August 20, 2005
The Nazis and the GOP (This is Scary)*
Originally Posted: Sept. 2004Final Revision/Posting: May 2005
In the movie "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," anyone who went to sleep that had a "pod" placed for them awoke as a mind numbed robot and fell in line behind everyone else that already was.
It reminds me of the blind support Bush gets because it seems that more and more people are going to sleep and awakening as mind numbed conservatives joining the Republican party.
But I've taken a more serious look at what the Republicans have become and it's scary.
The Republican party has not only grown and gained power by using the same tactics as the Nazis did, but the strategy, rhetoric and frenzied hate and anger surrounding both parties is also strikingly similar.
I realize that comparing anyone to the Nazis is uncalled for and should be repudiated. But consider the following:
1) Create an Enemy:
Nazis took anti-Jewish feelings, made it worse by blaming Jews for everything that was wrong in Germany, and made them the enemy.
Republicans took anti-liberal feelings, made it worse by blaming liberals for everything that is wrong with America, and made them the enemy.
Republicans have done such a great job demeaning and demagoging the word "liberal" - as the Nazis did with "Jew" - that Democrats not only have to run away from it, but conservatives use it as a insult ("You're a liberal!") and attached it to their propaganda ("liberal media").
September 2008 insert: Also see this
Originally Posted: Sept. 2004
Final Revision/Posting: May 2005
In the movie "Invasion of the Body Snatchers," anyone who went to sleep that had a "pod" placed for them awoke as a mind numbed robot and fell in line behind everyone else that already was.
It reminds me of the blind support Bush gets because it seems that more and more people are going to sleep and awakening as mind numbed conservatives joining the Republican party.
But I've taken a more serious look at what the Republicans have become and it's scary.
The Republican party has not only grown and gained power by using the same tactics as the Nazis did, but the strategy, rhetoric and frenzied hate and anger surrounding both parties is also strikingly similar.
I realize that comparing anyone to the Nazis is uncalled for and should be repudiated. But consider the following:
1) Create an Enemy:
Nazis took anti-Jewish feelings, made it worse by blaming Jews for everything that was wrong in Germany, and made them the enemy.
Republicans took anti-liberal feelings, made it worse by blaming liberals for everything that is wrong with America, and made them the enemy.
Republicans have done such a great job demeaning and demagoging the word "liberal" - as the Nazis did with "Jew" - that Democrats not only have to run away from it, but conservatives use it as a insult ("You're a liberal!") and attached it to their propaganda ("liberal media").
September 2008 insert: Also see this.
2) Blame Government:
Germans didn't trust their government during the 1920s and Hitler used that sentiment to bring the Nazis to power.
Republicans use their (manufactured) hatred of "(big) government" to gain power.
3) The Rhetoric:
Nazis used rabble rousing speech's to build their party.
Republicans use rabble rousing speeches (much more inciteful and inflammatory than Democrats) to build their party and secure their base.
4) The Propaganda:
"The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless one fundamental principle is borne in mind constantly...it must confine itself to a few points and repeat them over and over."
- Joseph Geobbels
Nazis repeated the same propaganda over and over to brainwash Germans and built their party.
Republicans repeat the same propaganda over and over to brainwash Americans to build their party: "liberal media," "cut taxes," "Democrats tax and spend," "Democrats will take your guns away," "Democrats are soft on (fill in the blank)," "Republicans are tough on (fill in the blank)," "Democrats are for big government," "get government out of our lives," "socialized medicine," "government-run health care," "drill in Alaska," "partial birth abortion," "privatize," "deregulate," "let the free market decide" and "John Kerry's a flip-flopper."
And they've rolled out two new ones: "personal accounts" and "intelligent design" (Democrats don't have propaganda of their own, except "tax cuts for the rich;" and that's recent).
Nazis told Germans not to believe leaflets dropped by British planes before WWII because it was "enemy propaganda."
Republicans brush off negative news stories by saying it came from the "liberal media" or it's "liberal propaganda."
The Nazis had Geobbels to spread their propaganda.
The Republicans have Karl Rove, talk radio and Fox News to spread their propaganda.
The Nazis produced their own propaganda films, pamphlets and posters.
The Bush Administration produced their own propaganda "news" videos - complete with "anchors" and a script - and distributed them to local news outlets.
They also paid conservative "columnists" and "reporters" to promote Bush's policies on TV, radio and in their columns (without disclosing they were being paid to shill).
