Among the confused delusions vomited forth by Tea Party members was their comic slander of President Obama as both a fascist and a socialist. Now, those casual comparisons of Obama to Marx and Hitler are becoming commonplace among the Republican demagogues who would replace him in the White House. Over just the past few days, Ricks Santorum and Perry likened the President to Mussolini and Hitler even as Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann placed Obama in the European socialist camp. So, voters can be forgiven for asking, which bogus totalitarian threat should we fear most?
For the down but not yet out Rick Perry, the answer is all of the above. This week, the Texas governor suggested his Kenyan was more like the Fuhrer in 1944:

"This election is about stopping a president of the United States and his administration that is abusing the Constitution of this country, that is putting America on a track to bankruptcy," Perry told a hotel ballroom packed with more than 200 volunteers.
"It is a powerful moment in Americans' history, and you are on the front lines," he added. "This is Concord. This is Omaha Beach. This is going up the hill realizing that the battle is worth winning."

Of course, for months Perry (and his wife) insisted in interviews and ads that Barack Obama is "absolutely" a socialist.
Newt Gingrich, too, chose both Hitler and Stalin as analogs for President Obama. When he wasn't declaring the Obama administration and Democrats in Congress are a "secular-socialist machine" that "represents as great a threat to America as Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union," Gingrich worried that Obama's "Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior" is "outside our comprehension."

If Rick Perry thinks Barack Obama may be Der Fuhrer, Iowa caucus co-champion Rick Santorum fears the President is Il Duce:

[My grandfather] came after having fought in World War I because Mussolini has been in power now for three years and had has figured out that Fascism was something that would crush his spirit and his freedom....And we have two parties that are out talking about how they're going to solve those problems. One wants to talk about raising taxes on people who have been successful and redistributing money, increasing dependency in this country, promoting more Medicaid and food stamps and all sorts of social welfare programs and passing Obamacare to provide even more government subsidies. More and more dependency, more and more government -- exactly what my grandfather left in 1925.

Then again, in April Santorum claimed President Obama had failed to fight against "militant" and "godless socialism." And just last month, Santorum expanded on his frothy communist mixture, baselessly declaring:

"President Obama is for income equality. That's socialism. It's worse yet, it's Marxism."

And that comes, Santorum fumes, from a President who consistently "sided with our enemies."
Santorum will get no argument from his recently departed GOP rival, Michele Bachmann. In 2008, Bachmann, famously warned about then Senator Obama, "I'm very concerned that he may have anti-American views." Ever since he took the oath of office, Bachmann as she did again today painted President Obama red:

"What the Congress had done and what President Obama had done in passing Obamacare endangered the very survival of the United States of America. I will continue fighting to defeat the president's agenda of socialism."

Surprisingly, Bachmann's words differ little from those of the Republicans' almost certain nominee, Mitt Romney. In Iowa Tuesday night, Romney kept up his pathetic slander that President Obama "believes in an entitlement society" in which "government should create equal outcomes." Repackaging his 2007 strategy to run against Hillary Clinton, Romney declared:

"I think he believes America should become a European-style welfare state."

Just the day before, Romney echoed Bachmann's warning about the dire, existential threat the un-American 44th President supposedly poses to his nation:

"[He] sees the European welfare state as perhaps being the more appropriate model. An entitlement society, where the role of government is increasingly to take from someone to give to others. That would deaden the American spirit. That would substitute envy for ambition. It would poison the very spirit of America that allows us to be one nation under God."

Of course, in that nation under God, that Republican fascist/socialist/Marxist/Nazi Barack Obama delivered the largest two year tax cut in modern American history even as the Dow Jones grew by a third during his time in office. Under his deficit-cutting health care program, most Americans will pay for private insurance to cover care from private doctors and private hospitals. While the 600,000 layoffs by state and local governments dwarfed any gains in federal hiring, the sluggish U.S. economy has produced 21 straight months of private sector job growth. Thanks to President Obama, the U.S. auto industry not only saved a million jobs for Americans, but now enjoys growing sales and large profits for shareholders. It's no wonder Mark Zandi, the economic adviser to the same John McCain who will endorse Mitt Romney today, concluded that the Obama administration averted "Great Depression 2.0."
And that, unfortunately for the myth-makers and demagogues now seeking the Republican nomination for President, will sound a lot like capitalism to the American people.