him, I got about two feet away, and I said in a very calm tone of voice, ‘Your policies in Iraq are reprehensible.’ And then I walked away.”
Howards says he knew the Administration has a “history of making problems” for people who protest its policies, so he wanted to leave off at that.
But the Secret Service did not take kindly to his comment.“About ten minutes later, I came back through the mall with my eight-year-old son in tow,” Howards recalls, “and this Secret Service man came out of the shadows, and his exact words were, ‘Did you assault the Vice President?’ ”
Here’s how Howards says he responded: “No, but I did tell Mr. Cheney the way I felt about the war in Iraq, and if Mr. Cheney wants to be shielded from public criticism, he should avoid public places. If exercising my constitutional rights to free speech is against the law, then you should arrest me.”
Which is just what the agent, Virgil D. “Gus” Reichle Jr, proceeded to do.
“He grabbed me and cuffed my hands behind my back in the presence of my eight-year-old son and told me I was being charged with assault of the Vice President,”Howards recalls.
[...]
“First of all, I was scared,” Howard recalls. “They wouldn’t tell my wife where they were taking me. Second of all, I was incredulous this could be happening in the United States of America. This is what I read about happening in Tiananmen Square. They hauled me away to Eagle County jail and kept me with my hands cuffed behind my back for three hours.”
At the jail, the charge against him was reduced to harassment, he says, and he was released on $500 bond. The Eagle County DA’s office eventually dropped that charge.
To his credit, Howards sued the Secret Service thug.
Given the number of articles I've read on similiar events, such a despicable action on the part of Bush/Cheney's storm trooper-esque entourage is hardly an isolated event by a bad apple.
You expect this sort of garbage in Mugabe's Zimbabwe, where it really is a crime to insult the president or vice-president. If our soldiers really are fighting for freedom, maybe they're doing so in the wrong places.
America may not be a fascist country yet but it sure seems that any town becomes that way when the emperor or vice-emperor visit.
1 comment:
Wow, that is a truly chilling incident. I have always been critical when people use hyperbolic labels like "fascist" (if they had to live under real fascism, they would know the difference) but the story shows how this government has taken us too far down that road. The more people can be aware of this, the better.
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