Frankly the word "fascist" is best defined as follows:
In contemporary political discourse, the term 'fascist' is often used by people as a pejorative description of their opponents.
Any other definition is generally a bunch of bullshyte.
So let me just get rid of the bullshyte and say it more plainly:
Conservative nationalism and militarism in America are usually in complete opposition to the totalitarian government-media complex.
I agree that the term is often used pejoratively. That's not how I used it. You'll notice that I usually leave most of the emotion out of the discussion. Too much emotion -- especially hostility -- makes the argument brittle.
Here are the first two paragraphs of what Wikipedia says about Fascism:
Fascism is a totalitarian nationalist and corporatist ideology.[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10] It is primarily concerned with perceived problems associated with cultural, economic, political, and social decline or decadence, and which seeks to solve such problems by achieving a millenarian national rebirth by exalting the nation, promoting the territorial defense or expansion of a nation through a constant state of military preparedness and promotion of militarism as well as promoting cults of unity, strength and purity.[11][12][13][14][15]
Various scholars attribute different characteristics to fascism, but the following elements are usually seen as its integral parts: nationalism (including national socialism, national syndicalism, economic nationalism, along with collectivism, and populism based on the nationalist values); corporatism (including class collaboration, economic planning, mixed economy, and third position); totalitarianism (including dictatorship, holism, major social interventionism, and statism); and militarism.[16][17] Fascism opposes communism, conservatism, liberalism, and international socialism.[18][12][11][19][20][21][22][23]
Fascism opposing conservatism makes sense. Conservatism seeks to preserve established tradition. A change from something to Fascism is not preserving the tradition. There is, though, a disturbing sharing of beliefs between fascists and staunch conservatives, just as there is a disturbing sharing of beliefs between staunch liberals and communists and socialists.
Edited by Pulptor, 16 October 2008 - 04:47 PM.