I'm both a liberal and a socialist, btw, so I'm not sure where I'd sit in your analysis, but it's irrelevant: I don't feel ashamed that some people who had beliefs that could be labelled with the same word as my beliefs are apparently considered to have been evil or cowardly in another country more than half a century ago. For an insight as to why "liberals" didn't and don't trust Communists and Soviet loyalists, try this league table of Democide in the 20th century. Other than war dead, the Soviet Union 1917-1987 killed about three times as many as did Nazi Germany 1933-1945: http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HT\\... IMO that extract from the Oxford Companion to Politics, quoted @31, is the most apt guide as to the appropriate use of "fascism" as an ideological label. We need to be clear about the connotations to avoid falling into the elephant trap of using the term as a general expression of abuse. Notice the fixation that both the Communists and Fascists had with identifying paramount leaders to ensure unity of thought, expression and action within a particular totalitarian ethic. It was widely reported that while members of the National Socialist German Workers' Party probably didn't actually read Hitler's Mein Kampf, they were mostly sure to have a copy prominently displayed on their book shelves to reassure visitors. Probably much the same could be said of dedicated Socialists, except they had and have a wider choice of literature to display as testimony to their ideological preferences