Is the US becoming more of a fascist state?

[iNow]

Well, the question is pretty well summed up in the thread title. Here's the proverbial rock dropped into the pond of water. Let's see where the ripples go and what they hit.

[Pangloss]

Oh no, you've created an interference pattern in the body politic! But was it caused by the issue passing through the LEFT-wing partisan blogger or the RIGHT-wing partisan blogger?!

[bascule]

This is not encouraging... (cloture vote on the restoration of habeas corpus rejected by the Senate Republicans, with a few breaking ranks)

 

I'll wait until Bush has the Capitol burned or orders then anschluss of Canada before declaring the US fascist, however it's arguable America is presently under the most authoritarian presidential leadership it's ever seen.

[Pangloss]

Apf. We can't even keep OJ Simpson in jail. If we're fascists we're pretty darn lousy at it.

 

You guys squint too hard.

[bascule]

Maybe the rest of the system realizes that suspension of habeas corpus is f*cking retarded given present circumstances, even if (most) Senate Republicans don't

 

Props to my man Dick Lugar, as well as Arlen Specter, Gordon Smith, and Olympia Snowe, as well as Senator Chuck "Betrayus" Hagel

[Blade]

John Weiss

 

John Weiss, a professor of history at Wayne State University, sought to give a definition of fascism in his book, The Fascist Tradition: Radical Right-Wing Extremism in Modern Europe. He arrived at a list of ideas that he believed to be shared by the majority of the people commonly referred to as fascists:

 

1 Organicist conceptions of community;

2 Philosophical idealism;

3 Idealization of "manly" (usually peasant or village) virtues;

4 A resentment of mass democracy;

5 Elitist conceptions of political and social leadership;

6 Racism (and usually, though not necessarily, anti-Semitism);

7 Militarism;

8 Imperialism.

 

point 1. i don't know that one

point 2. the american dream matches this one.

point 3. masculinity. no. more like obisitas.

point 4. yes Bush and the mainstream media clearly hate democrats.

point 5. yes there is bigtime elitism

point 6. yes. even the kkk is still allowed to exist.

point 7. clearly

point 8. territorial gain. yes. the americans are happy to invade and stay over long periods of time. verry long periods even.

 

so thats 6 out of 8. so yes it seems like fashism.

[Phi for All]

John Weiss

 

John Weiss, a professor of history at Wayne State University, sought to give a definition of fascism in his book, The Fascist Tradition: Radical Right-Wing Extremism in Modern Europe. He arrived at a list of ideas that he believed to be shared by the majority of the people commonly referred to as fascists:

 

1 Organicist conceptions of community;

2 Philosophical idealism;

3 Idealization of "manly" (usually peasant or village) virtues;

4 A resentment of mass democracy;

5 Elitist conceptions of political and social leadership;

6 Racism (and usually, though not necessarily, anti-Semitism);

7 Militarism;

8 Imperialism.

If you cut and paste from Wikipedia *please* give them a citation, otherwise you are plagiarizing.

[ParanoiA]

^ yeah, he gave himself away because everything was spelled correctly with punctuation...

 

This is not encouraging... (cloture vote on the restoration of habeas corpus rejected by the Senate Republicans, with a few breaking ranks)

 

I'll wait until Bush has the Capitol burned or orders then anschluss of Canada before declaring the US fascist, however it's arguable America is presently under the most authoritarian presidential leadership it's ever seen.

 

Yeah I would agree with that. I don't believe Bush is power hungry just for the sake of power and ego - rather I think he believes it's necessary for his war on terror. That's the excuse, and I believe any Republican following his lead will continue that theme. I don't like it, and it's not very republican of them I might add...but then, they dismiss Ron Paul as a non-republican so maybe this is the transition period for them. If so, I'm glad I jumped ship when I did.

 

Let me ask a question...Would you still believe in granting Habeas Corpus to prisoners of war if we were in a more conventional war with soldiers that wear uniforms rather than soldiers who do not?

 

I ask because I'm somewhat torn on the issue since I understand innocent people getting swept up in the process of fighting non-uniformed soldiers, but at the same time, it's war we're talking about and innocent people could still get swept up when fighting uniformed opponents.

[YT2095]

I don`t understand the Question?

 

since the US = united stateS and has about 52 of them, how can the Collective "stateS" become "State" (singular).

 

the US is Plural.

[Pangloss]

Well the emphasis is on "united", I suppose, ala "United Kingdom". We just kinda conveniently ignore the "S" on the end. (grin) It used to be used in the plural, back before the civil war. If memory serves, it changed during the post-war reconstruction period, or perhaps later during the world wars.

