Charles Dodgson also piles on Krugman, which surprises me. He makes the same mistake Sully does (despite v.'s good point) of interpreting Krugman as saying that Ashcroft=David Duke and /or Le Pen.
In a way he makes his point for me. Which was Krugman comparing him to, Duke, or Le Pen, or who? Neither. He just said that our far right has a lot of power in our government, while their far right currently doesn't. We have "angry people" on the left, too, but they don't have any power here.
On the other hand, as much as I don't agree that Krugman was trying to make this particular comparison, I will. I think that Tom Delay and John Ashcroft are as far into scary fascist loony right land, or even moreso, than Le Pen. DeLay has essentially admitted he's a flat-out Christian Reconstructionist. Is that not scarier than Le Pen? Can anyone seriously argue that Ashcroft is "to the Left" of Le Pen either?
We judge Le Pen based on European press coverage of him. Trust me, given a dose of DeLay and Ashcroft, their headlines would read "Fascist" too.
Is there anyone out there who can make a case that Ashcroft/De Lay are qualitatively different then LePen. I argue they're worse. Prove me wrong, please.
just to re-state...DeLay is a CHRISTIAN RECONSTRUCTIONIST. I'll take LePen, thank you.
