Adolf Hitler was precocious. He tried to overthrow the government at age 34 atop a movement of committed extremists. He wrote his memoirs — dramatically entitled “Mein Kampf (My Struggle)” — at age 36. He became chancellor of Germany at 44, and Führer of the Third Reich at 45.
“She was wrong. Profoundly wrong, and she wasn’t a woman who was often wrong about anything….What was she wrong about though?….She looked at Adolf Hitler and saw nothingness. Emptiness. Preposterousness.”
It’s not the man that should worry us; it’s the ideal! Just as the fallacy that Netanyahu believes he can destroy Hamas through a war of attrition, he can kill as many Palestinians as he likes, but the ideal will live on, and threat will multiply.
The same folly of our generals during Vietnam. We killed 100 N. Vietnamese and Vietcong, for every American lost. Yet, even though we won every battle, we still lost the war. Or our escapades in Afghanistan: We never lost a battle, but as the adage went. “The Americans had the clock, but the Taliban had the time.”
We can’t view Putin, Trump or any brutal authoritarian kleptocrat in a vacuum. You can rid yourself of the man, but the ideal lives on, and if history is an indication of things to come, then the next guy is usually progressively worse.
We need to deal with the root causes of these ideals to win. And in this day and age of social media, with lies and misinformation spreading faster than the speed of light, we need to take the propaganda seriously, and develop countermeasures to deal with the threat! Education is key!
In regard to Putin; the West will coalesce, and deal with him appropriately. Russia has proven itself a paper tiger. The only way he wins, is if the West self-implodes. I refuse to believe that will happen.
Churchill once said, “you can count on the Americans to do the right thing; after they’ve exhausted all other possibilities.”
The West will do the same. And they are realizing by the day that the Putin threat looms large!
Trump and his Christian Nationalists are a danger many of us never imagined. Will the American people wake up? The MSM will have to accept its share of the responsibility. Why are so many afraid to discuss Putin and the dangers of Putin $ in the Republican Party? Will their “both sides” reporting lead us into the abyss? Democrats need to step up and speak up. Time to remember Roosevelt and Churchill.
I write this from Hong Kong where a small garrison of British, Canadian and Punjabi troops fought to the last man against the Japanese invasion of this city in WWII the day after Pearl Harbor. Their story is outlined in the Coastal Defense Museum which is remarkably accurate and objective.
I was there today for hours.
The allied troops were slaughtered, outnumbers and under equipped they had no chance and they were beheaded and bayoneted even after being shot. They received no reinforcement and all brutally killed a long way from home. May god bless them.
British General Maltby surrendered on what was the first time hostile forces had taken British land. He remained a POW the entire war but was reduced to a colonel because he quit after everyone in his charge went down swingin except him.
Steve your essays and videos exemplify the courage and stamina we all need and appreciate. Maltby could have used it god damnit and we need it now because the stakes are no different.
You keep going man. My WWII navy veteran dad and 4 brothers who all served would demand it.
Two books come to mind: Jeff Sharlet's book, "The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power and "What's the Matter with Kansas?" by Thomas Frank. Both of those presciently laid out the basis for exactly where we are today. In the former we learn of the decades long, organized effort to subvert our government and turn it and us into a "Christian Nationalist" country. In the latter we can understand how today's Republicans are a mass of aggrieved, whining snowflakes who have been groomed for years to focus on social issues and imposing their limited world-view on the rest of us. And ignoring the issues that truly impact our well-being. Who we are as a nation rests very clearly on the foundation built over the last 250 years - the proponents of these extreme and dangerous ideas, as well as the deranged - yes deranged supporters of Donald Trump threaten the very existence of the America that was built by our ancestors and within which we grew up in. As a nearly 80 year-old man, who grew up in the 50's I remember well (and I actually did study history too) the histrionics and threats of the HUARC and that dark period of American history. We are on the verge of a much worse, very much worse, turn of events should Trump and his MAGA acolytes prevail. They must be stopped by all means legal and constitutional. Vote Blue! It is our only hope for survival.
