"Some on the left compare W. to Hitler. Nothing could be more wrong. It is our embarrassing distinction in the United States to have acquired a follower as our leader. You don't picture him on the podium at Nuremberg. No, you see him in the third row of the crowd on the rally floor. Look for his face, there, among the other sons!"[from the story W. in n+1, a bi-annual journal you should subscribe to; photograph of young Adolf, 7 years old]
5 comments:
I'm not sure what to think. Of course, the article is right in saying that the comparison between Hitler and Bush is a poor one—Hitler killed six million Jews. Iraqi casualties are far less, and the motive for attacking Iraq was not one of hate. Comparing a genocide to a war is not an apt comparison. (If we compared civilian casualties in both wars, I am quite certain that there were more in WWII.) You might also add that Hitler was good for Germany's economy while Bush....
But what I don't understand about this blurb is that it almost seems to say that having a leader, even if it means having Hitler, is better than having a follower posing as the country's leader. Then again, I haven't read the complete article.
Interesting thought. As I see it, he is not trying to equate the 'embarrassment' of having a president who launches into war with (ostensibly) good intentions/bad strategy to the tragedy of having a dictator like Hitler who's intentions and actions were BOTH terribly misaligned.
It is an interesting case of delineation though...the leader as an idealistic follower. I hesitate to say that in this age, whatever it is - post-modernism or what have you - idealism is dead. That we are too rational. I want to say that Bush is the exception that proves the rule.
Then again, when idealism dies, will our future MLK's, Gandhi's, Theresa's go with it?
Then also, will our Hitler's?
Jason,
I think you're right in saying that idealism is dead, but I don't know if its at the hand of rationality. Look at the progressives in the early 1900's. They were the picture of idealism but also the picture of rationality. The idea was that if we learned enough, if we just used the sciences and the new managerial techniques, we could solve any problem (with the notable exceptions of WWII, Wilson's failed Treaty of Versailles; poverty; and race.)
I don't know what has killed the idealism—probably being on top for too long. There's no epic struggle taking place, as there has been for so long in the United States (Civil War, Western Expansion, WWI, Depression, WWII, Cold War....)
Is it kosher to quote 'Fight Club' as a legitimate source in this discussion? Yes.
Tyler Durden:
"Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don't need. We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off."
Idealism should be dead. What should be alive is hope, and they are different entities. Idealism seems, to me, to imply a notion that if we manufacture the proper systems, engineer the right responses, and work hard enough we'll reach our ideals.
Hope suggests an orientation towards rightness in the face of powerlessness. And Christian hope in particular is rooted not in an idea but in the person of Christ.
As for the leadership thing, I would agree that W is a follower, and not a very critical one at that, letting himself be led into the territories of ideologues--people with ideals that give answers with no reference to the evidence they encounter. I would prefer to be hopeful, which is rooted in something beyond ideas in spite of the evidence.
dw
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