Many do not understand the shape of the political spectrum from left to right. It is not a straight line but rather forms a circle with the extremes of left and right side by side at the bottom of the circle. Thus the two extremes often have more psychologically in common with each other than the moderates at the top.

In fact the extremes are often found to be historically interchangeable. Hitler alway thought of die hard communists as good fishing grounds for Nazis recruits. It has been said that radicals of opposite types can’t be persuaded to an opposite ideology but they can be converted — Saul to Paul like.