At the very outset, let’s restate our definition of Neo-Fascism. Even if you do not agree with our definition of the current Republican Party being Neo-Fascist, you will at least know why we make that contention.
Remember, Populism is the opposite of Fascism. Populism is a political theory that says that everything starts with the people, and it creates policies based on what is the greatest good for the people.
Populism differs from Socialism or Communism in that it does not say that everyone should share equally, or that the government should run everything. It merely says that no one should be allowed to take over the government and run it for the benefit of a few at the expense of the many. Fascism does not say that either. That would definitely not win many elections. But that is Fascism: rule by one Party, supporting the rich and the powerful.
Populism began at a time when railroads were being given large tracts of land on which to lay tracks between cities. As often happens, those businesses gained substantial power over farmers and ranchers and smaller communities, resulting in confiscatory pricing and other abuses of political power. So Populism was a successful reaction to that. You have that same thing today in Wisconsin, where the governor has run roughshod over the people, and now a grass roots movement of Populists has risen up to remove him.
We’ve never had Fascism in this country. But Italy had Fascism and Germany and Spain. In those countries, the rich, the heavy industrial leaders, the banks, the military…and, to some degree at least, the Catholic Church all combined behind a political philosophy of nationalism…but really only to benefit those in the dominant political party, which in all these cases, was a Fascist Party.
Neo-Fascism is a new version of that old Fascism. Thus far at least, it does not involver national police forces or suspensions of Civil Rights. Of course those we call Neo-Fascists do not yet have complete control of the government, and the last time they did, they went on an orgy of two foreign wars and a $7 trillion spending spree that enriched the already wealthy and totally devastated the Middle Class and the average citizen.
Here’s what Neo-Fascism is expressed these days.
First, you have an alignment of one Party (in this case the Republican Party) with the military, with the industrialists, the global corporations, the financiers and with some churches. And of which political party does that remind you?
The result is the same as the result, although not yet so dominating, as the old Fascists. We’ve had belligerent wars, (Iraq and Afghanistan, although Afghanistan less so), with an arrogant nationalism ridiculing some of our staunchest allies, like France, when they did not support what turned out to be an illegal war. Then we have the GOP’s total support of monopolistic corporations, and writing corporate legislation like the hugely multi-hundred-billion dollar Prescription Drug Bill, which does not cut the costs of drugs, but makes a fortune for the drug companies by simply paying for them at a cost of tens of billions per year by the American taxpayer.
The Neo-Fascists, which now comprises the entire Republican Party has allied themselves with the super-rich in a legislative program of eliminating Medicare, reducing Social Security benefits and repealing health care reform. Since 1981, the rich have been getting huge amounts of money given back to them from tax reductions.
The top income earners in this country, a few million earn more than 160 million Americans. The average CEO of a major corporation earns 300-400 times what the average worker in their companies earns. The super rich have seen the greatest increase in their income since the1920s and the global corporations often pay no taxes at all.
They use the military to add an element of fear to their proposals. We were already at war with Afghanistan and yet the Republicans wanted to go to war with Iraq. After one Chief of Staff was forced out and his successor resigned, the military brass, who despite the two Chiefs of staff, are mostly Republicans, came around and we went to war. After the loss of 4,500 American soldiers dead and 30,000 wounded we accomplished nothing except to put our oil companies in a stronger position. Halliburton and the Neo-Fascist Vice President grew rich beyond rich on the Iraq War.
The second thing you do in organizing a Fascist Party is to set up a propaganda machine by changing the rules. No longer are media obligated to release information to the people on both sides of an issue. Then you buy up or otherwise control a very large percentage of the media. This is very important because by controlling the media you can see to it that your message is told, the other side’s is not and, in true Fascist propaganda, your side vilifies and ridicules the opposition.
Anyone can see the parallels here with the former Fascists. With propaganda on a daily basis coming from people like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and the Fox News Channel with people like Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly and Ann Coulter spreading not only one-sided and often false information, but doing so in a most insulting and ridiculing manner the technique is quite obvious.
Third, you begin to make changes in election rules and procedures so that you can steal the vote. You cry “voter fraud” where there is none. Then you institute strict regulations that outlaw the poor, the minorities, the elderly and immigrants. Those are the people who vote for candidates who want to help people.
Once you are in complete control of the government, you can go even further with extending vote rigging through the use of voting machines that can be controlled quietly by the manufacturers who are themselves aligned with the Party.
Characteristic of Fascists was that they took over the radio and banned, even shut down opposition media. They waged war on the truth in their societies by creating propaganda units that delivered the Fascist message and its spin on facts to make them favorable to the Party message.
If you know that there is no danger from a country, you won’t attack it. If you know that tax breaks for rich people will only make them richer, but not create jobs, you won’t vote for tax cuts for the rich. If you know that privatizing Social Security in the stock market could bankrupt your pension and leave you penniless, you won’t take that chance.
