Words and Politics :
When is a "Socialist" actually a
Socialist ?
When is a "democracy" actually a
democracy ?
Here we go again. If you --anyone-- has Marx in mind then
there is no such animal
as a Nationalist who is also a Socialist. Marxism, by
definition , and repeated ad nauseum
in all kinds of Communist writings, is avowedly and
vehemently Internationalist.
That's point # 1.
Point # 2 is that what a group calls itself, or a state,
may have just about nothing to do
with reality. I seriously doubt that when you think back to
the Cold War that you regard
all the "people's democracies" of eastern Europe as
democracies at all.
Point # 3 is that the structural / fundamental difference
between R and L concerns
property. Either L or R can be authoritarian OR democratic.
Maybe you are not
exactly keen about Sweden or Norway but Socialist or not,
they were always democratic.
And while you think well of Capitalism you've got to admit
that there can be dictatorships
which feature private enterprise --just about every
country in Latin America at one
time or another in the past, for instance.
But the Left always is public property centered, and the
right is always private property
centered. Always, 100% of the time.
Krupp was never taken over by the Nazi state , nor was any
other corporation. Quite the
opposite, at least while it lasted, German corporations did
quite well in the Third Reich.
Labor Unions, on the contrary , were sham unions, basically
house unions, or
neutered unions. That is typical of the Right, not the
Left, although this is
not quite as clear cut as the issue of property.
On the Left there is such a thing as "streets and
sewers socialism," the modus operandi
of the Wisconsin wing of the SPUSA for a long time , in the
past. Call it public works
socialism if you prefer, that is, putting public property
at the center of their politics.
That sort of emphasis was also typical of the USSR, albeit
under a dictator.
One thing to admit, the Berlin wing of the Nazi Party was,
for a while, pro-labor
and at least semi-Socialist. But that was never true in
Vienna in Hitler's crowd
and the Beliners did not prevail. Goebbels, a Berliner,
was seduced by Hitler and
became his perfect sycophant and the Strassers didn't do
too well, one brother killed
and the other escaping into exile in Canada. That ended any
vestige of Leftism
among Nazis except for their retention of the word
"Socialist."
By the theory of absolute meaning of words, BTW, mind
telling me why
hard core fundamentalists refuse to consider Mormons as
Christians ?
After all, they use the word of themselves. Or is it the
fact that
words may mask reality or mislead people ?
There are, to put it this way, con artists in politics not
only in sales.
The Nazis were as far Right as it is possible to get, just
as the Soviet Communists
under Stalin or the Chinese communists under Mao were as
far Left as possible.
Which brings up point # 4. There are extremes to all
political systems.
An extremist of the Libertarian persuasion is an
Anarchist.
An extremist of the democratic persuasion is a tyrant who
uses mob rule to govern.
And so on and so forth for all systems.
We are all susceptible to the dangers of the extremes of
any political philosophy we favor.
This will remain true as long as "original sin" remains
true. Which we need to always
be wary of, to escape another sin, identified by Aristotle
as hubris.
My humble opinion for today
Billy
============================================================
message dated 1/12/2011 9:15:56 P.M. Pacific Standard Time,
[email protected] writes:
Hitler to me is a confirmation, not a
contradiction of him being on the left.
National Socialist German Workers Party (NSDAP, Nazi for
short) doesn't sound that conservative or "right" to me.
Unless you want to tell me that ALL Socialist Workers
Parties are on the right. :-)
David
"I don't
understand why the same
newspaper commentators who
bemoan the terrible
education given to poor
people are always so eager
to have those poor people
get out and vote."--P.
J. O'Rourke
On 1/12/2011 9:54 PM, [email protected] wrote:
How can anyone figure out that guy ? He is a
lunatic. To say the least, he is inconsistent
in what / who he admires. Atlas Shrugs ran a
series of short articles that claim he is
a Lefty. After all, Marx is one of his idols.
Trouble is, so is Hitler.
You can find Libertarian ideas also, but just as
easily you can find authoritarian ideas.
Sounds to me like -just a wild guess-- Ernie
lives in California. My sister also lives
in the Peoples Republic. When she was visiting a
month ago she said a few choice
things about the Tea Party consisting of folks
with guns, the idea being that the
movement is a militia in everything but name.
Wonder where she got that idea.
I'm 100% certain that it has nothing at all to do
with the fact that all the media she
has access to is located in the Bay Area and that
her friends in San Francisco
are, like the city, 3/4ths Leftist Democrats
![]()
Anyway, now I know, from direct experience, what
was clear enough to me many
months ago, that the Tea Party consists of little
old ladies with attitude, older gentlemen
tired of being pushed around by elitists, and an
assortment of various and many others
who are best described as the kind of folks who
you would meet in a local neighborhood
corner cafe almost anywhere in the USA except big
cities and university enclaves.
Average people but with a fire lit under their
chairs who are motivated to do
something real in their communities.
For their troubles the Left demonizes them as a
" threat."
One word that comes to mind which is far more
accurate, is that they are "populists."
OK, to be technical, maybe "neo-Populists" might
be more clinically descriptive,
we are long past the era of farmers with
pitchforks, but that is the tradition.
Which is OK with me. No-one can accuse them of
apathy.
Billy
========================================================
message dated 1/12/2011 7:26:21 P.M. Pacific
Standard Time,
[email protected]
writes:
No one has any
evidence of that at all. In fact, he had
previously met the congresswoman back in 2007
and had a file in his house on her.
He didn't need to be incited, he was doing a
good enough job of "inciting" all by himself.
David
"I
don't understand
why the same
newspaper
commentators who
bemoan the
terrible
education given
to poor people
are always so
eager to have
those poor
people get out
and vote."--P.
J. O'Rourke
On 1/12/2011 8:52 AM, Dr. Ernie Prabhakar wrote:
Has anyone found *any* evidence
that he was at all aware of and/or influenced
by Tea Party rhetoric?
I assume not, but nobody on either side
seems to have even asked that question...
-- Ernie P.
--
Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist
Community <[email protected]>
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Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
--
Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist
Community <[email protected]>
Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism
Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
--
Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community
<[email protected]>
Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism
Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
--
Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community
<[email protected]>
Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism
Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
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