Henry A. Wallace's Warning of American Fascism

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Tag(s): American Facism; Democracy; Fascism; Fascism-Cant Happen Here; History; History; Propaganda
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March 6, 2008 at 08:56:34

Henry A. Wallace's Warning of American Fascism

by Ed Encho Page 1 of 3 page(s)

http://www.opednews.com

The American fascists are most easily recognized by their deliberate perversion of truth and fact. Their newspapers and propaganda carefully cultivate every fissure of disunity, every crack in the common front against fascism.

-Henry A. Wallace

In this dark period of the American experiment when the cats feet of creeping fascism grow louder by the day it is important to look to our history for those who offered up warning signs of what was to come. I would like to recognize former Vice President Henry A. Wallace for his outspoken warnings of the potential for the rise of American fascism. In retrospect and on careful analysis of the post WWII years we have seen an incremental process in which these fascist elements have slowly executed their plan to seize the country.

The creation of the CIA, the McCarthy years during which the real left was beaten back and degraded as a political force, the gradual and growing influence of the military industrial complex, the creation of a massive, well-funded infrastructure of think tanks and media shills, the hijacking of religion, the dumbing down of Americans through incessant propaganda, the destruction of the quality of education available in public schools, the erosion of worker’s rights as well as globalist ‘free trade’ pacts that would facilitate the looting of the fascist oligarchs and finally the stripping away of American civil liberties by a rogue administration who seized power illegitimately have seen that Wallace’s warnings went unheeded.

While this essay is primarily about Henry A. Wallace it is also about American fascism and the dangerous period that we are currently crossing the threshold into with an economy that is a house of cards, an imminent escalation of the war of aggression and the coming ‘pre-emptive’ strike on Iran, the capitulation of the Democratic party and the ever present fear that permeates the land and is stoked by the agents of fascism sets up the perfect situation for the final element: a demagogic leader with powers consolidated in the executive branch. Just look at the Republican presidential ‘debates’ of a several months back when torture and fear mongering dominated the discussion and the only rational individual on stage was ridiculed, marginalized and mocked while a television character named Jack Bauer was oft invoked along with what is now our divinely bestowed upon status as a righteous avenger torture state. While John McCain was the only one who spoke out against the vile practice he has since thrown with the rest for the sake of political expediency and only continues to pander to the worst Americans among us, the authority worshippers of the GOP base so I have little hope that a McCain presidency will be anything less than a continuation of our long slide into sorrow and historical infamy.

I would strongly recommend that people take a look at Naomi Wolf’s excellent article for The Guardian entitled Fascist America, in 10 easy steps which removes all doubt as to the very dark road that we as a nation are headed lest we draw upon the wisdom of those from the past who tried to warn us, men like Henry A. Wallace.

The Danger of American Fascism
By Henry A. Wallace

The New York Times, Sunday 09 April 1944

On returning from my trip to the West in February, I received a request from The New York Times to write a piece answering the following questions:

What is a fascist?
How many fascists have we?
How dangerous are they?

A fascist is one whose lust for money or power is combined with such an intensity of intolerance toward those of other races, parties, classes, religions, cultures, regions or nations as to make him ruthless in his use of deceit or violence to attain his ends. The supreme god of a fascist, to which his ends are directed, may be money or power; may be a race or a class; may be a military, clique or an economic group; or may be a culture, religion, or a political party.

The perfect type of fascist throughout recent centuries has been the Prussian Junker, who developed such hatred for other races and such allegiance to a military clique as to make him willing at all times to engage in any degree of deceit and violence necessary to place his culture and race astride the world. In every big nation of the world are at least a few people who have the fascist temperament. Every Jew-baiter, every Catholic hater, is a fascist at heart. The hoodlums who have been desecrating churches, cathedrals and synagogues in some of our larger cities are ripe material for fascist leadership.

The obvious types of American fascists are dealt with on the air and in the press. These demagogues and stooges are fronts for others. Dangerous as these people may be, they are not so significant as thousands of other people who have never been mentioned. The really dangerous American fascists are not those who are hooked up directly or indirectly with the Axis. The FBI has its finger on those. The dangerous American fascist is the man who wants to do in the United States in an American way what Hitler did in Germany in a Prussian way. The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power.

If we define an American fascist as one who in case of conflict puts money and power ahead of human beings, then there are undoubtedly several million fascists in the United States. There are probably several hundred thousand if we narrow the definition to include only those who in their search for money and power are ruthless and deceitful. Most American fascists are enthusiastically supporting the war effort. They are doing this even in those cases where they hope to have profitable connections with German chemical firms after the war ends. They are patriotic in time of war because it is to their interest to be so, but in time of peace they follow power and the dollar wherever they may lead.

