The similarities between bush & Hitler are often addressed; but what about

[Sapphire Blue]

... the Germans who did nothing in Nazi Germany & the Americans who do nothing in bush's America? What would we have done if we had lived in Nazi Germany? What are we doing now in bush's America?

As I type this, someone is dying in Iraq; someone is being tortured; someone is being abused; someone has lost their job; someone is joining the military because they can't find a job; someone is hungry; someone is considering abortion because they can't afford to raise a child; someone is abandoning a baby; someone can't afford diapers for their baby; someone can't afford shoes for their child; someone needs medical care & can't afford it; someone can't afford their medication; someone can't afford the nursing home; someone can't pay their rent; someone can't pay their heating bill; someone is homeless; someone is sleeping under a bridge; someone is hopeless; someone needs us desperately.

10, 25, 50 or more years from now, how will we answer the question "What did you do in bush's America?"

Are we doing everything possible? Can we do something more? Will we do something more?

Are we waiting for a courageous leader to follow? Someone like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.? What if we don't find that leader? What will happen? What will get done? What will change? What will happen to those who need us desperately?

Look inside yourself... the courage is right there. Don’t wait for someone else. Act. Now. Please do everything that you possibly can... for those who need us desperately.

Where Are the Good Americans?
Jeremy Brecher & Brendan Smith

(Excerpt)

Anyone who sees the photographs of the victims of the Nazi concentration camps must wonder how human beings could ever have allowed such things to happen. They must wonder how people of good will could have stood by while their government committed atrocities in their name. In the wake of that nightmarish era, people often asked, "Where were the good Germans?"

After the publication of the long-suppressed pictures of Abu Ghraib victims and the United Nations finding that torture and abuse are still taking place at the US prison in Guantánamo Bay, America has fashioned its own nightmare. We now must ask ourselves, "Where are the good Americans?"

(snip)

If Congress won't act, then it is up to the people. We must make every family dining table, every house of worship and every town meeting a place to stand up and speak out.

Only then will those who come after us know where the "good Americans" were.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060313/brecher

Elie Wiesel: The Perils of Indifference

(Excerpt)

In a way, to be indifferent to that suffering is what makes the human being inhuman. Indifference, after all, is more dangerous than anger and hatred. Anger can at times be creative. One writes a great poem, a great symphony. One does something special for the sake of humanity because one is angry at the injustice that one witnesses. But indifference is never creative. Even hatred at times may elicit a response. You fight it. You denounce it. You disarm it.

Indifference elicits no response. Indifference is not a response. Indifference is not a beginning; it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor -- never his victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten. The political prisoner in his cell, the hungry children, the homeless refugees -- not to respond to their plight, not to relieve their solitude by offering them a spark of hope is to exile them from human memory. And in denying their humanity, we betray our own.

Indifference, then, is not only a sin, it is a punishment.

(snip)

In the place that I come from, society was composed of three simple categories: the killers, the victims, and the bystanders. During the darkest of times, inside the ghettoes and death camps -- and I'm glad that Mrs. Clinton mentioned that we are now commemorating that event, that period, that we are now in the Days of Remembrance -- but then, we felt abandoned, forgotten. All of us did.

http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/ewieselperilsofindifference.html (text & audio)

A Conversation on Poverty and Segregation
Rev. Dr. William J. Barber

(An excerpt)

"But for God’s sake, don’t ever give up, because some child is depending on you, some family is hoping for a better day, some worker needs a breakthrough, the voiceless still need a voice, the poor still need an advocate, those in the margin still need to be mentioned, people who are down still need to be lifted, the hurt still need to be healed. Use your life in the court of humanity to say “I WILL OBJECT UNTIL JUSTICE ROLLS DOWN LIKE WATER & RIGHTEOUSNESS LIKE A MIGHTY STREAM!"

http://www.unc.edu/law/povertycenter/audio/barber.mp3

May God / Goddess / Allah / Jehovah / YHWH / the Creator / Waheguru / the One have mercy on us, awaken our souls and restore humanity.

