2008 US Presidential Election - Page 64

On October 30 2008 21:00 The Storyteller wrote:


That's generally accurate. You're looking at "left" as a term to describe government control. But you've got to look at where the government control comes in.

A country can be left wing economically but ring wing socially i.e. it can give welfare benefits and so on but still not intrude on anyone's individual rights. Or it can be left wing socially (no abortion, tough drinking laws, outlaws gambling, claps political prisoners in jail without trial etc.) but right wing economically (it lets everyone make as much money as they like).

So two countries could be "left wing" because of the role of their government, but the bureaucracy could be worried about totally different things.

On October 30 2008 22:16 fusionsdf wrote:
you guys are seriously abusing 'left' and 'right' on the far right you have fascist/tradiditionalists (the word Im lucking for starts with r, but I can think of it right now) the far left is extremely progressive like communism.

both groups can luck up journalists, restrict freedoms etc.

I mean if you look at the old monarchies before constitiutional monarchy (effectively before the right/left split), they werent very great on civil liberties, no press at all, torture, inquisitions.

Yet the traditionalists on the right wanted a return to that kind of past.

So from a social perspective, right has more to do with traditionalism than freedom.
From an economic posiion it has to do with free markets. And even though free markets and democracies are often linked (dont forget socialism and democracies are also often linked), governments to the extreme right can still restrict rights without suddenly being left.

As for Hitler, the fact that he didnt nationalize industries, and socially in that he struggled back towards volkish thought, the place of women is in the home, etc. Socially there is no arguement that he is far right. For politically/economically, He doesnt really fit the typical Far left either.

In fact the rise of fascism was driven in large part by the fear of communism. There was a large ideological divide that would be too large to contain in one wing

On October 30 2008 11:34 Mindcrime wrote:


yes

To quote Karl Hess...

“Power, concentrated in few hands, is the dominant historic characteristic of what most people, in most times, have considered the political and economic right wing."

“The far left, as far as you can get away from the right, would logically represent the opposite tendency and, in fact, has done just that throughout history. The left has been the side of politics and economics that opposes the concentration of power and wealth and, instead, advocates and works toward the distribution of power into the maximum number of hands."

“The attitude on that farthest left toward law and order was summed up by an early French anarchist, Proudhon, who said that ‘order is the daughter of and not the mother of liberty.’ Let people be absolutely free, says this farthest of the far, far left (the left that Communism regularly denounces as too left; Lenin called it ‘infantile left’). "

On October 30 2008 23:20 Savio wrote:
"In politics, right-wing, the political right, and the Right are positions that seek limited government and free markets."

"The right tends to support a decentralised economy based on economic freedom. Like left-wing, right-wing movements include both with culturally liberal and conservative movements, making economic policies a more universal difference between the left and the right. The right advocates separation of powers, whereas the left advocates consolidated powers.[9]"

"In recent times, the right is almost universally associated with economic freedom."

"The most notable distinction between left and right is in economic policy. The right advances policies such as property rights, free markets, and free trade. The left advocates equal outcome and ideologies such as socialism or communism ranging from radical to moderate."

"In America, the right has long been associated with minimal government and sometimes with law and order. It tends to support individualist human rights, free markets, and property rights. It tends to emphasize economic freedom while progressives tend to emphasize social justice."


I figure if Jibba quote Wikipedia, I can too.

On October 30 2008 21:55 Arbiter[frolix] wrote:
The whole "Hitler was left wing" argument is a familiar one but rather lame, I think.

By contrast, the voting bloc that has performed as usual is younger voters. In college towns and along the critical Interstate 4 corridor, the Obama campaign has focused relentlessly on this group.

For the first time, voters younger than 35 slightly outnumber voters 65 and older -- each group makes up about 24 percent of the total electorate -- and younger voters have shifted heavily toward the Democratic Party during the past four years.

But as yet -- in either Central Florida or the state as a whole -- a surge of younger voters hasn't materialized.

On October 30 2008 23:23 fusionsdf wrote:

In one you have the state buying or seizing the "means of production", in the other you have a government industry alliance so close its hard to tell the two apart.

In one the stated goal is equality (whether this extends past class to race or sex depends on the ruler). In the other you have strong classism. In one you have the abolition of religion as an outside influence, in the other you encourage religious fundamentalism, and use that religion to prop up the leader.

Its the extremism and totalitarianism that makes them appear similar, but they are on opposite sides of the spectrum.

In other words, fascism is rooted in conservatism and the glory of the past (especially with regards to hitler and mussolini) and communism with the inevitability of progress

On October 30 2008 23:57 fusionsdf wrote:
look you can argue with me all you want, there is a reason historians put the two on opposite ends of the spectrum

I mean were basically talking about an alien vs predator situation here