What should we be doing right now? What can we learn from 1930's Germany? nt

[LAS14]

[OrlandoDem2]

1. Saving money to buy a property abroad.

[edhopper]

2. What my family learned was

get the fuck out. Those who stayed, died.

[Glorfindel]

3. I would leave if I could, but I'm old and far from wealthy.

I'll just stick around and await developments.

[Deuxcents]

4. I'm in the same situation.

[anciano]

5. Same here.

[S/V Loner]

6. I'm too old to disrupt my life...

leave friends and start over. Fuck that. I'll go with FAFO and I don't react well to bullies. At 71 life in prison just isn't the same threat as it used to be.

[303squadron]

7. Solzhenitsyn and Hitchens give us a direction

“The simple step of a courageous individual is not to take part in the lie.” ~ Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

“Never be a spectator of unfairness or stupidity. Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will supply plenty of time for silence.” ~ Christopher Hitchens

We’re going to need these ideas in the next four years.

[LAS14]

15. Thanks. This sounds do-able and possibly even effective.

Along with the observation elsewhere in the thread that 1930's Germans were accustomed to obedience, whereas Americans are "a rambunctious lot."

[flying_wahini]

8. I've told my husband for around the last 10 years that we may need to amend our retirement plans if

TSF actually got in. He always said that was “being hysterical”. I say there were lots of “hysterical Jews”
that left Germany when they had a chance. Most of THEM survived.
Canada ain’t half bad.

[DFW]

9. One thing we can learn from the Weimarer Republik is not to do what they did to cause their own downfall

The Weimarar Republik let every crackpot "party," no matter how far out to lunch they were, have representation in the parliament. This made for a parliament so fractured that no consensus would ever be found. This led to paralyzation and governmental inaction. This was music to the ears and nourishment for the message of the National Socialists. In January, 1933, Pesident (ceremoinal in Germny) Hindenburg named Adolf Hitler as Reichskanzler. On March 5th, the Germans voted "enough is enough," and gave close to 44% to Hitler's National Socialists (NSDAP), who promised action instead of none. It was enough for them to be charged with forming a government. And so Reichskanzler Adolf Hitler was sworn in, just shy of his 44th birthday.

Modern day Germany is falling into the same danger zone. Now, besides the two traditional postwar parties, both faltering, there is a splintered left and a surging right, along with an increasingly irrelevant "pro-business-liberal" middle party (FDP). As in the early 1930a, this is offering nourishment to the far right AfD, whose message, like Hitler's, is "we'll get things done if no one else will." Things are obviously nowhere near as dire here as they were in Post WW I Germany, but, as in the USA, people can be made to think they are by clever media manipulation. Today's Germany has the new "Bewegung Sahra Wagenknecht," a far left upstart centering on a charismatic media manipulator, Sahra Wagenknecht. She already gets over the 5% hurdle, set after WW II so that 30 different crackpot parties wouldn't be paralyzing the post WW II parliamment. But now, in addition to the "traditional" SPD (Social Democrats) and CDU (Conservatives), there are the Free Democrats (Pro-business), the Greens (actually taking over the role of the old Social democrats, who have become the party of stodgy bureaucrats), the Wagenknecht party, the "Left (from which Wagenknecht split off)," and the far right AfD, whose stated goals include leaving the EU, leaving th Euro, closing the borders and kicking out any immigrants that don't meet their vague standards (sound familiar?). The AfD already stands at over 18% in the last parliamentary election, and could top 20% next time. The more the rest of Germany splits up, the more they love it. Just as the Republicans were licking their chops watching the Bernie vs. Hillary show in 2016, that is exactly what the AfD is hoping for here.

[LAS14]

14. How do you prevent crackpot parties from getting elected?

The Weimarar Republik let every crackpot "party," no matter how far out to lunch they were, have representation in the parliament.

And just exactly how were they supposed to prevent this? That's the problem with democracy. If you accumulate too many nutsy voters you're screwed.

[DFW]

16. Exactly the way the Bundesrepublik did after the war

Any party can run and present candidates. However, to get seated in the parliament (city, state or federal), a party must get a minimum of 5% of the vote.

[LAS14]

21. I'm afraid MAGA is getting a lot more than 5%. nt

[Kaleva]

18. Hindenburg had a lot of power as President

He had the power to name and remove chancellors and enact laws by decree.

[JanMichael]

10. I'm sure that some people would say get out the vote.

Good luck.

[Aristus]

11. What we need to learn is that, just because a revenge-crazed, incompetent

convicted felon has ascended to the highest office, it doesn’t mean that it has to play out here the way it did in Germany in 1933.

Germans of the post-Imperial era were still largely accustomed to being obedient and deferential to government authority.

Americans are a rambunctious bunch, and don’t like being told what to do. It doesn’t take much government action to trigger pushback.

Look at the berserk rage the Trumpanzees flew into when the CDC recommended mask-wearing during COVID.

The GOP has a vanishingly small majority in Congress. And some of the people who should have been on our side, Union Members for Trump and Minorities for Trump, for example, are already getting buyer’s remorse now that Trump has their votes and has tossed them aside.

[GP6971]

13. Well Hello!!

[Mike 03]

17. Some book recommendations

1. Life and Death in the Third Reich by Peter Fritzsche

2. What We Knew: Terror, Mass Murder and Everyday Life in Nazi Germany: An Oral History, by Eric A. Johnson and Karl-Heinz Reuband

3. Between Dignity and Despair: Jewish Life in Nazi Germany, by Marion A. Kaplan

4. The 12-Year Reich: A Social History of Nazi Germany, 1933-1945

There is no single strategy people deployed. A lot of it depended on their social position in society, their geographic region, their resources and social networks. Some people who read and studied "Mein Kampf" and had watched Hitler closely were smart enough to leave Germany even before he ascended to power. We won't know for certain which responses are the best responses until we know how society, particularly the MAGAs, see their roles. If they become "enforcers" for the regime, that will make things significantly more difficult and complicated. What if any role will violence have during the coming period? Are we mostly talking about financial and social risks, or risks to our safety? In general, the risks of practically everything grew the longer HItler was in power, and the more laws and specious "taxes" he put into place. It became much more expensive to flee Germany, with Jewish families having to sacrifice a huge percentage of their personal property and savings.

[Kaleva]

19. We can learn that economic conditions are considerably different

Germany was ravaged by the Great Depression while the US economy today is quite robust. And when was the last time the US lost a war where millions of it's citizens were killed?

[Bettie]

20. Well, if we look at some of our elected officials

it's "suck up to the new dictator by criticizing everything our current president says or does".

I think that's called "complying in advance".

I'm stocking extra food for when the prices go sky high.