The face of sin today often wears the mask of tolerance.

[_Droopy]

The Ensign article on the subject by Holland several months ago was a real step forward in that it admitted that homosexual tendencies may be largely biological in cause, and that the correct course of action in dealing with homosexual members is not condemnation.

As is so drearily typical of this place, it can be extremely difficult to get an iota of straight talk or simple intellectual honesty out of most threads, and the above is no exception whatever. I could find no Ensign article from "several months ago" that featured such a discussion, However, Here's what Elder Holland actually said in an Ensign article from October of 2007:

As for why you feel as you do, I can’t answer that question. A number of factors may be involved, and they can be as different as people are different. Some things, including the cause of your feelings, we may never know in this life. But knowing why you feel as you do isn’t as important as knowing you have not transgressed. If your life is in harmony with the commandments, then you are worthy to serve in the Church, enjoy full fellowship with the members, attend the temple, and receive all the blessings of the Savior’s Atonement.”

As one can see here, Holland makes no claims even approaching those made for him by Thama. Here's Holland again from his PBS interview:

... The emotion and the pain and the challenge of [dealing with homosexuality] has to rank among the most taxing, most visceral of any of the issues that any religious group wrestles with. As others of my colleagues and brethren have, I have counseled hundreds -- I don't know how many hundreds -- of these young people. I say young people because often that's the group that come to us most, but there are people of every age struggling. ... The counsel I have given is that God loves them every bit as much as he loves me; the church loves them. We do have doctrine; we do have borders; we do have foundational pieces on which we stand. And moral chastity -- heterosexual ... and homosexual -- are areas where God has spoken and where the church has a position. ...

I spoke earlier about the price everyone has to pay for the blessing of the covenant, to be counted within the institutional circle of the blessings of the church. ... I have spent a significant portion of the last few years of my ministry pleading to give help to those who don't practice [homosexuality] but who are struggling with the impressions and the feelings and the attractions and the gender confusion. Or if they do practice or are trying to deal with it, that group I have spent scores of hours with, if nothing else, just saying: "Hang on, hope on, try on. ... Get through the night; get to the light." ...

I believe in that light, and I believe in that hope, and I believe in that peace. So I offer it without apology, but I know sometimes that's thin to people who would want more. Any more than I can see it compromising on its heterosexual position of chastity before marriage and fidelity afterward, I don't anticipate it that [the church] would change on homosexual behavior. But none of that has anything to do with my belief in the value of that soul and the love that God has for that person.

But it's just that ... there is a quid pro quo in terms of wanting the church's blessing on our lives. If someone chooses behavior that goes in a different direction, people choose that every day. And while that may make me weep, ... people are free to do that. ...

I believe with all my heart that it's divine language; it's a divine commandment. There really are "thou shalts" and "thou shalt nots" in life. And in this world, in some contemporary life, thou shalts and thou shalt nots are not popular on the face of it; it wouldn't matter what subject. But we'll always have some, and we'll try to help each other master that and embrace it and see it through and be exalted on the other end.

It's tough being gay anyplace in society, in any church, but especially here in yours.

Absolutely. I don't think there's any question about that. And it's true of so many other things about the church. We're so defined by marriage and family. ... So it's got that added component of pain in a church where we do advocate and expect and encourage marriage -- traditional marriage, man to a woman, woman to a man -- and family and children. And for anyone in whatever gay or lesbian inclination may exist, ... the marriage I have and the marriage I've seen my children have and I pray for my grandchildren to have, they say, "For me it's an experience I'll never have." And true to the Holland tradition, I burst into tears, and I say, "Hope on, and wait and let me walk with you, and we'll be faithful, be clean, and we'll get to the end of this."

I do know that this will not be a post-mortal condition. It will not be a post-mortal difficulty. I have a niece who cannot bear children. That is the sorrow and the tragedy of her life. She who was born to give birth will never give birth, and I cry with her. ... I just say to her what I say to people struggling with gender identity: "Hang on, and hope on, and pray on, and this will be resolved in eternity." These conditions will not exist post-mortality. I want that to be of some hope to some. ...

