This was on Dan Hoover‘s "occasional blog," as the colleague who brought it to my attention so truthfully characterized it.
Well, I don’t care; I like McCain anyway. I like him even though he’s appearing at a fund-raiser for Karen Floyd. Speaking of which, I’m really jealous that Karen buys ads on the SC Hotline, but not on my blog. Not that I’m offering to sell any (those ads you see have to do with thestate.com or some other contract; they’re not sold for my blog per se), but she’s not exactly beating down my door, either.
If y’all keep reading this site at the rate you have been (note: just two more comments and this one will be at 300; the previous record was 259), the politicos will be throwing money at me — which would beat what they usually throw at me.
Of course, I expect those numbers to drop once I get tough on commenters — and that self-imposed deadline to decide what to do along those lines is coming up Sunday. So maybe that will save me from going all commercial.
Back to the original subject, I have a question for Bob McAlister: Since when are you and Charlie on the same team?
Related Posts
Brad, Rudy G. is coming to Charleston Aug. 16th to the Hibernian Hall. I missed the McCain visit but may make this one. It’s $100 entry fee, but you may get in free, press pass and all. You have to go hear Rudy.
Brad: I gotta tell ya, buddy. It’s all about you. Charlie and I were talking, see. And we came to the conclusion that we have never been on your side, politically speaking. So we decided we wanted to be on your team. Thus: McCain. That, plus McCain is the best man to lead us through perilous times internationally, and he’s the only candidate with the balls to say “no” to pork barrell spending. And we admire his courage and his willingness to do the right thing regardless of the political winds. But the biggest thing was that Charlie and I wanted to be on your team. Kinda feel like I’m wrapped in a cuddly, warm blanket. What’s the second verse to Kumbaya?
Brad,
Since you bring up the Karen Floyd race for Superintendent of Education, what a fine example of just how fragmented and weak our state’s executive branch is. (It seems like the same principle is also applied to the structure of most local mayors’ offices.)
It almost seems like the state constitution was written explicitly to make the executive branch as diluted and powerless as possible.
Oh, wait a minute, I get it now, it was deliberate…
OK. So does your UnParty have a platform position on this issue?
Seems to me that it would be in the interest of all (except the state legislature) to have a stronger, unified governor’s office.
From a political point of view, it would make the race for governor actually mean something and allow both parties to run broader, more intense campaigns. They could actually offer platforms that were comprehensive and had actual chances of getting things done their way.
Seems like the big party machines would look at this as an economy of scale issue. Instead of spending campaign money and resources spread out over several candidates with diverse issues and constituencies, they could consolidate their efforts into a single race which might engage more of the electorate.
From the voters point of view, it would go a long way to giving us some real accountability. We might get some representation that would have actual authority to get things done and that we could hold responsible if it’s not effective.
As it stands now, nobody can be held responsible because they can all point their fingers at other offices and claim that the authority to take action has been withheld from them.
Candidates might as well present the following universal speech:
“I’m a great guy. I have great ideas. Vote for me. But when I get in office, don’t expect me to be able to do anything. You see…”
The Dawning of Fascism in America
Anyone who has read this blog can easily see the parallels between the following and the comments of the reactionaries who pose as libertarians. There have been some changes in fascist rhetoric since the thirties however. Today, the racist aspect of fascism is cloaked in class language for example. Also, the enemies have changed (ostensibly) -from communism to Islam. Of course, fascism’s real enemies are still the same: liberalism, socialism, and social democracy.
Fascism is totalitarian capitalism. Communism is totalitarian socialism. Classic liberalism had failed by the early 1930s and its decline gave rise to these two movements. Undoubtedly, the social democratic reforms of the New Deal saved liberalism from its otherwise certain demise.
There definitely are solutions to save America from fascist despotism, but nothing can be accomplished while using an economic system that puts ordinary citizens at such a statistical disadvantaged. The economic wealth concentration caused by unregulated capitalism over time has concentrated political power into the hand of a few.
I hope my classic liberal friends are paying attention to people such as Ann Coulter. If you listen to Coulter carefully, then you’ll notice that her attacks on liberals are just the superficial trappings-her core message really vilifies classic liberalism itself.
Obviously, we’re becoming a police state of the fascist variety.
1. Fascism is the authoritarian rule by a privileged class and a full-scale assault on the lower class. Parliamentary institutions are set aside ruling is by decree often by a populist leader. Remember Hitler dismissed the Reichstag. Wages, any social net, labor laws and unions are quickly under attack. In short the club replaces the carrot. Even between the elites or capitalists of the same nation, the struggle intensities. Again remember Hitler had two groups of capitalist supporting him. One group was from the old-line heavy industries such as steal and coal. The other group was from the new technologies the electrics and chemicals. If you are unlucky enough to belong to a minority group, you’re as good as dead, you have no rights.
2. Fascism and Capitalism become one. There never has been a form of capitalism that did not invoke some form of fascist controls. One needs to look no further at the corporate power structure to see it tends toward absolute total control over the employees’ life. How many times have you heard of people married to their job, not by choice but by need? Even going back to the beginning of the Industrial Revolution the move from cottage industry to factory involved the lost of control by the employees. They were now no longer free to set their own hours. Secondly the fascist needs the capitalist to build the war machinery. Look again to the early supporters of Hitler: Henry Ford, the Rockefellers, the Dulles brothers, the Catholic Church, the German Krupp, who took great pleasure in heading up the Adolf Hitler Fund. Other large supporters of Hitler were Fritz Thyssen, Vereinigte Stahlwerke and Emil Kirdorf, their support was to show gratitude for Hitler’s anti-Marxist views. Further fascism tends to emerge during periods of economic upheaval. Both Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany arose during economic crisis. It was also common place during the 1930s that in polite English social circles to refer to fascism simply as corporatism.
