John Dean uses the "F" word

by **bvonahsen** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 4:56 am

No, not that one. <blockquote>Quote:<hr>John Dean knocks ‘imperial presidency’ Watergate whistle-blower asks if U.S. ‘is on the road to fascism' in book LOS ANGELES - John Dean, the White House lawyer who famously helped blow the whistle on the Watergate scandal that drove Richard Nixon from office, says the country has returned to an "imperial presidency" that is putting the United States and the world at risk. In his new book, "Conservatives Without Conscience," Dean looks at Republican-controlled Washington and sees a bullying, manipulative, prejudiced leadership edging the nation toward a dark era. "Are we on the road to fascism?" he writes. "Clearly, we are not on that road yet. But it would not take much more misguided authoritarian leadership, or thoughtless following of such leaders, to find ourselves there. "I am not sure which is more frightening," he adds, "another major terror attack or the response of authoritarian conservatives to that attack." Dean, who served 127 days in prison for his part in the Nixon administration's Watergate cover-up, recently talked to The Associated Press about the ascendancy of the conservative right and the two-fisted style of political leadership he says was central to its rise. "We have returned to the imperial presidency," he said. "We have an unchecked presidency." More than three decades ago, the 67-year-old Dean was a young White House lawyer when he warned President Richard M. Nixon that the cover-up of a break-in at Democratic national headquarters in Washington's Watergate complex was "a cancer growing on the presidency." Dean, who later pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice, went on to become the star witness at the congressional Watergate hearings, implicating several high-ranking administration officials. An authoritarian party His book is anchored to a discussion of authoritarianism, a school of thought that, in the simplest terms, tries to explain why some people lead and others follow. The classic authoritarian personality — mostly found in men — thirsts for power, is exploitive, cheats to win, opposes equality, intimidates and is mean-spirited. This headstrong leadership style marks the current Republican right in varying degrees, he says, starting with President Bush and moving on down through the leadership ranks. The Bush White House, Dean says, has "given authoritarianism a new legitimacy," the same legitimacy he says it enjoyed before Nixon's presidency unraveled. Authoritarian thinking, Dean writes, "was the principal force behind almost everything that went wrong with Nixon's presidency." For anyone familiar with Dean's writing, the sharp stabs at the Bush administration will come as no surprise. His latest book is a sequel of sorts to his 2004 best seller, "Worse Than Watergate: The Secret Presidency of George W. Bush." Dean's current book has been steadily climbing best-seller lists, with publisher Viking ordering a second run for a total of 180,000 copies. Booksellers pointed to Dean's prominence and his engaging writing style for the book's success despite a flood of political commentaries in recent years. "Books like this one, whether they be on one side or the other, there is a lot of interest from consumers," said Bill Nasshan, senior vice president of books for Borders Group, Inc. Booksellers also are not concerned about oversaturation in the current events section. "We expect a lot more of these books to be published. With the coming midterm election, the country is more divided than it's ever been," said Bob Wietrak, vice president of merchandising at Barnes & Noble Inc. In "Conservatives Without Conscience," Dean pays Bush a backhanded compliment, saying that while the president is "not a puppet" it is Vice President Dick Cheney who is the White House's dominant authoritarian. "Cheney has swallowed the presidency," Dean says. While his journey from Nixon White House insider to Bush administration antagonist has evolved over the years, Dean told the AP that his politics haven't changed drastically during that time. He still sees himself as a defender of the conservative values championed by the late Sen. Barry Goldwater, the Republican icon to whom his latest book is dedicated. But Dean says his version of Republicanism doesn't square with the authoritarians who have dominated his former party in recent years, from former House Speaker Newt Gingrich to White House strategist Karl Rove. He sees them drifting from traditional conservative values, citing, among other examples, deficit spending and the federal budget debt. "My views have changed very little over the last 40 years," Dean said. "The Republican Party and conservatism have moved so far to the right that I'm now left of center. "This country works best as a centrist nation. I think, basically, the electorate is centrist. You have the debate being set by the extremes." Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.<hr></blockquote>

by **Avalon** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:02 pm

I'm concerned that people will tune out at "fascism." "Authoritarian" has enough dry academism to it, but "fascist" may be taken as something that cartoon lefties have used as an epithet for decades.