Chaplin nailed the warning. This was 1940: Hitler is to Mussolini, as Putin is to Trump. All psychopathic devils skilled at lying convincingly to the masses.
Here is a free friends link to Chaplins and Washington's warning about Hitler...and Trump:
Sadly, though, he has too many supporters and enablers here. Most of them are Republicans. In their twisted minds, they see him as a Defender of Family Values.
Steve: Great and prescient words by MacArthur; thanks for printing them. What troubles me terribly is the way the republicans have coalesced around the grifter and putin. Liz Cheney put it well when she named them the putin wing of the republican party! Let's face it, we sort of have a fifth column in our nation in the form of grifter supporters and maga folks who have discarded all or almost all of the principles our country has been founded upon and based on for almost 250 years. Truth matters, and we must show them the truth somehow. We used to have a steadfast principle that partisanship ceased at the nation's borders. Sadly, no more. If we let these christian nationalists and religious fanatics get any power in this country, we will have no place to go, as they forget or refuse to acknowledge how this nation was mainly founded, by people escaping the religious intolerances of Europe! That is why we not only have enshrined in our Constitution, Freedom of Religion, but Freedom FROM Religion! VOTE DEMOCRAT AT ALL COSTS!
Wow, Steve! Excellent! At least once a day, I think about how Putin’s ally isn’t humans, it’s the daily capitalistic grind and digital circus we have become accustomed to. It's our complacency, our being comfortable with the things we possess, and perhaps, or petty squabbling about issues that we think are important. To me, we have become distracted seeing from the picture you have painted here.
The present requires so much focus and energy that there is it dedicate to correlating history with the present danger staring us squarely in the face!
I see the issue here as fear! The western world is, in my view, seems to be extremely fearful of the consequences associated with upsetting the status quo to stop Putin… and i think he is using it to his advantage. Do you agree?
No one has commented yet. I think you took an already-dark canvas and offered such an ominous warning, we don't know what to say. Maybe the details where we disagree aren't that important in comparison.
You are right, it is happening, democracy is unraveling here in our homeland. It is unraveling because we can not stop a narcissistic, craven rich man/boy. Our MSM cant stop him, our news outlets like fox promote him, our nations GOP is a shameful bunch of mostly white men and women, who do not represent their citizens, who sent them to Washington to legislate laws that support the nation and its people. Instead they cower to a man, who is empty, same as hitler was. It is perplexing, why we can not rid ourselves of this craven man, instead we give him air time, media time and we have allowed him to unravel the Biden admin by never going away, by actually being the “deep state”, demanding the GOP to follow what he wants and not what is best for the country. Our legal system is taking too long, to apply justice and in this matter, we can not hope that even the SC will do what is right for the nation. It not Biden’s age we should be concerned with it is the totality of those who are not using all the tools available to stop him.
Are we really that afraid of maga, they are a “basket of deplorable’s”, who should be sent back under the rocks they crawled out of, including those with their 25 point plan to dismantle democracy, the administrative state, the rule of law and the freedoms that are our birth right; they have no good right to call themselves Americas!
Trump plays a huge role. Who’s playing Himmler (Heinrich) and Goebbels (Joseph) roles? From a global perspective is it Trump and Xi ? Who plays these roles in trump cult? Stephen Miller and GOP? It’s truly frightening. We all need to wake up.
“She was wrong. Profoundly wrong, and she wasn’t a woman who was often wrong about anything….What was she wrong about though?….She looked at Adolf Hitler and saw nothingness. Emptiness. Preposterousness.”
It’s not the man that should worry us; it’s the ideal! Just as the fallacy that Netanyahu believes he can destroy Hamas through a war of attrition, he can kill as many Palestinians as he likes, but the ideal will live on, and threat will multiply.
