Thursday, December 8, 2016

Is the Trump Movement Fascist?



Is the Trump Movement Fascist?

Hidden within all of the biased and skewed rhetoric of the mainstream media Acela/West Coast elitists against the Trump populist movement is a very real danger that few discuss with any degree of equanimity.  That danger is there is a truly emergent Fascism in the Trump movement  with all of the associated negative effects on politics and society.

Some recent articles rant and accuse Trump of Fascism in a very cursory and argumentative way, because some of his campaign rhetoric seems to have implied some affinity for this political view.  The NYT, New Yorker. CNN and other blatantly liberal mainstream media are particularly egregious in this regard.

Fascism is in fact is pretty difficult to define.  More scholarly and cerebral views separate Trump’s actions from what is felt to be more classical views of Fascism. Some definitions of Fascism and a list of links to varying views are given below.

From Wikipedia:
 Fascism /ˈfæʃɪzÉ™m/ is a form of radical authoritarian nationalism that came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe. Influenced by national syndicalism, fascism originated in Italy during World War I, in opposition to liberalism, Marxism, and anarchism. Fascism is usually placed on the far-right within the traditional left–right spectrum.
Fascists saw World War I as a revolution that brought massive changes in the nature of war, society, the state, and technology. The advent of total war and total mass mobilization of society had broken down the distinction between civilian and combatant. A "military citizenship" arose in which all citizens were involved with the military in some manner during the war. The war had resulted in the rise of a powerful state capable of mobilizing millions of people to serve on the front lines and providing economic production and logistics to support them, as well as having unprecedented authority to intervene in the lives of citizens.

 Etymology
The Italian term fascismo derives from fascio meaning a bundle of rods, ultimately from the Latin word fasces. This was the name given to political organizations in Italy known as fasci, groups similar to guilds or syndicates and at first applied mainly to organisations on the political Left. In Milan in 1919, Mussolini founded the Fasci Italiani di Combattimento, which, in 1921, became the Partito Nazionale Fascista (National Fascist Party). The Fascists came to associate the term with the ancient Roman fasces or fascio littorio—a bundle of rods tied around an axe, an ancient Roman symbol of the authority of the civic magistrate carried by his lictors, which could be used for corporal and capital punishment at his command.
The symbolism of the fasces suggested strength through unity: a single rod is easily broken, while the bundle is difficult to break. Similar symbols were developed by different fascist movements: for example the Falange symbol is five arrows joined together by a yoke.
                         
Main article: Definitions of fascism
Historians, political scientists, and other scholars have long debated the exact nature of fascism. Each interpretation of fascism is distinct, leaving many definitions too wide or narrow.
One common definition of the term focuses on three concepts: the fascist negations of anti-liberalism, anti-communism and anti-conservatism; nationalist authoritarian goals of creating a regulated economic structure to transform social relations within a modern, self-determined culture; and a political aesthetic of romantic symbolism, mass mobilization, a positive view of violence, and promotion of masculinity, youth and charismatic leadership. According to many scholars, fascism — especially once in power — has historically attacked communism, conservatism and parliamentary liberalism, attracting support primarily from the far right.
Roger Griffin describes fascism as "a genus of political ideology whose mythic core in its various permutations is a palingenetic form of populist ultranationalism". Griffin describes the ideology as having three core components: "(i) the rebirth myth, (ii) populist ultra-nationalism and (iii) the myth of decadence". Fascism is "a genuinely revolutionary, trans-class form of anti-liberal, and in the last analysis, anti-conservative nationalism" built on a complex range of theoretical and cultural influences. He distinguishes an inter-war period in which it manifested itself in elite-led but populist "armed party" politics opposing socialism and liberalism and promising radical politics to rescue the nation from decadence.
Robert Paxton says that fascism is "a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victimhood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion."
Umberto Eco, Kevin Passmore, John Weiss, Ian Adams, and Moyra Grant, mention racism (including anti-semitism) as a characteristic of fascism; i.e. fascistic dictator Hitler idealized German society as a racially unified and hierarchically organized Volksgemeinschaft.
John Lukacs, Hungarian-American historian and Holocaust survivor, argues that there is no such thing as generic fascism. He claims that National Socialism and Communism are essentially manifestations of populism and that, for example, the differences between the political regimes of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy are greater than their similarities

