Europe’s new fascists
Although he didn’t vote for Golden Dawn, he sees it as “the only party that is actually doing things for the Greek people” — a cross between the welfare state and the Mafia. If he needed an escort to walk down the street or help paying for his cancer medicine, he’d call Golden Dawn. “They’re doing what the politicians should be doing,” he said. “There’s a hole, and they fill it.”
Authoritarian elements in the Greek government have a history of using far-right groups to outsource political violence against critics. Recent moves to rein in Golden Dawn came only after it grew too powerful to control and the state felt its own authority was challenged, explained Anastassia Tsoukala, a legal scholar. “They were bitten by their own snake,” she said. And Greece is not alone. Golden Dawn’s rise has parallels across Europe, and its significance should be of Continental concern.
IN September, I sat in a Budapest courthouse as four men with tattoos and shaved heads filed past in handcuffs. Called the Death Squad, the men were charged with six murders during a wave of attacks against the country’s Roma minority, including one in which the attackers tossed a Molotov cocktail at a house and then gunned down a father and his 5-year-old son as they tried to escape the flames.
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More concerned about America’s ongoing fascists and the mass of freeloading sheeple that continue to enable them…
Gingotts on November 18, 2012 at 6:30 PM
“Golden Dawn” sounds more like some Mystic/Gnostic cult than a political party.
Count to 10 on November 18, 2012 at 6:32 PM
That’s not far right.
darwin on November 18, 2012 at 6:34 PM
Courtesy of Big Government coming soon to a city near your.
rob verdi on November 18, 2012 at 6:34 PM
GRrrrr!!
OldEnglish on November 18, 2012 at 6:37 PM
I believe fascism is always a response to communism/socialism. The socialists in europe are always verbally attacking Jews and often physically, too. With the new war in the ME, you can expect more of it. But you will never see the MSM report on it.
Blake on November 18, 2012 at 6:38 PM
This can’t be right.
Beck talked about this when he was still at FNC, and NYT and the progs mocked him for it.
How could the progs be wrong? Ever?
budfox on November 18, 2012 at 6:38 PM
Far right? Hardly. They’re thugs more akin to Nazis and Commies – lefists in other words.
Anyway what’s new? The EU is the fascist organization Adolph himself would have designed.
CorporatePiggy on November 18, 2012 at 6:40 PM
The totalitarian, anti-nationalist EU is the very best friend groups like Golden Dawn have got. Golden Dawn wouldn’t have a chance if it weren’t for the power-grasping dictators in the EU driving people over the edge with their screwed up policies. The EU doesn’t give the tiniest little damn about Greeks and the Greek people know it.
Django on November 18, 2012 at 6:43 PM
Mussolini was always complaining about “liberals” so he must’ve been Far Right, right? But who did he classify as a liberal? Free-market capitalists!
Sometimes words don’t make sense.
JohnBrown on November 18, 2012 at 6:43 PM
Everything old is new again.
Ladysmith CulchaVulcha on November 18, 2012 at 6:44 PM
Sort of get the feeling these people aren’t reading Hayek and Friedman.
theperfecteconomist on November 18, 2012 at 6:46 PM
Europe’s new fascists, are also the most ancient fascists – islam.
Rebar on November 18, 2012 at 6:46 PM
So… uh… where is the New York Times to talk about the upsurge in rapes since these immigrants came to European cities? Where is the NYT to talk about the crime and ghettos that police are afraid to go in because of roving gangs of Muslims? Not to mention, where is the NYT to talk about the TERRORISM that these Muslims perpetrate on the world. It’s only “new Fascists” that worry the Times, is it?
Warner Todd Huston on November 18, 2012 at 6:47 PM
Hey, the Brownshirts were the biggest “boy’s club” around.
