The American Spectator

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 1:12PM

Nothing could be more disgraceful, shallow, or contemptible than for a citizen of the United States to compare his government to fascists and Nazis.

It is utterly irresponsible. It is historically, morally, politically, and logically without merit.

It betrays a lack of basic education about fascism and the history of Europe in the last century.

It is a brazen insult to the tens of thousands of Americans who died fighting in Europe. By belittling and trivializing their sacrifice, the writer above reveals the shallowness of any patriotism to which he might lay claim.

What total and perfect trash this is.

So-called conservatives who bray and bleet about fascism in the United States should be schooled by their betters -- those many conservatives of sound judgment -- about the conventions of effective and civil political discourse.

Real American| 4.7.09 @ 1:45PM

the trolls really come out in force don't they. the NY Times says Obama = Hitler. liberals should love the comparison. after all, Hitler was really an anti-semetic progressive who nationalized the economy, same as most leftists.

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 2:07PM

Real --

You don't know what you're talking about.

Liberate yourself from the coils of ignorance in which you dwell, sir.

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 2:11PM

No careful reader with anything greater than an eight grade education could read the NY Times piece and come away believing it had compared Obama to Hitler.

The fact that Hitler applied the principles of Keynes does not mean that ANYone who uses those same principles is a Nazi. For the love of God. Hitler's engineers no doubt applied Newtonian physics when the built airplanes for Hitler's military: does this mean that anyone applying Newtonian physics is a Nazi?

Please. Use the good sense God gave you. To do otherwise is ingratitude -- "that marble hearted fiend."

Alan Brooks| 4.7.09 @ 3:11PM

anyway,
liberal fascists DO exist-- they are not carrier pidgeons or Unicorns.

Alan Brooks| 4.7.09 @ 3:23PM

pigeons, not pidgeons.

that would be pidgin English, as in immigrants' speaking...

Quin| 4.7.09 @ 4:10PM

To Truth Hurts: First of all, my own column very carefully distinguished Italian fascists from Nazis, and explained in some detail why I was making the comparison, which is, on the facts alone, a good comparison. Second, I did NOT endorse this NYT reporter's comparison to Nazi economics, but said it was truly bizarre to make that comparison and pretend that any "nuances" could make it a good economic system (much less social system) to emulate. The weird thing is that the weird article was coming from the NYT.
Meanwhile, I will gladly defend my comparison of the economics of the past eight months to fascist Italy, anytime, anywhere.

MT| 4.7.09 @ 4:26PM

The liberal troll, Truth Hurts, is venting his spleen at the NYTimes--weird. Is it vent--then read? I have to laugh that liberals are lecturing us on gratitude and patriotism--okay, BusHitler, we're listening.

ACynic| 4.7.09 @ 4:45PM

There is precious little difference betwixt fascism/Nazism and communism/bolshevism; they are siblings.
Nazi's ARE National Socialists; it grew directly from the German Workers National Socialist Party; the precursor to the Nazi (National Socialist Party).
Also recall that during the 30s through the fall of the soviet empire, many in the west sympathized with the Soviet model as well as rationalized all the "excesses" of Stalin, Lenin, etc.
When the USA entered WWII the worst mass murderer in the history of the world was Joe Stalin. He retained this record until surpassed by Mao in the late 1960s.
By directly supporting Stalin against Hitler, the allies perpetuated the Bolshevik empire and allowed eastern Europe to remain in Nazi - oops, Bolshevik slavery - until the late 1980s.
The allies had to make a terrible choice in WWII; save western europe and eastern europe, OR, just save western europe.
Western Europe was saved and Eastern Europe was sacrificed.
WWII ended for the Eastern Europeans 50 years AFTER it ended in Western Europe.
As to the economic policies of National Socialism and Bolshevism/communism, well, national socialism does allow for a form of muted capitalism, whereby private property and profits are allowed, though only if it advances the goals and aspirations of the "leadership," aka, the STATE.
Both systems preach the supremacy of the STATE and the subordination of individual liberties and freedoms.
Obamanomics is merely the economic portion of national socialism combined with Orwellian political double speak .

