Getting It Right - Decision Time Is Here

10/30/08
Please Utilize Your Right To Vote, Many Patriots Have Died So That You Still Have That Privilege
By Sid Riley

This column presents a conservative viewpoint about items of interest in our community and our lives. Focus is on items impacting your pocket book, your personal freedoms, and your rights. I hope you will read the column regularly and it occasionally influences your opinions and actions. Now, on to the subject of the week:
"Social or Economic Stresses Historically Cause Changes to Occur…However, These Changes Are Not Always for the Betterment of a Nation or Society".
When significant changes occur within a nation, they usually have a social or an economic foundation that has sparked the movement and created the momentum of a new direction. History is replete with examples of this aspect of societies.
During the 1930’s the economy of Germany was in shambles as a result of the Great Depression. Inflation was rampant and the national currency had become worthless. The lifetime savings of the population had thus also been rendered worthless, business failures abounded, unemployment was widespread, and life was deteriorating at a fast pace. Desperately the population looked for someone to lead them out of this situation through a program of change that would restore their economy and national pride. Nothing else mattered.
Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party waged a tremendous, effective campaign in 1930 that offered a new glimmer of hope for the German population. Hitler traveled the country from end to end delivering dozens of major speeches promoting nationalism, attending meetings of hundreds of national organizations, shook hands and signed thousands of autographs, and even kissed numerous babies.
Hitler offered something to every citizen: work to the unemployed, prosperity to failed business people, increased profits to industry, social harmony through an end of class distinctions, and restoration of Germany’s former glory. He appealed to all classes of Germans. The name of the Nazi party itself was deliberately all inclusive - the National Socialist German Workers’ Party, a Union into itself.
Joseph Goebbels who functioned as his campaign manager brilliantly organized thousands of meetings and torchlight parades, plastered Hitler posters everywhere and printed millions of copies of special editions of Nazi newspapers. It was an advertising blitz for that day.
For Hitler, the master orator, the long awaited opportunity to use his talents on the German people had arrived. He would find in this downtrodden people, an audience very willing to listen. In his speeches, Hitler offered the Germans what they needed most, encouragement, a promise of prosperity, an equalization with the upper classes. He gave them heaps of vague promises while avoiding the details. He used simple catchphrases, repeated over and over. He skillfully played on the emotions of the audience lifting their level of emotion higher and higher until the people wound up a chanting, screaming, horde that looked upon him with almost religious adoration.
Winning the election thrust Hitler into a position of national and international prestige. In celebration of their national victory, Nazi storm troopers dressed in civilian clothes smashed the windows of Jewish shops and businesses, an indication of things to come.……
Another example of social unrest enabling change to occur is the history of Cuba in the late 1950’s. The poor struggling citizen peasants could barely scrape together an existence for their families as they lived under the Batista dictatorship and the class system that rose from his coup to power in 1940. Replete with criminal activity, suppression of the media, and unrelenting political imprisonment or execution of any who spoke against him, his regime was a period of economic despair, class domination, and hopelessness for a large segment of the population. The situation was ripe for the emergence of a new leader and promises of change.
In 1953 Castro led an uprising against the Batista military, but failed. He was imprisoned for a few years and then released to live in Mexico. He later organized an invasion force, and invaded Cuba in 1956. As his army moved across the country from the West, the population began to side with this new "savior" who promised them a new life of fair treatment, increased wealth, and equality. In a few months he had conquered the nation, marching triumphantly into Havana as Batista fled the country.
To the surprise of the international community, Castro immediately formed The Communist Party of Cuba, and became its first Secretary. He established a Single-party Socialist Republic. He began to suppress and nationalize the media, to nationalize all major businesses and utilities, and aggressively imprisoned anyone who spoke or acted against him.
Under the fifty year reign of Castro, the life of the poor peasant has changed little. Although Castro promised a classless society, he is recognized today as being among the wealthiest men in the world with assets estimated at over $900 million, much of which is "stashed" in Swiss accounts. Another promised social change that failed to become a reality for the underclass.
Then there is the example of what occurred in the United States of America during the economic turmoil of 2008 which was caused by decades of mismanagement within the national government and the financial institutions of the nation. With the U.S. currency becoming worth much less, escalating costs of the necessities of life, a burdensome, costly bureaucracy, growing unemployment, and a declining standard of living, the population was ready for a leader who promised change.
Onto this stage in the elections of 2008 stepped Barack Obama, a new leader with great oratory skills who promised to initiate a menu of Socialistic programs which promised the struggling classes increased earnings and benefits……. (sound familiar?)
RUDIMENTS: Odds and Ends Worth Mentioning –
- Congratulations to the City of Marianna for the paving of the latest portion of Kelson Avenue. I am looking forward to driving down that smooth, new, expensive street my water bills helped pay for. Hopefully, since they have installed all new drainage and water lines under this street, they won’t have to immediately begin poking holes in it to accomplish repairs.
- The DOT has destroyed the canopy over Hwy 73, our route to Dothan. If a private citizen had tried to cut down that many trees our FDEP would have been all over them.
- Isn’t it amazing that the price of oil has fallen 55% from its high, while in the same period the price of gasoline has only fallen 35%, do you suppose someone is still gouging the system? I wonder if the utilities will lower their fuel surcharges.
It is time for us all to take time to vote. As you cast your ballot you will be "Getting It Right".
Note: The opinions stated in this column are solely those of the author and do not represent those of Hatcher Publications.