Is the US on its way to a dictatorship? [Archives:2006/936/Opinion]
Dr. Abdulaziz Al-Maqaleh
It's now crystal clear; democracy is suffering a recession in its home land, America. It is being subjected to retardation or is presumably perishing. A seasoned Egyptian writer in the seventies expected the Soviet Union to disintegrate. The Soviet collapse, however, was a catastrophe for America as well. The US lost the challenge and the rivalry that had attracted sympathizers and made it a free-world leader.
Ultimately this lose will turn the democratic system in the US into a tyranny whose grip on its people would be far worse than the former Soviet practice. Under the pretext of protecting its citizens against terrorism, the US will find itself in the long run beleaguered by dictatorship. This can be seen is the foundations laid down by George W. Bush in this war on terror. It is eminent sign that the country is sinking into a totalitarian regime based on absolute individual dictatorship. Its actions and reactions mirror German Hitler's Nazism and the subsequent dictatorship this has propagated.
There are indications that the US is changing into a dictatorship. Take for example the notorious laws recently rejected by their Congress and then defiantly reinstated by the White House and its neoconservative hawks. One of the more serious indications lies in the lack of any opposition to President Bush's push to go to war under erroneous assumptions. There were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and there is no proof of Saddam's links to Al-Qaeda, allegations that have brought about the present ordeal of the Iraqi people. It is an ordeal that has also served to bring misfortune to Americans. Many American soldiers have died without justification because of miscalculated risks.
Risks that added to the perverse US image and to the alarm of nations in the face of the stupidity of its ruler who could unexpectedly launch a sudden destructive war on them as a result of misinformation.
The worst of dictators is the one who leads his nation into a useless war and does not resign while at the same time the legal institutions stand helpless to depose him. It is, at least, a procedure expected in a country which used to be democratic. The US, however, has had a precedent for indicting some of its former presidents who did not do even five percent of what this president and his administration have committed against America and its people. This president and its administration are arranging for the worst dictatorship in the 21st century.
Wiretapping one of the American institutions in the seventies, contributed to forcing a president out of the White House. It is a wonder it is not happening now with a president who practices wiretapping on American citizens and institutions. The excuse that is now circulated is that the wiretapping was only restricted to Muslim citizens, however, this is constitutionally condemned under any circumstance.
Dr. Abdulaziz Al-Maqaleh is Yemen's prominent poet and intellectual. He is the director of the Yemeni Center for Studies.
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