Paranoia Strikes Deep in America ... Over and Over

By Michael Kazin, The Nation
Posted on September 16, 2009, Printed on September 18, 2009
http://www.alternet.org/story/142690/

"If something is not done shortly, this country is going the way of Italy, Germany or Russia, and it is high time we did something," exclaimed Irenee du Pont, one of the more prominent conservatives of the 1930s. Many of his fellow Americans agreed there was good cause to be alarmed: a new Democratic president was proposing an unprecedented expansion of federal power that would increase taxes on the well-off and dole out benefits to the jobless and other unfortunates.