The main uses of “totalitarianism” and “fascism” I hear these days are in combination with the Islamic Terrorist bogeyman. The new caliphate of the Islamo-fascists (whatever that means) will be a totalitarian terrorist state where our women will be horribly abused. In contemporary political rhetoric, it seems that many of these terms just mean bad: the new bad of the bad people will be a bad bad state where bad things happen. If you want to say that a radio talk-show demagogue is bad, you simply call him a fascist. It doesn’t matter if it’s Michael Savage or Mike Malloy, they’re “fascists” to their enemies.

I don’t hear “totalitarian” swung around quite so vigorously. I presume this is because more people understand what it means and know that most credible figures in the American public arena aren’t interested in it.

As for totalitarianism, I suspect most people simply don’t understand that it is a form of government that can arise from either the right or the left but in the end exists to preserve itself over anything else. Particularly disturbing is the tendency of neoconservative war hawks to describe states such as Iran as “totalitarian,” when the actual socio-political environment is far from it.

For further clarification of these terms (as well as communism) the best sources have always been Orwell and Hannah Arendt, hands down. My own humble musings can be found here.