How we know Hitler was right wing.

[Saigon]

Alright, so how does a spectrum of totalitarian regimes measure anything useful?

There were some wonderful comments on this earlier, but essentially they seek to remind us of the dangers of extremism.

When someone starts talking about Marxism, it is important that young people know something about Stalin, Mao and Tito, so they know what can happen and what to guard themselves against.

When someone starts talking about Nationalism or Fascism, it is equally important that young people know something about Antonescu, Franco and Hitler so they know what to guard themselves against.

 

[Avatar4321]

Alright, so how does a spectrum of totalitarian regimes measure anything useful?

There were some wonderful comments on this earlier, but essentially they seek to remind us of the dangers of extremism.

When someone starts talking about Marxism, it is important that young people know something about Stalin, Mao and Tito, so they know what can happen and what to guard themselves against.

When someone starts talking about Nationalism or Fascism, it is equally important that young people know something about Antonescu, Franco and Hitler so they know what to guard themselves against.

The dangers of extremism?

Again How does being for limited government in the extreme lead to fascism?

And yes, I know limited government is an American concept. This is America.

 

[Quantum Windbag]

Alright, so how does a spectrum of totalitarian regimes measure anything useful?

There were some wonderful comments on this earlier, but essentially they seek to remind us of the dangers of extremism.

When someone starts talking about Marxism, it is important that young people know something about Stalin, Mao and Tito, so they know what can happen and what to guard themselves against.

When someone starts talking about Nationalism or Fascism, it is equally important that young people know something about Antonescu, Franco and Hitler so they know what to guard themselves against.

The problem with the way you lay out the spectrum is it normalizes half of the extremists by arguing that the only dangers come from totalitarian governments.

 

[Saigon]

Alright, so how does a spectrum of totalitarian regimes measure anything useful?

There were some wonderful comments on this earlier, but essentially they seek to remind us of the dangers of extremism.

When someone starts talking about Marxism, it is important that young people know something about Stalin, Mao and Tito, so they know what can happen and what to guard themselves against.

When someone starts talking about Nationalism or Fascism, it is equally important that young people know something about Antonescu, Franco and Hitler so they know what to guard themselves against.

The dangers of extremism?

Again How does being for limited government in the extreme lead to fascism?

And yes, I know limited government is an American concept. This is America.

I don't see any connection between limited government and fascism.

There are dozens of elements of right wing government that have no connection to fascism, because the gulf between Centre Right politics and Fascist politics is so vast, but when we look at regimes like those of Pinochet, Cristiani or Rios Montte, there are also regimes that were capitalist, pro-Western and yet clearly drifting towards Fascism.

 

[bigrebnc1775]

BigReb -

If you are going to posting Hitler's quotes and ask if they sound right wing, then you also need to consider quotes like this one:

"In the years 1913 and 1914, I… expressed the conviction that the question of the future of the German nation was the question of destroying Marxism."

"In the economic sphere Communism is analogous to democracy in the political sphere."

"The Marxists will march with democracy until they succeed in indirectly obtaining for their criminal aims the support of even the national intellectual world, destined by them for extinction."

"Marxism itself systematically plans to hand the world over to the Jews."

"The Jewish doctrine of Marxism rejects the aristocratic principle of Nature and replaces the eternal privilege of power and strength by the mass of numbers and their dead weight."


Of course Hitler does not sound like Reagan or Ike - that does not mean that he was not right wing. There is a massive distance between the centre right and the extreme right.

Conservatives should not see this as an insult and rush to deny what is obviously an accepted historical fact - Hitler has nothing whatsoever to do with modern Conservatism, anymore so than Stalin has anything to do with modern liberalism.

