Islamic terrorists are bad. Nazis were bad. Beyond that there doesn't seem to be much to justify using the term fascist to identify both sets of people. Jack Reed, a Democratic Senator from Rhode Island, gets this. Specifically, he notes that nationalism, one of fascism's key ingredients, isn't even in the mix with "Islamofascists," making them not fascists at all. If fascism is the only evil you recognize, then excluding the Islamic terrorists from the "fascist" category might cause you fits. But if you recognize fascism as one of many evils found along the ideological spectrum, then you probably understand how Islamic terrorists can at once be evil and not fascists.

"I think if one carefully has looked at the history of fascism, which was a political movement in western Europe that actually, in the two principal cases, came to power through democratic elections—at least in Germany it did—I think the analogy is very, very weak," Reed explained, "And what they're looking for is a kind of a connection, a symbolic connection, between the struggle against Nazism and fascism in Italy. And I think, again, it misperceives the nature of the threats we face today." Reed continued: "This is not a nationalistic organization that is trying to seize control of a particular government. It is a religious movement.... I think it goes to the point of that their first response is, you know, come up with a catchy slogan, and then they forget to do the hard work of digging into the facts..."

I never looked at it that way. It makes sense. However, if you think W. is vilified now, imagine the screams and howls if he stated the religious angle. My gosh, it's be made out as the new crusades.

"Islamic Terrorists" has always worked for me. It sums up the people we're dealing with very nicely. I would hate to see the fight against terrorism turn into a debate on semantics.

Their nation was destroyed in 1923 with the fall of the Ottoman Empire. They seek its re-establishment. Beyond that they fit every criteria of a fascist movement.

Paxton defines fascism as follows;

1.) A sense of overwhelming crises beyond reach of traditional solutions.

Today most Islamo-Fascists believe that they have reached the End of Days and only a final, apocalyptic battle between Muslims and non-Muslims will solve their present situation.

2.) Belief one's group is the victim, justifying any action without legal or moral limits.

Do I really need to explain that one?

3.) Need for authority by a natural leader above the law, relying on the superiority of his instincts.

Islamofascists find these leaders in religious, rather than political rulers, but have them just the same.

4.) Right of the chosen people to dominate others without legal or moral restraint.

Almost the Islamofascist worldview in a nutshell.

5.) Fear of foreign "contamination".

Again, need I explain?

Who is Paxton? Several of the criteria you list apply to many groups, not just fascists, while others, such as number one, don't seem to apply to all fascists.

Oh yea, forgot to mention who he was, sorry.

Hes an American historian specializing in Vichy France. He wrote "The Anatomy of Fascism" among other works.

Robert O. Paxton*

The fact that Rumsfeld is making the Nazi comparison speaks volumes about why he is so ineffectual.

He still lives in a world where all threats come from nation-states.

That's why we invaded Iraq, instead of sending our troops into Pakistan to capture OBL.

The value of inserting "fascism" in phrases and arguments that engage Islamic terrorism is that it reminds naive liberals (esp. liberal Jews) that Evil did not die out with the Third Reich.

Ben-T outlined pretty well Islam's international state-oriented ambitions, too.

Reed misses the mark, somewhat, in proclaiming that the threat is religious as opposed to national. It's both. The Muslim term Ummah refers to the Islamic nation: from Morocco to Malaysia (and beyond if they have their way).

A while back I ran a simple, perhaps too simple post, "Islam = Fascism = Communism." In any case, it's Public Enemy #1.

Hamas still demands the return of Spain to Islamic dominion.

The threat we face from Islamic terrorists is neither religious nor nationalistic. Saddam was nationalistic but he was not religious, and with Saddam gone Iraq is nothing more than a band of squabbling tribes. Iraqis are more interested in killing each other than killing Americans. It is dissolving into a secterian conflict with lots of opportunists seeking to build a new power base in Saddam's absence. If we were to leave Iraq it might explode into even greater bloodshed but then that only underscores the fact that the violence in Iraq is not directed against the infidel West, but against itself.

The term Islamic-fascism is bogus because I've seen no evidence that terrorists are synthesizing the teachings of the Koran with the teachings of fascistic thinkers like Carl Schmidt, Vilfredo Pareto or Mussolini. The term Islamo-fascist has appeal because it creates the misperception that our war in Iraq has parallels to our war against the axis powers. In much the same way we label all the violence in Iraq as "terrorism" even though most of it is secterian and not ideologically aimed at the United States.

