I just don't get it...When dictators take over the first to go

[EC]

(be killed or exhiled) are the liberals - librarians, teachers, artists, scientists etc.


So why don't the people of the right screaming for our demise, realize which side of history they are emulating? Don't they know they are shilling for devils?

[catbyte]

1. Well, the problem is...

The teabaggers ALSO hate liberals, teachers, artists, scientists, etc., so they don't see anything wrong with it in their shriveled, pathetic, evil little brains.

Diane

Anishnabe in MI

[MineralMan]

2. They are doing that.

All the time.

[RaleighNCDUer]

3. They simply don't know, or understand, history.

They could watch the History channel for a thousand hours straight and not hear that when the Reds took over Russia it was not the right who was their first target, but Kerensky and the liberals. The right that didn't flee in the civil war pretty much joined in with the bolsheviks.

Same in Germany. When the Nazis seized power they fought the communists, but their first targets were the liberals who supported democracy - many hard-core Nazis were radical communists who converted.

The real break down is not right and left, but authoritarian and anti-authoritarian.

[Fumesucker]

4. Feature not a bug from their perspective..

The book "The Authoritarians" explains it far better than I can in a single post, it's available to read online for free.

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/

OK, what’s this book about? It’s about what happened to the American government after "conservatives" gained control of Congress in the 1990s and the White House in 2000. It’s about the disastrous decisions that government made, which have created the enormous problems we face now. It’s about the corruption that rotted the Congress. It’s about how traditional conservatism has nearly been destroyed by authoritarianism. It’s about how the “Religious Right” teamed up with amoral authoritarian leaders to push its un-democratic agenda onto the country.

“Well,” you might be thinking, “I don’t believe any of this is true.” Or maybe you’re thinking, “What else is new? I’ve known this all along.” Why should a conservative, moderate, or liberal bother with this book? Why should any Republican, Independent, or Democrat click the “Introduction” link on this page?

Because if you do, you’ll begin an easy-ride journey through some relevant scientific studies I have done on authoritarian personalities--one that will take you a heck of a lot less time than the decades it took me. Those studies have a direct bearing on all the topics mentioned above. So if you think the first paragraph is a lot of hokum, or full of half-truths, I invite you to look at the research.

For example, take the following statement: “Once our government leaders and the authorities condemn the dangerous elements in our society, it will be the duty of every patriotic citizen to help stomp out the rot that is poisoning our country from within.” Sounds like something Hitler would say, right? Want to guess how many politicians, how many lawmakers in the United States agreed with it? Want to guess what they had in common?

Or how about a government program that persecutes political parties, or minorities, or journalists the authorities do not like, by putting them in jail, even torturing and killing them. Nobody would approve of that, right? Guess again.

Don’t think for a minute this doesn’t concern you personally. Let me ask you, as we’re passing the time here, how many ordinary people do you think an evil authority would have to order to kill you before he found someone who would, unjustly, out of sheer obedience, just because the authority said to? What sort of person is most likely to follow such an order? What kind of official is most likely to give that order, if it suited his purposes? Look at what experiments tell us, as I did.

If, on the other hand, you’re way ahead of me, and believe the extreme right-wing elements in America are still working to take over the country despite the recent election--nay because of it--I think you can still get a lot from this book. The authoritarians aren’t going away.

[tom_paine]

5. Historical awareness and self-awareness aren't exactly character traits of

Right-Wing Authoritarian Followers.

One might even go so far to say is that they self-select (and are selected by the RW Authoritarian Leaders) for the fact that they know no history but what Bushiganda tells them (and as with deficits and many other things it matters not if yesterday's Bushiganda contradicts today's Bushiganda).

It's a laughably sad state of mind, and yet, it has driven humanity for almost the entirety of human history.

The Rich team up with the Mean, Stupid & Gullible, then it's "Kill the Liberals" time. Perhaps the oldest story of humanity.

http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/

[HeresyLives]

6. The first up against the wall are intellectuals.

The so-called 'elite'.

What the right calls 'librul elites'.

Whitch is why it puzzles me that people on here are always ranting against the 'elites'.

That's not helpful.

As to intellectuals: 'librarians, teachers, artists, scientista', yes...or as Pol Pot decided in Cambodia 'everyone with an education, or even people wearing glasses,which, according to the regime, meant that they were literate.'

Now look at the party of Rush, Beck, Palin....whose side would they be on?

[EC]

7. Exactly...

When I was a kid I decided I wanted to be on the side of the nice people who didn't want to kill others like the nazi's did....I was a kid...like 7 or so, so why can't these grown-ups reason it out, that they are screaming for the side that are exactly what they are afraid we are...