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Author Topic:   Bush Admin - American Fascism
naiad
unregistered
posted August 15, 2007 12:53 AM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
The Reality of Red-State Fascism
by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.

Year's end is the time for big thoughts, so here are mine. The most significant socio-political shift in our time has gone almost completely unremarked, and even unnoticed. It is the dramatic shift of the red-state bourgeoisie from leave-us-alone libertarianism, manifested in the Congressional elections of 1994, to almost totalitarian statist nationalism. Whereas the conservative middle class once cheered the circumscribing of the federal government, it now celebrates power and adores the central state, particularly its military wing.

This huge shift has not been noticed among mainstream punditry, and hence there have been few attempts to explain it – much less have libertarians thought much about what it implies. My own take is this: the Republican takeover of the presidency combined with an unrelenting state of war, has supplied all the levers necessary to convert a burgeoning libertarian movement into a statist one.

The remaining ideological justification was left to, and accomplished by, Washington's kept think tanks, who have approved the turn at every crucial step. What this implies for libertarians is a crying need to draw a clear separation between what we believe and what conservatives believe. It also requires that we face the reality of the current threat forthrightly by extending more rhetorical tolerance leftward and less rightward.

Let us start from 1994 and work forward. In a stunningly prescient memo, Murray N. Rothbard described the 1994 revolution against the Democrats as follows:

a massive and unprecedented public repudiation of President Clinton, his person, his personnel, his ideologies and programs, and all of his works; plus a repudiation of Clinton's Democrat Party; and, most fundamentally, a rejection of the designs, current and proposed, of the Leviathan he heads…. what is being rejected is big government in general (its taxing, mandating, regulating, gun grabbing, and even its spending) and, in particular, its arrogant ambition to control the entire society from the political center. Voters and taxpayers are no longer persuaded of a supposed rationale for American-style central planning…. On the positive side, the public is vigorously and fervently affirming its desire to re-limit and de-centralize government; to increase individual and community liberty; to reduce taxes, mandates, and government intrusion; to return to the cultural and social mores of pre-1960s America, and perhaps much earlier than that.

This memo also cautioned against unrelieved optimism, because, Rothbard said, two errors rear their head in most every revolution. First, the reformers do not move fast enough; instead they often experience a crisis of faith and become overwhelmed by demands that they govern "responsibly" rather than tear down the established order. Second, the reformers leave too much in place that can be used by their successors to rebuild the state they worked so hard to dismantle. This permits gains to be reversed as soon as another party takes control.

Rothbard urged dramatic cuts in spending, taxing, and regulation, and not just in the domestic area but also in the military and in foreign policy. He saw that this was crucial to any small-government program. He also urged a dismantling of the federal judiciary on grounds that it represents a clear and present danger to American liberty. He urged the young radicals who were just elected to reject gimmicks like the balanced-budget amendment and the line-item veto, in favor of genuine change. None of this happened of course. In fact, the Republican leadership and pundit class began to warn against "kamikaze missions" and speak not of bringing liberty, but rather of governing better than others.

Foreshadowing what was to come, Rothbard pointed out: "Unfortunately, the conservative public is all too often taken in by mere rhetoric and fails to weigh the actual deeds of their political icons. So the danger is that Gingrich will succeed not only in betraying, but in conning the revolutionary public into thinking that they have already won and can shut up shop and go home." The only way to prevent this, he wrote, was to educate the public, businessmen, students, academics, journalists, and politicians about the true nature of what is going on, and about the vicious nature of the bi-partisan ruling elites.

The 1994 revolution failed of course, in part because the anti-government opposition was intimidated into silence by the Oklahoma City bombing of April 1995. The establishment somehow managed to pin the violent act of an ex-military man on the right-wing libertarianism of the American bourgeoisie. It was said by every important public official at that time that to be anti-government was to give aid and support to militias, secessionists, and other domestic terrorists. It was a classic intimidation campaign but, combined with a GOP leadership that never had any intention to change DC, it worked to shut down the opposition.

In the last years of the 1990s, the GOP-voting middle class refocused its anger away from government and leviathan and toward the person of Bill Clinton. It was said that he represented some kind of unique moral evil despoiling the White House. That ridiculous Monica scandal culminated in a pathetic and pretentious campaign to impeach Clinton. Impeaching presidents is a great idea, but impeaching them for fibbing about personal peccadilloes is probably the least justifiable ground. It's almost as if that entire campaign was designed to discredit the great institution of impeachment.

