Towards an American fascism?

Via Jim Lippard, Naomi Wolfe's "Fascist America, in 10 easy steps"

1. Invoke a terrifying internal and external enemy
2. Create a gulag
3. Develop a thug caste
4. Set up an internal surveillance system
5. Harass citizens' groups
6. Engage in arbitrary detention and release
7. Target key individuals
8. Control the press
9. Dissent equals treason
10. Suspend the rule of law

The list itself features more prominently in Wolfe's new book The End of America: Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot. The introduction is available at HuffingtonPost in two parts - Pt1 and Pt2.

And in case you don't check the comments at the Lippard Blog, I posted the following Hannah Arendt quote from The Origins of Totalitarianism in regard to item #2 and "enemy combatants":

The first essential step on the road to total domination is to kill the juridicial person in man. This was done, on the one hand, by putting certain catergories of people outside the protection of the law and forcing at the same time, through the instrument of denationalization, the nontotalitarian world into recognition of lawlessness; it was done, on the other hand, by placing the concentration camp outside the normal penal sytem, and by selecting its inmates outside the normal judicial procedure in which a definite crime entails a predictable penalty.