Look what it is out just in time to maybe save us all:
The NY Times has a handy review:
Mr. Ullrich, like other biographers, provides vivid insight into some factors that helped turn a “Munich rabble-rouser” — regarded by many as a self-obsessed “clown” with a strangely “scattershot, impulsive style” — into “the lord and master of the German Reich.”
Do say. Sounds familiar. Let’s explore some more:
Hitler was often described as an egomaniac who “only loved himself” — a narcissist with a taste for self-dramatization and what Mr. Ullrich calls a “characteristic fondness for superlatives.” His manic speeches and penchant for taking all-or-nothing risks raised questions about his capacity for self-control, even his sanity. But Mr. Ullrich underscores Hitler’s shrewdness as a politician — with a “keen eye for the strengths and weaknesses of other people” and an ability to “instantaneously analyze and exploit situations.”
Link:
Hrmm. Ok. What else:
Hitler was known, among colleagues, for a “bottomless mendacity” that would later be magnified by a slick propaganda machine that used the latest technology (radio, gramophone records, film) to spread his message. A former finance minister wrote that Hitler “was so thoroughly untruthful that he could no longer recognize the difference between lies and truth” and editors of one edition of “Mein Kampf” described it as a “swamp of lies, distortions, innuendoes, half-truths and real facts.”
Link:
Link:
Ok, ok. Two for two. No need to panic, right:
Hitler was an effective orator and actor, Mr. Ullrich reminds readers, adept at assuming various masks and feeding off the energy of his audiences. Although he concealed his anti-Semitism beneath a “mask of moderation” when trying to win the support of the socially liberal middle classes, he specialized in big, theatrical rallies staged with spectacular elements borrowed from the circus. Here, “Hitler adapted the content of his speeches to suit the tastes of his lower-middle-class, nationalist-conservative, ethnic-chauvinist and anti-Semitic listeners,” Mr. Ullrich writes. He peppered his speeches with coarse phrases and put-downs of hecklers. Even as he fomented chaos by playing to crowds’ fears and resentments, he offered himself as the visionary leader who could restore law and order.
Link:
I sense a trend:
Hitler increasingly presented himself in messianic terms, promising “to lead Germany to a new era of national greatness,” though he was typically vague about his actual plans. He often harked back to a golden age for the country, Mr. Ullrich says, the better “to paint the present day in hues that were all the darker. Everywhere you looked now, there was only decline and decay.”
Link:
A remarkable off prompter riff here from Trump, says it's safer in war zones than in some of our inner cities: pic.twitter.com/OO9stOM1Kq
— Sopan Deb (@SopanDeb) August 23, 2016
A terrifying trend:
Hitler’s repertoire of topics, Mr. Ullrich notes, was limited, and reading his speeches in retrospect, “it seems amazing that he attracted larger and larger audiences” with “repeated mantralike phrases” consisting largely of “accusations, vows of revenge and promises for the future.” But Hitler virtually wrote the modern playbook on demagoguery, arguing in “Mein Kampf” that propaganda must appeal to the emotions — not the reasoning powers — of the crowd. Its “purely intellectual level,” Hitler said, “will have to be that of the lowest mental common denominator among the public it is desired to reach.” Because the understanding of the masses “is feeble,” he went on, effective propaganda needed to be boiled down to a few slogans that should be “persistently repeated until the very last individual has come to grasp the idea that has been put forward.”
Link:
Link:
Link:
This is legit scary now:
Hitler’s rise was not inevitable, in Mr. Ullrich’s opinion. There were numerous points at which his ascent might have been derailed, he contends; even as late as January 1933, “it would have been eminently possible to prevent his nomination as Reich chancellor.” He benefited from a “constellation of crises that he was able to exploit cleverly and unscrupulously” — in addition to economic woes and unemployment, there was an “erosion of the political center” and a growing resentment of the elites. The unwillingness of Germany’s political parties to compromise had contributed to a perception of government dysfunction, Mr. Ullrich suggests, and the belief of Hitler supporters that the country needed “a man of iron” who could shake things up. “Why not give the National Socialists a chance?” a prominent banker said of the Nazis. “They seem pretty gutsy to me.”
Link:
Sweet Meteor of Death:
Hitler’s ascension was aided and abetted by the naïveté of domestic adversaries who failed to appreciate his ruthlessness and tenacity, and by foreign statesmen who believed they could control his aggression. Early on, revulsion at Hitler’s style and appearance, Mr. Ullrich writes, led some critics to underestimate the man and his popularity, while others dismissed him as a celebrity, a repellent but fascinating “evening’s entertainment.” Politicians, for their part, suffered from the delusion that the dominance of traditional conservatives in the cabinet would neutralize the threat of Nazi abuse of power and “fence Hitler in.” “As far as Hitler’s long-term wishes were concerned,” Mr. Ullrich observes, “his conservative coalition partners believed either that he was not serious or that they could exert a moderating influence on him. In any case, they were severely mistaken.”
While it's horrifying to hear the draconian things that @realDonaldTrump is talking about, we've actually seen @HillaryClinton doing them.
— Dr. Jill Stein (@DrJillStein) June 10, 2016
Link:
Go ahead and reach for the bottle, people, if you haven’t already:
Hitler had a dark, Darwinian view of the world. And he would not only become, in Mr. Ullrich’s words, “a mouthpiece of the cultural pessimism” growing in right-wing circles in the Weimar Republic, but also the avatar of what Thomas Mann identified as a turning away from reason and the fundamental principles of a civil society — namely, “liberty, equality, education, optimism and belief in progress.”
Link:
Link:
The next time someone tells you that Hillary and Trump are both equally bad, or that Trump is no Hitler, tell them to shut the fuck up and get the fuck out of your face because you don’t have time for their stupidity and ignorance. You’re going to be out participating in events to get Hillary elected.
*** Update ***
I guess we can throw eugenics into the pile:
— Dan Munz (@dan_munz) September 29, 2016
schrodinger's cat
I already had a falling out with a good friend of elebenty years because she mouths this shit about how there is no difference between Hillz and Trump. She has also gone full Brietbart. I just can’t with her anymore.
Mike in dc
Nach Drumpf, Uns– Green Party
Tom Q
It’s remarkable that nothing in the Times review mentions Trump or even references the possibility of a contemporary parallel, and yet the comparison jumps/screams off the page.
