WHAT ARE ALL THOSE ISMs ANYWAY?

                                                                                              PART I

I have to chuckle whenever I see liberals use the word neocon.  Actually, the neocons are the old liberals — our founding fathers.  They were the folks who believed that individuals are more important than the dumb masses (yes, you’re reading the last two words correctly).   Seventy years ago the word “liberalism” was hijacked and used as a cover for Marxist communism.   It is no wonder that today’s conservatives feel insecure what with socialism, communism, fascism and Marxism, under one umbrella called liberalism, is competing for the hearts and minds of the American people…and winning.

With all these isms flying around, I decided to look into them in order to understand the differences.  Most of these definitions are from a college text book someone gave me back in the 80’s.

Socialism, communism, fascism, and Marxism are similar to each other, but there are some important differences.  Let’s look at the two ways in which they are alike.   First, all four deal with an economic system in which the mode of production of goods and services are controlled by the government.  Second, they all believe that the self-serving individual is evil and society should be self-sacrificing.  People should serve each other for the greater good.  In all of these societies, the individual cannot be allowed to exist in isolation from the others.  Individuals and community are considered to be one unit. The differences between these  forms of government have to do with how the combined individual slash community interrelates with the social/economic/political environment.

Socialism:  Since the days of Franklin D. Roosevelt, we find ourselves living in an increasingly socialistic America.  Republicans and Democrats alike have moved toward socialism.  We still have individuals who own their own businesses creating needed goods and services, and providing jobs to those who would trade their labor for wages, but this is soon going to be a thing of the past.  It would seem that full-blown socialism is the new zeitgeist of our society.  In a socialist society the primary concern is that everyone is economically equal and each has their basic needs provided for by a central government.  The socialist mind-set believes that making people work for  basic needs such as housing, clothing, food, transportation, and health care is degrading to the workers.  They believe that businesses motivated by profit will always take advantage of labor by their selfish drive to make more and more money.  We will still own our own small businesses and still be able to acquire private property, but more and more, the government under Obama will nationalize the major corporations for the “good of society.”  With increasing frequency, we see the gradual erosion of private property ownership as local and federal government programs confiscate it for the “good of society.”  Large concentrations of wealth will no longer be tolerated which will result in the wealthy leaving America for better opportunities abroad.  That leaves Joe six-pack (me) living off the dole where the only legal jobs available are low-paying, mind-numbing government jobs.  Everyone but the ruling class will be living in government provided quarters.  Drugs and gangs will become even more desirable to young people seeking to express themselves.  I could go on painting a gloomy future, but I think you all understand that socialism leads inevitably to communism.

Communism:  Those of us old enough to have seen the “hippies” living in their pathetic little communes have a pretty good idea of what communism is all about.  In fact, communism goes back to the early Christian days.  It’s been tried many times and in many ways and it just doesn’t work because people are naturally self-serving.  And some are downright evil as we’ve seen with communism under Stalin and Mao.  To some, this pre-Stalin, pre-Mao form of communism seems an ideal way to live with all forms of production and all property being owned by the “community.”  And for those who have no ambitions other than to live their lives in peace and harmony every day, communism seems the perfect Utopia.  How sweet the siren’s call of “from each according to ability, to each according to need.”  The communist mind-set believes that private property (by the way, that includes money) and religion are the causes of all the evils of the world.  Today’s Marxist communists (of which many are college professors and politicians) see America and any other freedom loving peoples in the world as the chief cause of the problems of the world.  They must either be eradicated or transformed for the “good of society.”  If you want to know how wonderful communism is today, ask any Cuban who risked his/her life and limb getting into this country.

Marxism:  Conservatives believe that anyone who is anti-capitalist is a Marxist.  That’s not true. There are others who don’t agree with capitalism.  That would be your everyday garden variety long-haired hippy-type commie-pinko, and the tattooed, trinket-adorned (leave-no-external-organ-unpierced) weirdo.  It's the eggheads that teach our children who bother me.  Our children are being taught by the eggheads K-12 through Phd that Marxism is far superior to capitalism.  They are taught that capitalism deprives  human beings of their ability to be creative.  How anyone can swallow that hog-wash is beyond my understanding.  How creative was capitalism to be able to repeatedly put men on the moon?  No other form of government has ever done anything like that.  What other government had the wealth to accomplish such an astounding feat?  Our children are also taught that when they sell their labor, they turn their productive activity into a commodity, and in so doing they damage their self-esteem.  Furthermore, individualism (capitalism) prevents human beings from achieving their true nature (whatever the hell that means).   From the college textbook I mentioned earlier: “Marxism is a respected philosophical system.  And as a rigorous analysis and alternative to [conservative] capitalism is unmatched.” (Neopolitics, American Political Ideas in the 1980s, Linda J. Medcalf and Kenneth M. Dolbeare, Random House, 1985 p 205)

Fascism:  We all equate fascism with Nazi Germany and Mussolini’s Italy, but in modern times this view is passé.  Obama, in his usual demagogic manner, used fascist solutions to “aid” capitalism.  By nationalizing GM and Chrysler, two major automobile producers, Obama has, in his eyes, protected and maintained a major corporation.  This is the classic definition of fascism.  Allow me to quote from the same book I referenced above in speaking of fascism: “Managing the population includes rousing patriotic and nationalistic appeals, calls to sacrifice for the good of the nation.  It implies an adept use of symbols in order to manipulate a gullible, sheep like citizenry. (Remember the “Office of the President Elect” symbol he used during his campaign?)  Though the population may be engaged in the beginning, skillful manipulation of crises, economic and political, gradually leads to almost religious patriotic fervor.  Suppression of any dissent becomes increasingly oppressive, though still within procedural, legal limits.  Eventually, all necessary roads are taken to maintain the governing partnership.” [Between business and government] (p 206)  parenthesis and brackets are mine. Fascism allows small businesses to flourish but maintains control of production of the major corporations.  I have to admit that the definition I found in the textbook doesn’t quite match what Obama is doing.  The religious fervor isn’t for the nation, it’s for Obama himself.  I believe that was Hitler’s downfall at the end.

This is by no means all of the isms that exist today.  There is corporatism, anarchism, totalitarianism, conservatism, and capitalism to name the ones I didn’t cover.  There are some surprising things about these isms that I want to discuss in a future posting.