1. If you're going to respond to me use the quote function, YOU DON'T SEEM TO HAVE A PROBLEM DOING IT SOME OF THE TIME.

2That wasn't a Hitler quote that came from the 25 points of Hitlers German Socialist Worker's Party

 

[Saigon]

BigRegb -

I believe the quotes here are all from Hitler himself, but either way, there are DOZENS of quotes from Hitler attacking the left wing. He absolutely despised Marxism and everything related to it.

i'll check the quotes later.

 

[bigrebnc1775]

BigRegb -

I believe the quotes here are all from Hitler himself, but either way, there are DOZENS of quotes from Hitler attacking the left wing. He absolutely despised Marxism and everything related to it.

i'll check the quotes later.

You're confusing an agenda and thinking it's just quotes.

25 points of Hitlers German Socialist Worker's Party
The 25 Points of Hitler's Nazi Party

1. We demand the union of all Germans in a Great Germany on the basis of the principle of self-determination of all peoples.

2. We demand that the German people have rights equal to those of other nations; and that the Peace Treaties of Versailles and St. Germain shall be abrogated.

3. We demand land and territory (colonies) for the maintenance of our people and the settlement of our surplus population.

4. Only those who are our fellow countrymen can become citizens. Only those who have German blood, regardless of creed, can be our countrymen. Hence no Jew can be a countryman.

5. Those who are not citizens must live in Germany as foreigners and must be subject to the law of aliens.

6. The right to choose the government and determine the laws of the State shall belong only to citizens. We therefore demand that no public office, of whatever nature, whether in the central government, the province, or the municipality, shall be held by anyone who is not a citizen.

We wage war against the corrupt parliamentary administration whereby men are appointed to posts by favor of the party without regard to character and fitness.

7. We demand that the State shall above all undertake to ensure that every citizen shall have the possibility of living decently and earning a livelihood. If it should not be possible to feed the whole population, then aliens (non-citizens) must be expelled from the Reich.

8. Any further immigration of non-Germans must be prevented. We demand that all non-Germans who have entered Germany since August 2, 1914, shall be compelled to leave the Reich immediately.

9. All citizens must possess equal rights and duties.

10. The first duty of every citizen must be to work mentally or physically. No individual shall do any work that offends against the interest of the community to the benefit of all.

Therefore we demand:

11. That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.

12. Since every war imposes on the people fearful sacrifices in blood and treasure, all personal profit arising from the war must be regarded as treason to the people. We therefore demand the total confiscation of all war profits.

13. We demand the nationalization of all trusts.

14. We demand profit-sharing in large industries.

15. We demand a generous increase in old-age pensions.

16. We demand the creation and maintenance of a sound middle-class, the immediate communalization of large stores which will be rented cheaply to small tradespeople, and the strongest consideration must be given to ensure that small traders shall deliver the supplies needed by the State, the provinces and municipalities.

17. We demand an agrarian reform in accordance with our national requirements, and the enactment of a law to expropriate the owners without compensation of any land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the prohibition of all speculation in land.

18. We demand that ruthless war be waged against those who work to the injury of the common welfare. Traitors, usurers, profiteers, etc., are to be punished with death, regardless of creed or race.

19. We demand that Roman law, which serves a materialist ordering of the world, be replaced by German common law.

20. In order to make it possible for every capable and industrious German to obtain higher education, and thus the opportunity to reach into positions of leadership, the State must assume the responsibility of organizing thoroughly the entire cultural system of the people. The curricula of all educational establishments shall be adapted to practical life. The conception of the State Idea (science of citizenship) must be taught in the schools from the very beginning. We demand that specially talented children of poor parents, whatever their station or occupation, be educated at the expense of the State.

21. The State has the duty to help raise the standard of national health by providing maternity welfare centers, by prohibiting juvenile labor, by increasing physical fitness through the introduction of compulsory games and gymnastics, and by the greatest possible encouragement of associations concerned with the physical education of the young.

22. We demand the abolition of the regular army and the creation of a national (folk) army.

23. We demand that there be a legal campaign against those who propagate deliberate political lies and disseminate them through the press. In order to make possible the creation of a German press, we demand:

(a) All editors and their assistants on newspapers published in the German language shall be German citizens.