by **slimmouse** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:15 pm

Say it how it is would be my best estimate. We're all capable of presenting the case arent we ? From the Bush family sponsoring Hitler, right through to the Anthrax attacks, along with the accompanying destruction of civil liberties. From the Reichstag fire, to 9/11 ? From the "liberating Europe speeches" to the "spreading the flames of freedom throughout the middle East" Jazz From one false flag to another, we all KNOW the score. Are we incapable of making a logical case or do we just not care ? From the presstitutes and yes men to the facts of the matter ? We cannot be bothered to work it all out or make a logical case ?

by **bvonahsen** » Fri Jul 28, 2006 9:26 pm

'Fascism' and 'authoritarian' are better than 'nazi' or 'hitler' at least. Add to it that this is comming from John Dean gives a bit more weight to the charge. It gives one something to point to so you aren't just labeled a nutcase. Not that you wouldn't be anyway from some people but that would happen no matter what. It gives you a foot in the door so to speak. What is important is to get the attention of people who have tuned politics out and alert them to the dangers we see. I think a lot of people have this vague feeling that "the country is going in the wrong direction" but they may be blind as to just what that direction may be.

by **Hugh Manatee Wins** » Sat Jul 29, 2006 2:00 pm

Dean's tepid warning does little good when he talks about a "centrist" Eden and poo-poos the "extremists." So being anti-war anti-torture and anti-eugenics is "extremist"? Puh-leeese. He is giving a non-warning warning. Rather like Al Gore's movie about the coming end of the world as we know it so recycle. Mussolini actually said a better name for fascism was "corporatism." That goes to the heart of the matter without gettin' all egg-headed'n'stuff. Then some irrefutable dots to frame the picture: The corporations have been taking over our government ever since- *they paid for Hitler's war machine *attempted a coup against FDR *took in Nazis to form the CIA *took over the government from Eisenhower prompting his famous warning on the way out the door *Then the credit card companies and merchants gave our data to DARPA to create a Big Brother surveillance Gestapo of Total Information Awareness. Fascist = alliance of business and state or the military-industrial complex. Thugs, money, and technology killing a potential for democracy in triangulated fire similar to what happened at Dealey Plaza. Pretty clear description of fascism but you have to articulate it clearly and not focus on theoretical "-isms." Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=hughmanateewins>Hugh Manatee Wins</A> at: 7/29/06 12:11 pm

by **bvonahsen** » Sat Jul 29, 2006 3:46 pm

Yeah, I agree completely with you here Hugh. You're dead on. Like I said, Dean gives one a foot in the door to open it up further and hopefully make the larger points you just made. I like how you put that, I havn't seen it put like that so clearly and nice and simple. As I've said before, I'm kinda new, only been visiting RI and other simular sites for a couple of months now and anyways I am a visual artist and not really in my best element in prose. The way you summarize the points above is very good, I like it, thanks.

