Fascism with Canadian Characteristics - Guest Post

Twitter Anon Buck McYoung returns with a great historical analysis to explain where we are at in 2024.

Friend and collaborator of this Substack and the Voice Of GO(r)D podcast, twitter Anon Buck McYoung, whom you may remember from his great essay on the Tort of Malicious Prosecution and how it applies to the Coutts Four trial, returns with another very deep dive.

This particular essay resonated very strongly with me as someone who views the traditional methods of categorizing politics utterly useless, nevermind trying to put names to what these cretins are doing to our societies right now. Buck takes us on a trip back to one of the OGs of fascism, Benito Mussolini, and then examines what’s happening in 2024, and accurately describes a new and dangerous fusion of the fascism of old with the corporatized left of the new.

It’s a very thorough read, and I hope you enjoy.

As always - questions, comments, suggestions, corrections and Hate Mail are welcomed and strongly encouraged - gordilocks@protonmail.com

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Fascism with Canadian Characteristics

I am choosing at this juncture to write this article for one simple reason; The irrational exuberance subsequent to the Trump-election makes clear that few are ready to hear this message presently. But fewer still will be willing to hear it after the next election, when the objects of our anger no longer inhabit the highest office in our land.

For it remains the norm that in our political discourse that partisan affiliations disengage critical thinking and intellectual honesty. This appreciation causes me to predict with confidence that few self-styled Canadian "freedom fighters" and "patriots" will speak truthfully about our nation's significant predicament once Poilievre is the Prime Minister.

So hear me now, Canada, before I may not be able to say such things, or you may not feel comfortable in digesting them;

We live in a fascist society.

Ours is not the still-born Fascism of Benito Mussolini's Italy, or that which we are encouraged to consider the sine qua non of fascist ideology, the Nazi Third-Reich of Hitler's Germany. Rather, modern fascism, or what I am calling 'post-national fascism', is the kind that most of the Western world abides. It is characterized by illiberal 'managed democracies' that implement policies which originate in global governance institutions. It comprises regimes that weaponize the apparatus of the State against their citizenry under the pretexts of 'protecting rights' and 'fortifying democracy'. It is totalitarian in its objectives, while paternalistic in its methods. It cultivates the conditions for its impositions through the most sophisticated, data-driven social engineering ever devised. It strives to control the mind, so that it may control the masses, who are then led to demand the infringement of their liberties. It constructs enemies for us to vanquish, and recruits us to make war against our own interests to that end.

There is already much to unpack, so let us begin.


Fascism you say?

“Everything within the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State.” - Benito Mussolini


The historically literate will be quick, and correct, to point out that early conceptions of fascist ideology locate authority within the nation state. They will also note that our modern Western societies are increasingly internationalist in nature. However, this is not incompatible with describing contemporary Canadian society as fascistic.

For just as there are 50 states that comprise the United States of America, and at one time 28, now 27 states that comprise the European Union, Canada too is a state within a state, albeit not officially, but in most salient regards. Few recognize this as the de facto reality of our country's existence, despite the steady relinquishment of the few shreds of national sovereignty we once expressed. Maybe its about to dawn on folks in light of Trump's recent trolling.

Calling Trudeau a Governor and Trump's 'jokes' about Canada being the 51st state are actually quite elevated expressions of trolling. This is because there is a significant degree of truth underlying these statements; they are a product of Trump's refreshing habit of saying the quiet part out loud. The literal inaccuracy of such characterization obscures its metaphorical truth.

After all, Canada isn't close to being a sovereign nation. It never has been. Its progenitor populations were, for the most part, either loyalist cucks, who fled or fought against America's independence, or they were the survivors of their conquered peoples. Canada surely has had its share of brave patriotic men, many of whom were scarified in droves in WWI under incompetent British Imperial command. With others still who earned esteem at great personal cost in WWII. Furthermore, many honorable and brave Canadians have acted numerously as human shields between groups intent on killing each other.

However, Canada never won its independence, although many have tried. Most know of the French and Indian battles with the Crown, the War of 1812, and the Riel Rebellion. However, the short-lived Republic of Canada is rarely discussed.

