The introduction is by Chaz Bufe, owner and editor of See Sharp (and also an all-around good guy!); it should be its own monograph because it highlights where Nietzsche's thought diverges and converges with left-libertarian or anti-capitalist thought. Bufe is comparing Nietzsche with Mencken below but it serves to illustrate Nietzsche's opinions on class, etc. Keep in mind it's written for a general audience who are unfamiliar with Mencken's or Nietzsche's works.
Here are some excerpts (all grammar and spelling errors are mine):
"In terms of attitudes and beliefs, Mencken and Nietzsche shared many. Both were confirmed rationalists and materialists. Both were strong advocates of individualism. Both were deeply opposed to Christianity. Both held misogynistic views. And both were firm believers in a natural 'caste' system.
[...]
"Nietzsche believed that members of the lower classes who demonstrated their superiority should be admitted to the upper caste, and conversely that members of the upper caste who failed to demonstrate their superiority should descend to the lower classes, although he sometimes confused the naturally superior with the existing ruling class. As mentioned above, Mencken, whose father was the owner of both a factory and a professional baseball team, was a believer in Social Darwinism -- the doctrine that the rich are rich precisely because they are smarter and/or harder working than the poor. A more marked difference between the two men was that Mencken was a germanophile while Nietzsche was a germanophobe, even to the point of denying his German background and claiming that he was a Pole.
"Nietzsche despised anti-Semites. Nietzsche's attitude towards Jews and anti-Semites was straightforward. While he attacked Jews for their 'slave morality,' he also attacked Christians for precisely the same reason. One close-to-home example of Nietzsche's hatred of anti-Semites is that he refused to attend the wedding of his sister to the notorious anti-Semite Bernhard Forster. [Whose estate ironically took charge of Nietzsche's papers after Nietzsche's death.] [...] It's not terribly surprising that a great many of those who, for instance, have seen the photo of Hitler posing by a bust of Nietzsche at the Nietzsche Museum have come to the conclusion that Nietzsche shared Hitler's anti-Semitism and political views. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth, and it's highly probable that Nietzsche would have outright hated Hitler. An additional reason for thinking this is so is that Nietzsche despised the German Reich, which was being consolidated by Bismarck during Nietzsche's adult years.
[...]
"Unfortunately, Nietzsche repeatedly ignored the maxim, 'Good writers have two things in common: they prefer being understood to being admired, and they do not write for the critical or overly shrewd reader.' [A quote commonly attributed to Nietzsche.] If George Orwell's dictum is correct -- that political (and by extension philosophical) writing should be as clear as a plane of glass -- then Nietzsche's writing fails the test in many places.
[...]
"In fact, Nietzsche has remarkably little to say about the political, economic, and social conditions under which his Superman could arise. He apparently hoped that his ideas would gradually gain acceptance, and that members of the lower classes who failed to excel would voluntarily accept their roles supporting his highest (Superman) class, or perhaps that the highest class would become aware of its superiority and impose his caste system on the lower classes.
"To put it kindly, this reveals a remarkable political naivete. In the long, sordid history of states and governments, no ruling class has ever given up its power to those it considers more enlightened. All hypocritical, self-serving rhetoric about 'serving the nation' aside, the purpose of statecraft has always been to grab power by any means at hand, to use it to strengthen oneself and one's backers at the expense of everyone else, and to hang onto power by any means necessary. As long as governments and ruling classes exist, it seems highly unlikely that this will change -- ever.
[...]
"To put this another way, Nietzsche's political position is markedly romantic (ironically so, given that he considered himself a hard-headed realist) in that he feels that people should move freely between his intellectual classes, and that the ablest should rise to the top, but he provides no mechanism for this, and he ignores the fact that those in positions of privilege and power _always_ try to retain those positions (or at least pass them on to hand-picked successors, who are often their relatives.) Nietzsche and Mencken shift back and forth, confusing the 'naturally superior' witht hose at the top of the present socioeconomic heap, whose 'superiority normally consists only of inherited wealth and the power and privileges that go with it."
The introduction covers a lot more: what Nietzsche meant by "will to power" and how that's been (mis-)understood, etc. Way too much to post here. It's a book worth buying: http://www.seesharppress.com -- 3 copies left at only $5.95 apiece direct from the publisher. </shill>
-B.