Iowa Old Lady
I recently read Axelrod’s book, BELIEVER. At one point, Rod Blagojevich offered him a job and Axelrod turned him down after he asked Blago what his campaign was about and Blago said “you tell me.” Kellyanne Conway has sold her soul, assuming she had one.
shomi
I can’t be bothered to read all of Cole’s horseshit but looks like he’s doing a Trump=Hitler thing.
The drumpster fire is not smart enough and not persuasive enough and not as good a public speaker. Also hitler had an agenda that did not involve lining his own pockets whereas that is ALL the drumpster fire wants to do.
So any premise that the drumpster fire phenomenon is like Hitler is complete 100% grade A horseshit.
Also the Drumpster fire is a lot older than Hitler was during his rise to power. A LOT!
Major Major Major Major
@srv: Going for the low-hanging fruit today, I see.
Droppy
Seems to be a lot of NYT-quoting going on in this House of Cancelations. I mean, that’s ok, but I think the NYT is sort of like the Democratic party – often does shit that drives me crazy, but it’s so much less crazy than Fox News and at least has a platform (which it sometimes ignores) that points it in the correct direction that I don’t see a good alternative. I fully grant that the public editor is an idiot and has botched everything she’s touched. She’s the Joe Manchin of the Times. They have plenty of blue dogs; but the party itself is all we’ve got. OK, back to Hitler/Trump.
Roger Moore
@Iowa Old Lady:
Not a safe assumption.
Keith P.
OK, my scrollbar still works after reading this post. That’s a plus.
Calouste
So can someone ask Jill “I’m in need of mental help” Stein when Hilllary Clinton started building a wall with Mexico, deported 11 million Hispanics, or banned all Muslims from the country?
SenyorDave
@Calouste: So can someone ask Jill “I’m in need of mental help” Stein when Hilllary Clinton started building a wall with Mexico, deported 11 million Hispanics, or banned all Muslims from the country?
Well, her husband did sign the NAFTA agreement
Villago Delenda Est
@srv: It’s funny, but in Germany, a functioning liberal democracy right now, and for the last oh 60 years, the trains run on time. Italy, not so much. So, the question becomes, is there something besides the political system at play here? I do recall standing in the Bad Kreuznach Bahnhof one chilly March afternoon waiting for the express to Frankfurt to arrive from Paris, and it was late. The Germans around me were fuming…in Germany, you see, 1600 means 1555. Various mutterings about “die Französische” could be heard. The trains from some point in Germany to BK came in when they were supposed to…five minutes before the scheduled time. Why couldn’t this one? To be fair, this was the only time that train was late while I was stationed in BK and had to take the train to Wiesbaden or Frankfurt
So “the trains running on time” has more to do with culture than how authoritarian the government is.
This information provided to amuse the non-brain damaged (does not include you, of course) who read the blog.
Oh, and John…you could have put a lot of that stuff below the fold :).
seaboogie
Excellent points, Cole. Maybe add the amphetamine angle too….?
Trump
Godwin’s own God-child
Villago Delenda Est
@Mike in dc: DING DING DING DING DING.
The US Greens are morans. Pure and simple.
Bobby Thomson
Hitler’s speeches. Bedside table.
Frodo
@srv: Mussolini didn’t make the trains run on time:
http://www.snopes.com/history/govern/trains.asp
Just empty promises, like Trump’s.
The Dangerman
Speaking of Amazon books, Mr. Cole, Sir, this might interest you:
Author is a West Virginia Dude (and used to work for HRC at State to keep it even more topical)
Betty Cracker
Timely:
Trollhattan
Preach it, brother Cole, preach. Know far too damn many people believing Trump and Clinton are half a degree apart and since they have Clinton fatigue…why not “shake things up?” And I don’t live in Arkansas.
Ugh.
WereBear
Durn burn it. Had to get it. Used the link.
Bobby Thomson
@shomi: a lot of money in Zyklon B. And shoddy construction of temporary quarters billed at full price.
John Cole
@efgoldman: Sometimes I write for myself. Sometimes I write hoping it will reach a wider audience, but I doubt it. Sometimes you just want shit documented to refer back to.
Chris
Like I said in the last thread: it’s not just the fascists, who have always existed. It’sthe center right “establishment” elites lining up behind him because doggone it, at least he’s not a SOCIALIST; the far left fringe saying that they’re all just capitalists anyway so who cares, and besides he’ll shake things up and then the pendulum will swing back to us; and the many apathetic voters who don’t really care how much worse he is because they’re mostly not among the groups he’d target.
At least the Germans had the worst depression in history to justify losing their minds.
Major Major Major Major
@Frodo: This is actually one of my favorite “actually…” factoids.
SFAW
Sounds good to me.
ETA: Oh, and is there some way to call for a very small, but well-aimed meteor to visit Jill Stein? Maybe when she’s visiting St. Ralph the Pure?
Mk3873
Basically, just take that NYT review of the book and replace every reference to Hitler with Trump. It’s uncanny how apropos it is.
bobbo
@shomi:
Unfortunately, the only way you will be convinced that the parallels are real and meaningful is if Trump wins. Being able to say “I told you so” won’t be much comfort for those of us who saw this coming
Barbara
I have been scared for quite a while now. Even a passing understanding of Hitler’s rise should scare us.
The Dangerman
Shit, forgot the link above (perhaps a decaf thing):
The Industries of the Future
Patricia Kayden
Thankfully, if the minority vote comes out in force in November (and Trump has given them every incentive to do so), Trump will be stopped in his tracks. It is scary to know that around 40% of the White voting population is perfectly okay with electing a Bigot who has zero qualifications though. Good to know.
eclare
@Betty Cracker: WHAT THE FUCK? and I almost never use all caps
JPL
After reading the review earlier, I almost ordered it. Amazon had it available for same day delivery. Since I’m a coward, I’ll wait.
Frankensteinbeck
Trump is godawful bad at instantaneously analyzing and exploiting situations. Witness his tweets praising himself in response to mass killings.
Trump does not adapt his rhetorical style. He only has one.
He sure as HELL is not calculatedly keeping his rhetoric simple. Watch him go off-script. He doesn’t get smarter, he gets dumber. He is incapable of the analysis and manipulation in Hitler’s quote.
He is unbelievably bad at exploiting a constellation of crises. He’s the only GOP candidate who is worse off after terrorism events.
His adversaries sure aren’t underestimating him.