But by and large the threat posed by terorists is way overblown by everyone. We all have a much greater chance of getting killed by a motorist than a Muslim.

Bravo Eric.

Man, we're not going to make it seventeen hours! Those things are going to come in here, just like they did before, man...they're going to come in here and get us, man.... we're f**ked man!

"The threat we face from Islamic terrorists is neither religious nor nationalistic. Saddam was nationalistic but he was not religious, and with Saddam gone Iraq is nothing more than a band of squabbling tribes. Iraqis are more interested in killing each other than killing Americans. It is dissolving into a secterian conflict with lots of opportunists seeking to build a new power base in Saddam's absence. If we were to leave Iraq it might explode into even greater bloodshed but then that only underscores the fact that the violence in Iraq is not directed against the infidel West, but against itself." -Eric Wilds

Nothing about that is relevant to any possible links between Islamic ideologies and fascism.

"The threat we face from Islamic terrorists is neither religious nor nationalistic. Saddam was nationalistic but he was not religious, and with Saddam gone Iraq is nothing more than a band of squabbling tribes. Iraqis are more interested in killing each other than killing Americans. It is dissolving into a secterian conflict with lots of opportunists seeking to build a new power base in Saddam's absence. If we were to leave Iraq it might explode into even greater bloodshed but then that only underscores the fact that the violence in Iraq is not directed against the infidel West, but against itself."

Uhm...Mohammed Amin Al Husseini ring a bell?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhammed_Amin_al-Husseini

How about Sayyid Qutb?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sayyid_Qutb

"But by and large the threat posed by terorists is way overblown by everyone. We all have a much greater chance of getting killed by a motorist than a Muslim."

Which is not relevant to whether Islamofascists are actually fascists.

Another reason I favor using the F-word is that the incitement to mob violence, and such violence itself, is a pervasive Islamic tactic wherever Muslim clerics have followings in countries where they do not (not yet, from their jihadist point of view) have state power.

And the first Western referents that these bring to mind are Hiter's and Mussolini's Brown and Black shirts of the 1920s and 30s.

I concede that "fascist" is not a exact term to describe this fact, but it's as precise as I can think of, given their tactics (orchestrated mob violence) and their goal (Dar al-Islam)

Terrorism today has much more in common with the anarchist movement of the late 19th/early 20th century than with fascisim.

And Ben-T, the fact that terrorism is a real but nonetheless overblown threat is relevent becuase the facsism anology the thugs in the White House are trying to paint is a perfect example of how the treat is being overblown.

No,I'm afraid not. Your argument is the fallacy of special pleading.

Both the people you cite have been dead for a generation. What does their beliefs have to do with the secterian violence now gripping Iraq? The issue is whether the violence in Iraq is animated by a fascistic ideology and I see no evidence that it is.

Perhaps there is a case to be made that Saddam Hussein was a fascist since the Ba'ath Party was founded by Christian Socialists and Saddam had pan-Arabic aspirations. If you want to use fascism as a catch all phrase to describe any movement that uses violence and seeks power fascist, then Islamic terrorists could be labeled fascists. But this is just playing with words. The point is that adding fascism to Islamo doesn't mean anything. Why not just call them Islamo-Genghis Khanists or Islamo-Bonapartists or Islamo-Attila the Hunists? Each term is just as meaningless as the next.

Ben-T,

If you have read Paxton then you should know that his work clearly is not meant to give rise to simplistic use of the label fascist. He always acknowledges what a slippery term it is and his work on Petain's Vichy regime both showed that collaboration was possible partly b/c there were some domestic "fascist" roots for it but that at the same time Vichy is not accurately labeled as a simply fascist regime. Others have done the same thing w/ Franco's Spain, for example, working out as best they can what makes an authoritarian regime not simply synonymous w/ a fascist one. He often writes for the NYRB and other more popular outlets so possibly he has taken a stance on use of the term "Islamofascism" but I haven't run across any such usage by him. I would find it rather odd actually that a solid historian would approve of applying that term to Islamic radicals. So Dan is quite right to point out that those criteria for being fascist would apply to a slew of clearly un-fascist regimes (If one was too-cleverly inclined then those criteria could be interpreted to include Bush's Presidency, as many on the Left readily claim). Paxton is aware of how general and vague those criteria are and he is more reserved in how he applies them than you indicate.

