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Posted on 10/04/2002 11:31:48 AM PDT by Republican_Strategist
(Editor’s note: This was a hastily prepared reply.)
Being the good liberal that he is, Chris has to start off with nothing short of blatantly hypocritical attack by trying to characterize the usage of Hitler as some sort of political ploy by the American Right that unjustly scorns those kind liberal policies like sending the ATF to confiscate firearms despite the inherent right in the U.S. Constitution that clearly states in shall not be infringed, welfare that basically consists of the state stealing from citizens to pay for those that produce nothing, and public schools where America’s future generations bear witness to teachers “coming out of the closet” to proclaim their perverse sexual activities. Perhaps gun control and welfare are similar to nazi programs, but I doubt even the nazis would have stooped so low as to let queer teachers proclaim their repulsive acts in front of school children.
Chris being unable to deny the ideological parallels between the various ideologies like Nazism, Fascism, & Liberalism tried pedantry and tried arguing semantically the definitions. Webster’s Dictionary defines fascism as being, “a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.” He seems to be the one that fails to understand that because there is a dictatorial leader of such a government that it doesn’t mean you have proven such governments to be rightist nor did you prove they weren’t socialist either. It is not a choice of a or b, but more to the point it can be a & b.
Chris seems a bit puzzled and asked, “How is it that socialism equals fascism under those definitions?” Let’s do a comparison…
Fascism: a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.
And…
Socialism: any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods.
There is nothing contradicting when comparing the two definitions and he operates off the assumption that there is such an existing contradiction. This is mostly said out of ignorance for he doesn’t understand the foundation of fascism and its founder’s political ideology prior to founding his own, which was a branch of Marxism.
Mussolini, who was in his early years one of Italy's most prominent Marxist theoreticians and an intimate of Lenin. His well-known appellation of Il Duce ("the leader") was gained while he was still a member of Italy's "Socialist" (Marxist) party. He broke with the Socialist party in 1914 only over the issue of whether to join the war against Austria and Germany. Mussolini correctly foresaw that the Austrians could not win and wanted parts of Austrian territory for Italy after the war. He therefore advocated joining the Allies, which Italy soon did.
He never renounced his Socialist convictions, however and put forward an extremely Leftist election manifesto in 1919. He also came to power by essentially revolutionary means (the march on Rome) and even in power never ceased inveighing against "plutocrats" and the like. He also introduced into Italy many advanced features of a welfare State, leading to a steep decline in Italian infant mortality, tuberculosis etc . Also, Mussolini's famous slogan Mussolini ha sempre ragione ("Mussolini is always right") may seem merely comical now but at the time it embodied a definition of the truth that is as convenient as any Leftist could wish.
Besides his ignorance of the foundation of fascism, a problem exists with his self-serving definitions crafted around a narrow-minded claim that socialism can be equated with democracy. His presumptuous claim in light of the definition is truly mind-boggling for it makes clear that you governmental or collective ownership when democratically you would expect individual ownership by people. With government/collective you have to crush all dissent. His logic is absurd. He tops it all of slandering freepers want to crush dissent when he at the beginning admitted liberal policies like gun control that crush dissent.
Ann Coulter said, “Liberals have no real arguments – none that the American people would find palatable, anyway. So in lieu of actual argument, they accuse conservatives of every vice that pops into their heads, including their own mind-boggling elitism.” It perfectly sums up Chris’s following slippery slope of outlandish, untrue accusations that aren’t proven my his usage of dictionary definitions and attributes it all to two prominent conservative figures like Bill O’Reilly and Rush Limbaugh. He goes on to quote liberal and of course he says that is the freeper hero. This is pure demagoguery and he doesn’t have the slightest clue how argumentation and logical reasoning work. A liberal through and through.
