Replies

"Our own country is riddled with fascists in the so-called environmental movement. The use of the endangered species act, smart growth and other state mandated controls over property is the essence fascism."

I'm going to differ with you both here again. In a fascist state, the owner of the timber would have a cozy deal with the government. The loggers would work for him or another conglomerate (or Zaibatsu). As much logging as was required for the state's interests would be conducted, but the individual owner would naturally have a personal preference for doing what the state preferred -- as those in power have by definition, like minds.

However, what we have here are watermellons: green on the outside, but red on the inside. They want the state to own and manage the land to the exclusion of all other interests. This by itself would be odious, since it violates the principle of shared community access, but they take it further. Their secondary purpose is no doubt to increase state control over a significant national resource because power comes with both moving a resource into state control and then taking over its "management." We've seen the suit-happy greenies go nuts in the past 30 years.

Another twist on environmentalism is the Chinese model: the state owns everything and doesn't care about preserving it. For example, the air in some parts of China is horrendous and nobody could do anything about it during the rule of the red communist hardliners. I doubt that's changing under their increasingly fascist Chinese regime of today. By the way, Michael Ledeen's commentary on the differences between fascism and communism are excellent in that link.

"I'm going to differ with you both here again. In a fascist state, the owner of the timber would have a cozy deal with the government. The loggers would work for him or another conglomerate (or Zaibatsu). As much logging as was required for the state's interests would be conducted, but the individual owner would naturally have a personal preference for doing what the state preferred -- as those in power have by definition, like minds."

The Vampire Economy: Doing Business Under Fascism

Balint Vazsonyi, in his essay “Socialism: The Ultimate Evil,” reminds us that communism and fascism are two branches on the tree called Marxism. He makes that point in many of his works.

In his essay he writes that “Technically speaking, Communism is simply the final phase, the ultimate goal of socialism. So is what we call Nazism. ‘Nazi’ is short for National Socialism, merely another variant of socialism. Stalin ordered Nazis to be referred to as “Fascists” only to avoid the obvious analogy with Soviet Socialism. Germans never were ‘Fascists’ - the Third Reich was ruled by the National Socialist German Workers Party.

“Yes, Stalin and Hitler, the prize disciples of Lenin, were twins. So were communism and Nazism. In Budapest, when the Gestapo left, the NKVD (then GPU) did not even bother to change the building in which the tortures and murders took place. They kept the building and the personnel.

“Rather than enemies, Nazism and Communism were the ultimate competitors. Each wanted to conquer and rule,” wrote Vazsonyi.

I have no trouble at all grouping communism and fascism together as two extreme left wing movements. Both controlled people’s money, property, liberty and lives. The only glaring difference is that communism owned the property and means of production, while fascism allowed free enterprise and capitalism as long as property owners carried out the will of the state.

“There are to be no more private Germans,” said Freidrich Sieburg, a Nazi writer in the 1930s. “Each is to attain significance only by his service to the state, and to find complete self-fulfillment in his service.”

Walter Darre, who held the posts of Reich Peasant Leader and Agriculture Minister, assumed an important role in controlling private property in the Reich. He instituted land use plans, organic farming and clean soil programs.

Robert Proctor, in his book “Racial Hygiene: Medicine Under the Nazis,” writes that....”the Nazis were health fanatics who banned cigarette smoking, promoted vegetarianism and organic gardening, engaged in abortion and euthanasia, frowned on all capital excess and even promoted animal rights. They were environmentalists who locked up the land to promote paganism.”

All this control was carried out by a massive Reich bureaucracy that had no respect for private property. Rather than thinking that all Germans willingly went along with the fascist program - I’m sure many did - others were forced to obey when the Reich told them to act “for the common good” or face brutal state action. Many people - business owners and private property owners - saw what happened to those who disobeyed and left Germany.