Some claim Bush’s politics approach fascism; it’s not, says George Monbiot, it’s Puritanism.
Religion of the Rich
“The enrichment of the elite and impoverishment of the lower classes requires a justifying ideology if it is to be sustained. In the United States this ideology has to be a religious one. Bush’s government is forced back to the doctrines of Puritanism as an historical necessity. If we are to understand what it’s up to, we must look not to the 1930s, but to the 1630s.”
At one point, Monbiot writes that “Fascism recruited the elite, but it did not come from the elite. It relied on hysterical popular excitement: something which no one could accuse George Bush of provoking.” I find that dubious. The “Godly man” cult coupled with the apocalyptical end-times rhetoric among many Bush supporters seems to me to border on hysteria. N0netheless, Monbiot makes much sense, and has annotated the post with footnotes.