Seems Jonah Goldberg’s new book, Liberal Fascism, has come under a concentrated attack from David Neiwert, last seen here arguing to redefine masculinity along essentially partisan political lines (though naturally, and in keeping with what is his nearly inveterate dogmatism, he missed the thrust of his own analysis).
I haven’t yet read Jonah’s book, though the excerpts I’ve read seem diligently researched and forcefully argued — which, ironically, were we not living in an age of Liberal Fascism, would provide the intellectual basis for a serious political discussion rather than a determined smear campaign by those on the left so fearful of having a cherished identity marker (“Liberal”) tethered to a signifier they themselves presume to wield against their political enemies (“fascism”) that they have been driven to near frenzy in their efforts to dismiss the book out of hand.
None of which is to say that I necessarily agree with all that Jonah writes; again, I haven’t yet read the book (if you’re reading this, Jonah, howsabout sending me a review copy?), so I can’t comment on how effectively he sustains the book’s central argument(s). But given that I have myself long identified in the modern progressive movement (and, too, the modern social conservative movement) the trappings of fascism — on the tactical and metaphorical levels, if not strictly on the level of precise historical analogy — I suspect I’d find a lot with which to agree.
Whether that helps Jonah’s cause or not is another matter entirely.
At any rate, I emailed Jonah with my thoughts on Neiwert, which he reprinted on his Liberal Fascism blog. Nothing new there, really — and Jonah already responded quite effectively. But worth a reminder, nonetheless.
Jeff, I have not read the book either, but I believe that Goldberg’s thesis is that “Liberalism†(not the classical kind) and “Progressivism†(as in the movement) actually were coterminous with the fascisms of the past Century. National Socialist movements, were opposed by the International Socialist movements (i.e. Commies) as an impediment to full International Socialist realization. It is the International Socialist movements that classified the National Socialist movements as “right wing,†I suppose because they were to the right of the Internationalists, and in order to smear them as not sufficiently Socialist for the workers of the world. So, in effect, the modern association of Nazis with the “right†by Leftists is, in fact, an adoption of the International Socialist taxonomy – interesting, that.
Having said this, I cannot fathom how you could see elements of fascism in at least the mainstream of the social conservative movement. “I hope things don’t change too much, too fast†doesn’t track with fascism from where I sit.
The “liberal” response to “Liberal Fascism” is yet the latest in a decades-old string of examples of manic, whirling-dervishness that prove Jonah’s thesis.
My favorite piece of Teh Outrage is an apparent effort to ensure that google searches for “Liberal Fascism” turn up the urbandictionary.com definition of “Fuckwad” (guess who that is). The sales numbers speak for themselves. The suppression campaign is, fortunately, as abject a failure as collectivism itself.
I’m a little over a third through the book. It’s fascinating.
I mean, say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.
“I mean, say what you like about the tenets of National Socialism, Dude, at least it’s an ethos.”
Sometimes I just replace “Juden” with “privileged” and vice versa. It kind of works – at least on the rhetorical level.
“I hope things don’t change too much, too fast — and to facilitate that, I will call on the power of the state to oppose free trade, legislate certain ideas of morality, etc.”, seems a more appropriate formulation. And of course, there’s the Huckabee idea of reshaping the Constitution to fit Christ’s will.
I am not indicting social conservatism as a whole. Just certain of their tactics, which track with certain tactics on the progressive left.
““I hope things don’t change too much, too fast  and to facilitate that, I will call on the power of the state to oppose free trade, legislate certain ideas of morality, etc.â€Â, seems a more appropriate formulation. And of course, there’s the Huckabee idea of reshaping the Constitution to fit Christ’s will.”
Very well, Jeff, but legislating morality or somesuch is not unique or even necessary to fascism. I would argue that all law is morality – perhaps not correct morality – but morality nonetheless. You would then have to cede that Eisenhower or Kennedy’s America was wholly fascist in order to hold that those who would seek to return things to the status quo ante have fascist tendencies.
I don’t equate fascism to the exercise of law and authority, which I believe is the too-loose definition Leftists use in order to stretch the term fascism over anything that they don’t like.
Even Huckabee’s comments submit to the authority of the Constitution – he argues that we amend the Constitution through its own process, with ratification, rather than simply ignoring that which we don’t like and pretending that things are in it that are not. Now, I doubt I would vote for Huckabee as Dog Catcher, but there is a lot more respect for process therein than I have ever seen from our Pinko friends.
Good to see you back posting Jeff, you’ve been missed.
Recent Documents from Health Care Task Force demonstrate politics of personal destruction as practiced by your so-called Liberal Fascists.
Fuehrer Hillary possess cult of personality — those around her (such as Carville, Bubba, Bugalla — willing to shift your government from democracy to socialism — national socialism.
Say it, Dan Corrins!
Nationar sociarism!
I don’t have the time to rehash the whole “all law is morality” debate, which has been covered here, nor do I have the time to write detailed disquisitions on every complaint I have about certain tendencies within the social conservative movement that I equate with the kinds of totalitarian impulses that underpin fascism. Is Pat Buchanan a social conservative? Is he an America firster? I’m interested in the tendencies in fascism that move toward suppression of dissent (I’ll point you to some of the social conservative attempts toward “decency” codes) and severe economic and social regimentation. And of course, the elevation of the collective above the individual — which is found on both sides of the culture wars (though yes, social conservatives are less likely to rely on the courts to demand change).
Clearly, I am not saying social conservatives are fascists — simply that some of their tactics can be considered fascistic, just as many of the tactics favored by progressives are fascistic. The difference being that progressivism is practically built around a fascist mentality, with the transnational collective government taking the place of the traditional state.
Fascism, evolved for the global market.
What will Liberal Fascists do about all dem social cons who are worshipping together with Liberal Fascist’s and their Cult of Perpetual St. Goracle, savior of our planet and all living things?
I haven’t read the book either. I clearly need to; it looks fascinating.
The definite identity of National Socialism with Fascism is an artifact of the Anschluss, the alliance of Germany with Italy. They are, in fact, somewhat distinct. The essence of Fascism is the assumption that an ideal is realized in actuality — that the State and its machinery is the essence of the Community it rules. It then follows that the machinery of the State can and should be used to enforce (and reinforce) community values, and in that sense things like morality legislation can legitimately be described as “Fascist”. What is not legitimate is confounding such measures with the social and economic control measures characteristic of socialism, whether National or International.
Had Benito not thrown in with Adolf, fascism today would be recognized for what it is, the extreme case of populism. The German Nazis were not fascists; they were socialists, neither more nor less than the German version of Stalinists — “True Socialism in One Country.” The difference may be subtle, but it is no less a difference for that.
Regards,
Ric
I just got the book in the mail yesterday (it’s a little hard to get these days) and have read the forward or the preface or whatever.
