Yes, we've used the word "fascist" far more than is warranted. On the other hand, conservative pundits have a way of referring to any idea that is to the left of Ron Paul as "socialist." It's gotten so bad that I don't think either side really knows what it's talking about any more.

It sounds to me like Goldberg, like so many other pundits, would rather investigate the motives behind various political movements or philosophies (in his case, focusing on the Left) than the movements themselves. This is the great bane of public discourse, in my opinion. We have stopped debating the tenets of political ideals; instead, we attack candidates and parties for more personal foibles and for supposed ulterior motives.

Politics gets complicated but it really shouldn't be. Government has a tendency to overstep its authority; that's the natural progression for all governments throughout history, especially in the modern, post-revolutionary period. And all government authority can be taken to abusive levels. It doesn't matter what side of the debate you start from, Left or Right; both sides are capable of great evil.

I obviously haven't read the book, but despite the scholarship involved, this Liberal Fascism sounds extremely shallow.

Great post. I think you're right - a lot of people on the left are too cavalier with the term fascism, and people on the right are too cavalier with the term socialism, or communism - as if ANYONE with any relevance promotes communism. There are terms out there that are just intellectually lazy and designed to provoke an emotional response, they are best left to the people that don't have the energy or ability to think deeply.

It didn't have to be this way. But a two-party system does tend to lead to a polarized discourse, where most people on either side benefit from oversimplifying the issues, as long as they're able to split the electorate more or less evenly. The fact that even 9/11 was not able to change American politics indicates that the parties have such a strong hold on their members that nothing will be able to shake them loose. Real political freedom is therefor over in the US.

By deadlocking politics in all deliberative bodies, the executive branch becomes the only one place where action can be taken. That explains why the presidency has continued to grow in power and reach. The impeachment of Clinton was probably the last straw, not just because it failed, but because it made Congress look petty and immature. The fact that the executive branch has since authorized torture, misled the country into an elective war and run up well over a trillion dollars in debt since then shows that this change, too, is here to stay.

In the end, I don't think that it could have been otherwise. The US is the only country that thinks that a two-party system is sufficiently different from a one-party system in order to guarantee a better outcome. Virtually every other democracy has at least three major parties, and several minor ones. I don't think it's an accident that the US ended up where it is.

The two-party system has its problems, but so does a multi-party parliamentary system. I don't think any particular style of representative democracy is necessarily superior to the others out there; it all comes down to the people involved in it.

American politicians don't talk enough about the need for compromise. They prefer to talk in absolutes, and when these absolute ideals fail to materialize in actual policy, we tend to view it as a failure. The Republicans are particularly bad about this, I think. There is nothing remotely conservative about the Bush administration's domestic policy, yet he still drones on about conservative ideals. His newfound desire to cut earmarks is enough to make you want to vomit.

The American public needs to grow some grapes and get a bit more sophisticated in the way it relates to its leaders. Every problem in Washington is a mirror image of the problems in American society. The only way to really reform the federal government is for us to reform ourselves; we have to stop yearning for politicos who will merely tell us what we want to hear, and instead we need to be brave enough to be realistic and accept those hard truths. If the government was doing what it really needs to do we would have to endure some hardship before things got better on the other side (example: this "stimulus package" is a load of horseshit, but we're going to leap at it because it means we all get money. It's just more short-term gratification in the face of deep, long-term problems).

"American politicians don't talk enough about the need for compromise. They prefer to talk in absolutes, and when these absolute ideals fail to materialize in actual policy, we tend to view it as a failure."

I agree, but I believe that this is an expected outcome of a two-party system in the long run. Real multi-party democracies are almost invariably led by coalition governments, which rule on compromise platforms. Because the voter has a better way of indicating what they want, and what matters to them, the politicians have less leeway to interpret and distort their wishes. And because compromise is a transparent part of the political process, it is possible to hold parties to account. And finally, because legislative and executive branches are part of the same government, deadlock only occurs on issues where the compromise process fails. That means that less of the government's business is vulnerable to partisan politicing.

"The American public needs to grow some grapes and get a bit more sophisticated in the way it relates to its leaders."

Would be nice, but the public can't really do anything. Too many issues of importance to the American public have been divided up along party lines. I can't be pro-choice (D) and anti-gay marriage (R), or fiscally responsible (D) and against higher taxes (R). After all, I can only vote once, and that vote has to be a compromise on my part, between all the things I believe in. Where's the fiscally responsible, socially conservative party? Where's the green party? Where are the socialist, the liberals, the true conservatives? Why is there no anti-immigration party, a religious party, even a party for southern racial bigots? All these political platforms are spread out over only two parties, and I don't get to qualify my vote to explain what part of the Republican or Democratic platform I decided to vote for, and which part I find loathsome.

That's why the American people have no control over their government.

There is little material difference in how policy is fashioned in a multi-party system, though; you still have to compromise your absolute ideals to get anything done. And multi-party systems can be prone to instability whenever the leading party is challenged by the others.

People who approach politics from the perspective of one particular issue need to have their heads examined. Our two-party system is certainly not perfect, but it encourages moderation; neither extremity, liberal or conservative, can command the debate.

The real solution in America is to bring back and emphasis on the federal system. There is too much focus on the central government. The old adage was that "all politics is local," and I still believe that is true; our federal system encourages this if we recognize the inherent benefits of it. Too many Americans can talk at length about what Rudy Giuliani said in a debate last week, but can't tell you what their city council voted on.

That's the real problem. The federal government should have a relatively short list of issues it has to contend with. We have a paralyzed federal system because we have given it more responsiblity than it should have.