(b) Non-German newspapers shall only be published with the express permission of the State. They must not be published in the German language.

(c) All financial interests in or in any way affecting German newspapers shall be forbidden to non-Germans by law, and we demand that the punishment for transgressing this law be the immediate suppression of the newspaper and the expulsion of the non-Germans from the Reich.

Newspapers transgressing against the common welfare shall be suppressed. We demand legal action against those tendencies in art and literature that have a disruptive influence upon the life of our folk, and that any organizations that offend against the foregoing demands shall be dissolved.

24. We demand freedom for all religious faiths in the state, insofar as they do not endanger its existence or offend the moral and ethical sense of the Germanic race.

The party as such represents the point of view of a positive Christianity without binding itself to any one particular confession. It fights against the Jewish materialist spirit within and without, and is convinced that a lasting recovery of our folk can only come about from within on the pinciple:

COMMON GOOD BEFORE INDIVIDUAL GOOD

25. In order to carry out this program we demand: the creation of a strong central authority in the State, the unconditional authority by the political central parliament of the whole State and all its organizations.

The formation of professional committees and of committees representing the several estates of the realm, to ensure that the laws promulgated by the central authority shall be carried out by the federal states.

The leaders of the party undertake to promote the execution of the foregoing points at all costs, if necessary at the sacrifice of their own lives.


The History Place - Rise of Hitler: The 25 Points of Hitler's Nazi Party

 

[SSDD]

Either way, recently I've noticed two posters recently insist Hitler was left wing....and even liberal.

Here is SSDD:

Hitler's government was called right wing by communists and socialists of the time, but his governemnt was still socialist. It consisted of a large and powerful central authority which is, by definition, not a conservative, or classically lberal government

As has been explained to you, in the 1930's the term liberal had a different meaning than it does today.


Right wing and left wing are two wings of the same house and the house is socialism.

In cases like this, I am not sure facts have a great deal of impact, but maybe it is interesting to discuss some of the features of Fascism anyway.

Let's start with some quotes from Hitler:

"The main plank in the Nationalist Socialist program is to abolish the liberalistic concept of the individual and the Marxist concept of humanity and to substitute for them the folk community, rooted in the soil and bound together by the bond of its common blood."

As has been explained to you, in the 1930's the term liberal described a different political phlosophy than the term liberal describes today. In the 1930's liberal denoted the philosophy now known as classical liberalism...today, liberal describes any of the various faces of socialism.

When hitler said that he wanted to abolish the liberalistic concept of the individual, he was really saying that he wanted to abolish the conservative concept of the individual. Classical liberalism placed the individual, and the individual's rights at the top of the heap and government's primary purpose was to protect the rights and soveriegnty of the individual.

The cornerstone of any socialist philosophy be it right wing or left wing is the abolishment of the notion of the individual. The various socialist philosophies go about this in different manners which denotes them as right wing or left wing but neither have anything at all to do with classical liberalism or modern conservativism.

again, when you are talking about socialism, right wing and left wing simply talk about opposite ends of the same house.

 

[SSDD]

Jtpr -

I do agree with you that ultimately more people died under Stalin and Mao than under Hitler, although if we factor in people killed by Hitler's invasions in Europe it become a fairly close call.

This does not mean that every regime that kills millions of people is of the same ideology, though,

But the did have the same ideology. The ideology of the state vs the ideology of the individual. The two are entirely different things. You use a quote about hitler wanting to abolish the liberalistic idea of the individual. That was the cornerstone of his political philosophy which was socialism. All socialist tyrants had to abolish the idea of the individual.

"Comrades! We must abolish the cult of the individual decisively, once and for all." (Nikita Khrushchev , February 25, 1956 20th Congress of the Communist Party)

"All our lives we fought against exalting the individual, against the elevation of the single person, and long ago we were over and done with the business of a hero, and here it comes up again: the glorification of one personality. This is not good at all." (Vladimir Lenin, as quoted in "Not by Politics Alone.)