He is crude, a liar, egotistical, nihilistic, and has media backing. Trump lacks any of the actual skills that got Hitler where he was. Sure he would be a horrific president, but we knew that.
Barbara
@Iowa Old Lady: Kellyanne Conway has one goal, and that is preserving Republican appointments to the Supreme Court. It’s 4-4 down only one Republican appointee and their favorite tricks like voter suppression are already like the Wicked Witch of the East sitting in a bucket of water. They hope that Trump is distractable enough to let the good girls and boys in the Senate and House control policy.
Chris
@Barbara:
Likewise.
BruceFromOhio
MAKE AMERICA
I DID NOT SAY THAT
joel hanes
I’m starting to get the impression that Cole thinks The Donald might not be a good President.
Patricia Kayden
@shomi: Huh? Trump has been quite open with his racism. What the hell are you talking about? What makes you think that Trump’s policies won’t directly hurt Blacks, Browns, Muslims, women, LGBTs, etc.? What makes you think that his win wouldn’t empower White Supremacists to violently attack minorities? He has already said that he’s going to bring back “stop and frisk” if he is elected. What makes you think that a man who encourages violence against protesters at his rallies wouldn’t take it to a higher level as President?
I don’t get your lalalala attitude at all unless you have nothing to lose under a Trump Presidency and therefore don’t see how dangerous and fascist he is.
SFAW
@shomi:
Wouldn’t you be happier frequenting places like RedStoat, or FreeperLand, or maybe JillStein’s place?
But thanks for educating all of us about how Trump is nothing like Hitler, because reasons.
Ceci n'est pas mon nym
@srv: Republicans hate trains
Bobby Thomson
@Patricia Kayden: I maintain that white people are more stupid because they can get away with being more stupid. Call it perverse selection.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@John Cole:
This is one of those times.
Also I’ve been meaning to ask for the link to the post you did about all the race wars and other race based atrocities you fished out of the American memory hole. I’ve been wanting to share some of that with friends who are way too white for anybody’s good.
shomi
@bobbo: Oh just STFU pantswetter. Lol.
dedc79
But John, both candidates are repellent for differing reasons. Sincerely!
These purity ponies piss me off even more than the racists/misogynists do.
catclub
I still take some solace that in 1933 Germany had 47% unemployment. Things actually were very bad and they had good reason to be desperate.
Kind of unlike today.
OTOH, Second time as farce.
schrodinger's cat
@Frankensteinbeck: Hitler at least fought in WWI, what was Trump’s excuse for draft dodging?
gocart mozart
http://gocart-mozart.blogspot.com/
schrodinger's cat
@dedc79: Many of the purity ponies are soft racists with unexamined racial biases.
eclare
@joel hanes: Thank you! This thread needed some humor as I look at my bank account and wonder where my atheist liberal hippie dog and I can move to if the apocalypse happens. Like some others, yes, I’ve been worried about these similarities for a while.
sigaba
@Tom Q:
They leave it for the Straussians to make the deduction ;)
I don’t think they’d have to, I think from the review they’ve pretty deliberately written it to make the point without making the point. It’s huge bait for someone to say something like that without the Times getting their hands dirty making the comparison themselves.
@Patricia Kayden:
I think the post makes it clear that, for a certain kind of voter, Trump is hella qualified.
Elizabelle
Some good news: retired US Senator John Warner (Sane R – Virginia) is endorsing Hillary/Tim Kaine. And he took some good whacks at Trump during the announcement.
WaPost: ‘National Security for Dummies’ is no way to learn the presidency, John Warner says as he endorses Clinton
John Warner has endorsed Dem candidates in the past, but this is his first for president.
Patricia Kayden
@Betty Cracker: What does he mean by “should we keep them?” Every time he opens his mouth, Trump eliminates any doubt that he is not Presidential.
Major Major Major Major
@SFAW: You leave the noble weasel out of this, sir! I’ve known red stoats, and RedState is no red stoat.
scav
@Betty Cracker: Seems to feed off the negative energy and anger raised in the crowd, preferably one immediately before him. Setting potential base against base to feed the need, plus gathering a few media eyeballs? Maybe all the protestors could more effectively wander elsewhere and the baying mob would really start laying into each other (they’ve already started laying into the press there.)
SFAW
@Patricia Kayden:
shomi’s primary reason for being here is to scream that all the FPers sucksucksuckfuckingsuck. Anything he writes (in one of those comments) is just to “show” us all why his “thoughts” are “true.”
Yesterday, and maybe the day before, he seemed to be off his whole YOUFUCKINGSUCK schtick, but apparently meds wear off if you don’t keep taking them, so today his usual self is back.
Baud
Hitler never had to face a girl.
Comrade Scrutinizer
Ullrich’s book really doesn’t cover anything that Kershaw and Evans did earlier in their books. While I think that you can certainly say that Trump fits the fascist model, I’m not sure that a direct comparison between Trump and Hitler or Trump and Mussolini would show policy parallels. I think that you can make a lot of parallels between Trump’s campaign and the NSDAP campaigns, but you can also compare his campaign with Mussolini.
What’s sad is that early on, when Trump was just starting to roll out his nonsense, people who pointed out these parallels were called out for violating Godwin’s Law by the insipidly clever, or for indulging in hysteria, or for not understanding that Trump was a blithering idiot whose rise to a position as the presidential candidate of a major political party was inconcievable.
Sometimes our side is as much a danger as the Mighty Wurlitzer.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
john just seems to have Goodwind the form to death.
kindness
I wonder if Hitler snorted cocaine before big debates?
SFAW
@Major Major Major Major:
Damn.
I guess to give you an even better opening, I should have spelt it “stoate.”
Matt McIrvin
@efgoldman: Rhetorical ammo is always good. I get people REALLY OFFENDED when I say the stuff John said above.
Judge Crater
This is not the Weimar Republic, thank god. But Trump certainly is an apostle of Hitler’s various demagogic depredations. His latest rally showed him again calling up to the podium the mother of a person killed by an “illegal alien”.
The names change as one surveys the rhetoric of history’s many demagogues, but the fears and provocations always follow the same formula. Now, instead of Juden Suss (who in Nazi propaganda became a rapist and murderer) we have the rapists and murderers from Mexico and points south.
Trump knows nothing of history, but he instinctively plays on the atavistic impulses of his followers.
