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[Lizzie_Zoom]

People tend to say National Socialism and the Nazis with the right's equivalent to Communism, but they are totally wrong as they are both left wing who believe in the state controlling all aspects of peoples lives and all means of production also belonging to the state. Hitler nationalised many businesses and it was only the war that stopped him from nationalizing all of Germany's industries.

Politically the communists and Nazis hated each other, but Stalin and Hitler with both from the same political, utterly ruthless mould and you could not get a fag paper between their political ideologies. They were both vile and evil.

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No, sorry Rods2, but Hitler and the Nazis were definitely right wing. National Socialism is not socialist. Hitler led a totalitarian, military, state where no one but him had true status, giving power to his gang of thugs to ensure the people fell in line or were eradicated, and the Nationalist State ruled all with a rod of iron.

Stalin's USSR was intended to be socialist in the image of Lenin and the 1917 uprising,  but he made it an authoritarian state where every one was equal, but Stalin was the absolute Leader and made lesser citizens pay for mistakes and opposition.

 

The fact that your use the description "totalitarian" to describe Hitler and "authoritarian" to describe Stalin shows there's not a gnat's difference between them. My view is shared (more eloquently) by a writer here:

Fascism is an amorphous ideology mobilizing an entire nation (Mussolini, Franco and Peron) or race (Hitler) for a common purpose. Leaders of industry, science, education, the arts and politics combine to shepherd society in an all encompassing quest. Hitler’s premise was a pure Aryan Germany capable of dominating Europe.

While he feinted right, Hitler and Stalin were natural bedfellows. Hitler mimicked Lenin’s path to totalitarian tyranny, parlaying crises into power. Nazis despised Marxists not over ideology, but because they had betrayed Germany in World War I and Nazis found it unconscionable that German communists yielded fealty to Slavs in Moscow.

The National Socialist German Workers Party staged elaborate marches with uniformed workers calling one another “comrade” while toting tools the way soldiers shoulder rifles. The bright red Nazi flag symbolized socialism in a “classless, casteless” Germany (white represents Aryanism). Fascist central planning was not egalitarian, but it divvied up economic rewards very similarly to communism: party membership and partnering with the state.

From a 2011 Article in Forbes magazine

http://www.forbes.com/sites/billflax/2011/09/01/obama-hitler-and-exploding-the-biggest-lie-in-history/

To save me writing a book, I will unusually answer you Nick and Rods2 by way of referenced quotes from academic sources on the subject we are discussing.  You are both right in terms, as with many political regimes, left or right wing traits are common in both Stalin's Russia and Hitler's Germany and they were similar in the way they "resolved" their issues, both being absolutely ruthless, brutal and extreme. However, as I touched on before their ideology was different and represented the two extremes of philosophy, 'left and right' which is the loose label we apply to political parties.  So, to summarize my points I quote:

"Fascism is a generic name for a particular brand  of totalitarian regime. The name taken from the Latin fascas, the ceremonial bundle of rods and an axe carried before magistrates in ancient Rome, symbolizing the power and unity of the Roman imperium, was coined by Mussolini, whose National Socialist Party was the first such group to gain power.  In a general sense, it can be taken to include the National Socialists of Adolf Hitler in Germany." Keegan. J. The Oxford Companion To World War II OUP 2005 p.274.

"Nazis Ideology aimed at the building of a new social order in Germany to prepare the German nation for fighting: it laid emphasis on the radical or biological character of politics: and it contained the view that only through conflict with other races and nations could Germant prove itself worthy to establish a new German empire. The ideas produced by Nazism were not particularly novel.  They were derived from vulgar ideas about race and empire common to the radical right throughout Europe." [/b]Keegan. J. The Oxford Companion To World War II OUP 2005 p.607

"Nazism. The political doctrines evolved and implemented by Adolf Hitler and his followers. esp those relating to radical superiority: the German Nazi movement : gen. right-wing esp. racist, authoritarianism."  Shorter Oxford English Dictionary Sixth Edition Vol.II OUP 2007  p.1898

"Communism, the generally accepted name for the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, and for regimes based upon it. Though communist call themselves 'socialists', their movement had little in common with non-communist forms of socialism, or with earlier forms of communism in history, including Christian communism." [/b]Keegan. J. The Oxford Companion To World War II OUP 2005 p.200

"Stalinism. The politics pursued by Stalin: the version of Marxism-Leninism based on these, associated esp. with centralization, totalitarianism, and objectivism." Shorter Oxford English Dictionary Sixth Edition Vol.II OUP 2007  p.2993   

 

[SteveAvfc.]

