Tag Archives: enabling act

May 3, 2020 · 03:10

When Certain Unalienable Rights Conflict: Life and Its Sanctity vs. Freedom and the Pursuit of Happiness

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

When Thomas Jefferson wrote, and members of the Continental Congress edited and published the Declaration of Independence they included this in the preface:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Today we now have a situation that is not unknown in the history of the United States, where the right to life is threatened by people exercising their freedom and insisting on their pursuit of happiness. Since the United States became independent the country has known many bacteriological, and virological epidemics, and pandemics. They include Yellow Fever, Dengue Fever, Tuberculosis, Polio, Diphtheria, Measles, Rubella, Smallpox, Anthrax, the Great Influenza (Spanish Flu or H1N1), the Asian Flu of 1958 (H2N2), the Honk Kong Flun of 1968 (H2N3), HIV/AIDS, Ebola, the 2008-2009 H1N1, and the most recent that we are living through today, the novel Coronavirus 19, or COVID 19.

In each case local governments were forced to make choices that balanced these conflicting unalienable rights. In most of the early outbreaks, epidemics, and pandemics the onus was on the local governments to act in the best interests of their people. But of course that was well before hundreds of thousands of people were making daily intercontinental airplane flights, and millions more making interstate or non-intercontinental, yet international flights. Likewise, the scientists, physicians, and government officials during the pandemics of earlier times had at best delayed access to information, lacked our technology, and typically saw such events through the lens of local experience, unless they were members of the international medical community who studied in other countries, and built relationships with others like them around the world.

The best practices those pioneers tried to convince government officials of, until effective vaccines and treatments were developed, included what we now call social distancing and personal protective equipment, such as face masks. They also recommended shutdowns of mass gatherings, the shutdown of non-essential business, facilities, and even religious services. In some cases local and state governments took their advice. During the 1918-1919 Great Influenza, President Wilson made no comment on it, even before the stroke that kept him from actually being the Chief Executive, as a result, Federal agencies were not able to coordinate a national response to a national and international pandemic which by tha time it was over had killed between 20 and 50 million people around the world and some 660,000 in the United States.

However, the Supreme Court ruled in Jacobson vs. Massachusetts in 1905 that local and state governments did have the right to exercise their power to order people to obey vaccination, and other public health laws. Likewise there is the precarious balance between the rights of the community versus the rights of individuals during a public health emergency which are too numerous, detailed, and sometimes conflicting that I cannot deal with them in this rather brief article. That being said I hold to the right to life, above absolute liberty or the pursuit of our own gratuitous happiness.

I live in one of the strongest, if not the most heavily Republican dominated cities in Virginia. Last year a lone gunman killed and wounded dozens of our citizens at the Virginia Beach Government Center, yet under a year later the city declared itself to be a Second Amendment Sanctuary City, in effect the city surrendered itself to people who believe that their rights to bear the most lethal weapons possible and more important than the lives of government employees health care workers, first responders, and the police and sheriff’s departments, or other public institutions, their customers, and the general public are endangered.

In our local area, Judy and I saw large numbers of white people, who include people with college degrees, active duty, retired, or military veterans, and others who should know better based on the education and practical experience, to follow public health regulations completely disregard them at the Target store at the Virginia Beach Pembroke Mall, near the upscale Town Center area, and the Kroger Super Store on Holland Road go into the store without masking, or taking any care to practice any form of social distancing. Instead they crowded in disregarding all medical and public health recommended advice. Likewise, many employees who are now required to wear face masks either left their noses uncovered or wore their masks around their necks. It was a clear failure of local managers to implement corporate policy to safeguard the lives of their employees and customers.

This is not about the restriction of individual liberty but rather the exaltation of individual responsible and freedom to sacrifice momentary indulgences for the heath, safety, and life of their neighbors. Sadly, I saw little of that. If the only people endangering their lives were those arrogant and ignorant enough to care about the lives of their neighbors, I would simply say that they deserved whatever punishment Darwin awards them. However, it is about all of those other people who through no fault of their own are exposed to, become infected by, and either get sick or die, because of their selfish, indulgent, and narcissistic sociopathic behavior. Their actions prove that Trump’s sociopathic lack of empathy has tricked down into the lives and actions of people who once prized personal responsibility and adherence to the rule of law, at whatever level. I was reminded of the words of the late Eric Hoffer:

“The hardest thing to cope with is not selfishness or vanity or deceitfulness, but sheer stupidity.”

These actions are not the actions of responsible citizens, but the selfish, irresponsible, sociopathic views, and lack of empathy of the members of the Trump Cult, who as shown by their armed protests at various state capitals have no respect for law, local government, or responsibility to fellow citizens; even when the President encourages them to break the rules and recommendations of his own administration.

Call my views whatever you want, but please don’t call them politically motivated. President George W. Bush who I voted for twice, but lost complete trust in him and the GOP after returning from Iraq in 2018, warned about such a pandemic and what would be necessary to combat it when I was in Iraq, as well as the scientists, epidemiologists, and virologists of the CDC and other Federal agencies under Republican and Democratic administrations since have advocated. Instead the Trump Administration cut the funding for and existence of overseas branches of the CDC in China and other countries that could have given early warnings about COVID 19 were eliminated. Intelligence reports from December 2019 and on were ignored by the President and his closest advisers, until the stock markets crashed at the beginning of March 2020. Then after a long period of denials, delays, minimization of a real pandemic, blaming others, and then saying they are not responsible for anything related to the virus. That is not the action of a President, Administration, or Senate committed to personal responsibility and rule of law, regardless of party.

At some point there comes a reckoning when the followers and government officials of an administration have to heed the words of the German General Ludwig Beck who resigned his office in protest of the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and who died attempting to overthrow and kill Hitler on July 20th 1944. Beck said:

“Final decisions about the nation’s existence are at stake here; history will incriminate these leaders with bloodguilt if they do not act in accordance with their specialist political knowledge and conscience. Their soldierly obedience reaches its limit when their knowledge, their conscience, and their responsibility forbid carrying out an order.”

That is true today as much as it was in 1944. A failure to act in accordance with their specialist political, military, or scientific, medical, ethical, historical, and public health knowledge ensures that those that refuse to to act in accordance with their knowledge, are guilty of the blood guilt of those sacrificed to their cause, no matter what the cost.

Eric Hoffer wrote: “I can never forget that one of the most gifted, best educated nations in the world, of its own free will, surrendered its fate into the hands of a maniac.”
COVID 19 is that test for all of us, regardless of faith, political ideology, and party. If we cannot see the threat to both our individual rights, and responsibility as citizens and weigh them as our founders did, then we are not worthy of national survival. The American Experiment will have died, and none of us will escape the blood guilt of its demise and all who have and will die over the next 18 to 24 months of the Coronavirus 19, regardless of our party, ideology, or religious beliefs.

The fact of the matter is that in regard to whatever we do or fail to to today, we all assume the bloodguilt of President Trump, his administration, his personal cult, and the GOP Senate.

As Otto Wels, the leader of the German Social Democrats who refused the Nazi order to disband and voted against Hitler’s Enabling act said:

“You can take our lives and our freedom, but you cannot take our honour. We are defenseless but not honourless.”

Those words of Otto Wels should inspire terror in the heart of the members of the Trump Cult, because whether they understand them or not, they know that their lives are meaningless to the President.

So until tomorrow I wish you all the best.

Please be careful and stay safe,

Peace,

Padre Steve+

The Liberation of Dachau “Model Camp” at 75 Years

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Today marked the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Dachau, the model concentration camp of the the Nazi SS State.

On March 20th 1933, barely a month and a half after the Nazi takeover of the German government and three days before the passage of the Enabling Act the Police President Of Munich, SS Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler ordered the establishment of the Dachau Concentration Camp. He appointed SS Standartenführer Hilmar Wäckerle as Commandant and the first 200 political prisoners from Munich’s Stadelheim prison arrived at Dachau on March 22nd.