He yet again asks, “Again, let us consult Random house definition of communism: "Communism, n. A theory or system of social organization based on the holding of all property in common, actual ownership being ascribed to the community as a whole or to the state." If fascism is for the control of all property by a single man while communism is for the control of all property by the community as a whole or the state (which in many, many cases represents the community as a whole as in the United States) how do they lead to the same result? Who is the ignorant one here, my fellow Freepers?”
The error is obvious. Fascism is simply an autocratic government and the fact you have dictatorial figure heading that government doesn’t mean that you don’t have the government ownership. He, in the most ridiculous manner, takes an innocuous phrasing of fascism often being helmed by dictator as falsely assert some singularity when it fact it is and remains collectively owned by the state. With Coulter’s quote fresh in your mind, let me give you his following comment, “The political ideology of people on the right in America is much more closely related to authoritarian fascism than that of liberals could ever be.” Yet he remains part of an ideology that slaughtered 41 million unborn babies and counting.
He adds, “In terms of the political spectrum in which on the extreme left we have anarchy (no government at all)…” This is so horribly inaccurate that you almost want to pity the poor fellow. The extreme left is advocating for example, socialized medicine and Chris seems to think that is anarchy, which is defined as, “absence of government.” Talk about you cosmic distortions. He follows it up he just once again accuses the American Right and its extremity as being Fascism. So much for argument.
“Freepers in general advocating fervent American nationalism, group identity, white roots and undying support for an authoritarian man who stole the presidency, is more in calling with fascism or "national socialism." Yes, freepers are patriotic and freely admit it and they can be proud of that. Group identity? Nah, isn’t it a online group for conservatives? White roots? Sounds like he is playing the race card, but I guess it isn’t worth mentioning America’s roots are largely to do with our European ancestry. I do feel Bush is too liberal for me, but this calling him a Fascist is patent nonsense. Bush won according to the laws of this country and he was elected by the electoral college and Gore’s failed coup doesn’t constitute an election stolen.
The rant continues, “Freepers and people on the extreme right now in unlawful control of this nation advocate "America is a Christian nation" and enforce their will upon the populace by ensuring or proposing that prayer is allowed in schools, that the Ten Commandments be posted, having Jesus Day, and teaching creationism. For all of their divine reliance on the Constitution, it is politically inconvenient for them to have to mention the separation of church and state and the first amendment¹s proclamation that the United States shall establish no religion.”
I’m sorry, but Bush was elected and his presidency is wholly lawful and to assert otherwise just goes to show you how dishonest he really is. America is a Christian nation, founded on the Judeo-Christian belief system, and for example, the fact that our government was oriented around the bible. School prayer should be allowed for to disallow would be a violation of the first amendment and its allowance for freedom of religion. To advocate the opposite would be enforcing a unconstitutional fomenting hatred of religion that unlawfully controls the freedom of people.
Ten Commandments
Thou shalt have no other gods before me Thou shalt not worship any graven image Thou shalt not take God's name in vain Remember the Sabbath to keep it holy Honor thy father and thy mother Thou shalt not kill Thou shalt not commit adultery Thou shalt not steal Thou shalt not bear false witness Thou shalt not covet
Only some atheistic bigot could pretend like such a thing is some how a tragedy. He truly shows liberals are the enemies of religious freedom and free speech. He absolutely wants to unlawfully control people and then he asserts that that is what people on the right want to do. This is nothing short of the height of liberal dishonesty. Stealing his quote by Hitler, "If you repeat a lie long enough it becomes the truth." It wasn’t even an accurate quote, but accuracy was hardly his intent and that quotes bears strikingly similar to liberal advocacy. I suppose it is perfectly acceptable if liberals teach a fairy tale like evolution, wholly unsubstantiated, and then attack rightists for teaching creationism.
He ends is diatribe by trying to use the old liberal lie that Thomas Jefferson’s mentioning of the phrase “separation of church and state,” which never appears in the constitution was never meant to be abused the way liberals have done so as to use the government to implement atheism. He takes an establishment clause in the first amendment and then twists it to unrecognizable proportions that completely misconstrue it whereby he uses it to prohibit religion in violation of the first amendment.
