Posted on 01/18/2008 11:23:43 AM PST by Postal Dude
First of all, I am a German conservative who gives the CDU [Christian Democratic Union] his vote. I like my chancellor Angela Merkel, and I like my country. I DO like EUROPEAN diversity. This excludes Muslims! I consider myself a right-winger and I am pro-Israel. But I also do admit, that the Nazis were, after all, right-wing.
Fact is: The Nazis were ULTRA-right-wing extremistic, white supremacistic facists! Yes, their political party was called the "National Socialist German Workers Party", but it was neither a socialist nor a workers party! This name was purely propaganda to gain the people's votes to win the elections!
You can't judge a party by it's name anyway! For example: The "State Peace and Development Council" is the name of the ruling party of Burma [Myanmar]! The country is in fact ruled by a military dictatorship! They slaughtered thousands of innocent monks not long ago [you all heard about this disgusting story]! Burma ISN'T peaceful, and for sure it ISN'T developing, no matter what name their ruling party has!
What does THE LEFT stand for: Diversity by all means, Internationality, Multiculturalism, Pacifism, Racial Equality, Equal Rights for Homosexuals, Abortion, and so on! So that's, what ADOLF HITLER and his NAZI PARTY standed for?! HELL NO! THE OPPOSITE WAS TRUE!
Yes, there ARE a few points, where the socialist and the nazi politics meet! One point is "the Jews"! Well, do they really meet? The socialists, the leftists, do hate Israel, yes, but the Nazis DO HATE THE JEWS! The majority of the American Jews vote Democrat! So does that mean they all hate themselves? No! They dislike the American and Israeli intervention doctrine [I don't know why, really], but for sure they don't want to get rid of themselves! That's BS! Of course there are some idiotic self-hating Jews [Naturei Karta], but they are a MINORITY!
In WWII Hitler did pact with Stalin, but solely for strategic reasons. In the end, Hitler wanted to exterminate over 100 million Soviet citizens, of all ethnic groups, he deemed SUBHUMAN [see "Generalplan Ost"]. Do socialists deem other races, DOES Hillary Clinton deem Mexicans or African-Americans SUBHUMAN?! Do socialists want to get rid [BY MASSMURDER] of the diverse nation? NO! Their views are diametral opposed to that of the nazis! These idiots LOVE the diverse nation! They promote it! They live the diversity! But NAZIS deem human beings "unworthy of life"! Only NAZIS talk about "lesser races" and the "master race"! The Soviet Union was the most diverse nation on earth back then, whereas Nazi Germany was one of the most UNdiverse nations on earth! The Nazis literally KILLED the diversity!
Fact is: the Nazis did were right-wing. But that DOESN'T mean, all right-wing people are the same. That's MSN BS! Even an idiot has to recognice the difference between us GOOD christian, pro-Israel right-wingers and the "Stormfront, white supremacist, anti-semitic right-wingers"!
American racists tend to refer to themselves as right-wing, but hold leftist policies. Don't confuse American racists with European ones. Their racism is similar. Not necessarily their politics.
And no human creature is good—just to get that in.
Good summation A_perfect_lady.
And also a good explanation of why we are having a 'failure to communicate' moment with Postal Dude. If one's universe only consists of 'collectivist' societies (with the government seated as 'god') - then sure, one is going create some means of distinguishing between these different societies. In this universe I could see how one could place Nazi Germany and Socialist governments at different ends of the spectrum.
On the other hand, if we decouple ourselves from this starting point premise - and allow for the existence of societies with minimal government control (e.g., we have a God, and it ain't the government) - then from this viewpoint its easy to see how we (in America) lump Nazi Germany and the old Soviet Union into the same category (closely followed by other socialist regimes)...
The disconnect is that Postal Dude apparently can't allow for the possibility of a non-controlling government. Understandable, if that is what has been drummed into you all your life.
Sadly, we're approaching that mindset over here in America as well. We've forgotten the principles by which this country was established, and what our Founding Fathers believed.
Hopefully (and prayerfully) the Lord will bless us with revival before our candlestick blows out.
As many others have already (up to your comment here) and probably there are more after this one (haven't read there yet) stated, and which you have so far ignored, a principal component--more than racism--of the right-wing is 'small government' and usually pro-business. Left-wing is centralized control and equal distribution of resources/income.
