House of Eratosthenes

A dose of smiley-faced fascism, full of rosy prose and one-apology-per-paragraph, from a smiley-positive-person writing under the moniker of “One Pissed-Off Liberal“:

I think of myself as being part of the humanitarian left. That’s not a formal thing (afaik). I’m not an ideologue, a dedicated Marxist or committed socialist (though I do lean that way). I just come down on the left side of things because that’s where one finds compassion, charity, kindness, altruism, etc.- all those things that I perceive to be the best of which we are capable. I define myself as a leftist in opposition to what one finds on the right: selfishness, greed, profits over people, authoritarian meanness, police-state regulation of the powerless and lawlessness for the rich and powerful. It’s easy to be selfish and mean, perhaps that’s why so many people are. It’s much harder, and more laudatory in my view, to be a humanitarian. After all, what does the world need more of? Mean, selfish, greedy assholes? Or humanitarians? I think the answer is obvious.

And there ya go. In just a few sentences, he gets to “everyone who doesn’t share my ideology is a ‘mean, selfish, greedy asshole’.” Which I suspect was the point all along.

“Conservatives consider liberals well-intentioned, but misguided. Liberals consider conservatives not only wrong, but really, really bad people.” — Larry Elder.

As to his question, “What does the world need more of?” More people who are willing to go the extra mile to make sure a preposition is something they never end sentences with. After that, more people working, to produce goods and services that other people need, that reliably and economically do the things they’re supposed to do. In order for that to happen on a large scale, we need a lot more than to just “be massively creative,” as he says. We have to put that creativity to work, and we require freedom to profit from this to the fullest extent possible. We need to get worry out of the way. Minimize the taxes, minimize the regulatory stranglehold on our efforts. Make business plans, and then act on them, without worrying about silly artificial things like “If that puts us up to fifty people then we have to worry about ObamaCare.” Get worry out of the way of helping each other.

Liberals are such a funny lot. They write their tomes about the challenges humanity faces and how it’s time to dig in and really mean business — but once they’re done running things a little while, nobody’s digging in or meaning business because it’s like running through a thicket. Suddenly, everyone is dodging little-laws. Or breaking them. And the place doesn’t look like utopia; it looks like Detroit. You look around and there isn’t anybody acting on the values the liberal was discussing; nobody helping each other, nobody being grown-up or compassionate, beginning with the end in mind, looking down the road, thinking ahead, building a better world. Just litter in the sidewalks, abandoned factories, rotting houses and people awaiting in long lines talking about “foostamps.”

I’ve got a better idea for a title for his piece: “I’m running low on ways I can not be a mean asshole, and I’m down to just this. How am I doing?”

mkfreeberg: More people who are willing to go the extra mile to make sure a preposition is something they never end sentences with.

Hilarious.

Anyway, notice how the writer is advocating greater equality. That puts him square on the left.

mkfreeberg: “Conservatives consider liberals well-intentioned, but misguided. Liberals consider conservatives not only wrong, but really, really bad people.”

Seriously, do we have to find examples of conservatives calling liberals bad people? Ideologues exist on both sides of the political spectrum.
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 06:43
Preposition, something with which they never end sentences.
http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2011/11/grammar-myths-prepositions/
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 06:50
“Seriously, do we have to find examples of conservatives calling liberals bad people?”
Yes. First, narrowly define liberal, and conservative. (both, by any other name) Make two columns. Start at the beginning of recorded history.
When you’re done we’ll evaluate.
- CaptDMO | 06/25/2014 @ 07:33
We use the conventional definitions. See wikipedia:

Liberalism is a political philosophy or worldview founded on ideas of liberty and equality.

Conservatism as a political and social philosophy promotes retaining traditional social institutions.

Left-wing politics are political positions or activities that accept or support social equality.

Right-wing politics are political positions or activities that view some forms of social hierarchy or social inequality as either inevitable, natural, normal, or desirable.

