"And slime they have for mortar." - Genesis 11.3

Since Jan. 20, 1981, when Ronald Reagan delivered his first inaugural address, there has been a steady drum-beat demonizing anything and everything our government does.

Even the suggestion that our government do anything is labeled a socialist or a communist plot. Such labels are used as pejorative epithets and are intended to kill any proposal that might be beneficial to the citizenry or the nation.The same epithets are used to silence anyone who makes such proposals. Those using such labels have conjoined Stalinism and socialism as though they are the same thing. Reagan's vile statement that "Government is not the solution to our problems. Government is the problem" constituted one of the nastiest slurs on our nation's founders ever stated.

Except for our oldest citizens in America today, Nazi fascism is but an abstract phrase - not a reality. It's something you read about in history books. Stalinism or communism existed as a potent force from 1945 until 20 years ago and is fresh in people's minds.In 1945, people put fascism out of their minds and focused their fears and hatred on communism. This atmosphere provided perfect cover for a radical right wing to grow in strength, out of sight and mind of most people.

Is there a crypto-fascist fifth-column in the United States today? Very definitely, and many of their members have moved into positions of real power in our country.This fifth-column is well aware of the need for a powerful devil they can point to as an enemy. A fearsome devil is more important to this fifth-column than any god could ever be. These are people who use every single ethnic, racial, religious, social or economic prejudice as a "wedge issue" to divide the American people from each other. That devil may be anywhere; perhaps he or she lives next door to you.

This induced paranoia is just what the right wing desires. Such paranoia allows the implantation of irrational fears and hatred. "Divide and conquer" is their mantra.Hysteria is not a rational state of mind. People who can be brought to a heightened state of sustained anxiety and fear will believe the most outrageous of lies. As Hitler said, "The great masses of the people will more easily fall victim to a big lie than to a small one."

The man or the party that drifts too far to the right is in danger of crossing a Rubicon into a region of mental, emotional, social, economic and political constructs that our nation, the United States of America, fought World War II in Europe to defeat.It always worries this writer when I hear Washington politicians proselytizing on behalf of the "market" and unregulated monopolistic capitalism. What I hear are distant echoes from fascist Germany and Italy in 1933.

When Karl Rove spoke of creating permanent right-wing rule in America, he was not describing democracy, but its opposite. When Bush declared himself to be the "decider" and a proponent of a "Unitary Executive," he was referring to dictatorship. Think about that, and read the following statement by former Vice President Henry A. Wallace:"The really dangerous American Fascist ... is the man who wants to do in the United States, in an American way, what Hitler did in Germany in a Prussian way. The American Fascist would prefer not to use violence. His method is to poison the channels of public information.

"With a Fascist, the problem is never how best to present the truth to the public, but how best to use the news to deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power. They claim to be super-patriots, but they would destroy every liberty guaranteed by the Constitution. They demand free enterprise, but are the spokesmen for monopoly and vested interest."Their final objective, toward which all their deceit is directed, is to capture political power so that, using the power of the state and the power of the market simultaneously, they may keep the common man in eternal subjection."

When the political system of a democracy becomes a commodity in the capitalistic marketplace, the transition to an authoritarian technocratic fascist state becomes a tragic sequel.

J. Albert Rowe is a Coeur d'Alene resident. He can be reached at rowejim1@verizon.net.