Stop hating on Margaret Thatcher, the Potts got less grief for murdering their own children. MT was doing her job as we voted for her to do!. She is daughter, mother, grandmother, please respect that! 

[Jusme]

+1...     Must add, I got a text early this week reference Rod Stewart singing at the funeral. I treated it with the utmost contempt that it deserved. So sad that 'sick' jokes such as this are thought to be humorous... 

[Rods2]

Its quite traditional for parliament to be recalled when a former PM dies.

apparently not see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-22123307

Your right.I heard someone say it on TV and took it at face value without checking.Should have known better.

Personally I wouldn't believe anything Ken Clark had to say as he consistently undermined Margaret Thatcher while in her cabinet and was at the forefront of those that wanted to depose her in 1991. IMHO as bad or worse than Heseltine and Howe and the other backstabbing Tory wets.

[Rods2]

Where the political spectrum is essentially a circle the extreme left and right have many common attributes. I think we can argue on whether Nazi party were to the extreme left or right as on many policies they were very similar with the absolute control of the state and its use as the only means of production. There certainly were differences, but many more similarities. Eastern Europe and the USSR were always anti-semitic, which is why you saw mass migration to Israel in the 1970's and 80's.

I think it partly comes down to Lizzies comment on 12 historians together will have 14 different opinions. 

[Rods2]

The best tributes I have seen on Margaret Thatcher has been by somebody that knew and worked with her in John Redwood's diaries this week.

He has spoken many kind words including saying she was the best boss he has ever worked for. He said working with her was very different to the tough persona built around her by her speech writers and dress and presentation advisors, where as the UK's first PM they were worried when she first became PM she would have difficulties in being taken seriously in what was still essentially a man's world.

Her way of listening to policies and factual political thoughts and opinions along with other appropriate advisors was based upon finding the best possible solutions to problems which is why once adopted, she had the courage and confidence to see them through. They not only had to pass the test of being the right and best thing to do, but would also be subject to finding the correct answers to the expected questions and criticisms by being put through a 'devil advocate' test. He said, this was her key to good Government and this is why she got so much done so successfully.

[Steve B]

Maggie is now in the past ..She passed away some days ago...I think this thread needs to go the same way....We all have our opinions of maggie...I think we should leave it at that. 

[Nickbat]

Maggie is now in the past ..She passed away some days ago...I think this thread needs to go the same way....We all have our opinions of maggie...I think we should leave it at that. 

While people wish to contribute to this thread then let it be. Reading it is not mandatory. 

[Steve B]

what....keep slagging the dead

[Nickbat]

what....keep slagging the dead

No, there are some of us that respect Margaret Thatcher for being a great leader and would wish to express our thoughts in this week of her funeral.   

[Nickbat]

what....keep slagging the dead

..and your in-box is full. Couldn't reply to your PM. 

[Steve B]

empty now

[dbdb]

Maggie is now in the past ..She passed away some days ago...I think this thread needs to go the same way....We all have our opinions of maggie...I think we should leave it at that. 

yes it has reached thatcheration point

[cem_devecioglu]

Maggie is now in the past ..She passed away some days ago...I think this thread needs to go the same way....We all have our opinions of maggie...I think we should leave it at that. 

yes it has reached thatcheration point

 
I'm here for long time and didnt know we had this much Thatcher fans

[Lizzie_Zoom]

Maggie is now in the past ..She passed away some days ago...I think this thread needs to go the same way....We all have our opinions of maggie...I think we should leave it at that. 

While people wish to contribute to this thread then let it be. Reading it is not mandatory. 

Agreed Nick, and as I said before!

What is the point of a General Chat section on a Forum if we cannot debate, discuss and deliberate as much as each wants to or not in a free society.