REDWAVE
Urban Jungle Dweller
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2001
- Posts
- 6,013
The 1930's, the era of the First Great Depression, spawned a massive upsurge in fascism, especially in Europe. In Italy, Benito Mussolini had taken power in 1922. The Western "democracies" were actually quite friendly with fascist Italy for many years. They envied the fact that as a dictator, he was able to crush the labor movement and impose subservience and docility upon the workforce. But Hitler's rise to power in Germany in 1933, and his subsequent rearming and remilitarization of Germany, came to eventually pose a threat to the Western "democracies." One reason Tory British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain appeased Hitler at Munich was he was sympathetic to fascism, and wished he could wield the same kind of power in his country that Hitler wielded in Germany.
Today, we are in the midst of a severe global economic crisis, a worldwide recession/depression ("recession" is actually just a euphemism for "depression"). Just as in the 1930's, this has resulted in another upsurge in fascism. We have seen that with LePen's strong showing in the first round of the recent French elections, Pim Fortuyn in the Netherlands, Jorg Haider in Austria, etc. We see it also in the racist scapegoating of immigrants, in both Europe and North America, blaming them for the failure of the capitalists' system. Capitalism in its decay and decline inevitably casts aside the pretense of "democracy" and degenerates openly into outright fascism. But unlike the 1930's, when the fascist menace emanated mainly from Nazi Germany, today the fascist menace emanates mainly from the United States of AmeriKKKa.
The blatant stealing of the Presidency in plain view of the American people by a candidate who failed to receive even a plurality of the popular vote, and had to resort to widespread fraud and disenfranchisement of African-Americans in Florida in order to engineer a majority in the Electoral College, marked a open break with the traditions of "democracy" which had served to give the U.S. government a veneer of legitimacy, and gulled the simple Simons into supporting it. Of course, "democracy" in America had always been a sham and a fraud, as the rich manipulated the political system to ensure only candidates acceptable to them could get elected. But in the aftermath of the 2000 election, all pretense of democracy was jettisoned. This was because the ruling class realized it would never accomplish its reactionary agenda, deeply unpopular with the American public, by democratic means.
Just as Hitler engineered the Reichstag fire shortly after becoming power, in order to create the pretext to assume dictatorial powers, Bush engineered the Sept. 11 attacks to provide him with the pretext for a massive assault on civil liberties and basic democratic rights previously unheard of in U.S. history. Not even during World War Two, when the nation faced a far greater threat than a ragtag band of "terrorists," has the U.S. government assumed such dictatorial powrs. The passage of the "Patriot" Act, the rounding up of over a thousand Arab-Americans shortly after 9/11 without any charges being brought, the establishment of a concentration camp in Guantanamo Bay in total violation of international law and fundamental human rights, the widespread intimidation and persecution of political dissenters, the TIPS program, etc.-- all these together added up to an unmistakable drive toward a fascist police state.
In the area of foreign policy, the U.S. government assumed a stance of aggressiveness and bellicosity which the world has not seen since Nazi Germany. Ultimatums were delivered to the entire world ("You're either with us or against us"), the hapless backward country of Afghanistan was invaded and ravaged, U.S. bases (already established in a great many countries) were established in many more countries, especially in Central and East Asia. A noose was drawn around China. Fuehrer Bush established a new "strategic doctrine" of "preemptive strikes," essentially a blueprint for aggression against any country which might dare to challenge U.S. world domination. Now Iraq is in the crosshairs of U.S. imperialism, threatened with open, naked, brutal aggression by the greatest military power on earth.
We live today in dark and ominous times, which are likely to become much darker before we see the light. Only the mobilization of the social power of the international working class, and worldwide socialist revolution, can end the fascist menace once and for all, and liberate humanity from the clutches of capitalist exploitation and oppression.
Today, we are in the midst of a severe global economic crisis, a worldwide recession/depression ("recession" is actually just a euphemism for "depression"). Just as in the 1930's, this has resulted in another upsurge in fascism. We have seen that with LePen's strong showing in the first round of the recent French elections, Pim Fortuyn in the Netherlands, Jorg Haider in Austria, etc. We see it also in the racist scapegoating of immigrants, in both Europe and North America, blaming them for the failure of the capitalists' system. Capitalism in its decay and decline inevitably casts aside the pretense of "democracy" and degenerates openly into outright fascism. But unlike the 1930's, when the fascist menace emanated mainly from Nazi Germany, today the fascist menace emanates mainly from the United States of AmeriKKKa.
The blatant stealing of the Presidency in plain view of the American people by a candidate who failed to receive even a plurality of the popular vote, and had to resort to widespread fraud and disenfranchisement of African-Americans in Florida in order to engineer a majority in the Electoral College, marked a open break with the traditions of "democracy" which had served to give the U.S. government a veneer of legitimacy, and gulled the simple Simons into supporting it. Of course, "democracy" in America had always been a sham and a fraud, as the rich manipulated the political system to ensure only candidates acceptable to them could get elected. But in the aftermath of the 2000 election, all pretense of democracy was jettisoned. This was because the ruling class realized it would never accomplish its reactionary agenda, deeply unpopular with the American public, by democratic means.
Just as Hitler engineered the Reichstag fire shortly after becoming power, in order to create the pretext to assume dictatorial powers, Bush engineered the Sept. 11 attacks to provide him with the pretext for a massive assault on civil liberties and basic democratic rights previously unheard of in U.S. history. Not even during World War Two, when the nation faced a far greater threat than a ragtag band of "terrorists," has the U.S. government assumed such dictatorial powrs. The passage of the "Patriot" Act, the rounding up of over a thousand Arab-Americans shortly after 9/11 without any charges being brought, the establishment of a concentration camp in Guantanamo Bay in total violation of international law and fundamental human rights, the widespread intimidation and persecution of political dissenters, the TIPS program, etc.-- all these together added up to an unmistakable drive toward a fascist police state.
In the area of foreign policy, the U.S. government assumed a stance of aggressiveness and bellicosity which the world has not seen since Nazi Germany. Ultimatums were delivered to the entire world ("You're either with us or against us"), the hapless backward country of Afghanistan was invaded and ravaged, U.S. bases (already established in a great many countries) were established in many more countries, especially in Central and East Asia. A noose was drawn around China. Fuehrer Bush established a new "strategic doctrine" of "preemptive strikes," essentially a blueprint for aggression against any country which might dare to challenge U.S. world domination. Now Iraq is in the crosshairs of U.S. imperialism, threatened with open, naked, brutal aggression by the greatest military power on earth.
We live today in dark and ominous times, which are likely to become much darker before we see the light. Only the mobilization of the social power of the international working class, and worldwide socialist revolution, can end the fascist menace once and for all, and liberate humanity from the clutches of capitalist exploitation and oppression.
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