So here's the problem.
I think that the term "clerical fascism" is accurate to describe the Taliban and ObL, but the way it is being used by liberals (and now conservatives) is to defend militarism and war.
So that sucks.
I have been talking to other analysts about this problem, and they have similar concerns.
So maybe while I write a paper on clerical fascism for academic circles, I think that for public consumption the terms Islamic theocracy and Islamic supremacy are more useful for left discourse.
Against terrorism, theocracy, war and fascism...-Chip "Hey, I can change my mind" Berlet
-------------
So, your terminology is being co-opted for war propaganda?
Somehow, even if I have my own quibbles with it, I think you should persist against this usage. Don't ask me how, except to figure out a way to contaminate the illicit use itself as a fascist move of state war propaganda. You could switch to clerical or theocratic totalitarianism, or totalitarian fundamentalism--not quite as catchy, too many syllables, etc. But, you don't want to limit the concept to Islam, since that plays directly to the same US or western machinery and obscures all the Christian and Jewish forms of a similar system of state. [I just happen to be reading Exodus (19-40) where that great great grand daddy of all superstitious, jingoistic, nationalists, that is to say, Moses, gets the master plan of state from God, himself.]
In any event, it was the use of Thomas Mann's own nationalistic mysticism in Notes from a Non-Political Man, by the early National Socialist propagandists that got him to re-think his entire identification with German nationalism. He had literally given them better and more compelling rhetoric than they could have possibly fabricated on their own (see Journal entries 1918-21).
The problem with just about any somewhat systematic or rational terminology, is that if its internal logic can be manipulated, then it avails itself to propaganda, and be used by any side. Part of what I consider fascism, is exactly this kind of destruction or subversion of discourse. This idea is of course from Hannah Arendt. While everybody is familiar with the idea that truth is the first casuality of war, many are less familiar with precisely how that casuality is achieved. There is lying of course. But another, and more effective way is to turn all discursive forms into means that obscure intelligibility.
This is why I would urge you to somehow keep the intelligibility of your terminology and make the mis-use of it, an example of fascism.
Chuck Grimes