Militarization and the Authoritarian Right

Saturday 07 August 2010

by: Barry Eisler, t r u t h o u t | Op-Ed

Yes, former Bush administration speechwriter and current Washington Post columnist Marc Thiessen's demand that "WikiLeaks Must Be Stopped" is, as his colleague Eva Rodriguez notes, "more than a little whacky." But it's useful, too, because an infatuation with the notion of using the military in nonmilitary operations, particularly domestic ones, is a key aspect of the modern American right and of the right-wing authoritarian personality. Examining Thiessen is a good way to understand both.