[lbo-talk] the World Can't Wait

jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net
Tue Aug 16 13:17:53 PDT 2005



> I wrote:
> > > (1) the idea that Bush is "fascist" is a false analogy. Unlike
> > > classical fascism (e.g., Mussolini, Franco, Pinochet), Bush is not
> > > stomping on an politically-active and class-conscious working class.
> > > Getting beyond classical fascism (as 1960s lefties often did), the
> > > word fascism gets very nebulous.
>
> JT: > Listing political groups that oppose Bush as possible terrorist
> groups and placing names of people who oppose Bush on No-Fly lists is
> dangerously close to such behaviour. It isn't "officially fascism"
> unless the head of the DLC is assassinated?<
>
> I don't see the head of the DLC as representing the working class in
> any way. (Killing the DLC head would be a form of capitalist
> competition, not class struggle.) I see fascism as a (violent)
> response to working-class power. That's different from simple abuse of
> power to impose authoritarianism, as if Bush ordered the assasination
> of leading Democrats.
>
> The difference, I guess, is that for me fascism is a form of
> capitalist government, while you see it as a kind of behavior.
> ...
> --
> Jim Devine
> "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let
> people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante.

Make it the head of the IBEW and the Teamsters then. Is this what it would take it to make the use of the term fascism acceptable? It is a form of government but we define it by the behaviours of the people involved. How else?

John Thornton



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