"The Eliminationists:"

"""For most of my life, even into the 1990s, it was fairly easy to distinguish eliminationists from mainstream conservatives. Conservatives were people who welcomed the advances of science and education, were generally civil in their dealings with political opponents, shunned conspiracism and outrageous paranoia, and were not constantly sounding the alarm about the impending end of civilization. Religious beliefs always played a role in traditional conservatism, but the old consensus held by both liberals and conservatives--that religious freedom meant the freedom of every citizen to choose their creed without coercion--still held sway for the most part.

That began to change, though, in the mid-1990s. And by the first few years of the 21st century, the differences between the mainstream Right and its fanatical fringe became thin indeed.


Dave Neiwert,The Eliminationists: How Hate Talk Radicalized the American Right (Paperback)"""

Moyers: 'Democracy in America Is a Series of Narrow Escapes,

and We May Be Running Out of Luck'

For all of America's shortcomings, we keep telling ourselves, "The system works." Now all bets are off.

The following is an excerpt from Bill Moyers' new book, "Moyers on Democracy" (Doubleday, 2008).

Democracy in America is a series of narrow escapes, and we may be running out of luck. The reigning presumption about the American experience, as the historian Lawrence Goodwyn has written, is grounded in the idea of progress, the conviction that the present is "better" than the past and the future will bring even more improvement. For all of its shortcomings, we keep telling ourselves, "The system works."

Now all bets are off. We have fallen under the spell of money, faction, and fear, and the great American experience in creating a different future together has been subjugated to individual cunning in the pursuit of wealth and power -and to the claims of empire, with its ravenous demands and stuporous distractions. A sense of political impotence pervades the country -- a mass resignation defined by Goodwyn as "believing the dogma of 'democracy' on a superficial public level but not believing it privately." We hold elections, knowing they are unlikely to bring the corporate state under popular control. There is considerable vigor at local levels, but it has not been translated into new vistas of social possibility or the political will to address our most intractable challenges. Hope no longer seems the operative dynamic of America, and without hope we lose the talent and drive to cooperate in the shaping of our destiny.

You can read the rest of the excerpt Here