Declared by Toronto's first mayor William Lyon Mackenzie in 1838, this assertion of 'self rule', which predates the Union Act of 1840 that united Upper and Lower Canada, was quickly put down by the Crown. This event deserves a more prominent place in our national history and our contemporary political discourse, especially so, given the fact that 54% of Canadians currently say they'd prefer this style of government. Already, 36 of 56 of the Commonwealth nations have since become republics. As it stands though, Canada went from being colonized by Imperial France and Great Britain, to being a US vassal nation in the post-WWII era.

Canada never had self governance and was merely granted 'Responsible Government' as a Dominion of the Realm. Authority was originally exercised through the Governor and Lieutenant Generals, as proxies for the personified hereditary Crown, His or Her Majesty. But that same authority is now vested in a selected monarch, and his shadowy court which is the Privy Council.

I contend that the leader of the government of Canada is selected, because next to nobody votes for the Prime Minister of Canada. Arguably, one quarter of one percent of the population has a ballot with the potential Prime Minister's name on it. But, technically the Prime Minister is appointed by the Governor General, informed by their assessment of who can hold the Confidence of the House of Commons, our only elected officials.

The Prime Minister, none of the Ministers, nor any member of the Privy Council needs be elected. Such is the fundamentally undemocratic nature of the Canadian political system. At its base its consists of Prime Ministers appointing Governor Generals, appointing Prime Ministers. The best the plebs get is to elect people that may or may not recall the government once in a while. But those folks have pension reasons not to do so, as our current predicament attests.

The Prime Minister's position has authority, control, and direct influence on all appendages of the State, a situation unparalleled among the modern western nations.

If the PM doesn't like a court decision striking down legislation, there's a notwithstanding clause for that.

🤜Doesn't like prosecutorial discretion? Fire the Minister of Justice.

🤜Don't like central banking policy? Fire the Governor.

🤜Top general won't jab the troops or run ideological struggle sessions? Replace him.

🤜Have an unruly caucus? Whip them.

🤜Can't form a government on your own? Supply and Confidence Agreement.

🤜Getting bad press? Buy the media's compliance with taxpayer dollars.

🤜Populist protests camping in the streets? Suspend civil liberties and violently repress it.

🤜Get admonished by the courts? Ignore or appeal their findings until moot or any hope of political accountability is lost.

At this point it should be abundantly clear that Canada's governing authority is extremely centralized. While I don't care to discuss it at length, it should be obvious to any Canadian that this concentrated federal authority also has tremendous reach into what we previously considered, provincial jurisdiction, private society, and our especially our private economic lives.

It should suffice to remind you:

🚨 The Government decided what could be said in public (online) and what had to be censored, including scientific facts inconvenient to government policy.

🚨The Government prevented church gatherings, the conduct of business, and even regulated the number of people you could have inside your home.

🚨The Government limited the times and reasons for which you could leave your home, and where you could travel to.

🚨The Government directed the seizure of bank accounts, without even the slightest pretense of legal justification to do so.

🚨The Government committed mass assault, conducting medical experimentation, utilizing coercion, and without informed consent.

🚨The Government committed mass assault, utilizing paramilitary forces to violently repress a constitutionally-protected protest to the above mentioned mass assault, fabricating a bogus National Security pretext, and suspending civil liberties without lawful authority.

It has become fatally apparent that current constitutional protections cannot gird against recently demonstrated authoritarianism in Canada. Everyday we learn more about the serial abuse of office, naked financial corruption, fraud, cronyism, and rampant political interference that may even constitute the offense of treason were the rule of law equally enforced.

But that will never come to pass. None of our institutions seem to want to acknowledge these issues even exist. Instead, they actively conceal from the public the scope and scale of the corruption. With no effective check on power, and no demonstrated democratic legitimacy exhibited in the electoral process, its clear that our system is explicitly, and historically, authoritarian in nature.

I will now address what type of authoritarianism it is.


Communist Canada?


It has become quite a trope to say that West is being subject to a Communist takeover.

Yuri Bezmenov tells us of how the Soviet's planned to take a long march through the institutions and conquer America without firing a shot. So too does Alex Jones shout his warnings about the threat of the "Chi-Coms" and their UN army.

