Can a movement similar to fascism emerge in the US?

[Mr Khan]

Akvod said:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/opinion/sunday/24friedman.html?src=me&ref=general

Make Way for the Radical Center

By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

DID I mention that I’ve signed a pledge — just like those Republican congressmen who have signed written promises to different political enforcers not to raise taxes or permit same-sex marriage? My pledge is to never vote for anyone stupid enough to sign a pledge — thereby abdicating their governing responsibilities in a period of incredibly rapid change and financial stress. Sorry, I’ve signed it. Nothing more I can do.

If this kind of idiocy by elected officials sends you into a hair-pulling rage and leaves you wishing that we had more options today than our two-party system is putting forward — for instance, a party that would have offered a grand bargain on the deficit two years ago, not on the eve of a Treasury default — not only are you not alone, but help may be on the way.

Thanks to a quiet political start-up that is now ready to show its hand, a viable, centrist, third presidential ticket, elected by an Internet convention, is going to emerge in 2012. I know it sounds gimmicky — an Internet convention — but an impressive group of frustrated Democrats, Republicans and independents, called Americans Elect, is really serious, and they have thought out this process well. In a few days, Americans Elect will formally submit the 1.6 million signatures it has gathered to get on the presidential ballot in California as part of its unfolding national effort to get on the ballots of all 50 states for 2012.

The goal of Americans Elect is to take a presidential nominating process now monopolized by the Republican and Democratic parties, which are beholden to their special interests, and blow it wide open — guaranteeing that a credible third choice, nominated independently, will not only be on the ballot in every state but be able to take part in every presidential debate and challenge both parties from the middle with the best ideas on how deal with the debt, education and jobs.

“Our goal is to open up what has been an anticompetitive process to people in the middle who are unsatisfied with the choices of the two parties,” said Kahlil Byrd, the C.E.O. of Americans Elect, speaking from its swank offices, financed with some serious hedge-fund money, a stone’s throw from the White House.

As the group explains on its Web site, www.americanselect.org: “Americans Elect is the first-ever open nominating process. We’re using the Internet to give every single voter — Democrat, Republican or independent — the power to nominate a presidential ticket in 2012. The people will choose the issues. The people will choose the candidates. And in a secure, online convention next June, the people will make history by putting their choice on the ballot in every state.”

Here is how it will work, explains Elliot Ackerman, an Iraq war veteran with a Silver Star, who serves as the chief operating officer of Americans Elect, and whose father, Peter, a successful investor, has been a prime engine behind the group. First, anyone interested in becoming a delegate goes to the Americans Elect Web site and registers. As part of that process, you will be asked to fill in a questionnaire about your political priorities: education, foreign policy, the economy, etc. This enables Americans Elect to put you in contact with others who share your views so you can discuss them and organize together. Then you will be invited to draft a candidate or support one who has already been drafted and to contribute to the list of questions that anyone running on the Americans Elect platform will have to answer on the site.

“The questions, the priorities, the nominations and the rules will all come from the community, not from two entrenched parties,” said Ackerman.

Any presidential nominee must conform to all the Constitutional requirements, as well as be considered someone of similar stature to our previous presidents. That means no Lady Gaga allowed. Every candidate will have to post in words or video his or her answers to the platform questions produced by the Americans Elect delegates. In April 2012, the candidate pool will be reduced to six through three rounds of voting. The six, assuming they all want to run, will then have to name their running mates. The only rule is that a Democrat must run with a Republican or independent, and a Republican with a Democrat or independent.

“Each presidential candidate has to pick a running mate outside of their party and reaching across the divide of politics,” said Ackerman. In June 2012, the online convention will choose who among the six will run as the Americans Elect candidate — automatically on the ballot in all 50 states. If President Obama wants to run with John Boehner on the Americans Elect platform that would be fine — provided they go through the process. (President Obama should dump the Democrats and run as an independent, which he is, at heart, anyway.)

Write it down: Americans Elect. What Amazon.com did to books, what the blogosphere did to newspapers, what the iPod did to music, what drugstore.com did to pharmacies, Americans Elect plans to do to the two-party duopoly that has dominated American political life — remove the barriers to real competition, flatten the incumbents and let the people in. Watch out.

 

 

Also, for the people who've been replying to my thread. Please stay on topic. A lot of you've pretty much gone on to your wacky extreme shit, the exact stuff that I'm afraid would lead to a fascist movement.

 

And by fascist movement, I don't mean black shirts, anti-semetism, statism, etc.

 

I mean a centrist movement, reacting against an polarized political landscape, whose members have lost faith in the current government and democracy. I don't think the time is ready yet, but if unemployment continues to stay at its current level, it will happen.

In a way, I can see the Tea Party serving the same function as the strengthened socialist movement did in Europe. An radical political group (right this time, instead of left) making moderates and the middle class afraid. Combine that with the already existing fear of the imaginary American socialists, you have a middle class that feels like it's under siege by the left and right.

It's already happening in Europe. People are getting desperate and they are getting pissed at the current economic situation. I'm a Keynesian, that is, a believer that the government has to do something to end recessions as quick as possible, because I believe this is what can happen. Liberalism cannot surivive, if it seems like it's unable to provide, to deliver. Right now, the people feel like their governments, the free market, that everything has failed. And they're not just going to sit around.

 

 

Whether you're a libertarian, a social liberal, conservative (US definition), Republican, Democrat, etc. Whatever you believe the solution is to our economic situation, we all need to be afraid of this. Afraid of a centrist movement that reacts against everything we have right now.

 

Won't work. The emergence of a third party either leads to the quick death of the third party or the quick death of one of the other two, the system repolarizes, and the status quo is swiftly restored.