I was born at the end of the last war against Fascism. War babies, they called us. During my earliest years, the struggle against against Fascist dictatorships was part of the folklore, with constant references to it in entertainment and media. But that was not my war. This one is, and we are fighting it now.
I see the same forces and the same goals now as my parents used to talk about. Even much of the language and methods are the same. But, in fairness, how do we know whether the current administration is truly progressing toward Fascism, or not.
A number of regimes in the 20th century could serve as models of this type of government, but the best were found in Germany and Italy. The most common characteristics were these:
1) Seize power by any means necessary
In this case, the current administration and the republican party in general has used voter intimidation, gerrymandering, possible manipulation of vote totals, outright lying, probable conspiracy with foreign powers, and appeals to racism, as a short list. The legality or morality of any of this doesn’t seem to matter.
One strike.
2) Maintain rule by any means possible
This is best represented by the attempt to stack the court system with knee-jerk conservatives. The plan is that these implants could be counted on to shoot down any attempt by a progressive congress to get anything done. Less noticed but very persistent have been attempts to merely intimidate. The Media receives a lot of this, but they seem to fend it off fairly well. And in all fairness, it is possible the administration hasn’t been killing anyone on purpose, or at least not very many. They do seem rather fond of prison camps, though. Based primarily on incompetence and failure so far. . .
One half strike
3) Destroy all opposition
To represent the third case we have donald himself. He has removed most of the experienced and qualified people who dared to have a contrary opinion and has replaced them with witless, loyal hacks. As many people have found out, to criticize him is to invite a storm of public slander. Finally, to show how compulsive he is, he is still trying to incarcerate Hillary Clinton for daring to beat him.
One full strike
What happened to these people? We know that donald himself is just an arrogant rich kid who never really grew up, but the republicans should know better. Do they not remember that the populace who propelled Hitler to power ultimately paid the price for his insanity and murderous rage?
The only happy evaluation I can give you is that the loud voice in the White House is an arrogant idiot. The first guarantees he will never listen to a smarter person’s advice, and the second means that he has no clue about what he is doing. He has risen to his “level of incompetence” and is doomed to fail. If this is an attempt to install Fascism in this country, it looks a little weak, but the attempts to do so are persistent and need to be counteracted in strength.
Organize and vote like it makes a difference — it will.