The first SS guards assigned to Dachau were given the following instruction:

“Comrades of the SS!
You all know what the Fuehrer has called us to do. We have not come here for human encounters with those pigs in there. We do not consider them human beings, as we are, but as second-class people. For years they have been able to continue their criminal existence. But now we are in power. If those pigs had come to power, they would have cut off all our heads. Therefore we have no room for sentimentalism. If anyone here cannot bear to see the blood of comrades, he does not belong and had better leave. The more of these pig dogs we strike down, the fewer we need to feed.”

Wäckerle’s brief tenure as Commandant was marked by extraordinary brutality on the part of his staff, so much so that charges were brought against him by the Munich courts which resulted in his relief by SS Gruppenführer Theodore Eicke in July 1933. Eicke would establish the regulations which governed all the later Concentration Camps, and make Dachau the model camp for all others.

Theodore Eiche

Theodore Eicke

Among the later SS killers of the Holocaust who served at Dachau were Adolf Eichmann, and the Commandant of Auschwitz, Rüdolf Höss. It became a training ground for other Concentration Camp commanders and staff. Others would become leaders in the Waffen SS and the Einsatzgruppen death squads.

The announcement of Dachau’s Opening was reported by the German press in this release:

On Wednesday the first concentration camp is to be opened in Dachau with an accommodation for 5000 people. ‘All Communists and—where necessary—Reichsbanner and Social Democratic functionaries who endanger state security are to be concentrated here, as in the long run it is not possible to keep individual functionaries in the state prisons without overburdening these prisons, and on the other hand these people cannot be released because attempts have shown that they persist in their efforts to agitate and organize as soon as they are released.

Dachau began as a political prisoner camp for the Nazis to imprison Socialists, Communists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, some Jews, and other dissidents. It wasn’t a “death camp” designed to exterminate people even though tens of thousands of people died or were executed there. It was designed to terrorize, dehumanize, and destroy the souls of its inmates.

It was a place of inhuman medical experiments, a place of terror, and the administrative center of a network of over 30 large and 100 small sub-Camps which were used as sources of slave labor for the German armaments industry. But one has to remember that the SS was not simply an instrument of terror, but an institution also devoted to profit. Prisoners were valued in what their lives equated in profits. A prisoner was valued in what he or her could produce versus the expenses of keeping them alive for a period of 6 to 12 months. Under Himmler and his assistant for production and profits, ObergrüppenfuhrerOswold Pöhl the Concentration Camps, as well as the death camps became centers of profit for the SS in collaboration with German industrial concerns and industries owned by the SS itself.

Dachau was not one of the Death Camps, although it was a place of incredible cruelty, extraordinary suffering, brutality, and death. While not a “death camp” per say, an estimated 40,000 or more prisoners were murdered there. For tens of thousands of others it served as a transit camp from which they were sent to the death factories in Poland, including Auschwitz, or other work camps, where many died of being worked to death, malnutrition, disease, or the simple cruelty and maltreatment inflicted on them by the guards.

Holocaust survivor Yehuda Bauer wrote: “The horror of the Holocaust is not that it deviated from human norms; the horror is that it didn’t. What happened may happen again, to others not necessarily Jews, perpetrated by others, not necessarily Germans. We are all possible victims, possible perpetrators, possible bystanders.”

The picture that you see above is the memorial to the Unknown Prisoner at Dachau. The words: “Den Toten zur Ehr, den Lebenden zur Mahnung” [To Honor the Dead, to Warn the Living] are engraved at its base.

I have been to Dachau at least a half dozen times beginning back in 1996. For me as a historian of the period the trip is both for learning and for meditation, for beyond its historical significance this is a holy place, a place made holy by the blood of tens of thousands of victims of one of the most evil regimes in history. The crimes committed by the staff of Totenkopfverbande SS guards from it’s inception were intended to terrorize and dehumanize the inmates who included political prisoners, religious objectors, Jews, and homosexuals. The inmates were not there because they were convicted of any crimes, in fact many had actually been exonerated by courts. In the case of those who had been convicted by courts, all had served what ever sentence they had been convicted of, but upon their release from prison were picked up by the SS and taken to Dachau where they were imprisoned without being charged with a crime, and an indefinite period and no date of release. Sometimes prisoners would suddenly and without warning be released, but they remained under observation by the local police and Gestapo. If they talked about their experience they were quite often sent back.

Prisoners were told on arrival:

Here you are, and you’re not in a sanatorium! You’ll have got that already. Anyone who hasn’t grasped that will soon be made to. You can rely on that . . . You’re not prison inmates here, serving a sentence imposed by the courts, you’re just ‘prisoners’ pure and simple, and if you don’t know what that means, you’ll soon find out. You’re dishonourable and defenceless! You’re without rights! Your fate is a slave’s fate! Amen.

In the Camp the prisoners were subject to punishment for even the most minor or perceived infractions, beatings, and whippings. Other punishments were meted out by guards who themselves were punished if they showed any mercy or human kindness to a prisoner. “While an offender sentenced to a term in prison knew when he was going to get out, release for the concentration camp inmate was determined by the whim of a quarterly review board, and could be delayed by the malice of any of the SS guards.”

Theodore Eicke, the commandant who systematized the Concentration Camp system created a world that his subordinate, and the later Commandant of Auschwitz, Rudolf Hoess described:

“It was Eicke’s intention that his SS-men, by means of continuous instruction and suitable orders concerning the dangerous criminality of the inmates, should be made basically ill-disposed towards the prisoners. They were to ‘treat them rough’, and to root out once and for all any sympathy they might feel for them. By such means, he succeeded in engendering in simple-natured men a hatred and antipathy for the prisoners which an outsider will find hard to imagine.”

Even a brutal man like Hoess found the brutality hard to watch, he recalled the:

“malicious evil-minded, basically bad, brutal, inferior, common creatures’ amongst the guards, who compensated for their sense of inferiority by venting their anger on the prisoners. The atmosphere of hatred was total.”

In the twelve years of its existence the staff of Dachau, through mistreatment, execution by bullet, gallows, through being used as subjects in grotesque medical experiments, by “execution by work,” or untreated illness and disease, murdered 41,566 prisoners. The point to be remembered is that despite this incredible number of murders that Dachau was not an extermination camp.

As the Third Reich crumbled the Nazis attempted to hide their crimes. Many inmates from Dachau were sent to other camps, by train or forced marched hundreds of miles. During these transits many, already shells of humanity due to maltreatment, disease and malnourishment. Even as this was happening trains from other camps were arriving at Dachau.

On 29 April 1945 units of the U.S. Army 45th and 42nd Infantry Divisions liberated Dachau, which was surrendered by its senior remaining officer, a mere SS 1st Lieutenant, as the commandant and o ther senior officer had already fled. Most to be captured within days or weeks. The liberators were shocked by what they saw, the piles of dead, the bones in the crematoria, the emaciated prisoners, and a train car full of dead, and some soldiers took their revenge on some of the guards, and massacred an estimated 20-50 of the surrendered SS men. Although charges were preferred, they were dropped.

The Execution of SS Guards at Dachau

Regardless of the actions of the American liberators, even those who took justice into their own hands, the fact is that the Dachau guards all knew what was going on and had each to some degree participated in the atrocities at Dachau and in some cases other camps, or on the Eastern Front.

You may wonder why I took the time to go into such detail about my visits to Dachau and its terrible legacy. The answer is the same why I choose to walk American Civil War battlefields, it is to being to try to understand what the people there were seeing and experiencing.

Of course there were the prisoners who were so savagely treated by their jailers. Then there were the bystanders, the citizens of Dachau and other German cities who watched as Jews, political enemies, and others were marched to the camp, which was not a secret installation. Finally, there were the perpetrators, very few of whom were punished for their actions.

But another reason is that the survivors, be they victims, perpetrators, or bystanders are rapidly passing away

Soon none will be left. When that happens it is up to us the living to ensure that this is not forgotten and that those murdered at Dachau, the other Concentration Camps, the extermination camps, and those killed by the murder squads that went from one end of Europe to the other in a systematic attempt to wipe every Jew that they could find off of the face of the earth. Yes, there were other victims, but the Nazi crusade against the Jews knew no boundaries, physical or time included. Unlike every other genocide it extended beyond national borders, or time; it was an eschatological crusade that by the will of Hitler was limited by only one factor, the complete military defeat that was inflicted on Nazi Germany by those who she attacked.