My first impression of the rhetoric is that he is making some pretty sweeping claims about the connection with contemporary SecProggs, especially given the difficulty in defining Fascism in the first place, because it had so many flavor and varieties in the first half of the 20th century.
So I’ll have to read the rest to see how he makes his case.
“I don’t equate fascism to the exercise of law and authority, which I believe is the too-loose definition Leftists use in order to stretch the term fascism over anything that they don’t like.”
That’s part of it (anything they don’t like), and in my mind, it’s the definition I associate with common usage: you’re a fascist if you’re too authoritarian and are willing to use the levers of state power to enforce your narrow definition of what is good on the rest of us.
However, given that it was the Soviets who redefined fascism as anything they didn’t like, and given that they were every bit as authoritarian as the Nazis, you can excise the authoritarian part from it. Most kids on the street who scream fascist are referring to the authoritarian part of it, but the Soviets and the SecProggs probably aren’t.
The definition he uses, IIRC (book at home, me at work), is that fascism is a secular religion wherein the State is God. There’s a controlling dream or aesthetic or theme or somesuch (nationalism, worker’s paradise, master race) toward which the whole society is expected to work, and if you don’t go along with it, you’re a hated Enemy who must be purged from the body politic.
The term “totalitarian,” coined by Mussolini, means an all-encompassing state of affairs in which everyone is included, everyone is taken care of, all are united toward one goal, andâ€â€this is where the modern SecProggs come inâ€â€the government is involved in every minute aspect of your life.
The “nanny state” is a soft form of this kind of totalitarianism, minus the jack-booted militarism, genocidal racism, gulags, or other extreme manifestations of totalitarianism that we’ve come to associate with “totalitarian.”
In Franco’s Spain, men and women were expected to strive toward an ideal represented in Fernando and Isabella, whose real, historical personalities were subsumed by Franco’s idea of the perfect person.
So the fascist government sees itself as the Ultimate Caretaker, dictating what you eat, how much you excercise, how you think, where you live, what you learn, what you believe  FOR YOUR OWN GOOD!
The fascist government is also headed by a charismatic figure who mysteriously embodies the will of the people, and therefore is the embodied soul of the collective spirit of the nation, social class, or whatever formed the core of the mythical identity of the people. The charismatic figure is surrounded by benign experts who know intuitively what the people want and what’s best for them (always the same thing, dontcha know).
Ergo, Stalin, Castro, Chávez, Kim Jong Il, Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Mao, and all others of their ilk, are fascists. Communists are a type of fascist. Nazis are a type of fascist. Maoists are a type of fascist.
So anyone who wants to “make the world a better place” by putting the government in charge of the minutae of people’s lives has fascistic tendencies, at best, and is a fully fledged fascist at worst. They’re all committed do-gooders, which is why the book cover features a smiley face.
Hey, Jonah:
If you’re reading this, drop me a line to arrange a review copy also. I’m not paying for your weak crap, but I’ll humiliate you at your expense if that’s what you really want.
“My first impression of the rhetoric is that he is making some pretty sweeping claims about the connection with contemporary SecProggs, especially given the difficulty in defining Fascism in the first place, because it had so many flavor and varieties in the first half of the 20th century.”
That is my problem with this whole kerfuffle: Fascism has become impossible to define thus to me is a meaningless term. As I posted in a discussion on this over at SEKs place, I personally would like to see the word abolished. It has become nothing but a debate killer.
I haven’t read the book either. I clearly need to; it looks fascinating.
The Liberal Fascist reactionaries piqued my interest in the book and put at the top of my list.
I agree,Jeff. D.Neiwert demolishes the stupid sloppy Jonah’s book quite handily
So B Moe, you’re saying it’s become a corollary to Godwin’s Law/reductio ad Hitlerum? ‘Cause I’m down with that.
The trolls are digging deep for the bottom of the pit of stupid today.
Jonah gets into that in some detail. His assertion is there’s a sort of “family tree” of totalitarianisms of the 20th Century, with Marxism at the root, and international socialism and national socialism splitting from that. National socialism split into essentially three — Italian fascism, German Naziism, and American Progressivism. There were major differences (racial identity wasn’t as critical in Italian fascism as in German Naziism, for example), but the three cross-pollinated ideas.
Thus you had American Progressives citing Nazi economic policies with approval, and Nazis citing Progressive eugenics proposals with approval, and all three citing various Soviet policies with approval.
And, today, you have “liberals” citing Nazi philosophers with approval while lauding Progressive eugenicists and, like Mussolini, Hitler, and FDR, claiming to have a “Third Way” that will solve all our problems and allow us to get back at the folks who “betrayed” us.
“So B Moe, you’re saying it’s become a corollary to Godwin’s Law/reductio ad Hitlerum? ‘Cause I’m down with that.”
The only solid definition I have found is the economic one: industry is privately owned and state controlled, which makes sense, and describes progressives to a tee. But it only seems to ever be used in a political sense, and no one is able to agree on what defines it politically, and there are many more precise terms available to describe the attributes typically cited. The only reason fascism is used is for the emotional impact, and to stymie rational response. Like charges of racism, it is inevitably used to kill a discussion rather than contribute anything.
For lo, they did dig too deep and didst awaken Niewert’s Bane, the Balrog of Colorado.
…Which is quite a feat, given the facts we know about Colorado from John Hodgman’s invaluable tome of knowledge:
is an artifact of the Anschluss, the alliance of Germany with Italy.
Except Anschluss was the German-Austrian linkup into a single nation in 1938 (the German takeover of Austria):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anschluss
is an artifact of the Anschluss, the alliance of Germany with Italy.
Except Anschluss was the German-Austrian linkup into a single nation in 1938 (the German takeover of Austria).
Sorry for doubling up; thought the first one didn’t take.
Quite right, John; thanks for the correction.
It’s still the German-Italian alliance (“the world turns on a new axis!”) that results in the modern ability to identify fascism with Naziism. The two share some important features, but the underlying philosophy is different — they get to the same place by different roads, so to speak.
Regards,
Ric
The correct title for Jonah’s book:
Fascism: flirted with the left, went home with the right.
I’ve read seem diligently researched and forcefully argued
I call shenanigans. The book — which I read a pre-pub galley of — is complete tripe. He asked other people to do his research for him, and when I offered to help him out, I was told that I was misreading Spencer by someone who’d announced to the world that he hadn’t read Spencer. (Needless to say, he was wrong.) And his arguments may be forceful, but they’re not sound, as his favorite means of connecting liberalism (or progressivism) to fascism is the fallacy of the undistributed middle. To wit:
Insert any term you like. Rinse. Repeat. This isn’t to say that he’s not right about the Progressives being racist, mind you: many were, and many were openly and pseudoscientifically so. But that doesn’t mean that contemporary progressives (or liberals) are racist, at least not in the same sense. I can rehash the final chapter of Our America if you’d like, but it’s one thing to support eugenics, another entirely to believe in the validity of identity-based political movements.