3. Fascism uses rabid nationalism to rally the masses. Hitler used nationalism as a rallying cry through out his rise to power. First it was the unfairness of the Versailles Treaty, then it was Sudetenland, the Polish corridor, Austria, etc. Glorification of war and the military play a large role in this surreal nationalism. Often times a sense of historic mission is attached to the super patriotism.
4. Racism often becomes part of fascim. Little needs to be said here other than remember the Holocaust. Although, this is not a necessary trait of a fascist country, it is often present. Diversity is not tolerated. Homogeneous and uniformity are two traits admired by the fascists. Note the simlarity with corporate power structures and the good old boy network.
5. Fascism is often lead by a cult like figurehead. There is no question that Hitler Was a good orator and a populist figure.
6. Fascism uses the tools of violence and terror. Again little needs to be said, remember the Night of the Long Knives, Crystal Night, the slave labor and death camps?
7. Fascism beliefs of mysticism and irrationals. Starting with the later Hitler forbid His scientist working on the atomic bomb to even mention Einstein or some of the other Jewish nuclear physicists who were leaders in the field. The SS was founded on mysticism and is full of symbolic meanings and symbols. Hitler himself often referred to the ancient German legends and mythical beings.
8. Fascism is radically opposed to communism. It was Hitler himself who order the purging of the socialists from the Nazi party. Long before the purge and before the Nazis came to power they had a history of brawling with the communists. Reaction extends to values of Modernism as well as to attacks against liberals.
9. Fascists are consistent and rigid in their beliefs. There was no compromising with the Fuehrer as Chamberlain once learnt the hard way. Many still deny the Holocaust through an absurd belief that somehow Jews were less than human. Often times they appear irrational, after one outburst in which Hitler took to chewing the carpet, his aides started calling him the carpet eater behind his back.
10 Fascism calls for national unity. This is the deception, the fascist calls for cooperation between classes, but actually promotes division to conceal the tensions between the corporation leaders and their employees. Hitler replaced those union leaders that were less cooperative with pro business leaders.
Mark,
I’m sorry I missed the transition from Brad’s McCain lead to your downloaded term paper on fascism.
I apologize for being so slow. Maybe you could explain the connection, please?
Oh yeah,
I meant to put the previous post under Brad’s “Workers should have the right to unionize” heading-or was it the “Globalization is destroying the middle class” heading? Hmm, perhaps it was the “Unparty equals no party” heading. Nope, it can’t be any of those since they don’t exist, and nothing like them will ever exist as long as our local paper is in bed with the Chamber of Commerce.
Lieberman fits right in with the gang pictured above. Look to the left to see fascism incarnate. Don’t send me e-mails asking me to support the politicians who helped enable the neo-fascists.
Ohh.. kay.. Now it’s all clear. Guess I got my answer.
Here is the calculation that proves Mark’s theories. 911 – 822 = 89. Then you take 89 – the (sum of 9+1+1) and (the sum of 8+2+2) and you get 66. Now we have our clue and we know the mark of the beast is 666. Since this year is 2006, that is the last piece of the puzzle. We add that 6 to the other 2 sixes and we now have 666. This is why Aug. 22 was so important to the Moslem terrorists because Satan orders all of his attacks using this formula.
McCain’s biggest problem is that he comes up with a lot of dumb ideas in his effort to attach his name to reform legislation.
His campaign finance reform was actually an attack on individual participation, which denies private distribution of factual information, but grants a loophole for paid advertising on TV, radio and newspapers. No wonder Brad Warthen likes him.
McCain’s immigration reform actually loosens existing controls, which are not even being enforced. It opens the borders to a gold rush of the world’s most backward people. One business writer, cheering the prospect of replacing “expensive American workers”, honestly labeled it the “mongrelizing” of America.
McCain is an amiable fellow. I once ran into him and we chatted for about 15 minutes. When I asked how several of his then proposed campaign law would be implemented, he kept answering, “I hadn’t thought of that.” He didn’t go back and fix it, either. There just isn’t much upstairs with John McCain.
As he is in most matters language-related, Mark Whittington is right on target with this political post. It came as no surprise to me that the ones who didn’t think it “added up” were not our star pupils.
And Dave, not all of us are foolish enough to believe in the the vagaries and supersitions of ancient Judaism. As a result, your post was the one more closely resembling fuzzy math.
The Hating Left does believe in the vagaries and superstitions of radical Islam, because it makes them hate President Bush.
Well, the Common-Sensical Middle sees the wizardry and sorcery that both sides worship only serve to provide excuses to harm their fellow men.
I don’t hate Bush. I feel sorry for my country that its last two “best choices” for leadership were deeply flawed men who let their personal failings affect and infect our country. Clinton and Bush are two “lyin’s”, both sired in the same day.
The problem with most common sense is that it is based on “common knowledge” that is nothing but myth and half-truth.
I wish I could agree with Capital A that Mark W. is “right on target” with his post. Unfortunately, it is simply a cut-and-paste from a 3L site. The points where it’s not wrong or deluded are also equally applicable to communism. Number 3, for example, exactly describes Soviet communism during WW2, with its appeals to Rodina (Motherland) to save its sorry rear end from defeat.
Number 8 is especially wrongheaded. Far from being “radically opposed to” fascism, the real reason for opposition is that communism, just like fascism and national socialism, cannot tolerate any other system and claims an absolute monopoly of power.
Communism is just as radically opposed to any other variant on the communist system, i.e. Trotskyism, Maoism, or anything else for that matter. “Thou shalt not have any other communism besides the one in power” would be the best description.