So Holland has admitted to nothing of the kind.

[_Droopy]

I think Jewish ritual is nonsense and bullcrap,

This individual throws the term "bigot" at those who oppose homosexual marriage and homosexual practices, does he not?

[_Droopy]

Do you think the church's stance against adulterers (they can't have fellowship) is wrong?

Quit dodging my point.

It's a perfectly cromulent question. Homosexual acts fall under the definitions of adultery and fornication (depending on the circumstance).

Oh man, now you;re really using big words bc. Trevor will presently be on you like Godzilla on a Tokyo subway...

[_Thama]

The Ensign article on the subject by Holland several months ago was a real step forward in that it admitted that homosexual tendencies may be largely biological in cause, and that the correct course of action in dealing with homosexual members is not condemnation.

As is so drearily typical of this place, it can be extremely difficult to get an iota of straight talk or simple intellectual honesty out of most threads, and the above is no exception whatever. I could find no Ensign article from "several months ago" that featured such a discussion, However, Here's what Elder Holland actually said in an Ensign article from October of 2007:

As for why you feel as you do, I can’t answer that question. A number of factors may be involved, and they can be as different as people are different. Some things, including the cause of your feelings, we may never know in this life. But knowing why you feel as you do isn’t as important as knowing you have not transgressed. If your life is in harmony with the commandments, then you are worthy to serve in the Church, enjoy full fellowship with the members, attend the temple, and receive all the blessings of the Savior’s Atonement.”

As one can see here, Holland makes no claims even approaching those made for him by Thama. Here's Holland again from his PBS interview:

... The emotion and the pain and the challenge of [dealing with homosexuality] has to rank among the most taxing, most visceral of any of the issues that any religious group wrestles with. As others of my colleagues and brethren have, I have counseled hundreds -- I don't know how many hundreds -- of these young people. I say young people because often that's the group that come to us most, but there are people of every age struggling. ... The counsel I have given is that God loves them every bit as much as he loves me; the church loves them. We do have doctrine; we do have borders; we do have foundational pieces on which we stand. And moral chastity -- heterosexual ... and homosexual -- are areas where God has spoken and where the church has a position. ...

I spoke earlier about the price everyone has to pay for the blessing of the covenant, to be counted within the institutional circle of the blessings of the church. ... I have spent a significant portion of the last few years of my ministry pleading to give help to those who don't practice [homosexuality] but who are struggling with the impressions and the feelings and the attractions and the gender confusion. Or if they do practice or are trying to deal with it, that group I have spent scores of hours with, if nothing else, just saying: "Hang on, hope on, try on. ... Get through the night; get to the light." ...

I believe in that light, and I believe in that hope, and I believe in that peace. So I offer it without apology, but I know sometimes that's thin to people who would want more. Any more than I can see it compromising on its heterosexual position of chastity before marriage and fidelity afterward, I don't anticipate it that [the church] would change on homosexual behavior. But none of that has anything to do with my belief in the value of that soul and the love that God has for that person.

But it's just that ... there is a quid pro quo in terms of wanting the church's blessing on our lives. If someone chooses behavior that goes in a different direction, people choose that every day. And while that may make me weep, ... people are free to do that. ...

I believe with all my heart that it's divine language; it's a divine commandment. There really are "thou shalts" and "thou shalt nots" in life. And in this world, in some contemporary life, thou shalts and thou shalt nots are not popular on the face of it; it wouldn't matter what subject. But we'll always have some, and we'll try to help each other master that and embrace it and see it through and be exalted on the other end.

It's tough being gay anyplace in society, in any church, but especially here in yours.

