Inspiration

I hope people are reading these posts, because no one is leaving any comments!!

I am now on page 102. Slow going primarily because of the Thanksgiving holiday. On page 95 we are in the middle of discussing how Bismark inspired and unified the people into the Second Reich. Much has been discussed about the ideals of Bismark up to this point, but the next quotes have to do with the mentality of German politics at the time.

"Despite the democratic facade put up by the establishment of the Reichstag, whose members were elected by universal manhood suffrage, the German Empire was in reality a militarist autocracy ruled by the King of Prussia, who was also Emperor. The Reichstag possessed few powers; it was little more that a debating society where the representatives of the people let off steam or bargained for shoddy benefits for the classes they represented. The throne had the power---by divine right. As late as 1910 Wilhelm II could proclaim that the royal crown had been "granted by Gods Grace alone and not by parliaments, popular assemblies and popular decision...Considering myself an instrument of the Lord," he added, "I go my own way."

"He was not impeded by Parliament. The Chancellor he appointed was responsible to him, not to the Reichstag. The assembly could not overthrow a Chancellor nor keep him in office. That was the prerogative of the monarch."

"The middle classes, grown prosperous by the belated but staggering development of the industrial revolution and dazzled by the success of Bismark's policy of force and war, had traded for material gain any aspirations for political freedom they may have had.* They accepted the Hohenzollern autocracy. They gladly knuckled under to the Junker bureaucracy and they fervently embraced Prussian militarism."

" * In a sense, the German working class made a similar trade. To combat socialism Bismark put through, between 1883 and 1889, a program for social security far beyond anything known in other countries. It included compulsory insurance for workers against old age, sickness, accident and incapacity and though organized by the state, it was financed by employers and employees. It cannot be said that it stopped the rise of the Social Democrats or the trade unions, but it did have a profound influence on the working class in that it gradually made them value security over political freedom and caused them to see the State, however conservative, as a benefactor and a protector. Hitler, as we shall see, took full advantage of this state of mind. In this, as in other matters, he learned much from Bismark. "I studied Bismark's socialist legislation," Hitler remarks in Mein Kampf (p. 155), "in its intention, struggle and success.""

Congress as of today has as little or less influence in what goes on in our countries policy making and implementation than that of the Reichstag. The Bush administration may not have done all of the damage, but they sure have seized the opportunity to reap the benefits. The Bush administration has admitted over live national television that the legislative branch of our government holds no power over the executive branch. Also quoted as saying, "if congress does not pass the bill, we will still implement it and enforce the laws in said bill as if they were laws." Therefore, the throne in this analogy would be the presidential seat.

Also, the Chancellor position would go to the Vice President. Going on the record to state that his position as Vice President and the President of the Senate results in a quasi-hybrid title whereas neither have any jurisdiction over your position.

The middle class here is in a sense, the middle class of the 80's. And the industrial revolution could be equated with the dot com revolution. Those who made their money via the internet and stock market. Notice how the middle class has been slowly drifting away from the working class? They became so focused on making money and retirement that they have not even seen the freedoms being taken from them.

The working class is the same here. And this is probably the most striking quote to date from my read. Social Security. If this is not a total blueprint for the American mindset of today. Never have I seen the impact of our social security system laid out so well, and it is not even about ours....it is Germany's.

Please post comments if you have read this. Like I said before, I welcome comments and really want to continue to post here. It is hard going though, so some support would help. Thanks

Dan

Economic theory

Today I read about some of the excerpts for Mein Kampf. The one I found interesting here on page 84 is about Hitler's idea that economics is not the responsibility of the government.

"The state has nothing at all to do with any definite economic conception or development...The state is a racial organism and not an economic organization...The inner strength of a state coincides only in the rarest cases with so-called economic prosperity; the latter, in innumerable cases, seems to indicate the state's approaching decline...Prussia demonstrates with marvelous sharpness that not material qualities but ideal virtues alone make possible the formation of a state. Only under their protection can economic life flourish. Always when in Germany there was an upsurge of political power the economic conditions began to improve; but always when economies became the sole content of our people's life, stifling the ideal virtues, the state collapsed and in a short time drew economic life with it...Never yet has a state been founded by peaceful economic means..."