American fascism will not be really dangerous until there is a purposeful coalition among the cartelists, the deliberate poisoners of public information, and those who stand for the K.K.K. type of demagoguery.

The European brand of fascism will probably present its most serious postwar threat to us via Latin America. The effect of the war has been to raise the cost of living in most Latin American countries much faster than the wages of labor. The fascists in most Latin American countries tell the people that the reason their wages will not buy as much in the way of goods is because of Yankee imperialism. The fascists in Latin America learn to speak and act like natives. Our chemical and other manufacturing concerns are all too often ready to let the Germans have Latin American markets, provided the American companies can work out an arrangement which will enable them to charge high prices to the consumer inside the United States. Following this war, technology will have reached such a point that it will be possible for Germans, using South America as a base, to cause us much more difficulty in World War III than they did in World War II. The military and landowning cliques in many South American countries will find it attractive financially to work with German fascist concerns as well as expedient from the standpoint of temporary power politics.

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Ed Encho is a free lance writer, activist and consultant who resides in West Central Florida.

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Margaret Bassett is an 86-year old, currently living in senior housing, with a lifelong interest in political conumbrums. She hopes to hold out for one more presidential election. Bachelors from State University of Iowa (1944) and Masters from Roosevelt University (1975) help to unravel important requirements for modern communication. Early introduction to computer science (1966) trumps them. It's payback time. She's been "entitled" so long she hopes to find some good coming off the keyboa...

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Margaret BassettMargaret Bassett is an 86-year old, currently living in senior housing, with a lifelong interest in political conumbrums. She hopes to hold out for one more presidential election. Bachelors from State University of Iowa (1944) and Masters from Roosevelt University (1975) help to unravel important requirements for modern communication. Early introduction to computer science (1966) trumps them. It's payback time. She's been "entitled" so long she hopes to find some good coming off the keyboa...

to see more of bio, click on member name

Forty years later, the struggle still goes on

There are similarities between 48 and 08, except now the bugaboo is terrorist instead of communist. Then Dewey was a Republican retread (waiting until 52 for Ike to get his stateside act together). Dems faced the race question in an earlier version. The Dixiecrat mentality resurfaced when Trent Lott shot from the lip. What was very different were economic needs. After ravishes of war and depression, people really needed to become consumers again. Production only had to be rearranged for peacetime.

There's the really big difference! Ike warned us not to militarize to the hilt. We have more than done that. How to unwind is difficult. Edwards espoused the cause of the worker who needed to get back to more prosperous days. That's not the main issue in this election. Whether Obama or Clinton, the thrust is on enabling the corporate world to be a big player on the world scene. Neocons have so thoroughly championed the military/industrial/cybernetic complex that it will be hard for a person like Harry Truman to take on the corruption and collusion which exists now.

Take for example this latest flap over giving the big plane order to non-US companies. My logical part says it was inevitable because the dollar is so broken. But my political soul tells me that it will be a chief issue by the time the fall comes.

Seeing myself as a 20Something in 48, and looking at the young today, I wonder how they can carry on. Our generation forced an impeachment and then allowed the scourge to go on. After all, in 1964 Hillary was a Goldwater girl. It's a metaphor for the nation.

To be sure we must have a viable corporate world. What we do not need is a greedy one. The instutitions FDR put in place before his death need to be made modern. It's not just the UN and WTO and World Bank, but also UNESCO, ILO, and the Human Rights Commission. And, for sure, we have to rethink the genie which was let out of the bag when we chose atomic bombs to end World War II.

by Margaret Bassett (17 articles, 716 quicklinks, 15 diaries, 403 comments) on Thursday, March 6, 2008 at 12:50:41 PM

Author, Exec. Dir. The Center For Balance. Websites: PanditPress.com, OligarchyUSA.com, PublicCentralBank.com, EditorFreedom.com,
FascismUSA.COM & more
Kent WeltonAuthor, Exec. Dir. The Center For Balance. Websites: PanditPress.com, OligarchyUSA.com, PublicCentralBank.com, EditorFreedom.com,
FascismUSA.COM & more

The End of America

He was right.

Read Naomi Wolf's book - The End Of America.

Kent Welton,

FascismUSA.com

by Kent Welton (46 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 37 comments) on Thursday, March 6, 2008 at 1:19:04 PM

Ed Encho is a free lance writer, activist and consultant who resides in West Central Florida.
Ed EnchoEd Encho is a free lance writer, activist and consultant who resides in West Central Florida.

Great Book!

