I have long held the opinion that invoking Hitler in a political discussion is fatuous and lazy.

[11 Bravo]

Bush was not Hitler. Neither is Trump. No one else is Hitler.
But I will posit this: By the time we are finally able to refer to this miserable piece of subhuman garbage in the past tense, I believe that Trump, via his mishandling of Covid, evisceration of the USAID, cuts to SNAP benefits, veteran's benefits, Medicare, Medicaid, and a host of other programs may actually wind up being responsible for more deaths than Pol Pot, or ... yes ... Adolf Hitler.
And every single Republican shitweasel who supported him and his execrably cruel policies will bear some responsibility for that.

[malaise]

1. Agree100%

Rec

[underpants]

2. This was a fucked day

They wiped out much of The New Deal
60 years of USAID can’t be rebuilt

[Gimpyknee]

14. The USAID is not going away. It's just been moved to the State Department under the brilliant leadership of Marco Rubio.

[Stargleamer]

3. From Godwin himself:

Godwin published an opinion in The Washington Post stating "Yes, it's okay to compare Trump to Hitler. Don't let me stop you.". In the article, Godwin says "But when people draw parallels between Donald Trump’s 2024 candidacy and Hitler’s progression from fringe figure to Great Dictator, we aren’t joking. Those of us who hope to preserve our democratic institutions need to underscore the resemblance before we enter the twilight of American democracy."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law

[brush]

7. Yeah, Godwin's Law, the years-old internet meme that whoever invokes Hitlers name...

immediately loses the argument.

[luxmatic]

9. Not quite...

"As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."

I was on Usenet in 1990, and that's exactly what happened. 35 years ago! Wow.

[brush]

20. Huh? Not qute? I said years-old meme. No word salad pls.

[KT2000]

4. I find the comparison apt

The same techniques Hitler used to centralize power are being used by trump and his minions. Both use a paramilitary, ICE and Brown Shirts) to perform ethnic cleansing. They both appointed ignorant sycophants to executive positions. Both attacked institutions of higher education. Both had laws changed to facilitate their goals. Both generate fear in the population to control. And more.
We know that trump studied Hitler and the Third Reich and he harbors some of the same prejudices. His father, who trump idolized, was known to be sympathetic to some Nazi organizations. He was also known to be a racist.

The major difference is that trump is not really that intelligent and relies on the Heritage Foundation and advisors like Miller to get the job done. Trump is more the useful idiot that Hitler was.

Trump and Hitler are not amazing individuals, just sociopaths. Mao can be included as he also used some of the same tactics, especially the Red Guards.

We all know where the Nazis went with their beliefs. I believe to ignore the similarities is to ignore the reality. When you take away someone's access to medical care, nutritional support, and incarcerating people without due process, in a swamp - we are getting close! The methods of murder are different is all.

[brush]

21. Well said, KT.

[druidity33]

5. Well, there's this...

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2023/12/19/godwins-law-trump-hitler-00132427

and this...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/12/20/godwins-law-trump-hitler-comparisons/

from Mike Godwin of Godwin's Law.

[enigmania]

6. His name will join the lexicon of assholes like Hitler and Stalin.

[unblock]

8. it took many years. jews and others have warned for decades that "it can happen here" and we must be vigilant

but they managed to turn "hitler" into a caricature, and extraordinary extreme, a comically unrealistic figure.

instead of heeding the warnings about fascism, bigotry, and dictatorship, instead they reduced hitler's crimes down to exterminating jews and starting a world war.

the problem with that is by the time any of that happens, it's far, far too late to stop it, except by other nations destroying it all.

the warnings that were relevant was about hitler *before* the enabling act in 1933. by the time he had dictatorial powers, it was too late to stop what followed.


the parallels between donnie and hitler are extraordinary. the lies, the hate, the threats, the replacing of personal whim over established law, the media control, the corruption, and the brazen obviousness of it all yet still no one can do anything about it, all very much the same.

