December 14th, 2009
Selected quotes from Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn’s Leftism Revisited
Americans (or Britishers) are basically conservative. Being evolutionary rather than revolutionary they like familiar things and ideas in bigger and better editions, but they are easily horrified or disgusted by the essentially new, the different or unexpected. (xvii)
Whoever praises a collective unit in which he participates (a nation, a race, a class, a party) also praises himself. (4)
In the last two hundred years the exploitation of envy—its mobilization among the masses—coupled with the denigration of individuals, but more frequently of classes, races, nations, or religious communities, has been the key to political success…all leftist “isms” harp on this theme; i.e., on the privilege of groups, which are the objects of envy and, at the same time, deemed inferior in an intellectual or moral respect…they ought to adjust, become identical with “the people,” renounce their privileges, conform. (6)
Since we do not know who among us is nearer to God, we should treat each other as equals. This, however, is merely procedural. (10)
A certain equality of treatment is necessary in a free society. Only by treating people equally can one discover who is superior to whom. (12)
Egalitarianism, as already intimated, cannot make much progress without the use of force: perfect equality is only possible in total slavery. (13)
Since equality is the dynamic element in democracy, and liberty lies at the base of true liberalism, the two political concepts are equally exclusive. (14)
In every nation, the lower half of the social pyramid (if the expression is permitted) is by far the biggest half, which means that the people of quality can always be outvoted. (17)
The repression of 49 percent of the people by 51 percent, or of 1 percent by 99 percent, is most regrettable, but it is not undemocratic. (18-19)
Tolerance is a real virtue because it entails self-control and an ascetic attitude. (19)
…This brings about such errors as calling the confiscation of a newspaper “undemocratic.” If the majority of the people approve of it, such an act is highly democratic, but assuredly not liberal. (21)
In Germany after World War I, the National Socialists, most unfortunately, were seated on the far right because to simple-minded people nationalists were rightists, if not conservatives… (24)
…Extremes never meet. Extreme cold and extreme heat, extreme distance and extreme nearness, extreme strength and extreme weakness, extreme speed and extreme slowness never meet. They do not become identical or even alike. (25)
The Catholic faith is not conservative. It is, rather, like a tree, rooted to the same spot but changing in shape, shedding old leaves and branches, adding new ones. (41)
…The foundations of the American republic are aristocratic and Whiggish with an antimonarchic slant. (50)
One ought not to forget that the term “democratic” appears neither in the Declaration of Independence nor in the Constitution. Nor does the word “republic”; the Constitution merely insists that the member states of the Union have a “republican” form of government. (51)
In a letter to John Taylor (John) Adams insisted that democracy would inevitably evolve into oligarchy and oligarchy into despotism, a notion he shared with Plato and Aristotle. (52)
“who is secure in all of his basic needs? Who has work, spiritual care, medical care, housing , food, occasional entertainment, free clothing, free burial, free everything?” The answer might be, “monks and nuns,” but the standard reply is “prisoners.” (88)
Marx nurtured a real hatred for the Jews, in whom he saw the very embodiment of bourgeois capitalism. (110)
The farmer was and remains the stumbling block to socialist experiments everywhere. Since he raises his own food and tends to live in his own house, he is less “controllable” than say, the urban dweller. (117)
Just as the “Reddest” areas of Germany changed from red to brown to back to red, so it occurred in Italy. The Romagna, very red today, was very fascist in the 1920s and 1930s. (143)
In practice Hitler certainly subscribed to Mussolini’s “Tutto nello stato, niente al fuori dello stato, nulla contro lo stato” (”Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state). (144)
“German socialism does not differ from Marxism in its critique of capitalism nor in its concept of class struggle.” (147)
The patriot, on the other hand, is not contentious. Just as an intelligent man would never try to argue that his parents were the “best in the world” so the patriot considers his attachment to his country a matter of loyalty. (199)
There is no better way to generate hatred than by forcing a person to sign a confession of guilt which he is sacredly convinced is untrue. (218)
In a democracy, the manifold efforts—the talks, intrigues and chats, the incessant rubbing of shoulders—necessary to attain a leading position consume so much time and energy that the factual knowledge absolutely essential for statesmanship (as opposed to the qualifications of a mere politician) is seldom acquired. (262)
The typical leftist is a dreamer without honor, and that is a troubling combination. (291)
Since democratism is strongly ideological, the West has a tendency to “democratize” every conceivable domain of life—education, families, drama, stores, circuses, banks, hospitals. (310)
The alternative to authority is coercion. (333)
National Socialism was most certainly not a conspiracy; it was a mass movement, operating in broad daylight and filled with people who sacrificed time, money, their very lives for a wicked and stupid cause. But democracy could not admit to any of this. (334)
People are rarely diabolic or bent enthusiastically on evil. As a rule, they are only weak; they cannot resist temptation and thus give way to their evil drives. (339)