Really? Because I’m always hearing how liberals have two different standards depending on if you’re a Democrat or a Republican. Good to hear that isn’t true and they treat everyone the same. I’ll be sure to refer back to this whenever somebody makes that claim in the future.
The important thing to keep in mind is that Reagan himself was a Nazi. Don’t believe me? Well, follow along.
As we’ve seen in this thread, if you ever belong to a political movement, you belong to it for life. Nobody ever converts.
Ronald Reagan was a self-admitted Democrat in his younger days. So that means he remained a Democrat all of his life.
As we know, all Democrats are liberals. And all liberals are socialists. So Reagan was a socialist.
And Reagan himself pointed out that socialists are Nazis. So Reagan was confessing that he was a Nazi.
So you tell your friend he shouldn’t believe any lies a dirty stinking Nazi said.
You are correct - IME even liberals who put a toe off the reservation tend to trigger the barrage. Witness the university president who mentioned that maybe women aren’t as good at math as men on average.
To the truly fanatic, there are two types of people - True Believers, and heretics. Or in this case, liberals, and RACISTBIGOTFASCISTHOMOPHOBEs.
Regards,
Shodan
Shodan, I thought you were better than this straw-man bullshit. Guess I was wrong.
Also bullshit. I’m an anarchist who routinely deviates from liberal orthodoxy, yet I have never been called a bigot. Lot’s of other insults, but never a racist or a bigot. I did get called an anti-Semite once, but I was telling Holocaust jokes at the time so that was probably a fair cop. Maybe you could try not saying bigoted things?
(assuming you’re talking about Lawrence Summers)
I know! He was actually publicly criticized! People actually spoke up and disagreed with him! Some were even angry and might have used naughty words! It was TERRIBLE! What a barrage of people disagreeing with him that Summers faced! He then faced a future of estrangement from all possibility of association with liberals by being appointed to an advisor position by noted non-liberal Barack Obama.
Truly, Summers is a cautionary tale for all liberals – disagree with “liberal orthodoxy” and you may get appointed to an advisor position by incredibly conservative Presidents like Barack Obama.
In the context of U.S.A., it’s silly to use the ambiguous words “liberal” and “conservative” as a starting point. Let’s just compare Fascism with each of the two major parties.
Neither the Democrats nor the Republicans are even remotely a close match to Fascism. But it still may be informative to see which comes closer. Many Americans are “populists” outside either party’s mold, but the recent election demonstrates that this (“Trumpist”) group should be considered part of the GOP.
The Democrats are much more inclined than the GOP to favor government regulations, but it’s incorrect to think of this as a main hallmark of “Fascism.” In Fascist societies, government regulation is often directed at enhancing the power of the party’s business allies — which American Party does this call to mind?
Fascists tend to emphasize trade protectionism and nationalism, even focusing on a preferred “race.” Clearly these are attributes of Trumpism/GOP. And note that Benito Mussolini once said that ***Fascism “affirms the irremediable, fruitful and beneficent inequality of men.”***Clearly this sentiment is diametrically opposed to liberal thought, but strongly attuned to much GOP sentiment.
Fascists seek a personality cult and one-party rule. Both Trump and Bush-43 put themselves on a pedestal (Bush: “I trust God speaks through me. … If this were a dictatorship, it’d be a heck of a lot easier, just so long as I’m the dictator”); the Democrats do not similarly advance personality cults (despite contrary prattle on talk-shows). The Democrats frequently speak of bipartisanship, while the GOP has been adamant about destroying the Democrats. Thing like Hastert Rule are intended to keep GOP focused on single-party solutions. Refusal of any Democratic input on Trumpcare is another example: GOP input was welcomed for ACA, so much so that the program strongly resembles Romneycare. It is the GOP which seeks and would welcome one-party rule.
It is the GOP which wants a strong military and is more eager to intervene overseas. It views foreign affairs from a nationalist perspective, not a humanitarian one. This is the Fascist perspective.
Neither of America’s major parties fits closely with “Fascism.” But the GOP is far far closer.
So capitalism is authoritarian and communism is liberty. Got it; welcome aboard, comrade!
I’m an old middle class rural straight white man. Heck, I was a prison guard. I’ve lived in Texas. I’m like the literal embodiment of The Man. (One of my friends asked me how I felt about the election the day after because she assumed I must be a Trump supporter.)
But I’ve never had anyone call me a racist or a bigot.
Since we are trotting out the straw army, you are driving home from a visit to baristaville, and after a scone and three hefty cappuccinos, your back teeth are floating. Finally, you can no longer take it, so you happen to stop in front of my house and relieve yourself on my front porch. You are doing whatever you want, and I am not so keen on it, but, hey, liberty, I can got fuck myself.
Because, you see, liberty is a finite resource. You practicing your electric bass at full volume impinges on my freedom to not be exposed to that aggravating thump of part of a song. Without a reasonable sprinkling of personal responsibility, whatever-you-want-liberty ends up being chaos. But, I guess, me wanting others to not be wanton assholes works out to some kind of authoritarianism.
