What 'Fascism' Talk Really Accomplishes

[Valin]

Real Clear Politics

Peter Berkowitz
May 07, 2017

 

The allegation that Donald Trump’s presidency reflects the rise—or resurgence—of fascism in America has little basis in fact. But it is a sure way to amplify the scorn for Republicans gripping many on the left and the resentment of media and academic elites roiling many on the right. Such talk magnifies polarization and further debases American political discourse. It distracts from Trump’s actual flaws and the serious challenges the nation faces. Yet intellectuals won’t let it go away.

 

(Snip)

 

A scholar specializing in European history, Snyder observed that European fascism demonstrated that “politicians who emerge from democratic practices can then work to undo democratic institutions.” Like the fascists, Snyder argued, Trump and his team “seek to destroy the concept of truth”; attack the press as “opposition” and “enemies”; do not expressly champion democracy or human rights; undermine the judiciary by criticizing judges; and tighten their grip on power by exploiting “the threat or the reality of terrorism” in order “to encourage a Muslim terrorist attack within or upon the United States” and “to alienate and enrage Muslims.”

 

Snyder is right that democracy is vulnerable to despots arising from within. At the same time, his cartoonish depiction of Trump’s America illustrates the ease with which professors descend into demagoguery.

 

(Snip)

 

It’s not enough, though, to correct the intellectuals’ overwrought assessment of Trump. It is also necessary, because of their promiscuous use of the term, to set the record straight about fascism.

To qualify as fascism, governing ideas and conduct would have to include a * militarily aggressive and expansive nationalism, disdain for liberal democracy, commitment to embodying natural hierarchies in law, and subordination of individuals to the collective good.

Trump fails every prong of this test...........(Snip)

 

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* Francisco Franco After winning the spainish civil war was not militarily aggressive.

[Valin]

From the Comments

 

Groty1 • 2 hours ago

It's been part of the Democrat playbook to compare Republicans to fascism since Truman. What is remarkable to me is that Democrats and the half baked intellectuals who are surrogates for them believe their base is so stupid that they can recycle it every four or eight years.

The Oct. 26, 1948 edition of The New York Times had a headline about a Truman speech he'd given in Chicago against New York Republican Thomas Dewey read:

"President Likens Dewey to Hitler as Facists' Tool," followed by the subhead, "Dictatorship Stressed."
Out of the 70 years of comparing Republicans to fascists/Hitler, I think this one is the most repugnant. It was made only 3 years after FDR had sent tens of thousands of boys - including many Republicans - to Europe to die to stop Hitler. Though comparing Goldwater, whose grandfather was a practicing Jew, to Hitler also scraped the bottom of the barrel in terms of indecent repugnancy (see below).

Governor Pat Brown of California - father of the current governor of California - said of Barry Goldwater in '64, “Goldwater's acceptance speech had the stench of fascism. All we needed to hear was Heil Hitler.” Mayor Jack Shelley of San Francisco claimed that Goldwater strategists got all their ideas from Mein Kampf. The Hitler comparisons were common.

In 1968, Democratic hopeful Hubert Humphrey said, "If the British had not fought in 1940, Hitler would have been in London and if Democrats do not fight in 1968, Nixon will be in the White House.”

McGovern was prolific in his Hitler comparisons. He said of Nixon, “Except for Adolf Hitler's extermination of the Jewish people, the American bombardment of defenseless peasants in Indochina is the most barbaric act of modern times.” Never mind the president of his party, LBJ, had escalated the war in Vietnam.
That's enough to make my point. I promise you Ford, Reagan, and GWB were all compared to Hitler, too. Admittedly it is extreme with Trump, but I wonder if that is due to herd like groupthink facilitated by social media. The only Republican president since WWII that I have been unable to find elected Democrats compare to Hitler is GHB. I'm confident they exist. I just haven't found them yet.