Germany's neo-Nazi underground

[LemonAndLime]

You are saying two things and we should treat them separately.

1. That web-based content can be cited in an academic paper: Yes, web sites hosting articles with known authors, publishing date etc can be reference for sure but not sites like wikipedia hosting articles without authors.

Yes, thats what I said.

1. That using a web address suffices to be considered a citation. No! Your teacher or professor might tolerate a URL but a URL is not a citation and can’t be tolerated within a research paper irrespective of the country.

No, that’s not what I said. When I said “I referenced a web address” I didn’t mean I literally copied and pasted the web address and left it at that. I just couldn’t be bothered to type “I also listed the author, etc.”

 

[Warrenton]

The nineteenth century of Lords and the Estates vs democratic revolutionary forces does not really define the current North American reality—nor likely the European reality either.

This is a good point.

In a world defined by tyrants on the left from Lenin and Stalin to Mao and Pol Pot, in a world in which the revolutionaries of yesterday such as Che Guevera and Castro invariably become the tyrants of tomorrow, in a world in which a military demagogue of the left such as Hugo Chavez is a merely typical face of a tyrant. I would dispute that todays tyrants actually do fall on the right of the spectrum. Bismark changed the whole picture by appealing to the populism of the people to continue his hold on power.

I would agree with this - the traditional left/right analysis breaks down with modern dictators of communist/socialist leanings.

What seems to happen under the old analysis is that Hitler (and other fascists, Muslim rulers, nationalists like Marcos) retain the old nomenclature, while Stalin and Chavez receive the nomenclature of their parties.

You are correct that there is a disconnect here.

The problem with the modern system, however, is that Hitler ends up being described as a leftist, which he would never have agreed with, and which is at complete varience with writings contemporary with his era. The student, therefore, has to keep in mind the shift in meaning. This seems cumbersome (but maybe not as awkward as the problem you identified and which I agree with above).

Perhaps the old shorthand of left/right has simply reached the end of its useful life in describing modern political reality.

I liked your identification of the key issue now as being constitutional individualists vs. identity politics advocates, and found your description very clear.

 

[Darryl1958]

…
The problem with the modern system, however, is that Hitler ends up being described as a leftist, which he would never have agreed with, and which is at complete varience with writings contemporary with his era. The student, therefore, has to keep in mind the shift in meaning. This seems cumbersome (but maybe not as awkward as the problem you identified and which I agree with above)…

…

I don’t know that even Jonah Goldberg, who wrote the book on Liberal Fascism, would have stated that Hitler was a leftist. It is an abuse of history to say as much. The war between the fascists and the socialists in Europe in those years was real enough. Just as it does not make sense to overlay the nineteenth century definitions of left and right onto our modern world, so too it is a disservice to the historical record to overlay our own current definitions of left and right onto the politics of the 1930’s.

Just as there is politics being played when the leftists of today try to label today’s conservatives as fascists and racists, I tend to see calling Hitler a leftist as returning the favor. To the extent that anyone now agrees that Hitler was on the right, conservatives leave themselves open to the ludicrous charges that Bush is a fascist, and that right wing tea party types are racist for opposing Obama’s policies. Nuance is simply not a modern value, when the goal is to define Hitler as right wing, and then use that as a propaganda weapon against the modern right.

From a birds eye view, even when the "leftist Nazi’ arguments seem sincere enough in many cases, it is also easy to see that the best defense is a good offense. Once the leftist tactic of labelling all opposition to their views as some combination of sexist, racist, bigot, homophobe, xenophobe, etc has become identified, the logical next step for the practical conservative is to point out that fascist totalitarian government has more in common with left-wing goals than anything that conservatives are now promoting.

But that being said, it is clearly wrong to think that Hitler was a leftist either in terms of his time, or our own. The one big difference between Hitler’s fascism and today’s left, which you already addressed, and I have not yet responded to, is that Hitler was militaristic, and today’s left in America and Europe are essentially peaceniks. They don’t have enough aggression to fight their way out of a paper bag, frankly. I have been highly critical of that too.
That is not so much true for the left historically, with their Red armies and Kalishnikov’s, their Molotovs and their nihilistic mayhem and terrorism, but the mentality of making war on war is very much a modern left wing mantra nevertheless. It defines the vast majority of today’s left much more than militarism ever could.

