The Promise of American Life (long)

As luck would have it, I was browsing around in the local used book store recently and stumbled across a copy of Herbert Croly's The Promise of American Life (1909). I have plenty of other reading projects on my plate, so I didn't dive into it right away. However, when I had a moment or two, I thought I would give Cowen's approach of reading books in reverse order a try. No good - Croly's prose reads like Emerson's, only without the wit and charm. One bald assertion after another with seemingly no particular goal in mind. Not to mention that it seems so dated.

Still, I was left wondering why the was book so influential, so I started jumping around more randomly. Lo, and behold! -- Was there really a chapter entitled, "Nationality and Democracy: National Origins"? Indeed, there is, so I finally hunkered down to try to grasp the gist of his thoughts on the subject. From there, I came across another, earlier passage in which he defines the "democratic purpose". So what follows is my attempt to distill the man's program based on a few disjointed readings from the book ...

Croly asserts that "The salutary and formative democratic purpose consists in using the democratic organization for the joint benefit of individual distinction and social improvement." By this, he means that the organization must both support individual freedom and resolve the social question equally. Noting that these appear to be contradictory and mutually exclusive, he then goes on to press the third element of the French revolutionary slogan ("Liberty! Equality! Fraternity!") into service; the liberty and equality are presented as subordinates to the third principle, brotherhood. But what is the source of this brotherhood?[1]

Croly's subsequent argument is that nationalism and democracy are distinct yet crucial elements which must be used to advance efficiency. More to the efficiency in a moment, but national identity is the bridge by which socialism and democracy are brought together without sacrificing individuality (in fact, that is the title of this part of the book: "The bridge between democracy and nationality"):

The majority of good Americans will doubtless consider that the [policy of democracy] already indicated is flagrantly socialistic both in its methods and its objects and if any critic likes to fasten the stigma of socialism upon the foregoing conception of democracy, I am not concerned with dodging the odium of the word. The proposed definition of democracy is socialistic if it is socialistic to consider democracy inseparable from a candid, patient, and courageous attempt to advance the social problem towards a satisfactory solution. It is also socialistic in case socialism cannot be divorced from the use wherever necessary of the political organization in all its forms to realize the proposed democratic purpose. On the other hand there are some doctrines frequently associated with socialism to which the proposed conception of democracy is wholly inimical and it should be characterize not so much socialistic as unscrupulously and loyally nationalistic.

In a nutshell, he is arguing that in order to realize his vision of democracy, which has less to do with majority rule and much to do with defining and obtaining "the common good", we must appeal to and have recourse to that bond between people which is national in character. From here he goes on to something I found astonishing, and astonishingly familiar:

A democracy dedicated to individual and social betterment is necessarily individualist as well as socialist. It has little interest in the mere multiplication of average individuals except in so far as such multiplication is necessary to economic and political efficiency; but it has the deepest interest in the development a higher quality of individual self expression. There are two indispensable economic conditions of qualitative individual self expression. One is the preservation of the institution of private property in some form, and the other is the radical transformation of its existing nature and influence. A democracy certainly cannot fulfill its mission without the eventual assumption by the state of many functions now performed by individuals and without becoming expressly responsible for an improved distribution of wealth; but if any attempt is made to accomplish these results by violent means, it will most assuredly prove to be a failure. An improvement in the distribution of wealth or in economic efficiency which cannot be accomplished by purchase on the part of the state or by a legitimate use of the power of taxation, must be left to the action of time assisted of course by such arrangements as are immediately practical. But the amount of actual good to the individual and society which can be effected at any one time [emphasis in original] by an alteration in the distribution of wealth is extremely small; and the same statement is true of any proposed state action in the interest of the democratic purpose. Consequently while responsible state action is an essential condition of any steady approach to the democratic consummation, such action will be wholly vain unless accompanied by a larger measure of spontaneous individual amelioration [emphasis added]. In fact one of the strongest arguments on behalf of a higher and larger conception of state responsibilities in a democracy is that the candid, courageous, patient, and intelligent attempt to redeem those responsibilities provides one of the highest types of individuality -- viz. the public spirited man and a task which be enormously stimulating and edifying.

