America is Not a Fascist Nation

“Pan American Unity” by Diego Rivera; 74-foot-wide, 22-foot-high mural, commissioned by the 1939–40 WPA and the Golden Gate International Exposition on San Francisco’s Treasure Island, itself a creation of the New Deal’s PWA and the WPA (Photo: City College of San Francisco)

In a strange and disturbing pattern, more often than not, the news business will hold Democratic politicians to account for public spending policies in explicit terms of the degree to which American voters may tolerate socialism. Seldom, however, do reporters and our punditocracy hold Republican politicians to account for their open embrace of intrusive and discriminatory public policies, such as the suppression of family planning practices and voting rights, in terms of the degree to which American voters may tolerate fascism.

Democratic Party socialism amounts to spending public tax dollars on infrastructure modernization investment, social safety nets, law enforcement restructuring and revenue enhancement by adjusting tax codes towards higher marginal rates of taxation on income and stronger regulation of corporate profits. Republican Party fascism amounts to greater latitude and profitability for distributors of disinformation, increased intrusion of religious dogma into public health and education, privatization of public services while deregulating private industry for the benefit of moneyed interests and at the expense of the general welfare, tighter restrictions on voting rights with more political control over electoral processes and relaxed regulatory oversight over political campaign financing.