[opihimoimoi]

1. The Tale of the Spineless will lead beyond ON THE BEACH

we Will self destruct...in due time, we will self extinct.....its almost a Death Wish..albiet a collective one...

[Sapphire Blue]

2. The Tale of the Courageous will bolster the Spineless into action.

We will NOT self destruct. We will overcome the cruelty of the few with the love & the courage of many.

[C_U_L8R]

11. It is a very real death wish

(in the minds of the lunatic right)

it's called the Rapture

[madeline_con]

3. Don't forget the Bush connection to the Nazis.

Heir to the Holocaust

Prescott Bush, $1.5 million, and Auschwitz: how the Bush family wealth is linked to the holocaust

http://www.clamormagazine.org/issues/14/feature3.php

[kaneko]

4. As a person who spent her childhood

in Austria in Hitler times, I have always felt embarrassed and guilty when asked by Americans:
" Why didn't you people do somerhing while you could? " Now it is time to return the question.

[madeline_con]

5. Short of just going ballistic and doing something illegal...

I try.

[Cleita]

6. I understand what you are saying. It's not that easy.

It's because what they did was under a facade of legality that they made anything you might have tried to do seem illegal. They are doing the same to us. They essentially have corralled us and are daring us to jump the fence even though we can watch all the injustices being committed on the other side of the fence, what they are doing is legal and when we jump the fence we are breaking the law.

[Sapphire Blue]

7. Courage is never easy. The alternative is to sit back while terrible...

... things happen.

[goclark]

21. You got that right Sapphire! nt

[annabanana]

13. You have the authority to ask that question.

And a lot of Americans are beginning to get an understanding of the dynamics necessary to nurture a viper.

Welcome to DU:toast:

[KT2000]

8. Exactly

this is where we are now. These crimes are being committed in our name. We cannot ignore that it is happening.

[FightingIrish]

9. I recently wrote a letter to the editor about the chilling

parallels between this country now and Germany in 1933. The day it was published I received a phone call from a women with a German accent who said she had grown up in Nazi Germany. She said we are in exactly the same circumstances. She said that people did nothing because they didn't believe they were affected by what their government was doing.

[Sapphire Blue]

10. And what will we say in the future when someone asks "What did you do...

... in bush's America?" We have to be able to answer that we did everything humanly possible... and this needs to be the truth. We have to realize that what affects our neighbor affects us... we cannot turn our backs... our neighbor needs us desperately.

[goclark]

12. Sapphire Blue ~ You deserve the DU Oscar

You work so hard to help us understand thr world ~ and you do it with such passion and compassion.


Hope you are staying well ~ blessings as always!

goclark

K and Recommended

[Sapphire Blue]

14. ...

:hug: & blessings to you!

(Some might say that I deserve the 'DU Pain in the Fanatical Arse Award ;) )

[Alamom]

28. If so, we need more just like you.... n/t

[Gregorian]

15. When someone has a gun pointed at your head, your choices are limited.

Yes, there are those who are asleep, or who are really evil and just don't care. But even that is inaccurate since if they were to see the people screaming out in fear and pain in Iraq, they would not be so careless.

But we are faced with a group of criminals, and we are not going to play by violating the law. So essentially we are up against the barrel of a gun. That still does not excuse an answer to your question. However, what does one do? Wait until the person holding the gun is not paying attention? Everone has seen the movies. We know the moves. But they are limited. We know that half of this country would storm that White House and rip the occupants right out onto the street, if we could. And the same goes for Nazi Germany. Anyone who spoke up was executed.

I have examined the behavior (in the movies, of course) of one who is forced to do something at gunpoint. And therein lies your answer. It's survival. Delay's accusers got IRS audits.

I'm belaboring a stupid point. Basically we are all being held hostage, and there is little we can do. God am I proud of the people at DU and the other forums, and the rest of America who see the truth. We know, and we care. Unfortunately we can't pull the nation out of this by ourselves.

