Saturday, August 16, 2008

The Republicans are mainstreaming their worst extremists

It's almost fumy that a Democrat who claims the conservatives are racist, nativist fascist and Imperialist right wingers will be ignored as a radical left wing extremists, while the much worse totally dishonest right wing extremists are given total access to the Republican publicity machine and their Fascism is ignored by the mainstream media. Consider the new book by Jerome Corsi and the support it is getting by mainstream Republicans.

From Digby
the most telling thing about it is that one of the most mainstream Republican figures in the country -- so mainstream that she regularly appears with her Democratic operative husband on Meet the Press with their two daughters at Christmas time --- is giving her imprimatur to a book written by a known delusional, right wing racist. On that side of the dial the separation between the mainstream and the violent fringe isn't even one degree.

Dave Neiwert has, as you all undoubtedly know, written reams about how the right mainstreams its extremists. And this is one case where I think it's come fully to fruition, right out in the open. Corsi is not just a right wing ideologue. He's a full fledged nutcase, and yet he was hired by a major publisher, by a star GOP villager, to write an incendiary book of lies about the Democratic presidential candidate. They aren't even trying to keep their fingerprints off this thing.

In fact, the default position among Democrats, Republicans and the media is that the only kooks in the country with whom it is unacceptable to be professionally or financially involved with are on the left. And "the left" is defined so broadly that it includes groups like MoveOn and Vote Vets. The right, in contrast, has fully integrated even their extremist fringe into the mainstream and everyone accepts it.
This is the basic position of the mainstream media. The Right is beyond question, the Left is extremist.

My bet is that this is a residual effect of the Cold War in which Communism was the great threat to the West. But Communism is dead. It's over. And it has been replaced in Russia by Fascism. It has also been replaced in America by a form of authoritarian Fascism. That's really been the core of the Cheney/Bush administration. They want a nondemocratic form of Presidential authoritarianism, much like that which Vladimer Putin has put into place in Russia.

The ability of Jerome Corsi to get on to Larry King is a clear example of the dominance of this right-wing fascism. His publicity is the equivalent of letting Hitler onto a radio show to promote Mein Kampf.

The scary part is that the media either don't see that they are supporting Fascism, or worse, they see it and want to support it. My bet is the latter. It reduces their economic uncertainty.

Jerome Corsi is a complete Fascist and a liar to boot. And no one calls him on his lies, while the Republican party promotes him.

Is there any honest Media still in existence? If there is, it's sure not on the Sunday morning TV shows. They'll "report" Corsi's book as a legitimate view of Obama without pointing out that it is based on lies.

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