Fascist Fascism

Spencer Ackerman's noted that somehow in the course of composing his tome You're a Fascist: Nanny-nanny boo-boo, Jonah Goldberg managed to become a pretty serious apologist for Mussolini. And now here on his brand new "liberal fascism" blog we see the same thing. He means to argue that Mussolini, Hitler, and Vladimir Putin all admirered FDR and that therefore FDR was a fascist, but he can't help but get himself tied up with the idea "that Mussolini was the first world leader to stand-up to Nazi aggression" and some bemoaning of the fact that many of the pro-Mussolini segments of his book got left on the cutting room floor.

Now we shouldn't find this surprising since, as Jeet Heer has observed, National Review were Goldberg works has a long history of admiration for fascist political movements. But of course this is why people associate fascism with the political right. Jonah Goldberg, American conservative, thinks Mussolini, fascist, gets a bad rap just as his predecessors at NR used to pen paens to Franco.

Comments

I thought it was Sullivan who had the man crushes. You're getting obsessed.

Posted by Beer Here | January 9, 2008 3:48 PM

Mr. Goldberg has a point in that what some on the left like to call fascism wasn't in fact that monolithic. Franco stayed studiously neutral during WWII, and did not participate in the Holocaust; a couple of 'fascist' leaders, in Greece and Austria, were actually strongly anti-Nazi.

In much the same way, of course, neither were the far-left regimes; it was the Vietnamese communists who shut down the Cambodian Killing Fields, though they didn't get much credit for it from the USA. Revolutionary movements in Latin America were often at odds with those countries' Communist Parties as well. But this kind of silly thinking on the right should not excuse it on the left either.

Fascism is on the right in the same sense that Stalinism is on the left. It is, but it's not the only thing on the right.

Posted by Hector | January 9, 2008 3:52 PM

I think I said during the long composition process of the Doughpus Magnum that the obvious trajectory was to repeat Michael Ledeen's academic work on Italian fascism... as farce.

"When you look into the empty bag of Cheetos, the empty bag of Cheetos looks back into you."

Now, it's possible to have an infatuation with the Duce contextualised as part of a wider critical outlook. And while Ledeen is, to my mind, one of the most insidious shitbags in American politics, he speaks (or spoke) with some authority on the origins of Italian fascism. Jonah, not so much.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | January 9, 2008 3:53 PM

I disagree, Beer Here. Goldberg is not just wrong, but interestingly and instructively wrong. Plus, he's part of what once was regarded as the flagship conservative magazine.

I've wondered why more "honest conservatives" didn't point out earlier on that a democracy jihad in the Middle East and an omnipotent executive aren't quite Burkean innovations, but the whole love for Franco thing makes it make a little more sense.

Posted by snagglepuss | January 9, 2008 3:56 PM

Mr. Goldberg has a point in that what some on the left like to call fascism wasn't in fact that monolithic.

There have been countless historians who have made that point. Goldberg is not among them. His set of turd-flinging has no as-yet identified set of definable fascisms and falsifiable theses. The French Revolution was fascist because "it made politics into a religion". However, modern liberals are fascist because "they try to get beyond politics".

It's okay to have complex and subtle discussions about fascism, socialism, nationalism, totalitarianism, repression in liberal societies, etc. None of this is new, and none of it has to do with screeds such as Goldbutt's.

Posted by El Cid | January 9, 2008 4:11 PM

at the same time Hitler and the Nazis were attacking Jews as vermin, dirty, diseased, untermenschen, their propaganda machine was also accusing International Jewry of controlling the banks and the big corporations. it is natural for a fascist-lover like Jonah Goldberg to need to paint Mussolini as a socialist; by extension the left is fascist; in fact, the Nazi attack on Soviet Russia proves his point since it was a civil war. you can get very far in this sort of sophistry by just stating things or as Bush does by naming things. that's why we are in Iraq, to LIBERATE Iraq. Saddam, Chavez, Castro, Assad are worse than Hitler. Musharraf and the Saudi royalty are freedom-loving democracy promoting patriots. can I get a book contract too?

Posted by della Rovere | January 9, 2008 4:13 PM

NR's admiration for Catholic dictators shouldn't be forgotten-- Franco, who believed in the Masonic-Jewish conspiracy through the very end, and also the good 'Doctor' Salazar of Portugal.

Posted by MattF | January 9, 2008 4:15 PM

Re: Mr. Goldberg has a point in that what some on the left like to call fascism wasn't in fact that monolithic.

