How far are we from being a fascist state?

[Matilda]

I was reading an article on the Third World Traveler website dealing
with the growth of fascism under George W Bush in the U.S. It lists
fourteen common threads of fascism:

1. Powerful and continuing expressions of nationlism
2. Disdain for the importance of human rights.
3. Identification of enemies/scapegoats as a unifying cause.
4. The supremacy of the military/avid militarism.
5. Rampant sexism.
6. A controlled mass media.
7. Obsession with national security.
8. Religion and ruling elite tied together.
9. Power of corporations protected.
10. Power of labor suppressed or eliminated.
11. Disdain and suppression of intellectuals and the arts.
12. Obsession with crime and punishment.
13. Rampant cronyism and corruption.
14. Fraudulent elections.

I think we're well on the way.

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. How about there

the indictments may be the turning point, they can't, we are there, oh we are so there it is not even funny

[mom cat]

8. Unelected President (twice), blatantly flaunting the will of the people

in most of the core issues and at the point of his lowest approval, chooses to make a full court press for even more militarism...even to fight virus! All of this while having the most scandal ridden administration in the history of the country and having the press covering...Granted, they did object to his incompetently handling of Katrina. Yet, before the city has even dried out, this man with no power base among the people is drastically accelerating his quest for corporate and military dominance while simultaneously moving more Americans into poverty and gutting the UN Millennium goals that had offered a glimmer of hope to the world's desperately poor. He does this while maniacally blocking efforts to address global warming , All this while showing his utter reliance on science when it comes to developing more abominable ways of killing and controlling vans numbers of people. Does the development of a safe haven by the Moonies in South America bear any significance? Have the fascist elite decided to milk humanity of all that they own, let natural disaster take its course and let most of the people die, while they are "safe" in their hideaway? I am searching for some other more innocuous explanation for the neo-con's totally irrational behavior, but I have none. Katrina revealed the depth of their depravity..They even abandoned their own base..the SOLID SOUTH. They truly do not care.
We are all living on planet New Orleans right now. We are all being willfully and contemptuously abandoned by our leaders. If we were still living in a democracy then the majority would not be being sucked dry by ever increasingly ruthless oligarchs, the media would not live in fear, would be working feverishly to halt the global warming that threatens most multi-cellular life forms and we would stop destroying common sense approaches to population control.
In a democracy. the rascals would have been thrown out of office by now, now being granted the privilege of appointing the chief arbiters of the law. In a democracy, we would have a loyal opposition that would fight for the people, not sell us into deeper debt with new bankruptcy law, and allow the poisoning of our water, air and soil without even an attempt at a filibuster.The list goes on and on and on.

[opihimoimoi]

2. WE are Nearly there.....only the Military remains our protection.

If they turn on US....as some did at Kent State, killing Americans, we are doomed.

[mom cat]

9. They WERE killing Americans in New Orleans....It is already

happening. Right here at home.

[opihimoimoi]

14. Then...we are dooomed...its a matter of time before the gulags

[mom cat]

16. We are all going to die some time in the future anyway. The question is

what kind of a life do we want from now till then. I don't think that I am cut out to be a slave. So I guess that the only option I have is to fight like hell.

[opihimoimoi]

17. I been on the "Wall for Better Gov't" for years...this is the worst I ever

seen or thought possible...damn.

[mom cat]

18. I agree. the media now looks like Pravda on steroids, the level of graft

is so blatant, they don't even bother to conceal it any more. And the contempt for the people shown during Katrina was beyond belief. these people are evil and they play for keeps. i am not at all convinced that the apparently eminent change in puppets will even temporarily break the stride of the puppeteers.
But i have to stay and fight....My other planet is not ready yet.

[opihimoimoi]

19. We fight to save our children from this shit of bad gov't, bad decisions

and bad results...We fight for Humanity to live on a planet healed.

[rawtribe]

3. Dude look

in your rear view mirror.

[firefox]

4. He is talking about Australia you know

You can check all 14 of those points off concerning America. I do not know about Australia and some of these first comments might not realize you are talking about Australia.

[mestup]

5. Why does rampant sexism go with fascism? Just curious.

Don't mean to show my stupidity, but it would seem to imply a religious component. I always thought fascism was more an economic philosophy?

[nadinbrzezinski]

7. Women stay at home and have children

some of them will be male children, which you can use to fight future wars... it is as simple as that..

[McKenzie]

12. and, fascism expresses masculine values of power, dominance

and so on. It is a complete negation of the comlimentary values that are evident in the feminine side of human nature. BTW, both genders have male and female characteristics...fascism negates the feminine side and the corollary is sexism emanting from the core characteristic of fascist values, namely dominance from the centre and repression of anything that might challenge such dominance.

[The_Casual_Observer]

6. We got there in March 2003 when bush invaded Iraq

and nobody could do a god damned thing about it.

[mom cat]

11. We got there when the Supreme Court stopped the counting of the votes.

We have not had "duly elected leaders" ever since>

[Kool McKool]

10. The best essay I've read about fascism in America

... can be found here:

http://cursor.org/stories/fascismintroduction.php
(and you have to love the 1984 picture with Rush Limbaugh)

I use the word fascist whenever I can when I'm discussing the right-wing in America today, but you have to be careful and know exactly what it means. This essay makes very careful distinctions between fascism and merely right-wing politics.