In any case, this event crystallized the partisanship of the bourgeoisie, driving home the message that the real problem was Clinton and not government; the immorality of the chief executive, not his power; the libertinism of the left-liberals and not their views toward government. The much heralded "leave us alone" coalition had been thoroughly transformed in a pure anti-Clinton movement. The right in this country began to define itself not as pro-freedom, as it had in 1994, but simply as anti-leftist, as it does today.

There are many good reasons to be anti-leftist, but let us revisit what Mises said in 1956 concerning the anti-socialists of his day. He pointed out that many of these people had a purely negative agenda, to crush the leftists and their bohemian ways and their intellectual pretension. He warned that this is not a program for freedom. It was a program of hatred that can only degenerate into statism.

The moral corruption, the licentiousness and the intellectual sterility of a class of lewd would-be authors and artists is the ransom mankind must pay lest the creative pioneers be prevented from accomplishing their work. Freedom must be granted to all, even to base people, lest the few who can use it for the benefit of mankind be hindered. The license which the shabby characters of the quartier Latin enjoyed was one of the conditions that made possible the ascendance of a few great writers, painters and sculptors. The first thing a genius needs is to breathe free air.

He goes on to urge that anti-leftists work to educate themselves about economics, so that they can have a positive agenda to displace their purely negative one. A positive agenda of liberty is the only way we might have been spared the blizzard of government controls that were fastened on this country after Bush used the events of 9-11 to increase central planning, invade Afghanistan and Iraq, and otherwise bring a form of statism to America that makes Clinton look laissez-faire by comparison. The Bush administration has not only faced no resistance from the bourgeoisie. it has received cheers. And they are not only cheering Bush's reelection; they have embraced tyrannical control of society as a means toward accomplishing their anti-leftist ends.

After September 11, even those whose ostensible purpose in life is to advocate less government changed their minds. Even after it was clear that 9-11 would be used as the biggest pretense for the expansion of government since the stock market crash of 1929, the Cato Institute said that libertarianism had to change its entire focus: "Libertarians usually enter public debates to call for restrictions on government activity. In the wake of September 11, we have all been reminded of the real purpose of government: to protect our life, liberty, and property from violence. This would be a good time for the federal government to do its job with vigor and determination."

The vigor and determination of the Bush administration has brought about a profound cultural change, so that the very people who once proclaimed hated of government now advocate its use against dissidents of all sorts, especially against those who would dare call for curbs in the totalitarian bureaucracy of the military, or suggest that Bush is something less than infallible in his foreign-policy decisions. The lesson here is that it is always a mistake to advocate government action, for there is no way you can fully anticipate how government will be used. Nor can you ever count on a slice of the population to be moral in its advocacy of the uses of the police power.

Editor & Publisher, for example, posted a small note the other day about a column written by Al Neuharth, the founder of USA Today, in which he mildly suggested that the troops be brought home from Iraq "sooner rather than later." The editor of E&P was just blown away by the letters that poured in, filled with venom and hate and calling for Neuharth to be tried and locked away as a traitor. The letters compared him with pro-Hitler journalists, and suggested that he was objectively pro-terrorist, choosing to support the Muslim jihad over the US military. Other letters called for Neuharth to get the death penalty for daring to take issue with the Christian leaders of this great Christian nation.

I'm actually not surprised at this. It has been building for some time. If you follow hate-filled sites such as Free Republic, you know that the populist right in this country has been advocating nuclear holocaust and mass bloodshed for more than a year now. The militarism and nationalism dwarfs anything I saw at any point during the Cold War. It celebrates the shedding of blood, and exhibits a maniacal love of the state. The new ideology of the red-state bourgeoisie seems to actually believe that the US is God marching on earth – not just godlike, but really serving as a proxy for God himself.

Along with this goes a kind of worship of the presidency, and a celebration of all things public sector, including egregious law like the Patriot Act, egregious bureaucracies like the Department of Homeland Security, and egregious centrally imposed regimentation like the No Child Left Behind Act. It longs for the state to throw its weight behind institutions like the two-parent heterosexual family, the Christian charity, the homogeneous community of native-born patriots.

In 1994, the central state was seen by the bourgeoisie as the main threat to the family; in 2004 it is seen as the main tool for keeping the family together and ensuring its ascendancy. In 1994, the state was seen as the enemy of education; today, the same people view the state as the means of raising standards and purging education of its left-wing influences. In 1994, Christians widely saw that Leviathan was the main enemy of the faith; today, they see Leviathan as the tool by which they will guarantee that their faith will have an impact on the country and the world.