What is this "Some on the Left" nonsense? While the Left often employs the term nonsensically today as an all-purpose political slur word, when it comes to the various dictatorial reghimes of the 1920, 1930 and 1940s serous political historians also use the term "fascist" or "fascistic". Certainly in regards to Mussolini this can hardly be an ideological propaganda act, because he branded himself a Fascisti! And yes, they weren't monolithic, any more than the Communists were. But they all shared certain traits, revolving around a near-worship of the State (or in Germany, the Race), and no one in the 1930s doubted that they were, all of them, manifestations of the extreme right.

Posted by JonF | January 9, 2008 4:20 PM

While the Left often employs the term nonsensically today as an all-purpose political slur word

No, they don't. This whole book is rooted in Goldberg's hurt at conservatives being called "fascists," but I think liberals do that about as often as they defend Castro or advocate socialized medicine (ie, not much).

Posted by snagglepuss | January 9, 2008 4:25 PM

Man, it's gonna be tragic when the liberals kick down Jonah's door and execute him for criticizing them.

Oh, wait. That's what actual fascists do in response to criticism.

What a fucking twit. Do you think it even occurs to him that branding, say, Barbara Streisand a fascist is an incredible insult to the memories of people who suffered under actual fascists? But no, you know what, he's right. Writing mean posts on blogs about someone is the same as, say, being murdered by Franco's goons. And, hey, no problem with the Hitler mustache, either. I mean, it's totally classy to trivialize Nazism by making it a piece of kitsch art for your fucking book cover.

Posted by Freddie | January 9, 2008 4:28 PM

thanks Freddie for some genuine human perspective. God, i do hate this sort of right wing trash.

Posted by della Rovere | January 9, 2008 4:38 PM

Don't forget he denies that the Nazis targeted homosexuals. He is effectively a Holocaust denier.

Posted by Rickm | January 9, 2008 4:38 PM

I should have said "having mean blog posts written about you" for the above to make much sense.

Posted by Freddie | January 9, 2008 4:40 PM

I have no love for Mr Goldberg, but the way certain people have fallen over themselves to express self-congratulatory solidarity with their peers in the idea that Goldberg is not to be taken seriously--that his argument need not be read to be dismissed--strikes me as a real embarrassment. It is not, after all, difficult to undermine poor arguments with stronger ones. I don't imagine all this juvenile, knowing, self-satisfied posturing implies that there are no stronger arguments. It's just that there is something unattractively anti-intellectual in this kind of preening intra-coalition signaling.

Am I the only one having this thought?

Posted by Steak Tartar Buildup | January 9, 2008 4:40 PM

Steak-
While I certainly wouldn't endorse anyone who is ignorant of the historical phenomenon known as fascism to glibly dismiss Jonah's book without reading it, those of us who know a thing or two about the movement in Europe know that in order for Jonah's conclusions to be true, everything that every other scholar has written about fascism needs to be false. This, coupled with the fact that Jonah Goldberg is not a scholar, cannot read Italian, German, or French, suggests that there really is no knew information in the book.

Rather, it consists of a friable argument sandwiched between selective evidence and a procrustean bed of stupidity.

Posted by Rickm | January 9, 2008 4:45 PM

It's just that there is something unattractively anti-intellectual in this kind of preening intra-coalition signaling.

You know what caught my eye in what you are saying here? The phrase anti-intellectual. You know who were awfully anti-intellectual-- not in the "let's not seriously engage Jonah Goldberg's argument" way, but in the "let's kill the intellectuals" kind of way? Yes, that's right, genuine fascists. Fascism had actual victims, many millions of them, and throwing the term around lightly and superficially because you're angling to become the next great conservative talking head is disgrace. There are, in fact, many principled and intelligent arguments against what Goldberg is saying. And some of them are here, on this blog, in MY's previous posts and in these comments. Because they are angry doesn't make them less valid. You don't need to write a 10,000 word position paper on every issue to argue effectively against it, particularly in a blog comments section.

Posted by Freddie | January 9, 2008 4:49 PM

The chief problem with Goldberg's argument that fascism is a phenomenon of the left is that left and right are too fluid to make such generalizations.

"Right to privacy" arguments wouldn't have made sense in a progressive movement 100 years ago, but would have found an enthusiastic home in a conservative, anti-state one.

Likewise, a "security state" and "permanent revolution" approach to diplomacy are clear plagiaries of the Soviets, yet find a home in the remnants of the anti-Soviet party. The opposition to these ideas comes from the traditionally statist, traditionally idealist, party--one that's thought of as sympathetic to at least some of Marx's ideas.

