Some Random Political Humor, Some Impassioned Writings, and Some Constitutional Amendments

Ernst Nolte, whose 1968 book Die Krise des liberalen Systems und die faschistischen Bewegungen (The Crisis of the Liberal System and the Fascist Movements) ...was careful enough not to propose a hard and fast definition of fascism, and offered instead a list of six features that any movement had to have to count as fascist. The first three of them are organizational features: a cult of charismatic leadership, a uniformed Party militia, and the goal of totalitarianism.

A totalitarian political system is one in which the party in power claims the right to rule every sphere of life: political, religious, artistic, scientific, sexual, and so on through all the normally distinct dimensions of human existence. There are plenty of dictatorships that aren’t totalitarian. It’s common for dictators to spare themselves extra work by focusing purely on the political sphere, and letting people do what they want in other spheres of life so long as their activities don’t stray into politics. There are also totalitarian systems that aren’t dictatorships: there are plenty of religious communities, some of them more or less democratic in terms of governance, that claim totalitarian authority over every aspect of the life of the faithful.

The totalitarian dimension, though, is central to those movements and regimes that count as fascist by Nolte’s criteria, and it’s a crucial distinction. The charismatic leaders and party militias of between-the-wars European fascist parties presented themselves, and in at least some cases honestly saw themselves, as trying to overturn not merely a political system but an entire civilization they believed was rotten to the core. Crusades against "degenerate" art and literature thus weren’t simply the product of the individual vagaries of fascist leaders; they were part and parcel of an attempt to reshape an entire society from the ground up, and the cult of leadership and the party militia very often served mostly as vehicles for the broader totalitarian agenda.

The other three features in Nolte’s description... are Marxism, the second liberalism, and the third -- the hot-button one -- is conservatism.

Some Impassioned Writings

Nearly everybody uses the Internet. It is an essential source of information, research, commerce, social exchange, and so much more. Thus, it is as essential to daily life -- and to the economy and functioning of our country -- as the telephone and the postal service. It is a common carrier and must be regulated accordingly.

I operate a small business. To support the activities of my company, I run some web sites. Many of my daily transactions are over the Internet. I also purchase a wide variety of Internet-delivered services. The notion that due to my company's small size and tiny information-services budget I could suffer reduced connectivity with colleagues and vendors, and reduced visibility to my customers, is unfair and anti-American.

The services that I buy from my ISPs include telephony, web browsing, electronic mail, e-commerce, data storage in the "cloud", and application data collection and dissemination (some of my mobile products (apps) connect to backend servers that I administer, growing and drawing upon pools of data of various kinds). Thus, to collectively call these services telecommunications is to misrepresent their variety and complexity, and the breadth of technologies that underlay their diverse protocols.

The forces that would tilt this playing field (toward themselves, of course) do so not out of ideology but out of an accurately-perceived opportunity to make a lot of money. However, this would be to the detriment of the American people. It must be opposed.

My brilliant friend Ann Farrell summarizes the potential impacts of the proposed tax reform law on healthcare (HC).

She summarizes the key points from Sen. Van Hollen’s town hall she attended attended today (12/1/17). The content of the legislation is in flux but available for review by both parties. This is not “fake news”.

• Add $1.5T to national debt (crumbling infrastructure, depleted assets). Once bill passed, next Rs in Congress plan to address “intolerable debt” via further HC cuts and privatizations (highway tolls, charter schools, private prisons, etc.)

• Removes RE tax and medical expense deductions - huge impact on chronically ill, ALZ pts and caregivers, pts in SNFs (most dual Medicare/Medicaid patients). Senate and House bills differ.

• Huge cuts to Medicare and Medicaid - grows population of chronically ill, older, disabled & addicted population going without care or bankrupts them /families to pay for it. (CHIP still not funded!)

• Hidden cuts to rehab equipment and services needed by many disabled and elderly to remain mobile.

• Ultimate goal to privatize Medicare & VA (vouchers to help buy often unaffordable or unavailable private insurance)

• Corporations / wealthy donors advantaged - concerns raised re US equivalent of RT (Russia state media) if Sinclair controls 70% of market (no net neutrality – Fox / Breitbart on steroids). Dickens?

• Dems proposed – 1) Reallocate Medicare $ / services to focus more on in-home support (care givers and pts) not just funding SNFs and 2) Drug price controls. Rs propose 1) big cuts to Medicare / Medicaid, rehab services and 2) Lilly exec to lead HHS – no drug controls.

• Congress funded small amount (compared to what’s needed) for Opioid crisis but Medicaid cuts wipe out many addicts’ HC services - funding supports little (e.g. “just say no” campaigns).

Maryland and CA among top states hurt. Senator Van Hollen said only recourse today is to flood phone lines (all count calls) to Senators McCain (202.224-2235), Flake (520) 575-8633- I got a person!!!) Corker (202 224-3344.line off hook?) and Collins (main 207. 622-8414 busy) – only ones he saw as potential no votes.

For me and many of us this has negative impacts but is much worse for others (including next generations we love) and country at large.