America is now in fascism’s legal phase

[ZiprHead]

America is now in fascism’s legal phase | Jason Stanley

The US’s history of racism is fertile ground for fascism. Attacks on the courts, education, voting rights and women’s rights are steps to toppling democracy

www.theguardian.com

The contemporary American fascist movement is led by oligarchical interests for whom the public good is an impediment, such as those in the hydrocarbon business, as well as a social, political, and religious movement with roots in the Confederacy. As in all fascist movements, these forces have found a popular leader unconstrained by the rules of democracy, this time in the figure of Donald Trump.

My father, raised in Berlin under the Nazis, saw in European fascism a course that any country could take. He knew that US democracy was not exceptional in its capacity to resist the forces that shattered his family and devastated his youth. My mother, a court stenographer in US criminal courts for 44 years, saw in the anti-Black racism of the American legal system parallels to the vicious antisemitism she experienced in her youth in Poland, attitudes which enabled eastern European complicity with fascism. And my grandmother, Ilse Stanley, wrote a memoir, published in 1957, of her experiences in 1930s Berlin, later appearing on the US television show This is Your Life to discuss it. It is a memoir of the normalization years of German fascism, well before world war and genocide. In it, she recounts experiences with Nazi officers who assured her that in nazism’s vilification of Jews, they certainly did not mean her.

Philosophers have always been at the forefront in the analysis of fascist ideology and movements. In keeping with a tradition that includes the philosophers Hannah Arendt and Theodore Adorno, I have been writing for a decade on the way politicians and movement leaders employ propaganda, centrally including fascist propaganda, to win elections and gain power.

Often, those who employ fascist tactics do so cynically – they do not really believe the enemies they target are so malign, or so powerful, as their rhetoric suggests. Nevertheless, there comes a tipping point, where rhetoric becomes policy. Donald Trump and the party that is now in thrall to him have long been exploiting fascist propaganda. They are now inscribing it into fascist policy.

A somewhat longish article but worth the read.

 

[Swammerdami]

I agree this is a must-read. (And it's telling — and very sad — that, as is so very often the case, one must go OUTSIDE the U.S.A. (in this case to The Guardian) to get good news or opinion ABOUT the U.S.A.

Some excerpts.

[Bolshevism carries] on a campaign, directed by the Jews, with the international underworld, against culture as such. [In contrast] National Socialism sees in all these things – in [private] property, in personal values and in nation and race and the principles of idealism – these forces which carry on every human civilization and fundamentally determine its worth.

The Nazis recognized that the language of family, faith, morality and homeland could be used to justify especially brutal violence against an enemy represented as being opposed to all these things. The central message of Nazi politics was to demonize a set of constructed enemies, an unholy alliance of communists and Jews, and ultimately to justify their criminalization.

[Nixon’s campaign and administration] had two enemies: the anti-war left and Black people [and invented the drug war to target both.]
...
You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

 

[RVonse]

I agree this is a must-read. (And it's telling — and very sad — that, as is so very often the case, one must go OUTSIDE the U.S.A. (in this case to The Guardian) to get good news or opinion ABOUT the U.S.A.

Some excerpts.

[Bolshevism carries] on a campaign, directed by the Jews, with the international underworld, against culture as such. [In contrast] National Socialism sees in all these things – in [private] property, in personal values and in nation and race and the principles of idealism – these forces which carry on every human civilization and fundamentally determine its worth.

The Nazis recognized that the language of family, faith, morality and homeland could be used to justify especially brutal violence against an enemy represented as being opposed to all these things. The central message of Nazi politics was to demonize a set of constructed enemies, an unholy alliance of communists and Jews, and ultimately to justify their criminalization.

[Nixon’s campaign and administration] had two enemies: the anti-war left and Black people [and invented the drug war to target both.]
...
You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

I agree with the article that Bolshevism is opposite of Fascism and that they have both been at odds in the US since even before Nixon's administration. And not just in the US but other countries as well.