 

In a political/legal sense, the relevence is that the federal government has authority over state governments in most concerns, include protection of civil liberties. E.G. if a specific state passes a law prohibiting Mormons from practicing their religion, that law would be rendered null and void by the federal constitution, and the federal government has the specific power to enforce that freedom within that state. So the sense of unity is fairly justified, even if there are differences from state to state on various issues.

[ParanoiA]

Maybe he means "state" as in government entity rather than specific geographical regions.

[hotcommodity]

Oddly enough, we do have fasces in Congress:

 

http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Fasces

 

http://www.bloggers.it/theMinority/itcommenti/fasci2.jpg

 

We may, as a country, have some characteristics of a facist state, however facism involves uniting people for a common cause. The Bush administration tends to leech off of society, rather than unite it.

[iNow]

Maybe he means "state" as in government entity rather than specific geographical regions.

 

Maybe I meant "gaseous state." Regardless, it's definitely degenerate.

 

 

 

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

We may, as a country, have some characteristics of a facist state, however facism involves uniting people for a common cause. The Bush administration tends to leech off of society, rather than unite it.

 

I meant more to discuss the administrations (Repubs, Dems, and others) attempt to close down an open society... or crush a democracy uprising. It's the "power and jurisdiction" part that I thought more relevant.

 

 

Beware the supersolid despots.

 

 

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

I don`t understand the Question?

 

since the US = united stateS and has about 52 of them, how can the Collective "stateS" become "State" (singular).

 

the US is Plural.

 

Please read it as:

 

"Is the US becoming more of a fascist grouping of states which we describe as a nation." "State" had a better literary ring to it than the other option.

[Reaper]

I would have to say that the U.S. is starting to tend toward fascism. We are getting more paranoid, the government already keeps secrets regarding important issues (or ignores them all together), and the reasons for some of the absurd measures and policies we are making are becoming quite irrational and sometimes they have a ring of propaganda to it. Also, there has been a trend toward giving the president more power and influence within government affairs.

 

My two cents anyway.

[Pangloss]

... says the guy who's name and avatar exemplify the importance and relevence of secrecy! That's kind of an ironic position to take, don't you think?

[iNow]

Hi Pangloss,

 

You've now posted three times in this tiny 15 post thread, and none of those have discussed the topic. Are you intentionally trying to prevent this discussion from taking place? Regardless your response, I respectfully request that you talk about the subject at hand or stop posting to this thread. I do not mean to overstep my bounds, only to get people thinking about a topic which concerns me and discuss the topic further.

 

 

Lockheed, to your point, can we say if this is or is not different from the past absurdities somehow? If so, in what ways?

[ecoli]

1 Organicist conceptions of community;

2 Philosophical idealism;

3 Idealization of "manly" (usually peasant or village) virtues;

4 A resentment of mass democracy;

5 Elitist conceptions of political and social leadership;

6 Racism (and usually, though not necessarily, anti-Semitism);

7 Militarism;

8 Imperialism.

 

point 2. the american dream matches this one.

That's debatable. The american dream means different things to different people...

 

point 4. yes Bush and the mainstream media clearly hate democrats.

first off, I know plenty who would argue that most mainstream media has a leftist slant, so you'd have to prove that one to me. Also, I don't really see Bush proclaiming 'hatred' towards anyone. The democrats seem quite resentful of Bush, however (generalization, but it wouldn't be hard to find examples).

 

point 5. yes there is bigtime elitism

I think the opposing parties show elitism on opposite ends of the spectrum. It *tends* to balance things out.

 

point 6. yes. even the kkk is still allowed to exist.

Yes, but that's what being a democracy means! We have to let opposing/unpopular viewpoints to exist. Otherwise, we're no better than the fascists.

There is no, however, state sponsored racism, and personal bigotries seem to be dying out amoung the younger politicians. The older ones who reveal bigotry, are ostracized and removed from office (by public appeal). I would say that there has never been a time in history where active racism has played less part in government.

 

point 8. territorial gain. yes. the americans are happy to invade and stay over long periods of time. verry long periods even.

you are generalizing 'americans' and confusing political and economic imperialism with territorialism... but I guess that doesn't affect your point much, thouhg.

 

so thats 6 out of 8. so yes it seems like fashism.

[Sisyphus]

John Weiss

 

John Weiss, a professor of history at Wayne State University, sought to give a definition of fascism in his book, The Fascist Tradition: Radical Right-Wing Extremism in Modern Europe. He arrived at a list of ideas that he believed to be shared by the majority of the people commonly referred to as fascists:

 

1 Organicist conceptions of community;

2 Philosophical idealism;

3 Idealization of "manly" (usually peasant or village) virtues;

4 A resentment of mass democracy;

5 Elitist conceptions of political and social leadership;

6 Racism (and usually, though not necessarily, anti-Semitism);

7 Militarism;

8 Imperialism.

 

point 1. i don't know that one

point 2. the american dream matches this one.

point 3. masculinity. no. more like obisitas.

point 4. yes Bush and the mainstream media clearly hate democrats.

point 5. yes there is bigtime elitism

point 6. yes. even the kkk is still allowed to exist.

point 7. clearly

point 8. territorial gain. yes. the americans are happy to invade and stay over long periods of time. verry long periods even.

