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Posted on 10/27/2011 10:51:11 AM PDT by Chuckmorse
My co-host, liberalcommentator Dr. Patrick O Heffernan, raised this salient question during ourradio program The Fairness Doctrine. On October 26, we interviewed JoshuaRubenstein, the author of Leon Trotsky-A Revolutionary Life. Mr. Rubenstein mentionedwhat has become received wisdom which was that Stalin and the German Communistparty had helped to elect Hitler in 1933. I responded with the observation thatthe communists were probably motivated in their support for the Nazis by aninterest in turning Germany in a leftward political direction.
Rubenstein responded toPatricks follow-up question, in a condescending tone, that of course the Naziswere right-wing and that one should not be fooled by the word Socialist whichis part of the name of the National Socialist Nazi Party. Rubenstein based hisclaim that Nazism was right-wing on the claims that the Nazis were nationalistsand anti-Semites with the implication that these two principles should beconsidered as right-wing. This serious assertion, which constitutes conventionalthinking on the left, deserves a response.
Firstly, the right advocates,as I pointed out to Rubenstein, limited government and Hitler was not exactlyan advocate of limited government. The right understanding of nationalisminvolves an overall love of ones home country whether that country is theUnited States, Canada, Mexico etc. The left understanding of nationalism, onthe other hand, involves a love of the State. In this sense the left ishyper-nationalist as opposed to the more conservative nationalism. The leftviews the State as a redemptive force that should be empowered to changesociety and to literally change human nature through programs thatre-distribute wealth from the private earner and through bureaucracies made upof enlightened experts who would use the force of law to inveigh themselvesinto all matters of the private lives of the citizen.
This, obviously, describesNazism to a tee. This also clarifies why the Nazis were right-wing in thatthey were to the right of the Communists who sought total control by the Stateover all aspects of human life in their quest to establish a world ant colony,what they called a collective. The Nazis supported State Socialism, a highdegree of public ownership within a super state. The Communists supported WorldSocialism, what they euphemistically referred to as Internationalism, andoutright total ownership of all property and business. This is why Communism isto the left of Nazism and Nazism is to the right of Communism. Both ideologiesand both systems are, obviously, to the left of the American system ofindividual rights and private ownership.
The second piece of evidencepresented by Josh Rubenstein in his assertion that Nazism is right-wing, thatNazism is anti-Semitic is more complex. It should be noted that there are anti-Semitesand racists on both the left and the right and in this regard the left ishardly pure. As a matter of philosophy, the right rejects anti-Semitism andracism as these tendencies represent barnyard socialism as was noted byconservative philosopher Ayn Rand. Indeed anti-Semitism and racism assigncollective characteristics to groups of people based upon their ancestry andthis idea runs contrary to the core conservative tenet which is respect for theinherent rights of the individual. Judaism and Christianity, when viewed asphilosophies, also reject racism as the Judeo-Christian understanding is thateach and every individual is uniquely created in the image of God and shouldnot be in any way viewed as part of any group. This view explains in part why bothNazism and Communism were anti-Jewish and anti-Christian.
Furthermore, it should benoted, the father of Communism, Karl Marx, was a vicious anti-Semite who referredto Jews in his 1843 book On the Jewish Question as self-interested hucksterswho should be annihilated. Marx also profoundly influenced Hitler how creditshim with providing the foundation of his political education in his autobiographyMein Kampf.
And the NSDAP political platform of the 1920s and 1930s is full of socialist planks of the sort familiar to Democrats and OWSers today.
“Nazis are right wing” is a big lie that the Left started pushing immediately post-WWII, because they had to. Any thinking person saw the many similarities between the Communists and the Nazis, and with both to the socialists. For more on that, see the Hayek quote on my FR profile page. It’s the 3rd one, two paragraphs long.
National Socialist German Workers’ Party.
My gosh, you take out the word German, stick in Democrat and it all makes sense. The National Socialist Democrat Workers Party.
The Nazis fought the German Communists for control of Germany, not unlike a “turf war” between two street gangs.
Forget about the Left or Right canard when talking to the convertable.
Ask, what systems are most Statist? The answer to that puts the North Koreans at one extreme followed by Soviets, facists, and socialist democracies. Dictatorships and monarchies slide up and down in between based on the person in charge.
At the other end of the spectrum you have a man living alone in nature. Next to that are loose agreements of confederation, communal property (roads) etc., working up to 1776 America.
And they call the GOP Nazis? It is to laugh.
I think the psychiatrists call it 'projection'.
