Among the issues most commonly discussed are individuality, the rights of the individual, the limits of legitimate government, morality, history, economics, government policy, science, business, education, health care, energy, and man-made global warming evaluations. My posts are aimed at intelligent and rational individuals, whose comments are very welcome.

"No matter how vast your knowledge or how modest, it is your own mind that has to acquire it." Ayn Rand

"Observe that the 'haves' are those who have freedom, and that it is freedom that the 'have-nots' have not." Ayn Rand

"The virtue involved in helping those one loves is not 'selflessness' or 'sacrifice', but integrity." Ayn Rand

For "a human being, the question 'to be or not to be,' is the question 'to think or not to think.'" Ayn Rand

06 April 2009

Hudgins - Obama's Grab-Bag Socialism

I am not pulling my punches in my evaluation of Obama and the Democrat Congress. I believe that they are taking the United States down an insanely destructive path. I would like to point out a very good article taking a similar stance by Edward Hudgins of the Atlas Society. It is called "Obama's Grab-Bag Socialism."

I have heard and seen several references lately in which generally freedom-loving commentators are claiming that fascism is not socialism because socialism takes over the ownership of the means of production and other property. I think this is wrong. Socialism takes over control, sometimes ownership, of the means of production and of property. The Marxist forms of socialism, such as communism, take ownership, while fascism leaves nominal ownership in the hands of individuals or groups, but applies incentives, pressures, and force as desired to make those individuals or groups do the government's bidding. Both Marxism and fascism offer the people status as dependents by bribing them with health care and other state-provided or mandated benefits. It is the last coupled with the control of property and business that makes both fascism and Marxism socialism.

Mussolini and Hitler were of the socialist mindset. After being drummed out of the Italian Socialist Party for favoring Italy's participation in WWI, Mussolini started the Fascist Party with much of his viewpoint already set by his long allegience to the Socialist Party. Hitler gave his party the name National Socialist Party and even admired Joe Stalin, despite fighting the communists for power in Germany.

The United States has long been a mixed economy. The freedom of the individual to offer his services in employment, to hire others, to produce, to trade, to transport, and to control his property has long been interfered with by our governments. Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson began controlling private property and business in heavy-handed ways long ago. The aspect of socialism in which the government heavily began bribing the people into dependency began with Franklin D. Roosevelt. Teddy Roosevelt was tinged with fascism and Woodrow Wilson was very substantially fascist. Woodrow even had the fasces applied to the dime in 1916 and was an admirer of Mussolini.

Many claimed failures in the economy have come about due to government intervention.
The recession under Hoover, which Roosevelt turned into the Great Depression is one such example. Politicians and governments of the modern era love socialism as a means to control and power. For most, it is irresistible. So, the Federal, state, and local governments of the United States have all heavily applied socialism, sometimes in the form of government ownership of property (public schools, roads, parks, national forests, mass transit) and sometimes by the control of property and businesses through mandates, subsidies, tax deductions, tax credits, safety and pollution regulations, zoning, licensing, tariffs, banking regulations, accounting requirements, and much more. These controls can be gauged by the very high rate of expansion of the Federal Register and other government publications of regulations and contracts.

The public ownership of property is very considerable (consider the western states with huge portions, often the majority of the land, owned by the federal government, see my entry of 8 November 2008). But, the principle means used by government in the United States to control the lives of the people has clearly become the fascist model, with a number of features adopted more to the American character, primarily as misleading deceptions. It is entirely reasonable to call this socialism American Fascism. The core of Obama's goal is to turn the United States into a subordinate cog in an international fascist socialist regime. Of course, he avoids using the honest terms fascism and socialism like the plague, which is exactly what they are.

2 comments:

Christian Prophet said...

Of course fascism is a form of socialism. It sure as hell isn't individualism.

fas-cism
noun
1. a socialist governmental system led by a dictatorial party which seeks to control industry and commerce, and uses laws and governmental force to institute Utopian programs.

The above definition was copied from a site named "U.S. Constitution Abandoned Miracle?"
http://constitutionparti.blogspot.com

Charles R. Anderson, Ph.D. said...

Definitions of fascism are all over the map, in good part because the intelligentsia are trying so hard to shield their beloved socialism from any connection with fascism.

Consequently, the Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language, 2nd College Edition defines fascism as:

2. a system of government characterized by rigid one-party dictatorship, forcible suppression of opposition, private economic enterprise under centralized government control, belligerent nationalism, racism, and militarism, etc.: first instituted in Italy in 1922 3.a) a political movement based on such doctrines and policies b) fascist behavior

Note that definition 2 defines this concept very narrowly. As long as the Republican Party elects an occasional official, the U.S. is not fascist by this definition. If control of the opposition is simply done with bribes, threats to have the IRS do tax audits for 5 years running, tax penalties, unnecessary energy use restrictions and pollution controls, then many would claim we do not have fascist government. There is certainly no mention of socialism in the above definition, yet social programs and social engineering were very prominent in both Mussolini's Fascism and in Hitler's Nazism.

In the supplement to the Oxford English Dictionary, fascism is defined as

The principles and organization of Fascists. Also, loosely, any form of right-wing authoritarianism.

Fascist is defined as

One of a body of Italian nationalists, which was organized in 1919 to oppose communism in Italy, and, as the partito nazionale fascista, under the leadership of Benito Mussolini controlled that country from 1922 to 1943; also transf. applied to the members of similar organizations in other countries. Also, a person of right-wing authoritarian views.

Again we see no mention of socialism, except that fascists are supposed to be the opposition to communism. In fact, the disagreements between communists and fascists are reminiscent of a civil war in which people of similar cultural interests go at it with great fury over minor differences. The big difference is always that between individual rights and the subservience of the individual to government. In this, of course, fascism and communism have much, very much, in common. Both offer social program benefits as the carrot to encourage most of the people to give up their individual rights. Both are political philosophies of the left, not the right.