OMINIOUS PARALLELS

 We have a little historical quiz for you. No Googling! See how you do. 

1) Who said "Immigrants are poisoning the blood of our country?"

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler C) 

2) Having won an election, who said "There has never been anything like this in our history?" 

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler C) Thomas Dewey 

3)  Upon assuming power, who said "We will never surrender power. They will have to drag our corpses out of here" ? 

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler C) Stephen Miller D) Joseph Goebbels 

4)  Having lost an election, who went to court to have the election results nullified? 

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler C) Both Trump and Hitler D) Harold Stassen 

5) Having lost an election, who said "This feat has never been equaled and I have done this despite the unconstitutional ban placed on my broadcasting election appeals." 

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler  C) Al Gore 

6) Having been indicted and charged with a crime, who vowed revenge on politicians who "stabbed me in the back" and called them "traitors"? 

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler C) Joseph McCarthy 

7) Running for office, who promised to "dismantle the multi-party political system that fractured the nation and pitted individual against individual, farmer against farmer and labor against workers?"

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler C) Karl Marx

8) When briefed on _____'s behavior and after meeting him,  a political power broker was heard to say "What am I to do with that psychopath?" Who was the speaker talking about? 

A) Donald Trump B) Adolph Hitler C) Mao 

______________

Answers 

NB: Our source for the Hitler comments is the wonderful new book Takeover, Hitler's Rise to Power by Timothy W. Ryback. 

1)  Trump was quoted by saying this in recent political rallies and told that Hitler used the same words. 

2)  On July 31, 1932, Hitler said this about the results of his National Socialist Party winning 230 seats in the 600 member Reichstag. The National Socialists won the largest block of votes, although not a majority that Hitler was hoping for, it allowed him to form a coalition and be offered the Chancellorship. We find it remarkable that Hitler used the "No one has seen anything like this" type of rhetoric  that the former president often includes in his comments about nearly everything.  

3) Joseph Goebbels said this after Hitler was offered the Chancellorship. It is ominous that Trump has his own Goebbels in Miller. 

4) Both Hitler and Trump went to court after they lost an election. In April 1932, before the July election, Hitler lost the Reich presidency to  Hindenburg by 5,941,582 votes.  The Court upheld the election results, ruling that the margin of victory was "so significant that it made no sense for a national recount of the ballots."  Hitler nevertheless declared victory and claimed the election was stolen. Sound familiar? 

5) This was Hitler after the loss in April 1932. His words sound strangely familiar though, don't they? Be honest, many of you thought Trump said this. And that should bother you as much as it does us. 

6) This was Hiter after being arrested in 1919 after the failed Beer Hall Putsch. He also vowed "heads will roll". 

7) Hitler said this. 

8) Kurt Von Schleicher, the German defense minister who was known as the ultimate Berlin Power broker said this after meeting with Hitler to discuss the results of the July 1932 election. 

The point of this little exercise is how closely the words of two evil men mirror each other. We have no idea if Trump chooses his words to mirror Hitler. We doubt he is that smart. But what Trump is doing is using the same playbook that Hitler used. Both men gained power by appealing  to an uneducated and depressed lower middle class for his power, blaming the troubles of their respective countries on immigrants.