There has been a fair amount of chatter here as to the meaning of words and much misuse of them by the wingnuts, let us start with some basic accepted definitions.
Fascism
A governmental system led by a dictator having complete power, forcibly suppressing opposition and criticism, regimenting all industry, commerce, etc., and emphasizing an aggressive nationalism and often racism.
Corporatism
The organization of a society into industrial and professional corporations serving as organs of political representation and exercising control over persons and activities within their jurisdiction.
Benito Mussolini tried to implement this type of government; but it centered more around the dictator himself than the corporations themselves.
We have recently seen a pretty good example of a new type of corporatism:
An interesting article
When your Swiss banker throws you overboard, you know you've made some very powerful enemies.
Long famed for hiding money for everyone from Nazis and drug lords to spies and dictators, the Swiss government's banking arm has decided that WikiLeaks and Julian Assange are just too hot even for it to handle.
And so the PostFinance, which runs the country's banks, declared in early December that it had "ended its business relationship with WikiLeaks founder Julian Paul Assange" after accusing Mr. Assange of - gasp! - providing false information about his place of residence.
This move followed similar moves by credit card companies MasterCard and Visa, as well as PayPal and Amazon.com, to no longer process WikiLeaks payments and, in Amazon.com's case, to cease hosting its data.
Neo-Corporatism
Today, corporatism or neo-corporatism is used in reference to tendencies in politics for legislators and administrations to be influenced or dominated by the interests of business enterprises (limited liability corporations). The influence by other types of corporations, such as those representing organized labor, is relatively minor. In this view, government decisions are seen as being influenced strongly by which sorts of policies will lead to greater profits for favored companies.
An example of this is Citizens United v Federal Election Commission
In a 5-4 decision, the U. S. Supreme Court ruled thatcorporations and unions have the same political speech rights as individuals under the First Amendment. It found no compelling government interest for prohibiting corporations and unions from using their general treasury funds to make election-related independent expenditures. Thus, it struck down a federal law banning this practice and also overruled two of its prior decisions. Additionally, in an 8-1 decision, the Court ruled that the disclaimer and disclosure requirements associated with electioneering communications are constitutional.
We do have another couple of interesting definitions to deal with:
Plutocracy
- Government by the wealthy.
- A country or state governed by the wealthy people.
- Wealthy ruling class.
Capitalism
An economic system in which investment in and ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth is made and maintained chiefly by private individuals or corporations, esp. as contrasted to cooperatively or state-owned means of wealth.
Now in a perfect system wealth would be distributed evenly hence everyone would have ownership of the society as we all know this is far form being the case.
The Top 1%
a] Have 33.8% of the wealth
b] Own 50.9% of stocks and bonds
The bottom 50%
a] Have 2.5% of the wealth
b] Own less than 0.5% of the stocks and bonds.
We have not seen this level of inequality since before the Great Depression.
We have recently
1] Bailed out the financial sector with tax payer money.
2] Given tax cuts to those we bailed out.
I don't suppose I am the only one that thinks something is amiss?
So let us see how far down our capitalist system has profited the population as a whole.
The top 10%
1] Have 70% of the wealth
2] Own 90% of the stocks and bonds
Not very far down as one can see?
This is the group that the Republicans held the unemployed hostage for, and funnily enough many Democrats in DC were happy to go along with the show.
This is the default Status Quo position.
Democracy
A government by the people; a form of government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised directly by them or by their elected agents under a free electoral system.
Republic
A form of government in which the people or their elected representatives possess the supreme power
Something appears to be awry with respect to our classic definitions and the events of the last few decades.
Our media is controlled by a few corporations and is an exceptional propaganda tool:
The U.S. media landscape is dominated by massive corporations that, through a history of mergers and acquisitions, have concentrated their control over what we see, hear and read. In many cases, these giant companies are vertically integrated, controlling everything from initial production to final distribution. Here is information about the largest U.S. media firms.
We all have the right to petition government by:
Lobbying
The act of attempting to influence business and government leaders to create legislation or conduct an activity that will help a particular organization. People who do lobbying are called lobbyists. See also lobby.
However we must all admit that this system is heavily weighted by those with the money to influence and hire ex-government officials.
The 20 trade associations and companies that spent the most on lobbying increased their spending by more than 20% in 2009 to $507.7 million, up from $418.2 million a year earlier, according to a USA TODAY analysis of reports compiled by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics.
The top 20 include oil giant ConocoPhillips, which announced nearly 1,300 layoffs in January 2009, and drugmaker Pfizer, which shed 4,200 jobs since completing its merger with drug company Wyeth last fall.
Trade associations, such a nice way of stating corporate special interests don't you think? Will your private citizen rights be heard?
Just remember how the single payer lobby wasn't even invited to the table.
We will get the scraps; if we are lucky.
Austerity
This will be the next tool used to ever widen the gap between rich and poor, removing services and social protections in the name of the "greater good". The long term effect of these programs will be to further concentrate the nations wealth.
Just where the hell our democracy is heading who alone knows, but all the signs are not good.
I would say some form of:
NeoFeudalism
This is often used as a pejorative term aimed by one political group at another, I would argue at this time it is a bipartisan policy.
a] The concentration of wealth into a few hands via Tax cuts and bail outs
b] The concentration of power into vested interests via the courts in citizens united and corporate lobbying power.
Whatever you want to call it, it is not democracy as I understand the term.
Inverse Robin Hoodism, stealing from the poor to give to the rich is about as close as I can come.