Patricia Kayden
@Elizabelle: YAY!! I’d heard yesterday that Warner was going to do this. I have yet to hear of a prominent Democrat who is going the other way (i.e., endorsing Trump). Thank goodness for the few Republicans who are publicly rebuking Trump and supporting Secretary Clinton.
Baud
@efgoldman:
I’ve been on the fence.
Elizabelle
Incidentally, the NY Times gave Gary Johnson an op ed today, and there’s an overwhelming number of reader responses telling him he should drop out and endorse Hillary. Lots of complaining that a third party run just elects Trump.
Scott S.
Wouldn’t hurt to tell your Trump- and Stein-supporting friends that you’ve donated money to the Clinton campaign in their names. Make sure they know that, if Trump gets elected, their names will be on the list for the work camps. Too many of these chumps are taking an “I’m white, no worries for me, lol” attitude, and it wouldn’t hurt them to worry about what the Trump goons will do to them.
Trollhattan
@Ceci n’est pas mon nym:
They lurve trains so long as they’re hauling Bakken crude through urban areas.
SFAW
@srv:
where is the real srv, and what have you done with him?
catclub
@Baud: Any prophecies that no man could stop the rise of Hitler?
Trollhattan
@Baud:
Baud write in Baud, for Baud sake.
hovercraft
@Tom Q:
The republicans are all screaming that the review is an attack on Trump. They should be asked why a review of a historical figure who just happens to be a monster reminds them of their fuehrer, I mean leader, so much, his name is never mentioned, so why are you reminded of Trump?
SFAW
@Patricia Kayden:
Has Joe Manchin endorsed anyone yet?
Patricia Kayden
@SFAW: I’m just flabbergasted that anyone would question whether Trump is a fascist in the same vein as Hitler. No one is predicting that he will send millions to concentration camps but it’s obvious that he has no problem expressing racism, sexism, xenophobia, etc., and encouraging these disgusting traits in his supporters. This is a man who has the full support of White Supremacists and whose campaign is being managed by an alt-right buffoon. Sigh.
jl
@catclub: We’ll see what Baud does after Trump rolls out his free beer, smokes, and lotto tickets program.
dedc79
@schrodinger’s cat:
You’re right. Either racist or dangerously oblivious to what electing a virulent racist and misogynist to the presidency will mean for minorities/women.
Gelfling 545
@Frodo: According to my neighbors back when I was in college, an elderly German couple, Hitler didn’t either.
Patricia Kayden
@SFAW: Good question. Manchin is a DINO so that would make sense. He certainly hasn’t hid his hatred for President Obama.
SFAW
@Baud:
I assume that’s due to your (understandable) anger at Hillary for rigging the SuperDelegate voting against you. I hope you have moved past that, and will now support her campaign wholeheartedly.
Jeffro
@Baud:
Thinking of going third party? Me too. It’s so hard to choose between these two equally ba…ok, I can’t even type that with a straight face.
“Shake things up. Shake things up. Shake things up.” Maybe I really don’t want voter participation going up TOO much…
hovercraft
@Iowa Old Lady:
She is a Clinton hater from way back when, her hatred is personal and visceral. She would sign on with the devil himself to defeat her.
Elizabelle
I hope the NY Times is making their very own ombudsman, Liz Spayd, read the Ullrich book and do a book report on it. Fast.
[Also the crack-addled Hillary reporters — Amy Chozick and Patrick Healy and Maggie Haberman — and their incompetent political desk editor.]
Because there will be a lot of how the media, establishment, and churches aided in Hitler’s rise.
And then they thought they or others could control him.
Jeffro
@dedc79:
To say nothing of what it’s doing to a certain set of Trumplets’ inheritance…
WereBear
@Frankensteinbeck: And thank goodness he’s no Hitler, then?
catclub
OT: President Obama Kept His Promises to Native Americans
Feel good news.
Matt McIrvin
@Patricia Kayden:
I do, sometimes. I mean, just taking his own statements at face value, how would you actually deport 11 million people? There’s got to be some kind of concentration camp involved in the pipeline.
Elizabelle
@Baud: Up on that fence, could you do us a travelogue on Barcelona (sigh), Italy, France and Greece?
joel hanes
@eclare:
I think you can relax a bit.
There was a chance until that first debate
that The Donald might fool enough of the people enough of the time.
I think that window is now closed, and that he’ll ultimately get something close to KFMonkey’s canonical 27% of the popular in November. That will be a defeat so resounding that even the Rs might, conceivably, learn something from it … oh, who am I kidding?
The job for the rest of us is to hang The Donald, like a rotting albatross crossed with a millstone, around the necks of every R fool who endorsed or enabled him, especially in Senate races.
HRC’s gonna be the next President.
She’s gonna be a pretty good one, which will surprise people who have been paying attention to the wrong sources.
We’ll have at least a couple years of a prosperous economy in her first term.
different-church-lady
Do they give out Pulitzers for blog posts? Because DAYUM…
Mary G
I’ve been scared for a while now; it got worst after Brexit. It seems like simplistic and hateful right wing movements have been gaining steam all over the world for a couple of years now. ISIS is one of them. Trump is their equivalent here if we don’t stop him. Democracy is a fragile thing.
Baud
OT: Via Reddit, folks here will like this.
Matt McIrvin
…Before we had any idea Donald Trump would be running this year, I remember Theodore “Vox Day” Beale angrily arguing that the people who said it was impossible to round up and deport that many people were obviously wrong, because Hitler managed a program on that scale without breaking a sweat. He considered this a pro argument.
Major Major Major Major
@Baud: Fucking Baud!-or-Busters.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
tl;dr
Wrong Way Corrigan- er- Jill Stein is about as much of a threat to Clinton’s chances as Vermin Supreme. She’s a clown show and everybody knows it.
Clinton isn’t Gore, Stein isn’t Nader, and Trump sure as fuck ain’t Bush. Chill the fuck out. She’s got this.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@hovercraft: I knew she had a burning hatred for Clinton. How come, though?
singfoom
@Betty Cracker: Who let all this riff raff into the room? Get em up against the wall!
hovercraft
@Patricia Kayden:
Some conservadems probably won’t endorse, but I can’t see them actually endorsing Trump. The real assholes may say they are going to write in someone, but I think that’s as far as they’ll go.