Thankfully I read the whole thread before commenting, JohnA2. Mussolini sent troops to the Brenner Pass in the first attempted Nazi takeover. Gave a little pause to Herr Hitler.
Dicentra, I think you nailed it. Fascism is a variant of totalitarianism. The slide isn’t left or right, it is “total government control” to “no government whatsoever”. The motivation is irrelevant, only the effect is relevant.
Spare me from those who want to mould me for my own good as I am no longer a child.
As an aside, I think “The Simpson’s” episode where McBain was attacked by ‘CommieNazis’ was more accurate than a cartoon sit-com ought to aim at.
“Go pennies, help the puny children!”
Funny, SEK, you said in that post you linked that you didn’t read the book. Which is it?
You can read excerpts of the book over at the Liberal Fascism blog. Goldberg has a chapter titled “we are all fascists now” or somesuch, which would lead me to believe that he is not merely pointing out that today’s progressives have evolved from earlier forms of fascists.
Maybe, Scott, you can hold back on the “complete tripe” bit until you first read the book. Otherwise, you’re doing what it is progressives are often accused of, and trying to kill the argument before having fully encountered it because you don’t like the way it sounds on the surface.
I hadn’t read the book when I wrote that post, but have since and have no desire to edit it. The excerpts are representative of the argument as a whole. (I posted more about it after having read it. Scroll into January for those posts.)
Hey, Scott. How are you doing?
Whether SEK read the book or not (I’m hoping he did), did you see the difference between a learned (even if I disagree with him on a host of subjects) and the profoundly dumb (sashal)? And I second Mikey NTH (comment #31). Nice comment.
To elaborate:
The book is a disastrously blinkered view of American intellectual history. Were there socialist/communist/fascist sympathizers among the left in the ’20s and ’30s? Certainly, just as there were many Nazi/fascist/Klan sympathizers among the right in the ’20s and ’30s. Goldberg would have you believe that there’s a fundamental connection between the contemporary left and socialist/communist/fascist thought. So, because many on the left think socialized medicine is a good idea, they’re fascistic. Inasmuch as that statement is true, it’s utterly meaningless. The same can be said for, say, those who are pro-life — since it was a crime to destroy an Aryan baby in Nazi Germany, contemporary conservatives evince fascistic tendencies.
Of course, focusing on fascist policy allows Goldberg to circumvent all the other nasty aspects of fascism which in absolutely no way apply to the American left: hyper-nationalism and attendant xenophobia; the use of police force to establish and maintain control of the population; militarism and the cult of masculinity; &c. No one would associate those essential features of fascism with the American left … so Goldberg quickly dismisses their importance and focuses on the real fascism, i.e. a health-conscious culture.
(Sorry, didn’t see you there Dan. I’m back on my feet, albeit barely. But! Internet access restored and dissertation nearing completion.)
Bravo. In boca al lupo!
I’m glad that a total takeover of something like 1/6th of the US Economy and the State welding the Caduceus = “health conscious”
SEK
hyper-nationalism and attendant xenophobia;
how many leftists do I read who rant that contemporary America is not “their” America? Their hyper-nationalism is aggitate for contemporary America to be “completely torn down and rebuilt” to their totalitarian (for everything but sex, drugs and rock-n-roll) specifications. Their xenophobia (fear of The Other) is quite pronounced… their “other” being non-leftists who they treat as inauthentic humans.
use of police force to establish and maintain control of the population
Uh, use of the IRS to make sure everyone has had their proper annual checkup??
cult of masculinity
The obsessing of how to redefine what a real male should be akin to the real America?
Fascist or socialist, what it comes down to is a commitment of a top-down totalitarian/authoritarian government that oversees the most minute aspects of an individual’s life. When I think of the most meddling bits of legislation/policies promulgated over the past couple of decades, they’ve been from the leftside of the aisle — “hate” crime legislation, sexual harassment policies, speech codes, the bowdlerization of American history/society of its Judeo-Christian roots…right to government controlled home thermostats.
Damn, I love this place. Great comment, Darleen. All three of your points were great. I’m interested in the response.
“So the fascist government sees itself as the Ultimate Caretaker, dictating what you eat, how much you excercise, how you think, where you live, what you learn, what you believe  FOR YOUR OWN GOOD!”
Someone finally synthesizes the verbose minutiae attendant to the
meaning of ‘fascist’.
It would appear there is a vast chasm between the two extreme wings of this debate between conservative and progressive, which equates more to the methods, than the tactics and purposes of each half. Yet there may be agreement on the principles without a sound methodology for removing the problem personalities (those who are in elected roles without the mindset of ‘public servant’ and having only a personal agenda of wealth or power)
I would say that goon squads stomping the shit out of the opposition is akin to the psychic violence which often occurs in both environments, but with less evidence of harm. But is the harm ameliorated? Somewhat in the short term. In the long historical context, it’s a little like
death due to carbon monoxide; silent and painless; hard to detect.
#44
Think WTO violent demonstrations. There ya go.
Their xenophobia (fear of The Other) is quite pronounced… their “other†being non-leftists who they treat as inauthentic humans.
In the context of this discussion, this strikes me as a moot point: the difference between fascistic intolerance of others and partisan hatred is incomparable. Fascist regimes restrict immigration and rounded up “citizen foreigners” and banished, bashed or disappeared them. I know of not a single leftist who believes that conservatives should be identified, forced into camps and worked to death or shot. That said, I do hear many conservatives talk about closing the border, rounding up illegal immigrants, &c. Do I think those conservatives are fascists? No. Do you?
Uh, use of the IRS to make sure everyone has had their proper annual checkup?
So the IRS is part of the liberal fascist conspiracy? Does it have its own police force? Is it free to roam the land and summarily execute whoever it deems inadequately patriotic? There’s a point at which difference in degree becomes difference in kind: a mud hut and a skyscraper are both buildings, but the engineering principles required to erect them don’t remotely resemble each other. To put this another way: would you entrust your skyscraper to an “architect” whose specialty is building mud huts?
The obsessing of how to redefine what a real male should be akin to the real America?
That’s not what the cult of masculinity is. The “cult of masculinity” as defined by scholars of fascism — who, I imagine, would rather not be called what I originally typed, “fascist scholars” — is a culture obsessed with the militaristic, the athletic, the violent, &c. This is why Hitler found Jesse Owen’s victory at the Berlin Olympics so emasculating.
Fascist or socialist, what it comes down to is a commitment of a top-down totalitarian/authoritarian government that oversees the most minute aspects of an individual’s life.