I agree with those who suggest we (the West) have just experienced a Cultural Marxist campaign to destroy classically liberal and conservative sources of identity and political norms. But I would proffer that there is no communist regime in waiting to take over once the tenants of Western society has been destroyed. Rather, the goal is to prevent popular sovereignty from interfering with oligarchic control over the business of empire.

Those who fund the institutions which have waged the culture war on traditional Western values are avowed and successful American capitalist oligarchs. They preach and propagate a leftist collectivist worldview as both an adaptive camouflage of their true intent, and the pre-text for the expansion of State power on which they rely. Between flights to climate conferences on their private jets they are gobbling up the world's assets under their private ownership or corporate management, whether those assets be prime farmland or residential housing. They use State funds and State regulation to facilitate their private ventures while socializing the risks inherent in their investments. They leverage powers the State to protect the markets in which they participate from 'excess' competition.

🌎The largest donor to the World Economic Forum is Larry Fink's Blackrock, who was added to the WEF Board of Trustees in 2019.

🌎The largest 3 donors to the WHO in 2020-2021, were Moderna's USA, BioNTech's Germany, and convicted monopolist and vaccine privateer Bill Gates.

🌎The largest funder of progressive political causes is George Soros's Open Societies Foundation.

Globalist policies are indeed collectivist, but they are most certainly not communistic. Far from abolishing class from society as any self-respecting communist would seek to do, the tenants of Stakeholder Capitalism advocate for a power sharing agreement between elites; the 'elected' governments, private industry, formal civil society (which they happen to fund), and the supposed comity of nations (AKA the US-led 'Rules-based International Order"). They advocate a Global Private-Public-Partnership if you will, a global oligarchy.

These so-called "whole of society" approaches to global governance pay lip service to democratic institutions, but they also explicitly advocate for the destruction of markets, meritocracy, national identity, and popular sovereignty. 'We the People', as Yuval Noah Harari puts it, are just "useless eaters" to manage in their technocratic speed run. How could anyone mistake this for Communism? Only by conflating collectivism with communism, and forgetting that fascism is collectivist too.

A Visualization


For those familiar with the “Horseshoe Theory" of political ideology, it can sometimes be helpful to abstract the conventional political left/right spectrum as a line curved downward at the ends to form a horseshoe shape. That vertical axis introduced represents the spectrum of Authority and Liberty, or said otherwise 'collectivist' versus 'individualist' thinking.

When you go all the way to the left, in this political analogy, you end up with the State owning everything, achieved through a high degree of State control. Conversely, when you go all the way to the right, Corporations own everything, a situation also achieved through a high degree of State control.

"You'll own nothing and be happy" is what both the Communists and Fascists will tell you. The excesses of Stalin and Hitler look horrifically similar, and so too are their means.

The Post-National Fascist State


The regimes of both Stalin and Hitler have engrained in our collective consciousness a certain conception of the features of their respective ideologies. The Hitlerian world view is archetypally ultra nationalistic and xenophobic. Conversely, the Stalinist world view is fundamentally internationalist and universal. On this simplistic basis, one might conclude globalist coordination is communist in its political orientation. It certainly claims to be leftist and socially progressive, and it is obviously paternalistically authoritarian. It supports high profile leftist causes in the culture war.

Its fair to say our present moment is characterized by pathological tolerance and obsessive inclusivity. The DEI agenda is clearly a State implemented initiative...

...However, it is also globally coordinated. So too is the trans agenda, climate change agenda, the biosecurity state agenda, the internet censorship agenda, and the global migration agenda. That's not even to mention the obvious global coordination of finance through the Bank of International Settlements, and coordination of foreign policy through the Military Alliance (NATO) that backs it. What was Ghaddafi's greatest sin? Not keeping a slave haram, or running torture prisons, for the US was not bothered with that. It was his plans for a gold backed Dinar that made him the victim of 'spreading democracy'.

How is it that every nation in the West is experiencing the exact same simultaneous policy agendas?