Absolutely. I don't think there's any question about that. And it's true of so many other things about the church. We're so defined by marriage and family. ... So it's got that added component of pain in a church where we do advocate and expect and encourage marriage -- traditional marriage, man to a woman, woman to a man -- and family and children. And for anyone in whatever gay or lesbian inclination may exist, ... the marriage I have and the marriage I've seen my children have and I pray for my grandchildren to have, they say, "For me it's an experience I'll never have." And true to the Holland tradition, I burst into tears, and I say, "Hope on, and wait and let me walk with you, and we'll be faithful, be clean, and we'll get to the end of this."

I do know that this will not be a post-mortal condition. It will not be a post-mortal difficulty. I have a niece who cannot bear children. That is the sorrow and the tragedy of her life. She who was born to give birth will never give birth, and I cry with her. ... I just say to her what I say to people struggling with gender identity: "Hang on, and hope on, and pray on, and this will be resolved in eternity." These conditions will not exist post-mortality. I want that to be of some hope to some. ...

So Holland has admitted to nothing of the kind.

Sigh. Did he say or write the word "biological"? No. If that's the sort of semantics you have to go after to defend your intellectually inbred worldview from the changing teachings of apostles who are suddenly more progressive than you, then go for it. I wouldn't expect anything less from South Carolina. However, nothing in all of those quotes you wrote negates my point at all: the debate within the Church has always been whether the source of homosexual tendencies is a choice or something innate, and Holland clearly leaves both possibilities open-- it may be either.

But really, if you want to characterize Nazism and Islamic extremism as being "leftist" movements, then you're so far removed from being historically and politically educated that there's probably no real point debating with you... and I get the sense that just about everyone here (except me) has long since realized this.

[_Droopy]

Sigh. Did he say or write the word "biological"? No. If that's the sort of semantics you have to go after to defend your intellectually inbred worldview from the changing teachings of apostles who are suddenly more progressive than you, then go for it. I wouldn't expect anything less from South Carolina. However, nothing in all of those quotes you wrote negates my point at all: the debate within the Church has always been whether the source of homosexual tendencies is a choice or something innate, and Holland clearly leaves both possibilities open-- it may be either.

Try, try Thama, to engage in the admittedly arduous task of critical thought. It will do you a world of good in the arena of ideas to actually have something beyond the shifting Oprafied nostrums of the pop media culture from whence you clearly derive much of that which you believe about the world to support your pretensions to activity within that arena.

Also, let me say that you're pompous, snarky bigotry toward a region of the country you clearly know little or nothing about is telling, as are your assumptions about me. I'm not from SC, nor from the South at all. If you want to see real anti-intellectualism, go hang around the NY Times for a while, especially during an election year, and take the lay of the land there.

You also might try, just try, at a modicum of intellectual honesty with clear evidence. I'm aware of no long standing "debate" within the Church regarding "homosexual tendencies". Further, Holland leaves no "possibilities open" in any either/or sense. He says precisely, in his own words, what Oaks has said, that it is a complex of influential factors of which biology may be one, perhaps more for one than for another.

Further, the case isn't quite this simple. For many homosexuals, there may be more or less of a biological component as to the creation of biases or predispositions. For many others, there may be more of a conscious choice involved (the pan-sexual hedonism of our culture and our culture's worship of novelty and rebellion against social norms for its own sake provokes sexual experimentation as normative sexual practices become pedestrian). In most cases, however, we need not use the term "choice" to mean waking up one morning and deciding to be homosexual. "Choice" here refers to a long and complex series of choices in the form of responses to environmental, psychological, and perhaps biological influences over time, such that a certain developmental path is created.

[_Droopy]

But really, if you want to characterize Nazism and Islamic extremism as being "leftist" movements, then you're so far removed from being historically and politically educated that there's probably no real point debating with you... and I get the sense that just about everyone here (except me) has long since realized this.

Really Thama, you're just another brick in the pop-psych, public skool educated CBS Evening News wall.

