While living in Germany, I had an opportunity to visit the Dachau Concentration Camp in Dachau, Germany.  At the time, it was not yet declared a Jewish shrine. I was proficient in German then and read many of the documents that had been written there during WWII.

Dachau was the first concentration camp built by the Germans. At first, they kidnapped unwanted persons, took them to Dachau, and demanded ransom for their return. Following that, “enemies of the state” were captured and taken there to do slave labor.

Deciding who was an enemy of the state was determined by Gestapo tactics. The most common procedure was for someone who hated someone else to go to the SS office and declare something like, “Joe said that Adolph Hitler stinks.” That day, Joe would be picked up and, without a trial or hearing, hauled off to Dachau.

As a young man, Adolph Hitler was a starving artist. He lived in Vienna and attempted to become a famous painter. Most of the art industry at that time was controlled by Jewish businessmen. Unable to become accepted as a gifted artist, Hitler blamed the Jewish aristocracy.

When Hitler rose to power in Germany, he vilified Jews with pictures, movies and other propaganda lies that seemed to make all Germans hate Jews. At this time, Jews were rounded up and sent off to Dachau and other concentration camps to work as slaves.

There seems to be a misconception that the German Concentration Camps were solely for Jewish people. Overall, the camps held about 11 million people, but only 6 million were Jews. The other 5 million were political prisoners who were thought to be enemies of the German polity.

No doubt the treatment there was atrocious. I had a friend who as a child lived in a concentration camp with his mother. His mother was a single mom and needed welfare assistance. She was declared a ward of the government and sent with him to a camp in Poland. He could tell stories about being there that were so awful they seemed almost unbelievable.

Unfortunately, we are seeing Gestapo tactics rearing its ugly head in America. I refer to government monitoring of private correspondence, misinformation from the news media and government officials. Some of the tales they spew are also awful and unbelievable, but the American people just seem to take it without questioning. The justice system has simply evaporated. A nation of laws has become a nation of special interest groups.

How do we unravel this snarl made by present-day government whiz kids? We gain control of our election process again. If it takes literacy testing, voter ID, etc, so be it. Elected officials must be selected by people who are knowledgeable and law abiding. Why should people who own nothing, be allowed to overwhelm a system and force those with hard-earned assets to pay for their neediness?

We have raised a puppy that grew up to bite us.

 

Ed Field

Natchez