From April 1924 until late February 1925 the SA was known as the Frontbann to try to circumvent Bavaria's ban on the Nazi Party and its organs (instituted after the abortive Beer Hall putsch of November 1923). The SA carried out numerous acts of violence against competing socialist groups throughout the 1920s, typically in minor street-fights called Zusammenstöße ('collisions'). As the Nazis evolved from an extremist political party to the unquestioned leaders of the government, the SA was no longer needed for its original purpose: the acquisition of political power. An organization that could inflict more subtle terror and obedience was needed, and the SA (which had been born out of street violence and beer hall brawls) was simply not capable of doing so. The SA also posed a threat to the Nazi leadership and to Hitler's goal of co-opting the Reichswehr to his ends, as Röhm's ideal was to incorporate the "antiquated" German army into a new "people's army": the SA. The younger SS was more suited to this task and began to take over the previously held roles of the SA.
In Europe, Hitler was considered right wing in that he was only slightly to the right of Stalin. European ideas of the political spectrum differ from ours and we should point out that fact.
Actually, that is a brilliant argument! I guess that Trotsky gets a pass because, whereas Hitler had a country of his own with which to oppose Stalin, Leon only had a Mexican villa.
Now that I think about it, they were like an evil version of the Three Little Bears. Hitler's socialism was too nationalist, Trotsky's socialism was too internationalist, but the Left finds Stalin's socialism to be just right.
LLS
And they call the GOP Nazis? It is to laugh
Yep. They call GOP Nazis but most don’t know what that really means. It would mean they would have had to study history and of course we know most didn’t (they studied Yoga instead to prepare them for the world). Yep, the masters give them the catch word/phrase and they are off to “Oz”.
Google National Socialism and ludwig Von Mises and read the paper on National Socialism, it defines the differences between communism and the NAZI’s.
Basically NAZI’s believe in private ownership with total control by the state and communism believes everything is owned by the state.
WOW - GREAT find.....thx
Good grief, left and right in Europe is vastly different than left right in the USA. Both the European left/right are to the left of USA and therefore the Socialist Nazi party is certainly to the left of the GOP but given Barry, I am not sure the democrats and the Nazi party are too far apart.
People have come to say that Nazism is right-wing 1) because of the violent street-fighting between Nazis and nationalists on the one hand and Communists and socialists on the other, 2) because nationalist, religious, and aristocratic elements gave support to the Nazis in their struggle against the Communists and socialists, and 3) because Nazis exalted nation and race above class and internationalism, and 4) because they opposed the Bolshevik Revolution which had come to be seen as a left-wing phenomenon -- indeed as the touchstone for the left -- by many people.
None of these justifications are quite as iron-clad or cast in concrete as they might appear to many people. Leninists and Stalinists opposed undoubtedly left-wing Trotskyites and Social Democrats as much as they opposed Nazis, nationalists, or conservatives. The remaining nationalists and religious groups in the USSR -- even a few surviving aristocrats -- supported Stalin, who made use of national and religious themes in the war with Hitler. Leftists don't have a record of always opposing nationalist and always supporting internationalist movements: much depends on the other policies that such movements supported. And Lenin's Revolution was by no means supported by all groups that saw themselves as being on the left. All the same, though, when there's a titanic, apocalyptic struggle going on, people tend to assume that the forces struggling to destroy each other are at opposite ends of the spectrum.
You could respond that Nazism's celebration of the state and Volk above the individual puts it on the left, rather than the right, but you have to understand that the European right was different from the American right. It was more monarchical and aristocratic, more focused on the nation, state, and tradition than today's American conservatives were. For that matter, US conservatism in the mid-twentieth century wasn't always as devoted to individual freedom as many claim today.
Both left and right today tend to portray themselves in angelic terms and their opponents in demonic terms. So the right sees itself as freedom-loving, and the left as dictatorial. The left sees itself as pacific, vegetarian, non-sexist, anti-racist, anti-homophobic, anti-hierarchical, sweetly reasonable, tolerant and kind, and the right as the barbaric opposite of all that. A short study of history should convince you that these self-descriptions really don't fit what left and right have meant at various times in history. One can't gerrymander history so as to put all the good on one's own side and all the evil on the other.
There is no question the Nazi and communist’s party were the left no question about it.Just like real racism belongs to them too.Just listen the the OWS for anti semitism and let’s not forget that the Civil war was really one between the anti slavery party( later known as Republican party) and the Democrats who were slave owners in the south.
“Left” vs. “Right”, it all depends upon whether you are looking from the stage or from the audience.
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