Bestiaries of fascism

Time to bear witness

The bitterness of the defeated South tended to express itself in the study of history.

—Robert O. Paxton

I feel I got in early on the sort of palliative care highlighted in the above epigram.

The history of the Weimar Republic—leading into the overthrow of German democracy—rhymes so well with the unfolding disaster of Trumpism that it is impossible to ignore. (Those who don’t remember history are doomed to repeat it, and all that.) Nonetheless, over the last few years, I have had some sympathy with commentators who have claimed that using the word fascist wasn’t appropriate or was at least risky: not because it wasn’t true, but because of its limited purchase as a line of attack.

Comparison is "a way of thinking more than a method," and it works better when we try to account for differences than when we try to amass vague resemblances."

Historian Robert O. Paxton says in this fascinating profile, “the word was used with such abandon — ‘everyone you don’t like is a fascist,’ he said — tha…