Finally, the story must be told because there are those who either claim it didn’t happen, or are tired of talking about it. In Germany those include leaders of the new-Nazi AfD (Alternative for Germany) Party. In the United States, Britain, and other nations there are members of many new-Nazi and Alt-Right groups who desire very much the same thing. But if decent people decide not to speak out, if we remain silent, there is nothing anywhere that will keep these ideological descendants of Hitler from beginning it again, if not to the Jews, to other despised racial, religious, ethnic, or ideological groups. We live in a world where demagogues take advantage of people’s legitimate anxieties and deeply ingrained prejudices to stir up ungodly anger and hatred in order to both gain new followers and to incite those followers to a campaign of violence.

Doctor Timothy Snyder wrote:

“The European history of the twentieth century shows us that societies can break, democracies can fall, ethics can collapse, and ordinary men can find themselves standing over death pits with guns in their hands. It would serve us well today to understand why.”

But I know why, there are some people who are sociopaths, who though they seem ordinary have no empathy for others, and they are more numerous than we might ever suspect. Captain Gustave Gilbert, a psychologist assigned to the major war crime defendants at the Nuremberg war crimes trials noted:

“In my work with the defendants (at the Nuremberg Trails 1945-1949) I was searching for the nature of evil and I now think I have come close to defining it. A lack of empathy. It’s the one characteristic that connects all the defendants, a genuine incapacity to feel with their fellow men. Evil, I think, is the absence of empathy.”

That absence of empathy runs strong among Trump supporters and others of the religious and political right today. For the rest of my life I will fight them and expose them.

So until tomorrow I wish you all the best and ask that no matter what the leaders of your state say, to obey common sense and facts and be as careful as you can, as the COVID 19 pandemic is far from over.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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Filed under authoritarian government, Coronavirus, Diseases Epidemics and Pandemics, ethics, germany, History, holocaust, Military, nazi germany, News and current events, Political Commentary, racism, Religion, us army, world war two in europe

Tagged as 42nd infantry division, 45th infantry division, adolf eichmann, concentration camp system, COVID-19, dachau concentration camp, enabling act, gustave gilbert, Heinrich Himmeler, hilmar wackerle, Nuremberg War Crimes Trial, Oswald Pohl, Rudolf Hoess, SS state, theodore eicke, Totenkopfverbande, yehuda bauer

February 23, 2020 · 01:51

Money, Power, and Election Spending 1933 and Today

Hitler With German Industrialists

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Lord Acton noted:

“Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise influence and not authority; still more when you superadd the tendency of the certainty of corruption by authority.”

Less than a month after his appointment as Chancellor by President Hindenburg and before the Reichstag Fire, Adolf Hitler met with German industrialists at Hermann Goering’s Estate on February 20th 1933. The purpose of the meeting was to secure financial support for the Nazi Party in the upcoming Reichstag election, an election that would be the last in Hitler’s Germany.

The invitees were a “who’s who” of German industrialists and by the end of the day they had pledged over Two Million Reichsmarks to the Nazi cause.

It wasn’t hard for Hitler to win them over. They feared a Communist counter revolution against the Nazis and they were still unsure of the economic plans of the Nazis, as the Nazis did have a Wing that believed in a more socialist vision. Their leaders included Ernst Röhm leader of the Brownshirt SA, or Stürmabteilung which numbered over three million members and eyed itself as a people’s army to replace the 100,000 man Reichswehr. Likewise, the Stasser brothers, Otto and Gregor, attempted to wrest leadership and policy of the NSDAP from Hitler, who they believed was to friendly with the industrialists. Röhm even openly talked of a second revolution. But the industrialists had nothing to fear, by the next summer Röhm most of the SA senior leadership was dead, as was Gregor Strasser, murdered during the Night of the Long Knives, while Otto Strasser fled the country. The threat of a second revolution was over, and the German conservative establishment was safe.

Knowing the industrialists better than they knew themselves, Hitler played to their worst fears as William Shier recorded in his book The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich:

Hitler began a long speech with a sop to the industrialists. “Private enterprise,” he said, “cannot be maintained in the age of democracy; it is conceivable only if the people have a sound idea of authority and personality… All the worldly goods we possess we owe to the struggle of the chosen… We must not forget that all the benefits of culture must be introduced more or less with an iron fist.” He promised the businessmen that he would “eliminate” the Marxists and restore the Wehrmacht (the latter was of special interest to such industries as Krupp, United Steel and I. G. Farben, which stood to gain the most from rearmament). “Now we stand before the last election,” Hitler concluded, and he promised his listeners that “regardless of the outcome, there will be no retreat.” If he did not win, he would stay in power “by other means… with other weapons.” Goering, talking more to the immediate point, stressed the necessity of “financial sacrifices” which “surely would be much easier for industry to bear if it realized that the election of March fifth will surely be the last one for the next ten years, probably even for the next hundred years.”

Money and power, the sacrifice of hard earned freedoms, the selling out of political openness, workers, and Jews were irrelevant in the end. What mattered was profit and the protection of it and their status by an authoritarian state in perpetuity. As such the German industrialists, championed by Hjalmar Schachtsold their souls and their nation to Hitler. They included the head of Krupp Industries, Gustav Krupp, the head of Opel, Fritz von Opel, as well as the leaders of the electronics powerhouse Siemens, chemical and pharmacy giant IG Farben, one of the leading German insurance agencies Allianz, and numerous others. Hitler’s goal for the meeting was basically a shakedown of the industrialist leaders to raise enough money to ensure a two-thirds majority in the Reichstag to pass his Enabling Act which would enable Hitler to rule by decree, in effect, to establish a dictatorship, by parliamentary means. Historian Adam Tooze, the author of The Wages of Destruction wrote:

The meeting of 20 February and its aftermath are the most notorious instances of the willingness of German big business to assist Hitler in establishing his dictatorial regime. The evidence cannot be dodged.

Between the meeting and the election the Reichstag, scheduled for March 5th, the Reichstag was burned, and the Reichstag Fire Decree enacted. In the elections that followed the Nazis still not achieve a majority in the Reichstag, much less a two-thirds majority. Even so, with the surrender and acquiescence of every remaining party but the Socialists, the Nazis passed the Enabling Act. The leaders of the German economic and banking establishment, Nazi or not, were pleased, their mortal enemies could now be persecuted. By June, all opposition parties were liquidated, mostly by themselves, or outlawed, as was the SPD. All independent labor unions were dissolved and forcibly incorporated into Robert Ley´s German Labor Front, which ironically occurred the day after Hitler declared May 1st as a National Holiday to honor German Workers.

Hitler’s economic supporters included corporate and banking leaders from other countries, including Henry Ford of the United States, whose German factories as well as GM‘s German subsidiary Opel, produced much of Germany’s war materials.

The curious thing is that in many countries, including the United States, leaders of great corporations, the banking industry, builders, manufacturers are little different than their predecessors in Nazi Germany and so many other democracies that succumbed to dictatorship. Money needs power, and those that desire power need money, and are willing to spend it to their advantage, regardless of which candidate or party they donate.

Let’s take that as a warning for every politician who seeks the money of corporate lobbyists, and corporate leaders who seek political power, regardless of what ideology or party they represent, especially the religious, “patriotic,” or nationalist ones.

This is a lesson we all need to learn today. In 2016, some 6.5 Billion dollars was spent on Presidential and Congressional elections by all parties. Recent studies indicate that over 10 billion dollars, over 6 billion on traditional television and radio, media, as well as internet and social media advertising will be spent in the 2020 primary campaigns and general elections, the latter often manipulated by Russia, as it was in 2016. Regardless of the outcome in November, that cannot be a good thing.