Its one thing to be ignorant and know it. Its quite another to be ignorant and think you're educated. That's a real tragedy - and farce.

The scholarly literature available, going back to the WWII era, documenting the clear, unambiguous commonalities between Marxian Socialism (Communism), German National Socialism, and Fascism, are substantial, and your lack of either interest in or an open mind about this literature (I'd start with Von Mises, Von Heyek, and Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn) indicate that you have far too long a way to go to become substantively educated enough in these areas to put much effort into bringing you up to speed here, at least not in the short term. For a modern treatment, you couldn't do better than Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism, as an excellent introduction and overview of the subject.

Modern "Islamofascism" began in the 1020s with the Muslim Brotherhood (which still exists), and the Islamic states were, during WWII, allies and supporters of the Nazis against the the Allied powers. During the Second Intifada and through the 9/11 period, Mein Kampf was a top selling title on the Arab street throughout the Muslim world (and still, I understand, is today).

[_Runtu]

Really Thama, you're just another brick in the pop-psych, public skool educated CBS Evening News wall.

As opposed to those who are educated by FrontPage mag and the Limbaugh Letter, right?

Its one thing to be ignorant and know it. Its quite another to be ignorant and think you're educated. That's a real tragedy - and farce.

Oddly enough, I agree, though it's a damnable shame when someone is uneducated and ignorant, and knows it.

The scholarly literature available, going back to the WWII era, documenting the clear, unambiguous commonalities between Marxian Socialism (Communism), German National Socialism, and Fascism, are substantial, and your lack of either interest in or an open mind about this literature (I'd start with Von Mises, Von Heyek, and Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn) indicate that you have far too long a way to go to become substantively educated enough in these areas to put much effort into bringing you up to speed here, at least not in the short term. For a modern treatment, you couldn't do better than Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism, as an excellent introduction and overview of the subject.

I like Jonah Goldberg, but I don't think I'd call his book scholarly. There are indeed similarities between the extreme left and extreme right, but they do not spring from the same philosophical and political approach. And I'm interested as to which Hayek and Mises works you would recommend to support your fascism=socialism belief. Kuenelt-Leddihn indeed argued what you say, though I wonder if you have actually read anything he wrote other than what he published in National Review.

Modern "Islamofascism" began in the 1020s with the Muslim Brotherhood (which still exists), and the Islamic states were, during WWII, allies and supporters of the Nazis against the the Allied powers. During the Second Intifada and through the 9/11 period, Mein Kampf was a top selling title on the Arab street throughout the Muslim world (and still, I understand, is today).

And this is relevant how? Are the Islamists in any way "leftist"? Nope. Anti-Western, hateful, bigoted, etc. But leftist?

[_Droopy]

I like Jonah Goldberg, but I don't think I'd call his book scholarly.

I didn't say it was. I called it a "treatment".

There are indeed similarities between the extreme left and extreme right, but they do not spring from the same philosophical and political approach.

Really? Hegel, Heidegger, Nietzsche, Fichte, Marx, statism, statolotry, totalism, political and social collectivism, the absorption of the individual into the state, anti-capitalism, utopian idealism, the glorification of revolutionary violence? But, the problem we have here, yet again, is that Nazism does not represent any kind of "extreme Right" but indeed was, as Richard Pipes has written, a "heresy of socialism", or, as Karl Radek said, “Fascism is middle class Socialism….”.

And I'm interested as to which Hayek and Mises works you would recommend to support your fascism=socialism belief. Kuenelt-Leddihn indeed argued what you say, though I wonder if you have actually read anything he wrote other than what he published in National Review.