Paul Craig Roberts is right: "In the ranks of the new conservatives, however, I see and experience much hate. It comes to me in violently worded, ignorant and irrational emails from self-professed conservatives who literally worship George Bush. Even Christians have fallen into idolatry. There appears to be a large number of Americans who are prepared to kill anyone for George Bush." Again: "Like Brownshirts, the new conservatives take personally any criticism of their leader and his policies. To be a critic is to be an enemy."

In short, what we have alive in the US is an updated and Americanized fascism. Why fascist? Because it is not leftist in the sense of egalitarian or redistributionist. It has no real beef with business. It doesn't sympathize with the downtrodden, labor, or the poor. It is for all the core institutions of bourgeois life in America: family, faith, and flag. But it sees the state as the central organizing principle of society, views public institutions as the most essential means by which all these institutions are protected and advanced, and adores the head of state as a godlike figure who knows better than anyone else what the country and world's needs, and has a special connection to the Creator that permits him to discern the best means to bring it about.

The American right today has managed to be solidly anti-leftist while adopting an ideology – even without knowing it or being entirely conscious of the change – that is also frighteningly anti-liberty. This reality turns out to be very difficult for libertarians to understand or accept. For a long time, we've tended to see the primary threat to liberty as coming from the left, from the socialists who sought to control the economy from the center. But we must also remember that the sweep of history shows that there are two main dangers to liberty, one that comes from the left and the other that comes from the right. Europe and Latin America have long faced the latter threat, but its reality is only now hitting us fully.

What is the most pressing and urgent threat to freedom that we face in our time? It is not from the left. If anything, the left has been solid on civil liberties and has been crucial in drawing attention to the lies and abuses of the Bush administration. No, today, the clear and present danger to freedom comes from the right side of the ideological spectrum, those people who are pleased to preserve most of free enterprise but favor top-down management of society, culture, family, and school, and seek to use a messianic and belligerent nationalism to impose their vision of politics on the world.

There is no need to advance the view that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. However, it is time to recognize that the left today does represent a counterweight to the right, just as it did in the 1950s when the right began to adopt anti-communist militarism as its credo. In a time when the term patriotism means supporting the nation's wars and statism, a libertarian patriotism has more in common with that advanced by The Nation magazine:

The other company of patriots does not march to military time. It prefers the gentle strains of 'America the Beautiful' to the strident cadences of 'Hail to the Chief' and 'The Stars and Stripes Forever.' This patriotism is rooted in the love of one's own land and people, love too of the best ideals of one's own culture and tradition. This company of patriots finds no glory in puffing their country up by pulling others' down. This patriotism is profoundly municipal, even domestic. Its pleasures are quiet, its services steady and unpretentious. This patriotism too has deep roots and long continuity in our history.

Ten years ago, these were "right wing" sentiments; today the right regards them as treasonous. What should this teach us? It shows that those who saw the interests of liberty as being well served by the politicized proxies of free enterprise alone, family alone, Christianity alone, law and order alone, were profoundly mistaken. There is no proxy for liberty, no cause that serves as a viable substitute, and no movement by any name whose success can yield freedom in our time other than the movement of freedom itself. We need to embrace liberty and liberty only, and not be fooled by groups or parties or movements that only desire a temporary liberty to advance their pet interests.

As Rothbard said in 1965:

The doctrine of liberty contains elements corresponding with both contemporary left and right. This means in no sense that we are middle-of-the-roaders, eclectically trying to combine, or step between, both poles; but rather that a consistent view of liberty includes concepts that have also become part of the rhetoric or program of right and of left. Hence a creative approach to liberty must transcend the confines of contemporary political shibboleths.

There has never in my lifetime been a more urgent need for the party of liberty to completely secede from conventional thought and established institutions, especially those associated with all aspects of government, and undertake radical intellectual action on behalf of a third way that rejects the socialism of the left and the fascism of the right.

Indeed, the current times can be seen as a training period for all true friends of liberty. We need to learn to recognize the many different guises in which tyranny appears. Power is protean because it must suppress that impulse toward liberty that exists in the hearts of all people. The impulse is there, tacitly waiting for the consciousness to dawn. When it does, power doesn’t stand a chance.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/rockwell/red-state-fascism.html

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beebuddy
unregistered
posted August 16, 2007 08:38 PM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
I concur that the current trend seems somewhat fascist. What I want to see is a new party that is not far left or right. What we need, when it comes to government involvement in industry, is small government. What we need, when it comes to education and health care, is some government.

