For me as an outside observer it is the rate of change of the rights and freedoms that is scary and stunning, not the decline in absolute terms.
US involuntarily have all pieces of the puzzle for a very high quality totalitarian state. The question is whether someone will be able to assemble them before the immune system of the american society activates in full force and dismantles them.
Surveillance capabilities: check
Militarized police: check (Balko has some scary data, but haven't checked it thoroughly)
Obedient propaganda machine: not quite there, but as the lead up to the Iraq war showed - achievable.
Secret laws: check
Btw - KGB means "Комитет Государственая Безопасност" which translates into " Committee for State Security" not that far from "Department of Homeland Security"
As John Oliver said a few weeks ago about NSA: "We don't say you broke any laws with what you did, we are surprised you didn't have to."
Lets just hope that the US society will be able to reverse the trend.
If 'vaterland' is intended to be the German translation of Homeland, then Homeland == Heimat. And although usually an innocuous word, in certain contexts some Nazi connontations cling to it.
The word 'Homeland' actually creeps me out more than 'Heimat'.
Vaterland is "Fatherland". It's the same semantic meaning - although I now note that the NSDAP didn't actually ever use it, and it was allied propaganda that set this in perpetuity in the non-german world. Did not know.
US involuntarily have all pieces of the puzzle for a very high quality totalitarian state. The question is whether someone will be able to assemble them before the immune system of the american society activates in full force and dismantles them.
Surveillance capabilities: check
Militarized police: check (Balko has some scary data, but haven't checked it thoroughly)
Obedient propaganda machine: not quite there, but as the lead up to the Iraq war showed - achievable.
Secret laws: check
Btw - KGB means "Комитет Государственая Безопасност" which translates into " Committee for State Security" not that far from "Department of Homeland Security"
As John Oliver said a few weeks ago about NSA: "We don't say you broke any laws with what you did, we are surprised you didn't have to."
Lets just hope that the US society will be able to reverse the trend.