Roberts sounds like the kind of guy you'd hear was killed on Safari. Let's hope.

Classic "Dog Whistle Campaigning".

It wouldn't be a contemporary Republican primary without at least one Racist Dixiecrat in the field...

Calling the Bush Administration a bunch of Nazis is hyperbole. They are not genocidal fascists.

However, they most certainly are imperialists, and we need to face that fact for what it is.

Thompson has the reputation of being a more accomplished George Bush: lazy and intellectually incurious. Certainly, he managed to graduate from law school, pass a bar exam, and get an important position during a time of high legal drama (Watergate), but other than that, he's no bright light. I think these people throw out quotes and references from obscure books to give the impression that they are intellectually deep thinkers. Unfortunately, the author he chose to quote from is a right winger racist. Oops, was that a mistake, or is he playing to that kind of audience?

Thompson has the reputation of being a more accomplished George Bush: lazy and intellectually incurious. Certainly, he managed to graduate from law school, pass a bar exam, and get an important position during a time of high legal drama (Watergate), but other than that, he's no bright light. I think these people throw out quotes and references from obscure books to give the impression that they are intellectually deep thinkers. Unfortunately, the author he chose to quote from is a right winger racist. Oops, was that a mistake, or is he playing to that kind of audience?

What is really important is that the leader not use the military against the people who's will he disagrees with.

"...the will of a people is at least as important as their military might in overcoming an enemy."

Yeah, that's pretty much what he French thought in 1914...then they met the machine gun and were mown down like fields of wheat. They may have had elan to spare, but they were still dead.

Roberts, for those of you who don't know, was described in a New Republic article six months ago as "a man with links to white supremacism, whose book is not a history but an ahistorical catalogue of apologies and justifications for mass murder that even blames the victims of concentration camps for their own deaths."

You say this like it's a bad thing. What's next, you're gonna object to doubling Gitmo?

quintuple Guantanamo, times infinity!

Unfortunately, the author he chose to quote from is a right winger racist. Oops, was that a mistake, or is he playing to that kind of audience?

Classic dog whistle politics. As I recall, Roberts is associated with the venerable school of Anglo-Saxon glorification -- as in, only the English-speaking peoples are capable of organizating and sustaining true democracy. A kind of neo-Kipling, in other words. Lesser breeds without the law and all of that.

This crap used to be (still is?) amazingly common on the white supremacist right. I can remember being subjected to long, ignorant rants on the subject from my dear old Dizie dad. Ol' Fred knows his audience.

Let's see now... there's this Roberts, and that Roberts guy on the Supreme Court, and then there's Oral Roberts and the Roberts Crime Family...

And, of course, we can't forget Steve and Eydie-- I mean, Steve and Cokie Roberts, PBS/NPR anointed corporate media celebrity infotainwhores.

Dontcha see, people? Connect the dots here. Do we have to wait for hordes of these "Roberts" replicants to infiltrate our entire society before we act>

Delicatemonster, the difficulty is proving intent.

On Thompson's concluding remark: "And there's one thing in there that stuck out to me that I remember. And that is, he says, the will of a people is at least as important as their military might in overcoming an enemy."

This sends a chill of association with
the infamous 1935 movie Triumph of the Will by Leni Riefenstahl. The Wikipedia description of this film has it right: "The overriding theme of the film is the return of Germany as a great power, with Hitler as the True German Leader who will bring glory to the nation." For speaking about the "will of the people" and "military might" is Thompson more brain dead than Terry Schiavo ever was?

Thompson obviously hasn't read the damn book, he's just quoting a bit one of his staffers found for him. This guy is way dumber than Bush. He'll probably win in a landslide.

oleeb

You can't call the modern Republicans Nazi's for the simple reason that none of them understand a single thing about modern history or the history of fascism or socialism generally. There really are people out there that think that because the National Socialist Party had the word 'Socialist' in it, that Hitler was really a Leftist. Trying to educate them on this topic is useless, mainly because they don't want to learn. They can present a political program that is thoroughly fascistic, as long as they don't go over the line to eliminationism they are buffered away from the discourse.

And I don't think 'Corporatist' gets to the heart of the matter. The Nazi's didn't work for the Corporations, they made the Corporations work for the Nazi's. As long as the money was good and they weren't too inconvenienced the Corporatists went along. But you will notice there is no reference to company in "Ein Volk, Ein Reich, Ein Fuhrer", similarly all you need to know about Bush style fascism is summed up with American Exceptionalism, New American Century, and Unitary Executive. Does Cheney enjoy the wealth he has extracted? Certainly. Is that what really motivates him? I don't think so.