Yes, we are going to have socialism, but a socialism that preserves private property ... for now. This means of course that we are going to control the use of private property by controlling the way people think. And why not? Changing the way they think and feel will be exhilarating as they learn new modes of "individual expression". Perhaps we can forgive Croly of his naivete, since in 1909 he could not have known how this would have come out in practice as it did in the Cultural Revolution or any of the other attempts to purge people of their unfortunate bourgeois individualism.[2]

But the worst problem with socialism, according to Croly, is its unfortunate internationalism:

The great weakness of the most popular form of socialism consists however in its mixture of a revolutionary purpose with an international scope. It seeks the abolition of national distinctions by revolutionary revolts of the wage earner against the capitalist; and in so far as it proposes to undermine the principle of national cohesion and to substitute for it an international organization of a single class, it is headed absolutely in the wrong direction. Revolutions may at times be necessary and on the whole helpful, but not in case there is any other practicable method of removing grave obstacles to human amelioration; and in any event their tendency is socially disintegrating. The destruction or the weakening of nationalities for the ostensible benefit of an international socialism would in truth gravely imperil the bond upon which actual human association is based. The peoples who have inherited any share in Christian civilization are effectively united chiefly by national habits traditions and purposes, and perhaps the most effective way of bringing about an irretrievable division of purpose among them would be the adoption by the class of wage earners of the programme of international socialism. It is not much to say that no permanent good can under existing conditions come to the individual and society except through the preservation and the development of the existing system of nationalized states.

Now, this is the kind of thing that makes someone say that Croly and the acknowledged fascists share some of the same sentiments. The response to this is typically, "Yes, but he didn't share any of their other sentiments, so you are wrong to identify Croly as a fascist, and therefore you are wrong to in any way associate him with fascism." In the first place, saying that he shares some ideas with fascists and saying that he is a fascist are two different things, so claiming that I am wrong in asserting the former by proving that I would be wrong in asserting that latter is a non sequitur combined with a strawman. Secondly, I am curious as to how Croly, Hitler, and Mussolini could have all arrived at the same conclusion on this topic: is there a common influence for all three? And why aren't self-identified Progressives curious about this? And how influential was Croly's thinking on this topic? For example, it is well-known that Teddy Roosevelt based his New Nationalism on his interpretation of this book, but how much did Brandeis and, subsequently, FDR get out of it?

There are more areas in which the ideas of Croly and the actual fascists arrive at similar places. For one thing, there is his rejection of individualism and his association of that with the Manchester school. There is also his admiration for non-democratic means of arriving at his preferred state of efficiency. The chapter on nationality and democracy (VIII) is broken into segments that provide an overview of the relationship between the two; the effect on history and development on the national character; nationality and democracy in England,France, and Germany; and militarism. His synopsis of the English experience is:

The monarchy was reconstituted as the symbol of the national integrity and as the crown of the social system. The hereditary aristocracy, which was kept in touch with the commoners because its younger sons were not noble and which was national, if not liberal, in spirit, became the real rulers of England; but its rule was supplemented by an effective though limited measure of general representation. This organization was perfected in the nineteenth century. Little by little the area of popular representation was enlarged, until it included almost the whole adult male population; and the government became more and more effectively controlled by national public opinion. As a result of this slowly gathering but comprehensive plan of national organization, the English have become more completely united in spirit and purpose than are the people of any other country. The crown and the aristocracy recognize the limitations of their positions and their inherited responsibilities to the gentry and the people. The commoners on their side are proud of their lords and of the monarchy and grant them full confidence. It is a unique instance of mutual loyalty and well-distributed responsibility among social classes, differing widely in station, occupations, and wealth; and it is founded upon habit of joint consultation, coupled as the result of the long persistence of this habit, with an unusual similarity of intellectual and moral outlook.

