Walk Softly and Carry a Bag of Sticks
Once upon a time, the Communist atheist New York Times write an editorial in which it was warning that Fascism could arrive in America “silently, slowly, like fog creeping in on little cat feet.” I have not read the rest of the editorial, but I think that it end up with recommending that everyone put butter on their cats’ feet to prevent this from happening. Of course, it is all a silly idea, because Fascism is proud and violent and insolent and will tell you esactly what it is doing to you while it is doing it, much like the brave and dedicated torturers of the Inquisition.
Is wrong on so many levels, but especially the stance and the shoes!
Just think, for esample, how rubbish would have been the Spanish Civil War for Golf if El Generalísimo had not esecuted all those anarchists and Trostskyists, installed a militarized theocratic feudal dictatorship, and focused on attracting wealthy tourists by dispossessing the peasants of their land and building the finest golf courses the Iberian peninsula have ever seen. Imagine instead if he had said, “We are going to establish a fascist dictatorship centered around compulsory dress-wearing for ladies, vegetarianism, and being nice to animals. Also we might engage in a bit of genocide.” People would think he was mad! And rightly so. Because the nature of fascism is very clear cut and fundamental and easy to spot: Militarization of the populace, estreme and unashamed nationalism, highly centralized state control of all aspects of the economy and social life, and golf. If any political movement is lacking in one of these areas, it cannot properly be called fascism.
One man who understand this better than anyone is Venezuelan president Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías, who have recently hit on the brilliant strategy of closing down all the golf courses in his country. The so-called Independent newspaper in England is reporting that:
If they are closed, no fewer than nine courses will have been shut down since the campaign began in 2006, Julio Torres, head of the Venezuela Golf Federation, told The New York Times this week. Most of them, it so happens, are in oil-producing regions, and therefore linked with an industry once demonised by Mr Chavez for its links with the political opposition, and by extension with those “damned Yanquis”.
They say it as if Chávez have made this decision out of spite to annoy his political opponents. The fools! In fact, the real reason he have adopted this tactical hatred for the world’s most civilized sport is so that nobody can accuse him of being a fascist. Is brilliant!
Anyone who make the quick look at Chávez’s background and political practice-military strongman, populist politician who espouse a top-down nationalist socialism and make the efforts to strengthen the state and remove presidential term limits while establishing supervised inorganic local community decision making-would almost immediately assume that he is a typical Latin American demagogue with self-evident fascist tendencies. And yet NO! We now are knowing that he cannot be a fascist because he is persecuting the golfers. I laugh very much and loudly and longly while also taking my hat off to him. Much as I am believe that golf must play an integral part in the construction of any truly fascist society, even I am recognize that in this day and age the proud declaration of one’s fascist beliefs and aims can rapidly lose you friends and influence. Even Silvio Berlusconi tries to stay quiet about it.
My suspicion is that Chávez have made golf to be the sacrificial escapegoat that will enable him to continue to milk the sympathy cow of bed-wetting liberals, bein-pensant socialists, and closet masochist media types who fantasize about a jackboot crushing their heads so long as it is red and Chávez is wearing rubber and a buttplug at the same time. Such idiots are not caring anyway about the niceties of democracy and human rights. Most of their politics is based on envy and, therefore, a hatred of golf. Chávez have spotted that, and he is esploiting the red scum for everything he is worth. Well done, sir.
It is all a big shame, though, that he is not playing the golf, really. He is sound like just the sort of clubbable chap who you might want to have a round with and then take several large brandies at the 19th hole, chattling at the fireplace about bagging some grouse, holidaying in Marbella, and referring to one’s car as “the old girl.” Perhaps when he is overthrown by America we can bring him to Jandía to live with all the other deposed dictators.
I am have a large balloon waiting for you, Hugo!
For the most recent Manuel post, Take My Sex Test, please go to Coddle Pot. But be warned, it ain’t for the faint-hearted.
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