>>Well he’s pretty much dead wrong. Nazisim was a left wing movement through and through.
Yah, right. And 6 million Jews died of cholera. This is revisionist sanitizing claptrap. Needless to say, your assertion explains why capitalists massively funded fascism in Germany and elsewhere and why fascist thugs beat the crap out of leftists since time began. Apparently you didn’t live through the ‘60’s or under the tin horn right wing dictators we supported around the world. Read Anthony Sutton’s “Wall St. and the Rise of Hitler” for starters and Carrol Quigley’s “Tragedy and Hope” for finishers.
Conservatives absolutely must begin to understand the dynamic of why capitalism intrinsically evolves towards MONOPOLISM, i.e., “too big to fail”. That is exactly what happens when you gobble up the competition. Apparently capitalists, just like marxists, DON’T LIKE COMPETITION, which is the only thing that keeps them honest. Why there isn’t an ANTI-MONOPOLIST faction within conservatism is beyond me.
Conservatives trying to erect a barrier between themselves and the far right is a disingenuous attempt at spin doctoring their history that demonstrates the same level of intellectual rigor as we find behind “global warming”.
Interesting, you have to slam me as espousing revisionist history instead of actually making a point. Nobody has ever denied that the Nazis slaughtered jews. This is pretty similar to the communists in the U.S.S.R. slaughtering kulaks, etc in their period. You pick a scape goat and use them as a disposable tool for generating terror and deflecting blame.
I find it interesting that a party which avows clearly in their platform and stated objectives all the platitudes of the Left, is somehow not leftist. The whole justification for Nazis being right wing is that they opposed communists (and other softer socialist leftists). It doesn’t, however, happen to be valid. Yes, some capitalists did line up with the Nazis (as did much of the Left, as I mentioned and you ignored) but that was clearly because of the opposition to Communism. The other thing which complicates matters is that the concepts of ‘right’ and ‘left’ with respect to politics is very different in Europe. While it is true that industrialists in Germany backed up behind the Nazis, they came out of it being mere lackeys of the party. They also did it out of a choice between lesser evils. I’m not going to excuse them, but I can recognize their lack of good options.
Your understanding of capitalism is fairly minimal. Monopolies generally don’t prosper without government intervention. They fall because of their own issues and market pressures. There’s plenty of studies on this subject.
Of course I do find the comment ‘you didn’t live through the 60s’ as being particularly amusing. Does this imply that the U.S. was fascist in the 60s? Was Goldwater a fascist? Was Nixon a Fascist? (I’m hoping you consider these questions rhetorical, if not I’m left wondering the color of the sky in your world). How are the 60s relevant at all?
Since you’re convinced that the far right and conservatives have some sort of link, why don’t you explain it? I mean it must be self evident (heck with all those caps, it must be).
I mean sure the U.S. conservative wants a minimal government, just like the ‘far right’. Oh wait, that’s not true. The American conservative is dedicated to the rule of law, just like the ‘far right’, oh wait, that’s not true either. We conservatives like crony capitalism. Hmm, nope don’t like that either. Ok, I think I finally found one, we don’t like communism. Well the ‘far right’ doesn’t either but for a different reason. The ‘far right’ doesn’t like it because it’s a rival not an opposite.
The very origins of the terms “left” and ‘right” obscure an accurate description of political ideologies. The terms originate with first French General Assembly. Those supporting the old regime were seated at the right hand of the president of the Assembly. Those pushing for “change” were on the left.
As another poster suggested, and more accurate picture of political ideas would be a line upon which the farthest left would be the communists advocating state ownership of all goods and the means of production, perhaps just the right of that just a total monarchy in which the king (or emperor) owns the rights to everything but allows subjects day to day ownership subject to his pleasure, then fascists which allow private ownership but retain total control, and so on. Finally, on the far right are the anarchists which favor no government at all. In the scheme constitutionalists and libertarians far to the right of center.