Peter Longerich’s 2015 biography Goebbels instructs well how history can and does repeat itself. Like many of the Neo-Con ex ‘Lefties’ who loaded up the Bush Sr. and Jr. administrations, Goebbels was at first a true socialist, perhaps even a Marxist sympathizer. As a young novelist and later journalist, he had a real dislike for the Fat Cat capitalists who he and others from both the political left and right blamed for Germany’s fall from grace. When he ‘found’ Adolf Hitler, despite his many disappointments about Hitler from his diary entries (including the fact that he fervently believed that Hitler was in love with Goebbels’ fiancé Magda … and perhaps visa versa), Goebbels joined the new Fuehrer Cult. As with many others in economically and culturally depressed Germany, Goebbels was enamored with the man he referred to as ‘The boss’. The need for a messianic leader, actually a dictator, was very prevalent among many in the NASD AKA Nazi party. So much so that nothing else mattered as to actual policy vs. actual power. As Long as Hitler hammered home pride in the ‘Fatherland’, Volk family values and rejection of the Versailles Diktat, Goebbels forgave Hitler’s indecision on other issues. Of course, Goebbels’s bitter hatred toward all things Jewish kept him on a course that Hitler himself had steered for so long. Matter of fact, in the biography we learn how even Hitler had to slow Goebbels down at times and show more patience… and wait for the opportune moments to strike hard against the Jews.
Joseph Goebbels was a master in the use of propaganda. He knew what Edward Bernays accomplished in our nation through his introduction of propaganda into commercial and then political advertising. Without Bernays’s skills, the United States may never have even entered into WW1. Goebbels could have gotten lots of his ideas right out of Bernays’ 1928 book aptly entitled Propaganda. Jingoisticly, one cannot view any films showing the Nazi regime at work without noticing the abundance of flags and banners everywhere. Additionally, Goebbels’ use of pomp and circumstance with the trumpets and horns and of course the drum beats combined with the marches and uniforms was very effective. Why? Well, during troubled times all that is needed to indoctrinate the populace are repetitive sound bites and slogans used over and over and over again. Did not Mr. Trump use such populist propaganda on a great segment of the populace fed up with their economic plight and the absence of good jobs? Of course, all successful propaganda must have scapegoats ready in the wings to blame most of this on… with a savior standing by to lead them out of the abyss. Nazi Germany had the Jews and European banking system, and Trump’s Amerika has the Muslims and illegal Latino aliens as they are referred to.
Another interesting fact mentioned in the biography is that the Nazis did not need to play the ‘God card’ in order to get the masses to follow. Hitler and his cronies, Goebbels included, had such a deep revulsion towards any form of Christianity. They despised it because their goal was to make the Fuehrer the new ‘Christ’, or messiah, for Germany’s resurrection as a European power once again. This anomaly was not what we here in this Amerikan empire have ever experienced. The great and insightful American author Sinclair Lewis said it best 79 years ago with: “When fascism comes to America it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross.” Sadly, we are on our way to seeing it happen here soon.
The Neocon propaganda has worked so well for the ‘The Right Wing’. They have hijacked our wonderful flag and made it into a symbol of their perversions. They have hijacked the great avatar, Jesus of Nazareth, and made him the symbol of this ‘born again empire’, as if he would ever bless our illegal and immoral invasions and occupations… along with our merciless drone missiles. Their (so-called) adversaries, the Democratic Party, which great propaganda has labeled as ‘Left-wing’ or ‘Liberal’ or even ‘Socialist/ Marxist’, are just more ‘kinder and gentler’ servants of that same empire. They too kneel at the altars of Big Business and the Pentagon. Yes, dear friends, fascism, with its corporate police state, has arrived and most of us do NOT even realize it! Of course, our newest ‘Emperor with no clothes’, Mr. Trump, overtly does the bidding of the Deep State that he claims is “Out to get me!” He, along with his predecessors, will assure the Super Rich that the rest of us, the 99+ %, will become the drones that they need to service their beehive. Goebbels, if he is looking UP from his lowest point in the cosmos, must be so proud of what his work had accomplished here in Amerika.
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