By: Mary Mostert, Analyst, Banner of Liberty (www.bannerofliberty.com)
February 19, 2001
I've been somewhat amused in the last few days by the floundering noticeable in a number of news sources as Bill Clinton fades fitfully into history. Without a really hot war going on, or Bill Clinton or collapse in the economy, it seems a lot of people have trouble finding something to write about that they think people are interested in reading.
Apparently one of the new "issues" that is being tried out to get your attention is the notion that Fascism is going to get you. In the last three days I've gotten two e-mails on the subject of fascism. One accuses me of being a Fascist and the other accuses the Bush administration of Fascism. Then there was the column distributed by Universal Press Syndicate in which we are told there is "an unspoken leadership crisis" because, in the authors' view, President Bush is an "illegitimate" president who is "presiding over the presidency without the consent of the governed."
The e-mail, from a woman claiming to be a "Liberal Republican," whatever that is these days, says my posting on my website three government run websites giving out state Official Vote totals is "Fascist Propaganda" on my part. I don't get her reasoning although the official vote totals are not the same on the three websites.
She writes:
"The Fascists have taken over the Republican party and God forgive me, I didn't think that it would really happen so I did nothing. Well, I am speaking out now and there are lots more Moderate and Liberal Republicans like me than squeeky wheel Fascists. I am the silent MAJORITY and I will not be silent any more. We will take our party back!You can join the Aryan nation - they like your kind of disinformation tactics."
My first reaction to that statement was "Here's another person who hasn't a clue was Fascism actually is." The most important part of maintaining fascism is the cultivation of ignorance. "Fascism," my old World Book Encyclopedia notes, "like all forms of government rests at last upon the sincere consent of a large part of the population. To maintain this consent, the Fascist leadership must cut off the people from any information which might cause them to doubt the complete rightness of the fixed Fascist principles."
What I do is the opposite of Fascism. I provide information that people like the e-mail writer don't want the public to have. Fascism, besides suppressing information, depends upon the police to crush all opposition or dissent. It would seem to me that the people closes to the Fascist ideal are those who are doing their best to silence dissent and opposition. In modern-day America that has been tried with some success by merely using police and regulatory power to enforce political correctness. Without Clinton, that is probably going to get harder to do.
And, of course, Fascism must have a well defined "enemy of the state." In Germany, of course, that "enemy" was identified as the Jews. After the Jews were driven out, the "enemy" was Communism. By accusing people of being either a Jew or a Communist, any means of getting rid of them were OK. Once that notion was acceptable to the population, the Holocaust was merely the logical end of the road.
There is a very obvious movement being launched that is really searching for an issue to get the American public riled up. From the moment Al Gore conceded, one of those issues was the economy. We have been hearing "Recession" from some news sources every since. Yet, the Dow is still nearly 2000 points higher than it was in February 1999.
It is obvious, or should be, that the economy is probably going to suffer because of the energy shortages that have been caused by bad judgment on the part of environmentalists and their friends in government. California has an energy crisis because of its own action in closing down the nuclear power plant in Sacramento in 1989 and relying on the purchase of energy from outside California for 86% of the Sacramento area's needs.
However, at this point it is really hard to get the public frightened over the stock market, since it has been rising steadily with a few glitches since Ronald Reagan was elected in 1980. In fact, when Reagan took office in January 1981, the Dow average was 947.30. When the Reagan-Bush era ended in January 1993, the Dow average was 3301. In the Bush Administration the Dow rose from 2342 to 3301. During the time Bill Clinton was campaigning on "it's the economy stupid" and claiming America was in its worst recession "Since the Depression of the 1930s" the Dow averaged almost a 275-point rise per year.
During the first two years of the Clinton Administration, when Bill Clinton had a Democrat Congress, the Dow rose from 3301 to 3834, or an average of 266-point rise per year, nine point below the so-called "Bush Recession." The liberal media that is now trying to convince the public that we have a recession looming, since Bush is in the White House, never pointed out the economy slowed down when the Federal Government was totally controlled by Democrats.
Beginning in January 1995, when the 104th Republican Congress was sworn in, the Dow risen more sharply. From November 1994 to December 2000 - the Dow rose from 3739 to 10,414. Friday it closed at 10,800.
Of course, the NASDAQ has taken a beating in the last year of the Clinton Administration, and it has not recovered. But, scaring the general public into halting all spending, as the Democrats did in the election of 1932 which really DID have an impact on the economy, doesn't seem to be working yet. Too many people are thinking about what they could buy with the Bush tax cut.
So, since a recession scare hasn't worked, now we are seeing another scare tactic - the notion that Fascism is a threat now that George W. Bush is president.
Somehow I can't see most Americans buying into that ploy either. After the media fiasco of Election night, with EVERY TV network announcing a victory for Al Gore before the polls even closed, its going to take awhile for the public to be convinced that the sky is falling because George W. is the president.
To comment: mmostert@bannerofliberty.com
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