by **bvonahsen** » Sat Jul 29, 2006 4:52 pm

I can't believe that I didn't include a link with that. Here is a link to the Raw Story article and a transcript of Dean's appearance with Keith Olberman. There is also a YouTube video on the Raw Story page and of course Crooks and Liars has a video too. <a href="http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/Video_50_year_study_says_conservatives_0711.html">Raw Story </a> <blockquote>Quote:<hr>Rush Transcript DEAN: Goldwater Republicanism is really R.I.P. It's been put to rest by most of the people who are now active in moving the movement further to the right than it's ever been. I think that Senator [Goldwater], before he departed, was very distressed with Conservatism. In fact, it was our conversations back in 1994 that started this book. That's really where I began. We wanted to find answers to the question, "Why were Republicans acting as they were?" -- Why Conservatives had taken over the party and were being followed as easily as they were in taking the party where [Goldwater] didn't want it to go. OLBERMANN: What did you find? -- In less than the 200 pages that the book goes into. DEAN: I ran into a massive study that has really been going on 50 years now by academics. They've never really shared this with the general public. It's a remarkable analysis of the authoritarian personality. Both those who are inclined to follow leaders and those who jump in front and want to be the leaders. It was not the opinion of social scientists. It was information they drew by questioning large numbers of people -- hundreds of thousands of people -- in anonymous testing where [the subjects] conceded their innermost feelings and reactions to things. And it came out that most of these people were pre-qualified to be conservatives and this, did indeed, fit with the authoritarian personality. OLBERMANN: Did the studies indicate that this really has anything to do with the political point of view? Would it be easier to impose authoritarianism over the right than it would the left? Is it theoretically possible that it could have gone in either direction and it's just a question of people who like to follow other people? DEAN: They have found, really, maybe a small, 1%, of the left who will follow authoritarianism. Probably the far left. As far as widespread testing, it's just overwhelmingly conservative orientation. OLBERMANN: There is an extraordinary amount of academic work that you quote in the book. A lot of it is very unsettling. It deals with psychological principles that are frightening and may have faced other nations at other times. In German and Italy in the 30's, come into mind in particular. But, how does it apply now? To what degree should it scare us and to what degree is it something that might be forestalled? DEAN: To me, it was something of an epiphany to run into this information. First, I'd never read about it before. I sort of worked my way into it until I found it. It's not generally known out there, what's going on. I think, from the best we can tell, these people -- the followers -- a few of them will change their ways when the realize that they are doing -- not even aware of what they are doing. The leaders, those inclined to dominate, they're not going to change for a second. They're going to be what they are. So, by and large, the reason I write about this is, I think we need to understand it. We need to realize that when you take a certain step of vote a certain way, heading in a certain direction, where this can end up. So, it's sort of a cautionary note. It's a warning as to where this can go. Other countries have gone there. OLBERMANN: And the idea of leaders and followers going down this path or perhaps taking a country down this path requires -- this whole edifice requires and enemy. Communism, al Qaeda, Democrats, me... whoever for the two-minutes hate. I overuse the Orwellian analogies to nauseating proportions. But it really was, in reading what you wrote about, especially what the academics talked about. There was that two-minutes hate. There has to be an opponent, an enemy, to coalesce around or the whole thing falls apart. Is that the gist of it? DEAN: It is one of the things, believe it or not, that still holds conservatism together. There is many factions in conservatism and their dislike or hatred of those they betray as liberal, who will basically be anybody who disagrees with