Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Commies-fascists and democrats. Same thing.

Erasing Lies




Liberal fascism sounds like an oxymoron – or a term for conservatives to insult liberals. Actually, it was coined by a socialist writer, none other than the respected and influential left-winger H.G. Wells, who in 1931 called on fellow progressives to become "liberal fascists" and "enlightened Nazis." Really.
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These facts jar because they contradict the political spectrum that has shaped our worldview since the late 1930s, which places communism at the far left, followed by socialism, liberalism in the center, conservatism, and then fascism on the far right. But this spectrum, Jonah Goldberg points out in his brilliant, profound, and original new book, Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left from Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning (Doubleday), reflects Stalin's use of fascist as an epithet to discredit anyone he wished – Trotsky, Churchill, Russian peasants – and distorts reality. Already in 1946, George Orwell noted that fascism had degenerated to signify "something not desirable."

The passages are from Daniel Pipe's interesting, if somewhat overly effusive, review of Goldberg's book.  

Goldberg's triumph is establishing the kinship between communism, fascism, and liberalism. All derive from the same tradition that goes back to the Jacobins of the French Revolution. His revised political spectrum would focus on the role of the state and go from libertarianism to conservatism to fascism in its many guises – American, Italian, German, Russian, Chinese, Cuban, and so on.
 
I haven't yet read the book (I will), but Goldberg joins the ranks of cognoscenti, starting with Ayn Rand, Hilton Kramer, and Ann Coulter, who've been preaching this message for years.   As an aside,  I just yesterday ran across this testimony from the horse's very mouth.

Benito Mussolini -

The corporate State considers that private enterprise in the sphere of production is the most effective and useful instrument in the interest of the nation. In view of the fact that private organization of production is a function of national concern, the organizer of the enterprise is responsible to the State for the direction given to production. State intervention in economic production arises only when private initiative is lacking or insufficient, or when the political interests of the State are involved. This intervention may take the form of control, assistance or direct management.

5 comments:

Juice said...

Okay, my simple-simon brain hears these words spoken by Shrillary Clinton, while reading those words:

June 28, 2004
"Many of you are well enough off that ... the tax cuts may have helped you," Sen. Clinton said. "We're saying that for America to get back on track, we're probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good."

February 2, 2007
“I wanna take those profits and I wanna put them into a strategic energy fund that will begin to fund alternative smart energy, alternative and technologies that will begin to actually move us toward the direction of independence.”

God help us from the entire American Liberal.

Anonymous said...

and now a columnist for Newsweek,

Need I read anymore?

Anonymous said...

"Comrades! We must abolish the cult of the individual decisively, once and for all." --Nikita S. Khrushchev

"To be a socialist is to submit the I to the thou; socialism is sacrificing the individual to the whole." --Joseph Goebbels

"We must stop thinking of the individual and start thinking about what is best for society." --Hillary Clinton

What I want to know is when and why did conservatives begin calling individualist hating, state worshiping scum "liberals"?

Timbeaux said...

It's an argument that has been made for years, as you say. Fascism in its original sense was simply that private corporations owed their allegiance to the state, and therefore the state had the right to direct and even annex them under certain situations. It's main difference from communism being that the state was not interested in the direct control or planning of industry, as long as industry was getting the job done. Typically Italian, make them an offer they can't refuse....meet Mussolini's goals, the end justifies the means, or everything gets confiscated and given to someone who can get the job done.

So fascism wants control of the results and doesn't care about the methods, socialism wants control of the methods and doesn't care much about the results, communism wants control of both, and none of them have the slightest ethical compunctions. They're all power-mad and dangerous; hang 'em high.

Rodger the Real King of France said...

Fascism is communism only smarter.

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