Are you a troll (asking a question, not accusing you of being one exactly)? Or are you a closet racist (a racist who doesn't want to reveal himself to be a racist) who wants to get freepers on board with you [this suspicion is largely due to your comments about Muslims; in general they could be a bad thing for Europe and the world, but individually there are many kind and productive Muslims in the United States and probably also in Europe--and Europeans/Old Worlders seem to have difficulty separating religion and culture from race (along with from each other)]?
If you define ethnicity as ancestry, the United States had the Soviet Union beat several times over, and had ancestries from more than just Europe, Central Asia, and North Asia.
I think Chavez is a dictator working within the guise of socialism while Saddam was an out and out dictator...
And Mexican isn’t a race in the sense you’re using the term.
. . as did Edward Bellamy, an American Baptist minister who cared little for the concept of separation of church and state, much less school and state.
He would probably be called a right-winger by today's standards, too.
And why do you consider yourself to be conservative (right-wing), then?
In point of fact, the whole classification of political tendencies into ‘right wing’ and ‘left wing’ has, since about the mid 1920’s become nothing but a propaganda tool for the left.
‘Right wing’ as a practical matter means opposing internationalist socialism
(whether the formal International led by the Soviet Communist Party, or the UN as ultimate arbiter, let’s make the whole world into Sweden sort of international socialism that one finds among granola munching hemp-wearers near and on American university campuses).
Realizing that that is the functional definition, and any other usage has an element of propaganda in it, there no contradiction between recognizing that on the one hand the Nazis were, as their party name proclaimed, socialists—they instituted a command economy, exerting more state control over the economy than even the most stringent controls ever instituted by the British Labour Party or any Social Democratic or Socialist party in the Nordic countries—and on on the other, because they were nationalists, and thus opposed to internationalist socialism, were ‘right wing’.
It would serve American conservatives well to repudiate the whole notion of ‘right wing’ v. ‘left wing’, by heaping scorn on the actual usage.
Curiously, what now passes for the ‘left’ in America has more in common with the Nazis than with Marxist Communism: there is an obsession with identity politics, racial classification and the like (albeit not issuing forth in mass murder as under the Nazis); an irrational romanticization of nature; no insistance on state *ownership* of the means of production; and (if one looks closely) more reliance on Nietzsche than Marx.
That's sort of the point you're not getting. Freepers (at least a fair amount of them) consider the Nazis to have been socialists not only because that's what their party name says, but because many of Hitler's actions and views were socialist. Hitler and his Reich actually demonstrated socialist principles; they didn't merely use the word socialist in their title.
Nazism is a form of fascism, and fascism is a form of socialism. Benito Mussilini was a fascist, but the Italisn Fascists never turned Jews over to the Nazis, and the Holoaust only came to Italy when Germany invaded.
Communism, too, is a form of socialism.
By “socialism,” I mean an economy that is state-oriented. It’s opposite is “capitalism,” which refers to a market-oriented economy.
Most real-world economies, today, are a mix of socialism and capitalism.
The modern “Welfare State” is generally democratic and somewhat libertarian. It allows a degree of consumer sovereignty in that people can spend the money their allowed to have as they choose. Even so, the welfare state taxes and redistributes (as entitlments) a large percent of income. Insofar as housing, health services, education and so forth, everybody is more or less equal. But, you get to pick out what color shirt you wear.
Where authoritarianism ends and freedom begins in the modern welfare state isn’t clear. Is it at a tax rate of 62.5 percent?
I think most people wouldn’t mind the mixed economy if the tax rate isn’t so very high and if the services provided by the government were of reasonably high quality, especially if they had some choices in such matters as their family doctor and the teachers of their children.
Now, if Nazism is s form of socialism, does this mean Nazism is left-wing?
To try to collapse economic freedom and personal freedom into one political spectrum isn’t possible.
The democratic form of socialism is usually tolerant of privacy, a degree of individual choice, freedom of inquiry, different cultural values, and peaceful coexistence of nations. Democratic socialism is not totalitarian.
Therefore, when you contrast communism and fascism , and especially nazism, to democratic socialism, you would say the totalitarian varieties of socialism are “right wing” and the democratic varieties are “left wing.”
BUT ... what about a liberal, democratic, capitalistic society (think of Switzerland)? How could you say capitalism and nazism are both right wing, when capitalism is the opposite of nazism BOTH in the economic orientation of society and in personal liberty?
