I write this because it appears that our perceptions of politics and where people sit on the spectrum in a negative way.

I remember walking into year 11 history, all excited to learn about World War Two. I remember the titilating details of how a civilized country could desecend into facism, and how communism and facism faced off in the most technologically advanced battle in history. It was a battle of hearts and minds, in a world where these political ideologies were viewed without disgrace.

And as I think has happened in so many classes since World War Two was discussed, the political spectrum diagram was trotted out. A line - commusim on the far left and facism on the far right. In the middle we placed the political parties that dominate our politics today - labor, and liberal in the middle.

However, I believe this is creating a dichotomy that does not exist. Indeed, as the extremes of politics are approached, they converge to be in essence one and the same - a totalitarian regime.

Whether examining Hitler's Germany, or Stalin's USSR, they have the same characteristics. It is informative to remember 'Absolute power corrupts absolutely": John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton, first Baron Acton (1834–1902).

Therefore the best way to understand the political spectrum is to express it in terms of a circle: 


In this way, it can be seen that once a government is corrupted by power, it starts to hav ethe same characteristics.