In his new book The Return of Great Powers, which comes out Tuesday, reporter Jim Sciutto interviews several of Trump’s former advisers. All of them stressed that Trump regularly lavished praise on authoritarian leaders around the world, calling Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán “fantastic,” Chinese President Xi Jinping “brilliant,” and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un an “OK guy.”
Horrifyingly, Trump also said, “Well, but Hitler did some good things,” according to John Kelly, who served as White House chief of staff from 2017 to 2019.
“I said, ‘Well, what?’ And he said, ‘Well, [Hitler] rebuilt the economy.’ But what did he do with that rebuilt economy? He turned it against his own people and against the world. And I said, ‘Sir, you can never say anything good about the guy. Nothing,’” Kelly told Sciutto. “I mean, Mussolini was a great guy in comparison.”
Kelly said that Trump also praised Hitler for achieving complete loyalty from senior Nazi officials—and Trump expected similar fealty from the retired generals he brought on to his cabinet.
“He would ask about the loyalty issues and about how, when I pointed out to him the German generals as a group were not loyal to him, and in fact tried to assassinate him a few times, and he didn’t know that,” Kelly said. “He truly believed, when he brought us generals in, that we would be loyal—that we would do anything he wanted us to do.”
“Hitler did some good things” would end absolutely anyone else’s campaign in America. And this guy still has a chance of winning.
There is a reaon why people like Hitler were able to succeed as much as they did, foolish people following people.
I don’t think foolish is the right word. They are primarily full of hatred and want to see other people get hurt.
I mean, they are complete dipshits, as well. They’re just even more hateful than they are stupid.
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Trump striving to be like notoriously vicious dictators is part of what makes him so appealing to conservative voters.
If history is our guide, your conservative coworkers, neighbors and family members will politely watch as you are escorted onto a bus headed for re-education camp. They won’t be overt or cartoonish in their evil. They will just be themselves.
I’m convinced conservatives would vote for a potato if you put it in a Nazi arm band at this point.
GOP Voters: “I don’t see the problem here.”
“He was a good man, just had a slight issue with a few jews that didn’t obey the law” - probably the GOP
Here’s mine:
- He’s dead
I think about this a lot. If Hitler offered me 10 million dollars I’d take it, but that doesn’t mean I have to like him. I’m OK with admitting people I don’t like sometimes did good things, even if by accident. I think this is logically consistent because there are a lot of people I think are really good that occasionally do bad things.
Can you tell us some of the good things Hitler did?
Sure, even the most evil people don’t kick puppies ALL day. Note: I am not a Hitler supporter, just pointing out that TOTAL evil doesn’t exist:
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Hitler’s early reforms in Germany helped reduce unemployment significantly. Between 1933-1936, he introduced a series of measures aimed at generating jobs and revitalizing the economy through the Four Year Plan. By the time World War II began, the rate had dropped from over 30% to around 7%.
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Hitler initiated major infrastructure improvements throughout Germany, including building new roads, highways, bridges, airports, harbors, and canals. This helped modernize the country and facilitated trade and travel.
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Under Hitler’s rule, Germany made significant progress in areas such as education and healthcare. There was a sharp increase in the number of school children and students enrolling in universities, as well as investments in scientific research.
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Women’s rights were expanded during this period. Hitler allowed married women to continue working outside the home and gave them the right to equal pay for equal work. He also promoted women’s participation in the labor market by providing subsidies for childcare services.
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Hitler’s government launched a massive rearmament program, which led to rapid advances in German military technology. These advancements played a crucial role in the early successes of the Wehrmacht during WWII.
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The Nazi Party under Hitler invested heavily in improving housing conditions and construction projects for average citizens, notably through programs like the “Strength Through Joy” initiative, which provided low-cost vacations for workers.
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German culture flourished during the Third Reich. Hitler understood the importance of art, music, theater, and literature in maintaining national pride and identity. He funded numerous arts projects and encouraged artists to produce works that reflected his vision for a strong, unified Germany.