The White House also planted a partisan conservative "reporter" in the White House Briefing Room to lob blatantly slanted softball questions.
"I soon realized that the correct use of propaganda is a true art which has remained practically unknown to the bourgeois parties. Only the Christian-Social movement (see "Religion" below), especially in Lueger's time achieved a certain virtuosity on this instrument, to which it owed many of its success."
- Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)
October, 2010 insert: "All propaganda has to be popular and has to adapt its spiritual level to the perception of the least intelligent of those towards whom it intends to direct itself."
- Adolf Hitler (Mein Kampf)
5) The Brainwashing:
Germans believed their party and Hitler, no questions asked.
Republicans believe their party and George Bush, no questions asked.
Walk into a room with 10 Democrats, and you'll come out with a dozen opinions.
Walk into a room with 10 Republicans, and you'll come out with one opinion.
Are there any Republicans that can think for themselves? Or do they need Rush Limbaugh to tell them what to think, what to say, and what "talking points" to use in an argument with a "liberal" (December 2007 insert: Former White House Communications aide Dan Bartlett admits it)? Speaks volumes when they describe themselves as a "Rush Republican," doesn't it?
"The essence of propaganda consists in winning people over to an idea so sincerely, so vitally, that in the end they succumb to it utterly and can never escape from it."
- Goebbels
December 2007 insert: "...See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda."
- George Bush May 24, 2005 (here)
6) One Party:
In 1933 the Nazis declared themselves the only party in Germany.
The goal of Karl Rove and the GOP is to create a "one-party nation."
Republicans got a good start by using drastic gerrymandering to achieve "one party" dominance in the US House of Representatives and just might have rigged elections to take care of the rest.
March, 2007 insert: By firing eight US attorneys, some of who whom were (surprise, surprise) investigating Republicans, and replacing them with Republican political hacks, the White House could not only lessen the possibility of future criminal investigations against Republicans, but also dig up dirt, place dirt or conveniently leak made-up dirt on Democrats leading up to the 2008 elections (Tim Griffin, who replaced Arkansas attorney H.E. "Bud" Cummins, was a deputy to Karl Rove and served as research director for the Republican National Committee).
So Rove turned the Department of Justice - the Department of Justice, where the "scales of justice" are literally blindfolded! - into a branch wing of the RNC's "opposition research" department.
And there's more. Rove works in front of the polling stations too:
...There is no evidence of rampant voter fraud in this country. Rather, Republicans under Mr. Bush have used such allegations as an excuse to suppress the votes of Democratic-leaning groups. They have intimidated Native American voter registration campaigners in South Dakota with baseless charges of fraud. They have pushed through harsh voter ID bills in states like Georgia and Missouri, both blocked by the courts, that were designed to make it hard for people who lack drivers’ licenses — who are disproportionately poor, elderly or members of minorities — to vote. Florida passed a law placing such onerous conditions on voter registration drives, which register many members of minorities and poor people, that the League of Women Voters of Florida suspended its registration work in the state....(here).
Another March, 2007 insert: Rove also uses government agencies and their resources to get Republicans elected (here).
May, 2007 insert:
...amid a scandal over politicization of the Justice Department, Congress is beginning to examine allegations that von Spakovsky was a key player in a Republican campaign to hang onto power in Washington by suppressing the votes of minority voters (here).
Another May, 2007 insert:
Investigative reporter Greg Palast says 4.5 million votes will be shoplifted in 2008, thanks largely to the “Rove-bots” that have been placed in the Justice Department following the U.S. Attorney firings. Being the guy who uncovered the voter “purge lists” of 2000 that disenfranchised black voters, he’s worth listening to, even if the mainstream press chooses not to.
This time around, he claims to have 500 emails that the House subpoenaed and Karl Rove claims were deleted forever. They prove definitively, says Palast, that the Justice Department is infested with operatives taking orders from Rove to steal upcoming elections for Republicans and permanently alter the Department (here).
Since Republicans can't beat the Democrats on creativity, ideas and intellect, Rove knows the only way for the GOP to become the "majority party" is to lie, cheat, create Democratic "scandals" and keep turnout low; whatever it takes, no matter how dirty, nasty or illegal.
Is this what America's supposed to be about?
And to think that Rove has Republicans run on "American values" and "morals."
7) Favor Big Business:
Hitler's economic policies were designed to help the largest corporations in Germany, particularly ones where high-ranking Nazi officials were majority shareholders.
Bush appeases big business, big industry, big oil and his cronies.