Leddihn's Leftism Revisited: From De Sade and Marx to Hitler and Pol Pot takes this as a basic assumption, and shows how all of the collectivist ideologies of the early 20th century are interrelated. For Heyek, the core text is going to be The Road to Serfdom, which takes this as a part of its major thesis. Von Mises wrote about the subject extensively, But certainly one of the best sources would be his
Omnipotent Government: The Rise of Total State and Total War, with emphasis on the chapter entitled The Origins of Nazism, which can be read here:

http://mises.org/story/1447

Indeed, there's no reason at all to be ignorant of Von Mises' work, as virtually everything he's written is available for download at the Von Mises Institute website. I've got most of his works on disk, and own my own copy of Human Action (which is now, after I paid some $40 for it about 14 years ago, available for download for free).


If I gave the impression the Islamists were leftists, I didn't mean that. They were allies of the Nazis, and they are allies, as well, with many western leftists (who they would otherwise behead on sight) against America and western culture, even though they share no ideological affinities (the enemy of my enemy is still my friend, as a practical matter).

[_Thama]

Try, try Thama, to engage in the admittedly arduous task of critical thought. It will do you a world of good in the arena of ideas to actually have something beyond the shifting Oprafied nostrums of the pop media culture from whence you clearly derive much of that which you believe about the world to support your pretensions to activity within that arena.

Yes, clearly. My views on homosexual culture can't have anything to do with personally knowing homosexual couples, nor can my views on the biology of homosexuality have anything to do with participating in and reading the journals of genetic and biomedical research. No, since I prefer to use language as a communication tool rather than a display of esoteric vocabulary, my views must obviously be Oprah-born and MSNBC-raised.

Also, let me say that you're pompous, snarky bigotry toward a region of the country you clearly know little or nothing about is telling, as are your assumptions about me. I'm not from SC, nor from the South at all. If you want to see real anti-intellectualism, go hang around the NY Times for a while, especially during an election year, and take the lay of the land there.

I knew I should have put my location beneath my avatar. I'm NC born and raised, have spent a good bit of time in SC, and my bigotry is entirely contained to the state of SC, not the South in general. To most people in NC, VA, GA, etc., South Carolina is that dirty, backwards little place where you go to buy fireworks and guns.

You also might try, just try, at a modicum of intellectual honesty with clear evidence. I'm aware of no long standing "debate" within the Church regarding "homosexual tendencies". Further, Holland leaves no "possibilities open" in any either/or sense. He says precisely, in his own words, what Oaks has said, that it is a complex of influential factors of which biology may be one, perhaps more for one than for another.

Further, the case isn't quite this simple. For many homosexuals, there may be more or less of a biological component as to the creation of biases or predispositions. For many others, there may be more of a conscious choice involved (the pan-sexual hedonism of our culture and our culture's worship of novelty and rebellion against social norms for its own sake provokes sexual experimentation as normative sexual practices become pedestrian). In most cases, however, we need not use the term "choice" to mean waking up one morning and deciding to be homosexual. "Choice" here refers to a long and complex series of choices in the form of responses to environmental, psychological, and perhaps biological influences over time, such that a certain developmental path is created.

According to that Oaks quote: biology may or may not be a factor in causing homosexuality, it may or may not be a cause with variation in the population set, and the number of "influential factors" may be anywhere between 2 and infinity. If you don't think that qualifies as "leaving possibilities open", then I don't know what to tell you.

It is refreshing to see that you don't have quite as narrow a view of the causes of homosexuality as I had thought. Still, your description of "choice", as opposed to biology, as a cause of homosexuality leads me to believe that you don't have a very sharp grasp on what is actually meant in science by the term "biological causes". No gene can be expressed in a vacuum. The idea that environmental influences are needed as a part of the expression of homosexuality doesn't preclude it from being biological in nature any more than the idea that environmental influences (such as oxygen, adequate blood supply, a lack of testosterone receptor inhibition) are needed as a part of the expression of the SRY gene precludes your maleness from being biological in nature.

Really Thama, you're just another brick in the pop-psych, public skool educated CBS Evening News wall.

Its one thing to be ignorant and know it. Its quite another to be ignorant and think you're educated. That's a real tragedy - and farce.