As the center of politics has moved generally left over time, people who were liberals in their day may not be considered liberal today. Others, such as Lincoln, started as generally conservative, but became more liberal over time due to changing events. However, as we are concerned with liberal and conservative, a few examples should suffice.

Liberal: Martin Luther King, John Kennedy, Franklin Roosevelt
Conservative: Churchill, Reagan, Goldwater
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 07:48
Must everything be the same conversation?

I’m much more interested in this “he advocates greater equality” statement. Does he, really? Because I read the whole thing, and the primary point seems to be about how wonderfully compassionate and humanitarian and independent-minded he is. In fact, he’s quite self-congratulatory about it. Starting with this instead of “what I want to do” is an attempt to establish his bona-fides as a decent fellow, so that his proposals will look decent as a result. Then he casts some aspersions on everyone else to make their proposals look mean and awful.

It’s hard to really go on from there, because so much of it is vapid and dumb and droning, but everybody thinks of himself as decent and having decent reasons for what they hope for. That doesn’t make the reasons decent. Even if they are, it doesn’t make the results decent, or desirable. Anyone can advocate anything, but if what they seek to do has the opposite effect, then their words to the opposite mean less than nothing.
- nightfly | 06/25/2014 @ 08:52
nightfly: I’m much more interested in this “he advocates greater equality” statement. Does he, really?

He is for lifting up the downtrodden, against authoritarianism, and calls himself a humanitarian. Clearly he is advocating for greater equality.

nightfly: It’s hard to really go on from there, because so much of it is vapid and dumb and droning, but everybody thinks of himself as decent and having decent reasons for what they hope for.

We’re not defending his position, which even he admits is “simplistic”.

nightfly: Even if they are, it doesn’t make the results decent, or desirable.

Sure. But the definition of the political left is someone who advocates for equality, but not everyone on the left advocates for perfect equality, any more than everyone on the right advocates for absolute inequality.
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 09:21
nightfly: Anyone can advocate anything, but if what they seek to do has the opposite effect, then their words to the opposite mean less than nothing.

Words have power. So when Marx proposed that increasing inequality would lead to societal contradictions, revolution, and eventual social equality, it galvanized much of the world. While there are cynics in any movement, it’s simply not the case that most communists didn’t believe they were working towards a utopian future. It was the utopian vision, and the belief that the ends justifies the means, that led to revolution. It was the inherent contradiction of that vision with reality that led to great abuses.

Fascists, exemplar of the extreme right, saw everything in terms of racial war. Communists, exemplars of the extreme left, saw everything in terms of the class struggle. While fascists killed the Jews and enslaved the lesser races, the communists wanted to reeducate the wayward. Winston Smith grew to love Big Brother.
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 09:41
Z: “He is for lifting up the downtrodden, against authoritarianism, and calls himself a humanitarian. Clearly he is advocating for greater equality.”

Yeah, and I can call myself John Jacob Jingleheimerschmidt. Big deal. I can say that I’m for the downtrodden too. I can sing Johnny Cash’s “Man in Black” all day long. By itself that tells me nothing. But what am I gonna do? “Words have power,” sure, but so do actions. So I don’t particularly care what he says, especially when it’s all gaseous nonsense about helping everyone and being nice. Ain’t nobody saying otherwise. Where I start to pay attention is when he says that everyone who disagrees with his policies (that he hasn’t bothered to outline) is a big meanie mean meanster who needs to “butt the fuck out.” So where’s the greater equality when his first desire is to have half the people have no say in how problems get resolved?

Also – saying “the left advocates for greater equality” is also highly dubious. They claim it as a group, just like this particular example does, but does the claim hold up?

Z: “Fascists, exemplar of the extreme right, saw everything in terms of racial war. Communists, exemplars of the extreme left, saw everything in terms of the class struggle.”