8) Fear + Country - Disloyalty = Blind Faith:
"...the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism, and exposing the country to greater danger."
- Herman Goering to Gustave Gilbert, a German intelligence officer at the Nuremberg trials
The Nazis used fear of Jews and Communism and love of country to get Germans to blindly follow Hitler and his actions.
Republicans use fear of terrorism and liberalism and love of country to get Americans to blindly follow Bush and his actions.
The Nazis accused those who dissented as being disloyal.
Republicans accuse those who dissent as being unpatrotic.
"To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists, for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve."
- Attorney General John Ashcroft, Dec. 6, 2001
"Liberals hate America (October, 2008 insert: here) and our troops!"
- Brainwashed Republicans, every day
June, 2011 insert:
The Nazis had "Heil Hitler."
Republicans have Ronald Reagan's "Eleventh Commandment": "Thou shalt not speak ill of any fellow Republican."
9) The Invader:
Hitler invaded Europe without provocation or a credible reason, but conned his country into thinking there was.
Bush invaded Iraq without provocation or a credible reason, but conned his country into thinking there was.
Hitler used the "blitzkrieg."
Bush used "shock and awe."
"Where the German soldier sets foot, he remains."
- Hitler during WWII from the book "Hitler's War" by Edwin P. Hoyt.
"Americans don't 'cut and run.'"
- George Bush and the Republicans
"I give a propaganda reason for starting the war. Never mind whether it is plausible or not. The victor will not be asked afterward whether he told the truth or not. In starting and waging war, it is not right that matters, but victory."
- Hitler
10) The Enforcers:
The Nazis had the Enabling Act.
The Republicans have the Patriot Act.
The Nazis had the Gestapo and the "brown shirts."
The Republicans have similar versions of the same: the FBI, the CIA (Dec. 2005 insert: the NSA) and Attorney's General John Ashcroft and Alberto Gonzales.
The Nazis tortured WWII POW's.
"Enemy combatants" and prisoners were/are being tortured at Bagram Air Base, Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay.
Hitler had the SS do his dirty work.
Bush has the CIA doing his dirty work (by secretly flying foreigners/prisoners to country's that conveniently allow torture).
June, 2010 insert:
The Nazis used "enhanced interrogation" techniques on prisoners and used fancy legal wording to justify it.
Bush and Cheney used "enhanced interrogation" techniques on prisoners and used fancy legal wording to justify it. Here (I recommend reading that).
March, 2010 insert:
The Nazis had Kristallnacht, "Night of (broken) glass," against the Jews.
As the health care legislation passed Congress and signed by President Obama, a conservative blogger told his readers to conduct their own Kristallnacht by saying:
...if you wish to send a message that Pelosi and her party [that they] cannot fail to hear, break their windows. Break them NOW. Break them and run to break again. Break them under cover of night. Break them in broad daylight. Break them and await arrest in willful, principled civil disobedience. Break them with rocks. Break them with slingshots. Break them with baseball bats. But BREAK THEM.
And the orders were obeyed.
This was incited and basically condoned by Republican Party leadership.
April, 2010 insert:
The Nazis forced Jews to show their papers and demanded that personal papers be kept on the person of every individual
Arizona Republicans passed, and the Republican Governor signed, a law forcing police to check the papers of anyone who "looks" illegal.
You don't have to take my word for this similarity, take a Republican's.
June, 2010 insert:
The Nazis performed experiments on the Jews.
The Bush-Cheney administration just may have conducted illegal experiments on human beings as part of its torture program.
October, 2010 insert:
At a Republican campaign rally, Ted Nugent describes Democrats as rats.
The Nazis and Saudis described the Jews as rats.
11) Religion:
"But there is something else I believe, and that is that there is a God...And this God again has blessed our efforts during the past 13 years."
- Hitler, 1940
Contrary to the Republican myth, Hitler was not an atheist. He was raised a Catholic, believed in the Bible, went to a monastery school, was an alter boy and wanted to become a priest.
The Nazis had the Christian-Social movement.
The Republicans have the Christian Coalition.
In 1933 the Nazis conducted a violent campaign against the "godless movement."
Republicans ridicule the "godless" whenever given the opportunity.
Hitler attacked Communists for the spread of atheism.
Republicans verbally attack atheists, secularists and anyone who believes in the clear separation between "Church and State."
Nazis enacted prayer in school.
Republicans want prayer in school.