Also, for an understanding of fascism you should really read Stanley Payne as well, he is a good corrective to Paxton in many ways. It is almost always a bad idea to rely too heavily on the work of one historian. (Does this remind anyone of a scene from Good Will Hunting?)

I also think you would do better to refer to the Caliphate rather than the Ottoman Empire as what Islamic Radicals seek to recover. That is, Islamic unity is more important to them and primary before any idea of imperial/geographic conquest. The nationalism of a Persian Iran e.g. is actually a problem for these muslim extremists. In other places you have freely acknowledged the religious stratification of Islam and the wars raging w/in the religion and that lack of unity is reason enough to question labelling the extremists as fascists.

Finally, as Jeremayakovska is exemplifying above, the use of the term "fascist" has utility as political rhetoric that isn't found in other terms. If something is designated "fascist" or someone is labelled as the "next Hitler" then all debate over means of dealing with the perceived threat can be stifled or at least made hysterical. If one is facing a new Hitler than there is no option beside "utter annihilation" of that enemy as they are taken to clearly be E-V-I-L incarnate. All oppositon can be construed as "appeasement" or a lack of "moral clarity" in the face of evil, as "naive" regarding the mortal danger faced, and as fundamentally treasonous (Ann Coulter). This is why Leftists have spent the last 60 years labelling one opponent after another a "fascist" (you know like as in "you fascist pig!"), and why leftists in the form of jingoist nationalist neocons continue to do so. The technique has great cache as propaganda.

Ann Coulter? Why don't you put her in charge, man?!?!?

Game over, man....

"Both the people you cite have been dead for a generation. What does their beliefs have to do with the secterian violence now gripping Iraq? The issue is whether the violence in Iraq is animated by a fascistic ideology and I see no evidence that it is." -Eric Wilds

They are A.) Fascists and B.) The founding fathers of the ideology are enemies our possessed of.

Al Qaeda, along with pretty much every other militant Islamic group I can think of, is build on the operational and ideological model of the Muslim Brotherhood.

"I also think you would do better to refer to the Caliphate rather than the Ottoman Empire as what Islamic Radicals seek to recover." -Brian

Yes. Well, a pan-national Islamic superpower. The Ottoman Empire was the last breath of such regimes.

"That is, Islamic unity is more important to them and primary before any idea of imperial/geographic conquest." -Brian

When such regimes existed, they actively sought the conquest of non-Muslims wherever possible. Jihadis have made quite clear that, having established such a regime, they too would seek the conquest of non-Muslims.

"The nationalism of a Persian Iran e.g. is actually a problem for these muslim extremists. In other places you have freely acknowledged the religious stratification of Islam and the wars raging w/in the religion and that lack of unity is reason enough to question labelling the extremists as fascists." -Brian

I am not sure what they fact that they are fighting each other has to do with whether they are fascists.

Yes, when such "Pan-nationalist" Muslim regimes existed they acted like belligerent superpowers, but my point is that prior, far prior, to imperialist expansionism of current Islamic extremists is a regained Islamic unity, and that is probably unlikely to ever occur again. It would probably be easier to achieve a reunification of Christianity in the Church of Rome . . . you see that happening anytime soon? I suppose that possibly the seeking of regional hegemony by the U.S. and the desire of neocons to destabilize every regime there could possibly unite muslims as a reaction to a perceived axternal threat, but even that is seriously unlikely.

So your use of the term "pan-nationalist" is historically telling as regards the Ottoman Empire. It disintegrated partly b/c of the centrifugal force of tribal nationalisms, as well as the competing versions of Islam. And it is that reality which you acknowledge on the one hand which should impact your interpretation of the radical Islamic threat on the other, as well as whether or not they are "fascist."

Because . . . Persian nationalism (and a slew of others) as well as serious cleavages between Islamic communities directly undermines the claim that the Islamic radicals are "fascist" in any way that sheds light on the nature of their threat or the prudent ways to deal with it. Calling them such serves only as propaganda. Fascism was statist and nationalist, but it is precisely Mid East states and nationalists that are the biggest enemies for the Islamic radicals.

The point ultimately is that trying to reduce the specificity of the Islamic extremist threat to Mussolini's fascism or to Nazism (or Nazism or communism) is just not very helpful.