The result, until recently, was an exceptional degree of national efficiency; and in scrutinizing this national efficiency the fact must be faced that the political success of Great Britain has apparently been due, not merely to her adoption of the practice of national representation, but to her abhorrence of any more subversive democratic ideas. On the one hand, the British have organized a political system which is probably more sensitively and completely responsive to a nationalized public opinion than is the political system of the American democracy. On the other hand, this same nationalized political organization is aristocratic to the core -- aristocratic without scruple or qualification. What is the effect of this aristocratic organization upon the efficiency and fertility of the English political system? Has it contributed in the past? Does it still contribute? And if so how?

Is the disdain for democracy shocking at all? To his credit, despite his admiration for the aristocracy, Croly seems to recognize that a problem subsequently arose because of them: although the aristocracy began bargaining with the new middle class of industrialists, they also moved to protect their privileges and in so doing froze the system in an organizational form that was appropriate to an era when their particular interest -- land -- was the most important productive asset. He continues:

This bargain appeared to work very well for a while; but indications are accumulating that a let-alone economic policy [EH: laissez-faire] has not preserved the vitality of the British economic system. The English farmer has lost ambition and has been sacrificed to the industrial growth of the nation while the industrial growth itself no longer shows its former power of expansion. The nation passed the responsibility for its economic welfare on to the individual and the individual with all his energy and initiative seems unable to hold his own against better organized competition. Its competitors have profited by the very qualities which Great Britain renounced when she accepted the anti-national liberalism of the Manchester school. They have shown under widely different conditions the power of nationalizing their economic organization; and in spite of the commission of many errors, particularly in this country, a system of national economy appears to make for a higher level of economic vitality than a system of international economy. "At the present time," says Mr 0. Elzbacher in his "Modern Germany," "when other nations are no longer divided against themselves, but have become homogeneous unified nations in fact and nations in organization, and when the most progressive nations have become gigantic institutions for self-improvement and gigantic business concerns on cooperative principles, the spasmodic individual efforts of patriotic and energetic Englishmen and their unorganized individual action prove less efficient for the good of their country than they were formerly." The political leaders of England abandoned that is all leadership in economic affairs and allowed a merely individualistic liberalism complete control of the fiscal and economic policy of the country.

The problem as Croly sees it is that the English foolishly allowed individuals to try to compete with strong, foreign competition. That competition was cooperative and bound to win. In other words, since individuals cannot compete with state capitalists, Croly believed that the United States should embrace state capitalism. We also get a little taste of a recurring theme: that Croly's idea of hell is that we would leave anything to the chaos and chance of a free market.

In this passage, and in many others, we see Croly using "efficient" and "efficiency" without defining them. In some contexts, he seems to mean that the institutions are strong (an efficient nation), while in others he seems to mean that they are the least-cost producers. This is something that requires further study, as efficiency appears frequently throughout the text as one of the goals of his system.[3]

Croly then proceeds on to France.

Even the most loyal friend of France can however hardly claim that the French democracy is even yet thoroughly nationalized. It has done something to obtain national cohesion at home and to advance the national interest abroad, but evidences of the traditional dissociation between French democracy and French national efficiency and consistency are still plainly visible. Both the domestic and the foreign policies of the Republic have of late years been weakened by the persistence of a factious and anti-national spirit among radical French democrats.

The most dangerous symptom of this anti-national democracy is that an apparently increasing number of educated Frenchmen are rebelling against the burdens imposed upon the Republic by its perilous international position. They are tending to seek security and relief not by strengthening the national bond and by loyalty to the fabric of their national life, but by personal disloyalty and national dissolution. The most extreme of democratic socialists do not hesitate to advocate armed rebellion against military service [emphasis added] in the interest of international peace. They would fight their fellow countrymen in order to promote a union with foreigners. How far views of this kind have come to prevail, an outsider cannot very well judge; but they are said to be popular among the school teachers, and to have impaired the discipline of the army itself.