But what I do not agree with is that Fascism is any worse than Bolshevism. Because basically the Bolshevist's in the US today are the elite liberals who desire to run everyone's lives; they destroy individual liberty and tell us we are one and same pawns to be used by government who always knows best. While the fascist's are the devote extreme right wingers who worship religion and their firearms. To be sure, both sides are very bad, but if I had my choice I would take fascism for America over Bolshevism any day of the week. If for no other reason, at least the fascist's pretend they respect the Constitution and individual liberty.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

But what I do not agree with is that Fascism is any worse than Bolshevism. Because basically the Bolshevist's in the US today are the elite liberals who desire to run everyone's lives; they destroy individual liberty and tell us we are one and same pawns to be used by government who always knows best. While the fascist's are the devote extreme right wingers who worship religion and their firearms. To be sure, both sides are very bad, but if I had my choice I would take fascism for America over Bolshevism any day of the week. If for no other reason, at least the fascist's pretend they respect the Constitution and individual liberty.

The fascists want to run our lives also. You will follow our faith!

And so what if they pretend to follow the Constitution? That doesn't mean they actually do. The left has far more respect for the Constitution than the right.

 

[Swammerdami]

So America is teetering between Fascism from the Trumpists and "Bolshevism" from the "Jihad Squad." This will come as a surprise to anyone who has ever read a history book.

I agree this is a must-read. (And it's telling — and very sad — that, as is so very often the case, one must go OUTSIDE the U.S.A. (in this case to The Guardian) to get good news or opinion ABOUT the U.S.A.

Some excerpts.

[Bolshevism carries] on a campaign, directed by the Jews, with the international underworld, against culture as such. [In contrast] National Socialism sees in all these things – in [private] property, in personal values and in nation and race and the principles of idealism – these forces which carry on every human civilization and fundamentally determine its worth.

The Nazis recognized that the language of family, faith, morality and homeland could be used to justify especially brutal violence against an enemy represented as being opposed to all these things. The central message of Nazi politics was to demonize a set of constructed enemies, an unholy alliance of communists and Jews, and ultimately to justify their criminalization.

[Nixon’s campaign and administration] had two enemies: the anti-war left and Black people [and invented the drug war to target both.]
...
You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

... Bolshevism ... Bolshevism. ... Bolshevist's in the US today are the elite liberals who desire to run everyone's lives; they destroy individual liberty and tell us we are one and same pawns to be used by government who always knows best. ... I would take fascism for America over Bolshevism any day of the week. If for no other reason, at least the fascist's pretend they respect the Constitution and individual liberty.

The idea that America is choosing between fascism and Bolshevism is just some QAnon wet dream, very similar to the vilification which John Ehrlichman described.

The Fascist threat is very real. The GOP is already moving to suppress votes — Fulton County will have a SINGLE polling place? — and to overturn elections where the GOPNazis lose. Hitler galvanized Germany and won election with the help of hatred against Jews, non-Aryans and Bolsheviks. The GOP is following the same playbook but with Muslims substituted for Jews.

Who are the "Bolshevists" we should be so worried about? If I try to pretend this fear is even remotely sensical, I'm left assuming AOC and Sanders are the parallels to Lenin and Stalin in Mr. Vonse's world view. I do NOT think that those parallels would make sense to people actually familiar with AOC or Sanders.

I understand that some "learn everything they need to know" about AOC by watching Tucker Carlson or Alex Jones, or by reading bullshit newspapers. But even succumbing to those lies, it's far-fetched to think Americans support such agenda.

One top QOP leader has compared mask mandates to the Holocaust. Is that the sort of bullshit that feeds your idiosyncratic beliefs, RVonse?

 

[RVonse]

Who are the "Bolshevists" we should be so worried about?

