One of my colleagues sent around this story that is pretty disturbing: a UMass Dartmouth undergraduate student requested a copy of Mao Zedong’s life manual on communism Little Red Book through interlibrary loan and was subsequently visited by agents from the Department of Homeland Security:

The student, who was completing a research paper on Communism for Professor Pontbriand’s class on fascism and totalitarianism, filled out a form for the request, leaving his name, address, phone number and Social Security number. He was later visited at his parents’ home in New Bedford by two agents of the Department of Homeland Security, the professors said.

The professors said the student was told by the agents that the book is on a “watch list,” and that his background, which included significant time abroad, triggered them to investigate the student further.

Coupled with the recent revelations that Bush personally authorized government wiretaps and surveillance of electronic communication of Americans without a court order, we can think of this as yet another item for the “Fascism: Are We There Yet?” files.

Update: As it turns out, the student’s story was a hoax -- he just admitted that he fabricated the whole story. Nice -- real nice. Instead of being an example of our country’s gradual march toward fascism, it now stands as an example of liberals lying, making up false allegations, and basically acting like out-of-touch extremists. Real nice, whoever you are.