Here we see a consistency between his support for nationalism and his distrust of international socialism that betrays what would usually be called a bedrock characteristic of socialism: Croly is no peacenik. He thinks France needs a military draft and condemns those opposed to it. And he goes on to further emphasize his distaste for individualism in a way that forewarns of the coming totalitarian nature of planned economies. Where everyone is expected to do their share to advance the national, ... uh, ... efficiency, then shirking and laziness and failure to bring forth children to advance the interests of the nation is not just a matter of personal choice, but evidence of immorality, a threat to order, and possibly a sign of subversiveness. After lamenting France's lack of raw materials and the unfortunate inability to establish autarky, Croly has a surprising take on how France's unique character is a problem of too much individualism:

At first sight it looks as if France was something like a genuine economic democracy, and ought to escape the evils which threaten other countries from an economic organization, in which concentrated capital plays a more important part.

But the situation is not without another and less favorable aspect. France, in becoming a country of small and extremely thrifty property owners, has also become a country of partial economic parasites with very little personal initiative and energy. Individual freedom has been sacrificed to economic and social equality; and this economic and social equality has not made for national cohesion. The bourgeois, the mechanic, and the farmer, in so far as they have accumulated property, are exhibiting an extremely calculating individualism, of which the most dangerous symptom is the decline in the birth rate [emphasis added]. Frenchmen are becoming more than ever disinclined to take the risks and assume the expense of having more than one or two children. The recent outbreak of anti-militarism is probably merely another illustration of the increasing desire of the French bourgeois for personal security, and the opportunity for personal enjoyment. To a foreigner it looks as if the grave political and social risks, which the French nation has taken since 1789, had gradually cultivated in individual Frenchmen an excessive personal prudence, which adds to the store of national wealth, but which no more conduces to economic, social, and political efficiency, than would the incarceration of a fine army in a fortress conduce to military success. A nation or an individual who wishes to accomplish great things must be ready, in Nietsche's phrase, "to lived angerously" -- to take those risks, without which no really great achievement is possible; and if Frenchmen persist in erecting the virtue of thrift and the demand for safety into the predominant national characteristic, they are merely beginning a process of national corruption and dissolution.

Wow, strong language. So if the British and the French fail to achieve the necessary balance of nationalism and democracy (Croly's definition, not the standard one), who does? It should be no surprise at this point that the section on Germany is almost entirely devoted to a fawning review of the career of Otto von Bismarck, the German Junker who forged Germany on the Prussian model with blood and iron.

German nationality as an efficient political and economic force has been wrought by skillful and patriotic management out of materials afforded by military and political opportunities and latent national ties and traditions. During the eighteenth century the Prussian monarchy came to understand that the road to effective political power in Germany was by way of a military efficiency, disproportionate to the resources and population of the Kingdom. In this way it was able to take advantage of almost every important crisis to increase its dominion and its prestige. Neither was Prussian national efficiency built up merely by a well-devised and practicable policy of military aggression. The Prussian monarchy had the good sense to accept the advice of domestic reformers during its period of adversity, and so contributed to the economic liberation and the educational training of its subjects. Thus the modern German nation has been at bottom the work of admirable leadership on the part of officially responsible leaders; and among those leaders the man who planned most effectively and accomplished the results was Otto von Bismarck.

