Comment by unclad5968

There is never any purpose for a government rating people/organizations on an axis except to act on that information in some way, and there is basically no way that the government acting on ratings of loyalty to the present leadership, is not, at a minimum, a dangerous promotion of private interest above public interest.

It is fascist, though, only in the context of other actions by the administration.

I think this is a good question that shouldn't be down-voted.

If you look at various definitions of what facism means, you may see something like: "characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and by forcible suppression of opposition" (from M-W).

A "loyalty rating" implements both economic regimentation (the insinuation that higher scoring companies have better favor) and suppression of opposition (that companies actively avoid being seen as opposition).

So this is text-book fascist behavior.

It's not hyperbole to envision the justice department looking the other way for high-scoring companies, and actively persecuting low-scoring companies. You're right in that this is already happening (like with e.g. Harvard), but implementing a score in the open makes it shockingly easy to carry out fascist directives across the government bureaucracy.

The administration's vindictiveness and obsession with loyalty is extreme (for the US).

This government already has a track record of punishing poorly cooperative companies! Look into the illegal executive orders that targeted various law firms.

Read up on the law firms he targeted simply for having dems as clients.

John Adams: "I see a new nation ready to take its place in the world; not an empire, but a republic; and a republic of laws, not men."

> Can someone explain to me why it's facist that the government is recording who is cooperative and who isn't?

Because your experience with the government in a democracy shouldn't be dependent on whether the person in power decides you have shown sufficient fealty.

> unless you assume it will be used for punishing poorly cooperative companies.

Like they have so far?

> unless you assume it will be used for punishing poorly cooperative companies.

You don't have to assume that. The US government has already made that policy quite clear.