Arnold Schwarzenegger was born in Austria just after WW II, and should have been all too painfully aware of the history of the Weimar Republic and 3rd Reich, but he displays woeful (or willful) ignorance when he likens the all too easy overrunning of the US Capitol to “Kristallnacht.”
The Left was full of praise for a video made by Ahnold, in which he tried to link a couple of broken windows at the US Capitol to the “Night of Broken Glass” (Kristallnacht) in 1938, and blames Donald Trump for inciting an insurrection. Unfortunately for Schwarzenegger and his lefty buddies that is a very poor comparison. Let’s examine those concepts a little, shall we?
Kristallnacht occurred in November 1938, when the National Socialists were in full control of the country, had already purged the “communists,” and had been persecuting Jews for some time, when (community) leaders whipped their street thugs (Brownshirts, or Sturmabteilung – SA) into a frenzy on a slim pretext to go marauding through Jewish districts smashing businesses, synagogues, homes, and people. If you are looking for a modern equivalent, you would be better looking at the black clad BLM-tifa thugs whipped up into a frenzy of looting, arson, and destruction by their “leaders.” In another parallel, the authorities instructed police to stand down during the rampage of the Brownshirts – kinda like Portland or Minneapolis last summer!
OK, Mike, so what about the Reichstag Fire, and why is it important? Well, the Reichstag Fire preceded Kristallnacht by about 5 years, and it is important to understand how this, most likely staged, event was used by the National Socialists to consolidate power and crack down on opponents. Let me set the scene:
In the November 1932 election, the Nazi Party won a slim plurality (33% of seats) in parliament, with the strengthened communist party holding 17%. Hitler wanted to gain absolute power by (more or less) legal and constitutional means, and the Weimar constitution provided for the passage of an “Enabling Act” during a crisis which would allow the Chancellor (Hitler) to rule by decree. The problem was the need for a 2/3 majority of votes to pass the Enabling Act.
In a similar manner to many European parliamentary systems, the leader of an unstable coalition government could ask the President to dissolve parliament and call fresh elections in the hope of winning a clear majority. Hitler’s plan, roughly, was to demonize and intimidate the communists in order to increase his majority.
In February 1933, with new elections pending in March, the parliament building (Reichstag) caught fire, and a young Dutch communist named Marinus Van der Lubbe was captured at the scene and confessed to setting the blaze as a communist plot. Never mind that the Fire Chief was dismissed for daring to suggest that there might have been Nazi involvement in setting the fire, or that reports which later came to light suggested that the young Dutchman was brought to the scene after the blaze started, or that Hermann Goering in an unguarded moment in 1942 said “I did it!”
Having set the stage, and pinned the blame on the communists (with help from the press), Hitler got President Hindenburg to agree that a crackdown on communists was needed, which also had the fortuitous effect of virtually eliminating the communist party from parliament. After the March 1933 election, with opposing votes conveniently eliminated, Hitler was able to cobble together a coalition to vote for the Enabling Act, thus making himself dictator!
How does that apply to the USA, though?
- The Biden Government is coming into office with a pall of illegitimacy hanging over it.
- The Democrat Party has the barest of majorities in Congress.
- The Capitol incursion has all kinds of red flags suggesting a staged event.
- The compliant media is helping to pin the blame on Trump and his supporters.
- Democrats in Congress want to eject strong Republicans from their seats, simply for objecting to suspect slates of electors.
- Charges of “domestic terrorism” are being used, and will be used, to justify crackdowns on conservatives.
- Conservatives are being banned from polite society, from jobs, from social media.
- In short, the weak Biden government is seeking to consolidate power and crush opposition.
To sum up: Kristallnacht, a pogrom against “undesirables” was ginned up by National Socialists against their enemies, and carried out but their stormtroopers (thugs). The Reichstag Fire was a staged event designed to paint opponents in a bad light and to allow a weak incoming government to accrue more power and crush anyone who could oppose them. I might be wrong, but watch it unfold, then I’ll debate you.
Beware, prepare, pray, stay strong.