I am ranting because of this new stuff found in the patriot act that gives the the feds the right to expedite executions. WTF does 9/11 have to do with expediting executions in states with moratoriums on them?

It makes no sense and it scares me.

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Johnny
Newflake

Posts: 0
From: Egypt
Registered: Apr 2010

posted August 17, 2007 01:12 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Johnny     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
I am ranting because of this new stuff found in the patriot act that gives the the feds the right to expedite executions. WTF does 9/11 have to do with expediting executions in states with moratoriums on them?

It makes no sense and it scares me.


Gets rather scarier if you look at the (vast) evidence that it wasn't the work of Arabs who 'hate our freedoms.'

You can watch Terror Storm by Alex Jones on Google Video - great documentary on the history of state sponsored terrorism as a means of affecting political change.

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TINK
unregistered
posted August 17, 2007 01:19 PM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
I am ranting because of this new stuff found in the patriot act that gives the the feds the right to expedite executions. WTF does 9/11 have to do with expediting executions in states with moratoriums on them?

beebuddy ~ I haven't seen you around in a while. I'm glad you're back and I'm awfully glad you brought that up. I had the same reaction. I believe we would all be very foolish, irresponsible even, to continue to doubt were this is all headed. I don't favor a rush to judgment, but the evidence is mounting at an alarming rate.

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jwhop
Knowflake

Posts: 2787
From: Madeira Beach, FL USA
Registered: Apr 2009

posted August 17, 2007 01:59 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for jwhop     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
The evidence is mounting there are hate groups in the US willing to make lying allegations about anything and everything without a bit of evidence...among them are Daily Dos, Move on, Rockwell, Paul Roberts and a cadre of leftist bloggers, fruit loops nut cases, newpapers, networks, the DNC and demoscat candidates.

With friends like these, American needs no external enemies.

What's truly sad is there are some who cannot separate the bullshiiit from the truth..or whom, for political purposes, don't give a rat's ass what the truth is.

These same people never seem to wonder why...given their own convictions that America is a police state...they never seem to wonder why those whom they see as speaking out are still walking around the streets of America.

The reality is...that if some right here lived in the former Soviet Union, Cuba, North Korea, Vietnam or one of the other communist police states, like Saddam's Iraq for instance...you would already have been shot or in the alternative...you would be in a re-education camp being concurrently worked and starved to death.

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Mirandee
unregistered
posted August 17, 2007 10:09 PM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Stay tuned, Jwhop. While those who speak out against Bush are still walking the streets now, keep in mind that under Bush's new presidential directives over the past three months, at any given time that could change should Bush declare himself dictator by deeming anything of his choosing a "national emergency." All power would be his and Congress or any other Branch of government has no say as under his PD they have to relinquish all power to him alone.

Ask yourself, Jwhop, has any other president in the history of this nation sent out a presidential directive such as this one that gives one man sole power and abolishes the Constitution which established a system of checks and balance in this country? Does that sound like a democracy to you?

Our biggest threat does lie within this country. But it's not from the liberals or anyone else other than G W Bush and his administration. They are this nation's biggest threats. They are the biggest threat to democracy. They are the real terrorists.

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Johnny
Newflake

Posts: 0
From: Egypt
Registered: Apr 2010

posted August 18, 2007 12:08 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Johnny     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
America's biggest problem is not political dissenters or 'demoscat' ( ) candidates, but those who allow their feel-good pseudo-patriotism to blind them to all viewpoints but those sympathetic to their own.

Those who do not learn from history... I've yet to see any real explanation for W199-EYE, the collapse of Building 7, the stand-down of NORAD, or any of the other 'red flag' events of 9/11/01, which led to the passage of the Patriot Act (which was written well in advance of the 'New Pearl Harbor' event itself.

Governments are by their nature oppressive and corrupt. Just look at the Gulf of Tonkin incident. It is the citizens' duty to be vigilant.

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naiad
unregistered
posted August 18, 2007 07:27 AM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
"What's truly sad is there are some who cannot separate the bullshiiit from the truth..or whom, for political purposes, don't give a rat's ass what the truth is."

right on, brother...

"the Patriot Act (which was written well in advance of the 'New Pearl Harbor' event itself."