Simple - its globally coordinated through those same oligarchs:

(link to Buck’s thread - https://x.com/buckmcyoung/status/1865116794907660678)

The post-national fascist state also paints its political opponents, those being populist democratic nationalists, as far-right extremists. It claims them tantamount to fascists themselves, for opposing the globalist policies such as mass migration, or for advancing policies such as voter ID. This is a tell; a form of confession through projection. For it is the globalists who are the undemocratic forces, with authoritarian tendencies, serving oligarchic interests.


The Purchase of America


In the 1920s and 30s, fascism arose as a consequence of the State subordinating private interests, in service of the national interest. It is my contention that post-national fascism is a result of private interests, which have captured the apparatus of the State, and utilize it for their own self-interests. The way in which the merger occurs matters not, for both paths end in the same destination, and both are compatible with Mussolini's articulation.

The Supreme Court of the United States put the American Congress up for auction with Citizens' United in 2010. This landmark decision equated campaign finance contributions with speech, invalidating campaign finance laws under the 1st Amendment. Given prior SCOTUS precedent, which held corporations as "persons" under the Constitution, this opened the door to unlimited corporate finance of the US political system with predictable results.

Soon after, Obama signed a law suspending Habeus Corpus in 2011 allowing for indefinite detention of American citizen, without charge or trial. This was followed by the Smith–Mundt Modernization Act of 2012, which allowed for State produced propaganda to be directed at the American people. These were the twin tactics military planners perfected abroad during the 'War on Terror's' counter-insurgency campaigns to pacify restive populations; the soft power tactics of psychological operations on civilian populations to control their domestic politics, and the hard power of renditions for opponents of occupied regimes. These are among the hallmarks of totalitarian regimes, and their introduction signaled a radical shift in US politics few saw coming.

Although we have yet to see the use of indefinite detention of American citizens at large, we have seen, during the Trump-era, the prolific use of other means of lawfare; From dragnet spying on the Trump campaign, the abuse of congressional committees and impeachment powers under false premises, and the weaponization of the FBI and Justice Department in malicious prosecutions, entrapment, and political interference operations.

These documented conspiracies show that the National Security apparatus was weaponized against a political opponent before, during, and after his time in office. It not unreasonable to consider the denial of appropriate Secret Service details for both men running against Joe Biden, as potential State complicity in the attempted assassination on one of them. Let us not forget the State role in the successful attempt that kill the other candidate's uncle back in '63.

The fraudulent derailment of Trump's first term, the so-called 'fortifying of the election' in 2020, and the PsyOp that was the Biden administration, were merely a taste of what the US State Department and CIA have been serving to most of the world for decades. What is new, however, is that these totalitarian imperial methods and practices are being deployed at home. It surely has been a wake-up call for the common American voter. Sadly, that same electorate remains ignorant to how the Empire exports this very same brand of post-national fascism abroad.


The Characteristics of a Post-National Fascist State


Some would argue that it is insufficient that merely the merger of State and Corporate power exists to attract the label of fascism. They may say the presence of stark authoritarianism must also be present, as an essential element of what can be described as fascistic. I think that is a fair requirement, and I will make the case there too. Zbigniew Brzezinski and Carl Friedrich in their influential 1956 volume, “Totalitarian Dictatorship and Autocracy” describe totalitarianism as an extreme form of authoritarianism possessing six characteristics:

▶️an all-encompassing ideology,

▶️a single party,

▶️a terroristic police,

▶️a communications monopoly,

▶️a weapons monopoly

▶️and a centrally directed economy.

To address recent events in light of these six criteria, allow me to remind the reader that there is presently a coordinated effort to pass hate-speech and censorship laws across the NATO countries:

And the Harris Campaign questioned the fundamental precept of the 1st amendment:

As previously noted, the characterization of non-regime political factions as 'racist', 'sexist', 'bigoted', and even 'fascist', is a clear attempt to shift the Overton Window and exclude certain beliefs from public discourse.

Conversely, the pathological inclusivity of the DEI agenda has been pushed not just through State institutions, which it has, but somehow too through civil society, private employers, academia, professional associations, and even the churches. The same 'whole of society' approach is observed with the insane Covid policies, the Climate Change agenda, the Internet Censorship agenda, among other globalist policy initiatives.