Think about it, let it sink in.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Filed under economics and financial policy, germany, History, labor, laws and legislation, leadership, nazi germany, News and current events, Political Commentary

Tagged as 2016 election spending, 2020 election spending projections, Adam Tooze, adolf hitler, enabling act, ernst Röhm, Ford-Werke, Fritz Opel, GM, gregor strasser, Gustav Krupp, henry ford, hermann goering, hjaldmar schacht, IG Farben, Krupp, Lord Action, money and Power, otto strasser, reichstag, reichstag fire, reichstag fire decree, Robert Ley, sa, Siemens, Sturmabteilung

February 21, 2020 · 00:17

“You Can Take Our Lives and Freedom, but You Cannot Take Our Honor” Life is Not a Cabaret

Otto Wels

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Today I am going to address something of critical importance today, even though it occurred over 87 years ago, which in the scope of history is not that long, despite the fact that the average American, regardless of their political beliefs and ideology are ignorant of past events, even those of just a few years ago. Thus, when one discusses events of 20, 40, 60, 80, or 100 years ago, one typically receives blank stares, or appeals to historical myths and fabrications that they learned in school, church, or from the media, both news and entertainment. As a historian it drives me crazy, our society, including our political, business, and media elites, has become a new generation of Know Nothings, of whom none other than the President and cult like followers supply some of the worst, but certainly not the only examples.

in 1932 the Communist Party of Germany KPD, refused to ally itself with the Social Democratic Party, SDP because they viewed the Socialists as sell-outs who refused to embrace a Soviet State in 1918 and 1919. At that time they called themselves Independent Socialists, but though a minority unleashed a left wing reign of terror that pushed German Conservatives further to the extreme right, and left the Social Democrats working with the German Army to try to hold the center. In the end, it was the extreme right that finally won a thirteen year struggle to overthrow the Weimar Republic, and after abortive coup attempts, including the Kapp Putsch in Berlin, which was crushed by a nationwide strike of labor groups, and the Nazi led Bier Hall Putsch, which was crushed due to the duplicity of Hitler’s coerced allies, and the refusal of Munich’s police to withdraw in the face of the Nazi advance at Odeonsplatz.

However, the Nazis learned from their failures at violent revolution, and instead, despite being outlawed for a number of years, worked within the democratic model to slowly gain regional, and eventually a national following. By 1932 the Nazi Party, as well as the KPD were at the height of their support. The traditional conservative German right was divided and its leaders thought they could control the Nazi movement. The left was divided between the moderate SPD and the militant KPD. An alliance of the two left parties in 1932 and 1933 would have created a parliamentary majority and stopped the Nazi movement in its tracks, but the KPD, which had split from the SPD in 1919 hated the SPD more than they did the Nazis, even though the Nazis were an existential threat to the German left.

As a historian I think that this is one of the of the most relevant examples as the United States and other democratic nations lurch toward legally elected right wing authoritarian governments.

A few months after he gained power, Hitler’s Nazi majority Reichstag passed the Enabling Act, or by its full title Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich (“Law to Remedy the Distress of People and Reich”). The came on the heels of the Reichstag Fire Decree and had tremendous repercussions for the German Republic and in effect made Hitler and his administration a dictatorship. The legislative branch, the Reichstag was limited to nothing more than a rubber stamp for the executive, as was the judicial branch, the Reichsrat. It supposedly protected the rights of the President, the Reichstag, and judiciary, but it made Hitler the the sole decider of domestic and social laws, as well as all foreign policy decisions.

The law stated:

The Reichstag has enacted the following law, which is hereby proclaimed with the assent of the Reichsrat, it having been established that the requirements for a constitutional amendment have been fulfilled:

Article One

In addition to the procedure prescribed by the constitution, laws of the Reich may also be enacted by the government of the Reich. This includes the laws referred to by Articles 85 Paragraph 2 and Article 87 of the constitution. (Article 85 and 87 dealt with the budgetary process and allocation of funds for advertisement.)

Article Two

Laws enacted by the government of the Reich may deviate from the constitution as long as they do not affect the institutions of the Reichstag and the Reichsrat. The rights of the President remain unaffected.

Article Three:

Laws enacted by the Reich government shall be issued by the Chancellor and announced in the Reich Gazette. They shall take effect on the day following the announcement, unless they prescribe a different date. Articles 68 to 77 of the Constitution do not apply to laws enacted by the Reich government. (These Articles dealt with the legislative process in which the Reichstag, Government, Reichsrat, and President all had specific responsibilities which limited the power of the government to rush laws into force without due process and deliberation, and if needed the approval of the electorate)

Article Four

Treaties of the Reich with foreign states, which relate to matters of Reich legislation, shall for the duration of the validity of these laws not require the consent of the legislative authorities. The Reich government shall enact the legislation necessary to implement these agreements. (This removed the requirement of the Reichstag to approve treaties)

Article Five

This law enters into force on the day of its proclamation. It expires on April 1, 1937; it expires furthermore if the present Reich government is replaced by another.

When the legislation was introduced the debate was muted. While the Communist Party was yet to be banned, deputies of the Communist Party could not attend the session, many had already been arrested and many more were in hiding or had fled the country. Hermann Goering adjusted the rules for a quorum in order to compensate for the lack of members in attendance. Deputies of the Social Democratic Party were also terrorized, hounded, and some arrested, but 94 attended, outnumbered they did not buckle under the Nazi threats, which included the chamber being ringed by armed members of the SA and SS.

The non-Nazi Protestant based conservative parties provided no resistance, but the Catholic Center Party was torn by concerns that the legislation could limit the rights of the Catholic Church. However, they had been outmaneuvered by Hitler who had already negotiated a Concordant with the Vatican. The result was to ensure that the Catholic Center Party would vote for the measure, which passed with a mere 94 deputies opposing it, all members of the Social Democratic Party.

The only member of the Reichstag to speak against the measure was the head of the Social Democrats, Otto Wels. In defiance of Hitler, Goering, the Nazi Deputies, and the threatening SA and SS men uttered words that every resistor in every country threatened by authoritarian leaders who despise the rule of law and the Constitutions that they used to gain power need to hear and proclaim, because the truth can never be silenced:

“You can take our lives and our freedom, but you cannot take our honour. We are defenseless but not honourless.”

Shortly after the Enabling Act, every non-Nazi Conservative party voluntarily dissolved, their organizations, youth, and veterans organizations being absorbed into the SA or Hitlerjugend. Many rank and file KPD members readily embraced the Nazis, even if their leaders were killed, jailed, or exiled. That was not the case with the SPD. Because of their stance and the courage of Otto Wels, they became the most hated and persecuted German political parties.

Otto Wels died as an exile in France. Many Social Democrats were placed in Concentration Camps and died, likewise some Communists. The Catholic Center Party would find itself betrayed, and many of its leaders would be killed, jailed, or placed in Concentration Camps, and Hitler would persecute opposition members of the Catholic Church as if no Concordat had ever been negotiated. A few members of the Protestant conservative parties, would join the German resistance, and some would be jailed, placed in Concentration Camps, or after the failed Military Coup of July 20th 1944, would be executed for their resistance, but they were a distinct minority, and few had any misgivings as long as it looked like Germany would win the war.

But eventually the Nazis would be driven from power. Their descendants today, whether in Germany, the United States, or other countries must be confronted at all costs. Democracy, and the American Constitutional Democracy, based on the principles of the Declaration of Independence, which recognizes that all men are created equal, and the Constitution of the United States which was the first to checks and balances between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of government, must be upheld. The Executive Branch, cannot, regardless of which party is in power be allowed to overthrow that democracy.

We have reached a point in the history of the United States where the Executive Branch, over a period of decades has assumed the powers of dictatorship as the Legislative branch over the corresponding time has surrendered its prerogatives and powers, while the judicial branch had become the domain of politically appointed judges and justices. Donald Trump and the GOP Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, have been the leaders of that, but should by some chance Bernie win, I have no doubt that some of his supporters secure his power by similar means. Yesterday, the President declared himself to be the Chief Law Enforcement Official in the country, in effect above all law. The Founders attempted to ensure that would not happen by placing Congress above the Executive Branch in the Constitution, but they assumed that no Chief Executive would do such a thing.

One does not know what will happen next, especially after the Senate acquitted the President in his impeachment trial, and the President’s subsequent retribution on those whose did not support him completely, or obeyed their oaths of office.

