Comment Re: Hitler and the NAZIs were so stupid. (Score 0) 292
many countries are socialist.
False. Many countries are social democrat, but no country outside of a tiny number of failed states like Cuba are socialist.
Socialism, as an economic system, is defined by public ownership of the means of production and nothing else. German fascism was "socialist-like" by this definition because corporations were under government control and direction to an extent that was indistinguishable from ownership (the right of use and disposal).
It has become common in recent years to bandy about "socialism" to describe any social democratic system, but this is a debasement of the term and results in a profoundly confused debate, because social democracy is at best a very distant cousin to socialism. Social democracies have thriving private sectors that are heavily regulated but free to pursue business opportunities, capital expansion, etc, within fairly broad constraints.
In a socialist economy, there is no private sector, at least above the cottage-industry scale.