The next of Brzezinski's and Friedrich's criteria, the existence of a political uni-party, was cultivated in the common American's consciousness chiefly by strategist Steve Bannon in 2015. He shrewdly positioned Trumpism as a rejection of the Uni-party dynamic. This facilitated Trump's takeover of the Republican party, and his trouncing of the GOP establishment rivals that contested the leadership.

But the uni-party dynamic pre-dates the Obama and Bush Eras. It was evident when the Democratic Party, under Bill Clinton, abandoned main street America, to take on the interests of corporate America and the Military Industrial Complex. Ralph Nadar prominently decried the Uni-party in his 2000 campaign for President under the Green Party banner. And it was none other than Ronald Reagan, who when he lost the 1975 Republican primary and pressed to seek a third party nomination, remarked for the need to have two parties first. Note: He won that convention.

Trump certainly represents a significant challenge to the Uni-party in America. The intensity by which the Uni-party, the Deep-State, the Blob, the Cathedral, or whatever your choose to call it, has attacked Trump, is strong evidence this criterion is met.

The third criterion is a terroristic police. As a citizen of Canada, I have only a theoretical appreciation of how it feels to live under America law enforcement, an awareness which is no doubt influenced through pop culture exports like "Cops". But as a Canadian, I can also observe that the federal US law enforcement professionals have adopted the kind of unconstitutional practices pioneered in Canada. These so-called "Mr. Big Operations", a mainstay of Canada's gendarmerie the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, are dubbed "the Canadian technique". They consist of entrapment operations utilizing methods previously considered unconstitutional by the SCOTUS.

We have watched as no less than a dozen confidential informants and undercover agents were used in the construction of the 'terrorism' case purported conceived against Governor Gretchen Witmer. So too, it is now acknowledged that more than 50 (by some assessments hundreds), of federal agents were undercover and acting as agitators in the January 6th drama, which was loudly proclaimed to be an "act of insurrection".

What is appears from the outside, is that it is the federal government which is organizing terrorist and insurrectionist plots, under the pretenses of combatting extremism, but done so for political purposes. It appears they are cultivating terrorism and extremism to smear their populist political challengers, and substantiate government narratives which advocate for more State power and control.

Canada too has Law Enforcement and Intelligence Community operations promoting xenophobic, militant, accelerationist narratives, used to advance creeping authoritarianism. After introducing the Ideologically Motivated Violent Extremism framework for domestic terrorism in 2018, a maple-flavored Proud Boys appeared, called Diagolon, who's founder was launched on the podcast of Proud Boy founder Gavin McInnis.

McInnis, I'll remind you, is also the cofounder of Vice, an 'indie' media outlet who got its start with Canadian government funding, and went on to be a Soros-backed Mockingbird carve-out for the CIA. Gavin left in 2008 to became an internet edge lord hate provocateur and his next venture became notoriously infiltrated by Feds. The presence of the Proud Boys on Capitol Hill, now a designated domestic terrorist organization both north and south of the border, provided substance to the false narrative of Jan 6th. In due time, we have come to understand that Jan 6th was an explicit plot to prevent Donald Trump from becoming President for a second term.

Similarly, the Canadian "hate" Op, Diagolon, was used to declare the Canadian Trucker Convoy a threat to the State, and a pretext for the use of extraordinary powers. It ultimately resulted in the unlawful imposition of martial law in February 2022, the freezing of bank accounts, and the violent repression of protestors.

While the determination as to whether the US has a terroristic police is up to the reader to decide, and reasonable minds will disagree. However, there are many more examples we haven't the time to dissect that would also elucidate the point.

The fourth criteria for an authoritarian state is a monopoly on communication. Many are aware of the infiltration of the establishment media by agents of the state, such as the CIA's Project Mockingbird. But even that program never constituted a monopoly on communication.

However, the advent of the Disinformation Governance Board, and the infiltration of Legal Departments and Trust and Safety teams across all the major tech platforms, was a potent combination. It resulted in instances whereby true but disfavored information was effectively removed from Social Media, search results, and consequently the public discourse. Examples include the Hunter Biden laptop story, peer-reviewed scientific research on Covid, and personal stories of vaccine injury among other things.

