Peter R. Breggin, M.D.
Lately there’s been debate about President Obama’s underlying political ideology. Is he a Communist, Fascist or something else? Obama rose to power like a typical Marxist by organizing the urban poor. His original support was probably strongest among unemployed recipients of government handouts, and those elitists and intellectuals who claim to advocate for them. Typical of Marxists, he also continues to express both Ameriphobia and fervent internationalism.
So Obama’s sympathies and origins are Marxist, but so far he’s mostly redistributing wealth to big corporations. So he’s clearly not behaving like a conventional Marxist.
It may help to consider the similarities and the differences between a Communist and a Fascist. Let me start with the similarities. Both Marxists and Fascists are Statists who favor big government. Both begin with powerful, charismatic leaders who want to run all-powerful central governments.
As another similarity, both Marxists and Fascists want to destroy the middle class: the owners of small businesses, middle management, professionals, and skilled technicians and workers. Middle class folks are independent and responsible. They resent the burden of government regulations and taxes. They want the freedom to work hard to improve their own lives and the lives of their children. At least in America, those who see themselves as middle class usually don’t believe in big government and the welfare state.
In short, both Marxists and Fascists want charismatic leaders to take over the government and to strengthen its power; and in order to accomplish these ends, both Marxists and Fascists try to suppress a vigorous middle class.
Where the Marxists and the Fascists differ is in their publicly declared constituencies or power bases. Fascists tend to locate their power in the wealthy classes, especially in the leaders of large companies and industries. Their goal is to manage the existing economic structure from the top down. This is the surprising and shocking direction that Obama has taken since becoming president.
Obama built his original power base from a Marxist, internationalist viewpoint. But those who claim to advocate for the poor are now safely in his political corner. They helped get him into power and they have no alternative leaders—none whatsoever. From now on, Obama can turn his attention elsewhere—exactly as he has done.
Immediately after his election, Obama began to focus on taking control over the political establishment and especially corporate America. He made corporate America his new constituency and doled out billions to it. Even when some companies did not want the money, he forced it on them. In that way, Obama seized control of the economic engine from the top down, and made the CEOs and their Boards afraid of him and dependent upon him.
So is Obama going to turn out to be a Marxist or a Fascist—or something else? It all depends on what Obama has to do to maintain power. His long-term goal is that of all Statists—to use the government to gain as much power and as much control over the nation’s citizenry as possible.
We often talk of entitlements in regard to government handouts. There’s another kind of entitlement that is key to understanding Obama. Obama is not driven by ideology as much as by his self-righteous sense of personal entitlement to run the country. Like so many Statists, he is less a Fascist or a Marxist than a power-seeking opportunist. Like most people who feel entitled to bend and break the rules to their own advantage, opportunism is Obama’s ideology.
When we examine Obama’s pronouncements about the need for national health care, we find a shifting series of justifications: insuring the uninsured, then saving money, then undermining the greedy insurance companies, then the even more greedy and dangerous doctors, and now a morality of caring. Beneath this political pragmatism lies something much more ominous. Obama wants to build a permanent healthcare bureaucracy as the cutting edge of socialism. Once national healthcare is set in the political stone of bureaucracy, America will be transformed forever. Our great bastion of freedom will begin to crumble beneath the burden.
Meanwhile, the hope for America remains with the middle class—with those hardworking, responsible people who want a chance to earn a decent living and to take care of their families and community. Starting with the middle class, Americans must vote Obama and his supporters out of office before it’s too late.
