Fascism/corporatism/Obamism
Bookworm on Jun 02 2009 at 12:56 pm | Filed under: Barack Obama
In an interview timed to coincide with his book, Liberal Fascism: The Secret History of the American Left, From Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning
You know, when I first started pondering the book, I thought it might be all about economics. About ten years ago I went on a junket to Switzerland and attended a talk with the CEO of Nestlé. Listening to him, it became very clear to me that he had little to no interest in free markets or capitalism properly understood. He saw his corporation as a “partner” with governments, NGOs, the U.N., and other massive multinationals. The profit motive was good for efficiency and rewarding talent, but beyond that, he wanted order and predictability and as much planning as he could get. I think that mindset informs the entire class of transnational progressives, the shock troops of what H. G. Wells hoped would lead to his liberal-fascist “world brain.”
If you look at how most liberals think about economics, they want big corporations and big government working in tandem with labor, universities (think industrial policy), and progressive organizations to come up with “inclusive” policies set at the national or international level. That’s not necessarily socialism — it’s corporatism. When you listen to how Obama is making economic policy with “everyone at the table,” he’s describing corporatism, the economic philosophy of fascism. Government is the senior partner, but all of the other institutions are on board — so long as they agree with the government’s agenda. The people left out of this coordinated effort — the Nazis called it the Gleichschaltung — are the small businessmen, the entrepreneurs, the ideological, social, or economic mavericks who don’t want to play along. When you listen to Obama demonize Chrysler’s bondholders simply because they want their contracts enforced and the rule of law sustained, you get a sense of what I’m talking about.
I don’t think Obama wants a brutal tyranny any more than Hillary Clinton does (which is to say I don’t think he wants anything of the sort). But I do think they honestly believe that progress is best served if everyone falls in line with a national agenda, a unifying purpose, a “village” mentality expanded to include all of society. That sentiment drips from almost every liberal exhortation about everything from global warming to national service. But to point it out earns you the label of crank. As I said a minute ago about that “We’re All Fascists Now” chapter, I think people fail to understand that tyrannies — including soft, Huxleyan tyrannies — aren’t born from criminal conspiracies by evil men; they’re born by progressive groupthink. I have an abiding faith in the liberty-loving nature of the American people. But I think we are laying down the foundation for a challenge to that nature the likes of which we haven’t seen since Wilson was in office.
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I think that the real test of the fascist state will be when it encounters real and concerted opposition to its mission of creating Obamatopia on earth. I am not as optimistic as Jonah Goldberg about the outcome.
I think what liberals/progressives fail to grasp is that the problem with fascist/socialist systems is not that they are created by evil men, but that they are favorable environments that attract evil men and allow them to accomplish their evil. If you create a power structure where everything is determined from the top levels, imposed by overwhelming force, and insulated from popular opinion, the kind of people you end up with running things are not great thinkers with the best of mankind as their motivation but those who want to profit from all that power and whose idea of a perfect society is one that pays homage to themselves.
Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom”, Socratease. Absolutely! However, first you have to recognize that human beings are fallible, something that Liberals just can’t believe about themselves.
Benjamin Franklin:
“There are two passions which have a powerful influence in the affairs of men. These are ambition and avarice–the love of power and the love of money. Separately, each of these has great force in prompting men to action; but, when united in view of the same object, they have, in many minds, the most violent effects.”
1. Since corporatism only works if people buy into the notions of planning and coordinating and other such foolishness, I don’t see how it would not lead to some awful sort of dictatorship. Those of us who do not buy in will have to be silenced.
2. I have been listening to lots of books on CD in my car. A while back I listened to “Liberal Fascism” and most recently, I listened to “The Great Influenza” about the 1918 Spanish Flu. Goldberg spends quite a lot of time in his book about the fascism the country enjoyed under Woodrow Wilson. Without having any apparent political motives in the flu book, it substantiated this. Fascism is actually why that flu was named the Spanish Flu instead of the Kansas Flu (where it probably originated). Spain was sitting out WW One, but most other countries were hard in it and were enjoying their own bouts of fascism. Newspapers were tightly controlled so they would not say anything that would damage morale (such as “there’s a horrible epidemic brewing”) but since Spain was not in the war, Spain was not controlling its presses as much so that was where news of the flu epidemic first came out. “The Great Influenza” is shot through with history that supports Goldberg’s thesis which added a level of fascination to the flu book that would not have been there without “Liberal Fascism.”