them, is one of the cohesive factors. There are a few others but that's certainly one of the basics. There's no question that, particularly the followers, they're very aggressive in their effort to pursue and help their authority figure out or authority beliefs out. They will do what ever needs to be done in many regards. They will blindly follow. They stay loyal too long and this is the frightening part of it. OLBERMANN: Let me read something from the book. Let me read this one quote then I have a question about it. "Many people believe that neoconservatives and many Republicans appreciate that they are more likely to maintain influence and control of the presidency if the nation remains under ever-increasing threats of terrorism, so they have no hesitation in pursuing policies that can provoke the potential terrorists throughout the world." That's ominous, not just in the sense that authoritarians involved in conservatism and now Republicanism would politicize counter-terror here which we've already argued that point on many occasions. Are you actually saying that they would set up -- encourage terrorism from other countries to set them up as a boogey man to have, again, that group to hate here -- more importantly, afraid of? DEAN: What I'm saying is that there has been fear mongering, the likes of which we have not seen in a long time in this country. It happened early in the cold war. We got accustomed to it. We learned to live with it. We learned to understand what it was about and get it in proportion. We haven't done that yet with terrorism. And this administration is really capitalizing on it and using it for its' political advantage. No question, the academic testing show -- the empirical evidence shows -- when people are frightened, they tend to go to these authority figures. They tend to become more conservative. So, it's paid off for them politically to do this. OLBERMANN: This all seems to require, not merely, venality or immorality but a kind of amorality where morals don't enter into it at all. "We're right. So anything we do to preserve our process, our power -- even if it by itself is wrong -- it's right in the greater sense." It's that wonderful rationalization that everybody uses in small doses throughout their lives. But, is this idea, this sort of psychological sort of review of the whole thing, does it apply to Dick Cheney? Does it apply to George Bush? Does it apply to Bill Frist? Who are the names on these authoritarian figures? DEAN: You just named three that I discuss at some length in the book. I focused in the book, not on the Bush Administration and Cheney and The President because they had really been there done that, but what I wanted to understand is what they have done is made it legitimate to have authoritarianism. It was already operating on Capitol Hill after the '94 control by the Republicans in Congress. It recreated the mood. It restructured Congress itself in a very authoritarian style, in the House in particular. The Senate hasn't gone there yet but it's going there because more House members are moving over. This atmosphere is what Bush and Cheney walked into. They are authoritarian personalities. Cheney much more so than Bush. They have made it legitimate and they have taken way past where anybody's ever taken it in the United States. OLBERMANN: Our society's best defense against that is what? Do we have to hope, as you suggested, the people that follow, wise up and break away from this sort of lockstep salute to, "of course, they're right, of course there are WMDs, of course there are terrorists, of course there is al Qaeda, of course everything is the way the president says it." Or do we rely on the hope that these are fanatics and fanatics always screw up because they would rather believe in their own cause than double-check their own math. DEAN: The lead researcher in this field told me, he said, "I look at the numbers of the United States and I see about 23% of the population who are pure right-wing authoritarian followers." They're not going to change. They're going to march over the cliff. The best thing to deal with them -- and they're growing, and they have a tremendous influence on Republican politics -- The best defense is understanding them, to realize what they are doing, how they're doing it and how they operate. Then it can be kept in perspective and they can be seen for what they are. <hr></blockquote>

