The public…
…is experiencing political whiplash.
In reality, I think the public is disillusioned with both parties.
For those of you who rejoice at the “throw the bums out” mentality, I offer some cautionary words, taken from an earlier post of mine.
The following is an excerpt from Milton Mayer’s They Thought They Were Free. The book, first published in 1955, is an exploration of Germans’ attitudes in the period leading up to WWII and including the war and its immediate aftermath. It features interviews with ten “typical” Germans, conducted a couple of years after the war’s end, and offers extraordinary and often relevant insights into how it was that Hitler came to power and stayed there so long.
Here is my general discussion of the book and its author, who was a man of the left. To understand the following excerpt, it is helpful to know that for the purposes of the book, Mayer refers to the ten interviewees as his “friends”:
National Socialism was a repulsion of my friends against parliamentary politics, parliamentary debate, parliamentary government—against all the higgling and the haggling of the parties and the splinter parties, their coalitions, their confusions, and their conniving. It was the final fruit of the common man’s repudiation of “the rascals.” Its motif was “throw them all out.” My friends, in the 1920’s, were like spectators at a wrestling match who suspect that beneath all the grunts and groans, the struggle and the sweat, the match is “fixed,” that the performers are only pretending to put on a fight. The scandals that rocked the country, as one party or cabal “exposed” another, dismayed and then disgusted my friends…
While the ship of the German State was being shivered, the officers, who alone had life preservers, disputed their prerogatives on the bridge. My friends observed that none of the non-Communist, non-Nazi leaders objected to the 35,000 Reichsmark salaries of the cabinet ministers, only the Communists and the Nazis objected. And the bitterest single disappointment of Nazism…was the fact that Hitler had promised that no official would get more than 1,000 Reichsmarks a month and did not keep his promise.
My friends wanted Germany purified. They wanted it purified of the politicians, of all the politicians. They wanted a representative leader in place of unrepresentative representatives. And Hitler, the pure man, the antipolitician, was the man, untainted by “politics,” which was only a cloak for corruption…Against “the whole pack,” “the whole kaboodle,” “the whole business,” against all the parliamentary parties, my friends evoked Hitlerism, and Hitlerism overthrew them all…
This was the Bewegung, the movement, that restored my friends and bewitched them. Those Germans who saw it all at the beginning—there were not very many; there never are, I suppose, anywhere—called Hitler the Rattenfé¤nger, the “ratcatcher.” Every American child has read The Pied-Piper of Hamlin. Every German child has read it, too. In German its title is Der Rattenfé¤nger von Hameln
Although nothing is impossible here (in what used to be America), this seems more likely in a parliamentary system of government.
Must the presence of an intense Jew-hate be of the essence in both circumstances? Somehow or other, the idea is still bewildering, but regardless of that, relentless.
We see shades of this when politicians campaign for generic “change” and everyone imagines that the politicians means the changes he has in mind.
1930 Germany is not 2010 USA, but reading Sebastian Haffner’s first hand account of the social situation in Germany written in 1939, without benefit of hindsight, was chilling.
http://www.amazon.com/Defying-Hitler-Memoir-Sebastian-Haffner/dp/0312421133/ref=sr_1_1/180-6732113-6708911?ie=UTF8&qid=1386452447&sr=8-1&keywords=sebastian+haffner
Yet, yet, the problem is that, from the evidence I see, many, perhaps most of those on Congress today do not represent their constituents and their real needs and interests so much as they represent themselves and their parochial personal interests as members of the very exclusive Congressional club, or represent and foster the institutional, electoral, and ideological interests and needs of their Party.
The problem is that, very few of our supposed “representatives” know or apparently care enough about our history, our traditions, and the philosophical foundations of our Republican form of government to be able to articulate and to live by them, and to do a good job. The problem is that, instead of truth they speak lies, instead of fidelity to our history and to our Constitution they almost all ignore or distort them for their own purposes.
The problem is that, as well, many of them have no real technical background or education concerning any of the subjects about which they must make critical decisions and judgments, so, they rely on “Experts,” and those experts can be very easily selected, filtered, and “stacked” in such a way as to see to it that they are given a particular line of advice.
The problem is that, many Congressional hearings are much more very deliberately staged Kabuki Theater and partisan warfare, than they are a true search for the truth.
The problem is that, when they consider legislation–when they even bother to read it, or to give it any real, objective consideration–they think about the next election and not about the next generation or the next century, about its impact on them personally or, at the most, perhaps even its impact on their district or state, but not about its impact on our country, now and in the future.
