Old guard panics: Will the sun soon set on Bush/Obama/Clinton corporatism?

Now what's this talk of fascism?

So this is the closing argument. Trump is a “fascist”. OK, that is pretty pathetic. That Hillary Clinton is asserting this is flat out laughable. Hillary Clinton has literally embraced the core component of fascism, corporatism, her entire political life. One can make a case that if anyone is a fascist, she is.

Nothing fascist about this image…At all.

Is Trump a classical liberal (or a small government conservative) who eschews the power of the state? Certainly not. Will crony capitalism continue, perhaps in a slightly modified form if he is elected? Yes. This will happen. Crony capitalism will always be with us to some degree. This is a sad fact. But that the people who have long cozied up to both the state and corporate America and have advocated for the de facto fusion of both are trying to convince voters that Trump is a fascist and they are not is absurd.

Sounds a lot like “stakeholder capitalism”, lauded by the Clintons and Klaus Schuab alike.

But, but, we’re on the left. We are “progressive”. We don’t even know where to buy jackboots.

The fascists (and National Socialists - aka Nazis) thought they were progressives too it must always be remembered.

We will grant one important point in the “fascism” debate. If one was to cast an American fascist leader for a movie Trump would be a pretty good avatar. He looks the part, at least to the folks who still read The New Yorker. Plus as we said he is no libertarian, which means he will use the power of the state actively, probably. This of course troubles us. But will he use the state more than other presidents? Probably not. Is it at least possible that some parts of the government leviathan could be cut? It’s at least possible. Will accountability at the highest levels of government increase under a Trump presidency? Again, it’s at least possible.

Regardless, the “fascist” argument is not making much headway for the Dems it appears, and the fact that this is their play at this point probably bodes well for Trump.

But the race is very tight.