I therefore ask DT and 1^st of 2 (represenating the political left and right, unless I miss my guess) to examine Considering the Political Spectrum (or, 'Why Hitler was a Left-Winger') and report back to us on it. Everyone else please refrain from comment (though please do feel free to examine the article) until DT and 1^st of 2 have had a chance to respond (or decline to respond). Then the free-for-all may begin.

--Baloo

P.S.: My own comment until the above two persons respond is limited to this: Many "Right wing" groups do not favor increased individual freedom and smaller government at all, it's just that their design for the "perfect society" differs from that of the perceived Left wing colleagues.

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"Politicians and diapers should be changed regularly, for the same reason."
--(Unknown)
Come Hither and Yawn...

By his definitions, with extreme individuality on the right and collectivism/statism on the left*, Fascism would HAVE to be seen as a Far-Left concept.

The only quibble I have is with his thoughts on religion as a replacement for the state. While it is true that "modern religion" in the USA is not as threatening as the Government can be... that's only because they are not being ALLOWED to be.

He dismisses the past problems with such an idea with the traditional "oh, but that can't happen here today." I disagree.

*neither will work at the expense of the other.

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Calvin: "No efficiency, no accountability... I tell you, Hobbes, it's a lousy way to run a Universe." -- Bill Watterson

Anyway, I'll read it ASAP. Then I shall post.

Was that the most reactionary piece of literature you've ever read or what?

Let's start with where he places Republics. That's an obvious error. In a Republic, you place power in elected governments. In a Democracy, you place power in the hands of the people at large. How he puts them where he does, I don't get.

This reactionary also has no understanding of socialism. When I read that section, I immediately realized what was going on here. If he has even heard of Leon Trotsky, I'd be surprised. What I particularly love is how he talks about how superior republicanism is, then proceeds to talk about the evils of socialism (which is the purest form of republicanism). Classic.

One of the great misconceptions of ignoramuses like this "gentleman" is that the state is seperate from the people. This is not a monarchy. This is not an oligarchy. And it sure as hell ain't the United States of America. In a socialist government, the people ARE the state. The Soviets, for example. Those were formed not by the government, but by the people. They then became the state. That is why socialism can only come about through revolution (which is why the "communist" countries of Eastern Europe, even Tito's Yugoslavia, were deformed worker's states, emphasis on the word deformed).

Moreover, let's attack the basic folly of this propagandist and most people in general, definition of the left and right.

My favourite definition came from a Rage Against the Machine website.

"Left-wing politics are usually those concerning the working class, the enviroment and the general restoration and preservation of integrity and truth."

Now, most of you rightists will disagree, but I like it :-)

Anyway, political spectrums are relatively useless. Economically, the programs of the SEP are most definitely involving the government. As such, we're the complete antithesis of the Libertarian Party. But when it comes to issues of foreign policy, and many social issues (ie, immigration, abortion) we're right in line with the LP. Now, we're the far left and they're the far right. Does that make sense?

The SEP demands that the government stay out of our entertainment. The Republicans would disagree. Now, considering we're recognized as being on the left and they're recognized as being on the right (see, I can use the reactionary's methodology) that would mean that the left is based around keeping the government out of our lives and the right is based around it controlling it.

As it is, the author of the piece of propaganda Baloo posted is clearly a reactionary who holds some very extreme views (notice his hatred of the black nation seeping through? not surprising, as the dialectic tells us capitalism is the logical next step of feudalism which proceeds from slavery, so he's probably a big supporter of South Carolina) and has no idea what he's talking about. He openly admits he is uneducated, and that shines through in his writing style. Moreover, he seems to be definitely pushing a political agenda, has no idea how the class system works, and is unaware of the intricacies of politics. His condemnation of compromise is flagrant and unintelligent, as are his complete disunderstanding of Marxism (he misdefines communism and socialism, and does not even recognize Trotskyism, Stalinism, Maoism, Gueverism, or the other different facets) and Hitlerism in general.

To be bluntly honest, I dislike having to even read such pieces. However, it prevents me from having to work on my responses much, so I don't mind that part. As it stands, I am on the extreme far left of the political spectrum, as is the SEP, and I'm not afraid of denigrating into fascism anytime soon. I find the Republicans much scarer.

Thank you Baloo for proving to me, once again, that the US can produce more people who are completely misinformed and uneducated than any other country on earth.

Back to reading DEA reports on the KLA for me.

I suppose he's not interested in the theories of socialism, in favor of what he sees as what happens when you put it into practice. (Yes, I know, no truly socialist government has yet appeared, but that doesn't matter to him.) Since the commonly claimed 'socialist utopias' are all, in reality, rather unpleasant places to live at the moment, there is some small logic to this thinking, though the fact that these governments are not truly socialist does invalidate his argument.

And scattered in amongst the rhetoric ARE slivers of sense, which makes it all the more worrisome. I mean, okay, he doesn't like environmentalists and animal-rights folks. I don't like some of them, either. Is it really necessary to spend millions of dollars and move an airport facility to protect SEVEN FLIES? (this happened recently.) There's conservation, and then there's extremism. You simply don't go busting animals out of disease research labs. What if that cute monkey is carrying ebola? And how is a tropical monkey going to survive in the American wilderness, anyway?
That said, there's a LOT of unnecessary testing and replicative research being done today. There's no need to use 5000 rabbits to tell us how much NyQuil it would take to kill someone.

The guy's a bit rabid on being against population control, too. I don't see how allowing unrestricted access to condoms is morally equivalent to Auschwitz.

And then he talks about free speech and porn.. (expletive,deleted), that's old.. there is STILL no established link between porn and sex crimes or violence. Never has been. I'd bet money there never will be. Put it this way. 40% of convicted sex offenders have read/viewed pornography. But 95% have read the Bible. So? There's no causality there. Probably 99.9% of American men have viewed some sort of porn. What's the percentage of sex offenders in the population? .01%? And how many of those are women?

DT. You may be right. At least righter than this guy. Since they never taught political theory in my school, I don't know enough about true socialism to say so and pretty much all the books in the library are too slanted, one way or the other.

What's the definitive work on your point-of-view? Perhaps I can fit it into my budget this month.

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Calvin: "No efficiency, no accountability... I tell you, Hobbes, it's a lousy way to run a Universe." -- Bill Watterson

And actually First, the Bible itself has a lot of porn in it. I reccomend specifically the Pentatauch. It has pretty much every form of sex, perverted and otherwise, you could ask for. Good stuff.

There is quite a gap between statism and collectivism which is conveniently ignored. Fascism is statist, however it is as close to being collectivist as DT is close to being sane.

If one looks at Nazi Germany, the means of production remained in private hands. Hitler could never have become Chancellor without the support, either overt or tacit, of these industrialists.

Socialism is much more complex ideal than he presents; it is not communism, collectivism nor does it advocate that all the means of production be transfered over to state control.

Consequently his arguments are reactionary and are full of beans.

And I have a real problem with quoting a single book, The Ominous Parallels, to make such far reaching conclusions. Apparently reading a few Ayn Rand books does not a historian make.

coo coo.

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Ohh, so Mother Nature needs a favor? Well maybe she should have thought of that when she was besetting us with droughts, and plagues and poison monkeys. Nature started the fight for survival and now she wants to quit because she's losing...well I say "Hard Cheese"!
~C. Montgomery Burns

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"Politicians and diapers should be changed regularly, for the same reason."
--(Unknown)
Come Hither and Yawn...