Fascism is the hallmark of a totalitarian state and doesn’t conform strictly to right or left. You get them all across the spectrum. And you seem to forget one important thing: “communists wanted to reeducate the wayward” – BY FORCE. And that’s got nothing to do at all with liberty. “Winston Smith grew to love Big Brother”… and that was the crowning tragedy of the entire book. It meant that he was no longer a human being at all. He “loved” Big Brother because he was powerless anymore to do anything else. Tell me again how reducing free people to powerless dependence – even to the extent of robbing them of their own minds and personalities – is liberating. Equal, sure – equally miserable, equally doomed. But that’s why equality needs a counterweight. Courage, for example, requires prudence. Zeal requires temperance. Lose one half and the other half stops being itself.
- nightfly | 06/25/2014 @ 10:36
Nice fisking.

Freedom is so difficult. I was in Moscow during the FSU phase, and encountered college students who wanted to return to Communism. Freedom had too much risk.

Z is an iinteresting chap. Willing to define that which he dissaproves with language that encourages distaste for those he opposes, whether that description is apt, or not.When we grow up we look at cause and effect differently. As in, can we measure how these policies affect growth, employment, investment? Too bad each of these metrics rely so upon profitability. If only there was some other metric which could replace such capitalist metrics.

Like feeling smug. Competitive advantage is so 19th-century.
.
- OregonGuy | 06/25/2014 @ 10:56
nightfly: So where’s the greater equality when his first desire is to have half the people have no say in how problems get resolved?

It’s not that complicated. His belief is that some people have all or most of the power, and that this is an unjust situation that should be changed.

nightfly: Also – saying “the left advocates for greater equality” is also highly dubious.

That’s how it’s defined, and how most people use the term.

nightfly: Fascism is the hallmark of a totalitarian state and doesn’t conform strictly to right or left.

Fascists is a type of authoritarian nationalism. Nearly all historians and laypersons place fascism on the political right because they advocate absolute racial and ethnic inequality.

–
* Nazism and the Radical Right in Austria 1918-1934, Lauridsen.
* The Routledge companion to fascism and the far right, Paul Davies.
* The Culture of Fascism: Visions of the Far Right in Britain, edited by Gottlieb & Linehan.
* Fascism Past and Present, West and East: An International Debate on Concepts and Cases in the Comparative Study of the Extreme Right, Griffin et al.
* France in The Era of Fascism: Essays on the French Authoritarian Right, edited by Jenkins.
* Fascism and Neofascism: Critical Writings on the Radical Right in Europe (Studies in European Culture and History), edited by Weitz & Fenner.

nightfly: “communists wanted to reeducate the wayward” – BY FORCE.

That’s right.

nightfly: And that’s got nothing to do at all with liberty.

Communists are not liberals, or didn’t you get that part?
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 10:59
OregonGuy: Willing to define that which he dissaproves with language that encourages distaste for those he opposes, whether that description is apt, or not.

We use conventional terminology.

OregonGuy: When we grow up we look at cause and effect differently. As in, can we measure how these policies affect growth, employment, investment?

Of course you should, but that doesn’t mean liberal equals communism or liberal equals fascism.
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 11:10
“…authoritarian meanness, police-state regulation…”

I’ll bet you dollars-to-donuts that this opponent of “authoritarian meanness” is completely on-board with using the power of the state, including its police powers, to achieve his desired outcomes.
- cloudbuster | 06/25/2014 @ 12:44
“Fascists is a type of authoritarian nationalism. Nearly all historians and laypersons place fascism on the political right because they advocate absolute racial and ethnic inequality.”

Jonah Goldberg spends an entire book, Liberal Fascism, explaining why “nearly all historians” are wrong to classify Fascism on the political right. I find his argument clear and persuasive, so instead of trying to regurgitate the better part of a book, I’ll just recommend you read it.
- cloudbuster | 06/25/2014 @ 12:47
cloudbuster: I’ll bet you dollars-to-donuts that this opponent of “authoritarian meanness” is completely on-board with using the power of the state, including its police powers, to achieve his desired outcomes.

Probably believes in democratic governance.

cloudbuster: Jonah Goldberg spends an entire book, Liberal Fascism, explaining why “nearly all historians” are wrong to classify Fascism on the political right.