And yes, I know this question was about Australia - a country I know nothing about.

[Phoebe_in_Sydney]

13. Australia: point by point

Just my immediate reaction:

1. (Nationalism) Mmmm, maybe. Aussies still aren't powerfully nationalistic, but I sense an increase.
2. (Disdain for human rights) Yes
3. (enemies/scapegoats) Getting there. Working on Indonesians specifically and Moslems in general.
4. (militarism) Definitely not. We know just about anyone has got us covered.
5. (rampant sexism) sexism, yeah, but rampant might be stretching it a bit.
6. (controlled mass media) Yep. Tick that one off.
7. (national security obsession) Nah, still think most Aussies can't be arsed worrying about it. At least until something actually happens here.
8. (religion & ruling elite tied) Not yet, but worrying signs of tending in that direction.
9. (corporations protected) Johnny Howard's working hard on that one.
10. (labor power suppressed) Uh-huh, that's being achieved right now.
11. (disdain intellectuals, arts) Well not sure we ever held them in high regard.
12. (crime and punishment obsession) Maybe. media working on it.
13. (cronyism/corruption) A bit. But still streets behind BushCo.
14. (election fraud) No. Please let's keep the paper and pencils and compulsory voting.

I got 4 YES, 6 MAYBE, 4 NO

[Matilda]

15. I agree we're not there yet.

Rather weak on militarism, but that's mainly because we can't afford
it. We've always been rather sexist, and Howard's welfare and child
care policies are forcing more and more women out of the work force
and back into the kitchen - quite deliberately I believe.

And my first thought was that we do have honest elections - but what
about party preselection? The rank and file party members have no
say in who the candidates are, they're chosen by the power machines
in both major parties. With Labor it's the factions, and with the
Libs and Nationals it's increasingly going the way of the "christian"
Right, with party hacks being put up over the most promising.
So we're often faced with having to choose between mediocrities, all
of whom will toe the party line. They don't have to rig the votes
when they choose all the candidates, and the whole system's rigged
to favour the two major parties.

As for cronyism - whatever happened to ministerial responsibility?
Howard now has a long history of protecting errant ministers and
pandering to the interests of corporate mates such as Packer and
Murdoch. It hasn't yet reached the heights it has in the US under
Bush, but give him time.

I would have said we're becoming more fearful and therefore more
conservative, but when I read that list and thought about it, I
found it pretty worrying - creeping fascism.

[Phoebe_in_Sydney]

20. sexism

LOL'd at your comment "we've always been rather sexist" almost wrote pretty much those words myself. I honestly don't think that one's getting any worse -- but then we were starting from a pretty low mark.

Yes, Howard's welfare and child care policies are forcing more women out of the work force, but then his economic policies are forcing families to need two incomes anyway. Maybe it's just good old fashioned class warfare rather than sexism? Either way he's a loathsome character who's far too impressed with the way the Bush administration is operating. It's no coincidence that he sent his son over to work on the Bush Cheney re-election campaign and now they're looking at trying to axe compulsory voting.

Hadn't thought of the preselection process as election fraud. See your point, but at least at the actual ballot box the votes don't seem to be fiddled. If I hear the word Diebold mentioned in connection with an Aussie election I will however run into the street screaming.

Ministerial responsibility? Yeah well that's a laugh. I honestly believe they've taken that page from the Rove handbook -- just refuse to admit a mistake at any time, no matter what the evidence.

btw, don't know if you follow NSW politics at all, but how like a Rove job was the demolition of John Brogden? I don't have much sympathy for him but the tactics -- combining the clout of right wing of the Libs and the media muscle of Murdoch -- was pretty damn scary I thought.

[Matilda]

21. Yes, the Brogden affair was pretty horrible.

He clearly wasn't really up to the job, but at least he was a
moderate, and that was his crime. It's scary how much influence
the "christian" Right has these days, especially when you consider
how small a part of our population they represent.

I'm not impressed with the rise of Morris Iemma either - he's
definitely an example of the right-wing of Labor just putting in
their man regardless of whether or not he's the right person for the
job. He'll do what he's told, and that's all that matters to them.

[SweetLeftFoot]

22. As long

as we can go and watch our paper votes being counted, a long, long way.

[Matilda]

23. Now that we can scrutinize the new anti-terrorism legislation,

I wouldn't be too sure about that.

http://www.chiefminister.act.gov.au/whats_new.asp?title=What's%20New


It's difficult to read, but even to laymen, it's a worry, and the
advice of the DPP on the same page bears this out.

[Violet_Crumble]

24. I haven't been able to get past the 'DRAFT - IN CONFIDENCE' label...

I can't stop snickering at the sight of that on a public website...

[Matilda]

25. I love that Howard is totally pissed about it.

He thought he was going to sneak it by before anyone had time to
properly digest it.

John Stanhope should run for Federal Parliament and the Labor
leadership.

[oscarmitre]

26. Stanhope is not a populist

I think. My impression is that principles and not focus group results count with him. Of course that could be because the ACT has a well educated and politically aware electorate.

I just slapped myself for being overly cynical.

Anyway I like the way he operates.