I don't know what we can do. But I think we are doing everything we can under the circumstances. Cindy Sheehan would probably not be doing what she is doing without having first lost her son. This is the reality of our lives.

[Sapphire Blue]

16. The gun that you speak of is not loaded w/bullets; it's loaded w/fear.

Reject that fear; do whatever you can possibly do, encourage others, educate others. Together we can take our country back... and we will.

[RagAss]

29. Actually, it is loaded with bullets...

[Sapphire Blue]

31. The metaphorical guns are loaded w/bullets of fear.

[Orangeone]

36. Your picture of Elie Wiesel

Is ironic--he was all for the war in Iraq, and he compared Saddam to Hitler.

[president4aday]

52. Elie Wiesel is all ruminations on everything and nothing.

A real sacred cow.

[crowcalling]

17. Well I raised this question as well in another thread

Very appropriate! So thanks for this thread! Since I am currently listening to the audio book, and may I recommend, "Hitler and the Holocaust", Robert Wistrich.

I found the first chapter interesting, in that the citizenry were primed and educated into accepting what later came - through the clergy preaching hatred, media and other propaganda. Later, education. This is the part that alarmed me the most. So later, when the racial laws came about, it seems few batted an eye.

There are just too many similarities right now. The machinery that allowed the atrocities to occur is the same machinery we see today. Can I venture to say that without it, the German people would not have allowed the genocide that later occurred? They were brain washed. Just as the American people are being brain washed now.

Of course the perps were tried for war crimes. How about the perps of the media and hate talk that later allowed the sociopaths to accomplish what they did?

This is where I feel we need to highlight the parallels.

[Sapphire Blue]

20. Paul Levy on the bush cult...

THE BUSH CULT

by Paul Levy

It is a shattering experience to see through our imaginary projections and recognize that someone we thought was leading and protecting us does not have our best interest at heart. People who support Mr. George Bush resist and turn away from the irrefutable and readily available evidence that Bush is anything but a good leader, as if they are in denial with a capital D. Bush is saying one thing and doing totally the opposite, and many people are simply in denial of this and look away. It is truly as if people who support Bush are not only in denial, but are actually refusing to look and hence, blind to what to most of the world is very obvious. It is as if people who support Bush are under a hypnotic spell, and are suffering from a form of collective brainwashing. People who support Bush in his pathology are exhibiting nothing other than the groupthink of cultic behavior.

Followers of a cult unquestioningly give their power away to their leader’s version of reality. People in a cult have dis-connected from their discerning wisdom, which is the ability to discriminate between the opposites, between truth and lies, between good and evil. In a cult, any sort of reflection of the leader’s unconscious shadow is not only not allowed, but is severely punished. The cult leader is typically insulated from people who disagree with him, not even wanting to come in contact and have any connection with people who have a different point of view. People in a cult exhibit complete and total denial with regard to any evidence that contradicts the agreed upon belief of the cult. This perfectly describes people who are following Bush as their leader. People who follow Bush are completely in denial about his truly criminal behavior.

People who belong to a cult always get hooked through their unconscious fear and blind spot. The cult members’ relationship with each other is based on mutual unconsciousness, as they reciprocally reinforce each other’s denial and illusion. In a cult, there is always some form of mind-control, such as the Bush Administration’s control and manipulation of the media. “Staying on message” is the typical communication style within a cult. The cult leader plays with people’s fears so as to gain their trust and control them, which is a process that is not based on love but on power over others.

(snip)

At their root, cults are based on a mass, collective unconsciousness which feeds and reinforces itself. The cult is of the nature of an infinitely-perpetuating negative feedback loop, fueled by its members’ (“the elect”) unwillingness and resistance to self-reflect, look in the mirror and see what they are doing. Because it is so insular and unable to integrate any reflections from the outside, a cult always becomes self-destructive and ultimately destroys itself. This is why it is an extremely dangerous situation if Bush and his cultic followers take over our country, as it will create endless, unnecessary suffering for all of us. Bush might not just take down our country but our very planet as well. Another name for cults is collective psychosis.

