"Leftism: a philosophy that begins and ends in absurdity."

MJF 

"FEMINISM: the men-are-so-horrible-we-want-to-be-just-like-them movement."

MJF 

Maxim 190

"Il n'appartient qu'aux grands hommes d'avoir de grands défauts."

François de La Rochefoucauld

TRANSLATION: "Only great men have great faults."

"What is Conservatism?"

"So what is conservatism? Basically it is caution based on a perception that the world is an unpredictable, dangerous and often hostile place. So change is not rejected. It is in fact . . usually desired. But it is approached in a skeptical, step by step way to ensure that its effects are beneficial or at least benign. And an important criterion of what constitutes 'benign' is how the change affects individual liberty. At a minimum, a conservative wants to ensure that change will not reduce his individual liberty."

Dr. John Joseph Ray

Right-Wing Socialists, Not Conservatives

In the first half of the 20th century, Socialists with nationalistic and militaristic tendencies were viewed as the "right wing" of the Socialist movement. Nationalism and militarism were regarded by Socialists as "conservative" tendencies.

Mussolini was a Socialist

This usage of "right" is often conflated with the earlier political meaning of "right" applied during the French Revolution when supporters of the king (monarchists and aristocrats) sat to the president's right in the French National Assembly—comprising "the party of order". Supporters of the revolution sat to his left—comprising "the party of movement".

National socialists¹ and fascists,² like other Socialists, believe in all power residing in a totalitarian state—including state command and control of industry—without regard to individual rights, which are seen as subsidiary to state needs.

Hitler was a Socialist, too

Conservatives, to the contrary, believe ultimate power resides with the Divine, by which the state is guided. Individuals are granted rights, liberties, and freedoms by this Divine power. These individual rights, liberties, and freedoms drive a free enterprise economic system and democratic government.

No matter how "conservative" a Socialist group might appear to other Socialists, Socialism remains a distinctly separate band of the social-political spectrum from actual Conservatism. Claiming all power to the state—eliminating Divine guidance and individual rights, while eradicating the institutions designed to promote and protect them—leads predictably to Nazi horrors.

Protecting and preserving the institutions that facilitate the working of Divine guidance through the state, while preserving and protecting Divinely-derived individual rights—Conservatism—is designed to protect the people from excesses of the state. Conservative commitment to an individual's right to own firearms, by itself, might have prevented national socialist evils from spilling out.³

SEE: Conserving the Core, Right from Left, Political Spectrum Redrawn, and Leftism vs. American Conservatism.

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1. The full name of the Nazi party in Germany was National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) which arose out of the German Workers' Party (which Hitler joined in 1919).
2. Mussolini was with the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) until he was expelled for his opposition to the party's neutrality in World War I. He denounced the PSI, later founding the fascist movement.
3. The Nazis disarmed the people and stripped them of their right to bear arms.

MORE: Hitler Was a Socialist by Dr. John Joseph Ray; Stalin in Power: the Revolution from Above, 1928-1941 by Robert C. Tucker; Benito Mussolini – the socialist; Leftists become incandescent when reminded of the socialist roots of Nazism.

Ayn Rand Was a Man

"Conservatism At Its Highest"

"The conservative is concerned, first of all, with the regeneration of the spirit and character—with the perennial problem of the inner order of the soul, the restoration of the ethical understanding, and the religious sanction upon which any life worth living is founded. This is conservatism at its highest."

Russell Kirk

"Learn From Losing"

THE POWER OF STUPIDITY

It is not difficult to understand how social, political and institutional power enhances the damaging potential of a stupid person. But one still has to explain and understand what essentially it is that makes a stupid person dangerous to other people--in other words what constitutes the power of stupidity.

Essentially stupid people are dangerous and damaging because reasonable people find it difficult to imagine and understand unreasonable behavior. An intelligent person may understand the logic of a bandit. The bandit's actions follow a pattern of rationality:nasty rationality, if you like, but still rationality. The bandit wants a plus on his account. Since he is not intelligent enough to devise ways of obtaining the plus as well as providing you with a plus, he will produce his plus by causing a minus to appear on your account. All this is bad, but it is rational and if you are rational you can predict it. You can foresee a bandit's actions, his nasty maneuvers and ugly aspirations and often can build up your defenses.

With a stupid person all this is absolutely impossible as explained by the Third Basic Law. A stupid creature will harass you for no reason, for no advantage, without any plan or scheme and at the most improbable times and places. You have no rational way of telling if and when and how and why the stupid creature attacks. When confronted with a stupid individual you are completely at his mercy.

Because the stupid person's actions do not conform to the rules of rationality, it follows that:

1. one is generally caught by surprise by the attack;
2. even when one becomes aware of the attack, one cannot organize a rational defense, because the attack itself lacks any rational structure.

The fact that the activity and movements of a stupid creature are absolutely erratic and irrational not only makes defense problematic but it also makes any counter-attack extremely difficult-like trying to shoot at an object which is capable of the most improbable unimaginable movements. This is what both Dickens and Schiller had in mind when the former stated that "with stupidity and sound digestion man may front much" and the latter wrote that "against stupidity the very Gods fight in vain."

"The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity"

by Carlo M. Cipolla

Professor of Economics

U.C. Berkeley 

SEE: http://www.ecotopia.com/webpress/Stupidity/