So, we Free Democrats, Civic Party members and Market Liberals of the world object to being called “right-wing” when the Nazis are right-wing.
Here’s what Ronald Reagan said about left-right thinking. He said it was a false choice. The real choice is Up-Down. Up toward freedom in all human relationships, or down to totalitarianism.
The Pournelle chart is just silly. Only someone indoctrinated by the modern pro socialist media would claim that communism somehow more rational than Nazism.
Certainly the Nazism of the 1930s looks a bit superstitious to early 21st century people. They followed some now discreditted scientific theories of race. That is no more irrational than the discredited scientific theories of the communist and socialist.
That is what solves this issue. There are statists and non-statists. What rationale one uses for ones statism is only window dressing.
Good suggestion.
When carried to the extreme, almost any political or social movement can be characterized as totalitarian. This is a favorite tool of propagandists, who are adept at stretching things to absurd dimensions. That's how people who oppose affirmative action on principle get thrown into the same bucket of slime with racists and neo-Nazis. It's how conservatives who favor prayer in public school get branded as religious fascists. It's a question of degree, not direction.
Exactly. The chart was obviously created with certain preconceptions which are discredited upon serious reflection.
By every definition of socialism, yes they were.
Nazism is a socialist form of government.
Hitler's speeches show that he thought that the Bolshevists were not Socialist enough.
***********
"And if we ask who was responsible for our misfortune, then we must inquire who profited by our collapse. And the answer to that question is the "Banks and Stock Exchanges are more flourishing than ever before." We were told that capitalism would be destroyed, and when we ventured to remind one or other of these "famous statesmen" and said "Don't forget that Jews too have capital," then the answer will now be destroyed, the whole people will now be free. We are not fighting Jewish or Christian capitalism, we are fighting every capitalism: we are making the people completely free."
"While now in Soviet Russia the millions are ruined and are dying, Chicherin - and with him a staff of over 200 Soviet Jews - travels by express train through Europe, visits the cabarets, watches naked dancers perform for his pleasure, lives in the finest hotels, and does himself better than the millions whom once you thought you must fight as 'bourgeois.' The 400 Soviet Commissars of Jewish nationality - they do not suffer; the thousands upon thousands of sub-Commissars - they do not suffer. No! all the treasures which the 'proletarian' in his madness took from the 'bourgeoisie' in order to fight so-called capitalism - they have all gone into their hands. Once the worker appropriated the purse of the landed proprietor who gave him work, he took the rings, the diamonds and rejoiced that he had now got the treasures which before only the 'bourgeoisie' possessed. But in his hands they are dead things - they are veritable death-gold. They are no profit to him. He is banished into his wilderness and one cannot feed oneself on diamonds. For a morsel of bread he gives millions in objects of value. But the bread is in the hands of the State Central Organization and this is in the hands of the Jews: so everything, everything that the common man thought that he was winning for himself, flows back again to his seducers."
"So long therefore as the Socialist idea is coined only by men who see in it a means for disintegrating a nation, so long can they rest in peace .... But it will be a sorry day for them when this Socialist idea is grasped by a Movement which unites with it the highest Nationalist pride, with Nationalist defiance, and thus places the Nation's Brain, its intellectual workers, on this ground." ."
"1. 'National' and 'social' are two identical conceptions. It was only the Jew who succeeded, through falsifying the social idea and turning it into Marxism, not only in divorcing the social idea from the national, but in actually representing them as utterly contradictory. That aim he has in fact achieved. At the founding of this Movement we formed the decision that we would give expression to this idea of ours of the identity of the two conceptions: despite all warnings, on the basis of what we had come to believe, on the basis of the sincerity of our will, we christened it 'National Socialist.' We said to ourselves that to be 'national' means above everything to act with a boundless and all-embracing love for the people and, if necessary, eve to die for it. And similarly to be 'social' means so to build up the State and the community of the people that every individual acts in the interest of the community of the people and must be to such an extent convinced of the goodness, of the honorable straightforwardness of this community of the people as to be ready to die for it. -----------Adolf Hitler, Speech of April 12, 1921
you’re wrong.
http://www.amazon.com/Liberal-Fascism-American-Mussolini-Politics/dp/0385511841
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