The same folly of our generals during Vietnam. We killed 100 N. Vietnamese and Vietcong, for every American lost. Yet, even though we won every battle, we still lost the war. Or our escapades in Afghanistan: We never lost a battle, but as the adage went. “The Americans had the clock, but the Taliban had the time.”
We can’t view Putin, Trump or any brutal authoritarian kleptocrat in a vacuum. You can rid yourself of the man, but the ideal lives on, and if history is an indication of things to come, then the next guy is usually progressively worse.
We need to deal with the root causes of these ideals to win. And in this day and age of social media, with lies and misinformation spreading faster than the speed of light, we need to take the propaganda seriously, and develop countermeasures to deal with the threat! Education is key!
In regard to Putin; the West will coalesce, and deal with him appropriately. Russia has proven itself a paper tiger. The only way he wins, is if the West self-implodes. I refuse to believe that will happen.
Churchill once said, “you can count on the Americans to do the right thing; after they’ve exhausted all other possibilities.”
The West will do the same. And they are realizing by the day that the Putin threat looms large!
Closer to home we have a Hitler/Putin wanna be. How are we going to deal with him? Is war on our soil inevitable?
I have a new rule for myself: I can no longer say "I can't believe this" when talking US politics and geopolitics.
The MAGA believers are an amalgam of woundedness, ignorance, fear and rage. They don't think in abstractions. They believe myths are literal.
40% of Americans don't have $400 for an emergency.
And now I see a small group of hooded neo Nazis had a parade in my town yesterday.
The dark side of humanity is once again on the march. I believe it. Will the "better angels of our nature" prevail?
Trump and his Christian Nationalists are a danger many of us never imagined. Will the American people wake up? The MSM will have to accept its share of the responsibility. Why are so many afraid to discuss Putin and the dangers of Putin $ in the Republican Party? Will their “both sides” reporting lead us into the abyss? Democrats need to step up and speak up. Time to remember Roosevelt and Churchill.
We should consider the dangerous 5th Column here that supports Putin. Tulsi Gabbard, who Chump said could be his VP choice, said this:
The U.S. and NATO should stop supporting Ukraine so the war will come to an end.
Steve is asking us to FACE this reality.
He is adjuring us to THINK.
A knee jerk reaction will not suffice.
Let us re-read and ponder well
what this means for us.
Steve, whatever can we do when the enemy is not only afar but among us? How, oh how, has this come to pass??
I write this from Hong Kong where a small garrison of British, Canadian and Punjabi troops fought to the last man against the Japanese invasion of this city in WWII the day after Pearl Harbor. Their story is outlined in the Coastal Defense Museum which is remarkably accurate and objective.
I was there today for hours.
The allied troops were slaughtered, outnumbers and under equipped they had no chance and they were beheaded and bayoneted even after being shot. They received no reinforcement and all brutally killed a long way from home. May god bless them.
British General Maltby surrendered on what was the first time hostile forces had taken British land. He remained a POW the entire war but was reduced to a colonel because he quit after everyone in his charge went down swingin except him.
Steve your essays and videos exemplify the courage and stamina we all need and appreciate. Maltby could have used it god damnit and we need it now because the stakes are no different.
You keep going man. My WWII navy veteran dad and 4 brothers who all served would demand it.
Two books come to mind: Jeff Sharlet's book, "The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power and "What's the Matter with Kansas?" by Thomas Frank. Both of those presciently laid out the basis for exactly where we are today. In the former we learn of the decades long, organized effort to subvert our government and turn it and us into a "Christian Nationalist" country. In the latter we can understand how today's Republicans are a mass of aggrieved, whining snowflakes who have been groomed for years to focus on social issues and imposing their limited world-view on the rest of us. And ignoring the issues that truly impact our well-being. Who we are as a nation rests very clearly on the foundation built over the last 250 years - the proponents of these extreme and dangerous ideas, as well as the deranged - yes deranged supporters of Donald Trump threaten the very existence of the America that was built by our ancestors and within which we grew up in. As a nearly 80 year-old man, who grew up in the 50's I remember well (and I actually did study history too) the histrionics and threats of the HUARC and that dark period of American history. We are on the verge of a much worse, very much worse, turn of events should Trump and his MAGA acolytes prevail. They must be stopped by all means legal and constitutional. Vote Blue! It is our only hope for survival.
