I disagree with the comment that obama is not a nationalist. I think that he is; the nation is just not America.
Obama is a black nationalist, IMO.
Fascism predates Franco.
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It is quite false to portray fascists as "traditional", "religious", or "socially conservative". Fascism is a left-wing phenomenon.
I do think you are correct about the national/international divide. Stalin was an International Socialist, and Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco were National Socialists.
Franco was a Nationalist Authoritarian... not a Fascist.
Fascism is a variety of socialism where there is ostensibly private ownership of business, but the state has total control over it.
I disagree that fascists encourage participation in the Church (at least, the Christian church) or that they favor the traditional family structure. Hitler’s Germany was rigidly secular (although they did sort of allow the Church to function, as long as it kept a low profile). Also, it discouraged the traditional family structure by training children to view the State as their “parent” and the proper recipient of love and honor. Children were encouraged to turn in parents who resisted the State.
It is a very interesting issue, indeed.
I disagree. General Franco wasn’t a Fascist, he was simply an authoritarian ruler. His model of rule was simply military: Spain constitued a big military camp.
When a tactic did not work, he simply changed it, as a flexible and intelligent fighter. He abandoned his economical autarchic system in 1959, and tried a more classic liberal one which made Spain the second most growing economy among the developed countries during the 1960’s, just after Japan.
He supported the Spanish Second Republic, he suffocated a rebellion of the Asturian miners in 1934 against it. Only when it was clear that the 1936 left wing government was taking the steps towards a Socialist revolution, he acted.
He used a Fascist party, Falange, as political wing to fill his regime, but he did not create Falange. He used in the same manner the Catholic church: in the Spanish territories in Northern Africa there was full freedom of religion for Muslims, Jews and Christians.
General Franco, economically, was a true Socialist. He defended the average Spaniard against big banks and companies. Under his rule, an average Spaniard could afford two homes: one in the city and one in the beach (today: none). He limited the profits of the traditional Spanish oligarchies and transfered that money to the people. This is the reason, IMHO, of the bad press against him: big fishes (who own the media) do not forgive him that.
Fascism was a kind of collectivist movement developed by oligarchies as a response to Socialism. It was born in Italy, where the big fishes such as Pirelli and Agnelli (FIAT) among other characters such as former aristocrats, propelled Mussolini into power and in some cases, such as Pirelli, were his ministers.
Socialism was truly a popular movement that allowed the establishment of a dictatorship in order to carry out a plan of consecution or redistribution of wealth. Both Lenin and Hitler were Socialist, however, Lenin ruled a simple economy, therefore he did it directly (with terrible results). Hitler could not affor that: Germany’s productive tissue was very complicated. He did in fact own the means of production, when Hitler wanted a popular car, a Volkswagen; engineer Ferdinand Porsche designed it and it began to be produced in a state plant at Wolfsburg, but Hitler preferred to leave the management of the business to the previous owners.
The property of the means of production means nothing in a dictatorship: in the end you have to do what the ruler wants.
I don’t think Obama is a Socialist, at least a true Socialist. IMHO, his links with oligarchies, such as the renewable energies ones and involvement in supporting some big companies make him fall in the other side of your classification.
Sarah Palin, confronting big oil companies in Alaska, IMHO is in the opposite side of Fascism and Socialism: she is a true freedom fighter, a person that will defend the weak before the almighty.
However, such people are rare this days.
We are experiencing economic Fascism, and it is fair to call 0 and our Democrat Congress Fascist. You can go loopy trying to figure out whether of not we fit the Fascist or the Communist mold. The only thing certain is that we are entering new territory. The real confusion in using the terminology of Fascism and Socialism in trying to define our tyrannical oligarchy, comes from the American concept of conservatism and liberalism, right and left. Because American Socialism can be associated with international Communism, the left has always tried to hang the Fascist label around the neck of conservatives, even though American conservatism has nothing to do with Fascism. Fascism is Socialism, which is why 0 and the Socialist Democrats have no reservations in using Fascism to move their agenda, which will eventually give way to international Communism. Our Capitalist system is being usurped by Fascist economics. Call it a step in the Socialist revolution. A case can also be made that the destruction of our culture, liberties and individualism is nothing more than an assault of PC Fascism. Our leftist leaders are as Nazi-like as they come, without firing up the concentration camps, and we will see reeducation camps before they are done. Can we accuse 0 of being Hitleresque while calling him a Marxist? Of course we can, and we are correct in doing so.
I Really think there needs to be a new term for what Obama is doing. We could call it Obamaism.
Where Socialism is the means of achieving Communism, you could see Obamaism as a means of achieving Socialism.
Where Facsism is socially “right-wing” and supports private ownership that is strictly controlled by the govt, you could see Obamaism as “left-wing” Fascism that uses govt regulations to make privately owned owned business die and creates the opportunity to nationalize everything. then voila, Socialism.
Also, i could see Obamaism as militarily inclined, when BO finally has his private army up and ready to “keep the people safe”, if you know what i mean. ;)
Socialists generally speaking are internationalists who work with each other across the globe. Fascists are ardent nationalists.
I guess so. But you have to take into account that fascism and socialism have some of the same roots. That doesn't meant that they're the same thing or that they don't have connections to other philosophies.
Theory and practice also differ. Stalin was an "internationalist" in theory, but in practice, he certainly wasn't indifferent between various countries: he favored the big one that he controlled.
Whether Hitler really was a nationalist is also something people argue over. He certainly looked like one at the beginning of his rule. But by the end, he was aiming at something far bigger than Germany.
Socialists favor government ownership of the means of production, whereas fascists have no problem with private ownership so long as corporations are compliant with government objectives.
Fascists weren't opposed to starting up state-owned enterprises. And they certainly did expropriate some enterprises -- Jewish or foreign ones, certainly.
Social Democrats don't appear to have any problem with private ownership "so long as corporations are compliant with government objectives." Look at Sweden.
If Obama or other politicians today are socialists, that doesn't mean that they won't tolerate private or corporate property, just that they want control of aspects of its operation and profits.
Socialists are ardent secularists and generally disdain organized religion. Fascists often seek and receive the support of the Church and encourage religious participation.
Up to a point. But there are religious socialists. And fascists' relations with established churches may be more a matter of practicality, rather than of theory. Mussolini and Hitler weren't exactly other worldly or Christian in their thinking.
Socialists love social engineering, collective farms and kibbutzes. Fascists are generally socially conservative, support the military, law and order, and traditional family structures.
Others have brought up the objection to this quite well. Not every military dictator was a fascist. And Franco, though not a fascist, was a centralist. Basques and Catalans wouldn't call him respectful of their traditional institutions.
I'm not saying that you're wrong. Just that any generalization is going to have exceptions. For one thing, you have to compare one form of totalitarianism with another. Comparing a totalitarian group with one which contains totalitarians and non-totalitarians will give questionable results.
I'd certainly prefer to have lived under a typical Latin American or European dictatorship than under Stalin or Lenin. Throw Hitler into the picture, and things get complicated. He was as bad as Stalin, if not worse.
A country like today's Sweden, though "socialist," probably is better than either fascist or a communist states were. Whatever its vices, there is still a measure of personal freedom there that fascist or communist states didn't allow.