The problem is that, as members of Congress they very often do not do the very things they promised to do that go them elected in the first place. The problem is that, many of them are, or–corrupted by the inside the Beltway diseases of position, profit, influence, and power–they have become weasels, who wouldn’t know the truth if it bit them on the ass.
The problem is that, if candidates for office are not going to be honest about their qualifications, programs, and real intentions, I don’t see any very easy way, at all, of separating the wheat from the chaff.
So, it seems that eternal vigilance, constant suspicion, and thoroughgoing cynicism must rule the day, if we are to survive.
The problem is that, I don’t see how our democratic Republic can continue to survive while our “press” refuses to do its job, is so corrupt, and functions as the Left’s de facto “Ministry of Truth.”
The problem is that, with runaway entitlement spending, and now that close to 50% of our people are on/becoming addicted to one variant or the other of government supplied “Crack”–the payments, subsidies, free/low cost goods and services that allow citizens (and many non-citizens) for forego paying any taxes whatsoever, or in many cases enable them not to have to support themselves by working, how are we going to get them free of their government fostered addiction?
The problem is that, I can’t see how we can turn things around when our schools are churning out more and more functionally illiterate “graduates,” and an increasing number of those graduates have been indoctrinated into a distrust of, a disdain for, and even hatred for America, while simultaneously being denied the knowledge base and the intellectual and analytical tools needed to, first, recognize what deep trouble we are in and how far we have strayed off course and, then, to start to steer this country back toward our traditional course and values.
The problem is that, with our deficit and debt “maxed out,” our economy deliberately trashed on the road to Obama & Co.’s Socialist Utopia, and no one that I know of on the political scene articulating any kind of broad industrial policy and real solutions, it will be very hard to make the broad and deep economic changes necessary if we are to generate the funding and have the economic strength to make all the changes necessary to get us back on track.
The problem is that, with our diplomatic, military and intelligence communities penetrated, subverted, and deliberately emasculated and blinded so far as Islam is concerned, with our war fighting officers being purged in favor of Obama’s hacks, stooges, yes men, and true believers, and our military forces constantly worn out, starved and constantly being decreased in number and effectiveness (and, not coincidentally, a very worrying corresponding growth in the military power of various executive agencies–perhaps forming Obama’s proposed “Civilian National Security Force?”) it will be very hard for us, indeed, in the next few critical years, to detect, to defeat/repel, and to retaliate against the major attacks by Islam that are building against us.
I’m not arguing for the obviously disastrous “throw all the rascals out” approach that brought Hitler to power in Germany, but I’d like to know exactly how we are supposed to steer our country back onto something approximating our old, traditional course.
My intuition says that it will take one or perhaps more than one major shock/event to generate enough power to make possible such a moment of national clarity and, hopefully, such a radical shift in course.
I just received my copy of Diana West’s “American Betrayal” today. I am very much looking forward to reading it. Just from what I have read about it, and from reading excerpts at Amazon, I think it is a very important book.
“I think the public is disillusioned with both parties.”
That’s certainly true of independents and the non-political voter. Which is perhaps 30% of the public?
Conservatives however are disillusioned with the Republican leadership’s lip service and betrayal of conservative principles. Boehner and Ryan working behind the scenes to pass Comprehensive Amnesty for 11-33 million “undocumented democrats” is a perfect example.
All the while knowing that any provisions Obama dislikes will be ignored. It’s craven surrender by any measure. The GOP is yielding to big business interests in a case that clearly is not in the country’s best interests. If that doesn’t prove that the GOP is merely paying lip service to conservative principles, then willful denial is the motivation.
As for the liberal left, their frustration with democrats has nothing to do with substantive disagreement over the goals, just frustration that the democrats aren’t being as effective as they think they should be.
I watched the TV production of “The Sound of Music” on Thursday. Though many will see it only as a love story set to music, it was taken from a true story of an Austrian family that escaped from Austria shortly after the Anschluss (bloodless takeover by Germany) of 1938.
Behind the love story is a tapestry of human reactions to the gathering storm clouds and how different characters are adapting to the changes they believe are coming. At the end, as the Nazis suddenly takeover, there are surprises as different characters reveal themselves to be Nazis or as those who plan to collaborate with them. Captain von Trapp, as a former officer in the German Navy, is pressured to join the Nazis and return to serve the Navy. He is adamant about not joining the Nazis, but realizes he must escape or suffer at their hands.
This story did not seem remarkable back in the 1950s when the stage production was first done and most of the attention after the film was produced in 1965 was more on the wonderful music and the love story. It was easily accepted that the von Trapp family fled from the German takeover of Austria. In those days everyone knew why a family would want to escape from the Nazis.
