"From Freedom to Fascism"
April 10, 2006
12:23 a.m., MT

This afternoon my sweetheart and I attended a test screening of Aaron Russo's new film, "America: From Freedom to Fascism".

Click the link above to view the trailer -- and WATCH FOR THIS MOVIE. See it when it comes out: this may be your chance to blow a mind or two by inviting someone who doesn't "get" the freedom message.

I'm no film critic, so I'm not going to offer a critical analysis of its strengths or weaknesses. I will say that it conveys a clear and powerful message, perhaps best expressed by Russo himself: "What if it was our own government we had to be afraid of?" Now, I know that won't be news to most readers of this blog ... but it may be news to many of the people who eventually see this film.

The documentary-style movie covers a good deal of ground: the creation of the Federal Reserve, which essentially put the power to print money in the hands of a private bank; the IRS and tax law, specifically the Income Tax; RFID technology, and its threats to the future of freedom in America ... the coming of "global government," and, of course, the "National ID."

"From Freedom to Fascism" features a number of interviews, or portions of them, with many prominent activists: Ron Paul, Katherine Albrecht, Irwin Schiff, Catherine Austin Fitts, Franklin Sanders, Larken Rose, Vernie Kuglin -- and Joseph Banister, as well as other former IRS agents who've apparently "turned witness to the defense" of the American tax-slave in "the court of public opinion" ... and others whose names may have slipped my mind at the moment, but whose statements I found no less riveting or revealing.

I loved "V for Vendetta," and I think it's an important movie in many ways, like "The Matrix" was: It contained some equally memorable lines and a few fantastic scenes. Some people will undoubtedly find those movies easier to digest because fiction seems somehow less threatening and more entertaining.

"America: From Freedom to Fascism" is not "entertainment" -- it's education of the sort that would be banned in public schools (AKA government youth propaganda camps), and it's a "reality check" ... a pretty scary one at that, even if it holds few surprises for informed freedom lovers.

So far I have not seen Eugene Jarecki's "Why We Fight," and would like to. It's heartening to see these powerful and important freedom-oriented movies coming out at a time when freedom seems like such a precious and increasingly rare "commodity" in the world -- I use the term "commodity" loosely here. I'm also aware that with rarity, it'll become more sought after, more highly valued if harder to attain -- and that a higher valuation may be precisely what we have to place on freedom to win it back from those who value it so little they'd make the term FREEDOM worthless, just as they've done to the dollar.

It's a strange thing that as the price of freedom goes up, more people might be willing to pay it ... but as the gold price creeps higher, that's precisely what's bound to happen. There are reasons, no doubt, why gold, guns and freedom go together -- the tyrant may settle on any one of the three to demonize and confiscate, knowing it'll lead to eventual possession of the other two. The fabric of freedom that's so painstakingly woven unravels so quickly with just a few cut threads here and there.

When "We The People" finally realize that our Emperor is naked, will "We" feel better knowing he's already stolen the shirts of our backs? Even if he claims to have stolen them for the poor, how can we fail to note that in doing so, he's made us poorer -- like a perverse sort of Robin Hood who steals from the poor and middle class to give to the rich and obscenely wealthy? I don't mind anyone getting rich on account of their own honest efforts, for the record -- I do, however, object to thieves getting rich on account of my labor, and yours ... free markets don't long support them; bureaucracies seemingly encourage them to go forth and multiply.

Kudos to Aaron Russo for an important and timely film, and mayhap a few strategic incisions in the cobwebby cocoon of tyranny popularly mistaken for the coarse and shabby remnants of freedom in America today.

Cat

Comments: 1 person has added a thought or two ...

On Monday, April 10th, at approximately 11:04 p.m. Mountain time, Robert Noval said:

I can only base this on the clip; perhaps there's more on the subject in the complete film.

My problem is this: you show this to a left wing statist and they see the same material facts that you or I do. But it doesn't move them away form their usual knee-jerk reflex reaction.

You guessed it, the problem in Mussolini's "corporatism"is the "corporate" and not the "-ism".

As with all the ills of human society, "greed" and "capitalism" are to blame; centralized authority is just an innocent vicitm of a kipnapping.

The clip doesn't give you any help to move them to see the underlying abstract involved; that once the coercive power of government is expanded and centralized; once it is applied to matters that are outside the perview of government, then an overwhelmingly attractive incentive to seize that power is created. An incentive that inexorably leads to successful professional facsists.

All of leftist ideology is based on one fundamental metaphysical error: the misunderstanding of the dynamics of human economics.

I don't see how this helps illuminate the problem.

---The Bikemessenger

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