[lbo-talk] Bruce Bartlett: " I think it is only a matter of time before the Tea Party morphs into unapologetic fascism"

c b cb31450 at gmail.com
Tue Nov 12 06:55:30 PST 2013


Bruce Bartlett is a former Reagan Administration official. He is not a Democrat nor does he say this to promote voting for Democrats. This is a viewpoint from inside the Republican Party.

There is no premature anti-fascism. Of course, the current rightwing in the US is not identical to the fascists of the 1930's. duhh. But if you had warned against "fascism" in the 1930's , it would not have meant anything to anybody. "Fascism" was a new thing, unknown. You would have had to warn against "tyranny" or some other historically previous form of state. But of course fascism wasn't tyranny in the literal sense of that state form from ancient Greece anymore than tea Republican are "fascists" identical to the fascist of the 30s. Use of the term is necessary to raise the appropriate alarm in people's minds. They are like fascists, fascist-like.

On Sun, Nov 10, 2013 at 2:19 PM, Carrol Cox <cbcox at ilstu.edu> wrote:
> There are many problems in raising the cry of "Fascism," but the most
> serious result is to deflect understanding the immense repressive power of
> ordinary capitalist democracy, in all its varieties. One need only walk
> through an airport, register at a hotel, leaflet in a Mall, or cross either
> the Canadian or the Mexican border to realize that the u.s. ruling elites
> have no need for "fascism."
>
> Carrol
>
> P.S. Perhaps the most omni-present icon of the authoritarian state is the
> photograph on your driver's license.
>
>
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