I was amazed at how timely this bit of history appeared to me as I watched on Thursday. Austria was sabotaged from the inside by Nazi sympathizers who revealed themselves when they were certain they had the upper hand. It shows the way a country can be taken over by a single-minded group intent on power and control.
At one time I didn’t believe such a thing was possible here. Now, I’m becoming more worried about it. Primarily because so few people (LIVs) seem to understand what fascism/progressivism means and that there are so many in politics and the media that want it so badly. Imagine how you would feel when your left leaning neighbor turns you into the authorities for violating some PC rule and revealed that he was now the “Block Captain” for the Progressive Party. Not a comforting thought, is it?
GB…
They’re yielding to Democrat Big Businesses — which they conflate with Republican interests.
Goldman Sachs
Wall Street generally
Mega Banks
GE
Apple
Google
Intel
Costco
Silicon Valley generally
ALL of them are massively Democrat — in voting and in contributions.
This is the crowd that wants H1-B visas for the planet.
They want STEM slaves/ serfs / indentureds.
The RINOs are just giddy that Daddy payoff just dropped off another ‘contribution’ to the cause.
Wolla Dalbo …
You’re counting too low: you must toss in the Crony Capitalist crowd which includes:
GE
Microsoft
and the rest of the NSA apparats
Silicon Valley
Government unions
Federal contractors
Davis Bacon contractors and subs
Big Banks
Wall Street
The Medical-Pharma cartel
…
On and on it goes — even among those nominally paying Federal income taxes.
======
It’s only saving grace is that it’s un-finance-able — hence the massive debasement/ hyperinflation of the US Dollar.
The downside is that the destruction of the American currency will flat-line the economy of the whole planet.
In astronomic terms: it’s the same as our solar system after the Sun goes dark — indeed — evaporates.
The order of the planets goes to zero — everyone is on their own tangent.
And we have Alfred E. Newman in the wheelhouse of state.
blert,
Though the GOP leadership does conflate Republican interests with Democrat Big Businesses, it’s far from just or even mainly Democrat Big Businesses…
Top GOP donors tell party to legalize illegal immigrants
In addition, “Two-thirds of those who have found employment under President Obama are immigrants, both legal and illegal, according to an analysis that suggests immigration has soaked up a large portion of what little job growth there has been over the past three years.”
The Germans didn’t have a Constitution like ours to return to.
It’s not “throw the bums out” so much as “stick to the rules, ya bums.”
That helps a lot.
dicentra,
Didn’t you get the memo?
The US Constitution is an obsolete antique, the single greatest obstacle, to the glorious hope and change that awaits.
dicentra:
I agree that our Constitution is far superior. I even wrote posts on the subject, referencing Hitler’s takeover of Germany (see this and this).
However (and it’s a big “however”), Obama seems intent not on amending the constitution but on ignoring it and saying, “Who’s going to stop me?” So far, no one.
Holy shit. Read this comment:
http://gatesofvienna.net/2013/08/yet-another-circular-conservative-firing-squad/#comment-144157
I suspect that West’s book has a lot in common with “They Thought They Were Free”.
Neo: “Obama seems intent not on amending the constitution but on ignoring it and saying, “Who’s going to stop me?” So far, no one.”
Yes, and I find that, more than anything else that he has done or lied about, to be very scary.
Do you remember that debate about the highway speed limit back in the 70s? Members from both sides said that it was wrong to force states to either abide by the federal speed limit of 55 MPH or lose federal funding for highways. Members from both parties said that this was a federal take over, extortion, etc. Even though it finally did happen that way; at least there was a debate about it. At least quite a few said that it was the wrong way to go about it. Even some who agreed with the 55 MPH speed limit said that the method being used to achieve it was wrong.
Or going back further in history (before my time really) Douglas McArthur decided to push his own way in the Korean war (and really I do not disagree with him on his beliefs); However, what he did, by going against the orders of his commander, the President, was insubordination; and was rightly removed from command. It wasn’t about what he thought was best; it was that the process and the chain of command MUST be obeyed. Otherwise it is anarchy if generals can do what they want.
Now, Obama and the Democrats push through laws; then bypass those very laws as Obama sees fit – and so few speak out against this “process.”
That’s the problem – there doesn’t seem to be a process – it is just whatever Obama wants!
And this isn’t just my anti-Obama stance that scares me, it is this ignoring the process and chain of command (the constitution is above the president) that scares me.
rickl…
Keep in mind the staggering weaknesses of the Other Guys.
America was far from perfect in WWI, WWII or WWIII, aka Cold War.
Yet look at the Other Guys!
The pendulum of mass folly HAS to go to an extreme to get its feedback — kick in the ass.
=====
Our biggest problem is Group Think caused by tapping wa-a-a-y too many Ivies into Big Government.