The author misunderstood Goldberg's definition of fascism. The core of the definition is the operational aspect of fascism, the binding of corporations and government interest into a cooperative system to achieve centralized goals. This is otherwise known as corporatism.

This is exactly what FDR embarked on. To combat the depression FDR brought industry under the tight reign of federal regulators and policy, while at the same time preserving a caste of oligarchic corporate leaders. If your sophisticated enough to look past the horribly emotions of WWII and actually just look at FDR for what he was doing, he was a fascist, albeit a good intentioned one.

If we define fascism as simply as "increasing or centralizing government control," then I guess sure, FDR was a fascist. But every President could thus be labeled a fascist, since each President has had at least one arena in which he increased government control. At that point, fascism loses all descriptive value, and we've learned nothing. Unless you are a libertarian - I'm not - but at least they have a consistent enough philosophy that you understand why they'd say "everyone's a fascist."

I agree with the first and third paragraphs of Anse's post. With regard to the first paragraph, there is a nice quote from George Orwell (from the Wikipedia entry on fascism) :

"...the word ‘Fascism’ is almost entirely meaningless. In conversation, of course, it is used even more wildly than in print. I have heard it applied to farmers, shopkeepers, Social Credit, corporal punishment, fox-hunting, bull-fighting, the 1922 Committee, the 1941 Committee, Kipling, Gandhi, Chiang Kai-Shek, homosexuality, Priestley's broadcasts, Youth Hostels, astrology, women, dogs and I do not know what else... almost any English person would accept ‘bully’ as a synonym for ‘Fascist’.[22]

I also haven't read Jonah Goldberg's book. His main point seems to be that since the conservative movement values the rights and freedoms of the individual more than liberalism, there is less intrinsic danger for conservatives to overly subjugate the rights of the individual to that of the state (i.e., become fascist).

I think his point has validity, but only to the extent that conservatives ** really do ** value the rights and freedoms of the individual more than do liberals. That point can be debated, though. Liberals tend to restrict economic rights in order to redistribute income (i.e. tax somewhat more), and are more likely to favor restricting choice to ensure equal opportunity (e.g. in opposing "school choice", or in favoring universal health plans). Conservatives tend to restrict social behaviors (e.g. gay marriage) and were/are generally less concerned with institutionalized oppression, which are relevant to the rights and freedoms of the oppressed individuals (cf Civil Right Movement). As Anse says in his third paragraph, restrictions of rights can expand to become domination/subjugation from many different directions.

"There is little material difference in how policy is fashioned in a multi-party system, though; you still have to compromise your absolute ideals to get anything done. And multi-party systems can be prone to instability whenever the leading party is challenged by the others. "

That isn't really correct, I think. The compromise on the agenda is done in coalition negotiations. After the coalition agrees on the compromise, it has both executive and legislative branches in hand, it can get to work on the detailed execution of the agenda throughout its term. There is no chance of instability unless the compromise agreement is broken, or changing circumstances bring new matters to the front on which the coalition partners don't see eye to eye (because they were not part of the compromise agenda). At that point, the only democratic solution is to dissolve the government and have new elections. The US system does not allow for that.

"People who approach politics from the perspective of one particular issue need to have their heads examined. Our two-party system is certainly not perfect, but it encourages moderation; neither extremity, liberal or conservative, can command the debate. "

I must have been reading very different papers than you. It seems that the public debate is entirely done between extremists, while the real policy decisions are taken behind doors, protected by executive privilege.

I don't think you have a choice in a two-party system: everyone is a single-issue voter. The most important issue to you determines the party you vote for. If you're lucky (or a partisan hack), some of your secondary priorities will also be part of your chose party's agenda. But in the end, someone will read tea leaves to determine what voters really meant when they voted the way they did, and the electoral process will again have been totally meaningless.

"The real solution in America is to bring back and emphasis on the federal system. There is too much focus on the central government. The old adage was that "all politics is local," and I still believe that is true; our federal system encourages this if we recognize the inherent benefits of it."

I understand your point, but I disagree. The US is no longer a loose union of very different states. The degree of interdependence is drastically different. It makes no sense to have issues such as education (and education funding), healthcare (and its funding), environmental and other business regulations be done on a local level. It is antiquated, and at best it will cause the US states to increasingly diverge. Remember, divided we fall.

"The federal government should have a relatively short list of issues it has to contend with. We have a paralyzed federal system because we have given it more responsiblity than it should have."

Not even that can really work. The moment that there is room for a meaningful third opinion, the two-party system becomes less than adequate. At the least, the federal government is in charge of international policy and macro-economic factors, as well as internal and external security. That's plenty to disagree about. I would consider education, healthcare and some measure of social security to be part of the mandate of a modern state too.

Drobb, I agree that fascism is related to the reduction of rights, but it is more than that. Redistributing income in order to make sure that the next generation does not have to pay for this generation's mistakes is not the same kind of rights reduction as telling people that they cannot get married to each other if they're of the same gender. Forcing libraries to tell the government what people are reading is NOT of the same order as requiring people to wear a national identity card.

It's just not all black and white. Societies need agreed rules in order to function, and any rule restricts freedom. "Thou shalt not kill" limits my actions, to the benefit of society as a whole. So it is pointless to complain about the reduction of freedom itself: it is always a question of benefit versus cost.

But anyway, to my central point: you should be able to vote for a libertarian party. No such party exists in the US, although the Republicans have pretended to be one from time to time. Without a national, viable libertarian party, your political voice is muted.