The ones who are tearing down the statues of Jefferson and Shakespeare and wishing to re-write US history. The ones who are allowing crime and the ransacking of private property to run amok in our big cities. The ones in Washington who think they know best for the world by making sure America gets into every fake war they can find. The ones who believe no one is male or female and that everyone is an "it" following the prescribed government family planning and mask mandates. The ones who think the state knows best for central monitory planning, dismantling capitalism and price discovery, leaving an elite fed committee to steer the economy....bailing out the "too big to fail" in preference to better run smaller business.

All of these Bolshevists kind of people helped to establish the Soviet Union. It probably looked a little better than Germany fascism at the time but in the end was worse in the long run because it lasted longer.

 

[bilby]

Who are the "Bolshevists" we should be so worried about?

The ones who are tearing down the statues of Jefferson and Shakespeare and wishing to re-write US history. The ones who are allowing crime and the ransacking of private property to run amok in our big cities. The ones in Washington who think they know best for the world by making sure America gets into every fake war they can find. The ones who believe no one is male or female and that everyone is an "it" following the prescribed government family planning and mask mandates. The ones who think the state knows best for central monitory planning, dismantling capitalism and price discovery, leaving an elite fed committee to steer the economy....bailing out the "too big to fail" in preference to better run smaller business.

All of these Bolshevists kind of people helped to establish the Soviet Union. It probably looked a little better than Germany fascism at the time but in the end was worse in the long run because it lasted longer.

It's really difficult to respond to someone who not only has zero grasp on what is happening in reality, but also uses words to mean things that they don't mean to anybody else.

The things you are expressing terror of here are not happening in any widespread way in today's USA, are not supported in today's USA by any people or group with the power to bring them about, and (most importantly of all) HAVE NOTHING WHATSOEVER TO DO WITH BOLSHEVISM.

Bolshevism was (note the past tense) a very specific political ideology of the early 20th century. There are no Bolshevists with any political power in the USA, and if there were, they would be violently opposed to the activities, real or imagined, that you are characterising as 'Bolshevist'.

You need to start using only words you and your audience agree about the meanings of, or to expect to be dismissed as a raving loon with no understanding of the things you are saying.

Perhaps you have something to say. But it's literally impossible to tell, because the only sense it's possible to extract from your posts here is that you don't know what many of the words you are using mean to the rest of the English speaking world.

 

[Swammerdami]

Who are the "Bolshevists" we should be so worried about?

... The ones in Washington who think they know best for the world by making sure America gets into every fake war they can find.... The ones ... bailing out the "too big to fail" in preference to better run smaller business.

I'm mildly curious about your take on contemporary American politics. Were Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders among those clamoring to bail out Goldman Sachs' shareholders? Or are BOTH the lefties AND the righties "Bolshevist" in your view? The greenies too, I suppose. In your view it's just the Libertarians and the Bolshevists?

Bernie, BTW, voted No on the Iraq War (unless Wikipedia is just more fake news). Ms. Warren was still Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law at Harvard Law School at the time, but she announced vehement opposition.

... And I was also hoping you'd answered the question about mask mandates in the very Swammerdami post you excerpted from.

 

[Elixir]

... And I was also hoping you'd answered the question about mask mandates in the very Swammerdami post you excerpted from.

As usual with right wing extremists, you have to wait for them to stop frothing at the mouth before you can expect them to answer questions.

 

[RVonse]

Who are the "Bolshevists" we should be so worried about?

... The ones in Washington who think they know best for the world by making sure America gets into every fake war they can find.... The ones ... bailing out the "too big to fail" in preference to better run smaller business.

I'm mildly curious about your take on contemporary American politics. Were Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders among those clamoring to bail out Goldman Sachs' shareholders? Or are BOTH the lefties AND the righties "Bolshevist" in your view? The greenies too, I suppose. In your view it's just the Libertarians and the Bolshevists?

Bernie, BTW, voted No on the Iraq War (unless Wikipedia is just more fake news). Ms. Warren was still Leo Gottlieb Professor of Law at Harvard Law School at the time, but she announced vehement opposition.

... And I was also hoping you'd answered the question about mask mandates in the very Swammerdami post you excerpted from.