by **Hugh Manatee Wins** » Sun Jul 30, 2006 12:44 am

Thanks for that additional excerpt, bvonahsen. If Dean can put 'authoritarian personality' on the map, the next word that necessarily follows is 'fascist,' not 'conservative. When the social scientists examined what happened in Germany, Italy, Spain, and Japan they found the authoritarian personality to be at the root of FASCISM. They even devised a 'fascism receptivity' personality test which measures nine attributes of this fearful and violent neurosis. Mind you, this was 1950 and the beginning of understanding this problem which Hitler understood perfectly and articulated in his 'Mein Kampf' which other *ahem* governments then tried to modify to their own cultures. Also, this was before knowledge of secret "wild and dangerous things" like Skull and Bones, the Council on Foreign Relations, the CIA, the Psychological Strategy Board, the Trilateral Commission, COINTELPRO, Operations Mockingbird-CHAOS-Monarch, etc. so #8 on the list of nine attributes below has a meaning that it didn't back then when it probably referred to the smear myth of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. You can take the test and learn about it here: <a href="http://www.anesi.com/fscale.htm">www.anesi.com/fscale.htm</a> This is dangerous stuff. The truth about history and mass psychology, that is. The 'F-factor' test checks for: 1) Conventionalism:  Rigid adherence to conventional, middle-class values. 2) Authoritarian Submission:  Submissive, uncritical attitude toward idealized moral authorities of the ingroup 3) Authoritarian Aggression:  Tendency to be on the lookout for, and to condemn, reject, and punish people who violate conventional values 4) Anti-intraception:  Opposition to the subjective, the imaginative, the tender-minded. 5) Superstition and Stereotypy:  The belief in mystical determinants of the individual's fate; the disposition to think in rigid categories. 6) Power and "Toughness":  Preoccupation with the dominance-submission, strong-weak, leader-follower dimension; identification with power figures; overemphasis upon the conventionalized attributes of the ego; exaggerated assertion of strength and toughness. 7) Destructiveness and Cynicism:  Generalized hostility, vilification of the human. 8) Projectivity:  The disposition to believe that wild and dangerous things go on in the world; the projection outwards of unconscious emotional impulses. 9) Sex:  Exaggerated concern with sexual "goings-on." From the same website by Chuck Anesi who seems to take interest in all things military and especially WWII, here are 'The Fascist Virtues,' <blockquote>Quote:<hr>(Text from the Almanac of the Fascist Association of Elementary School Teachers, 1934, p. 92. Quoted in Herman Finer's celebrated work Mussolini's Italy [London: Victor Gollanz Ltd., 1934]. Images from Mussolini's Messaggio al Popolo degli Stati Uniti, in Voci D'Italia [Milan: Alfieri & Lacroix, 1937]. It must be admitted that "the extreme parsimony of gesture and word" was definitely not one of Sig. Mussolini's virtues. For that matter, "absolute loyalty in personal relations" was not one of his virtues, either.) <hr></blockquote> The Fascist Virtues: 1) Tenacity at work 2) The extreme parsimony of gesture and word 3) Physical and moral courage 4) Absolute loyalty in personal relations 5) Firmness in decisions 6) Affection for comrades 7) Hatred for enemies of the Revolution and Fatherland 8) Unlimited faithfulness to an oath that has been taken 9) Respect for tradition, and at the same time the desire for accomplishment for the morrow. Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=hughmanateewins>Hugh Manatee Wins</A> at: 7/29/06 11:18 pm

by **Et in Arcadia ego** » Sun Jul 30, 2006 1:01 am

<blockquote>Quote:<hr>DEAN: I ran into a massive study that has really been going on 50 years now by academics. They've never really shared this with the general public. It's a remarkable analysis of the authoritarian personality. Both those who are inclined to follow leaders and those who jump in front and want to be the leaders. It was not the opinion of social scientists. It was information they drew by questioning large numbers of people -- hundreds of thousands of people -- in anonymous testing where [the subjects] conceded their innermost feelings and reactions to things.<hr></blockquote> I'd like very much to know what study he's talking about and how, if at all, it can be referenced.. ____________________ Some are born to sweet delight, some are born to endless night.

by **Hugh Manatee Wins** » Sun Jul 30, 2006 1:30 am

<blockquote>Quote:<hr>a massive study that has really been going on 50 years now<hr></blockquote> This is figurative. Dean is being euphemistic. There is no "50 year-old study." It is called the National inSecurity State. So he's referring to the way spychiatrists and academia have co-opted the behavioral sciences to enact what Aldous Huxley warned would happen: scientific fascism. That is, using mass psychology to divide-and-conquer and sow the poisonous seeds of fearful uncritical obedience to 'authority' using every cultural institution possible. This is exactly what I've been describing in my deconstructions of TV and movies and tying them to Operation Mockingbird-type social engineering using gender roles, heroes and anti-heroes. Now here's Dean, who has probably known most of this for a long time, warning us about it because it has become 'too dangerous' like a political Chernobyl that is reaching a critical meltdown temperature after being the engine of the ship of state for 50 years. Dean is a johnny-come-lately or else just more worried than Bertrand Russel who said; ""I think the subject which will be of most importance politically is Mass Psychology. ...It's importance has been enormously Increased by the growth of modern methods of propaganda ... Although this science will be diligently studied, it will be rigidly confined to the governing class. The populace will not be allowed to know how its convictions were generated." Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) Philosopher, educator

John Dean uses the "F" word

John Dean uses the "F" word

F word and A word

Say it how it is....

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Re: F word and A word

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Re: F word and A word

Re: F word and A word

Re: what study he's talking about

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