Personally, I find calling Nazism a left wing philosophy excessive too, but posters and union leaders and leftists in general were describing Bush as a fascist long before Jonah Goldberg wrote his book on the subject.

The history was trashed long ago anyway.

 

[Kaninchen]

The problem with the modern system, however, is that Hitler ends up being described as a leftist, which he would never have agreed with, and which is at complete varience with writings contemporary with his era. The student, therefore, has to keep in mind the shift in meaning. This seems cumbersome (but maybe not as awkward as the problem you identified and which I agree with above).

For those those of us who do not live in the US, there’s no problem at all, of course, because we have no need whatsoever to converse in American Conservative.

 

[LemonAndLime]

For those those of us who do not live in the US, there’s no problem at all, of course, because we have no need whatsoever to converse in American Conservative.

I never understood why left/right is different in the US.

 

[Scott_Lafrance]

I never understood why left/right is different in the US.

Generally speaking, the “left/right” axis in American parlance indicated the level of government involvement in society. The left loves the nanny state, the right (supposedly) abhors it. However, with the recent (Tea Party candidates excluded) spat of Republicans, like John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Susan Collins, etc… love them some big government themselves.

 

[ringil]

I never understood why left/right is different in the US.

Because 'merica’s great. DON"T FORGET IT!!!

 

[bbarrick8383]

I never understood why left/right is different in the US.

Because the right’s right and the left’s wrong.

 

[estesbob]

For those those of us who do not live in the US, there’s no problem at all, of course, because we have no need whatsoever to converse in American Conservative.

Except when you want to discuss American politics with Americans. As we see often in these forums Europeans have little or no understanding of how US politics works leading to all sorts of misunderstandings

 

[ringil]

Except when you want to discuss American politics with Americans. As we see often in these forums Europeans have little or no understanding of how US politics works leading to all sorts of misunderstandings

Oh the irony in this statement.

 

[LemonAndLime]

Except when you want to discuss American politics with Americans. As we see often in these forums Europeans have little or no understanding of how US politics works leading to all sorts of misunderstandings

People from the UK for example are well-informed about politics in the US - it’s regularly broadcast on our TV screens, etc. However, in comparison, many Americans seem to not even know the very basics of British or European politics.

I have yet to hear a European say something like “So who is the president of the US? You are a communist nation, right?” but I have heard Americans say something very very similar about the UK/Europe.

 

[estesbob]

People from the UK for example are well-informed about politics in the US - it’s regularly broadcast on our TV screens, etc. However, in comparison, many Americans seem to not even know the very basics of British or European politics.

I have yet to hear a European say something like “So who is the president of the US? You are a communist nation, right?” but I have heard Americans say something very very similar about the UK/Europe.

One need only read the posts in CAF by Europeans when they comment on US politics to see the truth of my statement. .TThey view US politics through the prism of European politics and there is absolutely no comparison between the two. . I will admit ,however, that Europeans are slightly better informed about US politics than the Canadians that post here.

 

[Kaninchen]

Except when you want to discuss American politics with Americans.

Hm, not something I’ve indulged myself in, of course, not having the slightest interest in American politics. Unfortunately, it seems that American Conservatives want to discuss European topics in American Conservative.

 

[LemonAndLime]

One need only read the posts in CAF by Europeans when they comment on US politics to see the truth of my statement. .TThey view US politics through the prism of European politics and there is absolutely no comparison between the two. . I will admit ,however, that Europeans are slightly better informed about US politics than the Canadians that post here.

One need to only read the posts US members post about Britain to wonder what they know about Europe. I have been told on numerous occasions that my country is communist, but also in the same breath that the Queen is somewhat in total country of the country.