After explaining how Bismarck saw that the path to German unification led to war between his native Prussia and Austria and then France, and that in turn led to some compromises with the democrats whom he hated, Croly writes about Bismarck's return to the task of actually forging the nation:

It remained now to organize and develop the new national state; and the government, under Bismarck's lead, made itself responsible for the task of organization and development, just as it had made itself responsible for the task of unification. According to the theories of democratic individualistic "liberalism," such an effort could only result in failure, because from the liberal point of view the one way to develop a modern industrial nation was simply to allow the individual every possible liberty. But Bismarck's whole scheme of national industrial organization looked in a very different direction. He believed that the nation itself, as represented by its official leaders, should actively assist in preparing an adequate national domestic policy, and in organizing the machinery for its efficient execution. He saw clearly that the logic and the purpose of the national type of political organization was entirely different from that of a so called free democracy as explained in the philosophy of the German liberals of 1848, the Manchester school in England, or our own Jeffersonian Democrats; and he successfully transformed his theory of responsible administrative activity into a comprehensive national policy. The army was, if anything, increased in strength so that it might remain fully adequate either for national defense or as an engine of German international purposes. A beginning was made toward the creation of a navy. A moderate but explicit protectionist policy was adopted, aimed not at the special development either of rural or manufacturing industries, but at the all-round development of Germany as an independent national economic unit. In Prussia itself the railways were bought by the government so that they should be managed not in the interest of the shareholders, but in that of the national economic system. The government encouraged the spread of better farming methods, which have resulted in the gradual increase in the yield per acre of every important agricultural staple. The educational system of the country was made of direct assistance to industry, because it turned out skilled scientific experts, who used their knowledge to promote industrial efficiency. In every direction German activity was organized and was placed under skilled professional leadership, while at the same time each of these special lines of work was subordinated to its particular place in a comprehensive scheme of national economy. This "paternalism" has moreover accomplished its purpose. German industrial expansion surpasses in some respects that of the United States, and has left every European nation far behind. Germany alone among the modern European nations is, in spite of the temporary embarrassment of Imperial finance, carrying the cost of modern military preparation easily, and looks forward confidently to greater successes in the future. She is at the present time a very striking example of what can be accomplished for the popular welfare by a fearless acceptance on the part of the official leaders of economic as well as political responsibility, and by the and intelligent use of all available means to that end. [emphasis added]

How can you not recognize so much of what shows up 16 years later in Mein Kampf? There is the nationalism; the leadership principle (Fuhrerprinzip); the skepticism of democracy, individualism, internationalism, and Manchesterism. In other places in the book, we find that the highest ambition for all men would be to use their talents to efficiently advance the national cause. There is the admiration for war as a means to promote the national spirit.

What, really? Do I exaggerate? The next section of the chapter is called "Militarism and Nationality", and consists in equal parts of a claim that colonization is good for the colonized (in Asia and Africa), good for the colonizer, and not in any way at all contrary to Croly's brand of democracy.

The nations of Europe are to all appearances as belligerent as were the former European dynastic states. Europe has become a vast camp, and its governments are spending probably a larger proportion of the resources of their countries for military and naval purposes than did those of the eighteenth century. How can these warlike preparations, in which all the European nations share, and the warlike spirit which they have occasionally displayed, be reconciled with the existence of any constructive relationship between the national and the democratic ideas?

The question can best be answered by briefly reviewing the claims already advanced on behalf of the national principle. I have asserted from the start that the national principle was wholly different in origin and somewhat different in meaning from the principle of democracy. What has been claimed for nationality is not that it can be identified with democracy, but that as a political principle it remained unsatisfied without an infusion of democracy. But the extent to which this infusion can go and the forms which it takes are determined by a logic and a necessity very different from that of an absolute democratic theory. National politics have from the start aimed primarily at efficiency -- that is, at the successful use of the force resident in the state to accomplish the purposes desired by the Sovereign authority [emphasis added - here is the definition of efficiency!]. Among the group of states inhabited by Christian peoples it has gradually been discovered that the efficient use of force is contingent in a number of respects upon its responsible use; and that its responsible use means a limited policy of external aggrandizement and a partial distribution of political power and responsibilities. A national polity, however, always remains an organization based upon force. In internal affairs it depends at bottom for its success not merely upon public opinion, but, if necessary, upon the strong arm. It is a matter of government and coercion as well as a matter of influence and persuasion. So in its external relations its standing and success have depended, and still depend, upon the efficient use of force just in so far as force is demanded by its own situation and the attitudes of its neighbors and rivals. The democrats who disparage efficient national organization are at bottom merely seeking to exorcise the power of physical force in human affairs by the use of pious incantations and heavenly words. That they will never do. The Christian warrior must accompany the evangelist; and Christians are not by any means angels. It is none the less true that the modern nations control the expenditure of more force in a more responsible manner than have any preceding political organizations; and it is none the less true that a further development of the national principle will mean in the end the attachment of still stricter responsibilities to the use of force both in the internal and external policies of modern nations.