From Encyclopedia Britannica
Fascism, political ideology and mass movement that dominated many parts of central, southern, and eastern Europe between 1919 and 1945 and that also had adherents in western Europe, the United States, South Africa, Japan, Latin America, and the Middle East. Europe’s first fascist leader, Benito Mussolini, took the name of his party from the Latin word fasces, which referred to a bundle of elm or birch rods (usually containing an ax) used as a symbol of penal authority in ancient Rome. Although fascist parties and movements differed significantly from each other, they had many characteristics in common, including extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the rule of elites, and the desire to create a Volksgemeinschaft (German: “people’s community”), in which individual interests would be subordinated to the good of the nation. At the end of World War II, the major European fascist parties were broken up, and in some countries (such as Italy and West Germany) they were officially banned. Beginning in the late 1940s, however, many fascist-oriented parties and movements were founded in Europe as well as in Latin America and South Africa. Although some European “neofascist” groups attracted large followings, especially in Italy and France, none were as influential as the major fascist parties of the interwar period.

Recent links:
Balanced & scholastic views.:
Liberal leaning, but some valid points:

Rather than Fascism, it seems that the Trump movement represents a form of good old American populism similar to the actual Populist Party in the late 19th century, Ronald Reagan in the 1980’s and Ross Perot in the 1990’s.  Other examples we might not like to highlight as much, are the Know Nothing Party in the early 19th century and George Wallace’s American Independent Party in the 1960’s.  All of these were home grown populist parties, and some of them had trappings of Fascism, but were not Fascist.  In all cases of populism in the U.S., our system of checks and balances kept our democratic principles alive and robust.

Of course the fallout of Trump’s “Make America Great Again” is that we might sacrifice some of those beneficial aspects of recent liberal and socialist trends.  One example is the inclusiveness of all legal ethnic groups as Americans so long as they are willing to become citizens and adopt our democratic values and principles.  Trump’s threat to exclude Muslims based on religion is xenophobic.  Another example is universal availability of health and other essential services to all people.  Obamacare may need to be reworked, but virtually no one contemplates doing away with it.  Still another example is equal protection under the law, regardless of race and national origin. With respect to political correctness, elements of it are beneficial, but it should signify equality for everyone.  This means an end to special privileges for vociferous and activist special interests. There are others examples of a liberal and socialist nature that are beneficial to society.  We should examine these amenities carefully and not cut indiscriminately.

As Trump promised, what we must do is unwind those elements of liberalism and socialism that have denigrated and weakened our country.  We need to establish viable borders and enforce them.  If that requires a wall, so be it, but there may be other means available.  We need to provide some rational path for the roughly 12 million illegal aliens living in the country to either leave the country, or eventually legalize their status through a series of fines, study, and going through a defined legalization process.  We need to enforce our laws equally for everyone.  We should do away with so called “sanctuary cities” that break the law by harboring criminals.  Not only should “black lives matter”, all lives should matter equally without preferential treatment for a segment of society.  We should increase and support our police forces and protect citizens in hot spots like Chicago’s south side.  We should strengthen our military and bring it back from the deplorable condition Obama is leaving it in.  And we should eradicate Daesh or ISIS from the face of the earth and impose unequivocal death penalties on terrorists, foreign and domestic.  This may require additional boots on the ground in Iraq and possibly Syria. And we should isolate and quarantine Iran and North Korea until they conform with international laws and conventions.  We should reduce redundancy, but modernize our nuclear capability, so that our weapons are not stuck with 60 year old technology.

All of the above are Nationalistic, rather than Fascistic ideals.  As after many democrat/liberal interludes, our country is weak and an international laughingstock.  Russia and particularly China are in ascendancy.  We should either partner with them in a mutually advantageous manner or stand our ground with them and their expansion moves.  As Reagan did in the 1980’s, we indeed need “To Make Our Country Great Again”.  But this needs to be done with care, and with informed guidance.  Trump seems to have a good start with his emerging cabinet. Let’s hope he continues in a similar vein.

Concerning Twitter, YouTube and social media, the mainstream media is beside itself and twisting out of shape because Trump simply does not cater to them in the old fashioned way.  He delivers short tweets which the massed elitists respond to as if they are spontaneous and egotistical, whereas they are mostly spot on, and tweak the media mercilessly.  Longer messages can also be delivered by Twitter, or YouTube.  ABC, CBS, NBC. CNN. MSNBC simply are not required.  What better way for a populist president to communicate with the people? 

Ray Gruszecki
December 8, 2016

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