And Buckley and his ilk before that. That’s where fusionism came from. Prior to that you sort of had two distinct conservative movements in the US, one fiscally conservative (libertarian) and one socially conservative (traditionalist). In the 60s they started to merge in to the new right. Sort of came to a head with Jerry Falwell throwing in his lot with Reagan.

The US has always been problematic in one way or another, and the seeds for the rise of fascism were planted during the Clinton era by Newt Gingrich and crew. It was definitely the exploitation of the tragedy of 9/11 that gave them carte blanche to really start pointing their powers inward. The Patriot Act, the creation of DHS, moving immigration enforcement from the DOJ, with its rules and procedures, to DHS and its complete lackmof accountability. The list goes on.