The glaring hole in Goldberg's thesis is not in his analysis of the situation seventy years ago. It's his blindness to the situation now.

Posted by Shiynk | January 9, 2008 4:49 PM

While the Nazis certainly did target homosexuals, and this was of course a tragedy, there is also strong circumstantial evidence that Hitler was gay, and patronized gay rentboys when he lived in Vienna. Under the Nazi regime, of course, these inconvenient facts were hushed up. But the team of US pschologists who psychoanalzed Hitler during the Second World War (see the "Secret Wartime Report") concluded that he was probably gay. What happened to German homosexuals is of course a tragedy, but we should not oversimplify the situation.

And JonF is quite right in that 'fascist' has traditionally been a popular term of abuse on the Left, much as 'Stalinist' or some such is on the right. Liberals in the US don't use the term much because they are not very far on the left, in the international spectrum. The government of Venezuela, for example, uses the word heavily to describe its opponents (e.g. the slogan 'A fascist is less human than a snake.') much as the opposition in that country uses the term Stalinist.

JonF,
My criticism of the term 'Fascist' is that it is used so broadly as to become almost meaningless. What does it mean to lump together the reactionary Franco, the modernist Hitler, and the conservative Salazar, none of whom particularly had much in common with each other. It simply makes it harder to understand why, for example, Greece went to war with Nazi Germany even though they both had 'fascist' governments.

Posted by Hector | January 9, 2008 4:50 PM

but hector, if mussolini wasn't a "fascist," then the term really doesn't have any meaning at all. Mussolini and his italy were the embodiment of what serious people specifically identify as "fascism."

since jonah doesn't even understand that, there's no point in engaging with him.

Posted by howard | January 9, 2008 4:54 PM

Perhaps the most obvious criticism of the "Fascism was a Left-Wing movement" canard is the mysterious disappearance of the European Right after WWI.

In 1922, Mussolini became Prime Minister of Italy in a coalition government of Fascists, other Nationalist parties, Catholic parties, and classical liberals. Only the Socialists refused to accept his accession to dictatorship in 1924. Such a pity that Italy had no right-wing parties!

Hitler gained a functioning Parliamentary majority in 1933 with a 43% vote for his own Nazi Party and support from other Nationalist parties. He seized dictatorial powers the following year with support from the Catholic Centre Party. The only party in the Reichstag that actively opposed his accession were the Social Democrats (the Communist Party having previously been banned.) Such a pity that Germany had no right-wing parties!

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | January 9, 2008 4:54 PM

When you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares into you.

Posted by Random Dude | January 9, 2008 4:55 PM

"Right to privacy" arguments wouldn't have made sense in a progressive movement 100 years ago, but would have found an enthusiastic home in a conservative, anti-state one.

Whuh? Conservatives in 1908 where not "anti-state." They were the ones running quasi-autocratic monarchies and considering coups against elected parliamentary legislatures and building up the military and running the secret police and so forth. It'd have been the, er, liberals, who favored civil liberties, as it always has been.

Posted by John | January 9, 2008 5:13 PM

LP - exactly. Every fascist movement in Europe that actually got into power came to power as part of a right wing coalition of some sort. The actual left of the time (socialists and communists) always opposed the fascists. The relationship between fascists and non-fascist right wingers and conservatives was sometimes a fraught one, but they were all fairly clear they were on the same side. Were Paul von Hindenburg and King Victor Emmanuel III left wingers too? Was the Catholic Church in Spain and Croatia and Slovakia? The whole business is absurd.

Posted by John | January 9, 2008 5:16 PM

It's just that there is something unattractively anti-intellectual in this kind of preening intra-coalition signaling.

Your concern is noted.

(And concern trolling is part of Doughbob's planned response to his piece-of-shit book: 'where are the serious liberal rebuttals, as judged by me, the serious author of my serious book? Ah, I see none, and thus I win!')

Jonah wrote a book-length troll:

The content of a "troll" posting generally falls into several areas. It may consist of an apparently foolish contradiction of common knowledge, a deliberately offensive insult to the readers of a newsgroup, or a broad request for trivial follow-up postings... People post such messages to get attention, to disrupt newsgroups, and simply to make trouble.

He is Al with a well-connected momma, and thus deserves nothing but ridicule and beating with sticks of rhubarb.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | January 9, 2008 5:25 PM

Hmmm, no comments allowed at Jonah's You're a Fascist: Nanny-nanny boo-boo blog.
Someone needs to let Doughbob know that David Neiwert's review looks like a serious liberal rebuttal.