Also, with the above in mind, you can say that US members see European politics through the prism of US politics. Which leads to all sorts of assumptions.

 

[estesbob]

Hm, not something I’ve indulged myself in, of course, not having the slightest interest in American politics. Unfortunately, it seems that American Conservatives want to discuss European topics in American Conservative.

Some do, some dont. I dont kow enough about European politics to intliigently discuss it-other than knowing that the President of France has a foxy wife.

 

[Ridgerunner]

This is correct as far as it goes, and in addition to Rohm, we could point to Gregor Strasser, who was even more on the fringe.

But were they right or left fringe?

The answer, and why I agree with Lemon’s view, lies in the nature of Nazism. While encompassing many streams, as any successful party is apt to do, Nazisim’s main current always sourced in militarism and especially in German racialism.

This is important, because while some Nazis may have advocated for social levelling among Germans, they never advocated social equality among humanity at large.

Non-Germans, especially Jews and Slavs, were always slated to be made unequal, slaves, dispossessed or dead. Europe was to be permanently subservient to the needs and desires of the “master race.”

So, while in some micro-economical ways Nazism may have had leftist tendencies, in its global aims, Nazism sought to impose an kind of imperialism that denied any concept of egalitarianism to the human family. In that regard, Nazism is “like” a right wing idea. I would agree readily if someone objects that that the demonic, race based “aristocracy” proposed by Nazism is “beyond” right wing, but it is certainly not left wing.

I think Ukrainians during the Soviet era would have disagreed with this. Georgians and Central Asians too. The Soviet government was profoundly racist and ethnicist…not in words, but certainly in deeds. The Communist Chinese have mostly replaced Inner Mongolians with Han Chinese, and the same process is going on in Tibet and among the Turkic Uighurs in the far west.

And Bolshevism was extremely imperialist. I don’t think most Poles would disagree with that proposition, nor most Georgians. China, remember, took over Tibet AFTER the Red takover, not before. Those leftist groups termed it differently, but the result was no different from anything Nazism did or attempted.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Someone once told me several years ago, as I was traveling through MO that the northern half was liberal and the southern half was conservative. I’m assuming that, much like Oklahoma the southern half being conservative does not mean they are Republican. They are blue dog democrats who tend to vote for Republican candidates.

The whole state is conservative except for St. Louis and KC and the Columbia area, where the U of Mo is. Even in the St. Louis metro area, the real bastion of liberalism is the City itself, the much more populous suburbs are mixed. St. Louis is a fairly “German” city, suburbs and all, sort of like Cincinnati in that way. There is a smattering of cultural Democrat-ism in a few other places, but not many. The southwest part of the state is indisputably the most conservative, also the fastest-growing.

Most of Mo would be regarded as fundamentally “southern” to anyone from the outside. There are exceptions. Much of the St. Louis metro area, the KC metro area and the Columbia area are not. There are German communities along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers that aren’t. But most of the rest is. The farther south one goes, the more it’s so. But that’s not entirely so. There is an area along the Missouri River that used to be called “Little Dixie” because it was so southern in its ways. Little Dixie also used to be staunchly Dixiecrat in politics, but it’s pretty much Repub now. The country well north of the Missouri River used to be very southern in orientation, but the population has dropped a great deal, and it’s perhaps a bit more “prairie midwestern” now than it once was.

 

[Bezant]

I have been told on numerous occasions that my country is communist, but also in the same breath that the Queen is somewhat in total country of the country.

 

[Darryl1958]

One need only read the posts in CAF by Europeans when they comment on US politics to see the truth of my statement. .TThey view US politics through the prism of European politics and there is absolutely no comparison between the two. . I will admit ,however, that Europeans are slightly better informed about US politics than the Canadians that post here.

Ha!

Flirting with the European babes again are ya, Estebob?

 

[Darryl1958]

Because 'merica’s great. DON"T FORGET IT!!!

America is great ringil.
Seriously.
Don’t forget it.

Edit to add:
Four more years of Obama, and all bets are off though. It is not American genetics that are great. It is the values that has made America great.