But the historical terminology has simply fallen out of our control, on this topic you simply cannot call them on it, you can only hope that much of the structure of fascism can be dismantled going forward.

I don't believe his comments about the "will of the people" was meant as an endorsement of racism ... HOWEVER ... it is very much inline with the "stabbed in the back" meme - and that is what he's working to foster.

Everyone of the empires Roberts is so hard for went to shit, as the defeat of mechanized military forces by nationalist insurgency was followed by the fiscal exhaustion and social disorgder in the empire-building country, which, frequently, then had a fundamental change of government, sometimes by electotion and sometimes by revolution. Roberts is right: will is the reason that nationalist insurgencies always but always defeat empires. Neo-cons often advocate harsher force in Iraq and elsewhere as if it had ever worked: one will sometimes read them pointing admiringly to the British brutal attempt to suppress the Boers or the even to the Nazi occupations in Europe. Had Fred, or any of that lot of necrophiliacs, a functioning brain, he'd recognize that the strong imperial strategies Roberts commends were part &parcel of the loss of empire and of frightful moral and material loss at home, as well as pointless and immoral bloodshed on a vast scale.

Dunno about bin Laden exalting "the will", but it's classic Nazi terminology. Recall Leni Riefenstahl's classic paean to the Nuremberg rallies, "Triumph of the Will." Sig Heil Fred!

The W.A.S.P. class that Bush belongs to had long believed it was their duty to govern/dominate the riffraff. That this hack plays up to that belief with visions of himself getting the scholastic textbook contract down in Texas is slimy. But that actor doing his wink to the racists in the Republican "Base" is like that other actor's starting his campaign in the birth area of the KKK. Y'all come back 19 century, ya heah.

I wonder if Fred Thompson ever stopped to consider the will of this nation's people. I don't know anyone who intentionally got up before or after "the infamous 9-11" and turned on the TV and started scouring the network channels for information on any other country and their explosions but you can't even go to a doctors appointment without having everyone's head cranked up there and the opposing snide remarks made. (Kerry was a traitor) (Bush's mother wears army boots) there's an Al Qaeda agent under the bed, that's why those unclean people deserved the torture they got a Abu Ghraib, and my imported SUV gets lousy mileage but I only use it to drive to my phony non-profit office that I use for a love nest when meeting other lustful care-free swine like myself and as an address to send my free money too, that I can use for a lawyer if I get caught keeping it all for myself!

It doesn't at first blush, seem that Fred Thompson's got even a token for the clue bus when it comes to United States military might.

This international crime syndicate has ruined everything it touched willfully: organized religion is in a macabre shambles and in my view christians are coming much closer to accepting evangelical voodoo in place of principles of faith. Pedestrian social goodwill among american workers and neighbors and overall generalized interactions have been divided and individually crippled. An apparent dysfunctioning defense apparatus or at least one that is now operating on a private plane of servitude and not as the foundation of this country and it's ideals but in the service of dogwhistle foreign policy advisors who hope to send sabber rattling international messages that "They, The Money, Are Tough Ready And Dominant", all on our phone time. No one hired these "public servants" to lick themselves gratuitouslly in the middle of the sidwalk. They need to be prosecuted. They need to be punished for their deliberate crimes, in a real prison.

So Thompson has read a book? That makes him something of a intellectual in the republican party.

Nothing new here really. From Thomas W. Dixon to Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Southern Conservatives have always sought to counterfeit legitimacy as "statesmen" by quoting literary and intellectual charlatans in the service of bigotry and reaction.

“The National Government will preserve and defend those basic principles on which our nation has been built up. They regard Christianity as the foundation of our national morality and the family as the basis of national life.”
- Adolf Hitler, in his first radio address to the German people, 24 hours after coming to power.

The discussion regarding 'fascism', totalitarianism, authoritarianism is quite profound. Unfortunately for those subjected to this form of political phenomena is one that is retrosspective.
Prof George Mosse, the consensus expert on European Fascism (personal and academic study) wrote a fascinating book prior to his death in 2000, "The Fascist Revolution", I suggest all of you read it.