The question -- which you keep avoiding -- is whether the expanding violence in Iraq is due to a fascist ideology. When a bomb detonates in market place in Baghdad is this due to a fascist ideology? Or sectertian strife? I think the latter, and you have shown no evidence that fascism plays any role at all.

It all boils down to this: the Bush administration is desperate to find a new reason to justify thier botched war.

You never heard the word Islamofascism in 2001.

"Yes, when such "Pan-nationalist" Muslim regimes existed they acted like belligerent superpowers, but my point is that prior, far prior, to imperialist expansionism of current Islamic extremists is a regained Islamic unity, and that is probably unlikely to ever occur again. It would probably be easier to achieve a reunification of Christianity in the Church of Rome . . . you see that happening anytime soon?" -Brian

I know. The question is "are they fascists?" not "are they going to be succesfull?"

Its silly to say that they cannot be fascists because they are not nationalists. Nationalism has never existed in the Islamic world, and their "nations" are lines drawn on a map by Europeans. Islam IS their nation. It is the common tradition, language, religion, etc, that unites them as a people. They have some nationalism to a vague extent, not wanting to be ruled by people of a different race, but not enough to create states. Other than the "pan-nationalist" states you are identifying, no Islamic state existed prior to European colonization. They were ALL pan-nationalistic. You are essentially saying that the Islamists are not nationalists because they are not loyal to the "nations" drawn up for them by Europeans and to which they have no real connecting history stretching back farther than World War I.

"So your use of the term "pan-nationalist" is historically telling as regards the Ottoman Empire. It disintegrated partly b/c of the centrifugal force of tribal nationalisms, as well as the competing versions of Islam. And it is that reality which you acknowledge on the one hand which should impact your interpretation of the radical Islamic threat on the other, as well as whether or not they are "fascist." -Brian

Only if you consider nationalism the MOST important aspect of fascism. I do not. Hitler was an Austrian. If one fits every criteria for fascist except that they want to kill me because I'm not a Muslim insead of because I'm not an Arab, I'm going to call them a fascist.

"Because . . . Persian nationalism (and a slew of others) as well as serious cleavages between Islamic communities directly undermines the claim that the Islamic radicals are "fascist" in any way that sheds light on the nature of their threat or the prudent ways to deal with it. Calling them such serves only as propaganda. Fascism was statist and nationalist, but it is precisely Mid East states and nationalists that are the biggest enemies for the Islamic radicals." -Brian

Why? Persian Shi'ite Islamic radicals and Sunni Arab Islamic radicals tend to hate each other as much as they each hate the west. If anything, it reinforces the claim that they ARE fascist, concerned heavily with purity of race as well as purity of creed.

"The question -- which you keep avoiding -- is whether the expanding violence in Iraq is due to a fascist ideology. When a bomb detonates in market place in Baghdad is this due to a fascist ideology? Or sectertian strife? I think the latter, and you have shown no evidence that fascism plays any role at all." -Eric Wilds

No Eric, that isn't the question. Re-read Dan's post. Iraq is not mentioned once in it.

Ben-- I don't think Paxton gets close to distiguishing fascism or nazism from other ideologies (and it leaves some important stuff out--e.g., economics, and domestic policy generally), but doesn't it bother you that the definition you are using as authoritative fits W., neocon W-cheerleaders, and Israeli-hawks rather well? Now, I don't think these ppl are fascists, but you have to, no?

I think it's funny that the Republican Party funded Osama Bin Laden in the 1980's, and NOW worry about how Islamist, Fascist, and dangerous he is.

Skeptic, you are totally correct. I tried to point out to to Ben earlier that those criteria easily fit Bush as well and that it is a fundamental abuse of Paxton's work to apply those criteria to radical Islamic groups.

Paxton recognizes how vague those criteria are . . . and that is a major part of his point. This is why most historians only talk about "fascism" as Mussolini's Italy and a more radical form in Germany's Nazism. Even the use of a term like totalitarian has long been on the decline and is treated as very inexact and a term to be used w/ caution.

The only reason to talk about "fascism" applying to movements outside of the Second World War is for utility as propaganda.

But there are perfectly good reasons to take radical Islamic movements as threatening w/o them being "brown turbans" or w/e the equivalant to a fascist brown shirt would be in an Islamic context. (I hope I haven't just coined a term that is going to start showing up in neocon propaganda!)