However, it is my opinion, that anyone who truly values the primary principles of the Declaration and the Constitution, and not just be a compliant tool of any political leader, must ne willing to take a stand; like the one Otto Wels made when confronted with a dictatorship in the making. Even if the President unleashes the power of the police and his own heavily armed supporters against opponents, we must remember like Otto Wels, they can “take our lives and freedom, but they cannot take our honor…”

This is something that anyone committed to the principles of the Declaration and Constitution must take seriously over the next eight and a half months leading to the next Presidential election. If we fail, the effects will be felt for at least a generation, and the institutions of our government will be transformed in ways that the founders could only imagine in their worst dreams.

Democrats and Never Trump conservatives must keep this in mind. Nothing is guaranteed right now, it is quite possible that Trump and his cult like supporters in Congress, before the election, or if he is re-elected, with their now majority in the courts could enact something like the Enabling Act if we are not careful. We must be careful to watch for the major terrorist attack, or war that could lead to the implementation of already legislated laws, such as the Patriot Act, or executive orders that give near dictatorial powers to the executive, and which would, if they occurred, be supported by a majority of Americans.

Historian Timothy Snyder wrote:

”The mistake is to assume that rulers who came to power through institutions cannot change or destroy those very institutions—even when that is exactly what they have announced that they will do.”

Trump has said he would do that and his supporters are committed to what he says, but until now most Americans have refused to believe him, and them. Sadly, most still don’t. After all, once one ceases to resist what more is there to do, just go to the Cabaret.

As Joel Gray, the Master of Ceremonies in the musical and film Cabartet sang:

Where are your troubles now?
Forgotten? I told you so!
We have no troubles here
Here, life is beautiful.
The girls are beautiful.
Even the orchestra is beautiful.

Yes, ignore everything and immerse yourself in our entertainment and sports culture, as if nothing else matters. What does freedom matter if you have no troubles?

So until tomorrow.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

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Tagged as adolf hitler, authoritarian government, Cabaret, catholic center party, communist part of Germany KPD, Constitution Social Democratic Party, declaration of independence, dictatorship, Donald trump impeachment, donald trump supporters, enabling act, hermann goering, Joel Gray, nazi party, Nazi-Vatican Concordat, otto wels, president donald trump, Reichsrat, reichstag, reichstag fire decree, social democrats, SPD, timothy snyder

March 24, 2019 · 01:16

“You can take our lives and our freedom, but you cannot take our honour. We are defenseless but not honourless.” Remembering the Resistors to the Enabling Act Of 1933

Otto Wels

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

I will not be talking about the Mueller report until we know what is actually contained in it. So I will continue to discuss historical events that are relevant in our time.

One of the most relevant as this country and others lurch toward legally elected authoritarian governments is the example of the Hitler’s Enabling Act, or by its full title Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich (“Law to Remedy the Distress of People and Reich”) came on the heels of the Reichstag Fire Decree and though very short had tremendous repercussions for the German Republic and in effect made Hitler and his administration a dictatorship. The legislative branch, the Reichstag was limited to nothing more than a rubber stamp for the executive, as was the judicial branch, the Reichsrat. It supposedly protected the rights of the President, the Reichstag, and judiciary, but it made Hitler the the sole decider of domestic and social laws, as well as all foreign policy decisions.

The law stated:

Article One

Article Two

Article Three:

Article Four

Article Five

This law enters into force on the day of its proclamation. It expires on April 1, 1937; it expires furthermore if the present Reich government is replaced by another.

“You can take our lives and our freedom, but you cannot take our honour. We are defenseless but not honourless.”

But eventually the Nazis would be driven from power. Their descendants today must be confronted at all costs. Democracy, and Constitutional republics based on the principles of the Declaration of Independence, which recognizes that all men are created equal, and the Constitution of the United States which was the first to checks and balances between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of government in which the Legislative branch was assumed to be the most important.

We have reached a point in the history of the United States where the Executive Branch, over a period of decades has assumed the powers of dictatorship as the Legislative branch over the corresponding time has surrendered its prerogatives and powers, while the judicial branch had become the domain of politically appointed judges and justices,

One does not know what will happen next, but anyone who values the primary principles of the Declaration and the Constitution must ne willing to take a stand like Otto Wels when confronted with a dictatorship in the making. Even if the President unleashes the power of the police and his own heavily armed supporters against opponents, we must remember like Otto Wels, they can “take our lives and freedom, but they cannot take our honor…”

This is something that anyone committed to the principles of the Declaration and Constitution must take seriously over the next 19 months leading to the next Presidential election. If we fail, the effects will be felt for at least a generation, and the institutions of our government will be transformed in ways that the founders could only imagine in their worst dreams.

Democrats and Never Trump conservatives must keep this in mind. Nothing is guaranteed right now, it is quite possible that Trump and his cult like supporters in Congress and the courts could enact something like the Enabling Act if we are not careful, regardless of the findings of the Mueller investigation or anything else, and we must be careful to watch for the major terrorist attack, or war that could lead to the implementation of already legislated laws, or executive orders that give nearly dictatorial powers to the executive, and which would be supported by a majority of Americans.

So until tomorrow.

Peace,

Padre Steve+

Money, Power, and Authoritarian Leaders: 1933 and Today

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Lord Acton noted:

The invitees were a “who’s who” of German industrialists and by the end of the day they had pledged over Two Million Reichsmarks to the Nazi cause.

It wasn’t hard for Hitler to win them over. They feared a Communist counter revolution against the Nazis and were still unsure of the economic plans of the Nazis. Hitler played to their fears as William Shier recorded in his book The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich:

Money and power, the sacrifice of hard earned freedoms, the selling out of political openness, workers, and Jews were irrelevant in the end. What mattered was profit and the protection of it and their status by an authoritarian state in perpetuity. As such the German industrialists, championed by Hjalmar Schacht sold their souls and their nation to Hitler. They included the head of Krupp Industries, Gustav Krupp, the head of Opel, Fritz von Opel, and leaders of Siemens, IG Farben, Allianz, and numerous others. Hitler’s desire was to raise enough money to ensure a two-thirds majority in the Reichstag in order to pass his Enabling Act which would enable Hitler to rule by decree, in order to establish a dictatorship, by parliamentary means.

Between the meeting and the election the Reichstag had burned and the Reichstag Fire Decree been enacted. In the elections that followed the Nazis still not achieve a majority in the Reichstag, much less a two-thirds majority. Even so, with the surrender and acquiescence of every remaining party but the Socialists, the Nazis passed the Enabling Act. The leaders of the German economic and banking establishment, Nazi or not were pleased. In the coming months all opposition parties were liquidated or outlawed, independent labor unions as well, ironically the day after Hitler declared May 1st as a National Holiday to honor German Workers. But Hitler’s economic supporters included corporate and banking leaders from other countries, including Henry Ford of the United States.

This is a lesson we all need to learn today. In 2016, some 6.5 Billion dollars was spent on Presidential and Congressional elections by all parties. I have not seen the estimates, but I would bet that over 10 billion dollars will be spent in the 2020 general elections. Regardless of the outcome, that cannot be a good thing.

Think about it, let it sink in.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Tagged as adolf hitler, enabling act, Fritz Opel, Gustav Krupp, He ray Ford, hermann goering, hjaldmar schacht, IG Farben, Krupp, Lord Action, money and Power, reichstag, reichstag fire, reichstag fire decree, Siemens

February 27, 2018 · 00:25

Thinking the Unthinkable: The Reichstag Fire Decree and Today

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Yesterday I wrote about the Reichstag Fire and the resultant Order of the President of the Reich for the Protection of People and State or as it is more often known as the Reichstag Fire Decree. I wrote about how perilously close that I really believe that we are to a Reichstag Fire moment in our country today.

On February 27th 1933 Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party which was still a minority party in a coalition government of partners that wouldn’t have minded his failure, became recipients of of a political gift that allowed them to seize power under the very provisions of the Republic and Constitution that they despised. A Dutch Communist The very next day Hitler with the backing of President Paul von Hindenburg issued a decree under Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution which though directed at the German Communist Party, which was banned along with its publications, applied to every political party in Germany.