JP| 4.7.09 @ 4:47PM

It should also be noted that Mussolini learnt a lot about how to put fascism into practice from Woodrow Wilson. As a matter of fact, both Wilson and FDR had kind words for Il Duce and "His Third Way" politics. Intellectually fascism was very much in vogue during the 1920s. It wasn't until Mussolini invaded Ethiopia did the liberals drop Mussolini from thier rolodexes.

Alan Brooks| 4.7.09 @ 5:02PM

Lenin was the Godfather of totalitarianism.

Barzini:
"Certainly Don Corleone can present a bill for services: after all, we are not Communists"

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 5:26PM

ACynic --

"Cynic" as you probably are aware, comes from the Green for "dog," and in your case, the shoe fits perfect.

Nazis were NOT socialists. To say they were is simply false.

Hitler used socialists to get into power, but he detested socialism and communism. The whole justification for the war and the concentration camps was that he was fighting socialism. When then SS became powerful enough, Hitler dissolved the SA (the primary home of the socialist rank and file), executed its leaders, and impressed its members into the Army.

Hitler's fascism was an amalgamation of command economy authorities and -- as all fascist governments are -- crony capitalism. There is nothing socialistic whatsoever about it.

By conflating every form of government other than our own into one, moreover, you lose the heuristic value of any of the applicable terms (fascist, socialist, etc.).

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 5:28PM

Hillyer --

If you can't see the irresponsibility of calling the United States government fascist, then you're a fool. Our government is nothing like the Italian fascist government or the German variety.

The NY Times piece you are so gleeful about does NOT compare Obama to Hitler.

You'd better read it again. I think you'll be embarrassed.

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 5:43PM

Ultimately, my question to Hillyer and others is this:

Why can't you make a cogent argument against Obama's policies without resorting to these rash analogies?

Aren't conservative principles about taxes and government spending up to the job?

Just assess the current situation and say what it is you think the country and the government should do. If that means cut taxes and freeze spending, then make your argument. I'll be happy to read it.

But just scrawling paranoid nonsense makes any sensible person not only reject your ideas but lose entirely any respect for you.

Obama is Mussolini. Obama is a terrorist. Obama is a socialist.

Jeez, Louise. Get a grip. This is unmanly hysteria.

RT| 4.7.09 @ 6:04PM

>>>...liberal fascists DO exist-- they are not carrier pidgeons or Unicorns.

RT| 4.7.09 @ 6:04PM

Alan, did you mean passenger pigeons? Carrier pigeons are the common pigeons properly defecating on statues of dictators all over the world. Passenger pigeons are extinct.

Meanwhile, “liberal fascist” is a redundancy and unicorns are what the Prophet Obama rides on the black light posters that his cultist have hanging on the walls of their living rooms.

Mary| 4.7.09 @ 7:00PM

You're in good company:

If I were Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner, I would not sign any long-term lease on a home in Washington.

Socialists believe in government ownership of the means of production. Fascists believed in government control of privately owned businesses, which is much more the style of this government. That way, politicians can intervene whenever they feel like it and then, when their interventions turn out badly, summon executives from the private sector before Congress and denounce them on nationwide television. [Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts]

Too lazy to link, but here's little url: http://tinyurl.com/d6b8q9

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 7:29PM

Most of you -- no matter how impoverished your history education -- have probably heard of the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union was a communist country. In World War II, they fought the Germans as well and lost millions -- not hundreds of thousands -- of soldiers and civilians.

To conflate communism or socialism with fascism is not only incorrect, it actually decreases your ability to understand either system.

Cancer and heart disease are both things I'd prefer not to have, but I very glad researchers don't try to cut down on their workload by simply pretending they're the same thing.

Analysis to a great extent means finding salient distinctions and differences between things, not just bunching things together because of accidental similarities.

The nature, the very essence, of fascism is characterized by a) militarism; b) scape-goating; c) command economy (NOT democratic control of the means of production); d) intimidation, dissolution, or appropriation of mediating cultural institutions; and e) the fabrication of internal and external threats as the central organizing principle of the society.