WereBear
That’s guilty knowledge.
sigaba
@Frankensteinbeck:
A lot of the “Hitler was a genius”-talk is post-hoc rationalization. A lot of people are really uncomfortable with the idea that the world could be taken to the brink of disaster by someone who’s actually pretty stupid. Brilliant in the way he strings together nonsense, and sortof cunning in personal situations and sizing people up, but doesn’t actually seem to know how to plan or integrate ideas or think critically — if Hitler knew how to do that stuff he’d have died a happy and prosperous commercial artist. People need to believe that the Devil is a devious genius and that they were suckered into something, as opposed to the contrary, that they actually kinda wanted a lot of what the Devil wanted and lacked the will to stop him when he started taking.
There’s the Intentionalist and Functionalist read (I’m borrowing these terms). The Intentionalist would say Hitler meant for everything to happen and was wildly successful and executing his plans. I’m a pretty extreme Functionalist though, and I think it’s quite possible that Hitler was a barely coherent mental case who really didn’t understand anything but everyone around him projected their own wishes and desires upon him. Himmler wanted a Teutonic God-King, Goering wanted a drinking buddy, the German people wanted an avenger, Chamberlain wanted an honest broker. It’s like Life of Brian, or Hal Ashby’s Being There, there’s this hapless fool at the center and he’s just transgressive enough and jerkass enough and thoughtless enough to give all these other people license to do what they wanted to do but didn’t have the nerve, because they feared the consequences. And here comes Hitler, showing you there don’t actually have to be consequences.
And then everyone around them realizes the rules are gone and they can do what they want, and civil society eats itself in an autocatalytic reaction where everyone must do ever more transgressive and evil things otherwise they’re become suspect, they’ve become “politically correct,” and it becomes a competition to prove how PC the people around you are and how radical you can be. Nobody knows when Hitler actually ordered the Holocaust probably because at least three people around Hitler actually started doing Holocausty-type things on their own authority, just to impress Hitler with how hardcore they were. And Hitler sure signed off on all of this, and he definitely wanted it to happen, but people are still undecided over wether he was genius he’s was just everyone’s patsy.
Is Trump this singular personage who has brought us to this point? Or is it more the case that there just happens to be a Trump-shaped hole in American politics? The man just seems like such a negative and slight personage, it’s hard to believe that all of this is happening because of him, and we aren’t just witnessing millions of people — and a lot of elites — rolling him into something they wanted and needed.
Steeplejack (phone)
So we can’t “go Godwin” in the comments because it’s handled in the original post? Alrighty then.
Baud
@Elizabelle: That seems so long ago now. :-(
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@Baud: Brutal.
Archon
Hitler was looking like a crackpot to most Germans and the Nazis were bleeding supporters right up until the Great Depression hit. Once it hit Hitler’s long held critiques of Western capitalism looked prescient to large swaths of Germans. The economy basically collapsing for the 2nd time in 10 years had Germans looking for radical answers and Hitler gave it to them.
America in 2016 looks like Utopia compared to Germany in 1933. It says something very dark about the United States that people could turn to a radical like Trump in relative good times.
Frankensteinbeck
@WereBear:
In terms of his ability to get the power he wants, yeah. We still sure don’t want him in charge, but he’s sinking himself. The Republican base’s demand for a dumbass mean-spirited babbling overt bigot thankfully contains the elements that look like they’re stopping one of those from winning the presidency.
Mary G
@Baud: I was away from the computers when you got back from vacay and missed welcoming you and your humor back.
eclare
@joel hanes: I think it’s going to be a lot closer than that. And while I do think HRC will win, I really didn’t realize there was that much hatred here. It’s scary.
Matt McIrvin
@shomi: The thing is, there’s about a hundred grades of horrible in between here and Hitler, representing every authoritarian fuck from Berlusconi to Kim Jong Un, and Trump could be any one of them. Hitler’s just the extreme case. They’re 100% all things you don’t want in your country, and uncertainty is not your friend.
Baud
@efgoldman:
A part of me is still going around that traffic circle.
Felonius Monk
@Elizabelle:
Assumes Liz can read. Facts not in evidence.
evodevo
@John Cole: Thank you for putting this all in one place – all the better to jerk the chains of my right wing acquaintances/relatives and the “undecideds” I know.
Baud
@Mary G: Thanks, MG. I missed the jackeleriat too.
Frankensteinbeck
@sigaba:
Definitely a Trump-shaped hole. Look at when the GOP went over the edge, and look at the analyses of Trump’s supporters. We’re going through an extreme racism backlash. It is grotesquely ugly. Trump is too stupid to have taken advantage of it, they wanted someone like him and rejected all normal candidates. Even the outliers show HIllary winning, just slightly, and the reputable models show a stomp. We’ll get through this. If he had an actual army of brownshirts, democracy would be in trouble, but thank goodness his supporters are disorganized and cowardly. They love to preach somebody else waging armed insurrection.
Patricia Kayden
@Matt McIrvin: No doubt that Trump supporters would be perfectly okay with concentration camps for “those people” but I doubt the rest of us would allow that to happen. Still optimistic that we won’t have to worry about all this since we have enough sane people to vote against Trump in November.
Mike Toreno
That book is about the other Hitler.
WereBear
@Frankensteinbeck: I’m no fan of Goldwater, but he did caution against letting the lunatics into the party… And here we are.
My big worry now is that we’ve got some percentage of people whose minds have been so skewed against Reality that they may never come back up into the light again. Will we have to just let them move through the system like a bad meal?
Baud
@Mike Toreno:
Saul Hitler?
WereBear
@Frankensteinbeck: Great point. Hard to get a real Brownshirt organization going when they have trouble rising from a LaZBoy.
joel hanes
@eclare:
I think it’s going to be a lot closer than that.
You could be right.
But I think The Donald has finally catalyzed the negative feedback loop that will destroy him politically —
even if he doesn’t actually get indicted before the election, which could still happen.
The HRC campaign has taken his measure. She’s redefining herself in front of the biggest debate audience in history.
The Donald takes the bait over and over again — he can’t seem to help himself — and gets a bit more toxic each time.
By November, I think his support will be swirling around the drain.
Patricia Kayden
@hovercraft: The dog which is hit is the one which hollers. Trump supporters know exactly who Trump is.
Roger Moore
@dedc79:
I’m pretty sure that some of the purity ponies are racists and/or misogynists. That’s certainly the feeling I get from the Bernie Sanders “supporters” who refuse to accept it when he tells them they need to support Hillary. They clearly hate her far more than they care about anything he stood for.
eric
@Archon: Alas, by dark, I think you mean Obama.