Barely three weeks later the Reichstag, now emptied of Communists deputies gave its approval to the Enabling Act which gave the central government, that is Hitler to enact laws without the approval of the Reichstag, effectively ending any sort of parliamentary democracy and eviscerating the constitution. These acts gave the central government in Berlin to usurp State governments in States where non-Nazi parties held democratic majorities and to outlaw political opposition. The Social Democrats who voted against both laws were banned shortly after the Enabling Act was passed. Their leader in the Reichstag, Otto Weis proclaimed the last free words uttered in the Reichstag:

“No Enabling Law can give you the power to destroy ideas which are eternal and indestructible … You can take our lives and our freedom, but you cannot take our honour. We are defenseless but not honourless.”

The other political parties in Germany, including the conservative parties and center parties who had allied themselves with Hitler voted to dissolve themselves by the end of July 1933. None of the conservative opposition wanted to face the wrath of Hitler or his newly established extrajudicial Concentration Camps which were not run by the Ministry of Justice, but the Nazi Party.

In Germany it was the burning of the Reichstag but in any crisis the same could happen here. I think this is very possible with President Trump and a compliant Republican Party which has surrendered any sense of responsibility, including the defense of things that it fought against for years in order to maintain power by supporting a man that just two years ago most mocked and opposed; so much like the non-Nazi German conservatives and Hitler. Sadly, the Republicans don’t even have the excuse of an alleged national emergency to throw away all principle.

Now let’s think about today and lets let our minds wander into possibilities that are much more likely than they would have been a few years ago. So let’s take a journey to a future where most of us would not want to go. I mean really, I don’t want these things to happen, if not for any other reasons than things than effect me. I want to attend my 40th high school reunion on September 1st and a trip to Germany to the Oktoberfest and to visit our German friends later that month. So some things are about me, I mean if were going to lose all of our freedoms I want to get a few bucket list items in, but I digress, let’s go back to the unimaginable.

I would say close your eyes but then you wouldn’t be able to read unless you have some sort of software that turns my written words into spoken words, or unless you want me to start a podcast. If you want the latter make it worth it by doing something to get me a few extra bucks for more beer before everything goes to hell.

Let us imagine that following increased tensions and the failure of diplomacy on the Korean Peninsula a coordinated preemptive attack is launched by North Korean agents using Sarin nerve agent in the New York Subways and Washington Metro. In Chicago a SAM-7 Surface to Air Missile hits a United Airline Boeing 777 carrying almost 300 people on its descent into O’Hare Airport. As this is happening dirty bombs are deployed by other agents against major ports in Long Beach, Houston, Charleston, and Norfolk, while hackers shut down major computer networks controlling oil pipelines in the Midwest and Southeast causing oil spills and shutting down much of the nation’s petroleum distribution. Of course the someone claiming to represent the Islamic State will claim responsibility while the North Koreans deny any responsibility, sowing some doubt and confusion as to who did what.

While Federal, State and local law enforcement investigate at the points of attack, the FBI, CIA and NSA attempt to ascertain if and what foreign power or terrorist group was behind the attacks. In the mean time the country goes into a panic. Thousands of people were killed and injured in the subways, airports and maritime ports shut down, and prices soar, and Wall Street crashes, dumping some 30% of its value in three days. Prices for imported goods skyrocket, and the all commercial air traffic is grounded leaving millions of people stranded.

In response the President invokes measures from National Security Presidential Directive NSPD 51/Homeland Security Presidential Directive HSPD-20 of 4 May 2007, while Congress by a wide margin grants him the authority to pursue the attackers both at home and abroad. Neither the President’s opponents in the GOP or most Democrats object, after all it was about national security and the nation had been attacked; people had died, and the economy was in a major crisis.

The President, whose poll numbers were cratering and was coming closer to being implicated in by the Muller investigation uses these new powers to shut down opposition to him, including the Muller investigation in the name of national security, the siren song of all tyrants. Democrats in Congress finally realize that they have been outmaneuvered in the crisis but ti is too late, their protests go nowhere and they are labeled enemies of the state, as are responsible journalists who seek to uncover the truth. Those protesting the violations of the Constitution are jailed indefinitely without being charged in Federal and State facilities as well as for profit prisons.

As the investigation leads to the North Koreans, the President orders attacks on North Korea, leading to a nuclear exchange and major land war on the Korean Peninsula. While North Korea is obliterated, South Korea and Japan take massive hits, as do the American bases on Okinawa, Guam, and Pearl Harbor, all of which are hit by North Korean nuclear missiles. Martial law is declared and elections postponed indefinitely with the promise that once the crisis is over that they will be restored. Despite the disasters the President’s approval rating shoots up from under 40% to nearly 65%. A Supreme Court Justice who went along with the emergency degrees would later say:

“There was a fever over the land. A fever of disgrace, of indignity, of hunger. We had a democracy, yes, but it was torn by elements within, and successfully attacked by enemies abroad. Above all, there was fear. Fear of today, fear of tomorrow, fear of our neighbors, and fear of ourselves. Only when you understand that – can you understand what Trump meant to us. Because he said to us: ‘Lift your heads! Make America Great Again! Be proud to be American! There are devils among us. Liberals, Jews, Muslims, Immigrants, Gays! Once these devils will be destroyed, your misery will be destroyed.” (*adapted from the speech of Ernst Janning in Judgment at Nuremberg)

Thankfully none of this has not happened, but if Americans fail to appreciate the danger that lays ahead then all bets are off. Those who cooperate in moves to damage and undermine the American experiment in democracy and a constitutional republic with its safeguards and checks and balances will be show by their inaction and lack of resistance the truth of historian Dr. Timothy Snyder’s words: “The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be good or evil.”

Those that might doubt my concerns need only to look at the life and actions of President Trump, the cunning of North Korea, and the hyper-partisan nature and gullibility of much of the American electorate, and the response of the United States government and populace during past crises and threats to our national existence.

That cannot be allowed to happen.

Until tomorrow,

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Tagged as adolf hitler, donald trump supporters, enabling act, muller investigation, nazi party, north korea, otto weis, president donald trump, reichstag fire, reichstag fire decree, Social democratic party, terrorism

June 15, 2017 · 06:30

The Dangers of Political Violence: The Lesson of the Reichstag Fire

Friends of Padre Steve’s World,

Yesterday a man named James T. Hodgkinson opened fire on members of the Congressional Republican baseball team as they practiced for their annual game against the Congressional Democrats which is a charitable event that helps a number of local agencies that help children. House Majority Whip Steve Scalise was critically wounded and several police officers were wounded during the exchange of fire in which Hodgkinson was killed. I was shocked and infuriated by his actions. Political violence and the attempted assassination of any elected official in a democracy where we still have the ability to remove people or parties from office at the ballot box is never justified. I would call his act an act of terrorism just as I have other acts by so many others.

But unlike other times when a white shooter killed or wounded multiple people based on their race, religion, or politics I was joined by many GOP leaders. Sadly, some like Newt Gingrich, Repreantive Steve King and a host of Right Wing pundits blamed it on “typical left wing violence” while ignoring the constant attacks and threats from Right Wing extremists including members of the militia movement, the KKK, and various new-Nazi and Alt Right groups and individuals.

At least President Trump, for the first time in his presidency urged unity and extolled the best part of Americans working together. I was pleased to here his words which I think were genuine, and I hope that this will be a moment that defines his presidency in a positive way for all Americans. That being said I have reasons to doubt, not that I want to but because of his past actions which I will mention later in the article.

From was we know Hodgkinson was very active politically and quite angry at the GOP and President Trump but until today no one, even friends who knew him well would have expected him to cross the line to commit political violence. The congressman from his district from Illinois said that Hodgkinson was angry in his communications about issues but never crossed a line for the office to think that he was potentially dangerous. However, he had a history of domestic violence, destruction of property and a number of other issues. One of Hodgkinson’s Facebook posts from 2015 was a editorial cartoon criticizing Scalise. Hodkinson had been in the D.C. area a couple of weeks and had been spending time at the YMCA near the ball field where the shooting occurred. The former Mayor of Alexandria saw him a number of times and reported that he appeared to be living out of a gym bag and had offered to help Hodgkinson get a job.

