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Path: utzoo!utcsri!utcs!ian
From: ian@utcs.UUCP
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: Zundel etc.
Message-ID: <643@utcs.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 6-May-85 19:34:48 EDT
Article-I.D.: utcs.643
Posted: Mon May  6 19:34:48 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 6-May-85 19:43:54 EDT
References: <7197@watdaisy.UUCP> <628@lsuc.UUCP> <1039@ubc-cs.UUCP>
Reply-To: ian@utcs.UUCP (Ian F. Darwin)
Distribution: can
Organization: University of Toronto - General Purpose UNIX
Lines: 31
Summary:  Nazis not quite `duly elected'

In article <1039@ubc-cs.UUCP> robinson@ubc-cs.UUCP (Jim Robinson) writes:
>It was not a bunch of wacko private citizens who committed those crimes
>against humanity in WW2 - It was the duly elected *government* of Germany.
>Does anyone really think that any group, anywhere, could possibly 
>murder 6 million of their country's citizens without the *full* support 
>of the government? I don't.

I would argue with the point that the Nazis were `duly elected.'
Like the Bolsheviks in the Soviet, the Nazis in Germany formed
a leading power group through the careful disenfranchisement
(i.e., murder) of those who stood in their way. Read about `the
night of the long knives' in German history, and the fate of the
Mensheviks in Soviet history.

>This suggests to me that the real lesson to remember is that when a
>people allow themselves to be intimidated and muzzled by their government,
>as the German people allowed their government to intimidate and muzzle
>them, then that people should not be surprised when the unthinkable
>occurs. 
True. Ask the Afghans; their holocaust is happening while we sit here
in our self-righteousness over the buck or two we gave for Ethiopian
relief. And we continue to have `normal' relations with the Soviets,
as a generation before us had `normal' relations with Germany.

>Needless to say, the easiest way to nip that potential problem in the bud
>is to *not* allow the government to assume an undue amount of power.

With that sentiment I'd certainly agree.
-- 
Ian Darwin, Toronto	uucp: {ihnp4|decvax}!utcs!ian
Envoy-100: I.Darwin	Bitnet: ian@utoronto