War may be and has been a useful and justifiable engine national policy.

You see the emphasis on force as the organizing principle? That is not something of which the Progressive normally admits. War is not only good for building Christian nations, it is good for colonizing non-Christian ones:

Inimical as the national principle is to the carrying out either of a visionary or a predatory foreign policy in Europe, it does not imply any similar hostility to a certain measure of colonial expansion. In this as in many other important respects the constructive national democrat must necessarily differ from the old school of democratic "liberals". A nationalized democracy is not based on abstract individual rights no matter whether the individual live in Colorado, Paris, or Calcutta. Its consistency is chiefly a matter of actual historical association in the midst of a general Christian community of nations. A people that lack the power of basing their political association on an accumulated national tradition and purpose is not capable either of nationality or democracy, and that is the condition of the of Asiatic and African peoples.

No doubt modern Progressives can overlook this "era appropriate" view of the Asians and Africans to be conquered. But can they overlook the way in which Croly is intentionally trying to redefine liberal? Much ink has been spilled, chiefly by those of us who wish to reclaim the mantle of liberalism, about the change in the definition from one of "someone who defends liberty" to "someone who defends statism", and much defense has been made by the statists that they are the true heirs of Hume, Voltaire, Montesquieu, and Mill, but here we catch Croly with his finger on the scale.

He is using one interesting phrase - "national democrat" - to denote himself, while placing quotation marks around "liberals" to call their claims into question. What if he were instead to have used the phrase "national socialist"? By his own admission it would have meant the same thing, given his own definition.

Why are liberals "old school"? Why are we to question their liberalism? The answer, in this context, is that they oppose colonization because they don't understand nationalism and its relationship to democracy. And why shouldn't we oppose colonization? Here Croly has a curious answer:

The truth is that colonial expansion by modern national states is to be regarded, not as a cause of war, but as a safety-valve against war. It affords an arena in which the restless and adventurous members of a national body can have their fling without dangerous consequences, while at the same time it satisfies the desire of a people for some evidence of and opportunity for national expansion.

Got that? Colonial expansion is fun and brings us together, just like television would do in the 1950s and 60s.

No, I don't get the same impression from reading Croly that I do from reading Hitler or Mussolini. Hitler was animated by hatred, Mussolini by power, but Croly seems to have been animated by something else. But still, there is an element in each that recognizes the social question as the excuse for the implementation of a variety of other dubious programs. The Croly revolution would definitely be a top-down rather than grassroots-up movement. As it distrusted international socialism, individualism, Manchesterism, democratic liberalism, it had the appearance of being an anti-intellectual revolution, too. When you combine this with his worship of efficiency, which he defines as the successful use of force by a centrally planned state -- and notably, not by the people governed -- you can't help but think that what he most wants and needs is an action-oriented leader rather than an intellectual like William Jennings Bryan or Woodrow Wilson. Perhaps we were lucky that the Depression did not hit while TR was in office?

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[1] Note Bastiat's formulation of the problem: "Mr. de Lamartine once wrote to me thusly: 'Your doctrine is only the half of my program. You have stopped at liberty; I go on to fraternity.' I answered him: 'The second half of your program will destroy the first.'"