"the individual is subordinate to the organization" (Mao's little red book)

When a leader starts talking about subduing the individual to the state, then you are talking about socialism. How he goes about doing that puts him in the left wing or the right wing of the house of socialism because suduing the individual to the state is socialism.

 

[Agit8r]

BigRegb -

I believe the quotes here are all from Hitler himself, but either way, there are DOZENS of quotes from Hitler attacking the left wing. He absolutely despised Marxism and everything related to it.

i'll check the quotes later.

You're confusing an agenda and thinking it's just quotes.

25 points of Hitlers German Socialist Worker's Party
The 25 Points of Hitler's Nazi Party

1. We demand the union of all Germans in a Great Germany on the basis of the principle of self-determination of all peoples.

2. We demand that the German people have rights equal to those of other nations; and that the Peace Treaties of Versailles and St. Germain shall be abrogated.

3. We demand land and territory (colonies) for the maintenance of our people and the settlement of our surplus population.

4. Only those who are our fellow countrymen can become citizens. Only those who have German blood, regardless of creed, can be our countrymen. Hence no Jew can be a countryman.

5. Those who are not citizens must live in Germany as foreigners and must be subject to the law of aliens.

6. The right to choose the government and determine the laws of the State shall belong only to citizens. We therefore demand that no public office, of whatever nature, whether in the central government, the province, or the municipality, shall be held by anyone who is not a citizen.

We wage war against the corrupt parliamentary administration whereby men are appointed to posts by favor of the party without regard to character and fitness.

7. We demand that the State shall above all undertake to ensure that every citizen shall have the possibility of living decently and earning a livelihood. If it should not be possible to feed the whole population, then aliens (non-citizens) must be expelled from the Reich.

8. Any further immigration of non-Germans must be prevented. We demand that all non-Germans who have entered Germany since August 2, 1914, shall be compelled to leave the Reich immediately.

9. All citizens must possess equal rights and duties.

10. The first duty of every citizen must be to work mentally or physically. No individual shall do any work that offends against the interest of the community to the benefit of all.

Therefore we demand:

11. That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.

12. Since every war imposes on the people fearful sacrifices in blood and treasure, all personal profit arising from the war must be regarded as treason to the people. We therefore demand the total confiscation of all war profits.

13. We demand the nationalization of all trusts.

14. We demand profit-sharing in large industries.

15. We demand a generous increase in old-age pensions.

16. We demand the creation and maintenance of a sound middle-class, the immediate communalization of large stores which will be rented cheaply to small tradespeople, and the strongest consideration must be given to ensure that small traders shall deliver the supplies needed by the State, the provinces and municipalities.

17. We demand an agrarian reform in accordance with our national requirements, and the enactment of a law to expropriate the owners without compensation of any land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the prohibition of all speculation in land.

18. We demand that ruthless war be waged against those who work to the injury of the common welfare. Traitors, usurers, profiteers, etc., are to be punished with death, regardless of creed or race.

19. We demand that Roman law, which serves a materialist ordering of the world, be replaced by German common law.

20. In order to make it possible for every capable and industrious German to obtain higher education, and thus the opportunity to reach into positions of leadership, the State must assume the responsibility of organizing thoroughly the entire cultural system of the people. The curricula of all educational establishments shall be adapted to practical life. The conception of the State Idea (science of citizenship) must be taught in the schools from the very beginning. We demand that specially talented children of poor parents, whatever their station or occupation, be educated at the expense of the State.

21. The State has the duty to help raise the standard of national health by providing maternity welfare centers, by prohibiting juvenile labor, by increasing physical fitness through the introduction of compulsory games and gymnastics, and by the greatest possible encouragement of associations concerned with the physical education of the young.

