Evil Capitalists: History Repeats Itself.
W. B. Yeats composed a poem in 1920, titled "The Second Coming," that contains many quotable lines. The following lines affect me that most:
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold. . . .
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Interestingly, I found these lines in a book titled The Nazi Seizure of Power, by the late William Sheridan Allen, a professor of history at New York State University. Allen describes Germany as a divided nation, where "the centre cannot hold," where the best lack conviction, and the "worst" have more than just "passionate intensity." They have a nihilistic hatred of the present and their own negated status in it.
The life-experiences of the "worst" have left them with the no regard for the present, as Eric Hoffer described them. Hoffer continues that the battle for control of the future will be fought by the best and the worst over the heads of the inert people in the middle. That leaves the future up for grabs, where the grabbiest will probably win. In Weimar Germany, both the Nazis and the Communists behaved
grabbily. They hardly fit Hoffer's definition of the "best and the worst."
The moderate middle in Germany, afflicted with social inertia, lacked the initiative and leadership to respond to the grabby opposites. It could only offer, says Professor Allen, a "prissy moderation," that could not compensate for the middle's intimidation and lack of conviction. Basically, it could not push itself beyond fatalistic indifference. In the end, the passive middle went along with the victor—Communist or Fascist? It hardly mattered.
About pre-Nazi Germany, Americans typically believe that the right-wing Nazis defeated the left-wing Communists. In reality, they both represent radical, totalitarian concepts with only cosmetic differences. At the rate America is going, we will have to deal with the same radical extremes, with the hapless moderate middle waiting for the ax to fall. Can't we do better than that?
Americans believe that the Capitalist Nazis defeated the Communist Left. In reality, the Nazis were as anti-capitalist as the Communists, because they associated Capitalism with the Jews. Do you not believe me? Then take a look at Nazi-propaganda. Professor Allen said the Nazis built entire rallies around anti-capitalist themes:
"Down with the Dictatorship of the Moneybags!" (From The Nazi Seizure of Power, page 134)
and "The German Worker as a Slave to International Capitalists." (ibid. page 31) Again, with a gleeful Jew towing German slaves in handcuffs.
Really, except for cosmetic differences, Nazi hostility to Capitalism resembles the Marxist hostility, minus the anti-semitism. Take a look at the similarities between Nazi propaganda and the Marxist variety, gleaned from Facebook. Both Nazis and Communists realized they could stoke envy and hatred in a poorly-informed citizenry.
Tarring someone a Capitalist war-profiteer works as well as anything. The propaganda against Elon Musk amounts to character-assassination, but it can't hold a candle to the Jewish "Kriegsgewinnler" or war-profiteer in the Nazi cartoon. It just causes an eruption of hatred in the viewer.
Finally, notice this Facebook post from Lizzy the Lezzie about capitalist hoarders. If someone took some of the capitalists' money, they could alleviate the suffering of the poor. Not surprisingly, the Nazi had already discovered this vein of thought: Take the money hoarded by Jewish capitalists and distribute it among the poor and suffering. The similarity is just uncanny.