 

so thats 6 out of 8. so yes it seems like fashism.

 

I disagree with almost all of your reasons, but I do have some thoughts of my own...

 

point 1: There hasn't really been any rhetoric of this kind that I can recall.

 

point 2: That's a very vague criterion. There certainly is an "American way" which certain segments seem determined to spread around the world, but I don't know if that counts. That the country is more or less run by academics of a particular philosophy (Straussianism) might count as well.

 

point 3: Yes, I would say so. Bush on the ranch, cutting brush, using cowboy language. Actually the whole Western genre could be described as "an idealization of manly, peasant virtues," and if politicians invoke that spirit to their advantage, it certainly counts.

 

point 4: Yes. The push has been for expanding executive power, decreasing transparency, and decreasing the advisory role of Congress. These are anti-democratic tendencies. A lot of those neocons and objectivists seem to just find the whole "mass approval" thing tedious, even as they nominally trumpet it as a cause.

 

point 5: Yes. The neocons, philosophical descendents of Leo Strauss, are all about elitism, the assumption that most people simply cannot understand their true motives, and the "noble lie."

 

point 6: No, not really. No politician can be elected while publicly holding even ambiguously racist views. (BTW, that a radical and literally revolutionary organization like the KKK is allowed to exist is a triumph of liberal democracy. Let it always be the case that spectacularly unpopular views go unsilenced.)

 

point 7: A little ambiguous. We haven't "mobilized" as a country, the military has not become the police, etc. On the other hand, obviously we're more aggressive, and there is a national cult paying lip service to "supporting the troops."

 

point 8: Well, we are "the world's policeman." We have military bases all over the place, and active military operations of one kind or another in probably a hundred countries. Is that imperialism? I honestly don't know.

[Pangloss]

Hi Pangloss,

 

You've now posted three times in this tiny 15 post thread, and none of those have discussed the topic. Are you intentionally trying to prevent this discussion from taking place? Regardless your response, I respectfully request that you talk about the subject at hand or stop posting to this thread. I do not mean to overstep my bounds, only to get people thinking about a topic which concerns me and discuss the topic further.

 

 

Lockheed, to your point, can we say if this is or is not different from the past absurdities somehow? If so, in what ways?

 

You misunderstand the purpose of my posting behavior, which is actually to increase traffic, and attention to your subject, not reduce it. I'm not the only one posting amusing asides in this thread, and that's an acceptable practice in general at SFN, as are topic digressions most of the time.

 

As a thread-starter, what I generally do if I feel that a thread is a bit too far off the subject and I'm getting frustrated with the replies, is I'll post a thread asking people to focus more on the subject, or prompt them, like you did with Lockheed above. Nothing wrong with that. But don't sweat about digressions, they're (usually) just part of the social atmosphere here.

[iNow]

Right. So, now back on topic...

[hotcommodity]

Right. So, now back on topic...

 

If you'd like your thread to have more preciseness and specified direction, you have to put more thought into your opening post. You opened by saying:

 

Well, the question is pretty well summed up in the thread title. Here's the proverbial rock dropped into the pond of water. Let's see where the ripples go and what they hit[/u'].

 

If you believe the people in this thread are getting off topic, you have no one to blame but yourself. You're trying to guide the thread after it's already begun, and you're attempting admonish people even tho' they've made no mistake. In short, what you'll get out of your thread is what you put into it.

[iNow]

Right. So, now back on topic.

 

 

It seems the thread title wasn't specific enough. So let me ask it another way.

 

Is the US becoming more of a fascist state?

[Saryctos]

thinking...

[Pangloss]

No.

 

It is, however, becoming a state that's more divided by ideological partisanship. The presumption and declaration of fascism is one aspect of that problem, and the lie of those statements is seen in the fact that we're able to read them at all.

 

"Becoming more fascist" is like "being a little bit pregnant". You either are, or you aren't. We aren't. Doesn't mean we shouldn't be concerned about trends and issues, but we shouldn't misrepresent them for ideological gain either.

[iNow]

"Becoming more fascist" is like "being a little bit pregnant". You either are, or you aren't.

That wasn't a response I was expecting. Are you positing that there is zero gray area in expressoin of fascist tendencies by government? If so, I'd challenge you to support that, or at least define fascism as you see it.

 

 

Thanks also for the on topic post. I do appreciate it.