Ben,

When Bush states that we are at war with Islamo-fascists in Iraq then he is guilty of butchering language -- he's turns regular secterian conflict into a democratic fascistic divide.

Very well Brian, what criteria of fascist do they NOT fit, exactly? Other than not being "nationalist" (when you have deliberately limited "nationalist" to apply to the states drawn up by Europeans after World War I, instead of to the actual nations of Islamic history.)

Ben-- Well, the Islamic terrorists aren't socialists. Also, the fascists tended to be atheist, or anti- traditional Western monotheism anyway -- right?

Fascism has no inherent religious ideology to my knowledge.

Islamic economics has a redistributive tendency.

A redistributive tendency? So does the progressive income tax and medicaire. Ben, you are really grabbing at straws here.

C'mon, you know that you want to use the term "fascist" simply b/c everybody knows that "the only good fascist is a dead fascist" as the Left has said for years.

Islamic economics?

Strict Muslims are required to give to charity, but that hardly determines the distribution of wealth in Muslim countries. Most Muslim countries have highly unequal distibution.

btw, Michael Ledeen called the Islamic Republic of Iran "fascist" in 1979. Perhaps he was on to something. More here.

No. Ledeen was not onto something. He was a neocon agitator using the propaganda techniques common to the neocons and those further left.

For Ledeen actually being fascist is often meant as approbation, he fancies himself a scholar of Italian fascism and in fact is very well connected w/ the Italian remnants and heirs of the fascist movement to this day. The charismatic leader who unifies the nation and trancends "petty party politics" against a common enemy resonates w/ ledeen and other neocons in their writings and policies.

You can read about his flirtation w/ fascism here: http://www.amconmag.com/06_30_03/feature.html

Or, you could just recognize that identifying every hated "enemy" as a fascist is just a propagandistic technique, and therefore is, well, a "fascist" thing to do.

Them's harsh words.
It's an interesting read. I hope you have already or will read the link I provided.

"A redistributive tendency? So does the progressive income tax and medicaire. Ben, you are really grabbing at straws here.

C'mon, you know that you want to use the term "fascist" simply b/c everybody knows that "the only good fascist is a dead fascist" as the Left has said for years." -Brian

Dodged the issue Brian. Please point out a qualifier of Fascism that the groups commonly identified as Islamofascist do not fit.

Ben.

You are incorrigible. This is my last comment on this thread. I had already mentioned above aspects of fascism that the Islamic radicals that pose a terrorist threat to us do not share. To restate them and add a couple:

1) nationalism

2) socialism

3) religious belief

4) modernism

5) ethnocentrism/racism (no identity as a ethnic people)

6) a notion of plebiscitary (populist) sovereignty which means that the people are subsumed in the ruler who represents the interests of the nation, the Volk.

These should suffice.

"Please point out a qualifier of Fascism that the groups commonly identified as Islamofascist do not fit." -Ben T.

Uhm... nationalism...and...uhmmmmm, socialism.

Wow, the two most important characteristics!

You have already admitted that nationalism is not really open to them, and that they have only a "redistributionist tendency" (though I don't know quite what you mean, and I doubt it qualifies as socialism).

So your strategy to win this argument is (1) to admit that Islamicists lack the two most important features of fascism, but then (2) to continue insisting they are fascist anyway. I think you'll "win" only if you define winning as having no one left willing to argue with you.

oops, giving the wording of my comment 3) should read "religious disbelief" not belief.

"1) nationalism"

They fit it. They are loyal to the nations that they have historically had, not the borders drawn up for them by European colonialists after World War I. What a shocker.

"2) socialism"

Have it. Look at what the Koran says about economics, its essentially socialism.

"3) religious belief"

Obviously have it.

"4) modernism"

I've never seen it listed as a aspect of fascism.

"5) ethnocentrism/racism (no identity as a ethnic people)"

They want to kill people who are different from them in religion instead of people who are different from them in faith. Big difference.

6.)"6) a notion of plebiscitary (populist) sovereignty which means that the people are subsumed in the ruler who represents the interests of the nation, the Volk."

That I would have to explain to you that the groups generally referred to as Islamofascist believe in totalitarian rule is shocking.

"Uhm... nationalism...and...uhmmmmm, socialism.

