I've heard that too. Also can't attribute it to anyone. It's so true.

Posted by djuggler on July 6, 2006 01:21 PM Link to comment

Sinclair Lewis wrote it. I have a magnetic sticker with that saying on it. Sinclair Lewis wrote "It can't happen here" reading it is frightening. BTW, there is even a lead character who is a Unitarian in it. Yeah. :)

Posted by sandy on July 6, 2006 01:29 PM Link to comment

Oh and Sinclair Lewis also wrote "Elmer Gantry" another story that has relevance today.

Posted by sandy on July 6, 2006 01:33 PM Link to comment

Hmm. Wikipedia et al. attribute it to Sinclair Lewis and say it's a variant (without the cross part) of something attributed to Huey Long, but there are no hard citations. Interesting. One of the related quotes Google pops up with is that "fascism will come to America in the name of national security."

Posted by RSA on July 6, 2006 01:35 PM Link to comment

As I passed a billboard advertising a nearby titty-bar, passing a liquor store replete with all the spirits that anyone could partake (mmmmm....beer), hearing a nearby convertible blasting Snoop Dogg while my own radio announced that a flag burning amendment had failed after last week's USSC ruling that Bush would have to work with the congress in order to work out Gitmo parameters and pondering whether or not I want to take my family to see the new Pirates of the Carribean movie this weekend or simply take the wife to a saucy rated R flick, I thought of many things.....an encroaching fascist state certainly wasn't one of those things.

Relax, folks. Roy Moore lost badly in the heart of the bible belt and claims that we're only a sniff away from a theocracy reeks of hyperbole. Criminey, Bush can't even get his polls above 40% or his social security plan to the floor for a vote, and yet I'm supposed to worry about fascism?

Posted by RW on July 6, 2006 02:04 PM Link to comment

yet I'm supposed to worry about fascism?

It depends on how you define fascism RW.

"A new fascism promises security from the terror of crime. All that is required is that we take away the criminals’ rights -- which, of course, are our own. Out of our desperation and fear we begin to feel a sense of security from the new totalitarian state." -- Gerry Spence Lawyer and author Source: Give Me Liberty, 1998

or

"As nightfall does not come at once, neither does oppression. In both instances, there's a twilight where everything remains seemingly unchanged, and it is in such twilight that we all must be aware of change in the air, however slight, lest we become victims of the darkness." Justice William O. Douglas

And I can never, ever discuss fascism without adding my favorite quote of all times concerning the subject,

Fascism will come at the hands of perfectly authentic Americans, as violently against Hitler and Mussolini as the next one, but who are convinced that the present economic system is washed up and that the present political system in America has outlived its usefulness and who wish to commit this country to the rule of the bureaucratic state; interfering in the affairs of the states and cities; taking part in the management of industry and finance and agriculture; assuming the role of great national banker and investor, borrowing millions every year and spending them on all sorts of projects through which such a government can paralyze opposition and command public support; marshaling great armies and navies at crushing costs to support the industry of war and preparation for war which will become our greatest industry; and adding to all this the most romantic adventures in global planning, regeneration, and domination all to be done under the authority of a powerfully centralized government in which the executive will hold in effect all the powers with Congress reduced to the role of a debating society. There is your fascist. And the sooner America realizes this dreadful fact the sooner it will arm itself to make an end of American fascism masquerading under the guise of the champion of democracy.

When I consider the fact that those words were written over 60 years ago I better understand what is meant by the words "slippery slope"

Thank ya'll for helping me figure out where I saw the quote I mentioned. It seems now that at the time I was on a Huey Long kick when I saw it so I'll look in the Long / Lewis direction.

Posted by Buck on July 6, 2006 03:29 PM Link to comment

It depends on how you define fascism RW.

Webster's is fine.
http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/fascism

Again, where's the dictator-in-chief's social security plan? What about the Gitmo guidelines struck down last week?

I mean, if the executive is taking us ever so closely towards fascism, why can't we go a week without a #$*&ing leak coming out of the administration that undermines their policy? They can't even foment a freaking immigration policy to soothe their own base or keep their own CIA agents quiet, much less take our nation towards fascim.

Again, relax.

I'm quite sure Bush would like to do away with abortion if, you know, he were grand emporer over the fascist state. Alas, he's awaitin' the senate/house to give him the authority to sign a bill as right now he's as impotent as George Costanza getting out of a cold pool of water. Crikey, we're creeping closer towards socialism than we are fascism.

Posted by RW on July 6, 2006 04:18 PM Link to comment

Shit Ricky. We've been chin deep in socialism as long as I have been alive.

Socialism--a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done

The military and social programs is where all the money goes isn't it?

Posted by Buck on July 6, 2006 05:02 PM Link to comment

Nice quotes, Buck.

As to relaxing, does anyone think taking this tack would work on NRA supporters when a discussion of the Second Amendment comes up? "Relax, no one's talking about taking away your guns. What do you think, the government is a bunch of fascists?" I think it's the "creeping" part of "creeping fascism" that has people. . .creeped out. Granted, it's a slippery slope argument, as with gun rights activism, but there's no less reason for concern.

I don't think Bush is a fascist, for what it's worth, because I doubt he's ever thought seriously about political philosophy of any kind. I just don't believe that he sees any need for checks on his own authority, which is dangerous in itself.

Posted by RSA on July 6, 2006 05:06 PM Link to comment

I just don't believe that he sees any need for checks on his own authority, which is dangerous in itself.

Hasn't he been quoted as saying something like, "a dictatorship wouldn't be so bad as long as I am the dictator"? I think his personal philosophy is pretty clear.

I am reminded of the old saying

He who does not know, and does not know that he does not know, is a fool - shun him.

Posted by Buck on July 8, 2006 11:29 AM Link to comment

Buck, it was a self-effacing joke on his part. Come on, that was pretty much obvious to everyone. Psycho-analyzing every detail in order to find a hidden metaphor is Olbermann-esque but still not always the prudent avenue to follow....especially in the case of a straightforward JOKE.

Posted by RW on July 8, 2006 12:07 PM Link to comment

Bush is the perfect personification of a straightforward joke. The problem is that the joke is on us.

Posted by Buck on July 11, 2006 08:28 AM Link to comment