22. We demand the abolition of the regular army and the creation of a national (folk) army.

23. We demand that there be a legal campaign against those who propagate deliberate political lies and disseminate them through the press. In order to make possible the creation of a German press, we demand:

(a) All editors and their assistants on newspapers published in the German language shall be German citizens.

(b) Non-German newspapers shall only be published with the express permission of the State. They must not be published in the German language.

(c) All financial interests in or in any way affecting German newspapers shall be forbidden to non-Germans by law, and we demand that the punishment for transgressing this law be the immediate suppression of the newspaper and the expulsion of the non-Germans from the Reich.

Newspapers transgressing against the common welfare shall be suppressed. We demand legal action against those tendencies in art and literature that have a disruptive influence upon the life of our folk, and that any organizations that offend against the foregoing demands shall be dissolved.

24. We demand freedom for all religious faiths in the state, insofar as they do not endanger its existence or offend the moral and ethical sense of the Germanic race.

The party as such represents the point of view of a positive Christianity without binding itself to any one particular confession. It fights against the Jewish materialist spirit within and without, and is convinced that a lasting recovery of our folk can only come about from within on the pinciple:

COMMON GOOD BEFORE INDIVIDUAL GOOD

25. In order to carry out this program we demand: the creation of a strong central authority in the State, the unconditional authority by the political central parliament of the whole State and all its organizations.

The formation of professional committees and of committees representing the several estates of the realm, to ensure that the laws promulgated by the central authority shall be carried out by the federal states.

The leaders of the party undertake to promote the execution of the foregoing points at all costs, if necessary at the sacrifice of their own lives.


The History Place - Rise of Hitler: The 25 Points of Hitler's Nazi Party

Yeah, it's one of those things with Nazi philosophy, that though the Ubermensch were god-favored geniuses whose individual achievements were exalted, the little people were military fodder whose sacrifice was necessary to save the Volk, and their way of life.

edited to add; btw that 25-point program was from 1920's, not during the time that Hitler was Fuhrer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Socialist_Program#cite_ref-8

 

[SSDD]

the whole thing about hitler you can argue all day if he was a lefty {anti-smoking, pro-abortion, took down cross's etc..} or an extreme righty. but as a poster pointed out whats the point.? He just ended up being a cold blooded looney tune killer.

True - but it matters in terms of historical truth and accuracy.

It is important that we remember Stalin and Mao and Honnecker when we think of communism and the dangers that come with it.

Likewise, it is important that we remember Hitler and Cristiani, Pinochet and Stroessner when we think of the extreme right wing.

To me this is a kind of 'he who does not learn from history is doomed to repeat it' concept.

Orignially, on the first thread, you began this by claiming that certain governments were conservative. Conservativism has nothing to do with the right wing and left wing of socialism. By definition a true classical liberal state can not be oppressive. It's cornerstone is the freedom of the individual and the protection of the individual's rights. It can change into something else which has been the case in the US.

Today, the US is no longer a classically liberal nation. It has left its orignal charter and become socialist lite moving further into socialism all the time. Whether it will settle in the right wing, left wing, or somewhere in the middle still leaves in the house of socialism and removed from its orignal classical liberal aims.

 

[freedombecki]

I'm not sure why you are assigning an ideology to despots, murderers, tyrants, and dictators.

It's called smarm.

 

[The2ndAmendment]

Hitler was a right wing Authoritarian... Left vs Right is different than Libertarian vs Authoritarian

Political Compass - Composers

 

[freedombecki]

Not surprisingly, the Progressives tell you the total opposite of what's true: Joe McCarthy's HUAC Blacklisted innocent Hollywood writers, FDR's New Deal saved Capitalism and ended the Great Depression and Hitler and Nazism are right-wing ideologies.

Complete opposite of the truth

It's called smarm.

 

[freedombecki]

It's desperate stuff, but I don't get what other reason there might be for wanting to distort the usual terminology.