A perfect communications monopoly its likely an impossible ambition of every totalitarian state. But what we just witnessed, as has been detailed in places like the Twitter Files, and court cases like Missouri v Biden, should suffice for even the highest threshold for this criterion.

The fifth criterion of a Totalitarian State is a weapons monopoly. While most American's take pride in your Second Amendment, your President does not.

Canada's leadership continues to outlaw more and more classes of firearms. With a recent total ban on the sale and transfer of handguns, and a fresh confiscation ordered for even small caliber firearms like a semi-automatic .22s, our government imposes these weapons restrictions through the Canadian equivalent of Executive Orders. It does this while our legislature is currently deadlocked to avoid a non-confidence vote; one which would undoubtably end this deeply unpopular administration.

Americans are wise to double down on their commitments to the Constitutional principles embodied by the First and Second Amendments. These are the final bulwarks against full blown totalitarianism at home.

The final criteria of a totalitarian state is that of a centrally coordinated economy. The abandonment of the Gold Standard by Nixon in 1971, and the Implementation of Basel 1, 2, and 3, has provided central banks with powerful tools to control the global economy. The recent fiscal dominance of the US economy, brought about by massive federal spending, on top of massive Federal Reserve interventions, accelerated sharply during the 2008 crisis. Two decades of artificial effective zero-interest rate policies culminated in the MMT money-bomb that was the Covid monetary policy. This loose fiscal and monetary policy, directed spending from the US Federal government into the CARES Act, the Inflation Reduction Act, the Ukraine Appropriations Bills, and the CHIPS Act. Each of which represent an escalation of central planning over the American economy. This builds onto of the tremendous centrally planned portion of the economy which is the MIC, and is in addition to the state planning which occurs through the regulatory state.


Conclusion


Most readers who haven't made it this far no doubt bristled at the allegation that the United States of America is a fascist empire. It may come as some understandable surprise to them, given that they are just starting to experience domestically what their leaders have been propagating abroad for years. But those same folks will largely agree with the assessment that Canada has become a post-national fascist state.

If I have failed to persuade the reader that the USA is presently fascistic in its nature, even as its politicians and agencies undoubtably serve their corporate donors, then I have failed to make the case that it is starkly authoritarian in its nature. But the work of American philosopher Sheldon Wolin offers a revision of Totalitarianism that may save my assessment.

Wolin's concept of "Inverted Totalitarianism" suggests that a Totalitarian State doesn't necessarily arise by revolution and the overthrow of an established order, but rather can arise through a slow corrosion by corporate interest from within.

Its government isn't characterized by highly structured idealized modes of governance, but rather by its fitness is its ability to manage democratic processes for desired outcomes.

Wolin suggests these regimes don't ban speech, just limit its reach.

By this lower threshold, it should be less contentious to label the US a post national fascist state. I admit this label fit less well within the political borders of the USA, and am optimistic Trump is at least domestically a rejection of this ideology. However, it is abundantly clear that the so called 'liberal democracies' of the West, are presently anything but.

Romania just nullified its Presidential elections because the NATO skeptic, Euro skeptic candidate got 2/3rds of the vote attributed to a covert TikTok campaign. France's Macron denied Marine La Pen the presidency through some clever electioneering on the second ballot. And Trudeau continues to governs with zero legitimacy and next to no public support. Rishi Sunak called early election after a visit from Obama, and then proceeded to throw the election to Kier Starmer by running on conscription for Ukraine. Starmer's public approval 3 months on the job is negative 36%.

In the wake of the fall of the Soviet Union, The United States of America had become unopposed on the world stage. George H W Bush declare the dawn of a 'New World Order'. The Project for a New American Century declared the 21st Century the American Century, and went about plans to shape the world in ways that benefit certain quintessentially American corporate interests. It planned to do so through "full spectrum dominance", and embraced the doctrine of 5th Generation Warfare, expanding the battlefield and blurring the rules of engagement.

This is what those military planners and the Oligarchy has built for us; the illusion of democracy, a controlled global economy, and enough war and manufactured crisis to keep attention from the root of the corruption.


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Thanks again for reading; if you happen to have a Twitter account, go give Buck a follow.

https://x.com/buckmcyoung