It’s a polemic redefinition.
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 13:04
Zachriel: Probably believes in democratic governance.

You’ll have to clarify whether you’re agreeing or disagreeing with me, or just offering a tangential comment, because “democratic governance” has nothing to do with whether the power of the state is used against the citizens. As the saying goes “Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what’s for dinner.”

Zachriel: It’s a polemic redefinition.

Again, you’re going to have to clarify. It’s equally arguable that the categorization of Fascism as right-wing is a polemical redefinition. After all, both Hitler and Mussolini were long-time socialists — left wingers — as were the political movements they led, which were the prototypical (and in Mussolini’s Fascism case, eponymous) Fascist states. There was little about the governments of Germany or Italy that could be considered right wing. They were thoroughly leftist, just a different flavor of leftism than the Leninist/Stalinist communism they were competing against. Acadamia, and especially departments of History, have been captured by left wing progressives for a century or more, so their definition of Fascism as “right wing” is completely self-serving.
- cloudbuster | 06/25/2014 @ 13:18
I agree that communists are not liberal. I also observe that the Left finds itself quite enamored, in word and in deed, with communism. So that leads me to try to resolve a contradiction: is the Left in fact liberal when they like and advocate a system that is not liberal at all? Is their addiction to equality such that it lends them to ignore liberty – and thus become advocates of a great inequality, inasmuch as enforcing communism requires that some be “more equal” than others?

As far as Fascism… the Nationalist Socialist party named itself after a movement of the Left. They could be wrong about themselves, or others could be wrong about them. If the Left is marked by increased top-down authority and the Right by less, then I would suggest that Fascism and Communism merely disagree about where the lines ought to be drawn – one along ethnicity, the other along class – and that the end result will be fairly indistinguishable. The extremety of the current political right is not a totalitarian state but an anarchial one, libertarianism run wild.
- nightfly | 06/25/2014 @ 13:20
cloudbuster: It’s equally arguable that the categorization of Fascism as right-wing is a polemical redefinition.

The definition of right wing has been persistent for more than two centuries.

cloudbuster: After all, both Hitler and Mussolini were long-time socialists — left wingers — as were the political movements they led, which were the prototypical (and in Mussolini’s Fascism case, eponymous) Fascist states.

Until they swung to the right.

“Granted that the 19th century was the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy, this does not mean that the 20th century must also be the century of socialism, liberalism, democracy. Political doctrines pass; nations remain. We are free to believe that this is the century of authority, a century tending to the ‘right’, a Fascist century.” — Benito Mussolini

nightfly: I also observe that the Left finds itself quite enamored, in word and in deed, with communism.

Not everyone on the political left is enamored with communism.

nightfly: So that leads me to try to resolve a contradiction: is the Left in fact liberal when they like and advocate a system that is not liberal at all?

No.

nightfly: Is their addiction to equality such that it lends them to ignore liberty –

If they ignore liberty, then they are not liberals.

nightfly: and thus become advocates of a great inequality, inasmuch as enforcing communism requires that some be “more equal” than others?

That’s the extreme left. You’ve already agreed communists aren’t liberals.

nightfly: As far as Fascism… the Nationalist Socialist party named itself after a movement of the Left.

Sure, and they incorporated some socialist policies.

nightfly: If the Left is marked by increased top-down authority and the Right by less, …

That’s not what the terms mean. They originated in the French Revolution. Those who supported the Republic and social equality were on the left. Those who supported the centralized power of the monarchy were on the right.

nightfly: … then I would suggest that Fascism and Communism merely disagree about where the lines ought to be drawn – one along ethnicity, the other along class – and that the end result will be fairly indistinguishable.

They are very different ideologies. Communism envisions perfect equality. Fascism is absolute inequality. They differ according to their desired ends. The means are extreme because they are extremists; they believe the ends justify the means.

nightfly: The extremety of the current political right is not a totalitarian state but an anarchial one, libertarianism run wild.