They are enraptured by Taylorism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Winslow_Taylor
It’s the basis of technocratic justification of Big Government. All humanity is to be reduced to assembly-line rationalization. Every man a cog; every enterprise a feed lot for our ‘betters.’
The whole idea that perfectionist mandarins can tweak the American polity into Heaven on Earth — with Top Down heuristics… from their Master Plan.
At the end, humanity is saved by staggering incompetence.
Thank the Lord that Barry is so lazy — and not able to tolerate anyone brighter than himself. He can’t even stand to be with Soros!
(I was the one-way information flow and the humiliation there from.)
Oh, well, life is tough all over.
I talk to some Brits and Aussies on VOIP. They really really dislike the US Constitution, almost to the point of despisement. Which is strange, if you think about. But from their point of view, their news media puts so many stories of America on screen they think America is part of their country. That’s why they thin they deserve a “vote” in our affairs.
“The following is an excerpt from Milton Mayer’s They Thought They Were Free. The book, first published in 1955, is an exploration of Germans’ attitudes in the period leading up to WWII and including the war and its immediate aftermath.”
Bingo to the max.
Of course, every comparison to Hitler’s Germany and the Germany preceding it that made Hitler’s Germany possible and necessary by the logic that the effect always follows the cause necessarily, makes people roll their eyes and trot out the so-called Godwin’s Law which is a total piece of crapola…The truth is the truth, and good analogies are good analogies.
But the crapola that is the Godwin Law brings me to another piece of even bigger, more common, and more damaging crapola: That is the almost total lie that “Both Sides Are To Blame”, or, “We Are Sick of All of Them”.
Let me just state some true medicine for the brainwashed – since those these are merely another instance of the social brainwashing you get from the Left (our present day Hitlerites) and you fall for it everytime…
Here’s a Newsflash:
1. Both sides are not to blame.
2. Not everyone does it.
What better way to shield the Left from harm, to keep them exactly in place doing damage than to argue – as a last ditch effort when they are being exposed – that change makes no sense because the other side does it too.
This is almost their biggest lie. It is the most insidious.
It is morally, ethically and logically wrong to believe it. Anyone who does is the moral equivalent of Switzerland. I hope you have enough money to get through the end of civilization.
The Nazis weren’t conservatives. They manipulated the conservatives and in that, the Nazis are a lesson to libertarians to be careful about being too rigid in their advocacy of limited government. Not because libertarians are wrong in principle but because the immutable reality is America is a big country with a big government.
We can calibrate and moderate that government by drawing upon libertarian principles, but rigid ideology that doesn’t match reality can lead blindly to an unintended consequence of supporting a toxic movement that recognizes the gap and seizes the opportunity to fill it.
The modern Left may or may not be like Nazis in ideology, but they definitely utilize the Nazi method.
The Hitlerean danger to the Republic of the corrupt war hero McCain was not chosen by the people. I think the danger has already passed.
To return to reality, no American politician–even Obama and certainly not his opponents–publicly represents an anti-Constitutional, unAmerican ideology.
Comparisons of the “throw the bums out voters” to Nazis are as valid as comparing McCain to vampire biting the Statue of Liberty; of Bush to Hitler; or of Obama to…, well I can’t think any comparison to even the most extreme socialist that wouldn’t be correct for Obama. Oh, wait. Yes I can: Obama is no Pol Pot.
“Obama is no Pol Pot” Remains to be proven.
Pingback:Chicago Boyz » Blog Archive » Dangers of “a Plague on All Their Houses”
Eric,
The fact that you have to state that the “Nazis were not conservatives” I am sorry to say shows how truly epidemic and endemic and deep and prolonged the brainwashing has been.
You’ve been infected. At least you found your way out.
Saying the Nazis were not conservative is like saying Nancy Pelosi is not conservative. One of these days, when it all goes to hell. Liberals will look back at the tyranny of Obamacare and state unequivocally that conservatives did it and that Nancy Pelosi was a conservative is proof of it.
They already made Lincoln a Democrat. They made Jim Crow Republican. They can make black white and up down if they want.
Then they will make you defend the contrary and you get to be an obstreperous stick-in-the-mud for point out reality.
Let’s never forget: Hitler was a socialist. So were Lenin, Stalin, Mao, and Castro. SO are Obama, Pelosi, and Reid.
They will, if given time and power, take us to the same place those other people took their cultures.
And yet, we will be guilty because we allowed it.
The devil is always snapping at the heels. If we don’t turn and step on his head it is our own fault.
In a way, conservatives are to blame, in the way grown ups are to blame when they allow bad behavior continue.