[2] Again, Bastiat comes to mind:

Socialists look upon people as raw material to be formed into social combinations...

In the same manner, an inventor makes a model before he constructs the full-sized machine; the chemist wastes some chemicals -- the farmer wastes some seeds and land -- to try out an idea.

But what a difference there is between the gardener and his trees, between the inventor and his machine, between the chemist and his elements, between the farmer and his seeds! And in all sincerity, the socialist thinks that there is the same difference between him and mankind!

It is no wonder that the writers of the nineteenth century look upon society as an artificial creation of the legislator's genius. This idea -- the fruit of classical education -- has taken possession of all the intellectuals and famous writers of our country. To these intellectuals and writers, the relationship between persons and the legislator appears to be the same as the relationship between the clay and the potter.

...

Oh, sublime writers! Please remember sometimes that this clay, this sand, and this manure which you so arbitrarily dispose of, are men! They are your equals! They are intelligent and free human beings like yourselves! As you have, they too have received from God the faculty to observe, to plan ahead, to think, and to judge for themselves!

[3] It probably appeared self-evident to him, as efficiency quickly became the goal of his allies (including Brandeis) in the Efficiency and Technocracy movements that sprang up shortly after the publication of Promise.

National vs. Social

As if you haven't noticed, I've been giving lots of attention to the Jonah Goldberg thingy. It happens to be an interest of mine.

One of his comments on the interview with Glenn and Helen Reynolds was something like "Nationalizing and socializing mean exactly the same thing: When we talk of socializing health care, we mean nationalizing, and when someone talks of nationalizing the oil industry, they mean socializing it."

Well, yes and no. Goldberg is right when he says the two are the same, but they shouldn't be and they weren't always.

This gets down to what Marx said and meant in theory, and how his theories have been taken up in practice. Marx saw the final stage, the one succeeding capitalism, as being a thoroughly democratic society in which institutions like private property would give way to community property. Thus, factories would be socialized, the opposite of privatized. However, he also saw that the state, the mechanism by which the capital-owning class controls the workers, would also whither away. Thus, socialized industry or socialized health care meant something completely different to him than what we mean by that today.

Today, socialization of an industry means ownership becoming controlled by the state, i.e. nationalization. Marx's successors have adopted his vision for everything except the state and have substituted the state for the community. And in this regard, we find that the state-loving left is the more nationalistic.[1]

Nationalism is frequently conflated with extreme patriotism or jingoism. When using the term to describe a characteristic of fascism, that's a red herring. A fascist's nationalism is not primarily about which state is better, it is about the proper scope of the state. Mussolini's prescription was, "All within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state." And so it is when people speak of those things which are "too important to be left to the market," such as education, energy, health care, transportation, and so on. For each new field of endeavor into which the state enters, the state becomes that much stronger and more important (and the realization of Marx' state-free vision that much farther off). And as I have written in other contexts, no matter which party favors and clamors for the increase in state authority, the other is happy to exploit it for their own ends when they are in power. That is one reason it is a one-way ratchet. At some point, the scope of the state's authority will enter into every realm of personal life: that is what they meant by "totalitarian". For Mussolini, it was an explicit goal, enthusiastically sought; for today's neocons and takes-a-villagers, it is a "necessary evolution," driven by their concerns for physical and economic security, "market failure"[2], and the misfortune of "living in a second best world."

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[1] Yes, they are quick to blame America for the world's ills, but note how easily the left will forgive and forget their own when committing the same atrocities. The Blame America First tactic is merely cover for a Blame Republicans First strategy. World War I and II? Democrats. Viet Nam? Democrats. Only president to use a nuclear weapon? Democrat. President in power for both the first World Trade Center bombing and the initial planning for the second WTC bombing and thus responsible for America's poor image in the world? Democrat.

[2] Check it out: Quasibill catches the neocons explaining -- in terms of market failure -- why the state must pay for the economic security of Big Air under the guise of paying for the physical security of the passengers.