No. There are anarchists on the political left, as well.
- Zachriel | 06/25/2014 @ 15:00
The thing is, we’re playing with terms that are almost deliberately vague in modern parlance. If you want to go to back to the actual French Revolution definitions of “left” and “right” fine, but they’re simply not used that way in modern discussion.

In modern parlance, “left” = “liberal” = “progressive” and “right” = “conservative.”

I’ll try to talk in terms that actually mean something instead of terms that have politicized and sloganeered and misrepresented into oblivion. A true political spectrum is actually ranges from “individual” to “state.”

To the degree that, on any given issue, you support state power, your position on that issue is statist. On any issue that you support individual power, your position is individualist. Totalitarianism is statist, obviously, and anarchy is individualist. Libertarian leans toward the individualist, allowing for the state to play a subordinate role in defense of individual rights. Socialism and Democracy both, I would argue, lean toward the statist, as they are ideologies that seek to use state power to impose their ideologies and their dictates.

The fact is neither the modern left/liberal/progressive movement nor the right/conservative movements are terribly individualist in their mainstream manifestations. In the U.S. Democrats and Republicans both seek to hold the reigns of power and impose their will on the citizenry.

I’d argue that at this particular stage in history, in the U.S. the Republican/conservative movement is the less statist, as it has grown significant Libertarian and Natural Rights power blocks.

Obviously, the ideal of Communism/Socialism is equality for all, and Marx envisioned a withering of the state for a perfect society of equality. I don’t know why this isn’t treated with the contempt it deserves as anyone older than three knows that’s just not how humans behave.

Two very strong, opposing, popular strains of political thought in the U.S. are, at the risk of ridiculously oversimplifying:
1. Reduction of inequality through central management
2. Maximization of personal liberty through reduction of state power.

Neither side wants bad things for people. It all comes down to whether you trust the state.

All that in preamble, regardless of whether Fascism is “left” or “right” it is decidedly statist. As is communism in all its real-world manifestations, as is Social Democracy. Republicanism is slightly less statist — in the form of the Republican party it still envisions a strong state, but one constrained by strict Constitutional limitations. And Libertarianism is less statist, still.

As for Anarchists, if you listen to what they have to say, you find two types. The Libertarian Anarchists are true anarchists. True Anarchy is stupid and unworkable in the long term, but at least they understand what they’re asking for. On the “left” you find the Anarchists are mostly of the SocAnarch types and if you listen to them, you find out that they’re really communists or socialists, but too socially retarded to understand how that works.

I think the strong statist impulses of Fascism, Communism and Social Democracy are far more momentous and important than which aligns best with a bunch of stupid, dead Frenchmen.

That’s why I (and Goldberg) classify Fascism as an ideology of the “left,” (in modern parlance) because its actual, real-world manifestations are far more in line with actual manifestations of Communist, Socialist and Progressive governance.
- cloudbuster | 06/25/2014 @ 16:29
In the opening of Goldberg’s book, he does an outstanding job of explaining this. I’ve very often wondered if those reviewing it negatively ever bothered to read chapter 1.

In fact, a fascinating exercise is to go read those negative reviews. They essentially all boil down to just one thing: “But, but, but, that would force us to re-think something we don’t want to re-think, and darn it, we just don’t want to.”

Liberals, as I’ve said before, should never be put in charge of describing what exactly it is that conservatives want. They work hard at not caring about what it is. And they shouldn’t be put in charge of saying what happened in history, either, for the same reason. They look forward — especially in cases where the past contains lessons about how liberals are wrong and hurt people. Which is most of the time.
- mkfreeberg | 06/26/2014 @ 04:31
cloudbuster: In modern parlance, “left” = “liberal” = “progressive” and “right” = “conservative.”

That is not correct. For instance, communists are on the political left, but are hardly liberal. Neo-Nazis are on the far right, but aren’t usually considered conservatives.

cloudbuster: A true political spectrum is actually ranges from “individual” to “state.”

Yes, but that is orthogonal to the left-right. There are anarchists on the left and on the right. There are authoritarians on the left and on the right.

cloudbuster: The fact is neither the modern left/liberal/progressive movement nor the right/conservative movements are terribly individualist in their mainstream manifestations.

