Painful the grounds for resentment, the easier it is for a Fascist leader to gain followers by dangling the prospect of renewal or by vowing to take back what has been stolen.
If an advertiser can use that information to home in on a consumer because of his or her individual interests, what’s to stop a Fascist government from doing the same?
For the DPRK and its military, the ouster of Saddam Hussein conveyed a powerful message: it’s not enough to pretend to have weapons of mass destruction. To be secure, a nation must build them, own them, and hide them.
Good guys don’t always win, especially when they are divided and less determined than their adversaries. The desire for liberty may be ingrained in every human breast, but so is the potential for complacency, confusion, and cowardice. And losing has a price.
Especially when we are afraid, angry, or confused, we may be tempted to give away bits of our freedom—or, less painfully, somebody else’s freedom—in the quest for direction and order.
The Fascist game plan: a single party, speaking with one voice, controlling every state institution, claiming to represent all people, and labeling the entire sham a triumph of the popular will.
When, at a party, a woman (half socialite, half journalist) told me how brave she thought I had been for not getting a facelift, I was tempted to comment on the courage she had shown in dealing with the results of hers.
