Glenn Beck Says TRUMP Is Hitler.

++Glenn Beck ,who fasted in Nevada for Ted Cruz, called Hitler in Time Magazine and is angry with fellow conservatives for falling for him.

++This is a problem with the Right who called President Obama Hitler. Not everyone can be Hitler.

++But TRUMP is disturbing and as David Remnick pointed out more in line with the European Far-Right than people believe.

++There is a reason with my great book sale,I kept volumes on Nazism and Mussolini. I am currently reading Ian Kershaw's "Hell And Back:Europe 1914-1949". The very long chapter "Gathering Shadows" is a must read on the rise of the radical right and fascism in Europe,culminating in Hitler's Nazi Germany.

++Reading the chapter makes you understand that fascism appearance appeared before the Great Depression and that Nazism gained a foothold as the German population found their political system was dysfunctional. And for our present use,Nazism primarily was a middle-class phenomenon with about 30% working class. 

++While we identify Hitler with the Holocaust and the most systematic anti-semiticism known in history, the Nazis didn't mention anti-semitic themes in the first years of their existence . Yes,Mein Kampf at an early date described Hitler's fixation on Jews but apparently Nazis before taking power kept that low key in their political rhetoric. Instead,they stressed national unity and territorial integrity and emphasized Germany's "Glory Days" like "Make Germany Great Again."

++Hitler worshipped Mussolini, another favorite of the American Right even then. But Hitler thought Mussolini took too long to consolidate his power. Hitler didn't make that mistake--he took 6 months after being appointed the Chancellor.

++Kershaw's chapter alone is must reading to put to rest fascism has anything to do with the Left. American conservatives have been pushing this line for years. But history tells us differently. Mobilized authoritarianism was the new watchword and the genteel German public had to go along or find themselves in a virtual civil war between the Nazis and the Social Democrats. The German middle class found the price of political violence acceptable if the order of the state was preserved. 

++Another interesting observation by Kershaw was that the Nazis had no coherent economic policies. They were winging it and deferred to the corporate community for their ideas. The economic recovery of Nazi Germany, which wowed people like Joe Kennedy and Prescott Bush was the economics of will. It's why Pat Buchanan said Hitler's mistake was "going after the Jews".

++The acquiescence of the Germans and the Americans has a parallel in the present ignoring the violence in the Trump rallies and the present of White Power groups. Lawrence O'Donnell was incensed that a Secret Service agent beat up a Time photographer at a Trump rally but he was just humored on the Chris Matthews Show. 

++I predict this will get uglier and we do have the historical parallels to know what happens. It is useful to study the pre-power days of fascism.