Posted by blindjoedeath | January 9, 2008 6:02 PM

But the team of US pschologists who psychoanalzed Hitler during the Second World War (see the "Secret Wartime Report") concluded that he was probably gay.

He was, too, you boys. I installed two-way mirrors in his bunker in Berlin, and he come to the door in a dress.

Posted by James Gary | January 9, 2008 6:14 PM

OK. I'm just sitting here waiting for one of the new promoters of 'bipartisanship' to get up on his (or her) hind legs and say 'Jonah Goldberg's new book is a load of bull doody'. Any takers?

Posted by MattF | January 9, 2008 7:05 PM

Jonah Goldberg's use of "fascism" is getting to be like conservatives who use the term "racism" to exclusively refer to people on the left side of the spectrum, especially blacks like Jesse Jackson, while denying anyone on the right, e.g., George Allen, is a racist. It is actually a fairly common conservative rhetorical tactic, to take whatever word is associated with bad stuff on the right and completely misappropriate it to mean bad stuff on the left while denying the bad stuff on the right exists.

Obviously, whatever else Il Duce was, he was a fascist. Indeed, he was one of the most famous fascists in history. But no, he's not the fascist, it's the liberal representatives of the political movement that OPPOSED fascism who are the fascists.

Posted by Dilan Esper | January 9, 2008 7:41 PM

You just don't understand Goldberg's genius!

Mussolini,actually calling himself a fascist?--Not a fascist.

Ordering a salad for lunch?-Fascist!

Posted by Rob | January 9, 2008 7:49 PM

Mussolini invented the term, "Fascism." He called himself a Fascist. But Jonah somehow seems to think that Mussolini wasn't a real Fascist--the real Fascist apparently would have been FDR, if only FDR had been a vegetarian.

Horse manure.

What happened to German homosexuals is of course a tragedy, but we should not oversimplify the situation.

You, sir, are a holocaust denier.

Posted by rea | January 9, 2008 8:38 PM

So what if Hitler personally was gay? (Was he gay? I don't know, and don't particularly care.) Closeted gay men in positions of power enact and support anti-gay policies all the time.

Posted by Julian Elson | January 9, 2008 8:54 PM

Did anyone see that insurance company ad that was on TV like once this summer? It had a a guy talking about how separately, like a single twig, we are weak yet when work together, like a bundle of of sticks, we are strong. I guess someone at that ad agency had never seen the symbol of the Italian Fascist Party.

Has Goldberg's book been selling at all? The publisher doesn't seem to have a lot of faith in it, between constantly changing the publication date, the subtitle and so forth. It is just amazing how many of the people Goldberg think are fascists would have been rounded up and killed by actual fascists in a fascist state. I don't lesbian vegetarian neo-Marxist sociologists were really beloved in Berlin circa 1942.

While Franco may not have fought with the Axis in WWII and may have had a bit of a different governing style and philosophy than the more secular Mussolini and Hitler, he did consider Hitler an ally and let him bomb Guernica to test the Nazis' air capabilities. The Catholic Church also aided fascist movements throughout Europe and called Mussolini a man sent by god.

Posted by Reality Man | January 9, 2008 9:35 PM

Rather, it consists of a friable argument sandwiched between selective evidence and a procrustean bed of stupidity.

This sentence makes me hungry for some reason. Hungry for some fried stupid! I'm going to Wendy's.

Posted by gerontion | January 9, 2008 9:36 PM

Re: but I think liberals do that about as often as they defend Castro or advocate socialized medicine (ie, not much).

Liberals, yes. But there is a Left in this country that uses "fascist" as a general slur word for anything and everything on the Right much as the Right uses "socialist" in the same way. Though come to think of it the recent attempt by Goldberg et al to comandeer "fascist" for this purpose instead suggests that maybe "socialist" just isn't doing the job they want any more, and they're afraid Americans might actually embrace some aspects of social democracy.

Re: While the Nazis certainly did target homosexuals, and this was of course a tragedy, there is also strong circumstantial evidence that Hitler was gay

No there isn't. He had a close male friendship in his youth. You can't brand everybody as gay who enjoyed that (FYI: I am skeptical about similar claims of Lincoln's gayness for the same reason). Accusations that he enjoyed male prostitues are about as trustworthy a their original source (Stalin's propagandists). And as evidence in the other corner there stands good old Eva Braun whose relationship with him was intimate enough that she died with him-- not something a mere "beard" would do.

