Over the course of the last couple days there has been a concerted effort on the part of the infamous Republican attack machine to do some rebranding. Obama is no longer a socialist; now (amazingly without actually changing any intended policies) he is a die hard Fascist.
The Rebranding of Socialism
Unfortunately for the neo-conservative Republican base, the forced perception of Obama and his policies as “Socialism” have not had the intended effect. They failed to change the election and have subsequently failed to rally the American people against Obama’s policies. It would seem that the Republicans believe that the trouble is that the characterization of socialism just isn’t harsh enough and needs to be replaced with a new term.
The public has seen what true socialism is like. There are blends of socialism all over the world in “radical, failed countries” like Canada, England, Germany, France, Australia, Spain, Brazil, and even already in the US. It is true that we have seen massive failure in the overly authoritarian Communism, but conversely the world has experienced some of the highest levels of economic growth and social justice with a blended form of socialism and capitalism. The fallacy of attempting to incite hatred in Obama’s policies by referring to them as socialism is starting to be more than just glaring; it’s necessitated a shift to using the term “Fascism.”
In marketing this is referred to as rebranding. And, just like the Sham-Wow and every other piece of bullshit out there, Conservative economics is going to need a lot of marketing.
Political Rebranding Disproves any Notion of Authenticity
What should be most discouraging to conservatives is the fact that this sudden attempt at rebranding solidifies the evidence that this is not an authentic characterization of Obama’s politics, it is only a political stunt employed as a last ditch effort to maintain political significance. There is a huge difference between Fascism and Socialism, and in many ways they are on opposite ends of the governance/economic scale. This nearly diametric shift comes at a time when Obama’s actual politics and economics have not changed. So if the same policies were Socialism a few weeks ago but Fascism now, how can there be clearer evidence that there is no sincerity to this characterization?
The conservatives can only vainly hope that in calling Obama a Fascist that no one on their side actually looks up what the definition of Fascist actually is. My republican friends, you are being duped; there is a man behind the curtain.
The Inconvenient Facets of Fascism
It is certainly likely that by characterizing Obama’s policies as Fascist is meant to be a replacement for expressing that they believe the administration is overly authoritarian. But words like this fall flat on Fox News, you need a passionate rally cry like Fascist. Despite their substitution of the term Fascist for authoritarian, it is not even the accurate derivative of authoritarianism to use based on their logic. Communism, Monarchy, and Totalitarianism are also characterized primarily by authoritarian rule; but they just don’t have the ring that Fascism does. Who cares if it’s true? The Conservatives sure don’t. They seem to be confusing tyranny with losing.
One of the main aspects of Fascism prove this label as pure politics and no substance: class. Fascism invalidates the idea of class and hopes that resultantly it eliminates classism. This is in no way similar to either Capitalism (which creates classes and their distinctness) or Communism (which exploits classes already in place to reorganize power). It seems like it would be impossible to argue that Obama was trying to start elements of class warfare while simultaneously arguing that he was plotting to remove class distinctions. Impossible only if you are an independent person that thinks for yourself; a demographic that Republicans just can’t clinch.
Obviously when Obama’s policies are radically overblown and cherrypicked there is a better argument for Socialism or Communism than Fascism. Take for example his response to Samuel Wurzlebacher, (not) Joe the (not) Plumber, that he wanted to spread the wealth around. This statement was repeated ad nauseam to convince people that Obama was a Socialist. Except, if you watch the whole video, Obama is speaking toward not punishing people trying to begin small businesses that have not yet made 250K a year, which is actually a pro-business capitalist stance. Obama’s “spread the wealth around” was referring to opportunity to engage in capitalism as the “wealth” of our economy, not literally taking money and giving it to others. Any semi-intelligent person that actually watches the video can see that is what he is telling “Joe”, but I think we already know who that rules out.
Which One is the Fascist Again?
The major distinction of Fascism was its view of the government and its people in a form or corporate identity and governs according to the good of the corporate people. The government in many ways sees its people as elements of a corporation and governs accordingly. This was a particularly favorite government type to dislike by Scientology creator L. Ron Hubbard who often organized the governments of the enemy alien races of his science-fiction books in this manner.
Battlefield Earth aside, am I the only one that sees some part of our history in the corporatism that distinguishes Fascism? Operating the elements of the government according to the good of the corporate identity under vast authoritarianism sounds familiar for some reason. Just to make it easier to think about, let’s give the corporations names and see if that jogs the memory. Let’s call the government sponsored corporate identities Halliburton, Enron, KBR, Lockheed, Blackwater, and Diebold. Wow, that really does make it a lot clearer. I think the protesters of Fascism missed their mark by only one administration. If only this was February 2003, the people screaming about fascism would have actually had some legitimate ground to operate on.
Those that call Obama a fascist are in danger of their followers pausing their racially/politically motivated hatred just long enough to wiki the term Fascism and see what it actually means. And if that happens, they will slowly find that they have been protesting the tenets of their own side’s previous administration. When the streets are full of people crying “Fascism!”, it is the face of George W. Bush they are incanting, not Barack Obama. Is it possible to hate an opposing opinion so much you are willing to hate your own beliefs if the talking heads can convince you they are the beliefs of your opponents?
Stay with Fox News, we’ll keep you advised.
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