I know quite a few who aren't so bad. But Duncan Bannatyne isn't one of them.

If we define fascism as the political class wants us to understand it (the mass murder of millions of jews or a similar policy intention) then it would not be possible for later generations than those who lived or died in WW2 to "learn the lessons of history". For this was not Hitler's stated intention prior to being elected. It was not the case that the German people put him in power to murder the jews. He adopted the policy of facism after reading Musolini's book on the subject and he was a fascist from the start.

Fascism is a branch of socialism. Where the socialists took over the ownership of the means of production the fascists took over control of the means of production. The effect is the same only the name of the shop is different. There is nationalisation in both cases. The stated aim is to make the country "Great".

Today in the UK the power elite are not satisfied with regulating every aspect of business. They want to nationalise the people too.

Both Musolini and Hitler held that the individual should live for the state and that sacrificing the individual for the "good of all" was a legitimate policy. And so when Duncan Banatyne says "This isn't nanny statism, Big Brother, or wrongful interference in people's personal freedoms – it's the right thing to do to protect the health of the vast majority of us who don't smoke from the declining minority who do" he is speaking from a tradition with some history.

And his statement begs the question what would he consider "nanny statism, Big Brother, or wrongful interference in people's (sic) personal freedoms"?