'THE BUSH CULT' & other articles are available @ http://www.awakeninthedream.com/html/bush.html

I agree that we need to address (& we are addressing) media complicity & hate talk; it's one very important form of action.

Contact the sponsors of biased 'news' brodcasts & hate talk; contact the networks airing biased 'news' brodcasts & hate talk; contact your cable provider; write a LTTE, expressing your views on the subject; do whatever you can.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

18. "All politics is local" - Tip O'neil - True in Germany, true here.

Most Americans don't think about what doesn't affect them personally. They get upset and motivated when they lose their jobs, their kid's schools shut down, their taxes go up, their kid comes home in a bodybag, or they discover they can no longer afford to by the latest shiney toy advertised on the tube.

I give you as evidence that, in 2004, almost 40% of the electorate didn't bother to vote, and of those that did, half of them (approximately) voted for the Boob. And, that was the highest turnout since 1968 when a similar electorate overwhelmingly voted for a criminal who was killing their kids.

[izzybeans]

19. You are going to start getting into validating the point that

what's his crust from the University of Colorado was saying about little Eichmann's and that's a good thing. This is just a much more eloquent way of saying that bureaucratic indifference within the modern machinery is quite a dangerous toy. It produces a culture of folks staring down the barrel of a narrow task and following orders un reflectively. Drive the train, build the engine, deliver the gas tanks, administer the treatment-all performed by different folks full-filling a specialized role directed from above-a directive often times mangled down the hierarchy.

The thing about modern warfare and collective violence is that personal responsibility is nearly a myth, however every decision chain has someone at the top, and so...well responsibility for the machine resides in the arms of the person driving it. Yet he or she never pulls the trigger, greases the engine, nor drives the train themselves.

The same can be said about My Lai, about the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, and other modern atrocities, they are enabled by collective conspiracies of silence and a widespread indifference to humanity that pervades a group, in each case a different group of variable size-only very rarely is a whole nation complicit, save for the folks being purged.

The only thing that will keep me from thinking the worst is when a place like DU no longer feels as if it must be "underground". I think despite that appearance we all know that the collective indifference is no were near that of WWII Germany. There are many more of us today that can look back and say, I told you so, than in that case. Be glad you are one of them, and that many more of us exist.

You might also like reading Zygmaunt Bauman's book "Modernity and the Holocaust" it's pretty powerful.

[Sapphire Blue]

22. No the collective indifference isn't what it was in Hitler's Germany...

... and we can't let it reach that point. We need to do more than being glad that we can look back & say "I told you so." We need to act now, reach as many people as we can now, do whatever we can now.

We need to hold our government accountable, educate & inform others, stomp out fear like the poison that it is, speak out at every given opportunity, and we need to encourage others to join us.

We also need to bring back community, caring for our neighbor... every neighbor... we need to restore the commonwealth, and damn the corporate wealth.

We need to take back America.

[izzybeans]

23. Which is the exact opposite of indifference.

so we agree.

:toast:

[Sapphire Blue]

24. We agree if we do more than just say "I told you so."

We agree if we can truthfully answer the question "What did you do in bush's America?" by saying that we did everything humanly possible to take it back.

[izzybeans]

25. It was a metaphor.

The point was that the "opposition" is much more powerful here than in Nazi Germany, so much so that the phrase Republican America sounds ridiculous, while Nazi Germany does not.

In Germany most average citizens of that generation lived turning a blind eye and have to answer questions such as "Why didn't you say something, papa?" Only the dwindling base of a certain foe will have to answer such questions years down the road.

again we agree, I think you misread me for some reason.

[Sapphire Blue]

26. Many in this country turn a blind eye to the plight of others...

... because a particular issue doesn't affect them personally... they become complacent... they become indifferent.

It isn't "only the dwindling base of a certain foe" that will have to answer questions years down the road, but also those who stood by and did nothing.

[izzybeans]

27. again we agree, why the "those who stood by and did nothing"

that is exactly the point on which we agree.

