[Potemkin]

Peculiar yes. Impossible now yes. But tomorrow may tell a different tale. After all, recent conditions are quite different from those that fostered democracy.

Almost anything is possible in the future. However, the future is constrained by the past and by the present. The problem for both fascism and Communism in America is that, due to the fact that the founding of the American nation was a liberal moment, liberal ideology has become identified with patriotism. You cannot be a good American without espousing liberal values. As soon as you reject liberal values or even question them, you immediately lose your credentials as a patriot. This is in contrast to, say, Britain, the other great bastion of liberalism. Here, there was no popular revolution which established liberalism in a nationally defining moment. Instead, liberalism was imposed from the top down and is an ideology which is identified almost solely with the hereditary ruling class, and which is hostile to the interests and values of the masses. Liberalism has strong, deep roots in American society, and cannot really be dislodged now. However, it has only shallow roots in British society and it is easy to imagine it being uprooted and cast aside at some time in the near future.

[starman2003]

The problem for both fascism and Communism in America is that, due to the fact that the founding of the American nation was a liberal moment, liberal ideology has become identified with patriotism. You cannot be a good American without espousing liberal values. As soon as you reject liberal values or even question them, you immediately lose your credentials as a patriot.

Caesar was a popular figure and naturally considered patriotic even though he openly flouted a republican/anti-despotic tradition going back about twice as far as US democracy up til now. (He was killed but the assassins were hardly speaking for most Romans.) Basically all it'll take are crises which are directly linked to the weaknesses of democracy, to get enough people to see the light, and they sure seem to be coming. Even now some academics have openly raised doubts about democracy. I'm confident its failings will become unbearable someday--perhaps in just a decade or a few.