Socialism shares some qualities -- particularly the awful totalitarian regimes of the former Soviet Union, Cuba, China, N. Korea. But to say socialism and fascism are the same thing loses so much that the comparison has negligent explanatory use.

ACynic| 4.7.09 @ 8:03PM

To Truth Hurts;
Read "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich," by William Shirer; the definitive account of Hiter's rise to power.
Ernst Rohm, leader of the Brown Shirts was murdered under Hitler's orders because he, Rohm, had become too popular and Hitler did not want this competition.
Hitler detested the Bolsheviks /Communists, not socialists.
Hitler and his bunch were ALL socialists from their earliest days in the German Workers Socialist Party.
Further, because many in the Bolshevik aristocracy - the nomenklatura - were of Jewish heritage (though, they were in reality atheists, just like the Nazi's by the way; another common thread amongst Nazis/communist/socialists/fascists), it fit in nicely with Hitlers anti semitic views.
Hitler and the Nazi's abhorred capitalism because they believed that profits should benefit the state, not the individual. Hitler coerced the large industrial firms of Germany to produce products for his military, he also dictated to them pricing, profit margins, worker hours and benefits, etc. etc. German industrialists - independent of their political inclinations - had no choice but to bend to Hitler's will or else.
It was not partnership of govt. and industry (which would be crony capitalism); but a govt. dictated industrial policy in which industry was told what to do and how to do it.
This, of course, is socialism; to be expected from Hitler - a socialist.
Like all socialists or communists, Hitler had to lie to gain power.
Just as Lenin et. al., swore to all he would create a worker's paradise - a total lie - the communists created an aristocracy of group think elitist intellectuals who reserved for themselves all privileges and rights one would find in a democratic society while denying the same to their serfs - the populace. Ditto for other socialists/communists/fascists like Castro, Mussolini, Kim Jong, etc.
Lying - and coercion - is a prerequisite to be a communist/fascist/socialist; it is the only way to gain and maintain power. It is also very effective.
Just as Hitler exterminated about 12 million "enemies of the state," Stalin and Lenin, did likewise, albeit far more efficiently and effectively- on the order of 30 to 60 million (depending on the source you wish to cite).

Like all socialists and communists, Hitler felt that society had to be re-made into a more "equitable" society in which the government -that would be himself - would dictate to society how things were to be.
Unlike the bolshevik communists, Hitler did allow individuals and companies to keep profits and own property provided that they were in conformance with his govt agenda.
This is socialism.
By the way, A Cynic is from the Greek, not from the Green.
The "Green" is another one of those socialist fascist communist ideologies in which the elite desire to control and dictate to others how to run their lives via the big lie; in this case, the end of life on earth because of actions of the unwashed masses. Ergo, they must be controlled.
I can see why you confused the two.

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 8:38PM

ACynic --

The Green / Greek crux you so shrewdly identify was merely a typo. Don't get too caught up in it all, comrade. You'll lose your health.

Now, perhaps you can answer me this:

If there is no essential difference between communism and fascism, why have the two terms at all? Why not instead just talk about "totalitarianism"?

You'd be pretty much in the clear, but you'd lose the benefit of analytic differentiation -- i.e., the ability to talk economically about the significant structural political, cultural, and economic differences between fascist and socialist states.

I'd recommend YOU read Shirer's fantastic book. Sounds to me like you skipped over the chapters where the man painstakingly records the relationships between and among fascist and socialist organizations and groups.

To say that Hitler was a socialist, again, is simply false. It's historically not true.

You can try to revise history all you like (and I think we all know why reactionaries are so desperate to convince people Nazis are "really" lefties...), but it doesn't change the simple, absolute, immutable fact of the matter: Hitler hated, reviled, loathed, renounced, detested, attacked, rejected, rebuked, fore-swore, and utterly repudiated socialism -- its practice, philosophy, ideals, motives, ideologies, historiographic theories, everything.