[RedOnce]

30. K&R

[nofurylike]

32. thank you for this crucially important post and thread, Sapphire Blue! as

always, you enlighten, and challenge us to be our best.


peace and solidarity, always

[nofurylike]

33. K&R

[OhioBlue]

34. K&R great thread!!

I think we are starving for some leadership. Cindy Sheehan steps out to protest the war, makes some statements for the Right Wingers to pick apart and is marginalized... They make her into a caricature with talking points to minimize her message. A message of peace is like banging your head against the wall with some - all they come back with is that "you should support the troops". You can't even make a rational argument about how you do support the troops and want them to have adequate equipment, training, pay, health care, etc. but want them to come home. it is just turned around that you don't support them if you don't support their mission.

I do speak out about the Bush administration, but have pretty much worn out that welcome. The people that agree with me are like preaching to the choir, the ones that don't agree with me, will never and it only ends up in conflict. I would love to see a MLK or Gandhi step up to really lead the effort against the war, torture, the sale of America, the assault on social programs, et. al. Because I don't know how we can win some people over. I don't mean to sound like a defeatist - your thread was great, but I feel pretty helpless.

[Sapphire Blue]

51. Please see this thread...

If you're feeling discouraged in light of events around you...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=580153&mesg_id=580153

[nofurylike]

35. excellent discussion! important! we need tangible suggestions too. eom

[nofurylike]

37. kick. we really need to have this discussion!. eom

[nofurylike]

38. i hpe everyone will read this and think about it all. we must act! eom

[nofurylike]

39. it really is at this point. Sapphire Blue you inspire, constantly! eom

[nofurylike]

40. kick

[nofurylike]

41. kick so everyone can read this, and think on it. crucial! eom

[Disturbed]

42. I wish that people would stop comparing Bush to Hitler.

It only feeds into backlash. Bush and Cheney are more like Musslolini and his Fasicsts than Hitler. American Neo Fascists are starting to destruct from within. They have shown the World what a lousy agenda they have and have screwed up so many times that even the non-political Americans are starting to notice. How many damn scandals are they imbroiled in now?

[nofurylike]

43. either way, we must stop them. i appreciate your thoughts on it, and

would like to think that you're correct that they are self-destructing, but i fear that is not so. or more, i feel that we can not just hope so, and not act to make it so.


peace!

[nofurylike]

44. i forgot to acknowledge that it is true that their scandals are being

exposed.

we must work constantly to press media to cover that, though!!


peace!

[nofurylike]

45. kick

[nofurylike]

46. kick!

[nofurylike]

47. kick. thank you, Sapphire Blue, for all you do!! eom

[nofurylike]

48. kick for the morning folk to read and pass it on, please! eom

[NJCher]

49. Everyday, routine things we can do to protest this war

Just to name a few things:

a) attend every war protest

b) write a letter to the editor every month. Editorial pages, which are one of the most read features of any paper, will allow a person one letter a month. Hey, think about it: it's like getting a 2" x 1 column ad free and the value of that would be, around here, about $400 or more.

I like to write letters and most of my ideas come from DU.

c) put bumper stickers on your car and a sign on your lawn

d) send letters to senators and reps and get others to do so, too.

If all of us just did those things on a routine basis, it would go a long way. The key word here is "routine." Protesting this war has got to be a regular part of our life, just like brushing one's teeth or going to work.

One additional thing we can do is spread the word in our workplace. If you're in an area that's highly republican, you can do it the way my brother does. He prints out flyers and when he goes to the newspaper stand, he slips a flyer in each newspaper. He also drives around the coffee spots and slips his flyers into the newspapers the coffee shops buy for customers to read. (He also likes to stick around and have a cup of java himself and watch the expressions on peoples' faces when they read his flyers).

I'm lucky 'cuz I'm a teacher. I'm careful about how I do it (no rants from me), but I've gotten many students to open their eyes about what's happening. Those students stay in touch, send me articles, and in turn, get other students interested.