Chaplin nailed the warning. This was 1940: Hitler is to Mussolini, as Putin is to Trump. All psychopathic devils skilled at lying convincingly to the masses.
Here is a free friends link to Chaplins and Washington's warning about Hitler...and Trump:
https://medium.com/liecatcher/dictator-lies-1363eb393d11?sk=8faa3fae0015187f8edb1513c88b87f7
Spot on.
Sadly, though, he has too many supporters and enablers here. Most of them are Republicans. In their twisted minds, they see him as a Defender of Family Values.
Steve: Great and prescient words by MacArthur; thanks for printing them. What troubles me terribly is the way the republicans have coalesced around the grifter and putin. Liz Cheney put it well when she named them the putin wing of the republican party! Let's face it, we sort of have a fifth column in our nation in the form of grifter supporters and maga folks who have discarded all or almost all of the principles our country has been founded upon and based on for almost 250 years. Truth matters, and we must show them the truth somehow. We used to have a steadfast principle that partisanship ceased at the nation's borders. Sadly, no more. If we let these christian nationalists and religious fanatics get any power in this country, we will have no place to go, as they forget or refuse to acknowledge how this nation was mainly founded, by people escaping the religious intolerances of Europe! That is why we not only have enshrined in our Constitution, Freedom of Religion, but Freedom FROM Religion! VOTE DEMOCRAT AT ALL COSTS!
Wow, Steve! Excellent! At least once a day, I think about how Putin’s ally isn’t humans, it’s the daily capitalistic grind and digital circus we have become accustomed to. It's our complacency, our being comfortable with the things we possess, and perhaps, or petty squabbling about issues that we think are important. To me, we have become distracted seeing from the picture you have painted here.
The present requires so much focus and energy that there is it dedicate to correlating history with the present danger staring us squarely in the face!
I see the issue here as fear! The western world is, in my view, seems to be extremely fearful of the consequences associated with upsetting the status quo to stop Putin… and i think he is using it to his advantage. Do you agree?
No one has commented yet. I think you took an already-dark canvas and offered such an ominous warning, we don't know what to say. Maybe the details where we disagree aren't that important in comparison.
You are right, it is happening, democracy is unraveling here in our homeland. It is unraveling because we can not stop a narcissistic, craven rich man/boy. Our MSM cant stop him, our news outlets like fox promote him, our nations GOP is a shameful bunch of mostly white men and women, who do not represent their citizens, who sent them to Washington to legislate laws that support the nation and its people. Instead they cower to a man, who is empty, same as hitler was. It is perplexing, why we can not rid ourselves of this craven man, instead we give him air time, media time and we have allowed him to unravel the Biden admin by never going away, by actually being the “deep state”, demanding the GOP to follow what he wants and not what is best for the country. Our legal system is taking too long, to apply justice and in this matter, we can not hope that even the SC will do what is right for the nation. It not Biden’s age we should be concerned with it is the totality of those who are not using all the tools available to stop him.
Are we really that afraid of maga, they are a “basket of deplorable’s”, who should be sent back under the rocks they crawled out of, including those with their 25 point plan to dismantle democracy, the administrative state, the rule of law and the freedoms that are our birth right; they have no good right to call themselves Americas!
Trump plays a huge role. Who’s playing Himmler (Heinrich) and Goebbels (Joseph) roles? From a global perspective is it Trump and Xi ? Who plays these roles in trump cult? Stephen Miller and GOP? It’s truly frightening. We all need to wake up.