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To: The Duke
Was [Hitler] equating Jews with Communists?
Hitler hated Jews (thereby attracting antisemites - and antisemitism was pretty mainstream in Germany, and FTM was far from unknown in America) and was competing directly with the Communists for the support of those who hated/feared (actual) liberalism.
Although our modern socialists' promise of greater freedom is genuine and sincere, in recent years observer after observer has been impressed by the unforeseen consequences of socialism, the extraordinary similarity in many respects of the conditions under 'communism' and 'fascism'. As the writer Peter Drucker expressed it in 1939,
'the complete collapse of the belief in the attainability of freedom and equality through Marxism has forced Russia to travel the same road toward a totalitarian society of unfreedom and inequality which Germany has been following. Not that communism and fascism are essentially the same. Fascism is the stage reached after communism has proved an illusion, and it has proved as much an illusion in Russia as in pre-Hitler Germany.
No less significant is the intellectual outlook of the rank and file in the communist and fascist movements in Germany before 1933. The relative ease with which a young communist could be converted into a Nazi or vice versa was well known, best of all to the propagandists of the two parties. The communists and Nazis clashed more frequently with each other than with other parties simply because they competed for the same type of mind and reserved for each other the hatred of the heretic. Their practice showed how closely they are related. To both, the real enemy, the man with whom they had nothing in common, was the liberal of the old type. While to the Nazi the communist and to the communist the Nazi, and to both the socialist, are potential recruits made of the right timber, they both know that there can be no compromise between them and those who really believe in individual freedom.

What is promised to us as the Road to Freedom is in fact the Highroad to Servitude. For it is not difficult to see what must be the consequences when democracy embarks upon a course of planning. The goal of the planning will be described by some such vague term as 'the general welfare'. There will be no real agreement as to the ends to be attained, and the effect of the people's agreeing that there must be central planning, without agreeing on the ends, will be rather as if a group of people were to commit themselves to take a journey together without agreeing where they want to go: with the result that they may all have to make a journey which most of them do not want at all.
____________— F A Hayek, The Road to Serfdom (May, 1945 Reader’s Digest Condensed Version)

If you read The Road to Serfdom (Reader’s Digest Condensed Version here), you will see that FA Hayek used the term “liberal” to denote people who today would be called “conservatives” in America. That is because Hayek, an Austrian, learned English in America before the meaning of “liberal” was essentially inverted, according to Safire's New Political Dictionary, in the 1920s. And the meaning of “liberal” was not changed in Britain, where Hayek wrote Serfdom during WWII.

33 posted on 03/19/2024 8:09:35 AM PDT by conservatism_IS_compassion
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To: conservatism_IS_compassion
You can say the same about the Left's constant carping about "racism" and "global warming" today.

The Left learned in the 1960s that Americans would tolerate incredibly intrusive and un-Constitutional powers of the government as long as they were directed at eliminating "racism" (an impossibility in a free society) and "protecting the environment."

Those two causes have been used ever since to impose a totalitarian, communist seizure of control over American society.

Think about: every single association in American society is now subject to the tutelary despotism of the government for conformance to "anti-discrimination" goals, including LGBTQ+ and child mutilation. It's only now that the religious frogs have noticed the water is boiling.

Similarly, look at your home: the toilet tank, shower head, household cleaners, detergent, your car, your clothing, your kids' toys, in sum-- everything-- is subject to inspection and permitting by Fedzilla for "ecological" damage and "public safety."

39 posted on 03/19/2024 8:57:01 AM PDT by pierrem15 ("Massacrez-les, car le seigneur connait les siens" )
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