Frankensteinbeck
@WereBear:
That’s hard to say. I don’t think we’ve ever been in a situation like this. They’re not going away, they’re not getting any less racist, and they may actually comprise a small majority of whites. When Obama is no longer in front of their faces they may get less incoherently burn-the-house-down obstructive. There’s also a hope for the California result, where they drive away just enough people that the power balance flips. What they have now is a mile wide and an inch deep. They know it, and that’s why they’re freaking out.
patrick II
One more brick to add to the wall John built.
From Vanity Fair
Felonius Monk
@jl:
Neither RepubliKlowns nor Trump does “free stuff”.
Bailey
@Patricia Kayden:
I wouldn’t get too excited. According to Gallup, the Democrats “will definitely vote” pre-election poll is currently at 65% which is about 12% off what it has been for the past 4 elections:
Gallup 2016
Matt McIrvin
@joel hanes: The third and final debate has Chris Wallace as moderator. He’s going to be completely in the tank for Trump, so Clinton basically has to go one on two. That’s the tough one.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@Archon:
‘Large swaths’ equaling the 33% of the vote Hitler received in the last federal election of ’32 before Hindenburg appointed him Chancellor. Hitler wasn’t that popular to begin with, everyone tends to forget he got in through the side door and cemented his rule over the bodies of the KPD, SPD, the German right, and even his own Brownshirts.
NotMax
@Baud
True story.
Sometime not all that long after WW2, an aunt was employed in the editorial department of a well-known, upscale women’s magazine. One day, she received a phone call from someone pitching a story. Aunt asked her who she was and got the reply “Hitler’s sister.”
Aunt responded, “Um hm, and I’m the Queen of Sheba” and hung up.
Turns out it was a legit call.
WereBear
@Frankensteinbeck: I agree they won’t ever change. I’ve met pretty rocks who are more self-aware.
But maybe they will get tired of politics and become survival preppers instead. It will be a boon to expired MRE warehouses everywhere.
Baud
@NotMax: I don’t think I knew that he had a sister.
sigaba
@Frankensteinbeck:
I agree a big difference between now and then is that in Germany at the time there was almost unremitting political violence, and it was common for right wing extremists to walk on murder raps. Also most of the people around Trump aren’t convicted criminals or insurrectionists. (Most.)
evodevo
@Baud: LOL been there, done that ..
Waldo
@Archon:
It really is amazing. A) because its happening, and B) because it’s largely Trump’s own incompetence that’s saving us from disaster. So far.
Origuy
Manchin endorsed Hillary back in January. Politico
Wikipedia has articles that list who has endorsed Clinton, Trump, etc.
Including foreign politicians. Trump’s reads like a Who’s Who of European fascism.
Frankensteinbeck
@WereBear:
This election is already showing a shift I expected. It is much more overt and ugly, and the attacks on Hillary are more personal. It’s all about attacking her, and the media is gleeful to jump in. At the same time, we’re not seeing the level of uniformity and fanatical anything-to-stop-this obstruction Obama got. Too many high profile dissenters, and while the base is mostly falling in line, the numbers aren’t as good and it wasn’t as swift as with Romney. It’s a difference in the flavor of misogyny vs. anti-black racism. When Obama is no longer in front of their faces 24/7, the GOP may behave very differently. More insults, less obstruction.
Brachiator
@shomi:
@Matt McIrvin:
Trump has hired to help run his campaign people who are known to be white supremacists. Both he and one of his sons seem to have a fondness for re-purposing and re-tweeting “joke” and warnings based on anti-Semitic screeds.
Trump welcomes the aid and comfort of European bigot nationalists. In turn, white racists feel that Trumps speaks to them and they look forward to trying to shape national policy should he be elected.
Trump’s public message is becoming more open and blatant than that of old style racists such as Father Charles Coughlin. To throw Trump into the box with generic authoritarians is a big mistake.
joel hanes
Clinton basically has to go one on two
Against Chris Wallace and The Donald.
She can do that with her hands tied behind her. Wallace is one of the shallowest ponds extant, and, as I’ve noted above, she has The Donald’s number.
Although Lauer exceeded expectations in the first debate, I don’t think that he had a lot to do with HRC’s win.
She pushed The Donald’s buttons and got right in his face, without needing the moderator’s help, and without having to break debate norms in a way that a partisan moderator can easily step on. Now she’s done that once, and it worked, she knows where she is. I’m sure she kept some powder dry, some ammunition in reserve.
In short, he’s toast.
And the press is finally, FINALLY, coming to terms with Trump’s unsuitability. The days of faux balance are ending.
You know in the roadrunner movies, the trope in which Wile E. Coyote has once again run right off the clifftop, and is standing on thin air, buoyed only by his lack of perception of his actual situation ?
Trump walked off that cliff in the first debate.
In the second, she’s going to hand him another anvil, or two.
We will be hearing this sound until November
NotMax
@Waldo
Akin to Prof. Schickele’s description regarding P. D. Q. Bach: “His plagiarism was limited only by his faulty technique.”
Mike E
@SFAW: srv liking the cut of Cole’s jib…yikes. If this is how it all ends, well, it was a good run!
And shomi’s wadded up panty is now main chute strong xD
Matt McIrvin
@Archon: I think that white Americans may be more inherently Nazi than 1930s Germans were. It takes much less to get us close to the brink.
Kathleen
@John Cole: I’m glad you documented this in such detail. We need to have this on record. Thank you for your time and energy.
Kathleen
@John Cole: I’m glad you documented this in such detail. We need to have this on record. Thank you for your time and energy.@Patricia Kayden: And a media who don’t bat an eye as they make every effort to mainstream a candidate who is supported by Nazis and Klansmen.
hovercraft
@Comrade Scrutinizer:
She was a Phyllis Schafley acolyte, who hated everything the Clintons stood for from the get go. Clinton’s impeachment was her first national exposure, and she has never forgotten her roots. Hillary is the antithesis of everything she believes in. This is a National Review article about the origins of her generation of “feminist” conservative activists.
Just One More Canuck
@Baud: Vic Hitler
Applejinx
@joel hanes: Trump is spamming the shit out of Twitter trying to raise twenty million dollars.
