Fear is a powerful emotion. It causes intelligent and decent people to do things you might never expect. I was thinking about fear as I listened to the news this morning. Fear is causing the world markets to collapse. Fear is being used by the McCain Campaign to get elected. Fear is being used to justify two wars and start a third (in Iran). History is instructive and in times like these, the lessons that history offers are scary.
What is happening here? Economic collapse, war and a political campaign based on intolerance – sounds like Germany in 1933 doesn’t it? Only this time there are weapons with the power to end the world. What McCain and Palin are doing now is irresponsible, dangerous and destructive to our country. They are fanning the flames of intolerance, pure and simple. If they lose, will that calm down the people who are shouting “kill him”, “off with his head” or “Arab” at their rallies? If they win, then God help us because the need for calm, steady leadership and diplomacy will never be greater.
What is our alternative? We have to trust that the principles that we have aspired to as a Country can succeed. In the words of a great president “We have nothing to fear but fear itself”. We must act against intolerance and not remain silent in the face of bigotry and hate-mongering. Good Germans allowed the Nazis to take power through their silence. I guess I just wrote myself into doing something to end the fear I see in the eyes of my employees, my clients and my family. Let’s all act without fear and speak out.
FiegerTime - Geoffrey Fieger's Blog 
Just wanted to say HI. I found your blog a few days ago on Technorati and have been reading it over the past few days.
The Obama Truth Squads silencing the opposition
Children being indoctrinated into Obama worship and singing his praises
Teens in paramilitary clothing chanting Obama praises
Denouncing any criticism of Obama as evil and racist
A neo-religious tenor to an entire campaign
Yes, it does sound more than a little like Wiemar Germany and the rise of the Nazis.
Several of McCain’s “truth squads” in other states, including New Hampshire, include Republican officials with prosecutorial powers, including the state’s attorney general.
Detroit Free Press
Drudge Report Lie: Implies Obama “Truth Squad” is Threatening Criminal Prosecution
Daily Kos
Yes… McCain people with toy monkeys labelled Obama, burning crosses before rallys, recruiting KKK to “monitor” voting polls in Arkansas and Mississippi, Ministers praying for McCain’s “Christian Nation” before rallys… it all fits with a man who was on the Board of an organization that harbored nazi collaborators and right wing death squads and who seeks the endorsement of anti-Catholic bigots. Look for McCain to begin railing against union organizers – oooops, just heard a clip of him from Monday. He should have titled his book “Faith of Mein Fatherland” instead.
You’re funny, Geoffrey – using Daily Kos to refute The Drudge Report. LOL
If Kos is where you get your information, then there’s little or no hope of an intelligent conversation with you. Enjoy your Obama Kool Aid.
BTW: I DON’T use Drudge either; they’re as bad as Kos in their own way / polarity.
Did you have trouble following the link to the Detroit Free Press story?
What a relevant post at any time!
What scares me is how religion– or an ideology similar to religion (as in the case of Hitlerism)– can cause good people to do bad things. Until he became religious, Ziad Jarrah, the lead hijacker of United Flight 93, was a great guy who worked with disabled children.
At its most basic form, it’s tribalism and peer pressure. Ever heard of the Milgram Experiment or the Stanford Prison Experiment? Well, that’s how Nazi Germany worked. Nazi “doctors” were probably not mostly psychotic sociopathic men. No. They were programmed by ideology, peer pressure… a matter of survival that probably served our primitive ancestors well. But did evolution take into account modern technology and medical technology? No. And these same “doctors” who performed vivisections on non-consenting, conscious prisoners or who sewed identical twins together to make “Siamese Twins” or who performed other pointless experiments and didn’t flinch at their screams went home at the end of the day to their families, told their wives they loved them, and gave their children kisses and boxes of candy. Also scary is the stories I’ve heard about families turning best friends who were Jewish over to the Nazis. Or stories about people waiting on platforms and watching trains go by with sickly Jews and not giving it a second thought.
It seems that being a social species we have as much capacity to do harm as much as good– all BECAUSE we’re a social species.
And it was with the Bush administration that I began to understand how Nazi Germany got started.
Julie