This post is a good concept to stretch peoples' minds and make them think. As soon as I read it, I was saying to myself, "Why didn't YOU think of that?" I will make this the subject of one of my letters to the editor.

One last item from me--another thing we can do is to remain mindful at all times about what is going on. Everytime I drive up to my house, I think, "Somebody in Iraq just went home and found a bombed out home. Or worse: was in their home when it was bombed." When I go to sleep, I think, "Somebody in Iraq has no comfortable bed to sleep in." No--it's not pleasant to think about this all the time but I just can't do otherwise. What bush is doing is so horrible that it has altered my existence.




Cher

[OhioBlue]

50. thank you Cher. n/t

[Mnemosyne]

53. "They Thought They Were Free"

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11845.htm

The Germans, 1933-45

Excerpt from pages 166-73 of "They Thought They Were Free" First published in 1955

By Milton Mayer

But Then It Was Too Late

snip>
"You see," my colleague went on, "one doesn’t see exactly where or how to move. Believe me, this is true. Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow. You don’t want to act, or even talk, alone; you don’t want to ‘go out of your way to make trouble.’ Why not?—Well, you are not in the habit of doing it. And it is not just fear, fear of standing alone, that restrains you; it is also genuine uncertainty.

"Uncertainty is a very important factor, and, instead of decreasing as time goes on, it grows. Outside, in the streets, in the general community, ‘everyone’ is happy. One hears no protest, and certainly sees none. You know, in France or Italy there would be slogans against the government painted on walls and fences; in Germany, outside the great cities, perhaps, there is not even this. In the university community, in your own community, you speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, ‘It’s not so bad’ or ‘You’re seeing things’ or ‘You’re an alarmist.’

"And you are an alarmist. You are saying that this must lead to this, and you can’t prove it. These are the beginnings, yes; but how do you know for sure when you don’t know the end, and how do you know, or even surmise, the end? On the one hand, your enemies, the law, the regime, the Party, intimidate you. On the other, your colleagues pooh-pooh you as pessimistic or even neurotic. You are left with your close friends, who are, naturally, people who have always thought as you have.

"But your friends are fewer now. Some have drifted off somewhere or submerged themselves in their work. You no longer see as many as you did at meetings or gatherings. Informal groups become smaller; attendance drops off in little organizations, and the organizations themselves wither. Now, in small gatherings of your oldest friends, you feel that you are talking to yourselves, that you are isolated from the reality of things. This weakens your confidence still further and serves as a further deterrent to—to what? It is clearer all the time that, if you are going to do anything, you must make an occasion to do it, and then you are obviously a troublemaker. So you wait, and you wait.

snip>


ClaraT posted a thread on this just awhile ago. I tried doing a search and got nothing.

An important book in these times.


In hope of peace,
v

[BuyingThyme]

54. kcik

[Hubert Flottz]

55. America has come a very long way toward seeing Bush for what

he really is.

In 2001 if you had started a thread about the neocons and their ersatz Fuhrer, on a political web site, they would have pounced on you like they used to pounce on me. I'm glad to see that so many are now wide awake. Hitler did leave us an example of what to look out for. Bush is every bit as insane as the real deal. He has a much more sophisticated propaganda apparatus and a far superior war machine, to do with than hitler had, but we have an example of what not to be and the Germans did not. If anyone is guilty, it is the American people, because we knew, down in our gut, didn't we?

It's like getting killed in a car wreck...we never thought it could happen to us until the last split second. The person in the wreck always knows it could happen when he gets into the car, but he never dwells on the fact that the worst could happen to him.

The neocon game plan is not new it's just been revived. Nazis and neocons know that the best place to hide something is right out in the open and that goes for hiding anything from election theft, to a conspiracy to dominate the planet. An example of what I'm talking about is Poppy's "New World Order" that he announced in public, all the way back in the early 1990s, to the neocon's PNAC web site. Right out in the open...so monstrous who would, or could, believe what they are seeing? BELIEVE IT!

Is it too late to stop the madness? I wish I knew...

[Sapphire Blue]

56. ...