So, per your own accounting, libertarian-authoritarian is orthogonal to left-right.

cloudbuster: All that in preamble, regardless of whether Fascism is “left” or “right” it is decidedly statist. As is communism in all its real-world manifestations, as is Social Democracy.

Communism envisions a stateless society after a period of dictatorship of the proletariat.
- Zachriel | 06/26/2014 @ 04:38
mkfreeberg: In the opening of Goldberg’s book, he does an outstanding job of explaining this.

Right, because a polemic written by a conservative syndicated columnist overturned generations of scholarship by simply redefining words to suit his political position.

mkfreeberg: In fact, a fascinating exercise is to go read those negative reviews.

“Goldberg shows a near superstitious belief in the power of taxonomy”

“The book reads like a Google search gone gaga.”

” It’s a caricature of reality, like something from a comic-book alternative universe: Bizarro history. … Goldberg isn’t content to simply create an oxymoron; this entire enterprise, in fact, is classic Newspeak.”

“Apparently written with a paint roller”

Heh. Thanks. That was worth a laugh.

mkfreeberg: Liberals, as I’ve said before, should never be put in charge of describing what exactly it is that conservatives want.

Certainly some liberals don’t. Generally, conservatives find many reforms to be ill-thought and subject to unintended consequences. They are suspicious of the growth of government and how it has impinged on traditional institutions, such as family and church. They see most inequality as the natural outcome of merit, and that inequality challenges people to excel. However, conservatives vary considerably. There are those who would use government to impose morality, and others who would limit government as much as possible.

mkfreeberg: They look forward — especially in cases where the past contains lessons about how liberals are wrong and hurt people.

The left has certainly run off the rails in the past. So has the right. If you were to make an argument, then you might say that past liberal successes has led to overreach. That might make a defensible argument.
- Zachriel | 06/26/2014 @ 05:13
Two words that are basically left unspoken, are risk and uncertainty.

If there is common cause for the Left and Right, shouldn’t it be in terms of how we approach the enemies of risk and uncertainty? I would assert that whatever union exists between the Left and Right are when attempts are made to legislate efforts to reduce or eliminate risk and uncertainty. talking with politicians, I find they see these solutions as really cool ideas. Pick a path that reduces uncertainty or risk to economic players, and see increased activity amongst those players. Really cool ideas are, of course, statist in nature. Sure, we all read about the Invisible Hand, but don’t trust that the Invisible Hand will work in our favour. Hence, to reduce risk and uncertainty–to achieve socially agreed upon good outcomes–we must legislate to protect and encourage activities that result in socially agreed upon good outcomes. How else to explain corn subsidies for motor fuel?

The unstated problem of legislation is akin to what we term “the ratcheting effect.” Once in place, there forever. As markets, tastes and preferences change, the legislated allocation becomes legislated mis-allocation. For socially agreed good outcomes. I think we need another education program from D.C.

Of course, we could turn inwardly, and develop a relationship with God. That there is a season for everything. Creation and destruction. Gain and loss. It is when we replace objective values with normative values–to achieve socially agreed upon good outcomes–we state the thesis for the State versus the non-State. If we all agree that pink is good, how do we explain to non-pink producers that they must subsidize pink producers? How is it that one producer of goods gains an advantage over all other producers?

Because, it’s a totally cool idea.

http://cafehayek.com/2014/06/pinko-redux.html
- OregonGuy | 06/26/2014 @ 09:05
OregonGuy: If we all agree that pink is good, how do we explain to non-pink producers that they must subsidize pink producers? How is it that one producer of goods gains an advantage over all other producers?

There’s several different issues. Industrial policy, which is meant to encourage the development of important technologies; independence, so that a nation is not so dependent on others that it represents a security risk; and pollution.

OregonGuy: Really cool ideas are, of course, statist in nature.

Seems most of the really cool ideas come from the private sector.
- Zachriel | 06/26/2014 @ 10:59

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