Re: While Franco may not have fought with the Axis in WWII and may have had a bit of a different governing style and philosophy than the more secular Mussolini and Hitler, he did consider Hitler an ally

Spain was so devastated and bloodied after its Civil War it had to sit out World War II. The country could not have fought off a band of drunken Hobbits. A better case can be made for the Salazar regime of Portugal being on the outs with Hitler.

Posted by JonF | January 9, 2008 9:50 PM

I don't believe that I denied that homosexuals were killed by the Nazis. What I was intending to convey was that Nazi persecution of homosexuals was a thinly veiled smokescreen, considering that there is some evidence that Hitler himself was a homosexual. Creating a society more open to gay rights would not reduce the threat of a future Hitler coming to power. By no means. Incidentally, Germany in the 1920s was so gay-friendly that homosexuality wa known as 'the German vice.'

JonF,

Well, the point is, Franco didn't participate in the Holocaust. You can't claim that a lack of manpower was responsible for that. Clearly he had the soldiers and the popular support to kill all the Jews in Spain, after the Civil War, much like he did to the communists and socialists. He didn't because however much he may have despised the Jews, his anti-Judaism wasn't the murderous kind.

Moreover, not only did he not send his soldiers to join the Axis, but he didn't even let German troops into Spain- something which would have cost him little, and helped Hitler a great deal.

I despise Franco as much as the next leftist, but credit where credit is due.

Reality man,

The kind of 'fascism' that the Church supported was the Falangist kind which predominated in countries like Spain, Greece, Austria, and some of Latin America, and which, as bad as it was, never partook of the ultimate evil nature of the Nazi regime.

Posted by Hector | January 9, 2008 10:05 PM

"While I certainly wouldn't endorse anyone who is ignorant of the historical phenomenon known as fascism to glibly dismiss Jonah's book without reading it"

I would.

Hector, I've read numerous bios of Hitler and in none have I ever seen any evidence whatever that Hitler was in any way "gay" or that he had any sexual contact with men ever.

While he wasn't exactly a "PUA" (Pick Up Artist), and while there is some testimony for significant kink in his sexual relations with women, never have I read anything about homosexual tendencies (although I assume some authors would be happy to suggest such tendencies in just about anyone.)

"But the team of US pschologists who psychoanalzed Hitler during the Second World War (see the "Secret Wartime Report") concluded that he was probably gay."

Oh, please. A bunch of Freudians decides he's gay. I've read at least one bio by a Freudian about Hitler and he's off the wall about Hitler having only one testicle or some nonsense.

And you don't psychoanalyze someone from a distance. These guys were clueless and guessing.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | January 9, 2008 11:08 PM

I'll add to JonF's point. Eva Braun wasn't even the first, only the last. Hitler had several female obsessions, not least of which was his niece, Geli Raubel, but there were a number of others by all accounts.

Hitler was not good with women given his personality, but women nonetheless found him fascinating and he frequently attracted them. Some of these acquaintances turned into affairs to one degree or another.

There is also some testimony that he used prostitutes to some degree.

There is, however, no evidence that he ever used a cigar on an intern in the Chancellery, however.

There is zero evidence that Hitler was gay.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | January 9, 2008 11:15 PM

Hector, I believe after the fascist victory, Franco instituted a quota whereby one out of every five loyalist prisoners were executed...now I may not know the generally accepted international rules of war but this certainly does not sound like fascism with a human face no matter how hard closet fascist-lovers on the right try to portray it. (I do not think even the Nazis treated prisoners in this manner).

Posted by della Rovere | January 9, 2008 11:19 PM

You just don't understand Goldberg's genius!

Mussolini,actually calling himself a fascist?--Not a fascist.

Yes, indeed. But it's just as nasty to go around slandering Lenin, Stalin, Trotsky, and Gus Hall as "Communists."

Just because you run for President of the U.S. as the Communist Party candidate shouldn't allow people to engage in vile McCarthyism by accusing you of being a "Communist"...

Posted by RKU | January 9, 2008 11:19 PM

Creating a society more open to gay rights would not reduce the threat of a future Hitler coming to power.

WTF is this supposed to mean?

Posted by The Modesto Kid | January 10, 2008 12:00 AM

Franco did send Spanish "volunteers" to fight with Hitler. Google "Division Azul".

Posted by tequila | January 10, 2008 5:12 AM

Modesto Kid. You didn't know that teh holocaust was caused by teh hot gay love in Weimar Berlin?

Bet you didn't know that because you don't listen to Rush. (Like Jonah Goldberg who listened, heard about Feminazi's, and wrote a book about them.)

