Fascism in America, Part One

fas·cism (American Heritage Dictionary...what a fitting source)
n.

1. often Fascism
   1. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
   2. A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.

Thus, we have begun by defining our terms in the time-honored style of serious academics everywhere. The first thing to note is that this classical definition of fascism does not appear to work as a description of America's current politics. Disappointing, of course, since it's always reassuring to place one's dysfunctional government on a continuum with failed political movements of the past. Like so much in this ingenious land, America's fascism, if such it is, must be sui generis.

I think the term gets thrown around because certain features of National Socialism and Mussolini's tyranny in Italy appear in play in modern America; to wit, the rise of corporatism and the diminished role of a free press in organizing dissent to a centralized power structure. If Leo Trotsky were still around (I call him Leo because "Leon" makes him sound so bratty), he would make short work of the analytical task. Alas, even if Stalin's hit man had not struck him in the head with an ice axe in Mexico City so long ago, it's doubtful Leo would still be with us. So we're left to our own devices. What to call this peculiar political system in the USA?

I suppose we could draw attention to its salient features and see if that suggests anything. The first thing we should note is that the American system today is totally, completely and absolutely dedicated, consecrated and devoted to the service of Big Business. That is its first and only value. The reason we have the leaders we have today is because they are adept at representing Big Money. Bush is little more than a useful idiot for these purposes, but he was effective, because of his name (mainly) and because Americans are suckers for a kind of moronic folksiness, in getting to the White House. Once enthroned, representatives of Big Money who had used the revolving door between Fortune 500 companies and the federal government to build large personal estates (Cheney and Rumsfeld) could then use him, along with the venal horde known as the Republican Congress, to set things up so that Big Money, and only Big Money, could prosper.

It is not difficult to find evidence for these generalizations. Almost the first order of business was a large-scale repeal of the progressive income tax; followed later by a massive overhaul of the bankruptcy laws on terms which favored banks and credit card companies; and then the piece de resistance, the prescription drug "benefit" law which specifically forbade Medicare from negotiating volume discounts with pharmaceutical companies. I mean: do they have to draw you a picture? The Iraq war, of course, has largely served two functions, to control oil for America's domestic suppliers (if by no other means than making sure it stayed in the ground - see Greg Palast's work on this subject), and to allow the funneling of taxpayer dollars to certain inside war contractors, such as Halliburton, Bechtel and Blackwater, as well as munitions and weapons contractors generally.

So one feature common to both National Socialism and modern America is the essential identity between the interests of Big Money and Big Government; however, we arrived at this position along a path different from Nazi Germany. Nazism grew out of post-World War I desperation in
Germany and conditions of hyper-inflation. Hitler promised a resurgence of the commonweal for everyday Germans. In 2000 by contrast, America's standard of living had been on the decline for some 30 years, and its major difficulty was that it could no longer sustain its own post World War II prosperity. The world had caught up to our manufacturing advantage, and increasingly the U.S. had turned to "service sector" jobs, meaning minimum wage or slightly better, which brought about the destruction of the American middle class. The process, if anything, is accelerating, as the U.S. becomes one of the most stratified societies in modern history, with an ever-increasing percentage of total wealth held by an elite.

What was left in America was the wealth of the super-rich, and most of this was derived from transnational corporations who participate in the global economy. Washington D.C. serves this special interest group, and Congress routinely passes laws, such as "free trade" agreements, which facilitate the international nature of the business they pursue. For those who are successful in international business, the rewards are very high, and more of the capital can now be conserved and reinvested because of tax "relief," and taxes other than for the entitlement programs are redistributed mainly to big business through the military-industrial complex.

Thus, the circle is complete. In a fundamental sense the federal government is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Big Business which functions as an operative arm of its international business plan. As a further example, the current immigration proposal is solely for the purpose of guaranteeing a cheap and efficient labor pool for agri-business and other users of minimum wage earners. If proposed legislation in Congress is looked at through this lens, many of their more egregiously counter-productive measures (if considered from the viewpoint of the average American) make perfect sense as the result of business lobbying.

Next time I will look at Social Security reform, which had a brief vogue a couple of years ago, then sank beneath the waves. It will be seen again, and the reasons for it are instructive in seeing what America has become.