I would definitely recommend Naomi Wolf's book as an essential read among many others. Fascism is going to be our future until we are allowed to really see our past other than the flag swaddled, childlike version of it that has been condoned by the state and used to indoctrinate us all into our exceptionalism.

Truth be known we are no better than any rotten empire in history and maybe even worse.

Wallace understood this which was why he had to be marginalized and the rest of the true left destoyed by the apparatus of oppression that rose out of the ashes of WWII to make the world safe for money and imperialism.

Thanks for reading and commenting

by Ed Encho (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 46 diaries, 266 comments) on Thursday, March 6, 2008 at 2:19:26 PM

Peace Studies Degree from Bradford UK before it became just one more arm of the UK Government's Department For International Developments contractor.
sliphochPeace Studies Degree from Bradford UK before it became just one more arm of the UK Government's Department For International Developments contractor.

Henry A Wallace

Thank you for the article, you might find this useful

http://www.wrmea.com/backissues/0491/9104027.htm

Leon Hadar writing in 1991 "The Neocons: From Cold War to Global Intifada

by sliphoch (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 9 comments) on Thursday, March 6, 2008 at 5:58:03 PM

The articles reflect additional thoughts that expand on the author's ten volumes Genesis Begins the Millennia. The work begins in 1995 with a fictional account of ordinary Israelis absorbed with everyday events. There are extraordinary happenings the characters gradually recognize as portents of the Messianic Age. Volumes four and five show why the Messiah decided to delay His arrival.
Volumes six through ten [Tradebombers] begin six weeks before the 9/11 World Trade Center tragedy. Again,...

to see more of bio, click on member name
Jason PazThe articles reflect additional thoughts that expand on the author's ten volumes Genesis Begins the Millennia. The work begins in 1995 with a fictional account of ordinary Israelis absorbed with everyday events. There are extraordinary happenings the characters gradually recognize as portents of the Messianic Age. Volumes four and five show why the Messiah decided to delay His arrival.
Volumes six through ten [Tradebombers] begin six weeks before the 9/11 World Trade Center tragedy. Again,...

to see more of bio, click on member name

American Fascism

You and Naomi Wolf have given us valuable insight how we have lost our liberty.

What is to prevent Mr Bush from staging a false flag event, declaring Martial Law and using NSPD 51 to establish a dictatorship?

by Jason Paz (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 30 comments) on Thursday, March 6, 2008 at 9:05:15 PM

Ed Encho is a free lance writer, activist and consultant who resides in West Central Florida.
Ed EnchoEd Encho is a free lance writer, activist and consultant who resides in West Central Florida.

RE: American Fascism

What is to prevent Mr Bush from staging a false flag event, declaring Martial Law and using NSPD 51 to establish a dictatorship?

I truly believe that it is less possible now than before simply because too many people are on to the game and let's face it, the illusion of legitimacy is what protects the system.

Bush will leave peacefully presuming that the neocon choices Hillary Clinton and John McCain face each other in the general election which appears more and more likely with each media assisted knee capping of Obama. The fix is in and McCain and Clinton are both warmongers blessed by Joe Lieberman and the Israeli Lobby to continue the Middle Eastern wars of agression, continue the efforts to close down debate in America through casting a wide net for potential 'domestic terrorists' as defined by the Jane Harman-Joe Lieberman travelling carnivals of perversion that will soon be launced under HR 1955 and S 1959 and ensuring that the empire's top export continues to be death.

It is said the best way to end a dictatorship is to make a dictator act like a dictator and these people know that, they will continue to sucker gullible Americans with their sham democracy and continue to slowly restrict free speech, ban books and eliminate civil liberties.

Just think of the boiling frog because the frog is us.

Thanks for commenting

by Ed Encho (6 articles, 0 quicklinks, 46 diaries, 266 comments) on Friday, March 7, 2008 at 5:05:37 AM

Len Hart is a Houston based film/video producer specializing in shorts and full-length documentaries. He is a former major market and network correspondent; credits include CBS, ABC-TV and UPI. He maintains the progressive blog: The Existentialist Cowboy
Len HartLen Hart is a Houston based film/video producer specializing in shorts and full-length documentaries. He is a former major market and network correspondent; credits include CBS, ABC-TV and UPI. He maintains the progressive blog: The Existentialist Cowboy

American fascism

Great and timely post, Ed. Thanks...

I recall well my adolescent introductions to the cautionary literature --Brave New World, 1984, It Can't Happen Here. I wish I had read Wallace then.

It's a great essay and describes perfectly the US under Bush. Indeed --it DID happen here.

by Len Hart (107 articles, 142 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 364 comments) on Sunday, March 16, 2008 at 5:14:36 PM

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