The scholarly literature available, going back to the WWII era, documenting the clear, unambiguous commonalities between Marxian Socialism (Communism), German National Socialism, and Fascism, are substantial, and your lack of either interest in or an open mind about this literature (I'd start with Von Mises, Von Heyek, and Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn) indicate that you have far too long a way to go to become substantively educated enough in these areas to put much effort into bringing you up to speed here, at least not in the short term. For a modern treatment, you couldn't do better than Jonah Goldberg's Liberal Fascism, as an excellent introduction and overview of the subject.

Modern "Islamofascism" began in the 1020s with the Muslim Brotherhood (which still exists), and the Islamic states were, during WWII, allies and supporters of the Nazis against the the Allied powers. During the Second Intifada and through the 9/11 period, Mein Kampf was a top selling title on the Arab street throughout the Muslim world (and still, I understand, is today).

Jonah Goldberg is your idea of scholarly literature? Interesting, sure, but scholarly literature? After reading that, I'm now quite convinced that you simply pulled your other references from a Google search. There are clear, unambiguous commonalities between Marxism and the United Order, as well as bat wings and bird wings. Similar results do not logically imply a similar basis. All you establish by drawing connection in structure and function between Marxism, Nazism, and other forms of Fascism is establishing that extremism in either leftist or rightist doctrine has the potential to create brutal dictatorship. Unless, that is, you simply choose to redefine "rightist" as everything good that you specifically agree with, and "leftist" as anything that falls outside that set of ideas.

[_Droopy]

Yes, clearly. My views on homosexual culture can't have anything to do with personally knowing homosexual couples,

Utterly irrelevant. And you dare lecture me about what science is?

nor can my views on the biology of homosexuality have anything to do with participating in and reading the journals of genetic and biomedical research. No, since I prefer to use language as a communication tool rather than a display of esoteric vocabulary, my views must obviously be Oprah-born and MSNBC-raised.

I know what the present status of the science of genetic research into the biological origins of homosexuality is, and it is inert. There is no evidence of such origins, if by "orgins" you mean a gene or set of genes that can be pointed to as "the cause" of homosexual ideation, feelings, and desires and which can be thought of as overwhelming psychological, social, and environmental dynamics.

I knew I should have put my location beneath my avatar. I'm NC born and raised, have spent a good bit of time in SC, and my bigotry is entirely contained to the state of SC, not the South in general. To most people in NC, VA, GA, etc., South Carolina is that dirty, backwards little place where you go to buy fireworks and guns.

OK Thama, so you're just a standard, cookie cutter left wing Moonbat. So what else is new?

According to that Oaks quote: biology may or may not be a factor in causing homosexuality, it may or may not be a cause with variation in the population set, and the number of "influential factors" may be anywhere between 2 and infinity. If you don't think that qualifies as "leaving possibilities open", then I don't know what to tell you.

Intellectual honesty with the evidence and facts Thama! That's all I'm asking and I don't think its all that much to expect.

Here's what Oaks actually said:

Feelings are another matter. Some kinds of feelings seem to be inborn. Others are traceable to mortal experiences. Still other feelings seem to be acquired from a complex interaction of “nature and nurture.” All of us have some feelings we did not choose, but the gospel of Jesus Christ teaches us that we still have the power to resist and reform our feelings (as needed) and to assure that they do not lead us to entertain inappropriate thoughts or to engage in sinful behavior.

Different persons have different physical characteristics and different susceptibilities to the various physical and emotional pressures we may encounter in our childhood and adult environments. We did not choose these personal susceptibilities either, but we do choose and will be accountable for the attitudes, priorities, behavior, and “lifestyle” we engraft upon them.