You make a good point.

Who are the "Bolshevists" we should be so worried about?

The ones who are tearing down the statues of Jefferson and Shakespeare and wishing to re-write US history. The ones who are allowing crime and the ransacking of private property to run amok in our big cities. The ones in Washington who think they know best for the world by making sure America gets into every fake war they can find. The ones who believe no one is male or female and that everyone is an "it" following the prescribed government family planning and mask mandates. The ones who think the state knows best for central monitory planning, dismantling capitalism and price discovery, leaving an elite fed committee to steer the economy....bailing out the "too big to fail" in preference to better run smaller business.

All of these Bolshevists kind of people helped to establish the Soviet Union. It probably looked a little better than Germany fascism at the time but in the end was worse in the long run because it lasted longer.

It's really difficult to respond to someone who not only has zero grasp on what is happening in reality, but also uses words to mean things that they don't mean to anybody else.

The things you are expressing terror of here are not happening in any widespread way in today's USA, are not supported in today's USA by any people or group with the power to bring them about, and (most importantly of all) HAVE NOTHING WHATSOEVER TO DO WITH BOLSHEVISM.

Bolshevism was (note the past tense) a very specific political ideology of the early 20th century. There are no Bolshevists with any political power in the USA, and if there were, they would be violently opposed to the activities, real or imagined, that you are characterising as 'Bolshevist'.

You need to start using only words you and your audience agree about the meanings of, or to expect to be dismissed as a raving loon with no understanding of the things you are saying.

Perhaps you have something to say. But it's literally impossible to tell, because the only sense it's possible to extract from your posts here is that you don't know what many of the words you are using mean to the rest of the English speaking world.

If anyone has any grasp on Bolshevism I would consult a Russian leader who knows their own USSR history. Listen to what Putin has to say about how Bolshevists are gaining popularity in western nations here:



It is a short video not FOX news showing the actual words spoken by Putin.(There are CC subscripts for translation). Hiis message is clear, to let the Bolshevist's stay in the west and not come to Russia again. ( time stamp 2:00).

And there are Bolshevists in both parties. For example, when it comes to staying out of fake wars D. Trump shares more in common with Bernie Sanders than he does George Bush or Hillary Clinton.

 

[ZiprHead]

You're kidding, right?

The guy that poisons or disappears or jails opponents is your go to guy against the woke and cancel culture???

 

[Loren Pechtel]

If anyone has any grasp on Bolshevism I would consult a Russian leader who knows their own USSR history. Listen to what Putin has to say about how Bolshevists are gaining popularity in western nations here:



It is a short video not FOX news showing the actual words spoken by Putin.(There are CC subscripts for translation). Hiis message is clear, to let the Bolshevist's stay in the west and not come to Russia again. ( time stamp 2:00).

And there are Bolshevists in both parties. For example, when it comes to staying out of fake wars D. Trump shares more in common with Bernie Sanders than he does George Bush or Hillary Clinton.

And why should I believe a word he says??

 

[funinspace]

If anyone has any grasp on Bolshevism I would consult a Russian leader who knows their own USSR history. Listen to what Putin has to say about how Bolshevists are gaining popularity in western nations here:



It is a short video not FOX news showing the actual words spoken by Putin.(There are CC subscripts for translation). Hiis message is clear, to let the Bolshevist's stay in the west and not come to Russia again. ( time stamp 2:00).

And there are Bolshevists in both parties. For example, when it comes to staying out of fake wars D. Trump shares more in common with Bernie Sanders than he does George Bush or Hillary Clinton.

And why should I believe a word he says??

Well...because he is the ring leader of the world's largest mafia; and he was a professionally trained spy, trained to lie...of course.

 

[Swammerdami]

And there are Bolshevists in both parties. For example, when it comes to staying out of fake wars D. Trump shares more in common with Bernie Sanders than he does George Bush or Hillary Clinton.

