From: David MOREY (us@divadeus.freeserve.co.uk)
Date: Mon Dec 08 2003 - 20:35:57 GMT
DMB
Coming from the UK it is interesting to hear
this sort of thing. Thanks for taking the time.
Regards
David M
----- Original Message -----
From: "David Buchanan" <DBuchanan@ClassicalRadio.org>
To: <moq_discuss@moq.org>
Sent: Sunday, December 07, 2003 8:11 PM
Subject: RE: MD Democracy in the MOQ
> David M and all y'all:
>
> DM asked:
> Glad to see your approach does not try to simplify history.
> Clearly the problems of WWI and the depression, hyper-inflation,
> war reparations, communist agitation, ineffective government,
> saw a desperate nation see dictatorship and the fuhrer principle
> as a means of escaping its predicaments and the burden of
> a squabling democracy. USA today is very different. What are the
> factors taking the USA down its current road do you feel?
>
> dmb answers:
> Right. I still remember phrase I ripped-off for my thesis on Hitler. I'd
> asserted that the rise of fascism in Germany was due to "a particular
> sociological constellation". Since then, however, I've come to think that
> its a pretty weak explanation insofar as it construes fascism as a unique
> event. If that were true, then it would have no connection to the rise of
> fascism in Italy, Spain, Portugal, several of the Eastern European
countries
> or the re-emergence in recent years in the form of punk skinheads and the
> American right-wing militia movement. This is why I think Pirsig's
> description of fascism as an anti-intellectual re-assertion of social
values
> is so helpful. His explanation allows us to see the thing much more
clearly
> and it allows us to see it even in a variety of sociological
circumstances,
> even in non-Western cultures, such as the case of Islamo-fascism.
>
> More to the point, I suppose you'll have to accept a mediocre answer to
your
> question about today's American version of the same, because I don't have
a
> very good one. 9/11 certainly helped to accelerate it. LOts of it is due
to
> the "angry white guy" stuff; a reaction to the liberal progress made by
> racial minorities, women, gays and lesbians and secular culture in
general.
> It has lots to do with the tendency of (SOM) intellectuals to be be
> dismissive or even openly hostile to traditional morallity, religion and
the
> transcendental realm. These are genuine conflicts, but I also think all of
> this, and more, has been artifically pumped up and aggravated by the media
> and by politics.
>
> I give brief examples of each. In the last 10 or 15 years a web a
right-wing
> media organs have developed into what is pretty accurately called an "echo
> chamber". It goes back at least to the 1970's when Adolf Coors financed
the
> formation of the Heritage Foundation and some small media outlets, but it
> really took off about the time Clinton was first elected in '92. As talk
> radio and the internet began to blossom even more right-wing millionaires
> and billionares like Richard Mellon Scaife and Reverend Moon began to
> finance magzines and newspapers like the Weekly Standard and the
Washington
> Times. Once all the pieces were in place, the web would operate on a sort
of
> trickle up basis. Scandalous stories would begin in the ghetto, either on
> internet sites like the Drugde Report or on radio talk shows like Rush
> Limbaugh's. The same stories would then work their way up into said print
> media, then the mainstream papers and magazines and before long the same
> dubious stories would be broadcast on the major networks. The stories
would
> bounce around for weeks or months until the volume and repetition became
> such that only a deaf and blind person could avoid it. This is how the
> famous Lewinski sex scandal became serious news and lead to the
impeachment
> of a President. It started on the Drudge report and ended in the Senate.
And
> this is only the most famous such story. This same echo chamber also
painted
> Clinton as a drug runner, an thief, a murderer, as the father of an
> illegitimate black child and more. The man couldn't even get a new dog
> without some sinister motive being assigned to it.
>
> Politicians got just as ugly during this same period. Newt Gingrich
> orchestrated a Republican take over of the House of Representatives, for
> example, by unifying all House races under a single tatic. Namely, he sent
> out instructions to all candidates telling them to repeatedly refer to
> liberals and liberalism as "corrupt", "sick", "perverted" and the like.
> There was also a nation wide effort by Republicans to transform the House
> through re-districting. Most Americans have heard about the recent efforts
> By Tom Delay to do this in Texas, but it has been happening nationwide in
> '81, '91 and '01. Not only are they trying to change the borders of
> congressional districts in their own favor, which is really nothing new
and
> is done by both sides, but they've also gone out of their way to make sure
> that they are as many Black Democrats as possible. They hope to make
> Democrats into the minority party in more ways than one. One of the chief
> Republican operatives by the name of Benjamin Ginsberg has dubbed this
> effort "operation ratfuck". Did I mention that this was ugly? There is
lots
> more to tell, but I imagine you see the point by now. Through media and
> politics there has been a concerted effort to demonize anything liberal or
> intellectual and it has done so by appealing to the most hateful and ugly
> sides of human nature. And its working.
>
> like I said, this is only a mediocre answer and things are far more
detailed
> and complicated than I could ever express in a single post, or even a
single
> book. But you could probably take any part of this sketch and look it up
for
> yourself. Its not easy, but its out there. I saw some of this happen first
> hand. (I worked in talk radio for five years during this period and am
> ashamed to admit that I gave Matt Drudge a microphone way too many times.)
> But I'm also not saying anything that hasn't already been written about by
> others.
>
> So, the short answer is... The reason that we're looking so fascist these
> days is quite simply because people have been working so hard at it.
>
> Thanks,
> dmb
>
>
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