Triumph of Will?

I normally don’t claim any degree of prescience but those of us with an excessive amount of collective real time history are bound to see parallels. A few days ago (Wed. Oct 1,) I posted “Reminiscence” on the subjects of an old friend, Hitler Youth, and darker days in Germany under the last dictatorship. The conclusion which I had hoped the reader would draw was to the remarkable similarity between the linked YouTube video of Obama kids and the films of Leni Riefenstahl, the famous chronicler of the Third Reich.

Riefenstahl gained her initial fame with a cinematic effort which covered the Congress of the Nazi Party in Nüremberg in 1931 entitled Der Sieg der Glaubons (Victory of Faith.) It so pleased Hitler and propaganda minister Geobbels that they invited her back to a 1934 gathering to assemble the epic, Triumph of Will. No question is raised to Riefenstahl’s ground breaking talent as a film maker. She was superb, well in advance of her time. She was, of course, also an ardent admirer of Hitler from the moment she read his book, Mein Kampf. Her efforts to further Nazi propaganda were legend and she was even charged at post-war trials in the city where she initially gained her crowning moments. She was not, however, convicted of complicity in the Nazi horrors.

Born in 1902, she only succumbed in 2003, but left an enduring legacy for propaganda film makers’ world wide.

Someone with far better resources than I has gone to the trouble of lifting some of Riefenstahl’s film footage and assembling it with the sound track from the video I linked in the October 1 piece. The result is—for lack of a better word—scary. Click on the link and understand why I am alarmed. It’s short.

I am not insinuating that Obama is Hitler revisited. I am saying that their propaganda techniques are absolutely identical. They share many other characteristics as well; a false claim to be of the people, seeking the destruction of the morals of the existing government, and using racial disparities as a weapon.

Typical of Hitler’s early accomplishments were the construction of the autobahn and the subsidized Volkswagen. Both had a tremendous appeal to the citizens at the time. It enabled ownership of an automobile for even the most modest household and the fast roads to drive them on. In addition he endorsed numerous social programs at low or no cost to the citizens to further secure their loyalty to the regime.

He was also not shy about claiming the endorsement of God in his enterprise to further cement his relationship with the citizenry. It was all too good to be true; and you know where we’ll go with that.

I spent two solid years in Europe post WWII, met a large number of people, and saw the ravages of a world war. My memories are sometime disrupted but they will never disappear. I am happy to offer my observations to those of you who are not old enough to have had the experiences. In this case, my prayer is that you never have to.

In His abiding love,

Cecil Moon