Oh my goodness. It's a tangential point, but It is almost unbelievable what a hard-on some people have for blaming Cheney's criminal adventure in Iraq on Hillary.

First of all, Hillary was not the only intelligent Congressperson deceived by Cheney's lies. In fact, among Democratic Senators Yeas outnumbered Nays 29 to 21 on the 2002 AUMF Resolution. Seriously, what is the obsession with the repetition "Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton" on this matter? Joe Biden was another of the Yea-voters, and he's the frigging POTUS now. Yet the righties still have their hard-on "Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton ... Hillary Clinton." Seriously: What gives?

Secondly, and even more importantly, have YOU, RVonse read the speech Ms. Clinton gave in the Senate explaining her vote? (Spoiler alert: No, you haven't.) Stupidly or not, she explains that her vote was made to REDUCE the likelihood of War. ("REDUCE" with an R — Do you understand that word?) Her argument actually made much sense at the time, to anyone who didn't know — as we do now with the benefit of hindsight — that Cheney and his cabal were INTENT on their lovely War, and deliberately rushed its onset before Saddam had a chance to give in to their demands.

 

[bilby]

Bolshevism has long been a bogeyman of the fascists. Hitler and Mussolini found it a convenient target for the hatred of their followers, with its clear and unabashed aim of disrupting the status-quo in which those fascist supporters were thriving.

Ayn Rand had a petulant teenage girl's wrath against it as the system that stomped all over her middle-class privilege.

But it went away, driven under by Stalinism, which was then itself defeated in stages from Stalin's death in 1953 up to the final collapse in the early 1990s.

Bolshevism is a rare, marginal, and basically powerless ideology today - and yet its spectre shuffles on like a zombie, driven by the need that fascist ideologues have for an enemy to despise, in a world where anti-semitism has become gauche and passé at best.

It's continuing popularity as an enemy, despite its demise in reality, is driven in the West, and particularly the USA, by the resurgence of Rand's popularity - indeed, a fear of bolshevism, and/or the accusing of enemies of harbouring bolshevism, is a hallmark of an idiot who has fallen into the trap of worshiping Ayn Rand's pseudo-philosophical nonsense.

When a Russian today talks of the threat of bolshevism, he is likely a supporter of Putin's neo-fascist dictatorial rule (and not infrequently is Putin himself, as we see above).

When an American talks of the threat of bolshevism, he is likely a victim of Randian 'objectivism', who (as is typical of the type) hasn't even the intellectual depth to identify a currently extant enemy, but instead simply accepts without question that the one in their sixty five year old scripture still exists.

It's both hilarious and pathetic. Which is not to say that it's not dangerous. Fascism has been all three since it's inception.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Righties want pregnant women to be forced to give birth. They, many times, tried to ban loud music. Thinking isn't a prerequisite, in fact, it is discouraged. Righties forced the evacuation of the US Capitol building when they didn't like the result of an election.

But beware the boogieman! After all, we must fear left-wing populism -> fascism but embrace right-wing populism -> fascism.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Just now?

The Year of the New Normal Fascist

And so, as 2021 goose-steps toward its fanatical finish, it is time for my traditional year-end wrap-up. It’s “The Year of the Ox” in the Chinese zodiac, but I’m christening it “The Year of the New Normal Fascist.”

And what a phenomenally fascist year it has been!

I’m not talking amateur fascism. I am talking professional Class-A fascism. Government and corporate sanctified fascism. Bug-eyed, spittle-flecked, hate-drunk fascism.

I’m talking mobs of New Normal fascists shrieking hatred and threats at “the Unvaccinated” as they are dragged off “Vaccinated Only” trains, painting Nazi-era messages on their windows of their stores, leaders of government fomenting mass hatred, TV commentators literally quoting sadistic Nazi SS doctors, leftists going full-fascist on Facebook, concentration camps, Goebbelsian propaganda, censorship of dissent ... the whole nine yards.