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naiad
unregistered
posted August 18, 2007 07:58 AM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
interesting....Llewellyn Rockwewll is the founder of the Mises institute -- Ludwig von Mises... http://www.mises.org/

"For Mises was able to demonstrate (a) that the expansion of free markets, the division of labor, and private capital investment is the only possible path to the prosperity and flourishing of the human race; (b) that socialism would be disastrous for a modern economy because the absence of private ownership of land and capital goods prevents any sort of rational pricing, or estimate of costs, and (c) that government intervention, in addition to hampering and crippling the market, would prove counter-productive and cumulative, leading inevitably to socialism unless the entire tissue of interventions was repealed."

and Eleanore quotes him in support of her socialist tirade and Jwhop ~

quote:
( http://www.linda-goodman.com/ubb/Forum16/HTML/003530.html )

Wages are not paid for labor expended, but for the achievements of labor, which differ widely in quality and quantity.

MISES, LUDWIG VON, Human Action: A Treatise on Economics, Action Within the World


No socialist author ever gave a thought to the possibility that the abstract entity which he wants to vest with unlimited power—whether it is called humanity, society, nation, state, or government—could act in a way of which he himself disapproves.

MISES, LUDWIG VON, Human Action: A Treatise on Economics

Socialism is not in the least what it pretends to be. It is not the pioneer of a better and finer world, but the spoiler of what thousands of years of civilization have created. It does not build, it destroys. For destruction is the essence of it. It produces nothing, it only consumes what the social order based on private ownership in the means of production has created.

MISES, LUDWIG VON, Socialism


another of her supporting statements is from Frederic Bastiat ~

quote:
Socialism...confuses the distinction between government and society. As a result of this, every time we object to a thing being done by government, the socialists conclude that we object to its being done at all.

BASTIAT, FREDERIC, The Law


...who is featured on the Mises institute (founded by Rockwell) website as a great economist.

yet here, the very same Rockwell is referenced by the insulting Jwhop in the following manner ~

quote:
The evidence is mounting there are hate groups in the US willing to make lying allegations about anything and everything without a bit of evidence...among them are Daily Dos, Move on, Rockwell, Paul Roberts and a cadre of leftist bloggers, fruit loops nut cases, newpapers, networks, the DNC and demoscat candidates.

so who is actually lying? is it the anti-communist economists and libertarians....is it Eleanore, and/or the esteemed Jwhop....?? it does seem that the vehemence and disinformation has yet again, contradicted and discredited itself in an attempt to obfuscate and confuse...and direct the focus in whatever way possible, away from the reality of the creeping fascism.

the goal is the avoidance of any totalitarian form of authoritarianism, and it is totaliarianism that Jwhop is confusing with the terms "leftist" and "socialist." the reason -- to deflect the reality of the totalitarian and fascist state in the making. by identifying fascism with "leftism", they think it possible to remove the fascist label from the current political climate. it's simply a disinformation, deflection tactic.

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jwhop
Knowflake

Posts: 2787
From: Madeira Beach, FL USA
Registered: Apr 2009

posted August 18, 2007 02:51 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for jwhop     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Non patriotism has been duly noted.

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naiad
unregistered
posted August 18, 2007 07:56 PM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
lol....fascism in action.

undeniable, isn't it?

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Johnny
Newflake

Posts: 0
From: Egypt
Registered: Apr 2010

posted August 18, 2007 11:02 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Johnny     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Non patriotism has been duly noted.

Loving a country and loving the government of that country aren't necessarily the same thing.

The Constitution made America the greatest country in the world; anything that subverts it is unpatriotic practically by definition. If the 'terrorists' hated our freedoms, the passage of the Patriot Act could only be a victory to them.

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ListensToTrees
unregistered
posted August 19, 2007 04:32 AM           Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Non patriotism has been duly noted.

One day we'll be able to have discussions rather than arguments by just discussing the facts; weighing ALL of the facts up. Throwing personal insults at people, however subtle, take all involved away from this one goal.

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Eleanore
Moderator

Posts: 112
From: Okinawa, Japan
Registered: Apr 2009

posted August 19, 2007 06:32 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Eleanore     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
One day we'll be able to have discussions rather than arguments by just discussing the facts; weighing ALL of the facts up. Throwing personal insults at people, however subtle, take all involved away from this one goal.

Pull up a chair and bring some snacks, maybe a few books and some blankets, too. It's been a long wait so far. But one day ...

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