Posted by Porco Rosso | January 10, 2008 5:47 AM

Well, the point is, Franco didn't participate in the Holocaust. You can't claim that a lack of manpower was responsible for that.

The main reason Franco didn't participate in the Holocaust is that Ferdinand and Isabella anticipated the Holocaust by almost 500 years. Estimated number of Spanish Jews at the time of the Holocaust--less than 1000. Note that Jewish religious services were illegal in Spain until 1965. See the entry for Spain at this site:

http://www.simpletoremember.com/vitals/world-jewish-population.htm

Posted by rea | January 10, 2008 6:41 AM

re: Incidentally, Germany in the 1920s was so gay-friendly that homosexuality wa known as 'the German vice.'

Well, yes. And the Nazis were just some oddball fringe group in the 1920s that had tried to stage a coup in a beer hall. They weren't running the show yet.

Re: He didn't because however much he may have despised the Jews, his anti-Judaism wasn't the murderous kind.

I'm not sure Franco can be classed as an anti-Semite. He passed a law allowing Jews descended from the exile on 1492 to claim Spanish citizenship and during the war he allowed his diplomats in occupied Europe to hand this citizenship out quite liberally, without any fact checking, saving many thousands from the Nazis.

Posted by JonF | January 10, 2008 7:17 AM

Creating a society more open to gay rights would not reduce the threat of a future Hitler coming to power.

This is such a nonsensical statement I feel like it had to have been stolen from Jonah.

Please produce a citation of someone, anyone, anywhere, who argued for gay rights on the grounds that it would prevent the ascension of a neo-Hitler.

Preserving abortion rights would not reduce the threat of a Martian invasion, you know.

Particulars aside, what the hell is your point supposed to be? Millions of gays were murdered under fascism, but it doesn't really count because a bunch of American psychoanalysts who never met Hitler decided he was into dudes?

Posted by Jake H. | January 10, 2008 9:29 AM

Della Roevere,

Oh, certainly. I don't doubt it. Franco was a bloodthirsty tyrant, and killed probably around 200,000 loyalists after the war was over (and another 100,000 during the war). Spain in the 1940s was a very bad place to be any kind of socialist, communist or anarchist. I don't mean to minimize the number of people killed by Franco- had I been around in Spain I would probably be one of them.

The point that I was trying to make was a much narrower one, that Franco's government, while certainly evil, was different in kind and in nature and substantially less evil than the Nazis. One of the manifestations of that difference was that Franco killed _political_ prisoners for _political_ reasons, and he didn't go after anyone for their racial or ethnic background. (It's also worth noting that Franco, unlike Pinochet, Petain, or most of the South American 'fascists', overthrew a government that had itself less than a blameless record).

If you want to go after the Catholic Church for supporting Franco, be my guest, I would agree with you. What I disagree with is when people lump together Franco and Hitler and interpret the Catholic support for the one as support for the other.

JonF,

Franco's government was certainly anti-Jewish in rhetoric, perhaps not so much in practice. The loved to use the phrase 'Judeo-Masonic conspiracy' to describe communism, socialism, liberal democracy, anarchism, etc. I think that Franco disliked the Jews intensely, but had no taste for what the Nazis were doing to them- which makes him a really interesting historical figure. It's interesting that someone who railed against the Jews so often wound up saving thousands of them from the death camps.

Posted by Hector | January 10, 2008 9:32 AM

Della Roevere,

To use an analogy,

I despise fascism in much the same way as right wing conservatives oppose communism. Nevertheless, responsible right wing conservatives can draw the distinction between the more liberal communist regimes in places like Cuba, Nicaragua and Yugoslavia, and the bloodthirsty tyrannies in places like the Stalinist Russia, China and Ethiopia. Even though they continue to oppose them all.

Similarly, I think that while I oppose all forms of fascism, some of them are much worse than others. I would disagree with anyone who defends Franco, but I wouldn't consider him evil in the same way as a holocaust denier.

Posted by Hector | January 10, 2008 9:39 AM

I'm not quite sure why Cuba should be counted among the comparatively liberal communist regimes like Yugoslavia. It seems to me that Cuba is about middle-of-the-road, commie-wise: not as totalitarian or brutal as Maoist China, Stalinist Russia, North Korea, or the like, but somewhere around the area of "typical" communism -- maybe somewhere around Brezhnev's USSR, Honecker's GDR, etc.

Or at least, so it seems to me.

Posted by Julian Elson | January 10, 2008 2:22 PM