Blake on November 18, 2012 at 6:47 PM
How about an article from the NY Times on America’s new fascists, i.e. Obama-bots in the Democrat Party who want to force us all to accept socialist health care, who want to tell us what we can eat, drink and smoke, who want to regulate our business lives and steal all our money through confiscatory taxation.
ericdondero on November 18, 2012 at 6:52 PM
Welfare state and the Mafia?
Sounds like leftists and unions.
Mimzey on November 18, 2012 at 6:54 PM
European countries have pretty much allowed Muslim immigrant groups to form there own mini-nations within their borders. They pay little attention to national laws and the government allows this as long as they don’t mess, too much,with the natives. At least not with the rich natives who hold power anyway. Are they really surprised that the natives are now ignoring the laws too?
Rocks on November 18, 2012 at 6:59 PM
I defy the New York Times to properly define “right” and “left.”
steebo77 on November 18, 2012 at 7:00 PM
That just screams “right-wing.”
steebo77 on November 18, 2012 at 7:02 PM
Notice how politically motivated violence automatically becomes “far right”. It’s like the people that write these articles have never opened a history book.
Browncoatone on November 18, 2012 at 7:07 PM
Charles Johnson is now writing for the New York Slimes?
john1schn on November 18, 2012 at 7:10 PM
Guys, guys…the far-right comes from the nationalistic tendencies. That’s what you share with Golden Dawn – your insistence on a culturally pure nation.
ernesto on November 18, 2012 at 7:11 PM
Yep, like the jokers at the Southern Poverty Law Center classifying New Black Panthers as “right wing”.
slickwillie2001 on November 18, 2012 at 7:15 PM
Oh, let the NYT have its fun — they are a dying left-wing rag, you know.
Hopefully the NYT can draw a lesson from Greece on what happens when a country goes too far left, becomes insolvent, and imports hostile hordes of Third World immigrants to oppress and harass the natives.
Punchenko on November 18, 2012 at 7:17 PM
You confuse culture with heritage. Everyone who wants to live here should share American culture regardless of where they might have come from. No country can survive without it.
darwin on November 18, 2012 at 7:18 PM
Right-wingers’ fault:
davidk on November 18, 2012 at 7:35 PM
But American culture changes with every new wave – unless you’re of the stripe that is still bent out of shape over all that Catholic immigration from Ireland and Italy. When you insist that America must be culturally pure: that there can be no deviation from the mores of some aristocratic British invaders, you’re letting your “right-wing” native-ism fly, which is the same motive behind Golden Dawn’s antics.
ernesto on November 18, 2012 at 7:40 PM
The culture is being changed by immigrant waves allowed in against the will of the citizens of the country. As in Europe, mass immigration from 3rd world countries in perpetrated on host nations by elitists of all stripes for their own usually selfish goals.
And you’ve been here long enough to know full well that groups like Golden Dawn fit comfortably within the ideological spectrum of the Left and not the Right. Paying or cancer medicine? Sounds like welfare state liberalism to me.
Charlemagne on November 18, 2012 at 7:56 PM
Why is the Hot Air logo always over the Submit button these days?
Charlemagne on November 18, 2012 at 7:57 PM
@ernesto: The problem isn’t immigration per se, it’s the presence on our border of a large, dysfunctional country with a 175-year-old grudge against us and a consequent belief that it’s morally entitled to exploit our politics and even change the demographic balance to its own advantage. No other country in the world can be so characterized and no other country poses comparable challenges to American culture. No European elites fantasized that Ellis Island would be the beachhead in a political-cultural war to neutralize Yankee ascendancy, and no Yankees would ever have dreamed of ceding cultural ground in any such imagined conflict .
Seth Halpern on November 18, 2012 at 8:07 PM
Well that’s just the thing; they pull an inverse libertarianism. They take the economic policy of the left and the nationalism from the right, just as libertarians take the economic policy from the right and their decided anti-nationalism from the left.
ernesto on November 18, 2012 at 8:16 PM
Right wing?
http://xaameriki.wordpress.com/2012/10/30/golden-dawn-ideology-our-real-socialism/
We spit on the face of Right-wing traitors, spit their loyalty to the Zionist regime, spit their political respectability!
