Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Europe Reverting to Old Ways

If you had asked me even a year ago what I thought of the idea of a serious Nazi resurgence anywhere in Europe I would have laughed.  The EU is terrified of the idea of Nazis holding power again right?  Then in Greece 20% of their legislature went to. . . you guessed it the Nazi party.  While I'm not holding my breath for a lightning thrust out of Greece, you do have to recognize that this is an old pattern, that was first enacted in the 30's.  In fact an economic crisis just a little bit worse than the one we face now is responsible for bringing the Nazis to power in the first place. 

In times of crisis people tend to turn to the voices that are loudest for both A). blaming someone else and B). offering to take the worry/burden away through any means necessary.  Liberties will be traded for security, and people will turn a very blind eye to the disturbing signs that are happening.  That is how the Soviets gained (and retained) power, and the Nazis, and indeed that very pattern almost played out in Iraq, except in that case it was decidedly more violent and had decidedly more parties with a stake. 

Perhaps most disturbing is the American Liberal's way of self denial about the nature of such people.  The Nazis were extolled as a model society right up until they invaded Poland.  The same could be said for the Soviet Union.  Hell right up until the Fall there were Liberals actively seeking to help them out.  Teddy Kennedy of all people apologized to a member of the politburo for the "tare down this wall" speech.  No the Soviets aren't bad they just used slave labor and starved out their people. 

The EU has treated Greece as their red headed step child for decades. Just because the red headed step child which was due for a crash went 1/5 to the Nazis, who cares?  yeah its just that France, one of the major powers behind the EU, and right next door to Germany, has just elected a Socialist president.  Now why is that a big deal?  Well. . . you do remember the Nazis were the National socialist party right?  Yeah. . . oops. 

Now Brietbart.com is reporting that roughly 5,000 Jews are trying to leave France fro Israel, which if accurate would be a pretty large exodus all things considered.  I personally think that despite the fact that France has been growing more anti-Semitic for years, it is far more likely that the Muslims have to worry, and they have been causing the most problems.  This is dangerous and disturbing to say the least. 

Would we see a return of the Nazis?  well Europe is already "united" so you wouldn't need Panzers rolling across the lowlands to do that.  No, all you'd need is a crisis and political savvy.  We in America are not removed from this and we may very well play a central role in the coming days, so I think it is time we seriously stop what we're doing sit down and really look at what's going on.  If we keep playing like everything's normal we will be blindsided by things we totally knew could never happen again. 

2 comments:

Ken said...

The American public for the most part pays no attention to what is going on in our own country let alone in Europe. If nearly half the people in this country think our President is doing a good job what does that say aout our intelligence quotient. The dumbing down of America started in the 60's and has increased each and every decade. We are a society that is almost to the poion of being an entitlement society like Europe. We may not elect Nazi politicians but we sure keep electing Democrats.

Anonymous said...

That simply isn't true. Golden Dawn (the Greek neo-Nazi party) recieved 7% of the votes, around 1/3 of what you're reporting. Worrying indeed, but not even close to 1/5 (20%) of the votes. Being a European, I can provide you with first hand testimony that the rise of far right parties is more of a reaction to Muslim immigration, as opposed to the Jews.

I'd also like to point out that it's absurd to accuse the Parti Socialiste (the French Socialist Party) of being affiliated with National Socialism, as it is a social democratic party, i.e. towards the left. The social democrats were on both the Nazi and the Communist hit list from day one, so linking social democracy to any extremist party is a far stretch to say the least.