Just as some people have different feelings than others, some people seem to be unusually susceptible to particular actions, reactions, or addictions. Perhaps such susceptibilities are inborn or acquired without personal choice or fault, like the unnamed ailment the Apostle Paul called “a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure” (2 Cor. 12:7). One person may have feelings that draw him toward gambling, but unlike those who only dabble, he becomes a compulsive gambler. Another person may have a taste for tobacco and a susceptibility to its addiction. Still another may have an unusual attraction to alcohol and the vulnerability to be readily propelled into alcoholism. Other examples may include a hot temper, a contentious manner, a covetous attitude, and so on.

In each case (and in other examples that could be given) the feelings or other characteristics that increase susceptibility to certain behavior may have some relationship to inheritance. But the relationship is probably very complex. The inherited element may be nothing more than an increased likelihood that an individual will acquire certain feelings if he or she encounters particular influences during the developmental years. But regardless of our different susceptibilities or vulnerabilities, which represent only variations on our mortal freedom (in mortality we are only “free according to the flesh” [2 Ne. 2:27]), we remain responsible for the exercise of our agency in the thoughts we entertain and the behavior we choose...

Oaks leaves no open door for a reductionistic theory of direct genetic origin as you disingenuously keep insisting. The origins of homosexuality are indistinct, complex, and obscure, and Oaks is here doing nothing more than admitting what the journals you claim to read make clear: the "origins" are unknown, but may have a biological component, and that component is in the nature of predispositions and biases, not a deterministic biological programming.

It is refreshing to see that you don't have quite as narrow a view of the causes of homosexuality as I had thought. Still, your description of "choice", as opposed to biology, as a cause of homosexuality leads me to believe that you don't have a very sharp grasp on what is actually meant in science by the term "biological causes". No gene can be expressed in a vacuum. The idea that environmental influences are needed as a part of the expression of homosexuality doesn't preclude it from being biological in nature any more than the idea that environmental influences (such as oxygen, adequate blood supply, a lack of testosterone receptor inhibition) are needed as a part of the expression of the SRY gene precludes your maleness from being biological in nature.

Yes, yes, I'm quite aware of all this. My problem is with biological determinism; with those who propose that genes are primary in the development of homosexuality (and other complex human qualities) rather than a constituent element among other, equally important and interdependent constituent elements, as Oaks accepts in his essay.

Jonah Goldberg is your idea of scholarly literature? Interesting, sure, but scholarly literature? After reading that, I'm now quite convinced that you simply pulled your other references from a Google search.

Just one more self important intellectual snob and leftist pompous ass after another here isn't it? Its like watching The View. One after another after another after another after another after another. I didn't say he was a scholar (although, for all I know, he may be capable of that kind of work). I said he gave the subject an excellent "treatment", and that is all. His book has been given substantial prasie by first rate intellectuals, including scholars, however:

http://liberalfascism.nationalreview.co ... VjMDQxMjRk
YzdmYzA=&p=1

http://www.victorhanson.com/articles/th ... 11008.html

There are clear, unambiguous commonalities between Marxism and the United Order, as well as bat wings and bird wings. Similar results do not logically imply a similar basis.

Utter nonsense (and an indication that you haven't really thought about it very hard at all). There are no commonalities whatsoever, as a number of General Authorities have pointed out over time.

And unfortunately for this facile analysis, we know the intellectual origins of the utopian collectivist movements of the 20th century. This is not a theoretical empirical question but a matter of intellectual and social history, the history of ideas, and a study of political economy. Your analogy is fine for the study of homology, but not for an analysis of political, economic, and social history.

All you establish by drawing connection in structure and function between Marxism, Nazism, and other forms of Fascism is establishing that extremism in either leftist or rightist doctrine has the potential to create brutal dictatorship.

You argue in a circle here by assuming, yet again, operating upon nothing more than bare assertion, and received popular media and academic nosturm, that Nazism and Socialism represent the right/left poles on an ideological fulcrum. They do not.

Unless, that is, you simply choose to redefine "rightist" as everything good that you specifically agree with, and "leftist" as anything that falls outside that set of ideas.

What "set of ideas"? Define "rightist" please.