In short he states unequivocally that a 'right-wing' or 'reactionary revolution' can occur in a modern society as a 'left wing' or 'progressive-liberal revolution'. Each seek to fully overturn the entire system of before. A right-wing revolution can and will occur in a democratic or authoritarian state. What a 'right-wing' revolution seeks to do is reconstruct society to a 'past ideal' one where there is a clensing of of domestic or internal enemies to the nation-state. In Germany it was the ideal of the 'folk' and the ideal of the 'Teutonic Knights' while in Italy it was the embodiment of the Roman ideal and beauty. Both sought to reconstruct society towards that ideal as it was threatened. In all cases the materialistic middle class is threatened and shrinking against economic forces it cannot weather. In Germany this was the result of the Versaille Treaty and Italy it was in consequence of the industrial powers in Europe encroaching on their traditional markets.

This is where the totalitarian-authoritarian state resides. Reconstruction of society within and the perpetual threat from outside. To repulse the external threat only military means can be used, it is a mortal threat. Thus the growth and religious honor of the military which again is used to identify the internal threats. These threats are also peoples from outside the traditional unitary culture. In Germany it was the Jews, Gypsies and all non ideal Germans. In Italy it was also foreigners and the non beauty of the Roman legend.

Moving forward the US experience with this reconstructionist movement is clear and comes from the Evangelical Right. Intertwined with old time religion of the rapture and biblical mythology of the coming end of time that is the surface language of being saved or left behind. Underneath the representation is clear, white, affluent, right wing to save the culture. Tancredo is trying to use this without religion as the Mexicans are invading our culture. Is it culture of tacos and music and spanish language or is a threat economically to the resident white folk for their jobs and well being when the middle class continues to shrink economically?

The case of authoritarianism is made each day with this administration as how it conducts its political business morally and prcedurally. The die was caste long ago attempt to break the courts with the ideology of the Federalist Society which was nothing but a code word for white authoritarianism and reactionarism. The unitary principle is the latest effort.

Yet before his death Mosse held out hope that America would withstand this authoritarian and totalitarian movement because it was so big and diverse. Resilient was his term. What has to be overcome is the corruption and manipulation of the ballot box where a tidal wave of repudiation must be forth come. I wonder if it can be done. Each vote is sacred.

Male white supremacy is part of our nation's DNA. It was the Confederacy and never was fully repudiated. This time it must esponged. This time if a tidal wave politically like 1932 appears and is successful in commanding a peaceful and orderly transfer of power all measures of exposure and accountability must be an integral part of the governance. I call it the 23 percenters and Dean so elequently identified them (authoritarians) in his book "Conservatives Without Conscience" from the research of the Canadian political scientist and psychologist. They must be fully exposed and accounted for.

I wonder though with so much at stake and so much risk now forwarded by the alliance of corporations and political authoritarians and evangelicals will an orderly transfer of power be allowed to take place? Is Clinton their fall back position? Understand in their language that liberals are no different an internal enemy as Mexican illegals or Middle East Terrorists. They threaten the whole system and would deconstruct the entire reconstructionist movement, is is an ideal.

As a matter of fact, he said "ONE thing" stuck out at him. If some other media outlet twisted Clinton's or Edwards' words in this way, you would be sure to call them on it.

That's just the kind of nuanced interpretation that the Drudge-fueled media slime machine never tolerates when it comes from a liberal or a Democrat. Imagine a Democratic presidential candidate similarly quoting a passage from one of Che Guevara's works, and the ensuing media firestorm. It's easy if you try.

"the will of a people is at least as important as their military might in overcoming an enemy".

Actually, the problem with this isn't that it's false, but that it misses the point. If we had the will, yes, we could "win" in Iraq. But apart from a handful of loonies, no one has that will, including people like ol' Fred who talk it up. Will involves sacrifice, and usually some proportionality between ends and means; "winning" in Iraq plainly involves sacrifice--in blood and treasure if not in principle--that most people have figured out isn't worth the return. The problem with the right is that it doesn't know the difference between making judgments about the actual national-security needs of the country and locker-room sloganeering. Thus the revisiting of our "loss" of Vietnam, which was nothing more than the realization that "winning" there was worth less to us than to the North Vietnamese. In that sense Vietnam was precisely the triumph of will over military might that commenters are ridiculing here. But so what? If we lacked the will in Vietnam, well, it was because in the end our will was vanquished by our prudence--a much-underrated virtue in the Republican Party these days.