Re: The Fourteen Characteristics of Fascism

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> "It was usually coupled with a suspicion of things foreign that often
> bordered on xenophobia."  I think renaming "French fries" to "Freedom
> fries" and French wine-dumping qualifies there; I have not seen that type
> of reaction before that I can remember.

  It has happened, although before probably everyone on this list's time. I 
understand during World War I, Sour Kraut became "Liberty Cabbage" and some 
other stuff was renamed too. It really doesn't make much sense to me, since 
changing French to Freedom would seem to suggest they are synonymns. :-)

> "Beyond the simple fact that the political elite and the national culture
> were male-dominated, these regimes inevitably viewed women as second-class
> citizens."  Certainly the elite is male-dominated, but I don't see a trend
> there.  The other part also I don't see much change on.

  Yeah. That is changing too though. I really wouldn't be surprised to see a 
female president in the next ten to twenty years, tops. This is something 
that is slowly improving, not worsening.

> "They were adamantly anti-abortion and also homophobic. These attitudes
> were usually codified in Draconian laws that enjoyed strong support by the
> orthodox religion of the country."

  I don't like what this is inferring, but then again, beings that it is on a 
site named "SecularHumanism.org," I can't expect it to be unbiased about 
religion.

> Here the Bush team actually appears to be going against his party, on the
> homophobic issue at least (he has not overturned the "don't ask, don't
> tell" policy in the military, though as Tim noted some loud-mouths like
> Rush Limbaugh want to do that); 

  I think it's a good policy, for the most part, and to clarify, Rush hasn't 
been complaining (that I know of) about this particular issue. You must 
remember that we (as in social conservatives) generally aren't homophobic in 
the classic sense of that word, although liberals might think so. 

  Social conservatism just rejects extramarital sexual relations, hetrosexual 
or homosexual.  The don't ask, don't tell policy is good in that it keeps 
things professional, IMO. People don't need to advertise their sexual 
activity or such. Keep it to themselves, I certainly don't want to hear about 
it.

  Even within Christian circles, I would emphasize that there is good reform 
going to accepting homosexuals, just not homosexual activity. There is a 
difference, you know. I think this military's policy works well in this 
respect.

> on abortion I think the Bush Administration
> fits the bill but currently there are limits imposed by the Constitution so
> it's not clear where that is headed, what is clear is that they would
> appoint Supreme Court Justices that would like to overturn Roe v. Wade.

  Even "Roe" wants to overturn Roe v. Wade. The Supreme Court never should 
have "legislated" from the court. Talk about drawing comparisons to Facist 
Europe, Roe v. Wade has results in more deaths than the holocaust. :-(

  It particularly bothers me that pro-choicers' policies insist that even 
babies that could be born that very moment should be able to be killed. I was 
born two months premature. I'm glad my parents weren't fans of the abortion 
cartel, or they could have killed me if they had so wished. 

  This is a human rights issue, although not in the way the site you reference 
would frame it.


> > 8. Religion and ruling elite tied together
>
> This seems to have been accelerating as well, but the connection has always
> been there.

  Hmm... how so? City Halls can no longer have Christmas decorations unless 
they also include decorations from at least the other "big two"... The Pledge 
of Alligence is under attack by the Ninth District Court... And the 
non-official "ruling elite," the media, considers Christianity an enemy.

> For example, a person may be charged with a drug offense that would bring a
> minimum 10 years in prision under sentencing guidelines, but is then
> offered a plea agreement which entails 2 years in jail.  In other words, if
> you make the government prove you are guilty (and trials are always a
> crap-shoot, even in the best of worlds, since it comes down to "whose
> lieing" and in that case the defendant almost always loses; and if someone
> ID's you, even though those are extremely inaccurate, you are all but
> guaranteed a conviction), you get an extra 8 years in jail as punishment
> for exercising your constitutional rights.

  Yes. Well, the ten year time frame is the one that is right. You get a bonus 
for making things easier, not punishment for making things harder.

> > 13. Rampant cronyism and corruption
>
> Increasing vastly with the Halliburton / Carlyle Group / Bechtel / Paladin
> Capital contracts, etc.  Too much to write here :-).

  This is as old as the Union. It's very hard to make this a case for this 
increasing.

  -Tim

- -- 
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Timothy R. Butler       Universal Networks      www.uninet.info
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