I wouldn’t disagree with that — all totalitarian forms of government are totalitarian. But Goldberg didn’t choose to write a book called Liberal Socialism, for which you could make a case. The far left is still somewhat socialist, not in the “We revere Stalin” sense of the term, more like the “FDR was right about the responsibility a government has to those it governs.” But to call that fascist is simply wrong, if only because it overlooks all the many ways in which socialism differs from fascism.
When I think of the most meddling bits of legislation/policies promulgated over the past couple of decades, they’ve been from the leftside of the aisle
This point is largely rhetorical. I could complain about conservatives meddling in the reproductive rights of women. They’re trying to tell women what kinds of sex they can have and when; what kind of contraceptives they can use and can’t; what measures they can take if they get pregnant. It’s as meddlesome as hate crime legislation, just not normally framed that way. In short, all legislation will be considered meddlesome by the people it puts out, but that doesn’t mean we should consider all meddlesome legislation inherently illegitimate. I wholeheartedly approve of the impact of the Civil Rights movement on contemporary American society, despite how difficult it made the lives of racists the country over.
“The far left is still somewhat socialist, not in the “We revere Stalin†sense of the term, more like the “FDR was right about the responsibility a government has to those it governs.†But to call that fascist is simply wrong, if only because it overlooks all the many ways in which socialism differs from fascism.”
Ayup. Every Friday night, the MoveOnBots and ANSWERbots across the street every Friday are there out of their deep and abiding sense of respect for FDR…
Ayup. Every Friday night, the MoveOnBots and ANSWERbots across the street every Friday are there out of their deep and abiding sense of respect for FDR…
I respectfully request a translation.
What can I tell you, Scott. If you can’t see the connection between modern progressivism and the tactics of fascist states, then you are either being willfully blind or else you are in denial.
I won’t even get into the irony of your refusal to find an evolving of “Othering” to include an Othering based on a social construct like partisan politics, germane to the debate. If you are such a remarkable stickler for the definition of fascism — and are willing to attack Goldberg’s arguments on completely literalist grounds — then why are we even talking? Modern progressives can’t be Fascists, because most of them don’t wear Brown Shirts. Q.E.D.
No. But defining conservatism as a mental disorder is certainly a step in that direction, wouldn’t you say?
And please, knock it off with the gulag and roaming death squad shit. Today’s purges happen with bureaucracies. It’s the soft totalitarianism of a reborn progressive spirit, that knows it need not murder or incarcerate to take away power. It has simply to marginalize. And this is done through the press, through the academy, and through bureaucratic powers.
Plus, in the exerpts I’ve read, Goldberg differentiates between Socialism and Fascism. But let’s just pause right here: why don’t you give us your definition of fascism, and we can go from there, Scott. Else we’re talking past one another.
What you’re missing, Scott, is that the character of a force is not altered by a change of polarity. A requirement to suppress classically-masculine behavior is just as “masculinist” as one to exalt and enforce them; it’s merely a negative expression of the same impulse, which is obsession with “gender typing”. Similarly, a declaration that every evil in the world is due to American influence is precisely as jingoist as the original positive version, and insistence that a black person can and must succeed is just as racist as the contrary stereotype if what is important to the arguer is the “black” and not the “person”.
“Fascist” could and should be a useful word, but it is not — and that is because you, and those you agree with you, insist that Hitler and the Nazis were fascist. Confounding the two is almost entirely an artifact of Stalinist propaganda, which had to, first, define why it was that the Soviet Union was allying itself with Germany, and, second, explain why, after the falling-out, the two systems were antithetical. Mussolini’s proposals and policies were thoroughly Leftist in origin, so the first objective was achieved by painting Hitler with what was, then, a complimentary shade of Red; equating the Nazis and the Fascists complimented the former. Afterward it became necessary to insult the former ally, and inevitably this ended up insulting the original source of the compliment. National Socialism began as Leninism’s German interpretation, and evolved to Deutsche Stalinismus in exactly the same way as the Russian version. Mussolini’s Fascism is the European version of what Americans call “populist”, modified by the characteristic Leader-cultism / Somebody Else’s Problem Field without which Europeans don’t seem able to manage a hot dog stand.
If you’re going to insist that Hitler was a fascist, Goldberg’s observations stand insofar as I have been able to acquaint myself with them. The real problem with that is that the inventor of the word was not.
Regards,
Ric
What, am I going to be the token PWer who’s read the thing? (Once I’ve read it, that is: the thing rivals Harry Potter 7 in thickness, but I’m not going to read straight through for 18 hours to finish LibFas.)
I know of not a single leftist who believes that conservatives should be identified, forced into camps and worked to death or shot.
I doubt Germans thought that about Jews, at first. Remember, this was the slow boiling of a frog: first was the demonization, then the marginalization, then the requirement to carry papers, then the yellow stars, then the signs over the shops, then finally when the Jews had been thoroughly dehumanized and blamed for all Germany’s ills, it was time for a final solution to the trumped-up problem.
One of the reasons that today’s totalitarianism is “soft,” as Jeff says, is that the nation is prosperous. Generally, I’ve got mine and you’ve got yours, and there’s no reason for me to fear losing mine to you. But if the economy tanks or we find ourselves in prolonged, dire straits, things could get ugly.
And I won’t take any bets as to which side successfully demonizes the other first…
I’m just sayin’
Apropós of something allied:
Nobuddy hyar but us peasants, ah reckon.
Regards,
Ric
SEK
Fascist regimes restrict immigration and rounded up “citizen foreigners†and banished, bashed or disappeared them. I know of not a single leftist who believes that conservatives should be identified, forced into camps and worked to death or shot. That said, I do hear many conservatives talk about closing the border, rounding up illegal immigrants, &c. Do I think those conservatives are fascists? No. Do you?
First off, a lot of leftists have historically done the first — Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, when North Vietnam overran South. Look at Hugo Chavez. Secondly, where in the legitimate illegal alien debate has a mainstream conservative advocated rounding up illegals and putting them in workcamps or executing them. Even the nativist Pat Buchannan hasn’t called for such measures. Indeed, conservatives on this issue (and a lot of classical liberals) hold that ’rounding up’ illegals is unnecessary … enforce a border (which is the right and duty of ANY nation) and enforce laws against employers and attrition will take care of illegals (happening already in So. Cal).
What would the Left like to do with conservatives? How about be stripped of political power, silenced, or die?
Does it [IRS] have its own police force?
Are you telling me the IRS doesn’t have certain enforcement powers unavailable to the more mundance municipal style police agencies? And you have no problem with them using those powers for something as prosaic as a medical checkup?