"Secular schools can never be tolerated because such schools have no religious instruction, and a general moral instruction without a religious foundation is built on air; consequently, all character training and religion must be derived from faith...WE NEED BELIEVING PEOPLE." (caps mine)
- Hitler
Hitler could not have come into power without the support of the Protestant and Catholic churches and Germany's Christian's.
The Republicans and George Bush could not have come into power without the support of the Religious Right/Evangelicals.
- Hitler
"God told me to strike at al Qaeda and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam (Hussein), which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East."
- George Bush
November 2007 insert:
Propaganda posters in 1942 showed meticulously groomed GI's in clean, pressed uniforms with statements that we will win because "We're on God's side". In fact, the enlisted man's belt buckle in the German army bore the inscription "God is with us". Here.
With that in mind...
Hitler: "God is on our side."
George Bush: "God is on America's side."
December 2007 insert:
"(The National Government) regards Christianity as the foundation of our national morality, and the family as the basis of national life."
- Adolph Hitler
"America was founded on Judeo-Christian principles."
- Republicans
Conclusion:
"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State." (Bold mine.)
- Geobbels
Again, while it is and should be a knee jerk reaction to severely denounce any comparison between the Nazis and anyone, you have to remember it is a knee jerk reaction.
But at worst, if I'm right, Republicans are just like the Nazis - without the camps. At best, if I'm wrong, the Republican party has become a cult - with power.
"Thus inwardly armed with confidence in God and the unshakable stupidity of the voting citizenry, the politicians can begin the fight for the 'remaking' of the Reich as they call it."
- Hitler (Mein Kampf)
I'm glad I'm a Democrat and can think for myself.
Public Service Announcement:
Signs that you're a brainwashed Republican:
1. Your views and opinions were/are someone else's.
2. You blame "liberals" and/or Clinton for everything.
3. You blast, blame and ridicule Hollywood, France, environmentalists, Dan Rather, Michael Moore, the "liberal" media, the UN, and the WTO (other much needed enemies created by the GOP because it always has to be someone else's fault).
4. You despised Bill and Hillary Clinton from the moment he announced his candidacy for President in 1991 and your hatred for both of them has grown exponentially ever since.
5. Bush is not to blame for 9/11 because that was all Clinton's fault. And the 1993 attack on the WTC was also Clinton's fault - not Bush 41's - even though Clinton had only been in office a month.
6. You hate Ted Kennedy (as you're trained to) but can't name three pieces of legislation that he supported or opposed in his 40+ years in the Senate as the reason for such vile hatred. Heck, you can't even name ONE (and saying it's because he's "liberal" or that he's for "big government," or it's because of Chappaquiddick, won't cut it. But go ahead and use those reasons, it'll prove my point exactly).
7. Antonin Scalia is your favorite Supreme Court Justice - "because he's got such a wonderful mind" - but are unable to describe one legal opinion he wrote. Heck, you can't even NAME one.
8. You hated John Kerry because he was a "liberal" and a "flip-flopper," but didn't know anything about him until Karl Rove told you he was "liberal" and a "flip-flopper," so you kept ridiculing Kerry as a "liberal" and a "flip-flopper" just like you were told to.
9. You automatically take the conservative/Republican side of every issue.
10. You only get your news from Fox News and/or conservative talk radio.
11. You don't believe a negative news story on a Republican because it's either "liberal propaganda" or it came from the "liberal media."
12. You regularly spout Republican propaganda: "Democrats tax and spend," "liberal media," "Democrats are soft on (whatever)," "Democrats are going to take my guns away," etc.
13. You constantly use the words "lib" or "liberal" as an insult or in derogatory ways.
14. You get riled up and join in whenever a Republican publicly blasts "liberals" (just like you're trained to).
15. Since nothing is more important then defending your (indefensible) arguments:
A) You're too arrogant and stubborn to admit you're wrong (even on a minor point) and ignore facts that do prove you wrong.
B) You lie, distort facts and stand logic on it's head.
C) You're willing to show your ignorance and insult your own intelligence by using spin that's laughable (i.e. "We lost 1,000 men some DAYS during WWII!" Or "We've had troops in Japan and Germany for the last 50 years!")
16. When "debating" a "lib," you become belligerent, pugnacious and insulting.
17. When "debating" a "lib," you repeat GOP talking points or talk radio rhetoric (practically word for word) because you don't have any reasons or ideas of your own to support your argument.