I referenced this post in a post at Chicago Boyz…”Dangers of a Plague on All Their Houses”
http://chicagoboyz.net/archives/40509.html
I should like to point out the problem with the analogy is that it is reversed. In Germany, the “rats” were the Weimer politicians saddled and blamed with the loss of sovereignty and prosperity and pride. Welcome the Nazis.
If we apply the analogy correctly, the corrolary to the Weimer pol is Obama and the progressives. The correlary to the loss of World War I and loss of pride and prospertiy is Obamacare and the perceived failure of the state.
What is unsettling are two parallels: The rise of a terrorist state seizing power by unconstitutional means and the hatred and slander of Jews.
I read rickl’s link to the comment at “gates of Vienna.” Mesmerizing reading and hopeful in that there were people and education during his time that he speaks of were were high caliber and committed to the defense of freedom. His sadness is somewhat distressing. My response is anger.
Sadness results from loss of faith. But if you faint in the day of adversity, your faith is weak.
Perhaps I should clarify how the analogy is reversed.
The “infinitely worse” (See Chicago boys) regime is already in power here. It’s replacement can only be something better. Let the young be dillusioned. Let them. They won’t vote. Voting age should be 40 anyway. But if they do vote, is isn’t going to be for Obama.
delete.the.alternative…”It’s replacement can only be something better”
Imagine a Hillary Clinton presidency, or an especially wimpy RINO, combined with Dem control of at least one house of Congress. Bad economic and regulatory policy drives a continuation of economic decline and increasing misery. Youth unemployment reaches European levels, including for educated youth. Politically-connected businesspeople, especially on Wall Street, make more and more money.
Don’t you think a demagogue with an explicit Mussolini-like platform of an “organic state” would have a pretty good chance of getting elected?
Good point, David Foster. And you’re right. I simplified the alternatives and the one thing that is not simple in this world is us. It could very well drag on, ugly like, until AI relieves us. I wanted to point out, however, that the administration that is capable of imposing Holocaust is the current one.
Here’s a little something for hope, a rational argument that reality bats last. Let us fight and stay determined to minimize the damage.
http://whitelocust.wordpress.com/2009/10/18/egalitarianism-will-come-to-an-end/
Excerpt from the article by Murray Rothbard. (Note: I’m not a libertarian as my moniker obviously shows but libertarians are close brothers.)
We began by considering the common view that the egalitarians, despite a modicum of impracticality, have ethics and moral idealism on their side. We end with the conclusion that egalitarians, however intelligent as individuals, deny the very basis of human intelligence and of human reason: the identification of the ontological structure of reality, of the laws of human nature, and the universe. In so doing, the egalitarians are acting as terribly spoiled children, denying the structure of reality on behalf of the rapid materialization of their own absurd fantasies. Not only spoiled but also highly dangerous; for the power of ideas is such that the egalitarians have a fair chance of destroying the very universe that they wish to deny and transcend, and to bring that universe crashing around all of our ears. Since their methodology and their goals deny the very structure of humanity and of the universe, the egalitarians are profoundly antihuman; and, therefore, their ideology and their activities may be set down as profoundly evil as well. Egalitarians do not have ethics on their side unless one can maintain that the destruction of civilization, and even of the human race itself, may be crowned with the laurel wreath of a high and laudable morality.
Eris, the LEft does comparisons and requires you to work, whether you like it or not.
Those here and on the other side of the US civil war, requires you to think.
Are you able to think based upon new data and information sources? Or are you waiting for someone to give you a comparison and tell you how to think about them?
RUN.
Heard of Dark Enlightenment?
RUN.
Our job is to use this opportunity to help the newly wakened understand that these disappointments are inevitable when we rely on the skill and inherent “goodness” of technocrats (the very underpinning of progressivism).
In the words of Niccolo Machiavelli: “It is necessary to whoever arranges to found a Republic and establish laws in it, to presuppose that all men are bad and that they will use their malignity of mind every time they have the opportunity.”
The founders understood that all men are “ambitious, vindictive and rapacious”.
Rather than attempting to create a form of government designed to help them build a “utopia” (the “Fatal Conceit”), they designed forms of government designed to mitigate against universal human depravity (decentralized and limited). A form in which the “separate and distinct exercise of the different powers of government” would allow each branch “to resist the encroachment of the others”. Ambition “made to counteract ambition.”
david foster,
Yep. Hitler and the Nazis didn’t come to power just because of a deep flaw in ethnic German culture or structural flaw in the Weimar Republic government.
The social-economic conditions in Germany were chaotic with real destabilizing conditions on the ground. Germany was a disintegrating state. It was an understandable – and rational – reaction for Germans to reach for strong, unifying, stabilizing leadership.
