re: #287 Charles

You & I will have to disagree on this point then. I am not saying that Fascism and Socialism are identical. I am saying they do have common origins in both ideology and people. Activists moved from “socialist” to “fascist” parties.

The view that Fascists were “left wing” parties comes from the fact that, like the Marxists, the Fascists wanted to radically change society and were eager to use violent revolutionary means to do it. Traditional “right wing” parties sought to preserve the social order of old Europe. They mistakenly thought the Nazis and other Fascist parties would do this for them.

Terms like “left-wing” and “right-wing”, and the meanings attached to them, have shifted around quite a bit. The original definition of the term “right wing” applied to those protecting the status-quo. Both the Nazis and the Marxists opposed the status quo hierarchy in Wiemar Germany.

The industrialists & capitalists backed the Nazis to keep the Socialists & Marxists at bay, which is not the same thing as saying the Nazis and the capitalists were of the same political orientation. The Nazis had their own ideas of what to do with the capitalists once they got hold of power.

Today, the meanings of left and right have coalesced around certain ideologies, and their adherents seem happy with the labels. Fine. Both extremes are still enemies of liberal democracy and should be opposed. Which is why I have no problem with all of the DHS reports on all of the extremist groups threatening America, whatever the label.