so where exactly does this lead? donnie hasn't yet exterminated millions or started a world war, but who or what would stop him?

donnie and the republican party have no guardrails, no moral compass, there is nothing within them to hold back and say "woah, that's a bit extreme don't you think?" nothing. only checks and balances can stop them. public opinion, condemnation from the media. but they are well down the path of eliminating all opposing voices. congress will never impeach him, even if the house did, the senate would never remove him. many republicans in congress think this one crappy bill is a political disaster, yet they can't help themselves, they still have to vote for it. and the supreme court has repeatedly pwned itself to help donnie.

and then there's the media, which told us not to vote for dukakis because he once released one prisoner who later committed a crime, not to vote for gore because he boasted once, not to vote for hillary because some emails that sorta had classified info passed through a server she set up that users were told not to put classified info on, now heap praise on donnie, who is demonstrably 1000 times worse than any of that.

they barely even mention that he's a convicted criminal. endless wall-to-wall coverage about a baseless and corrupt search for evidence of a crime against hillary, with pronouncements that an indictment would destroy her career, then when donnie is convicted on 34 counts, they shrug and say gee, no one seems to care.

so fine, donnie is not hitler 1944. yet.

but he sure as sh*t looks a hell of a lot like hitler 1933, and he's almost nearly got an american version of the enabling act. in practice, who's gonna stop him?

it should surprise no one if elections rigged, blatantly or subtlely going forward, in any case in a way that keeps donnie and/or his chosen successor in power for decades, and the things they do will only get worse and worse.

so a world war and or genocide within 10 years? that should come as no surprise.

but the bottom line, is that we're nearing the very last chances to stop it all and restore democracy, if we haven't crossed that line already.

[Hekate]

10. We now have Concentration Camps. Death Camps. I'm done with euphemisms.

We have descended into Hell. Whether Hitler’s name is mentioned or not is almost beside the point.

[LittleGirl]

11. Don't forget the 400,000 covid

Deaths before he left office in 2020.
He didn’t give a shit about those people.

[red dog 1]

12. He may not be Hitler, but he does admire Hitler.

For years, he kept by his bed a copy of "My New Order," a collection of Hitler's speeches.

[damifino10]

13. TRUMP is

A mass serial killer. We will never know how many people the asshole has caused to die/ Covid, medicare and failing hospitals, etc. etc, etc. Hope you are not one of his victims.

[mdbl]

15. Trumps reference should be "Shitler"

that rings better to me.

[SocialDemocrat61]

16. Hitler wasn't Hitler

when he started.

[allegorical oracle]

17. Agree that no one IS Hitler, but he left a roadmap. Just viewed a

documentary about Hanna Arendt, who was a writer arrested by the Nazis.

Arendt posited after living through the Nazi overtaking of Germany:

One day everyone is striving to maintain their normal lives -- the next day all the rules have changed. One by one the changes occur -- co-opting civil rights, universities, courts, news reporting, politics, immigration, and finance.

Studying Hitler is like practicing your basketball free throw or your baseball swing. It's recognizing what is happening and how to deal with it.

We are in jeopardy.

[Martin Eden]

18. Trump would have millions executed if he could

Immigrants and political adversaries. Due process, detention, transport, are all a major nuiscance. Kill and disposal is quicker, easier.

He is a racist, a megalomaniac, and a fascist, but but not an ideolgue like Hitler. He came from wealth and privilage. His primary motivation is to feed his insatiable ego by being at the very top and having everyone around supplicating, following orders.

Hitler had visions of a Greater Germany for the aryan race, but Trump really doesn't care about making America or the people in it great. It's all just part of the con job for self promotion.

[LuvLoogie]

19. MAGA is those Germans, though.

People are getting disappeared. People are dying in the camps. And MAGA are saying, "Yeah, so?"

Hitler is a duck. trump is a duck.