‘Populists’ and the ‘Tools’ of Totalitarians
‘Populists’ and the ‘Tools’ of Totalitarians The only hope of defeating neo-fascism in Europe is if those the authorities and journaliars call ‘fascists’ can find their courage and speak of what is really going on. John Waters Back in the late summer of 2014 I spoke at the closing-down party of a business near the town of Pesaro, on Italy’s northern Adriatic coast. It was a heartbreaking occasion. The event was held in the open air, on the premises of a family business that was closing as a result of the ‘recession’. The business was a garden centre, a longtime family concern which had been driven to the wall in the wake of the economic collapse of 2008 and its continuing fallout. It was no common garden centre, for it boasted some of the most beautiful glasshouses I have ever seen, more beautiful even than those venerable specimens to be seen at the Botanical Gardens in Dublin. The man who owned and managed the business was bereft, because its closure meant that his children, all of