American Legion communications director John Raughter denies Jonah Goldberg's allegations that his outfit was "founded as an essentially fascist organization."
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Fascists in the American Legion?
02 Jan 2008 02:46 pm
Comments (31)
I don't know much about this, but it does seem there may be some connection there:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_M._Owsley
"During his 1922–1923 tenure as leader of the American Legion, Owsley made numerous speeches in which he openly endorsed and supported both Benito Mussolini and Fascism."
Of course, it wouldn't be too unusual for a post-WW1 veterans organisation to be rather right-leaning.
I think it's awesome that a pinhead pseudo-pseudo-intellectual like Goldbutt would p*** off the American Legion. Ha ha.
Well its not hat surprising, Goldberg is never going to qualify for membership. Unless they do start up that Chicken Hawk Auxilliary.
otto, on this website you're only allowed to sneer at Jonah. Whether he may have a point on the matter at hand is irrelevant.
I don't know the details of Goldberg's claim or much history of the American Legion, but it seems to me that the Legion's response isn't very responsive. As I understand it, Goldberg claimed that the Legion was founded as a "fascist" organization - around World War I. So I don't see how a response describing the organization's endeavors in World War II answers the charge at all.
You see? He denied being a fascist! Always a good sign of a true fascist (school teachers, college professors, people who read books, etc).
I always had the impression that the AL has served a role as a creepy, right-wing militaristic organization. The cranky right-wing uncle of the VFW, if you will.
While calling it "fascist" might be uncouth, in a colloquial sense, it wouldn't necessarily be inaccurate.
I always had the impression that the AL has served a role as a creepy, right-wing militaristic organization.
For a second there, I thought this was another comment about me.
The funny thing is that the inherently fascist nature of the American Legion is one of the few accidentally true observations in Jonah's book.
How does the American Legion fit into Goldberg's "argument"? Does he think it's a good example of a liberal organization?
As others have stated, I also thought that, irrespective of whether or nor the Legionnaire's are fascist, they are definitely not liberal.
How does the American Legion fit into Goldberg's "argument"? Does he think it's a good example of a liberal organization?
Well, they must be liberal. After all, they're fascists.
how does what the american legion may or may have not been founded as vindicate goldberg's much more recent fascist sympathies?
That's why we call it the Unamerican Legion.
I always had the impression that the AL has served a role as a creepy, right-wing militaristic organization.
When I was going through language training in Monterey, I always thought of the AL as a place where they didn't check IDs and was home to lots of drunk 18-21 chicks on Friday night.
You might want to engage the actual argument, which is that fascism is a left end of the spectrum thing. The fascists were all about central control, were anti-business, in favor of government run health care... the list runs on and on. Conservatives have nothing in common with any aspect of fascist thought.
The basic problem with progressive dreams of government run programs is that government gets more coercive, not less. This is true whether we talk about left wing progressivism, or something like Huckabee's right wing populism. They both end up in the same place, with the same kind of coercive government control.
To use a simple example in health care, witness the UK: they are now proposing to push the obese and smokers to the back of the line for health care.
Doesn't this just reinforce my repeated claim that the everyday definition of "fascist" in America is just something like "really, really bad"?
So the reporter tells the A/L guy about Goldberg's claim (which may be historically correct for all I know), and the A/L guy indignantly says "We're not bad, we're good, patriotic people---therefore we can't be fascist by definition!".
government gets more coercive, not less
Ah, yes the magic of government, always becoming more coercive, no matter what else is happening. Kind of like the magic of the free market in the way it works, although not in the same direction.
Some few among us might be so foolish as to want to see the mechanism by which goverment supposedly always bcecomes more coercive; might even be skeptical that it always must work that way, or always has worked that way in the past. Some few among us might even go so far as to ask for actual evidence to support this striking natural law you posit, which is to political philosopghy what gravity is to physics. Damn spoilsports . . .
James Robertson illustrates how it's done: define the spectrum in a highly artificial and selective manner (left = 'central control', right = 'individual liberty), illustrate them with attributes vague enough that they can be applied to both fascism and liberalism ('anti-business', 'in favor of government-run health care'), and ignore anything that doesn't fit the pattern you've created.