I guess we could all stick to propaganda and demonizing, but there is also the historical accuracy wing ----

I'm more interested in that than oh-how-awful propaganda.

But the rest of you go on with the message that Hitler was a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad man and so on. I think that's sort of boring....haven't we been fed that message for lo, these many decades?

I'm more interested in what actually happened at the time.

The smell of corpses stretched around the world, obfuscating the details.

It's smarm.

 

[freedombecki]

Not getting it Amy, those on the right are for smaller and less intrusive govt with less regulation, while those on the left are for the opposite. So how does a person on the right get to a totalitarian state if he/she wants less and less gov't intervention and regulation?

That's because you are only seeing the best qualities of the right and refusing to aknowledge the others.

That's like me saying "those on the left are for equality for all and better education for everyone".

I am aware of the foibles of the right, but what I am not seeing is how a person who wants less govt intervention ends up with a fascist govt if that ideology is taken to extremes.

It's political smarm.

 

[editec]

The Rhetorical GAME we keep playing is in thinking that we can easily and accurately catagorize governments into a scale that is linear.

But the world's history just keeps showing us that it really does not work that way.


In the EARLY XXth century the word socialism was practically a term that was meant to say that the government was based on a theory that the MEANS OF PRODUCTION ought to be owned by the state for the benefit of the commonweal.

That naturally lead to extremely authoritarian governments, like Stalin's USSR.

Fascism was also a form of government/economic order leading to extreme authoritarianism but unlike theoretical socialism as practiced by Marx, OWNERSHIP of the means of production CONTINUED TO STAY WITH THE CAPITAL CLASS.

So while Hitlers government WAS authoritarian (just like Stalin's was) the PROFITS of production continued to accrue to the capital class.

BAsically socialism has nothing to do with welfare, or how society treats the people.

Socialism has to do with who OWNS the means of production.

FASCIST SOCIALISM leaves ownership in private hands, and is VERY authoritarian

Marxist SOCIALISM nationalized the means of production, and is very authoritarian.

What we CALL government/economics systems is largely irrelevant.

What thosae governments DO, and how they treat their people is the critical issue.

If there IS a scale that matters, it's the AUTHORITARIAN SCALE\, much much much more than the economic one.

A state without a centralized government doesn't last very long.

Inevitably the powerful create a centralized authoritarian government.

Anarchy (the state of having NO state) is a short lived event AT BEST.

Now what our modern conservatives seem to want is less power to the government, right?

But that will NOT prevent an authoritarian centralizing of power.

What that must inevitably lead to is power centralized in the hands of those who control the means of production.

And what do we call THAT kind of goverment?

FASCISM.

The left's DELUSION is that a highly centralized government that owns the means of production will eventually lead to COMMUNISM...a society without ANY centralized authority.

But it NEVER leads to that happy Anarchy that it claims it will lead to.

It too always leads to a highly centralized AUTHORITIAN form of government.

It's really all about who has the POWER, kids.

ANY FORM OF POWER BASE tends to accumulate still more authority over societies over time.

We are seeing THAT right now in the USA, are we not?

 

[KnobbyWalsh]

I am so sorry, do you have the help you need to do things like tie your shoes?

Saigon was wrong about everything he concluded as a result of his facts. That is not a sign of intelligence,

Like you'd know. Intelligence? What do you know about intelligence?

I might not a lot about intelligence, but I know idiocy when I see it.

Christ, THAT was original!

 

[ecinicola]

Hitler was neither right wing or left wing. No one ran for election against Hitler. There was no left or right wing in Germany.

 

[Mac1958]

Hitler was neither right wing or left wing. No one ran for election against Hitler. There was no left or right wing in Germany.

This whole absurd "Hitler was on YOUR side" discussion is nothing more than a very transparent, hyperbolic partisan slap fight. It amazes me that anyone would play this silly game.

.