Yet these are all Republican (Neo-Fascist) positions taken or attempted by the Bush Administration but sold to the public sold to you in propaganda by people like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Michael Savage and the entire Fox News Channel staff who are hired because they will accept, for money, the role of propagandist rather than news reporter. They are, without question, in the same tradition as Herr Dr. Goebbels, the Fascist, Nazi head of propaganda.
Neo-Fascists are really only Fascists faced with a different, more media savvy, more media diverse world than the old Fascists were able to manipulate. The Neo-Fascists realized long ago…25 years ago…that they needed to control as much of the radio, the daily chatter as they could and at least some of the television. They got their break when television expanded into cable. There they could say anything and get away with it.
Once the fairness doctrine was overturned by President Reagan, so that media were not obligated to tell the truth, or at least both sides of a political issue, then the Right Wing could begin to tell lies without any penalty. They did it incessantly about President Clinton, who made it easier for them by giving them real, serious personal things they could use to discredit him, while piling on even more lies than they otherwise could have.
People say that the truth will come out, and it often does. But often, it does not. People go to jail for 18 years for crimes they did not commit. And what are they supposed to say, after losing 18 years? Would you go to jail, be despised, hated, subject to a life with real criminals, real murderers, lose your health and your family…for a later settlement of several million dollars? Most people would not.
So what about our country? How will it survive without the truth? Would those 4,500 men who died in Iraq, or the 30,000 who were wounded, some ruined for life…would they rather have had their lives…if the truth had been told.
Dick Cheney, the leading Neo-Fascist, is still alive. Why is he still alive when the 4,500 men he sent into Iraq died for a lie? Why is he still living the high life on the millions he made on the war and the millions his friends made on the war…while 30,000 American soldiers have missing legs, arms, eyes, skin….or cannot find one day of peaceful rest?
Neo-Fascists are in power. They may not have the Presidency or the Senate but they are working on it. And they are dangerous. Cheney should be tried for war crimes and for the treason of giving out names to Columnist Robert Novak of covert CIA agents. He should have been tried for treason in the Valerie Plame case.
Right now, in our country, the Neo-Fascist Republicans are trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act. They want to return the health care system to the hands of private companies. They are trying to reduce Social Security payments, change the system to make it a 401K system and trying to raise the age of eligibility to 68 or higher. They want to remove regulations from banks and investment companies so that they can start the next round of mortgage securities frauds and credit card scams.
They want to “reform” the tax code. That means they want to simplify the tax code with only something like 3 rates and no deductions. But the tax collections, which are now somewhere around 18.5% would be lower. And then, once they have lowered the rates, they will bring back deductions for homes, and business expenses. Pretty soon the rich will be richer and the Middle Class will now be the Lower Class.
The Neo-Fascist governors of Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio newly elected in the 2010 elections, are the vanguard of the Neo-Fascist philosophy, making it work at the local level. Governor Walker of Wisconsin has created huge tax breaks for corporations and for wealthy businessmen. He has taken approximately $4,000 in health care and other benefits from Wisconsin’s public workers. Governor John Kasich of Ohio has tried to disband the public sector unions altogether. Not negotiate harsh deals…just get rid of them.
The governor of Michigan, Ric Snyder, has put into effect a law, which he carried out in Benton Harbor, MI, that says he can simply replace a mayor or city manager if he does not like the financial circumstances of that community. This is the kind of raw power…eliminate anyone like the unions who could stand up to you…that Neo-Fascists like.
You’d better be ready because these guys are coming to a theater near you. They are coming to your hometown as mayor or governor or Senator or President. Your only chance to continue life as you have known it is to vote them out. We all must vote only for people who will work for the good of all the People Right now, which means Democrats.
Just remember one thing. They will say that they just want efficient government, so we need to cut government spending and the only way we can do that is by cutting Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. They say that they want to balance the budget.
Here are the facts. They have been in control for 8 years of Reagan, 4 years of Bush I, for part of Clinton’s presidency, 6 of the 8 years of Bush, and they have blocked jobs bills and other bills for the middle class over 200 times in the Senate of the United States to stop virtually anything for the people from being passed.
Of our $15 trillion debt, $3 trillion came under Reagan, $2 more trillion under Bush I, $7 trillion under Bush II, and a trillion a year left by the Bush Recession for three solid years of the Bush Recession. That makes $15 trillion. That is what the Neo-Fascists…who are all making over $100,000 and all of whose patrons are making an average of about $400,000 per year and in the millions in the top ten percent of one percent.
If they win the House, the Senate and the Presidency, there is a very good chance that
1. We could be at war with Iran in less than 6 months.
2. We could have another round of tax cuts for the rich
3. All social programs, including health care reform would be ended.
4. All entitlements would be turned into private plans
5. Medicaid would be turned into unaffordable private insurance
6. All unions would be banned
7. Abortion would be banned
8. Unemployment insurance would be ended, and
9. Government would be slashed to practically nothing
10. The post office would be shut down and its functions sent to UPS, FEDEX.
11. Assembly for protest would be shut down and declared illegal in all public places.
12. Rendition…in the form of public arrest without charge…would become common.
This is what you have to look forward to if the Neo-Fascist Republicans are elected.