And in all fairness, he does admirably with the little he has to work with; after all, it would be far easier to lay out axes on which liberalism and fascism occupy opposite ends than it is to construct an axis as tortured and fanciful as the one Robertson describes.
Had you read what I wrote, you would have noticed that I placed left end big government into the same buck with right end big government. Not all liberals are looking to head there any more than all conservatives are - but I get just as nervous about "compassionate conservatism" as I do about "It takes a Village".
In both instances I'll end up with a govt minder telling me what to do. It doesn't matter all that much what their theoretical goals are; either way, "it's for my own good" that I'm being told what to do and having my money taxed into oblivion.
Had you read what I wrote, you would have noticed that I placed left end big government into the same buck with right end big government.
Yes, I picked up on that. What you don't get is that 'big government'/'small government' axis is completely meaningless in the real world.
Re: To use a simple example in health care, witness the UK: they are now proposing to push the obese and smokers to the back of the line for health care.
And in the US the working poor are shoved to the back of the line, if they are even allowed in line at all. So tell me again that the Brits are somehow more malevolent?
For a second there, I thought this was another comment about me.
There's no controversy about who your masters are, Al.
witness the UK: they are now proposing to push the obese and smokers to the back of the line for health care.
Or, alternatively, not. And the reporting to suggest otherwise was bullshit, but Robertson, being a glutton for bullshit, lapped it up. Look at all the yummy yummy steaming bullshit piled on Robertson's plate.
Wesley Everest might have thought they were facists, if they hadn't killed him in 1919.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia_Massacre_%28Washington%29
"If ever needed," he said, "the American Legion stands ready to protect our country's institutions and ideals as the Fascisti dealt with the destructionists who menaced Italy."
Asked whether that meant taking over the government, he replied:
"Exactly that. The American Legion is fighting every element that threatens our democratic government-soviets, anarchists, I.W.W., revolutionary socialists and every other 'Red ... Do not forget that the Fascisti are to Italy what the American Legion is to the United States."
That's what Owsley said.
How you could be aware of this statement and try and tie it into a theory of liberal fascism is greater than my understing of mendacity or stupidity allows.
Actually, I think I've just been missing something very obvious in Goldberg's thesis.
As I've argued, the most common sense of the word "fascist" in America today is just "really bad."
But we must also remember that Goldberg lives in the Conservo-Sphere, in which the most common sense of the word "liberal" is also just "really bad."
So Goldberg's claim is actually just the simple tautology that "Really Bad" = "Really Bad", hence syllogistically correct---Logic 101!
Unfortunately - Jonah is sort of correct - The American Legion was inspired, in good measure, by the post WW1 German Freikorp's street battles with Weimar era reds allied with the then recently killed Rosa Luxemberg.
The Freikorp went on to inspire the brownshirts in Germany - Ultimately. the AL fought that which once inspired it - so forgive them.
Jonah Goldberg called group essentially fascist in origin?
Wonders never cease.
The American Legion. REMF pussies who spit on Vietnam vets. And got their fat pasty asses kicked by said vets.
"Conservatives have nothing in common with any aspect of fascist thought."
A large military driven by private contracts and central planning? Using the resentment of outsiders and foreign nations to align the working class with the capital class against the cultural elite? A strong executive empowered to detain, wiretap and aggressively interrogate enemies of the state? Building unity through reverence for the military, church, and national symbols? Campaigns focused on appeals to "traditional values" that establish the liberal opposition as weak and detrimental to the national character? Subsidies to big businesses that curry favor with the party? Social organizations designed to instill loyalty to god and country in children? Invading weaker countries on the pretext of eliminating a phantom threat?
Y'all aren't into that stuff anymore? Boy, I'm relieved to hear that.
Hey, it's true that elements of the New Deal like the WPA and NRA emulated fascist programs. But those programs generally didn't survive into the postwar years. The welfare state of today owes most of its heritage to the social democratic platform of the non-communist Left. The crux of fascism was right-wing parties adopting statist militarism to stimulate the economy and serve as a unifying force to maintain social order and protect entrenched social and economic institutions. How's that working out for you guys these days?
Comments closed January 16, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
Spencer might have to do a side "Too Hot for NYT" blog.
Posted by P O'Neill | January 2, 2008 2:50 PM