Under the same conditions, would Americans reach for the same thing? Yes we would.
Even under those conditions, the Nazis weren’t ushered into power on chariots with a rain of flower petals. They relied on creative, aggressive maneuvering in government and on the streets to squeeze into power and then replace the Weimar Republic from within.
I’ll add that the strong nationalistic government the Germans wanted and perhaps needed at the time didn’t necessarily have to be aggressively genocidal, imperially expansionist, and led by someone who was – or became – irrational. It’s an open question whether national socialism could have worked for Germany if it hadn’t had its worst features. There’s a reason many in the West who later fought the Nazis were initially sympathetic to and even admired the German project before it tilted over.
The Germans needed something to pull them out of their nation’s death-spiral. Unfortunately, Hitler and the Nazis are what they got.
Yeah, I think it could happen here. We’re not intrinsically superior as a people than they were. We can hope that if it does happen here, the leaders are sane and ethical unlike the Nazis, but the Left which acts like Nazis doesn’t give me optimism on that front.
VXXC: “Heard of Dark Enlightenment?”
Yes. Subversive stuff.
I don’t agree with specific content in the movement, which is varied and evolving, and oppose some of it, but I can’t fault the ethos of interrogating the dominant politically correct culture and seeking healthier alternatives.
I mentioned yesterday that Diana West’s “American Betrayal” landed in my mailbox. I’ve had my computer off this morning so I could delve into it. This is not a review but a progress report:
When I ordered the book, I was under the impression that it was about Communist infiltration and subversion of the U.S. government. That’s true, but there is more going on. This isn’t just another listing of Soviet agents and Venona files. West is concerned about why our conventional history glosses over these facts or outright denies them.
It has relevance to the present day, too. In Chapter 1 she discusses how our intelligence agencies and the military have purged any references to Islam and jihad doctrine from their briefings and discussions of terrorism. She makes it quite clear that this did not begin under Obama, but was in full swing during the Bush administration.
Likewise, she explores how leading conservative commentators *cough*Charles Krauthammer*cough* dismissed any discussion of Obama’s obvious socialist ideology and background during the 2008 campaign, when an open examination might have made a difference in the election results.
It paints a very disturbing picture of how denial and willful ignorance of reality has become utterly pervasive in American culture, and how many conservatives and Republicans seem to be incapable of standing up for traditional American values.
She starts out Chapter 2 by recounting the fall of the Soviet Union, and wonders why there were no trials or purges of Communists and fellow travelers in the aftermath. It seems that Boris Yeltsin was prepared to do that, but was discouraged by opposition from Western governments. Hmm.
She segues back to World War II and notes the incredible volume of Lend-Lease materiel that was sent to the Soviets, which was given a higher priority than American and British military needs. For example, over 200,000,000 pounds of butter was sent to the USSR at a time when it was strictly rationed in the United States. Airplanes and tanks were being sent to Russia at the time of the fall of Singapore and the Philippines in early 1942.
She discusses the Nuremberg trials after WWII, and notes that, while Nazi atrocities were examined in great detail, equivalent Soviet war crimes were strictly off limits. One Soviet judge was even a veteran of Stalin’s show trials of the 1930s, which paints a disturbing picture of one group of blood-soaked mass murderers sitting in judgment over another group of blood-soaked mass murderers. Keep in mind that WWII started as a collaborative effort between the Nazis and Soviets, yet the Molotov-von Ribbentrop pact was ruled “inadmissible”.
All of this was done with the total complicity of the Americans and British, while the Soviets were subverting and subjugating the nations of Eastern Europe at that very moment, and also while US and British troops were forcibly repatriating some two million Soviet refugees, which she calls “our own war crime”. ( I suspect that she will revisit that little incident in greater detail later on.)
She wonders whether Nuremberg was a Western version of a Stalinist “show trial”.
All of that was in the first two chapters.
She begins Chapter 3 with “Warning: Reading this chapter may be hazardous to your worldview.”
Oh goody.
The comment at rickl’s link is beautiful and sobering.
Although this passage in one of the subsequent replies is equally sobering, I find its key sentiment encouraging:
“But what I have come to see in the last few years is that the American people do not need their government to survive with their essential values of individualism and freedom intact. Survival will not be easy for any, and many even of those who prepare will lose their lives, as will vast numbers of those who have done nothing but hope the government will come to their rescue in the wake of its own collapse. But America, the people that adhere to the authentic founding values of the nation, will endure.”
up until he must leave office he benefits from not showing how far he could go, past that point, anything may go
One thing you have to take into account about Germany is the Treaty of Westphalen. This left many people in religiously homogenous areas with little contact to “others.” Even in the 50s and early 60s, in my husband’s public school, the Catholic kids didn’t speak or play with the Protestants. The people were used to being told what to think by their governments and pastors, and after the Weimar economic breakdown, you can imagine that many were looking for security. The decadence of Berlin society and the distance from academia and higher learning for most people didn’t help either.
