The recent attack at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum has sparked a clam, rational, discussion between both sides of the isle. So of course both conservative and liberal bloggers are trying to tag each other with the name “von Brunn”.
In fact, the favorite tool of many on the left is the controversial report: “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment”.
Somehow, a link has been made between conservatives and Nazism, despite the fact their political philosophies stand in a stark contrast with one another.
Let us put this little diseased puppy to sleep: Nazis are not conservative. Never have been, never will be. I suspect that a good deal of open-minded people stopped reading there, but in the off chance that they’d like to continue, let me qualify that statement.
Nazi, as many should now by now, is an abbreviation of the German word, Nationalsozialist, or in English: National Socialist.
Nazism is based off of the political philosophy of fascism which holds the belief that promotion of national and racial pride over individual rights is a good. It also believes that a severe control over the economy, social interactions, is best headed by a dictator backed up by a centralized autocratic government.
Fascism, Stalinism, and all totalitarian governments thrive off of a strong central government where nearly everything can be controlled by a single, disturbed, person.
History and free speech are often the first targets of such a regime, which destroys the source of knowledge for the civilized person. The more powerful a government there is, the less freedom one can enjoy.
The term “right-wing” is born out of the 1789 French National Assembly, where politicians who held more traditional values sat on the right side of the isle, giving us the term we know today.
So, then, what are the values and the traditions that today’s right-wing holds? Well, if some commentators are to be believed, it’s that the United States should give ultimate power to the federal government. Entrepreneurs shouldsurrender private enterprises for the good of the nation, and the government should threaten and intimidate any who oppose. After all, the right-wing is full of Nazis.
Is that what the American conservatism is today?
No.
The founders of this country upheld an ideal of self-government and a little ‘r’ called republicanism. One where there’s a minimal centralized influence, where the people – through education, discussion, and at times, heated debate – would prevail with cooler heads, and solve their wrongs on their own – without the need of a centralized power.
Sounds like tyranny.
What happened at the Holocaust Museum was a tragedy, but to assign blame to either conservatives or liberals only serves to disguise the revolting actions of alleged shooter, and self-proclaimed Neo-Nazi, James W. von Brunn.
He was a Nationalsozialist, he tried to intimidate those who thought differently; Christians, Jews, Bush, McCain, Obama, Neo-cons, he even went as far as listing The Weekly Standard on his hit list. In 1981 he even tried to take members of the Federal Reserve Board hostage. Clearly, he loved to hate.
But with the convenience of being able to blame those we love to hate, we lose sight of who the true criminal is. We call him everything but what he is by name: a clinically paranoid psychotic.
