posted on May, 4 2003 @ 12:46 PM
It is important to remember that the Nazis created a "shadow government" in Germany even as the "democratic" Weimar constitution continued to
operate in theory. Hitler at first implemented his programmes through the constitution, using existing government agencies and departments. Later he
set up Nazi Party bureaus that duplicated the functions of the Weimar government, allowing the latter to remain in place but without power, while the
Nazi bureaus (especially the SS, and of course Hitler himself) held the actual power. The Communist Party in Russia created a similar invisible
government after the Bolshevik revolution, leaving the revolutionary constitution as well as the government bureaucracy in place while Communist Party
agencies and the General Secretary wielded the real power.
If the tendancy toward social breakdown continues in the advanced industrial nations, it's not difficult to conceive of voters electing overtly
authoritarian, right-wing administrations campaigning on law and order platforms. In the face of widespread rioting, looting, and mayhem (especially
if it spilled over from the ghettos and threatened the suburbs), reactionary hysteria could propel authoritarian types into both the executive and
legislative branches of government. The "middle classes" (i.e. professionals, small business people and so on) would then support charismatic
martial style leaders who promised to restore law and order, particularly if they were men with impressive military or police credentials.
Once elected, and with the support of willing legislatures and courts, authoritarian administrations could easily create much more extensive
mechanisms of invisible government than already exist, giving the executive branch virtually dictatorial powers. Such administrations could also
vastly increase government control of the media, implement martial law, escalate foreign militarism, further expand the funding and scope of the
police, national guard units, secret police and foreign intelligence agencies, and authorise more widespread surveillance of citizens as well as the
infiltration of dissident political groups. Random searches and seizures, curfews, government control of all organised meetings, harassment or
outright banning of groups that disagreed with or attempted to block government policies, and the imprisonment of political dissidents and others
judged to be dangerous to national security would then become routine.
These developments would not occur all at once, but so gradually, imperceptibly, and logically given the need to maintain law and order that most
people would not even be aware that an authoritarian take over was underway.
Indeed, it is already underway in the US...............