The Big Lie Technique

A favourite technique of the Nazis was the 'big lie'. Here is an article by Andrew Leonard in Salon that points out that the Republicans have adopted this technique as the cornerstone of their political technique. Here's the key bit from his article:

The GOP embraces the big lie

There it was, in broad daylight on my computer screen, a Wall Street Journal headline so shocking in its brazen embrace of an alternate reality that despite my best interests for mental self-preservation, I was forced to react.

The GOP strategy of principled opposition is winning over independents.

You can call the GOP strategy a lot of things, including, no question, "effective." But the one word you cannot use to describe it is "principled." When Sarah Palin talks about "death panels" and Sen. Chuck Grassley warns about "pulling the plug on grandma," they are not being "principled." They are consciously lying for political gain. In my dictionary, that is the opposite of "principled."

South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint has even gone so far as to say the U.S. is "where Germany was before World War II," making, it would seem, an extraordinary analogy between President Obama and Adolf Hitler. It seems incredible, but then you see the posters waved by protesters at town hall meetings featuring Obama as an SS trooper, and you realize that DeMint is being taken at his word by a significant fraction of the general populace.

Yes, the GOP went there. ...

... Hitler was accusing the Jews of engaging in the big lie, when in fact the Nazis would be history's greatest practitioners. Jim DeMint suddenly appears in a different light, because he is actually deadly accurate when he compares the present climate to pre-WWII Germany. The GOP's avid willingness to wield the big lie makes the comparison valid.

Sadly, this propaganda technique worked for the Nazis and it certainly appears to be working for the Republicans.

I find it ironic. My parents generation went to war to fight the kind of sleazy governments that used the Big Lie technique and as I go into the twilight of my years, the Big Lie technique has found a home in the very country that led the fight against it in the early 1940s. Who says God doesn't have a sense of humour?

Tragically, all those Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, and social democrats that were ushered into the gas chambers and sent up as smoke didn't get to laugh along with God and the Nazis. Somehow God's humour is too much of a private joke. I prefer humour that isn't at the expense of people, especially the weak, the young, or the mentally deficient. But the Republicans -- and God -- appear to read their humour from a different book.


By the way, speaking of Hitler, here's an interview with Birgit Schwartz by the German magazine Der Spiegel entitled "Hitler Considered Himself an Artistic Genius":

SPIEGEL: Doesn't the perception of Hitler as an artist make him seem less evil?

Schwarz: No. In fact, his love of art led directly into the heart of evil. But neither is it the root of everything else. His fanatical pursuit of his own cause, and his self-image as a genius, contributed to his powers of persuasion and, therefore, his success. Art was part of his life until his last hours, even playing a role in his private will, in which he mentions his collections. This was someone who issued the so-called Nero Decree (Ed's note: Hitler's Nero Decree, issued in March 1945, ordered the destruction of any infrastructure which could be of use to the Allies.) while at the same time making sure art treasures were rescued. But no one is willing to admit to his obsession with art.

...

SPIEGEL: Are you going so far as to draw a line between the concept of genius and the Holocaust?

Schwarz: Let me say it one more time: The genius was allowed to be above morality. The amorality of the Nazis represents taking this position to its unthinkable extreme. Goebbels wrote the brutal sentence: "Geniuses consume people." Part of Hitler's concept of a genius was the image of an enemy. In his case, it even needed to be a mortal enemy.

...

SPIEGEL: Does a genius need a muse? If so, was Hitler's muse Eva Braun -- or perhaps his favorite architect, Albert Speer?

Schwarz: Perhaps an artist needs a muse, but a genius doesn't, because a genius's creative strength comes from within. And a genius, as Hitler explained to his secretary, could not have any children. However, he did have role models, including Frederick the Great, who became increasingly important to him. Hitler felt that he was an incarnation of this art-loving ruler, who was both a collector and a military strategist. He imitated everything about him, including his love for dogs and, later, his shuffling walk and stained uniform. It was even obvious to the terribly banal Eva Braun, who chided him for his excessive efforts to imitate Frederick. In the end, he insisted on having a portrait of the king nearby at all times, even in the bunker. Academics are familiar with this adoration and with how alarmingly deep it went, but it probably hasn't been adequately studied.

One problem with the Republican Party is that too many of them preen themselves as misunderstood geniuses. Just saying...