INSANITY IN THE HEADLINES: How an otherwise ‘Good’ People come to accept Blatant Lies from their Government

I was watching a tape of O’Reilly’s interview with Obama before the Super Bowl and I was struck by the Presidents parsing of words and out-right lying about the facts.  In this day and age of video and audio and the Internet, I can’t believe anyone would have the audacity to tell such bold faced lies.  But then it hit me; I’ve seen this pattern before:

“The size of the lie is a definite factor in causing it to be believed, for the vast masses of a nation are in the depths of their hearts more easily deceived than they are consciously and intentionally bad. The primitive simplicity of their minds renders them a more easy prey to a big lie than a small one, for they themselves often tell little lies, but would be ashamed to tell big lies.”

–Adolf Hitler

[NOTE: We can find the pattern in most any dictator, but I use Hitler because he is one of the better examples and because I am most familiar with this period in history.]

Now, we must understand, Hitler claims that leaders can get away with lying because people are stupid.  Read his words again: “The primitive simplicity of their minds renders them a more easy prey to a big lie than a small one,…”  By implication, it is assumed that the reader will naturally grant that Adolf is not among these ‘simpletons.’  No, he is much more intelligent, sophisticated and ‘nuanced’ in his thinking.  And there is a lot – and I mean a lot of this in Obama, as well. However, Hitler was not nearly so ‘brilliant’ as he thought himself to be and neither is Obama.  If Hitler had been as aware of human nature as he wants us to believe, then he would have at least given some passing acknowledgement that the German people were actually aware that he was lying; it just didn’t benefit them to say anything about it.  This is because Hitler drove his country into debt to buy their participation in his lies. After the war started, he simply stole what he needed to keep the German population bought off from the nations he had invaded.  In other words, Hitler bribed the German people to go along with his delusion.  And, once again, Obama is guilty of the same thing – but then, so are the American people as guilty as the Germans were in the 1930’s.

That’s right: Hitler bought the willing participation of the German people.  They knew about the Holocaust, but they didn’t care.  They knew that Germany was looting the occupied nations, but they didn’t care.  They didn’t care because Hitler took great pains to make sure the German people received material benefit for supporting him and his regime.  I cannot urge you strongly enough to read Gotz Aly’s book, “Hitler’s Beneficiaries: Plunder, Racial War, And the NAZI Welfare State.”  Read it and you will understand just how far Hitler went to bribe people to go along with his plans.  It had nothing to do with the people being ‘stupid;’ that’s just something all self-appointed elite like to tell themselves to make themselves feel superior and entitled to the positions they seek.  No, it had everything to do with good, old-fashioned human greed – the same greed we see in a vast majority of America today.

But it doesn’t stop there.  The similarities between 1930’s Germany and the political tactics Hitler used to manipulate the German people as compared with modern America are scary to those who know them.  For example, Hitler said this about ‘terrorism:’

“Terrorism is the best political weapon for nothing drives people harder than a fear of sudden death.”

Now, ask yourself, how much of our liberty has been lost to ‘The War on Terror?’  And yet, Obama is telling us that the war on terror is mostly over.  So why hasn’t the government ended all the programs and closed the agencies that were created to help us fight the war on terror and keep us safe at home?  The answer is simple, and it is the same reason Hitler never gave up any of the control he seized.  Our government has no interest in allowing us to be free.  It wants to control every aspect of our lives – period.

Hitler made the Jews into scapegoats, but few people realize he also attacked Capitalism – if you were a Capitalist that did not have the favor of the NAZI Party, that is.  If your name was Messerschmit, or Porche, you were protected by the State.  But if your name was Heinkle, then you either did what the State told you to do or you lost control of your business.  I used those names for a reason.  First, Heinkel was not liked by Hitler, so his aircraft company was given very few military contracts.  But William Messerchmit and Porche were both liked and favored.  In the end, this cost the German military dearly.  Now, this is good for the free world, but it is an example of how centrally planned governments often suffer from their own corruption and political favoritism.  In this case, Heinkel made a night fighter that could have greatly impacted the British night bombing campaign, but Hitler didn’t like Heinkel, so his fighter didn’t receive any money or attention until the war was almost over.  And Porche continuously received funding for a drive system used in German tanks that simply did not work and should have been abandoned but wasn’t because of Hitler’s affinity for Porche.  As for Willie Messerchmit, his fortunes ebbed and waned, according to whether or not he was in good favor with Hitler at the time.  And the German air force (Luftwaffe) suffered for it when they could least afford to suffer.

Today, Obama’s enemies are ‘the rich’ (just like Hitler), ‘Conservatives’ (for Hitler, it was the Jews) and the TEA Party (for Hitler, it was Communism).  Americans say they oppose a large part of what Obama is doing to the country, but the majority is only paying lip service to their opposition because they receive some benefit from the government.  So, while they are all in favor of ending someone else’s benefit, they are not so willing to end theirs.  The net result is a skyrocketing national debt and a bought-off population (just like 1930’s Germany).  And this is also why, when people see Obama lying on TV, they know he is lying, but they are unwilling to take any meaningful action that might cause their benefits to end.  And this is how an otherwise (or formerly) ‘good’ people comes to accept open lies from its government.  It is that simple.