My gut says that is a bust-out. It’s got to cost a lot of money for him to do that: Clinton people own Twitter and they’re certainly not donating those ‘sponsored posts’, that’s expensive.
He’s trying to raise as much money as he can, as fast as he can, before the whole thing blows up and he can no longer keep doing this. Or, someone on his team or in his family is doing it knowing that The Donald is about to blow.
The fact that he’s spending heavily on fundraising in hostile territory means he doesn’t intend to continue it. This is a bust-out. He needs to take as much money from his loyalists as he can, before either failing or flaming out.
Applejinx
@Archon:
Oh come on. Granted, 1933 Germany was a whole other level of bad: don’t be absurd. PART of the reason (not all, but part of the reason) for Trump is that these are goddamned not good times. Any more than it’s good times that gave the UK Brexit. Hillary is most definitely up to speed on this, don’t fuck up her message.
We’re a good country, but ‘Rust Belt globalization’ has been happening people’s entire adult lives, the issues with radical income inequality make talk of averages a disingenuous joke, people dropping entirely out of the workforce after years of no jobs makes unemployment figures a disingenuous joke, and we do not have to claim everything is awesome to beat Trump. We have serious work to do and Hillary will have to take strong action.
America is not as dark as you think. America is way more FUCKED than you think, but not irreparably so.
Mike E
@Applejinx:
Yuuuge!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: Much like the Baud!2016 campaign, going in circles.
Lurking Canadian
@Gelfling 545: Well, no, the trains didn’t *actually* run on time, but for damn sure people stopped complaining about them when they were late.
Applejinx
@sigaba:
Dirty cops are not right wing extremists? Cops don’t walk on murder raps, when the victim is black?
We’ll get through this but that IS one of the points of similarity. It’s already here, and it has to stop.
Applejinx
@Mike E: Never said he wasn’t. But he’s also spending heavily on spamming Twitter, trying to raise twenty million dollars. And Twitter is NOT donating those sponsored posts. Not a fucking chance. He’s paying heavily for that, Twitter is Hillary-friendly. They’ve got to be soaking the fuck out of him for those sponsored posts, yet he is doing it.
Dmbeaster
@Frankensteinbeck:
Trump may only be Hitler lite, but he uses the same playbook. They are both of the broader archetype of the demagogue as first identified by the Greeks.
Another important thing to understand about Hitler was the impact of his incarceration. When he got out, he was in constant fear of deportation to Austria, and resolved that without regard to his true beliefs, he had to pursue power legally. This enforced a discipline concerning his behavior that was previously lacking, and honed his skills of persuasion and manipulation.
Dmbeaster
@srv:
Yes, we understand that you would dump all that American democracy stands for in favor of timely trains. The only problem with your hero Trump is that his business history demonstrates no ability to make those trains run timely.
p.a.
Probably been mentioned in previous comments: German Conservatives made alliance w
tRumpHitler thinking he’d be weak and easy to control, and thinking theFreedom CaucusNazis would be junior partners in the coalition gvt.Lizzy L
@Applejinx:
Are you suggesting that he might withdraw before the election, claiming it’s all rigged? (Mm mm, take the money and run…) Because I don’t think God loves me that much, or you either. //snark, mostly.
p.a.
@Lizzy L: Would Pence automatically become the nominee? A ‘smoke filled room’ scenario to pick a pres/vice pres team?
D58826
My maternal grandmother was on the last ship out of Germany on the eve of WWI. She told my Mom that Hitler spoke a very poor grade of German (kind of like a German cockney) but the way he talked could charm the paint off the wall. I’m not sure that ‘old little hands’ is quite that talented but he does pretty much satisfy the 5 items listed in the book review.
At this point the only question is are there enough Good Americans to stand up to him than there were Good Germans who didn’t stand up to Hitler.
Applejinx
@Lizzy L: That would not be good.
The trouble there is, if he withdraws it would be with cries to go to war against the illegitimate usurpers and traitors.
He’d be ‘gone’, very probably to Russia or something, and would not be President. But, we would have one motherfucker of a domestic terrorism problem, one to make the Irish look at us and go ‘dang’.
I prefer him to lose, not withdraw. The only way he’d withdraw is by calling for outright civil war. Only that would save face for the guy.
Joey Giruad
There’s a good case to be made for NAFTA and subsequent “trade agreements,” a case that could well convince a well-meaning president to get on board with it; trade agreements prevent world war by entwining all economies. If one fails, they all fail, so no-one will dare start a huge war.
I’m not saying it’s true or wise or any of that, but I could see a economically-naive president buying it.
ps: wow. way off topic. request deletion.
Lizzy L
@p.a.: From CNBC:
Rule 9 of the Republican National Committee rules governs “Filling Vacancies in Nominations,” and stipulates that should the party’s presidential or vice presidential candidate leave the ticket for whatever reason, the hole may be filled either by a reconvening of the national convention or by the party committee itself. The vice presidential nominee is not given any preferential consideration.
Should the committee elect to fill the vacancy — a seemingly more likely scenario given the logistics involved in organizing a second convention — Republican National Committee members representing a given state are entitled to cast the same number of votes as that state was entitled to at the convention. If the RNC members from any state are not in agreement about casting of their votes, the votes of that state are divided equally among members of the RNC voting.
The final stipulation of the rule is that no candidate may be chosen to fill a vacancy except by receiving a majority of the votes entitled to be cast in the RNC election.
scott alloway
@Bobby Thomson: Like. Muchly.
gogol's wife
@joel hanes:
Ooh, I love this comment.
rikyrah
Cole,
I already knew this. Thanks for putting it in black and white. I really don’t have the time or patience as you know for those that claim there is no difference between them. I do not have the luxury to NOT take the man at his word
Miss Bianca
I put a hold on this book earlier today. With any hope it will come in before the election…and with any hope, it will be merely a fascinating historical dissection, rather than a blueprint for the New American Reich, after that.
SFAW
@Dmbeaster:
Umm, I think srv was making a joke.
Tokyokie
Cole, Thanks for going to all that trouble. A difference I’d point out is that Hitler’s rise was enabled considerably by a fractious multiparty parliamentary system. But a book I keep coming back to (and one I’ve mentioned before) is Philip Kerr’s Berlin Noir trilogy, especially the first installment, March Violets. Reading it, you realize that what was most vital to Hitler’s rise to power was a lot of upper-class German thinking that he need not be taken seriously and that they could control him. And we know how well that worked out. Sellouts like Teddy Boy Cruz and ZEGS are assholes would be forging low-number party membership cards were they in Germany during the 1930s because their only interests are self and short-term.
