Fascism 101 (an intro)

No, this is not a how-to or an endorsement of fascism! Everyone knows that the term fascist is a pejorative and the word is used to slime your opponent no matter what his beliefs are. Don't like a guy? Call him a damn "fascist". But what in the world is this thing called "fascism"? There are many books written about the subject, and I have read several of them. Fascism is not all that hard to understand.

I submit that if we were honest and understood Fascism that we would all have to acknowledge that  the USA is a fascist state and has been for generations. Here I use the term descriptively and not pejoratively.

Fascism is a system of government and does not really have any theoretical apparatus or underpinning. Fascism denies fundamental rights and liberties to individuals and exalts the State above all. Fascism makes the executive branch the unquestioned master of all and exalts the police state as the source of all order in society. Fascism plans the economy via central planning and makes use of large cartels in the private sector. Fascism does not take ownership of the businesses but rather takes control. Producers are subsidized and hence don't complain about the rules and regulations: government and Big Business become one.

To understand a thing, it is often useful to look at its history and lineage. For that we need to look back to Italy between WWI and WWII.

Coming next: the origin of Fascism.