He says here that a strong economy cannot exist without a strong government and a strong government will inevitably bring about a strong economy. Yet it is when the government begins to get involved in the intricacies of the economy, and the people become obsessed with the economy and not the practices of the state, both will shortly collapse.

I like this excerpt because of the current stock market situation and the steady decline of the Dollar to the Euro. The American economy has risen and fallen with the times I know, but there has been multiple occasions where the government has interfered and our economy has never truly rebound.

Example 1:
The removal of the US dollar from the gold reserve. In other words, we told the world that we did not need the gold to back our money. (We actually do not have enough gold in the US to cover all of the money in circulation.)

Example 2:
The Fed Reserve bank at the request of the US Gov, has continually cut interest rates in order to try to stabilize the economy, with little or no success. The Interest rate cuts have helped the decline of the dollar in the world market.

Please continue this discussion in the comment section below. Lets see what you think the quote might mean.

Good day again....

Dan

The Economy

Today I read about the fall of the German economy. I shall take this time to write some of the interesting facts pointed out in the book.

"The Mark, as we have seen, had begun to slide in 1921, when it dropped to 75 to the dollar; the next year it fell to 400 and by the beginning of 1923 to 7000."

"The stangulation of Germany's economy hastened the final plung of the mark. On the occupation of the Ruhr in Jan. 1923, it fell to 18,000 to the dollar; by July 1 it had dropped to 160,000; by August1 to a million. By November, when Hitler thought his hour had struck, it took four billion marks to buy a dollar, and thereafter the figures became trillions. German currency had become utterly worthless. The life savings of the middle classes and the working classes were wiped out."

"The inflation could have been halted by merely balancing the budget--a difficult but not impossible feat. Adequate taxation might have achieved this, but the new government did not dare to tax adequatley. After all, the cost of the war (WWI)-164 billion marks-had been met not even in part by direct taxation but 93 billions of it by war loans, 29 billions out of Treasury bills and the rest by increasing the issue of paper money."

"From the on, goaded by the big industrialists and landloards, who stood to gain through the masses of the people were financially ruined, the government deliberately let the mark tumble in order to free the state of its public debts, to escape from paying reparations and to sabatoge the French in Ruhr. Moreover, the destruction of the currency enabled German heavy industry to wipe out its indebtedness by refunding its obligations in worthless marks. The General Staff, disguised as the Office of Troops to evade the peace treaty which supposedly had outlawed it, took notice that the fall of the mark wiped out the war debts and thus left Germany financially unencumbered for a new war."

I find this point of history particularly interesting, given our present economic situation, because the government and the mass media outlets do not make it known why we are losing ground to the Euro. The US dollar is currently worth the least it ever has been and there are no reasons as to what is going on. Gas prices are continuing to soar and the reason given is because of lackluster oil productions and "terrorism". The real reason that it is costing more is because the value of the dollar is plummeting.

Interesting similarities can be made here and I hope you can point out those I have missed.

Good day,

Dan

Is The Past The Key To The Future?

I have been reading a book called 'The Rise and Fall of The Third Riech', in order to better understand how a mortal man was able to raise himself up to a godlike status and be tolerated by the people, all the while torturing and tormenting a majority of the population. Now while I am only about 63 pages into the text, (63 out of 1200 or so), I have discovered some striking similarities between what was going on in Germany post WWI and pre WWII and what is going on today in the US. I will make it a point to detail my findings and thier implications to our modern society as I continue to read.

I hope that you find this as compelling as I do, in order to maybe, oh..i don't know..., learn from our mistakes while we still can.

Thanks for reading.

Dan