The “cult of masculinity†as defined by scholars of fascism
So obsessing about a new definition of masculinity doesn’t make it a cult? It’s only a “cult of masculinity” when The Other (as defined by Scholars of Fascism)?
Nice gig.
Hitler didn’t just “obsess” about masculinity, but about the “volk” in general…about the SUBLIMATION of the individual to the state. Look at his breeding programs coupled with the elimination of “defectives.” He wasn’t just obsessed with “masculinity” but with “femininity”, too.
They’re trying to tell women what kinds of sex they can have and when; what kind of contraceptives they can use and can’t; what measures they can take if they get pregnant.
And to what extent have they succeeded? Where are the scores of women arrested/sued/fired for shacking up, for using a condom? Come on, SEK, at least be honest here. There are little to NO laws constraining adult women from doing anything with their bodies, even up to 24 weeks of pregnancy, and sometimes right up to labor.
And lets’ recall that the Civil Rights movement was born out of the religious community and supported by classical liberals (contemporary conservatives) of the time and opposed by many Democrats, regardless of Hillary’s attempt at revisionist history.
Jeff,
If you can’t see the connection between modern progressivism and the tactics of fascist states, then you are either being willfully blind or else you are in denial.
What features of a fascist state, as opposed to a socialist and/or Big Government state, do you see currently at play in American politics? I don’t buy into identitarian thought any more than you, and acknowledge its anti-egalitarian nature. But that doesn’t make it “fascist,” at least not according to the definition currently at play. I’m not opposed to saying that the leftist dream of a managed society might not be totalitarian — that’s Ursula K. LeGuin’s critique in The Lathe of Heaven, although even that tends to put too much power in the hands of a particularly talented individual.
I won’t even get into the irony of your refusal to find an evolving of “Othering†to include an Othering based on a social construct like partisan politics, germane to the debate.
This may be an artifact of my research, but it seems to me that partisan politics now are no different than they’ve ever been. If anything, they’re just less parlimentary. (For which you can thank those reacting to LBJ’s masterful playing of the House and Senate.) I can assure you that at the turn-of-the-last-century — when corporations were buying Senators and Representatives and hiring their own private armies and unions were arming their members in preparation for Class Warfare — the stakes of “othering” were much higher. I think some perspective might be in order here.
If you are such a remarkable stickler for the definition of fascism  and are willing to attack Goldberg’s arguments on completely literalist grounds  then why are we even talking? Modern progressives can’t be Fascists, because most of them don’t wear Brown Shirts.
One reason we’re talking is that I’m not addressing periphal issues of fascistic logic. Brown shirts or black matter not. What matters are the essential characteristics of the thought, which include (in abundance) elements inimicable to contemporary liberalism. Liberals don’t monger wars. They don’t celebrate masculine performance. They don’t believe in the ultimate authority of a single infallible potentate. All those are essential elements of fascism as conventionally defined. (The fact that Goldberg glibbly glosses over the Spanish Civil War is telling in this regard.)
And please, knock it off with the gulag and roaming death squad shit. Today’s purges happen with bureaucracies.
I would, only Goldberg insists that they’re the logical consequence of liberal thought. (Actually, he “cleverly” says that he’s not calling liberals “fascist” … then proceeds to do exactly that. But! Plausible deniability! He has it! After all, he’s said he isn’t doing it, so no matter how many times you demonstrate he’s doing just that, he’ll quote himself saying that’s not what he’s up to.)
It’s the soft totalitarianism of a reborn progressive spirit, that knows it need not murder or incarcerate to take away power. It has simply to marginalize. And this is done through the press, through the academy, and through bureaucratic powers.
Alright, you do see how different this is from what Goldberg claims, right? You’ve accounted for contemporary conditions, and attempted to translate the ’20s and ’30s into the ’00s. Goldberg hasn’t. He cherry-picks the ’20s and ’30s for the least flattering portraits of progressives he can find, then says that’s what contemporary liberals are really up to now. (Only they aren’t, since they’re not fascists, like he said before he proved they were, ad infinitum.)
But let’s just pause right here: why don’t you give us your definition of fascism, and we can go from there, Scott.
It should be evident from my previous comment. “Fascism” is a historical movement that entails a totalitarian control over all aspects of life. It is founded on a cult of personality. It is xenophobic, nationalistic and militaristic. All regimes previously identified as “fascist” have fit this definition. You can link “totalitarianism” to “socialism,” but that only covers one aspect of a fascist regime, traditionally understood.
Ric,
A requirement to suppress classically-masculine behavior is just as “masculinist†as one to exalt and enforce them; it’s merely a negative expression of the same impulse, which is obsession with “gender typingâ€Â.
I understand what you’re saying here in terms of social control, but fascism is an historically discrete entity, and that’s not what self-proclaimed fascists considered “masculine.” Their definition was far more conventional.
Similarly, a declaration that every evil in the world is due to American influence is precisely as jingoist as the original positive version, and insistence that a black person can and must succeed is just as racist as the contrary stereotype if what is important to the arguer is the “black†and not the “personâ€Â.
I don’t see many liberals claiming that every evil in the world is due ot American influence. I see many who say that given the influence America has, inaction is immoral. And I see others who complain that of all the possible actions we could take, the ones we’ve decided to work neither in our national interest or to forward human rights generally. But I don’t see that as jingoist so much as an acknowledgment of our stage-presence in the world community.
“Fascist†could and should be a useful word, but it is not  and that is because you, and those you agree with you, insist that Hitler and the Nazis were fascist.
Now I need to hit the books … but I’m not doing that tonight. I know for a fact that Hitler’s sympathies with Mussolini’s fascism were a matter of public record. I’ll bring the citations back tomorrow.
Mussolini’s proposals and policies were thoroughly Leftist in origin, so the first objective was achieved by painting Hitler with what was, then, a complimentary shade of Red; equating the Nazis and the Fascists complimented the former.
This, though, I know to be wrong. Mussolini’s proposals were dictatorial — he wanted absolute control over the Italy and did what he had to in order to obtain it. He made deals with the socialists, the separatists, and anyone who would enter into a successful coalition with him. This isn’t populism American-style, as the Italian government was parlimentary.
More tomorrow, though, as I need to eat something. (I know, I know, lamest excuse to bow out of a debate ever … but damn it, I’m hungry.)
Incidentally, here’s a website associated with that supposedly non-existant IRS “police,” or Criminal Investigation/CI: http://www.irs.gov/irs/article/0,,id=98398,00.html. And I seem to remember this fellow by the name of Elliot Ness who made a bit of a name for himself working in that sort of capacity in the Chicago area – entirely mythical, I suppose.
“Incidentally, here’s a website associated with that supposedly non-existant IRS “police,†or Criminal Investigation/CI: http://www.irs.gov/irs/article/0,,id=98398,00.html. And I seem to remember this fellow by the name of Elliot Ness who made a bit of a name for himself working in that sort of capacity in the Chicago area – entirely mythical, I suppose.”
