Except in this case, the US public (the press at least) has done the introspection. The transnational white power movement, and the Christian nationalist movement (there’s a lot of intersection) qualify for all of Umberto Eco’s fourteen properties of fascist ideology. They also adhere to Luis Britto García’s eight characteristics of Fascism. These movements also feature Emilio Gentile’s ten elements of fascism.
Now I understand in the age of internet discourse, we have to be mindful of Godwin’s rule of Nazi analogies, so it may not be enough for us to simply say that the US state is fascist so much as we have to be explicit about how it compares, such as (a few examples out of dozens, if not hundreds):
The overconfinement of inmates by the federal and state prisons, or of extrajudicial detainees in detention centers without reasonable hygiene or living provisions so that disease runs rampantly through them, what came to light during the COVID-19 lockdown.
The lack of reasonable oversight of law enforcement allowing them to seize or kill at will, comparable to the Freikorps irregulars from which Rohm’s Sturmabteilung were recruited.
ICE’s defiance of orders to arrest and deport immigrants only if they were convicted felons, instead arresting and detaining them at will, often deporting them not to nations of origin but into the hands of human traffickers, and sometimes detaining American citizens that were insufficiently nationalized (e.g. didn’t speak English and were too dark) knowing they had a slim chance of ever getting back to home soil. Compare this to the Heydrich’s Sicherheitsdienst who was ordered only to arrest and detain undesirables that were already violent criminals. Not only did Heydrich ignore the violent criminal provision but also kept adding new qualifiers to the undesirables list that qualified for arrest. His batch of detainees ballooned so quickly as to turn from a warehouse in Berlin to the massive complex of concentration camps that we were taught about in school. And we know (or should know) how that story evolves.
I studied the holocaust in the aughts once the US started doing Are We The Baddies stuff, wondering if that process might be a thing to watch for, so if you aren’t sufficiently educated about the German genocide machine, and how it applies to the United States in the 2020s, there’s way too much to compare.
I could go on and on and on about the capture of the federal government, the denial of judicial confirmations to President Obama, so that a Republican president (Trump) could flood the Federal judiciary with Federalist Society judges, the countless judicial carve-outs of civil protections allegedly guaranteed by the fourth, fifth and sixth amendments to the Constitution of the United States, the bloated prison state that has more inmates (total or per capita) than any other penal system on the planet, including nations that are supposed to be scary and authoritarian like China and DPRK. And if you really were interested, I could go into the specifics as to how all that compares to the German Reich starting about a Century ago.
In 2013 when Edward Snowden blew the whistle on NSA’s PRISM, XKeyscore and ESCHALON programs, we had learned they were over ten years in the making. I didn’t want to find out that the US is executing and incinerating people by the thousands per day, and find out we’ve been doing it for years now. So far we’re not there yet, but it is conspicuous how much latitude law enforcement and prison officers have when it comes to cruel treatment, violence or even killing.
So yes, the US is already doing fascism by the bunches, and a couple of huge, dangerous movements are established in state and national politics that are invoking a lot of fascist narratives. But now the Republican party is looking to neuter elections in the US, make it a one-party state and swap out any official (elected, appointed or hired) that doesn’t salute the new world order, as per Project 2025 by the Heritage Foundation. It’s easy to websearch. That should scare the snot out of all of us regardless of whether the F-word is attached to it.
Except in this case, the US public (the press at least) has done the introspection. The transnational white power movement, and the Christian nationalist movement (there’s a lot of intersection) qualify for all of Umberto Eco’s fourteen properties of fascist ideology. They also adhere to Luis Britto García’s eight characteristics of Fascism. These movements also feature Emilio Gentile’s ten elements of fascism.
Now I understand in the age of internet discourse, we have to be mindful of Godwin’s rule of Nazi analogies, so it may not be enough for us to simply say that the US state is fascist so much as we have to be explicit about how it compares, such as (a few examples out of dozens, if not hundreds):
I studied the holocaust in the aughts once the US started doing Are We The Baddies stuff, wondering if that process might be a thing to watch for, so if you aren’t sufficiently educated about the German genocide machine, and how it applies to the United States in the 2020s, there’s way too much to compare.
I could go on and on and on about the capture of the federal government, the denial of judicial confirmations to President Obama, so that a Republican president (Trump) could flood the Federal judiciary with Federalist Society judges, the countless judicial carve-outs of civil protections allegedly guaranteed by the fourth, fifth and sixth amendments to the Constitution of the United States, the bloated prison state that has more inmates (total or per capita) than any other penal system on the planet, including nations that are supposed to be scary and authoritarian like China and DPRK. And if you really were interested, I could go into the specifics as to how all that compares to the German Reich starting about a Century ago.
In 2013 when Edward Snowden blew the whistle on NSA’s PRISM, XKeyscore and ESCHALON programs, we had learned they were over ten years in the making. I didn’t want to find out that the US is executing and incinerating people by the thousands per day, and find out we’ve been doing it for years now. So far we’re not there yet, but it is conspicuous how much latitude law enforcement and prison officers have when it comes to cruel treatment, violence or even killing.
So yes, the US is already doing fascism by the bunches, and a couple of huge, dangerous movements are established in state and national politics that are invoking a lot of fascist narratives. But now the Republican party is looking to neuter elections in the US, make it a one-party state and swap out any official (elected, appointed or hired) that doesn’t salute the new world order, as per Project 2025 by the Heritage Foundation. It’s easy to websearch. That should scare the snot out of all of us regardless of whether the F-word is attached to it.