Wow, the two most important characteristics!" -skeptic

They have both. You have attempted to obscure the debate to serve your dishonest argument by suggestiong that nationalism must equate with the nations drawn up for them by European colonialists other than their own actual, historicaly, nations. The view of economics taught in the Koran and in Islamic theology is highly socialistic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_economics

I shouldn't have to do the most basic research of your points for you.

Both of your are pronouncing that Islamofascists are not fascists with clearly nothing but an extremely cursory knowledge of what their beliefs are.

P.S: You are both, I suspect deliberately, including some factors that apply only to National Socialism to Fascism in general.

Wasn't Mussolini both a nationalist and a socialist? Isn't that the primary meaning of fascism? Islam is a socialist ideology? Aren't you confusing the injunctions for tithing and alms with socialism? What nation are they nationalists for? A nonexistent one? (The Ottoman empire wasn't a _Volk_.) Do John Walker Lindh and black Muslims from Miami belong to that nation? Is wikipedia really the basis of the extensive research you have done on Islam and fascism that allows you to lord your expertise over us?

I called Wikipedia "The most basic research". I did a quick google search on your points since you proved unwilling to do so yourself.

If by socialism you strictly mean government control over the markets for the purpose of creating equality of wealth, Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy were not socialist (of course they were in fact socialist, because they believed the government should control the market, as any Islamofascist also believes). An ideal Islamist society would engage in socialist acts such as redistribution of wealth, not allowing lending based on interest, and participatory capital-labor arrangements.

They are very loyal to nations. Their own, historical nations. Those are not the nations drawn up for them by European colonialists.

But I'm done here. Your argument has rested on the fact that Islamofascists are not nationalistic. This has been shown to be false. You are now attempting to suggest that they are not socialistic. I don't have time to debunk every single point. They fit all characteristics of fascism, with the possible exception of having their hatred based on religion instead of race.

Why are you using the word "volk" instead of just using the word "nation"? National Socialism is necessarilly fascism, but fascism is not necessarilly National Socialism.

Another few very basic points about the differences;

"azism differed from Italian Fascism in the emphasis on the state's purpose in serving its national ideal on the basis of a national race, specifically the social engineering of culture to the ends of the greatest possible prosperity for the Germanic race at the expense of all else and all others. In contrast, Mussolini's Fascism held that cultural factors existed to serve the state, and that it wasn't necessarily in the state's interest to serve or engineer any of these particulars within its sphere. The only purpose of government under Fascism was to uphold the state as supreme above all else, and for these reasons it can be said to have been a governmental statolatry. Where Fascism talked of "State," however, Nazism spoke of the "Volk" and of the Volksgemeinschaft (the "national community")."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism

"While Nazism saw both party and government as a means to achieve an ideal condition for certain chosen people, fascism was a squarely anti-socialist form of statism that existed as an end in and of itself. The Nazi movement, at least in its overt ideology, spoke of class-based society as the enemy, and wanted to unify the racial element above established classes. The Fascist movement, on the other hand, sought to preserve the class system and uphold it as the foundation of established and desirable culture [citation needed], although this is not to say that Fascists rejected the concept of social mobility. Indeed a central tenet of the Corporate State was meritocracy. However, Fascism also heavily based itself on corporatism, which was supposed to supersede class conflicts."

Didn't provide the link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism

Also, of course Islamofascism doesn't fit the strictift definition of fascism, as it manifested in Italy. That is why it is called "Islamofascism" and not just fascism. People don't call Gabdel Nasser, Anwar al-Sadat, and Hafez al-Assad "Islamofascists". They were just fascists who happened to be Muslims.

Islamofascism signifies a conglomeration of some of the ideas in Islamic theology and some of the ideas in fascism. In order to maintain consistency, that no system which departs from any of the points of fascism is fascism, you would have to argue that Nazism is not fascism, since it departed in some respects from Mussolini's classical fascism.

Ben T, wikipedia (or google) this: "sophomore."

Ad hominem attacks are not an argument. Have you really fallen that far? I'll take my leave.

Ben: An ad hominem is a fallacious type of argument. I wasn't presenting my name-calling as an argument for the falsity of your claims (which I and others more qualified have argued against above quite sufficiently, I think). I was justing pointing out what is probably obvious to everyone other than you. Therefore, it wasn't an ad hominem; it was just an epithet.