Even the fucking Postal Service has its own shock troops bearing MP5s.
A bit off-topic, but a visit to SEK’s website reveals this little gem he apparently shared with a class he was teaching:
“A moment to cherish (with dread): when we discussed the war in Afghanistan in Watchmen, they were surprised that we’d decided to go to war there before 2001. I told them that what they saw in Watchmen actually happened (if not on that time table), then mentioned that we didn’t actually go in ourselves. They looked confused. “And you know who we trained and financed and armed to do that?” I asked. Blank stares. Guy in the back pipes up “Osama bin Laden” and they all shoot him “BULLSHIT!” looks, then turn to me for confirmation. I confirm, and the class is sitting there, mouths agape, for a good ten seconds.”
“Mouths agape” is a good way of putting it, no? How does someone with scholarly aspirations and access to the internet manage to keep themselves uninformed to such a spectacular degree?
No need — stipulated. The expression of those sympathies is well known.
What I am saying is that Mussolini was successful in a way Hitler was not, precisely in the matter of “[making] deals with the socialists, the separatists, and anyone who would enter into a successful coalition with him.” The few coalitions Hitler was able to achieve in Germany always arose from either ideological similarity (vide Austria) or the National Socialists’ achievement of some kind of power over their “partners”, where Mussolini was able to bring otherwise antithetical movements into his party using other methods as well. [Parenthetically, my initial introduction to Mussolini was via Niven and Pournelle’s Inferno, and I have not yet seen that picture to be substantially refuted. It leads to a somewhat sympathetic view of Benito.]
The reason Mussolini was able to achieve those coalitions, and gain the envy and admiration of Hitler, was that the core of his message was that the otherwise powerless could achieve sufficient power to better themselves by combining their efforts even when they disagreed in fundamental ways — it is the reason he chose the fasces as a symbol: many weak reeds bundled together make a strong hatchet handle. Note that this is very strongly distinct from Marxism-Leninism, in that the latter takes its strength only from the Proletariat, discarding the bourgeoisie as useless or antithetical. The middle class, and even the more compliant of the Italian nobility, were among the weak reeds Mussolini proclaimed his ability to join together. As such Mussolini has a great deal in common with what I think of as “bombastic populism” as exemplified by Huey P. Long. [My father was a great admirer of the Kingfish up until the latter days, and his best friend was not precisely a Marxist but kept Capital and The Daily Worker in the magazine rack beside his easy chair. I was exposed to the notions at a very early age.]
(Parenthetically, I see by the comments at Goldberg’s site that there are some who attempt to portray Long as a Rightist. If you see that assertion in any work, you may safely discard the entire work as of no value; the author is either a liar or a fool.)
The concept of Benito Mussolini as an uncomplicated totalitarian is purely an artifact of people attempting, ex post facto, to define National Socialism as “fascist” and therefore distinct from “real Socialism”. I am well aware that there are multiple gigabytes and megapages of scholarly work designed to conflate the two; it is facile, superficially rational, and fundamentally dishonest. Hitler was a Socialist, full stop, pilcrow, new chapter. The characteristics you and other scholars attempt to raise up as fundamentals of fascism were largely Hitler’s attempt at tactics that would resonate with German attitudes to make his goals easier to attain; they differ from Stalin’s tactics to the same end in exactly the same way German national self-definition myths differ from those of Russians, and for precisely that reason. In fact, Hitler and Stalin were more alike than different, and Hitler and Mussolini were more different than alike. Calling Adolf a “fascist” in contrast to Josip’s “communist” is an attempt to slather enough makeup on a pair of identical twins to make them different people.
Regards,
Ric
“…would provide the intellectual basis for a serious political discussion rather than a determined smear campaign by those on the left…”
That’s some rich irony there. A whole book of Godwin’s Law-esque smearing of lefty political ideas (complete w/ Hitler mustache – nice!), and you point out the shame that the left can’t except it w/o smearing back.
Why can’t they just rationally discuss why they’re like Hitler? I don’t know Jeff. I just don’t know.
I haven’t read it all, but what I’ve read is low grade analogical nonsense – I mean, I can pretty much say anything is like anything and loosely justify it. It’s political-advocacy smearing of the worst sort instead of a sober (and non-Hitler referenced) effort regarding collectivist attitudes (or some such).
On a funnier Hitler-inspired note, check this out. Fuckin’ hillarious…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2triiYXSY8
Goldberg’s book is stupidly named and stupidly focused. His assertion that today’s Democratic Party (his “Liberal”) is a direct descendant of those who espouse violence-based authoritarian statism (“Fascism”) is a laughable example of the “all my enemies represent all enemies ever” school of elementary-school banter. His next book should be either “Hillary is a Meanie” or “Al Gore is a Pantywaist”. Jonah makes half an argument, makes it badly, and pulls misunderstood facts out of his assfile and presents them as authoritative sources. What his book lacks is coherence: his book even says at one point that “even if Nazi nationalism was in some ill-defined or fundamental way right-wing, this only meant that Nazism was right-wing socialism. And right-wing socialists are still socialists.” So socialism can be a right-wing phenom, too? Way to stick to your guns there.
Of course, he’ll soon argue that liberal fascism is only one type of fascism and further complete the undermining of his thesis. He really should have just gone into hiding upon the completion of his book, since others are much better able to explain his thesis. Of course, maybe that’s because he hasn’t fully thought it out yet.
“Why can’t they just rationally discuss why they’re like Hitler?”
Probably due to the fact that it’s really hard to accomplish Sanger’s “Negro Project” when you’re trying to get votes from those remaining blacks and African-Americans who help to keep Liberal Fascists in power.
If you have to go through all those mental gyrations to prove you’re not a fascist, you probably are.
“The book is a disastrously blinkered view of American intellectual history. Were there socialist/communist/fascist sympathizers among the left in the ’20s and ’30s? Certainly, just as there were many Nazi/fascist/Klan sympathizers among the right in the ’20s and ’30s.”
Except that Nazi/fascist/Klan weren’t of the right.
“Fascist regimes restrict immigration and rounded up “citizen foreigners†and banished, bashed or disappeared them. I know of not a single leftist who believes that conservatives should be identified, forced into camps and worked to death or shot.”
Never heard of the Stalin regime?
“peasants view their social, economic, and natural universes  their total environment  as one in which all of the desired things in life
such as land, wealth, health, friendship and love, manliness and
honor, respect and status, power and influence, security and
safety, exist in finite quantity and are always in short supply,
as far as the peasant is concerned. Not only do these and all
other “good things†exist in finite and limited quantities, but in
addition there is no way directly within peasant power to increase
the available quantities.”