The inflammatory rhetoric ends with, “By flooding websites, intimidating vote counters, manipulating polls and posting private information about real and imagined enemies of the Freepers on the internet in order to quash any form of valid dissent and the democratic process and thus the rights of others, the freepers have readily and deservedly distinguished themselves as the foremost advocates of fascism in this nation. It is time to correctly apply the definitions of dictionaries and political scientists where they properly belong: Free Republic equals fascist advocacy.”
Flooding web sites? Do you mean creating a web site? Ah, so freepers don’t have the right to exercise their opinions. Or do you mean by taking part in other online forums thereby once again exercising speech is again being admonished by this self-righteous, hypocritical fascist.
Intimidating vote counters? Obvious reference to the Gore Coup in Florida whereby Miami-Dade decided to violate Florida’s Sunshine laws that make it clear manual recounts must be public and cannot be held in secret. Even the New York Times threatened to sue over that one and they are hardly champions of conservatism. I’m sure 15 republicans, congressional aides and such, in Khakis, were a frightfully unimaginable scene.
Manipulating polls? He means taking part in a poll is equal to manipulation?
The rest was just unfounded accusations. His whole argument seems to be that conservative activism that he wants to squash equals fascism? He makes no sense what so ever and in fact indicts himself as fascist that wants to exert control over everyone. He could have just saved us the trouble of trying to go into length on the discussion because it all comes out to say, “conservatives are fascist because I say so.” He’s just angry because liberals have for years tried slandering republicans with such slanderous comparisons and truth be known Hitler was a leftist.
I’ll end with a befitting quote from Coulter, “Serious political debate evidently consists of randomly accusing your opponent of being a hateful bigot or having some vague ephemeral association with corporate crooks. Those are good arguments.” And, “Liberals also have many important and substantive backup arguments such as they hate Republicans.”
“Serious political dialogue becomes the exception when political discourse is littered with ad hominem land mines.”
Well, no. You might want to look up someone called Moses, from way before the birth of Christ.
So close your eyes and think of Christmas.
You have an immensely vivid imagination. It is no more rooted to the reality of Evangelical Christians than Hillary Clinton's mad muttering about the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy.
I wasn't thinking of Evangelicals so much as the sort of FR poster who thinks school prayer is dandy so long as it plugs Judeo-Christianity (but never Islam!), or who wants the law never to confict with the Ten Commandments.
I have known some Evangelical Christians who were both tolerable and tolerant; not all of them are that way, unfortunately.
Well, the Nazi's and Fascists were on the left. These Socialists stood just to the right of communism.
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"[Adolf Hitler on Nazism and socialism:] "Each activity and each need of the individual will thereby be regulated by the party as the representative of the general good. There will be no license, no free space, in which the individual belongs to himself. This is Socialism--not such trifles as the private possession of the means of production. Of what importance is that if I range men firmly within a discipline they cannot escape? Let them then own land or factories as much as they please. The decisive factor is that the State, through the party, is supreme over them, regardless whether they are owners or workers. All that, you see, is unessential. Our Socialism goes far deeper."
"Why need we trouble to socialize banks and factories? We socialize human beings."
Adolf Hitler to Hermann Rauschning, quoted in The Ominous Parallels, by Leonard Peikoff C. 1982
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Any Questions?
Maybe you can list some real examples of these conservatives?
The right-left model is something that the totalitarians use to describe themselves. Fascists on the right, communists on the left. I'm willing to accept their description of themselves. But, as you say, there is little practical difference between the two.
My point is that the old assumption that conservatives and libertarians are somewhere right of center of that continuum is false; the idea that believers in democracy are at the center, halfway between fascism and communism, is false. If you believe in liberty, you are not part of that model. If communism is on the left and fascism on the right, all that is at the "center" is just some blend of the two, which are not that different in any case.
Classic liberals should not allow themselves to be so characterized as "center" or "right of center".
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