Shortly after I moved to the town where I now live, I was asked by a woman at a party about the difference between Americans and Germans. I told her off the top of my hat that Americans handle chaos better. Time has only reinforced that impression.
expat…”One thing you have to take into account about Germany is the Treaty of Westphalen. This left many people in religiously homogenous areas with little contact to “others.” Even in the 50s and early 60s, in my husband’s public school, the Catholic kids didn’t speak or play with the Protestants. ”
Apparently there is research showing a strong correlation between which areas of Germany had pogroms in the Late Middle Ages, and which areas showed the strongest anti-Semitic behavior in the early 1930s.
expat…re “Americans handle chaos better”…see Statism and the Death of Surprise:
http://ricochet.com/main-feed/Statism-and-the-Death-of-Surprise
It strikes me that the current American worship of educational credentials, which results in 16-22 years spent as a product on a conveyor belt, must have a malign effect on the ability to handle chaos, or even modest degrees of unexpectedness or confusion.
I just read most of the comments here, and boy, you people talk about some of the craziest stuff.
Coming from me, that may or may not mean much.
The Leftist alliance as we know of it in the US, composed of several ideologically incompatible factions such as lawyers, gang bangers, terrorists, unions, teachers, public employees, diplomats, state bureacrats, federal judges, and so on and so forth, were originally a Soviet creation. It was to be their kill switch, their secret weapon, their Alpha strike that will paralyze and destroy superior American nuclear striking range and systems architecture reliance. But the thing is, the Soviets went kaput before they had the chance to activate this weapon their KGB was grooming for literally decades. Bella Dodd’s biography recounted her status and experience as an agent for the Communist cause vis a vis America’s teachers and unions as early as 1930. That’s only 1-2 decades after the Great War that gave birth to the power of the Stalins and the Marxists in Russia.
Things such as the infiltration of the Roman Catholic Church, hiring gays and child molestors so that the Church would self destruct from the inside out, making them easier to destroy from the outside in.
The Left’s power is not a cheap or shallow thing. Because it wasn’t made by one person or even a few generations of people. What would 7 to 10 generations of fanatical holy warriors be able to accomplish if they didn’t blow themselves up as the Islamics do? If they grew up, were born, and gave birth in their host nation?
The result will be a lot less pretty than whatever the Alien movies showed you.
So it’s crazy all right, all this talk about the Soviets and that woman’s book. But it’s the kind of crazy I’ve learned to accept as normal and real in the world.
The universal harmony will not allow the United States to stand free and prosperous when so many nations have been buried by American power. Even if the citizens here and in the country knew not what their country did or why… the price will still be paid. Rhodesia. Colonial South Africa. Vietnam. Cuba. Just some of the nations that fell in part due to American power.
Leftists and socialism operates on a sort of pyramid and delayed payment scheme. They shorten the total life of a person or a nation, in exchange for giving goodies in the now. People could have worked for it in time but the Left gives it to the Volk without the work and without the time expended. There is no free lunch. There is always a price to the goodies people got. There is always a price to the stuff Americans destroyed, whether your intent was good or not.
When the Left always talked about the Evil American Empire, they weren’t so much accusing us of doing those things as telling us that is what they have been using American power for. What kind of God, Divine Justice, or Karma would allow a nation to continue to exist unscathed when that nation’s power has been responsible for supporting evil and destroying humanity itself?
There’s no way you can get around it. 10 generations have agreed to pay for the goodies they received in their lives, with the souls and lives of every American born in the 21st century. That payment, that contract, will be collected.
While the intel analyst is correct as to the true power of the Left and its consequences, there’s always something to be said for the Russian and Mongol solutions to a losing war.
The power of the Leftist alliance is not mere politics. They have morphed considerably since the days they were the Soviet Union’s pets and weaponized dogs. I became aware of a considerable cache of data which I correlated and triangulated in 2007-8. I came to a similar conclusion as the intel analyst as Gates of Vienna. This doesn’t include their allies, the Islamic Jihadists which will soon acquire nukes from Europe or perhaps Iran. Then they’ll be able to strap nukes to expendable tools and explode them, giving the Left an excuse to crack down on domestic terrorists (Tea Party).
However, there is one thing no living thing can overcome. Not even Totalitarian Leftists.