Who was actually the benefited of the massive invasion of foreign manpower in our country? It was undoubtedly the class of capitalists, especially great contractos of the state, those who set up a dance festival of wasting the money of the People, for the Olympic 2004 Games. We proclaimed then and shout even today with the full power of Our Soul: The Left seeks the role of the pimp in the labour movement so they can then push them in the claws of international capitalism.
Under the title “People’s money back to people,” we organized – and will continue to do that-food distributions to our compatriots who have real need. With the program “Work for Greeks” we try-and will continue to do so-to relieve our compatriots who are looking for work. With the establishment of a blood bank only for Greeks we finally pay another debt to our breed, giving the holiest of our goods to the Greek people. THIS IS OUR SOCIALISM!
This project is a case of a genuine social and Nationalist Movement, which is required to be the guarantor of the unity of our people.
And will soon come the day anticipated by the sky, the earth and the sea, the day awaited by the whole volk, a volk stricken by desperation and poverty but still proud, the day when in front of our leaders will stand millions of Nationalist Fighters, with faith stronger than Fire. And then there will be no power in the world to stand against our iron will for a social nationalist revolution!
Hail the leader! Hail the Movement! Hail Victory!
And…
anti-capitalist
The party has an environmentalist affiliate organization called Green Wing, whose blog features articles about recycling, organic farming, the blight of strip mall construction, and traditional ways of harvesting olives.
Green Wing has also promoted eugenics.
“In [the] secular state there is no social stratification based on income-economic classes. The popular classes are collaborating organic[ally], other groups of people with special abilities and production skills each. Just like in a living body. The different systems contribute harmoniously and in full cooperation for their survival.”
On one side, the free market is “only the vehicle [of] internationalist capital, banks and moneylenders.” Adam Smith’s “theory of the ‘invisible hand’” (the belief that free markets channel selfish behavior into social benefits) has been disproved, because on “one finger of the hand, [is a] shining gold ring with the star of David!”
sharrukin on November 18, 2012 at 8:19 PM
Yes, their economic platform is certainly left wing, but their nationalism is undoubtedly of the right. It is a prime motivator of fascists as well as other right wing movements, including contemporary American conservatism. Cultural purity is important to a right winger, whether they be extreme or moderate in this regard.
ernesto on November 18, 2012 at 8:22 PM
Correct.
International socialists (Marxism) are socialists.
National socialists (Fascism) are socialists.
Being nationalist isn’t right wing, or left wing.
Fascists are leftists.
Some are and some are not.
Tell that to the Democratic KKK.
Tell that to La Raza (The Race).
Tell that to Black liberation theology.
“Being in his quality as a [N-word redacted], a degree nearer to the rest of the animal kingdom than the rest of us, he is undoubtedly the most appropriate representative of that district.” – Friedrich Engels
Was Friedrich Engels co-author of The Communist Manifesto also a right-winger?
sharrukin on November 18, 2012 at 8:38 PM
Culture does not necessarily mean race.
OldEnglish on November 18, 2012 at 8:44 PM
True, Mussolini wasn’t racist, just a Fascist.
sharrukin on November 18, 2012 at 8:47 PM
the more extreme the left becomes, the more extreme the response. I just wish these right wing parties would be smarter than to use nazi-style symbols. It does them no good politically to go out of their way to invoke the nazis, since nazis are sort of unpopular in the west. What they need to do is fight communism with whatever populist tactics work, while making themselves look like the good guys. People are low-information voters. That has been proven over and over again. So take advantage of that. Don’t sabotage yourself.
keep the change on November 18, 2012 at 9:24 PM
You can use adblocker to get rid of that just like you do ads. Right-click, down at the bottom. Choose the bottom URL form of the HA logo.
slickwillie2001 on November 18, 2012 at 9:25 PM