Since we're talking about Nazis and Republicans....

[sofa king]

Perhaps this is a good time to go over the similarities, large and small.

First of all, what is fascism?

a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition

A closer examination of fascism yields fourteen issues on which most fascist parties of the 20th century agreed. It's well worth examining all of them. If you read just one link here, read that one. Can't be bothered? Then just read this.

But the Nazis were socialists, right? They were the National Socialist German Workers' Party, after all.

No. The socialist angle was quickly shown to be bullshit, exactly as compassionate conservatism has been shown to be bullshit.

As William L. Shirer points out in his still-relevant overview of the Nazis, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, p. 68, as the Nazi party was putting together its first political platform "(socialist leaning) demands had been put in at the insistence of Drexler and Feder, who apparently really believed in the 'socialism' of National Socialism. They were the ideas which Hitler was to find embarrassing when the big industrialists and landlords began to pour money into the party coffers, and of course nothing was ever done about them." Just like nothing was done--or the opposite was done, about these issues.

In fact the National "Socialists," once in firm political power, crushed the workers' unions in Germany, as their big-business financiers desired. Echoes of the same policy shows here. For example, when the Department of Homeland Security was created in America, George W. Bush made sure the new employees were forbidden to form unions.

Big Business? Sure. The similarities between the Nazis and the GOP on that front are obvious and numerous, from the large picture to the small one.

For example, the Nazi Party enjoyed its economic successes primarily from foreign investment and from multinational corporations, as well as the enthusiastic support of German financiers at home. Fritz Thyssen controlled the largest steelworking company in Germany and had a nice, tight relationship with Prescott Bush through Bush's firm, Brown Brothers Harriman. In 1933, it was a letter from Thyssen and economic wizard Hjalmar Schacht to President Hindenburg which convinced Hindenburg to appoint Hitler Chancellor of Germany. Both the Nazis and the Republicans tried to raise profitability by cutting benefits and driving down real wages. Just as big business played an inextricable role in Nazi Germany, so too has it played an integral role in Republican America, from Dick Cheney on down.

Both the Nazis and the Republicans talked a good game about free trade, but both were actually protectionists when it came to domestic corporate interests. Both appeased their corporate sponsors through deregulation.

Hitler used his business connections in the exact same way George Bush did, all the way down to free airfare. Hitler was tight with Erhard Milch, the director of Lufthansa, and Milch extended free airfare to Hitler for the duration of his political campaigns while Germany was still free....

...Exactly as Enron provided use of their private aircraft to George W. Bush in 1999 and 2000. And similar to the way John McCain travels today.

Both Hitler and Bush used a terrorist incident to solidify their grip on power. For Hitler, it was the burning of the Reichstag. For Bush, it was 9/11. Both went to great lengths to cover up subsequent investigations of the crime. In Hitler's case--thanks mostly to the lens of history--there is little doubt that his own Nazi Party facilitated the incident. Some of you still don't want to believe the Republican Party is behind 9/11, but the results were exactly the same: capitalizing on the climate of fear, both Hitler and Bush used their respective incidents to increase their authority.

And what did they both do with that authority? Why, they used it to spy on their own people, of course. In 1936, the Gestapo secured the ability to operate without judicial oversight... just as the Departments of Justice and Defense did in 2002. Carefully couched within that domestic surveillance of both nations was the authorization of torture.

Once their authority was expanded, both started wars of aggression against weaker countries. Both used false pretenses to justify the attacks. For Hitler it was the Gleiwitz Incident. For Bush it was http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Ledeen">non-existent WMDs. Both used their premier foreign diplomats to help neutralize opposition, with Ribbentrop negotiating a non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union, while http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/02/05/sprj.irq.powell.transcript/">Colin Powell attempted to steer the United Nations over to the U.S. side.

Both created fallacious diplomatic blocs designed to create the impression that both nations had more support worldwide than they actually did. Neither actually got very much military help from those organizations, and were forced to man their coalition armies through bribery, coercion and intimidation.

Domestically, both the Nazi Party and the Republican Party motivated the support of right-wing authoritarians through the support of wedge issues. Both were ardently against homosexuality, while they were both embarrassed by homosexuals within their own ranks.

The Protestant right wing of both nations were utilized to secure domestic acceptance. Germany had its Reich Bishop. America has James Dobson. Both religious organizations attempted to hoodwink lower- and middle-class people into supporting platforms which were manifestly not in their best interests. Both succeeded wildly.

While the United States' own viciously racist past now precludes the overt use of racism as a political policy, the Republican Party has found ways around it, notably in immigration policy directed against not-quite-white North Americans (Canadians are happily excepted). Immigration policy is also the central issue to the modern successor to the German Nazis, the NPD. However, both parties in practice relied heavily on the use of cheap labor from foreign nations to maintain high corporate profits. Once the Third Reich included occupied subject nations, German business happily outsourced its labor to the detriment of the country--no jeep-like vehicles were built in Germany after 1943 because of the bankruptcy of the German automobile industry.

Both benefited greatly from control of the media, and both achieved it through shady intimidation and corporate ownership. Both relied heavily upon false propaganda. Both put their chief propagandists (Goebbels and Rove) in the highest positions of authority. Both attempted to neutralize the judiciary by packing the courts and moving spying and torture outside of the courts' authority. Both singled out foreign enemies and diverted attention to those enemies to conceal their own shortcomings. Both relied on fear to achieve their goals. Both suffered for their partiality to corruption and cronyism. Both endured rampant war profiteering which harmed their armies in the field.

In fact, the differences between Nazi Germany and the Republican United States comes down to just a couple of issues. The Republicans aren't anti-Semites--but they are racist, sexist homophobes, just like the Nazis. America isn't a one-party state (yet), as the Third Reich became, but that isn't for lack of trying. Don't be fooled by arguments that the Republicans aren't Nazis because they can't get away with what they really want--that's primarily an issue of competence, not ideology. The Nazis relied more heavily on murder and false imprisonment to get their way... but this election year isn't over by a long shot. Mostly, it's a matter of refinement and certain cultural taboos, if you ask me.

In a way, when George Bush compared Barack Obama to Neville Chamberlain, he had something of a point--but not the point he was making. It's not the radical islamists who are the fascists--it's the Republicans. We Democrats are culpable to a degree for allowing the American Nazis the leeway they have enjoyed for the past seven years.

It will ultimately be up to us to take America back and to repair what damage can be repaired--and to ensure that fascism is once more (temporarily) put to bed here in the United States. I hope we can.

[shain from kane]

1. We'll have to consult with Jonah Goldberg on the matter. He has an entirely different definition.

[90-percent]

2. KO

Didn't Keith once make a special comment about GWB inadvertently playing the Neville Chamberlain role?


-90% Jimmy