There have been many people who have taken the Left lightly in the US, in Europe, etc. What I could do against them for disagreeing with me pales in comparison to what the Left will do to them in time. That is the reward of taking evil lightly, that is the reward of those who have not suffered enough to have hardened resolve. They will get hardened through the blood and fire, one way or another.
david foster,
I lived for several years in a very small town in the middle of Hesse. I remember visiting a small exhibit there showing the Tracten (traditional women’s clothing) from various towns in the area in the late 1800s. Catholic and Protestant women had different clothing. I don’t think there was any sample of Jewish dress. You can only imagine how this affected the psyche of the people. You categorized them before you got a chance to know them.
I agree that credential worship is a big problem. It discourages the kind of out-of-the-box thinking that helps us handle problems. It’s a bit like bureaucracies where the workers reduce everything to checking off boxes. How else do we get kids suspended from school from chewing a PB sandwich into the shape of a gun. The teachers and administrators all had impecable credentials, I’m sure. But they had no common sense or guts.
Helicopter parenting is also a problem.
A little child asked, “why is this disgusting piece of vermin, Obama, allowed to wreck my future.”
There is the truth and then there is the copy, the fake, the duplicate. For instance, the herd mentality. The truth is stated “No greater love hath a man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” The counterfeit seeks to deny the power of sacrifice, to reduce by academic and intellectual mocker, the power of love, a power that only has power because of a greater Power. The infinite is necessary for the finite to have meaning.
We learn friends through family. And yet, even if family is taken away, the principle remains for the victim to have a choice. Still, against the removal of the biological education, the principle remains and seeks completion. The power of the universe, created through the power of love, expresses itself in ways unlooked for and unkownn. Perhaps the power of evil is nothing more than the raking and watering of soil.
Although both my parents were from New England, and worshiped the ground JFK walked upon, I am an east Virginia boy.
What bothers me most is that America is no longer what it once was. And the big eared skinny guy in D.C. pushing us all around? My daughter could whip his ass.
Expat…
IIRC, The Protestant chicks wore BLACK bonnets, the Catholic chicks wore RED bonnets… Nat Geo had a color spread ninety-years ago showing the gals in their traditional dress going off to Easter services. At the time, color plates were quite new.
The colors of the bonnets were identical to the modern German flag.
I’m not sure what the yellow — the bottom stripe — signifies on the German flag, though it would appear that the Protestants came out on top. (Black over Red)
This symbology appears to have been picked up by the Nazis/ Blacks vs the Communists/ Reds.
Perhaps one of neo’s posters knows more….
Spock, find, the human cheese, and destroy. Spock.
Spock!!!!
The left began ignoring the Constitution whan FDR was in office. In the 40s the Supreme Court gave them all the cover they needed. At this point we have social security and a multitude of other unconstitutional programs that are widely supported even by conservatives.
Obama flouts rule of law pretty much at will, on top of that.
The key factor that makes a constitution work is the culture. Constitutions don’t enforce themselves. The question is to what extent Americans will demand rule of law.
I think one key factor with respect to illegals is that they are from cultures that don’t have rule of law. Hence banana republics. That is a big part why politicians like them. they accept big government solutions and even demand them, but ignore violations of rule of law. They are the population the power hungry leadership wants.
Good point, Don. Change the people, change the culture, change the Constitution. That’s the formula and why amnesty is a strategic necessity for communist (thank you Diana West) piece of sssssssssssssssssss Obama.
Here’s sumpin better:
http://dailycaller.com/2013/12/09/cruz-slams-the-lawless-implementation-of-obamacare/#!
}}} At one time I didn’t believe such a thing was possible here.
Welcome, JJ, to the fruits of 100+ years of the “Germanic System of Education”.
If you give me a time machine, and the power to go back and kill one person in the cradle, Horace Mann would be very, very high on my list.
Come the revolution, one thing that ought to be a part of the new Constitution:
No public education organization above the county level. Bring back the “Little Red Schoolhouse”, if you like.
This would do wonders for the concentrated clusterf*** which is modern education.
Two other unrelated suggestions:
1) Government at all level MUST use GAAP — Generally Accepted Accounting Practices. Stop the funny-money BS that enables half the chicanery.
2) Term limits plus separation of branches. The latter was generally understood but not usually codified, but anyone who has a job function in the executive branch at the same time as they have a job function under the legislative branch — or any variant thereof — should not be allowed. Career politicians, as well as “branch-crossing bureaucrats” should not be allowed.
IGotBupkis, you should check out the private Japanese system for a working model.
I used to look askance at those who wore tin foil hats, but now I have one of my own.
Two years down the line, the conspiracy theories look more like prophecies.