Nice encapsulation of the left’s view of the world, too.
That’s why I always refer to liberals/leftists as reactionaries.
I’m too lazy to Google it, but George Soros was advocating “de-Nazification” for American conservatives last year.
The Goldbrouhaha is an excellent argument for the proposition that the terms “left” and “right” are essentially meaningless. All the political isms of our day, fascism, communism, progressivism and yes, even “classical” liberalism, are revolutionary creeds, born of the collapse (intellectual, then physical) of the old feudal-religious West.
Fascism, communism, and progressivism, may all be termed “socialist”, as each are, in varying ways and to varying degrees. American “conservatism” is simply “classic” liberalism with a generous dollop of peans for traditional morality. To the extent that LF puts fascism squarely in the socialist camp, where it belongs, it is a successful book.
Hypernationalism, xenophobia, militarism, etc. are by no means exclusively fascist. They are as ancient as Cain, and because of this, useful to those breeds of socialist who wanted to build up a corporate state in their home country, which they wished to see powerful.
Hitler and Mussolini’s vision were to appeal to the emotial timbres of the establishment while creating the Hegelian God-State which would ameliorate all social disorders WITHOUT needing to liquidate the bourgeoisie or shoot peasants for having grain.
So, being “hyper”-nationalist (more nationalist than the New York Times thinks appropriate), a “xenophobe” (desiring that controls on immigration should be in place before we decide who we let in), a “militarist” (desiring a mitilary which makes our enemies pause when considering taking us on, and knowing that the best way to make the military such is to use it to destroy our enemies occasionally), or a “theocrat” (desiring that not every piece of our moral traditions be abandoned to please a small but vocal lifestyle minority), are all traits that one can possess without in any way being a fascist. Nor, as the example of fascism indicates, to they prevent you from being a socialist.
If that sticks going down, it’s because you’re married to the “right/left” dichotomy. All Goldberg is doing is expanding on the central idea of Hayek’s “Socialist Roots of Nazism” chapter in The Road to Serfdom. As expected, that’s making the usual suspects angry.
Darleen,
where in the legitimate illegal alien debate has a mainstream conservative advocated rounding up illegals and putting them in workcamps or executing them.
That’s not what I wrote. I wrote: “That said, I do hear many conservatives talk about closing the border, rounding up illegal immigrants, &c.” Still, if we’re going to talk about speech codes being a slippery slope to fascist regimes, it seems only fair that I can have my slippery slope too. Or we could dispense with the slippery slopes altogether. The choice is yours.
What would the Left like to do with conservatives? How about be stripped of political power, silenced, or die?
You found a crazy leftist. Congratulations! I can find some crazy conservatives too, but I don’t see how that’d advance the conversation.
Are you telling me the IRS doesn’t have certain enforcement powers unavailable to the more mundance municipal style police agencies? And you have no problem with them using those powers for something as prosaic as a medical checkup?
I’m saying that the IRS isn’t remotely like the fascist police forces. This strikes me as a self-evident point, but difficult as it is not to violate Godwin’s Law here, I’m going to try.
So obsessing about a new definition of masculinity doesn’t make it a cult?
Not if we’re talking about the defining features of historical fascism, it doesn’t. Again, this seems to me a straightforward point: fascism embraced a cult of hyper-masculinity, “liberal fascism” doesn’t. You can say liberals want to redefine what is and isn’t masculine, but no one thinks that liberals want America to embrace hyper-masculinity the way Mussolini wanted Italians to.
And lets’ recall that the Civil Rights movement was born out of the religious community and supported by classical liberals (contemporary conservatives) of the time and opposed by many Democrats, regardless of Hillary’s attempt at revisionist history.
Yes, the Dixiecrats opposed the Civil Rights movement, and you know where the prominent Dixiecrats ended up? The moden day Republican Party. Don’t believe me? Google Strom Thurmond, Jesse Helms, or Phil Gramm.
Interest Observer,
How does someone with scholarly aspirations and access to the internet manage to keep themselves uninformed to such a spectacular degree?
I don’t know about your CIA, but mine funneled money to arm and train mujahadeen through bin Laden’s Maktab al-Khadamat organization.
Ric,
The few coalitions Hitler was able to achieve in Germany always arose from either ideological similarity (vide Austria) or the National Socialists’ achievement of some kind of power over their “partnersâ€Â, where Mussolini was able to bring otherwise antithetical movements into his party using other methods as well.
While Mussolini was able to create some form of coalition, it wasn’t with the socialists per se, but with the socialists who remained after years of threats, physical intimidation, and duels. Mussolini famously dueled socialist and communist editors, wounding many, killing two, but it made his position clear: you’re my kind of socialist — i.e. in name alone — or none at all. (Scroll to the bottom of this post for a number of contemporary accounts of this.)
The middle class, and even the more compliant of the Italian nobility, were among the weak reeds Mussolini proclaimed his ability to join together. As such Mussolini has a great deal in common with what I think of as “bombastic populism†as exemplified by Huey P. Long.
True enough. You can’t browse the archive of any major newspaper with a Rome bureau without finding scads of references to the need to “strengthen the resolve of the middle class” and “make sure everyone is not only employed, but works hard.” Mussolini harped on this for years. But one difference between Mussolini and the Kingfish — with whom I have more than a passing familiarity, what with being from Baton Rouge and all — is that Huey never got the military power down. Yes, he tried to have the state police invade New Orleans, but he wasn’t successful the way Mussolini was at forming a fascist army to supplement the Italian one, of rounding up and deporting the Italian communists, or torturing those who opposed him. In this sense, I think we can see a crucial difference — Long was a politician who dabbled in violence, whereas Mussolini was a violent dictator who dabbled in politics.
Parenthetically, I see by the comments at Goldberg’s site that there are some who attempt to portray Long as a Rightist. If you see that assertion in any work, you may safely discard the entire work as of no value; the author is either a liar or a fool.
Absolutely correct.
The concept of Benito Mussolini as an uncomplicated totalitarian is purely an artifact of people attempting, ex post facto, to define National Socialism as “fascist†and therefore distinct from “real Socialismâ€Â.
It wasn’t ex post facto. From The New York Times, 24 July 1923:
Given what we know about the Nazi Party and who ran it, it seems to me the Russians were right. More from “German Leaders Divided on Nazis: Middle Party Leaders Favor Forcing Fascists into Cabinent as Means of Curbing Them,” The New York Times, 28 December 1930:
On our side of the pond, we find items like “15,000 Reds Cheer Attacks on Hitler,” The New York Times, 6 April 1933:
In 1933, the World Committee for the Victims of German Fascism published The Brown Book of Hitler Terror.