Here in Europe, things are particularly fascist. One by one, New Normal countries are rolling out social-segregation systems, ordering “lockdowns” of “the Unvaccinated,” and otherwise persecuting those who refuse to conform to official New Normal ideology.

Austria has made “vaccinations” mandatory. Germany is about to follow suit. “Covid passes” have been approved in the UK. Greece is fining “Unvaccinated” pensioners by reducing the amount of their state-pension payments. Swedes are “chipping” themselves. And so on.

In New Normal Germany, “the Unvaccinated” are under de facto house arrest. We are banned from society. We are banned from traveling. We are banned from protesting. Our writings are censored. We’re demonized and dehumanized by the New Normal government, the state and corporate media, and the New Normal masses on a daily basis. New Normal goon squads roam the streets, brutalizing pensioners, raiding barber shops, checking “papers,” measuring social distances, literally, as in with measuring sticks.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Just now?

The Year of the New Normal Fascist

And so, as 2021 goose-steps toward its fanatical finish, it is time for my traditional year-end wrap-up. It’s “The Year of the Ox” in the Chinese zodiac, but I’m christening it “The Year of the New Normal Fascist.”

And what a phenomenally fascist year it has been!

I’m not talking amateur fascism. I am talking professional Class-A fascism. Government and corporate sanctified fascism. Bug-eyed, spittle-flecked, hate-drunk fascism.

I’m talking mobs of New Normal fascists shrieking hatred and threats at “the Unvaccinated” as they are dragged off “Vaccinated Only” trains, painting Nazi-era messages on their windows of their stores, leaders of government fomenting mass hatred, TV commentators literally quoting sadistic Nazi SS doctors, leftists going full-fascist on Facebook, concentration camps, Goebbelsian propaganda, censorship of dissent ... the whole nine yards.

Here in Europe, things are particularly fascist. One by one, New Normal countries are rolling out social-segregation systems, ordering “lockdowns” of “the Unvaccinated,” and otherwise persecuting those who refuse to conform to official New Normal ideology.

Austria has made “vaccinations” mandatory. Germany is about to follow suit. “Covid passes” have been approved in the UK. Greece is fining “Unvaccinated” pensioners by reducing the amount of their state-pension payments. Swedes are “chipping” themselves. And so on.

In New Normal Germany, “the Unvaccinated” are under de facto house arrest. We are banned from society. We are banned from traveling. We are banned from protesting. Our writings are censored. We’re demonized and dehumanized by the New Normal government, the state and corporate media, and the New Normal masses on a daily basis. New Normal goon squads roam the streets, brutalizing pensioners, raiding barber shops, checking “papers,” measuring social distances, literally, as in with measuring sticks.

During a required company meeting I work for, the people running the show were explaining that Covid-19 had financially cost the company $1,000,000 in health care costs. They showed the numbers, how many workers required ER, hospitalization, deaths, and the bottom line that it affected the company. $1 million out of the pocket of the owner for the added health care costs. The cost of the incentives for vaccinations for the company was a small fraction of that total, and not included in the $1 million price tag.

Yet, people were writing in about how care the owners require vaccinations just because OSHA and the Federal Government through other means would require companies getting paid by the Feds needing to be vax'd.

Flat out, from a Libertarian view, the owner of the company has rights (typically more than the workers). Their income source is threatened by their workers, the health care outlays are increased.

And all we get from our resident Libertarian is more Nazi hyperbole. The Kings and Queens of "personal responsibility" are whine about needing to be responsible for their own decisions. The right to get paid, the right to run a business, the right to live seem to all have to sit in the backseat to 'right to not get vaccinated'.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

Flat out, from a Libertarian view, the owner of the company has rights (typically more than the workers).

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

Flat out, from a Libertarian view, the owner of the company has rights (typically more than the workers).

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!

This is the best part of Libertarianism... the importance of a right varies from time to time, and usually when most needed to make a point in an argument.

For instance, the "A worker can quit a work for someone else" arguments have transitioned to "companies can't force employees to do something".