How many Republicans really think the Nazis were a leftist political party?

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Far too many, far too many

Many conservatives accuse Hitler of being a leftist, on the grounds that his party was named "National Socialist." But socialism requires worker ownership and control of the means of production. In Nazi Germany, private capitalist individuals owned the means of production, and they in turn were frequently controlled by the Nazi party and state. True socialism does not advocate such economic dictatorship -- it can only be democratic. Hitler's other political beliefs place him almost always on the far right. He advocated racism over racial tolerance, eugenics over freedom of reproduction, merit over equality, competition over cooperation, power politics and militarism over pacifism, dictatorship over democracy, capitalism over Marxism, realism over idealism, nationalism over internationalism, exclusiveness over inclusiveness, common sense over theory or science, pragmatism over principle, and even held friendly relations with the Church.
To most people, Hitler's beliefs belong to the extreme far right. For example, most conservatives believe in patriotism and a strong military; carry these beliefs far enough, and you arrive at Hitler's warring nationalism. This association has long been something of an embarrassment to the far right. To deflect such criticism, conservatives have recently launched a counter-attack, claiming that Hitler was a socialist, and therefore belongs to the political left, not the right.
The primary basis for this claim is that Hitler was a National Socialist. The word "National" evokes the state, and the word "Socialist" openly identifies itself as such.
However, there is no academic controversy over the status of this term: it was a misnomer. Misnomers are quite common in the history of political labels. Examples include the German Democratic Republic (which was neither) and Vladimir Zhirinovsky's "Liberal Democrat" party (which was also neither). The true question is not whether Hitler called his party "socialist," but whether or not it actually was.
http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-hitler.htm

Then there is the enabeling act.
The only party to go on record voting against it were the social democrats after communists had already been thrown in jail.

A two thirds majority was needed, since the law would actually alter the German constitution. Hitler needed 31 non-Nazi votes to pass it. He got those votes from the Center Party after making a false promise to restore some basic rights already taken away by decree.
However, one man arose amid the overwhelming might. Otto Wells, leader of the Social Democrats stood up and spoke quietly to Hitler.
"We German Social Democrats pledge ourselves solemnly in this historic hour to the principles of humanity and justice, of freedom and socialism. No enabling act can give you power to destroy ideas which are eternal and indestructible."
http://www.historyplace.com/worldwar2/timeline/enabling.htm...Show more

The nazis and the communists were totalitarians, which means, among other things, that they wanted control of everything in order that when any hint of insurrection appeared, it got squashed.

It has utterly sod all to do with the ideology of a modern leftist who thinks a public service should be in State hands in order to prevent a private company running it into the ground for profit reasons. Indeed, just as fascism, nazism, communism and the rule of religous extremists such as the Taliban are closely linked, liberalism and conservatism are also closely linked, and the posturing of certain people who mantain otherwise should be ignored....Show more

That's Jonah Goldberg's book "Liberal Fascism." I'm sad to see that the contents of this book have already seeped into the minds of many conservatives who will now parrot it without being as knowledgeable as Goldberg (who is, incidentally, also wrong, but enough has been written about that elsewhere). Part of the problem lies in the distinction between what Fascists/Nazis sometimes said - talking about lifting up the working man, full employment, etc. - and what they did - fight and kill communists in their own countries, bust unions and make nice with the corporate establishment. If you only pay attention to what Nazis said, and not what they did, and took names like "National Socialist" at face value instead of evaluating the actual policy programs enacted by them, you could have the mistaken impression. But I doubt the person you are referring to has even done so much as read about what the Nazis said they were all about, like Goldberg did....Show more

The Nazis were elitists, plain and simple.
They claimed to be socialists to get the support of the lower class majority, and used their sense of patriotism and religion to gain support much like the people who appeal to the religious right.
They paid lip-service to everyone until they had the power they wanted, then they chose a state religion and started enforcing morals of that religion upon the people.
The Jews where propagandized as being evil just like the right does on talk-radio with their demonized myth called a "lib".
They demonized the Jews to be a person who didn't want to work for what they had, and were just lazy squatters that had no right to be part of their "empire", much like we see about immigrants and the poor, coming from the right.

Desire for security from an outside threat drove the German peope to give up their rights for security thinking they only had something to fear if they had something to hide. Later the Jews, homosexuals, drug addicts, liberlas etc found they really did have something to fear when the ashes started raining down over the land from the furnaces.

Hitler himself hated communist and liberals it is well documented.

The problem some people have is realizing you can claim to be a leftist politician to get people to allow you to centralize power, for the purpose of redistributing wealth, but only eftists will actually give up that power once centralized. That was what Marx stated, and neither him nor his philosophy is responsible for the atrocities that people claiming to be socialists have commited.
The only people to blame were the power mongers themselves, and the people who thought they had nothing to fear if they had nothing to hide....Show more

I actually know a conservative guy who lives in Texas who accuses liberals of being both Marxists AND National Socialists! HA! I think that if Hitler and Stalin were still around, they would laugh their asses off, since the two are diametrically opposed!:)...Show more