I’m sure that there will be more information about Hodgkinson coming out so I will not go into any more detail or speculate why he committed this act, but I will discuss the very real dangers to civil liberty and legitimate peaceful political dissent that his act could lead.

Despite my initial optimism about how the President Trump responded today and many of his advisors have shown spoken in very authoritarian language about political dissent, demonizing their opponents, first during their GOP opponents in the primaries, then all who opposed them during the general election and afterwards. The president even blessed violent acts committed by his supporters during the campaign. Any time a protester physically responded to bullying or intimidation at Trump rallies they were set upon and then were blamed for the resulting violence even if they were the victims.

But what I am afraid is that acts such as Hodgkinson’s will result in draconian measures to limit dissent. People forget that it was the action of a single Dutch Communist acting on his own to burn down the Reichstag that gave Hitler the ability to pass the Enabling Act in March of 1933. That act gave his government unprecedented authority to arrest and detail opponents without due process rights, as well as to shut down opposition newspapers. It was followed up by other laws during the course of the Third Reich which further restricted political opposition. Often people arrested in the round ups would be acquitted of any crime but then upon release would be taken by the SA or SS to concentration camps.

Another incident was the assassination of a junior German diplomat at the German embassy in Paris in November 1938. When he died Hitler gave Josef Goebbels permission to launch a pogrom against the Jews now known as Kristallnacht. Hundreds of synagogues were burned, thousands of Jewish businesses looted, and hundreds of Jews killed, with thousands rounded up and sent to concentration camps.

The problem is that individual acts of violence against leaders who are predisposed to authoritarian responses give those leaders license to suspend laws and civil liberties on what are called exceptional circumstances. The attack by Hodgkinson could easily be construed as an act of political terrorism. As Timothy Snyder noted in his book On Tyranny:

“Modern tyranny is terror management. When the terrorist attack comes, remember that authoritarians exploit such events in order to consolidate power. The sudden disaster that requires the end of checks and balances, the dissolution of opposition parties, the suspension of freedom of expression, the right to a fair trial, and so on, is the oldest trick in the Hitlerian book. Do not fall for it.”

That is a warning to all who think that individual acts of political violence can be excused or tolerated, they end up threatening the liberties of all. While I do not think this particular attack is a Reichstag Fire moment, the next one might be and anyone who thinks that their act of violence will help the country is sadly mistaken. For that matter it is also possible that a group or individual sympathetic to Trump could create a false flag incident in order to prompt him to suppress legitimate dissent.

Like I said we will find out more as the days go by about the shooter, the attack, and the possible executive or legislative responses to it, not to mention possible violence against protestors or politicians committed by armed Trump supporters who have often threatened to respond violently to any attack against Trump or the GOP.

This is a very dangerous moment. I do pray that Representative Scalise will recover from his wounds and hope that I will not see progressives rejoice regarding the crime committed by Hodgkinson. Likewise as I mentioned earlier in the article I am heartened by President Trump’s response yesterday and I pray that it will be something that defines the rest of his presidency. I may oppose many, if not most of his policies and actions, as well as hoping that the investigation of his advisers interactions with the Russians goes forward; but I will never continue to hope and pray for the best for our country and yes even for him. That being said I am very wary based on his past words and actions and will never give up my right as an American to speak openly and honestly. I learned that lesson from many great American military men including General Smedley Butler and Colonel David Hackworth. Dissent is still an act of patriotism no matter what some people claim.

Until tomorrow,

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Tagged as Baseball, bernie sanders, congressional baseball game, enabling act, James Hodgkinson, kristallnacht, president donald trump, reichstag fire, reperesnative steve scalise, terrorism

August 8, 2012 · 02:08

Wade Page Nazi Thug versus the Respectable Nazis

Wade Page, the gunman who walked into a Sikh temple in Oak Creek Wisconsin and opened fire killing 6 members of that community was a Nazi thug. A member of the “Hate” music scene Page was a virulent racist and anti-semite. Even some of the bigger Neo-Nazi groups condemned Page’s action. However, that does not mean that they disapproved of what happened, just that the blatantness of Page’s action embarrassed them.

Page and his thuggish brothers are much like the Brownshirts, the Nazi bullies that intimidated anyone who stood in their way prior to the Nazi seizure of power and in its immediate aftermath. They were useful tools of smarter and more respectable Nazis but often proved an embarrassment to the party. When the Sturmabteilung, the SA Brownshirts became a political liability Hitler and the SS made an alliance to eliminate the SA leadership and sharply reduce that organization’s power in the Third Reich. Men like Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich who planned and executed the Holocaust held such thugs in contempt.

Page has put Neo-Nazi leaders and sympathizers on the spot. While Neo-Nazi and others like them believe and preach White Supremacism, anti-Semitism, and racism they at least publicly distain murder of people at worship. It is very hard for them to defend him to do so would be to expose themselves. However, I wonder if the victims had been Moslems if they would have condemned the action at all.

Despite the brutal nature of Page’s massacre of the Sikhs, his type of White Supremacist or Neo-Nazi is less dangerous to society than the “respectable” Nazis. In the 1920s and 1930s the quiet and “respectable” Nazis remained in the background. The were lawyers, judges, economists, police officials, teachers, engineers and physicians. They mingled with the mainline conservatives, nationalists and even monarchists. They served as civil servants, education or in the private sector and remained in the background. They were the respectable front of National Socialism. Many kept their party membership hidden from colleagues even as Hitler built bridges with industrialists, bankers and brought their party to the forefront of the German political scene.

After the seizure of power they were the men that drafted the Nuremberg Laws and the Enabling Act. They wrote laws on forcible sterilization, they ran the political, economic and bureaucratic organizations that used slave labor to power their economic machine. They sat around a table at Wansee and dictated the Final Solution to the “Jewish problem” They were the men that engineered the Holocaust. But unlike the Brownshirt “thugs” of the SA they were respectable and tried to keep their hands clean. Without them Hitler could not have succeeded in gaining absolute power or keeping it.

It is the respectable Nazis who hold back their more virulent ideas for the time that they can use the political system that they despise to gain power and government agencies that they rail against to enforce their agenda. This is exactly what National Socialist Movement leader Brian Culpepper of Tennessee advocates. He said “We insert ourselves into the infrastructure of other established parties due to the bias against us and the difficulty of third parties getting ballot access….” and that “We have people working with the most recent incoming class of freshmen in the House,…And they don’t even know it.”

The Wade Page type of Neo-Nazi or White Supremacist is easy to spot and until they do something heinous like Page did in Oak Creek most of us don’t take them seriously. Covered in racist tattoos and playing in bad bands they hardly seem a credible threat until they are caught committing a serious crime or murder.

However, people that hold similar views but are more subtle in their methods and presentation are much more dangerous. Just as men like Wilhelm Frick, Hans Frank, Wilhelm Stuckart, Ernst Kaltenbrunner and Otto Olhendorf were in the Third Reich these men and women are often well educated, come from good homes and mingle quite well. They lead think tanks, write commentary in national and local publications, websites and even provide commentary on cable news programs. They promote fear and pedal conspiracy theories involving those that they distain, accuse opponents of trying to destroy the country and refer to their opponents as liberals, socialists or communists or in league with radical Islamists. They publicly disavow violence but their ideology is that which those that commit violence use as justification for their acts.

Wade Page is a troubling figure but even more troubling those that hold the same views and given the right circumstances have the money and political capital to bring them to fruition. One only has to look at the history of the Weimar Republic to see how easily this can happen.

