[al_c]

The default, knee-jerk response to any political or cultural disagreement these days is to declare the situation analogous to WWII Germany and to liken one’s antagonist to Nazi figures of varying rank from brownshirted street thugs up to and including Hitler himself. It’s lazy because it’s common and common because it’s lazy.

This can NOT be repeated enough.

[MV=PY]

Excellent, well-written, logical piece!

Thanks for posting.

[JusPasenThru]

“Nice speech. Now what?”

[Bruce Campbells Chin]

Nice post.

The core problem is that the federal bureacracy has morphed into a largely unaccountable fourth branch of government. The entire concept of regulations written and made legally enforceable by someone who was not elected by anyone violated republican norms. Then when you add in things like civil service and whistleblower protections, those folks are no longer employed at the will of the President.

They're a major locus of power in the federal government, and completely unelected. That is a travesty.

[Wilhelm Tell]

We’ve gone from the banality of evil to the evil of banality.

[babble-on]

banality of weasel ?

[Montaignes Cat]

Lots to think about in your essay.

[JusPasenThru]

Along the same lines: https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2012/02/hhs-and-soft-totalitarianism

The experts get to dictate our lives because, well, they went to expert school and learned from other experts that they themselves are experts and we’re not and we need to shut the hell up and do what they tell us to.

Kent and Taylor are the paradigm of the above.

[mjp]

The evil of Nazi Germany is the same as the evil of leftardism, because deep down they both are based on and have the same fundamental principles: emotionalism, altruism, collectivism, totalitarian statism, and socialism. They are variants of the same paradigm that has existed in Western culture since Plato.

[x]

Furshlugginer Bube mit wilden Augen.

[Tijeras_Slim]

A pleasure to read.

[Texas Fossil]

Thank you for your observations.

Many years ago, I struggled through Hannah Arendt’s “The Origins of Totalitarianism”. Most difficult book I ever read. Sentence structure alone was complex.

I read that book to come to understand how the Jews in Europe allowed themselves to be caught up in the Holocaust. It helped me to understand some of it, but I never fully grasped it.

—

My view?

Totalitarianism in all forms is Evil. Progressive, Socialist, Marxist, Fascist, Communist, Dictator, Islamist, “Bureaucrap”.. All Evil!

[WLusvardi]

Hannah Arendt was a leftist who projected authoritarianism onto the political Right and despised the Working Class. She twisted everything.

[GOPJ]

I never believed in the ‘banality of evil’... and thought she was misguided at best.

Aside from that, wondering what famous historical figures might have thought about an issue is seldom more that projection and riding on the power and reputation of others to push forth our own ideas.

I couldn't get past the premise of this piece.

[The_Media_never_lie]

You write a pretty good column. Are you someone we would know?

[gogeo]

Excellent.