Liberalism? Conservative? What do these really mean?
Wow...good job! Pretty much sums it up and yeah...prepare to be attacked with namecalling. I'm sure they are on their way!
Why do liberals think that Fascism and Communism are polar opposites?
@Alyssa Capitalism DOES work. Most of mans greatest achievements have been thanks to free markets and entrepreneurship. Did some government bureaucracy tell Albert Einstein to create the theory of general relativity? Did government bureaucracy tell Henry Ford to revolutionize the automobile? NOOOOOOO The reason that things are so bad in many third world country's is due to socialism. The only hope for these people is that they will have a chance to work themselves out of poverty. The closer you move to Marx, is the closer you move towards shortages, famine, and impoverishment. Don't you remember the bread lines in the Soviet Union? That's the result of rationing. The reason we keep having these boom and bust cycles is due to these Keynesian economic policies that have been dug into the thought of most of our past presidents. We need to stop the spending and let markets and the price system work. I want real growth and not a series of bubbles.
What is the difference between totalitarianism and fascism?
totalitarianism is a reference to the amount of government involvement in private affairs. fascism is a political movement that puts the financial and military elites at the helm of policy making. Fascism purports that society is a living organism and therefore it must be purged from the "disease" of socialism. It is reactionary in it very basis. It was created by bussiness leaders supporting mob leaders to counter the growing womens and labor movement. Fascism distrusts democracy and therefore tends to support very strong executives. A strong executive is conceived as being authoritarian. Since fascism sees socialism as a disease, it tends to take totalitarian forms in its efforts to involve itself with every day life and destroy any trace of socialism or dissent wherever it may be found. Hope this helps. PEACE. edit: other answers are misguided. Totalitarianism is not necessarily fascistic. It is not even necessarily anti democratic. For example, the prohibition of drugs is a classic example of a totalitarian measure and it is enforced in most democracies. Also, socialism, which is opposite to fascism, has taken form in totalitarian governments. Totalitarianism is about the degree of governmental power Authoritarianism is about the degree of executive power Fascism is specifically about an organic conception of society to be protected along the tenets of traditional european values (particularly a bourgeois conception of ancien regime values a la Napoleon II)... heh, hope this helps. and: I like Brodier's answer... disagree on the need to be authoritarian, but agree that both have been historically authoritarian. (if you forget about Sparta and Rome)