To Those Who Are Ignorant of the Past

A lot of people love to talk about fascism coming to the United States, draped in a flag and carrying a cross. Well, maybe that’s so; but I happen to think that it’ll come the way good old-fashioned fascism came to Germany. In fact, it’s almost here now.
Last Sunday, the BBC presented a documentary about Hans Litten, a young German lawyer, who single-handedly tried to stop the rise of Adolf Hitler through the courts during the early part of his rise.
The Beeb does great documentaries, better than some of the skewed tripe you’ll see on MSNBC or Fox. And, if you listen to the words and descriptions of events and the situation that existed in Germany in the early 1930s, which enabled the rise of Hitler, you’ll see why. In fact, you’d better watch this near your bathroom, because it will hit you like a ton of bricks and you’ll literally cack yourself.
Start with a poor economy replete with people driven emotionally, psychologically and physically into the ground under the burden of war and rising unemployment…then add a purely feel-good political movement aimed at the so-called oppressed middle classes and you’re almost there. Next, inculcate a fear of socialism and communism, being sure to affiliate such fears with the labor (union) movement, then, stir up enmity towards intellectualism.
Intellectuals, like Hans Litten, the subject of this documentary, always question ideologues. And so begins the demonization of intellectuals for their perceived “elitism.” If you think that you’re seeing a backlash against intellectual elitism in the United States today, just remember what arose out of the last movement to denigrate higher intellectual education.
And, please, don’t think the Left today is entirely exonerated from blame. As much as the Right, they’ve bought into Big Lie propaganda tactics espoused by the Tea Party and used these methods as virulently and as onerously against the President. Whilst the mouthpieces of the Left pay lip service to intellectualism, and, indeed, many would go as far as to identify themselves as such, they’re not.
Intelligence and an appreciation of culture does not make one an intellectual. It does, however, make you a dilettante. Just ask Arianna Huffington or Hermann Goering.

By Marion