18. When "debating" a "lib," your argument always comes down to Clinton's sex life.
19. You never question George Bush because he's never wrong, never lies and never makes mistakes.
20. You never question Dick Cheney, Don Rumsfeld or Condi Rice because they know everything.
21. You label every "lib" that opposes the Iraq war as a traitor, anti-American or communist.
22. You conveniently overlook blatant Republican hypocrisy, such as:
Bush 41 and Dole go to war: good and their service is glorified.
Gore and Kerry go to war: bad and their service is ridiculed.
(And I don't want to hear that Gore was "just a reporter" in the Vietnam War and "never got his uniform dirty" because at least he served, while Bush rarely even wore his National Guard uniform!)
And...
Clinton avoids Vietnam: he's "a draft dodger" who "hates America."
Bush and Cheney avoid Vietnam: they're "great leaders" and "great Americans."And...
Clinton lies under oath in a civil deposition - Impeachment
Dan Rather mistakenly uses forged documents in a story about George Bush and later admits the error - "He MUST resign!"
Bush lies, exaggerates and uses forged documents to mislead the country into a totally unnecessary war that turns into a colossal disaster - "four more years, four more years!"
And this.
23. The back-to-back Hitler and Bush quotes at the bottom of the "Religion" heading didn't send a chill down your spine.
24. You're spinning and making excuses so you can answer "no" to these questions, i.e. No. 4 - "Hey, I didn't start 'hating' the Clintons until he got the nomination (or took office). And besides my hatred for them isn't 'exponential'." No. 8 - "Of course Kerry was a liberal, everyone knew that. And nobody 'TOLD' me to SAY anything!" (Okay, then just like you were TRAINED to). No. 9 - "I don't 'automatically' take the conservative/Republican side of 'EVERY' issue. No. 10 - "No, I also get my news from Joe Scarborough on MSNBC!" No. 19 - "Sometimes I DO question George Bush...on his trade policy with Cameroon. And he doesn't preach God and morals enough." No. 22 - "Hey, George Bush joined the National Guard!"
25. You want to respond to this without considering the possibility that you really might be a brainwashed Republican by making up comparisons between Hitler and the Democrats and/or ridiculing me and calling me a "liberal" (exactly the sort of belligerent actions I'd expect from a brainwashed Republican who's unable admit the truth).
If more then two of these apply, seek professional help immediately. I'm serious.
May, 2010 insert: See Glenn Beck Proves Me Right.
May, 2011 insert:
For what it's worth, in the 1939 movie Confessions of a Nazi Spy this was said:
Narrator (35:00):
...the Nazi party has created a new fascist society based on a devote worship of the Aryan superman. A new fascist culture infu(s)ed with the glorification of conquest and war. A fascist system of life where every man, woman and child must think alike, speak alike and do alike. A rigidly censored press, with all news colored by the ministry of propaganda...A new religion ridiculing a brotherhood and equality of man before God. A fascist economy with its watchword, 'canon, not butter.' A fascist philosophy, with a supreme command, blind obedience to the Fuhrer...
The Republican "Party" demands "devote worship" of - what they believe - their conservative superiority; they "glorify conquest and war;" every conservative "man, woman and child thinks alike, speaks alike and (does) alike;" their "ministry of propaganda" is Fox "News" and talk radio, and they add their own "coloring;" the only "religion" that matters is Christianity, and atheists are "ridiculed;" they want to cut programs for seniors and the most needy, but won't cut a penny from the defense budget - "canon, not butter;" and most of all, they demand "blind obedience" to the President...at least a Republican President (see "devote worship" and "blind obedience" of George W. Bush and even more so, Ronald Reagan).
A Nazi propaganda leader (36:30):
...national Socialism in the United States must place itself in the American flag. It must appear to be a defense of Americanism. But at the same time, our aim must always be to discredit conditions there in the United States. And in this way make life in Germany admired and wished for. Racial and religious hatred must be fostered on the basis of American Aryanism. Classes(?) must be encouraged, in such a way that labor and the middle classes will become confused and antagonistic. In the ensuing chaos we will be able to take control.
Republicans wrap themselves in the American flag; they "discredit" (blame and attack) everyone who dares disagrees with them so they can make a conservative America "admired and wished for;" "racial and religious hatred is fostered;" they have "antagonized" "labor and the middle class;" and in our political "chaos," Republicans and conservatism have "taken control" (2012 insert: here) by turning "liberal" into a dirty word and beginning, moving and ending every legislative "debate" further and further and further and further right.
September, 2011 insert: See Charlie Chaplin.
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