HISTORY: How The World Shrugged Off Kristallnacht. It’s easier to understand, as I see the kinds of things people are shrugging off today.

UPDATE: From the comments:

When I read about the comments Soviet apparatchiks made in the 30s as the collectivization imploded and millions died — Those damn wreckers and saboteurs! — I used to think they were just lying to get along. Now when read the comments at the Washington Post by people absolutely enraged that Obamacare is not working due to “Republican obstructionism” I am not so sure. I think people are capable of deluding themselves much much longer and more deeply than any reasonable person suspects.

The rhetoric is eerily similar to the early 30s. Let us hope the outcome is different, this time, and we do not have to go through a wretched period of totalitarianism to rediscover why moderation and moderate expectations are a good idea, and hungering for a strong man to Put Things Right is the most amazingly dangerous folly.

Indeed. As I wrote in 2010: “They’ll be going after ‘hoarders and wreckers,’ next.” And note this.