All this oppressive regulation and bureaucracy is there for a reason. We do not have rules, codes and laws just for the sake of making your life miserable. I suspect that part of the problem may be that the laws are written and enforced in ways that lead to the letter of the law fucking things up sometimes, because your particular situation might not quite align with where the intent is supposed to be. That is something we might consider trying to address. But simply tossing out huge chunks of legal code because sometimes it seems to fail is a recipe for not improving things.
There’s a reason that neo-fascism is called the Far Right and not the Far Left.
*Conservatives *want government to leave people alone? Since when?
For certain values of people.
Any school of thought that countenances dictatorship, be it right wing, left wing or other, is deep down, objectively and essentially fascist. Any notion of the masses being led by a dictatorial/totalitarian party or individual, who seek absolute power through violence, oppression, while scapegoating or demonizing other groups is fascist. It does not matter what the ideology of the group in power happens to be, if they possess these characteristics, they are fascist. It’s a myth that fascism must be right wing only. Both Hitler and Mussolini started out as Left oriented socialists, then once they became involved with the more right wing industrialists of the time, they gravitated towards the right. However, Nazism is a type of fascism which espouses racial hatred, namely anti-Semitic, while promoting Aryan racial superiority. This is not generic fascism. It has been surmised by some scholars, that Stalin was not just a Communist, but was essentially fascist when you look at how he ruled the Soviet Union. Considering the purges, scapegoating and becoming an absolute totalitarian ruler. Instead of racial purity, it was ideological superiority that Stalin championed. Using brutality, oppression and murder to gain and hold power. There was an obvious form of ‘Soviet’ nationalism which Stalin also espoused. This could be said of many other despots who have acted similarly in their given country in modern times, mostly Leftists, with only a smattering of right wing dictators.
You seem to think “fascism” is the generic term for totalitarian-authoritarian regimes. It’s not. It is indelectably linked with Italy (and Germany) and WWI through WWII.
It is a specific term. It has a specific meaning, context, value and form. If you want a generic term, use totalitarianism. It is the word that specifically communicates and highlights the similarities between Italian fascism, German Nazism and Soviet communism.
I’m not exactly sure what point you’re making here. There is certainly one widely-used meaning of the word “communism” – albeit, not the only meaning – under which the U.S.S.R. (when it existed) would have been considered a communist country. And yet, Stalin didn’t abolish the State. Khrushchev didn’t abolish the State. Etc.
In Fascism regulations are not designed to enhance the power of business allies but to use business as a tool of government.
The GOP does not embrace inequality of man, it is the liberals who draw up classes of people and then want the law to treat them differently.
If you don’t think there was no personality cult around Obama, you were not paying attention. As bad as Trump is there was no celebration and weepingwhen he won. Celebrities will never make sappy tributes to Trump. Children won’t be taught songs of praise to Trump.
Democrats frequently speak of bipartisanship but never practice it. They voted for Obamacare as a group and opposed Trumpcare as a group.
Democrats have no problem intervening overseas in Libya, Iraq, Serbia, Afghanistan, and Syria.
Good grief - this is a freaking Gish gallop in action.
In what Bizarro world are you living? The GOP revel in the inequality of man, and have actively engaged in implementing legislation that facilitates discrimination against various groups, including gays, Muslims, women, and blacks. If you’re playing the “liberals are the real bigots for pointing out conservative bigotry” card here then there’s no reasoning with that.
People were happy about Obama being elected after eight years of watching the Bush administration damage the country, and about a black man finally succeeding to the Presidency. That does not in itself constitute a “personality cult”. Likewise the lack of celebrities paying tribute to Trump isn’t an indicator that he’s less fascist than Obama.
However, what we got instead of “celebration and weeping” after Trump’s election was a spike in hate crimes against women and minorities. Frankly I’ll take celebration and weeping if it’s all the same to you.
Oh, and about children singing songs: did you forget about the USA Freedom Kids, who sang about America crushing its enemies?
Yeah, that wasn’t remotely fascist at all.
Number of Republican amendments incorporated into Obamacare: 161.
Number of Democratic amendments incorporated into Trumpcare: 0.
Do you genuinely believe the things you post, puddleglum, or do you just hope we will?
I know enough history to point out that business owners did know that the option then in the 1930’s was to have the ownership of their business to disappear under the communists. What took place was that many business then did not mind much to become a tool of the fascist government when many did like the results under a fascist regime (like the Nazi government getting rid of unions).
For all you Lefty Libs who seem to be under the mistaken assumption that Leftist Libs cannot be fascist, you should read Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg! I personally don’t care whether you agree or not, that’s your choice. Libs are being fascist in America today! 
Welcome to the Dope! If you’d like to engage with people who disagree on a substantive level, and offer reasonable and thoughtful critiques and disagreements, we stand ready to engage with you as well.