In light of the 9/11 News today - this article is very powerful

[TNOE]

I think - I hope others with take the time to read it - it really struck me.

http://www.hermes-press.com/etch1.htm



The Necessity For Enlightened Thinking


By Norman D. Livergood

We who live in the post-World War II period possess an immensely
valuable symbol, even if we don't understand it or use it effectively:
the example of Nazi Germany.

We've been conditioned to see Germany under Hitler as an
unquestionably horrible example of dictatorial tyranny and inhuman
barbarity--and to see our present American culture as completely
opposite to that of Nazi Germany. And we like to think that if a tyranny
such as that in Germany under the Nazi regime were present and growing
in America we'd unquestionably be able to see it.

So it's a shock when we realize: most people living in Nazi Germany
didn't see the tyranny! They thought it was the best time of their
lives!




Milton Mayer's book, They Thought They Were Free, concerns Germans still
living after World War II who had been members of the Nazi Party. Mayer
came to know them and studied their lives and attitudes.

[grasswire]

1. thanks for posting this...

....it looks like a fascinating site. I've bookmarked it to read it later today. I appreciate your tip.

[tom_paine]

2. kick

Good reading. The arrow is shot straight and true...

[Killarney]

3. Scary

but true

and I see the parallels with the blind eye the Repubs put to Bush.

[Tansy_Gold]

6. Not only the Repubs are blind; some Dems, too

It's not that the parallels between Hitler and * are identical, but that certain similarities ought to serve as a warning of what COULD happen if we aren't careful.

A friend of mine pointed out last night, re the California financial crisis, that it seemed ironic that the prison sector would be protected from cuts but health care and other human services would be gutted by Schwarzeneggar's cuts. I suggested that maybe, just maybe, the growing rates of incarceration, especially among people of color and even more especially among young males of color, was a slightly more subtle way of eliminating an unwanted population than herding them into gas chambers.

For another perspective on Germany under Hitler, interesting reading is Friedrich Percyval Reck-Malleczewen's "Diary of a Man in Despair." It's still available from Amazon and others.

from the translator's Foreword:

"This book is history of a kind that will be found in few history books. It is, in the real sense of the word, living history, because it is the history of Germany in the Nazi period as was experienced by an extremely vital and aware man, Friedrich Percyval Reck-Malleczewen.
This is the accurate account of the forebodings of Reck-Malleczewen, who put his thoughts down as the only means of defending himself from a horror that finally engulfed him. Its entries cease with October, 1944, because Reck-Malleczewen was killed by a Genickschuss, a shot in the neck, the following February 23, in the Dachau concentration camp."

[TNOE]

4. Thanks guys

I do hope others will take a look.

[alfredo]

5. Excellent resourse for quotes.

Kick

[TNOE]

7. Just a Kick

to put ahead of the "locks".

[JohnyCanuck]

8. Checkout "Brainwashing America" by Dr. Livergood on the same web site

The puppet Bush regime is using new, aggressive forms of brainwashing to change the very way Americans think and feel. This is the psychological dimension of the "High Cabal's" general onslaught against American workers, just as the "war on terrorism" is the military dimension and corporate crime and tax cuts for the rich comprise the economic dimension.

We are living under the beginning stages of a military dictatorship in precisely the same way that 1930s Germans suffered under the Nazi regime.

As in the case of Nazi Germany, state-sponsored propaganda (brainwashing) is a vital part of the Bush regime's strategy.

<snip>

Personality simulation systems are being used to create political campaigns that apply voter profiles to control their voting behavior. TV commercials and programs use personality simulation to profile viewers to control their purchasing and viewing behaviors. And sophisticated propaganda and brainwashing techniques are being used by the Bush junta to keep American citizens under control.

http://www.hermes-press.com/brainwash1.htm

Just as an FYI, Dr. Livergood was formerly head of the Dept. of Artificial Intelligence at the US Army War College.

[Malva Zebrina]

9. thank you for that link

I am too overwhelmed by it all to make a coherent comment.

One quote that stood out for me:

" In a democracy such as ours in America, it's the responsibility of citizens to inform themselves and to struggle against any encroachment of constitutional liberties. If some people are too unintelligent or morally deficient to see the tyrannous acts of the Bush administration, if some people are too cowardly to stand against those acts, it's still your individual responsibility as an American citizen to uphold the principles of democracy on which this nation is founded."


Really--but who, anymore, thinks they have a "responsibility" I wonder. Most just want to get on with their lives with as much and as many perks as they can muster or buy. As long as they have the bread and circus, they will simply care about themself and their own family--there are, imo, few who care about the "responsibility" to struggle againt an encroachment of their civil liberties. In their mind, their "civil liberties involves getting what they can for themself--and not having to pay for the dregs of society--ie, the poorer.