What is Fascism?

     While there is a concerted effort by some parties to use the term Fascist to negatively brand right-wingers, here is a brief summary drawn to some extent from a book called Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg which was interesting to me as it compared Marxism, Mussolini’s Italian Fascism, Nazism, with American liberalism/progressive thought as promoted in various ways by Teddy Roosevelt, Wilson, FDR, Kennedy, Johnson, the Clintons, Obama,, and even to some extent George Bush.  He argued that all of these political views had large similarities, and were generally left wing, socialist movements, except that the American versions were a lot milder and nicer.
    Some characteristics of these movements:
– Utopian, have a faith that the ideal society can be achieved.
– Very negative about currently existing circumstances and systems (blame “the system”, “the establishment”, “capitalists”, “the rich”, certain races, or other specific groups for society’s ills), and campaign for change.  (Right wingers can also have these attitudes, for example, the federal government "swamp" (Trump).
– Have a sort of elitist view of themselves as having the right answers to society’s problems/superior values, etc., entitling them to be in charge of the country.
– Belief that government, particularly federal, intervention of the right sort could bring about the ideal society (strongly in favor of planned economies, for example).
– Make the needs of individuals subservient to the common good (the state or government).
– Tend to put down religion as a threat to the common good and try to substitute in its place the elevation of the state as the object of some form of worship (may have their own “scriptures”, “saints”, icons, etc., require a sort of faith commitment), which might appear to be a sort of quasi or godless religion in its own right.
– Tend to promote/legislate eugenics (abortion is a manifestation), “good” health practices, racial preferences (the race may differ).  Most have been anti-Semitic.
– Distrust or ignore democratic institutions or constitutional constraints when they get in the way of desired outcomes.
– See immutable forces (evolutionary concepts applied to societies and government) at work that lead to (their definition of) societal progress.  Some examples: worker classes will inevitably rise up to throw of their capitalist masters (Marx), “the arc of history bends toward freedom” (Obama), when people have a choice they will inevitably choose a democratic government (Bush).