Angel| 4.7.09 @ 8:55PM

Coercion is coercion--regardless of ideology. I didn't like Obama telling Bank executives that his "...administration was the only thing between them (bankers) and the pitchforks." I didn't like it one damn bit. That's not leadership--that's extortion. It was an ugly episode.

Ran| 4.7.09 @ 9:11PM

"I can see why you confused the two." Cynic, I hate to disagree, but methinks 'tis the meds at fault. Hell, I like your posts, I just hate seeing 'em wasted.

Doesn't TH smell one awful lot like 'Bob'? Dig the faux command of subject, the hilarity of his/her/its goof-ups, the outright, naive lies ["To say that Hitler was a socialist, again, is simply false. It's historically not true."] 'Tis Bob's normal M.O. Ghaud, but it's bhoring.

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 9:30PM

Ran --

Doesn't sound to me like you have a reasonable argument to make against any of my points.

And no, "It's boring" doesn't count.

MT| 4.7.09 @ 9:52PM

It is boring--so typical.

Doug N| 4.7.09 @ 10:18PM

Truth Hurts, have you ever seen Monty Python's "The Life of Brian"? Fascists, communists; People's Front of Judea, Judean People's Front. Six of one...

Cookie| 4.7.09 @ 11:09PM

If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck--it's a duck. DUH!

Truth Hurts| 4.7.09 @ 11:29PM

Doug N --

In a million years, you'd never out Monty Python me, and I could recite Life of Brian, even were I drugged and bound and gagged and sunk to the bottom of the ocean.

But Doug, my friend, think: is Python's "six of one" anything to base your political philosophy on?

I think John and Terry and the rest of the boys would think you a fool if you did.

"If it looks like a duck..."

Come on, comrade. You can do better than that.

Alan Brooks| 4.7.09 @ 11:45PM

I am corrected--passenger pigeons!
carrier pigeons are used for sending messages-- at least they were.

Cookie| 4.7.09 @ 11:51PM

If it acts like a commie and governs like a commie--it's a commie.

Deborah| 4.8.09 @ 8:33AM

Mr. Hillyer asks, "What about freedom?" Don't you know that went out with Ronald Reagan? Ask David Frum that question.

Seriously, I believe "freedom" is considered a four-letter word on the left. Or else it is basically defined as "freedom for me, but not for thee."

Doug N| 4.8.09 @ 8:37AM

Truth Hurts, you miss the point, I think. Whether one calls a political movement "fascist" or "communist," the reality is that each is totalitarian in nature. Both extol the state above the individual. The only real difference is that one brand espouses international socialism, and the other espouses national socialism. Totalitarianism is the extreme form of what we term "leftist" ideology. On a political spectrum, if we place those totalitarian regimes that deny personal freedom and place the state above all other concerns (regardless of whatever that regime calls itself) on one extreme, what is its opposite on the other end of the spectrum? Totalitarianism, but practiced under another name? That makes no sense. Where would anarchy, the total absence of government place on the spectrum? In the center?

Anarchy=the extreme of libertarian/ conservative philosophy. Totalitarianism=the extreme of socialist/communist/fascist philosophy.

Ran| 4.8.09 @ 8:44AM

Alan,
Carrier pigeons differ in that they carry the passengers. Carrier pigeons are conservative and productive; passenger pigeons are liberals - they are used for spending others' wealth.

Tom G| 4.30.09 @ 8:21AM

Incidentally, David Leonhardt was quite wrong to claim that Hitler's economic policies worked. On the contrary, thanks to crash rearmament and other Nazi economic measures, by 1939 National Socialist Germany was speeding toward an economic crack-up. Hitler's headlong plunge into war in 1939 was partly motivated by his realization that the German economy was in a precarious position indeed. Hitler believed that only war and the loot it would bring in could avert disaster. See Richard Evans' "The Third Reich in Power, 1933-1939."

Natasha Fatale| 5.15.09 @ 2:40PM

EVERYONE, reread the posts of 'Truth Hurts', skipping over the others' posts. Note how long they are on sweeping generalization and short on specific points. heh... You're debating a bot! Truth Hurts fails the Turing Test. Brilliant bit of progamming, though.

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