Thirties Germany Redux

Today, the day after his impeachment acquital,  His Stable Genius transformed the annual Prayer Breakfast into an auto-da-fe, and then he followed it with a "victory speech."  It concerns me that Americans are increasingly falling under the spell of Our Dear Leader's rhetoric. Things they might not have accepted  a decade ago, five years ago, TWO years ago, are now applauded. I am increasingly thinking we are repeating Germany in the thirties.

Gere is an essay Goebbels wrote about  Hitler as an orator. Note the last sentence.  It makes me shiver.

It is perhaps a classic proof of the inner strength of the German people that it heard the appeal of a man who went his own way, in opposition to the state and society, the press and public opinion, apparently against all reason and good sense. It is also a classic proof for the outstanding rhetorical brilliance of the Führer that his word alone was enough to transform an entire period, to defeat an apparently strong state and to bring in a new era.

An historic figure who has such impact must command all the skills of the spoken word. That is the case with the Führer. He speaks as confidently before workers as before scientists. His words strike deep into the hearts of farmers and city-dwellers. When he speaks to children, they are deeply moved. The magic of his voice reaches men’s secret feelings. He translates historical philosophy into the language of the people. He has the ability to call up long forgotten history and make those who hear him feel as if they had always known about it. There is no element of superiority in his speaking, the kind of thing one sees in the speeches of the educated.

...One can say that his speeches to his people and the world have an audience unprecedented in world history. They are words that inspire the heart and have a lasting impact in forming a new international epoch, There is probably no educated person in the world who has not heard the sound of his voice and who, whether he understood the words or not, felt that his heart was spoken to by magical words. Our people is fortunate to know the voice the world hears, a voice that puts words into thoughts and uses those thoughts to move an era. This man is a man with the courage to say yes and no, without qualifying them with an if or a but. Millions of people are suffering from bitter sorrow, great troubles, and terrible need. They see hardly a star of hope through the dark clouds that cover Europe’s sky. No one is able to dispel the despair they face. But in Germany, God chose one from countless millions to speak our pain!

https://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/ahspeak.htm