Peace

Padre Steve+

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Tagged as adolf hitler, brian culpepper, brownshirts, conspiracy theories, enabling act, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, Hans Frank, heinrich himmler, jewish problem, national socialist movement, nazi germany, nazi party, nazis, neo-nazis, nuremberg laws, oak creek wisconsin, Otto Olhendorf, racism, Reinhard Heydrich, sa, sikh temple shootings, ss, wade page, weimar republic, white supremacists, Wilhelm Frick, Wilhelm Stuckart

November 20, 2010 · 12:13

The Road to Totalitarianism is paved with Good Intentions

“They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” Benjamin Franklin

Hitler presides over the Reichstag during the passage of the Enabling Act

Sometimes in crisis nations enact laws that in the heat of the moment sound quite good. In fact the writers of such laws usually don’t have bad intentions, they react to a crisis enact laws to safeguard society from the events of the crisis which usually included widespread political, social and economic disruption. In 1919 with the country engulfed in economic, social, political crisis that had evolved into what amounted to a civil war Germany added an article to the Weimar Constitution. That article was Article 48 and read as follows:

Article 48 of the German Constitution of August 11, 1919:

If public safety and order in Germany are materially disturbed or endangered, the President may take the necessary measures to restore public safety and order, and, if necessary, to intervene with the help of the armed forces. To this end he may temporarily suspend, in whole or in part, the fundamental rights established in Articles 114, 115, 117, 118, 123, 124, and 153

During the turbulent history of Weimar Article 48 was used by the Socialist President Friedrich Ebert who had to guide the country through the collapse of the monarchy, the humiliation of Versailles, the period of hyperinflation as well as an attempted takeover by those who wanted to implement a Soviet government as well coup attempts from the political right. After Ebert’s death in 1925 Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg was elected President and during the economic, political and social crisis brought about by the Great Depression invested the conservative Chancellor Heinrich Brüning with the powers of Article 48, something that he also granted to Brüning’s successors Franz von Papen, Kurt von Schleicher and Adolf Hitler.

Under Hitler it was invoked after the burning of the Reichstag, the German Parliament building an event which was very likely executed by the Nazis themselves while blaming the Communists. It was issued in the following manner:

ARTICLE 1. In virtue of paragraph 2, article 48, of the German Constitution, the following is decreed as a defensive measure against communist acts of violence, endangering the state:

Sections 114, 115, 117, 118, 123, 124, and 153 of the Constitution of the German Reich are suspended until further notice. Thus, restrictions on personal liberty [114], on the right of free expression of opinion, including freedom of the press [118], on the right of assembly and the right of association [124], and violations of the privacy of postal, telegraphic, and telephonic communications [117], and warrants for house-searches [115], orders for confiscation as well as restrictions on property [153], are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed.

Following this the Reichstag passed a law called the Enabling Act. This law gave the President unlimited power which Hindenburg ceded to Hitler. When Hindenburg died in 1934 the offices of President and Chancellor were merged in the person of Adolf Hitler. This is the text of the Enabling Act legislation:

The Enabling Act of 1933

The Reichstag [the lower house of parliament] has passed the following law, which is, with the approval of the Reichsrat [the upper house], herewith promulgated, after it has been established that it satisfies the requirements for legislation altering the Constitution.

ARTICLE 1. In addition to the procedure for the passage of legislation outlined in the Constitution, the Reich Cabinet is also authorized to enact Laws referred to by Articles 85 Paragraph 2 and Article 87 of the constitution. (Article 85 outlined the process by which the Reichstag and Reichsrat approved the Reich budget. Article 87 restricted government borrowing.)

ARTICLE 2. The national laws enacted by the Reich Cabinet may deviate from the Constitution provided they do not affect the position of the Reichstag (low house of Parliament) and the Reichsrat (the Upper House). The powers of the President remain unaffected.

ARTICLE 3. The national laws enacted by the Reich Cabinet shall be prepared by the Chancellor and published in the official gazette. They come into effect, unless otherwise specified, upon the day following their publication unless they prescribe a different date. Articles 68 to 77 of the Constitution do not apply to laws enacted by the Reich government. (Articles 68 to 77 stipulated the procedures for enacting legislation in the Reichstag.)

ARTICLE 4. Treaties of the Reich with foreign states which concern matters of domestic legislation do not require the consent of the bodies participating in legislation. The Reich Cabinet is empowered to issue the necessary provisions for the implementing of these treaties.

ARTICLE 5. This law comes into effect on the day of its publication. It ceases to be valid on 1 April 1937 or if the present Reich government is replaced by another.

The Enabling Act was passed by a majority of the Reichstag by a vote of 441 to 96. The Communists had been banned and had no representation, the center and right cast aside their reservations and voted for it and only the Socialists led by their Chief Otto Wels voted against it. For their trouble most of the Socialist deputies would be imprisoned, go into concentration camps or have to flee the country.

Some leaders of religious groups that initially supported the Nazis rapidly discovered that they had made a deal with the Devil. As Martin Niemöller said:

They came first for the Communists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak up because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for me
and by that time no one was left to speak up. .

In times of crisis people seek security and stability and are often willing to sacrifice constitutional liberties to do so. Unfortunately when a people and nation willing abrogate their constitutional rights and protections by legislative action or executive order in the name of security and safety they ensure that they will lose all. The German political parties that voted in favor of the Enabling Act included cultural and religious conservatives. Most of these people feared a potential Communist takeover and continued political and economic instability more than surrendering their rights and freedoms.

Unfortunately it is my belief as well as that of many civil libertarians on both sides of the political divide that we have set the stage in this country for a totalitarian state. Our legislature passes massive bills which none have read that are so Byzantine that no one can understand them which often give nearly unchecked power to unelected bureaucrats in government agencies and often serve to grant more power to the Executive Branch at the expense of Congress, the Courts and State governments. Such legislation passed under conditions where people believe a crisis exists includes the Patriot Act of 2001, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Protection Act of 2004, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) of 2008 and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) of 2010. Most of the people that voted for these laws certainly believed that they were doing the right thing, but all contain provisions that give unelected and unaccountable bureaucrats unheard of power over the daily lives of Americans and contain provisions that sacrifice individual rights and liberties. There are numerous other examples which in conjunction with Presidential Executive Orders and Directives, some public and many secret that provide the Executive Branch willing to use them almost unbridled power. Under normal conditions no President would attempt take full advantage of such powers nor would most people accept such a power grab, but history shows that under emergency or crisis conditions people and legislatures willingly surrender liberty for supposed security.

In Weimar Germany the catalyst was the fear of Communist takeover in the midst of economic crisis that created the conditions by which non-Nazi citizens and political parties surrendered their liberties. In the wake of the attacks of September 11^th 2001, continued terrorist threats, two wars, economic crisis, the collapse of the housing market and the ineffectiveness of government leaders at the Federal and State levels the United States in a place where many people may accept an authoritarian or totalitarian regime so long as we are safe and the economy gets back on track. Instead of a Communist threat we have a Muslim extremist terrorist threat. Instead of the Great Depression we have a world economy on the brink of collapse. People are fearful; millions are going bankrupt or losing their homes and jobs and more seem to be willing to surrender freedom just to be safe and have some semblance of an orderly society again. You really can’t blame people for wanting a return to an America where it is safe and the economy is doing well there is nothing evil in that desire. Unfortunately history shows that there are those that will exploit people’s fears and longings to gain unbridled power and once they have it will stop at nothing to keep it.

In 1933 the German people surrendered their rights and freedoms for the promise of safety, security, economic recovery and a return to national greatness. The question that I have to ask is will the people of the United States of America do the same in the next few years? I think the answer is obvious. It will only take a successful terror attack on the United States Homeland, an economic collapse or a government shutdown to force the issue. People will demand results and will welcome whoever can deliver those results. We have already shown what people will accept in order to travel by commercial air and from that it is but a small step to accepting such measures in the rest of life. Get ready folks it will be a joy.

Peace

Padre Steve+

6 Comments

Filed under History, laws and legislation, national security, Political Commentary

Tagged as adolf hitler, article 48 of weimar constitution, benjamin franklin, economic crisis, Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, enabling act, executive branch, executive orders, franz von papen, friedrich ebert, great depression, heinrich bruning, Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Protection Act of 2004, kurt von schleicher, martin niemoller, nazi use of article 48, otto wels, Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) of 2010., Patriot Act of 2001, paul von hindenburg, presidential directives, reichstag fire, september 11th 2001, socialist party of germany, totalitarianism, treaty of versailles, Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) of 2008, weimar germany, weimar hyper-inflation, weimar republic

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