Of course, another difference is that Hitler was honored for bravery during wartime, and Trump thinks that having spent time in a military-themed prep school and fighting VD are the same as enduring several years of Western Front trench warfare.
Brachiator
@D58826:
People always seem to forget that there were plenty of people standing with him because he promised to make Germany great again.
JR in WV
@Patricia Kayden:
shomi thinks in their dreams that they won’t be suffering under der Trump’s reign. Deluded. Everyone will suffer under der Trump.
We’ll be lucky if there aren’t rolling power black-outs nationwide.
But I don’t think he will be elected. I was calling on behalf of Hillary’s campaign, and got a real strong supporter on the phone. She was certain she was going to vote for Hillary. Up in Ohio, too, which is good news.
So we always thank them for their support, which is easy to do, easy to be sincere. Then we ask if there’s any chance they might be interested in volunteering to help out. She bursts into laughter and says “Honey, I’m 90 years old and can barely walk, but I’m certain I’m going to vote for her!” and cackles with joy.
It was great. I told her that early voting started in just a couple weeks if she wanted to go for that. I think she wanted to go to a regular polling place and do it in front of everybody, though.
hilzoy
Do not tell them to shut the fuck up. Try to reach them. Try to convince them that being President is a job, and elections are extended job interviews. Tell them that if they’re angry, it would behoove them to try to figure out who they should be angry at, and how they can oppose those people and their policies. And try to make them see that our system of government is a precious inheritance that will not take care of itself; it needs us to sustain it. It treats us like grown-ups who don’t just say “well, maybe it would be better if someone blew the whole thing up”, but try to figure out exactly what went wrong, and how to fix it. If we act like pouty children instead, we could lose it all.
SFAW
@JR in WV:
Is there any kind of infrastructure which you could leverage, so as to be able to say “Can we offer you a ride to and from the polls?” I know that something like that has been done in past elections.
SFAW
@hilzoy:
Thanks
TriassicSands
A number of observers have doubted that Trump has ever read a book as an adult. But, if he has, I’ll bet that book was Mein Kampf — the illustrated, children’s condensed version maybe, but with all the essentials included.
redshirt
Has anyone said “It Can’t Happen Here” yet?
JR in WV
@kindness:
No, he injected amphetamine derived drugs, rather his “doctor” did. Last longer than cocaine.
Mike Toreno
@Baud: The Hitler that ruled Germany from 1933 to 1945 and created worldwide death and ruin, as opposed to the Hitler that sits in the bunker, planning, being informed of things, playing Call of Duty, and struggling against Fegelein the Antic Master.
Do watch Downfall, (about the last few days of the Third Reich) if you haven’t already, and if you can handle it – rough rough rough. If you haven’t seen the Hitler videos that are all over Youtube, and want to watch Downfall, watch it before watching any of the videos.
JR in WV
@Archon:
But Hitler didn’t have 30 years of Fox News, spewing the big lie far more effectively than Goering ever did. TV is so much better than radio, and, of course, we know now that pictures DO lie, and very well indeed.
Just ask Roger Ailes, or Rupert Murdock.
redshirt
@JR in WV: This. And an internet that provides all the information in the world, but also any lie you want to push. Just check out foxnewsdotcom for proof. Or Drudge. And so people who live in that bubble believe lies as truth. Hence the danger.
dww44
@joel hanes: Your comment will be my talisman. Thank you.
Bob2
How could you miss this one?
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/trump-files-donalds-big-book-hitler-speeches
dww44
@SFAW: I too thank Hilzoy and have saved it to share with others on the morrow. And maybe at opportune times with youngish voters here “who’ve always voted for a Republican ” (not old enough to realize that when she was born this red state was still very much a Democratic one and her parents were likely Democratic voters then).
fuckwit
This is the most Billmon thing I’ve ever read here as a FP post.
Full-on Godwin mode engaged. And totally justified.
We really are in an existential battle here.
JR in WV
Two things about my very limited anecdotal phoning experience, maybe 300 calls. The black people I spoke with were emphatically pro-Hillary people, as were most of the older women.
The anti-Hillary people hang up very shortly after I mention I’m a volunteer with the Hillary Campaign. There is usually no opportunity to persuade them, although I did hear another phone bank person doing that at least once the other evening.
I talked to one guy the other day, “I’m working two jobs, and doing therapy to keep sober, so I won’t have time to volunteer. But I’m sure going to vote for her!” All I could do was thank him for his vote and tell him there are people pulling for his success, and that Hillary is one of them.
Which I believe.
She really does care, or I wouldn’t care so much. I would still work for her, because the alternative is so despicable. The people who are close to her are good people, and they care for her, which is a big “tell” for me.
Procopius
@Archon: It wasn’t exactly the Great Depression. It was Chancellor Breuning’s mindless and unshakable conviction that austerity would solve the problem. That not only made things worse, he refused to take any measures to relieve suffering. Think of Hoover on steroids. At least Hoover allowed some relief measures. We really can hardly imagine what it was like, but remember the Nazis never got more than 33% of the vote. Hindenburg hoped Hitler could produce a coalition government that would last more than a few weeks. He was not seen as an idiot or incompetent back then. Read Shirer’s “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.” I was born in 1937, so I grew up when this was still fresh in people’s minds.
HeartlandLiberal
@John Cole: Your post with comparisons should be on the front page of very newspaper in the country. End of discussion. In my first career, pre computers, I almost finished a PhD i German lit and history. I assure you, from having read the several shelves of books I still have on the history Germany, and particularly Hitler, your comparison is entirely too accurate for comfort. I have watched in disgust this year as our traditional media have written about Trump in a way that is just too eerily reminiscent of how they totally misunderstood and misreported on the rise of Hitler in the Thirties. The mainstream media have failed this nation. We do not have journalism. We have click bait infotainment, and TV news shows that are nothing but infotainment/infomercials, owned and controlled by the corporate oligarchy.
louc
The review was a brilliant subtweet. The question: Did it violate Godwin’s law since it never mentioned Trump? You as a reader can only make your own inferences.
sunny raines
“So once again a monster, comes knocking at the door
trump preaches the gospel of bigotry and fear”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XhK_8eRrcM