I could go on, but I wanted to make the point that calling Hitler’s regime fascist wasn’t a matter of historical revision. The connection was made as early as 1923 — the nationalists, later Nazis, were inspired by and took the name of Mussolini’s party. The connection becomes even stronger when both Germany and Italy support the Nationalists in the Spanish Civil War, while the Republicans were supported by the Soviet Union.
All of this is only to say, there certainly were socialist elements at work in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, but those weren’t the defining elements of either regime, nor of fascism generally.
N. O’Brain,
You do realize that quotation is about contemporary American politics, don’t you?
SEK – I don’t know about your Wikipedia, but mine doesn’t contain anything at the link that would provide even the remotest support for your assertion. Perhaps you’ve other evidence to offer to back up this “blowback” assertion that you’re promoting? The Truthers and the Ron Paul supporters go on about it at length, but I would hope that you find their company less than congenial.
SEK
Don’t you read your own links?
although the CIA did not fund MAK or foreign volunteer mujahideen in general
THE CIA (as in “our”) did not fund Osama, who was violently anti-American.
You owe your students an apology.
I’m disappointed, Scott. I expected better from you.
SEK
and back to another thing That’s not what I wrote, you are being disengenuous. You positioned the sentences back to back as a comparison and when called on it, you back off with a neo-Emily Latilla line. There is no ‘slippery slope’ between enforcing existing immigration law and concentration camps. None. I familiar with this type of argument from radical feminist sites … wearing of lipstick is the moral equivalent of female genital mutilation. It’s the same mendacious “smear by degree” that inflates “sexual harassment” statistics by classifying stuff like overhearing a dirty joke in a hallway as the equivalent of being shoved against the wall and groped.
Don’t try and teach your grandma to suck eggs, Scott.
This isn’t that difficult. Here’s the key sentence:
MAK maintained a close liaison with Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency through which the CIA funneled money to Afghan mujahidin, although the CIA did not fund MAK or foreign volunteer mujahidin in general.
The CIA gives money to the ISI, which then distributed the money among the mujahidin. Now, the CIA line is that the ISI only ever funded native Afghan fighters, as opposed to foreigners like bin Laden. I don’t buy it, mostly because the cozy relation between bin Laden and the ISI throughout the ’80s and, some argue, to this day. The CIA wrote blank checks, so much as the agency would like to think that the ISI discriminated when it the distribution of CIA moneys, I have my doubts. (The fact that militant elements within the ISI are accused of continuing to protect bin Laden to this day makes me think I’m not a Truther here, more a pragmatist.)
That said, Darleen, you jumped on that single point and ignored the rest of my post. What do you think of the rest of it?
While it might not be regarded as conclusive on the question of whether Bin Laden received CIA funding, SEK might find it instructive to google Peter Bergen, Ayman al-Zawahiri, Brigadier Mohammed Yousaf, Abdullah Anas, and Marc Sageman, who differ widely in their ideologies but seem to share a common view, based on their experience or study of the 1979-1989 struggle against the Soviets, that Bin Laden and his foreign volunteers were not recipients of U.S funds, training, or arms to any significant degree.
Darleen,
I’m not being disingenuous in the least, nor am I backing down. Here’s what I wrote:
I know of not a single leftist who believes that conservatives should be identified, forced into camps and worked to death or shot. That said, I do hear many conservatives talk about closing the border, rounding up illegal immigrants, &c. Do I think those conservatives are fascists? No. Do you?
See how I don’t think any of these situations are commensurable? I don’t think conservatives are fascists, ipso facto I don’t think they want to round up immigrants and work them to death or shoot them. This seems to me rather straight-forward — so much so I even said we ought to dispense with slippery slopes altogether. If I wanted to assert a connection between immigration reform and concentration camps, I wouldn’t have called slippery slopes out of bounds, right?
IO,
I’ve read Holy War, Inc. and know the evidence you’re referring to. But just as the CIA has reason to deny it gave money (however obliquely) to bin Laden, so too do bin Laden and the ISI have reason to deny it accepted money from the CIA. Again, we’re supposed to believe that none of the money the CIA funneled through the ISI ended up in the hands of foreign fighters. I don’t buy it, if only because if we can’t keep track of where money and weapons go in a country we’re currently occupying, I doubt we can control their movement in a country we aren’t.
“Again, we’re supposed to believe that none of the money the CIA funneled through the ISI ended up in the hands of foreign fighters…”
You can believe whatever you want, Scott, it is when you start teaching your beliefs as fact it becomes problematic. Some folks believe God created the world 6000 years ago, for instance.
SEK – I just find it irksome that you’re taking this belief (which reflects your perception of the principals involved and your degree of trust relative to each) and presenting it to your students as a fact, without any qualifiers. The thrust of your statement would seem to be “We made Bin Laden,” when the evidence is in fact a little more problematic. Moreover, even your reading of the facts here wouldn’t support the United States deliberately seeking to fund, arm, or train Bin Laden, which would be at odds with the statement your students received with mouths agape.
In any event, this thread seems somewhat dead, so I’ll quit badgering.
B. Moe, you’ll note that I didn’t teach that. It was a tangent intended to make the literary text more vivid for them. And yes, I did go into more detail in the classroom. The students had no clue that the US was involved in Afghanistan, or that bin Laden wasn’t considered Public Enemy #1 at the time.
IO, as for what the US intended the money it sent to the ISI to do, well, we know they intended it to go to fight the Soviets, and I doubt they 1) could control how that was accomplished or 2) cared all that much. There’s an abundance of evidence to this effect, and a reason that we have phrases like “unintended consequences,” which I think this situation falls under.
As for the thread being dead, damn it, I spent a good hour sifting through the archives this morning. Feels like wasted time now. C’est la vie, I suppose.
German Fascism: Because Germans were Fascist when They were Nazis, but not Liberal when They were Fascists
For some reason, I keep hearing people claim that socialism, not fascism, is responsible for the beast of Nazi Germany. (Did they not call themselves ‘National Socialists’?) They insist the Nazis were only dubbed fascists after WWII so that liberals
Fascism is such a loaded word really. Loaded as in melodramatic. Liberals today just aren’t that tough. It’s an ideology that glorifies weakness and pillories strength. There’s a reason no one has stepped up to fill Daniel Moynihan’s shoes really. Don’t tell Jim Webb that, but it’s true. Liberals can’t really ask questions anymore. They can mostly just edit the narrative in a minor copy-editing kind of way. Jonah seems to aspire with this book to Narrative of that kind, and I think really that for the right to seize upon a narrative like that is kind of an embracing of a weakness that’s more perception than reality, and speaks to a decay or at least enervation in our polity more generally. Spare me, I guess is all I mean to say, the tomes about what we don’t stand for.
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I haven’t read the book either. I clearly need to; it looks fascinating.