I can also create lists of really bad and evil things that he did, so he’s not exactly my favorite person.
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“You know, with Hitler, the more I learn about that guy, the more I don’t care for him.” - Norm Macdonald
I didn’t even know he was sick.
His ex-wife Ivana said in their divorce hearings that he kept Mein Kampf on his bedside table. Very believable, but perhaps he had it just as a token since I’m not convinced he can really read.
He’s a complete fucking nong, but he’s not that stupid that he can’t read.
A bit of an exaggeration, sure. I suppose if he was motivated by something he truly loves like Hitler, he could sit down and read a book.
Not a chance. You can’t have it both ways, and there’s no way he had the patience to read an old book. He didn’t read intelligence briefings specifically made for him.
I promise you’d be surprised what being interested in a topic can do. He doesn’t give a flying fuck about intelligence briefings. But a book by a genocidal dictator? Now that will really pique his interest.
If it isn’t true that Donald Trump mostly reads Harlequin romance novels, it will still now be my headcanon.
I think they meant anything longer than a tweet or a newspaper article about himself. We know how his officials had to dumb down every briefing for him because he never read anything ahead of time and had a hard time in general comprehending basic topics.
He seems to have a problem reading teleprompters, the easiest thing to read since the invention of books in large print.
Part of that might be due to his refusal to wear his glasses in public.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/trump-seen-wearing-glasses_n_5e1eac25c5b63211760b28cb
True. Most of the time he’s simply not interested in reading
https://www.businessinsider.com/trump-trade-tariffs-eu-colorful-cards-2018-7
Being able to and wanting to, being practised in reading and actually understanding what you read are probably very different things. Some people decided that colorful flash cards work best with him. The news articles about him not reading his briefing materials but looking at the pictures are also out there. I think he reads everything that comes in the size of a flash card or a tweet, much longer than that and I have my doubts.
since I’m not convinced he can really read.
It’s the illustrated version with the big boy toy gun.
Was it Mein Kampf or a book of Hitler’s speeches? I’ve heard both.
Here’s the fun part. Ivana said it was Hitler speeches. Trump says it might have been Mein Kampf.
What a kamikaze of a defense…
More of a blitzkrieg, he’s hoping to prevail through the use of shock tactics and being overwhelmingly offensive.
Hmm you might be right. And if 2016 has taught us anything: it might work.
You’re stealing my bit, man!
I do like how Kim is just “an OK guy”
It’s a pretty big step up from “Little Rocket Man” though.
My memory of that little fight is that Kim came out sounding much more sane than Trump did. Which is REALLY saying something.
But then they got together and made up, and Kim probably promised him that abandoned hotel, and suddenly they were best friends.
I don’t know, Little Rocket Man does indicate a more complex vocabulary. If anything “OK guy” signals some mental decline.
I just meant in terms of praise or insult.
Well that’s true.
Kim probably complained that Trump used too much teeth.
I could build a good economy too, if I redistributed wealth while saddling an entire ethnic/religious demographic with debt, forcing them in to slavery and excluding them from economic statistics. Oh, and make meth legal for the workforce.
The thingy is, it wasn’t that good of an economy outside of the war industry. People paid for car IOUs that would build tanks, but they never got the cars. Compared to east Germany that eventually got the cars.
Yeah but those cars were Ladas
More likely Trabants or, for the elite, Wartburgs.
Seizing the assets of a vast number of people is indeed a great way to prop up your economy even before you decide to use them as slave labor.
And that’s already legal in America! Hooray!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United_States
“Fun” fact Hitler was a speed freak. He would take speed before speeches so that he looked more animated.
Now say if anyone wanted to draw any parallels…
Not that anyone would expect Trump to know this, but Hitler rebuilding the economy was kind of a fraud. He basically used fake currency (before it was cool), banned unions and made it nearly impossible to quit a job, and stole from a big chunk of Germany’s own population and those surrounding it. Ordinary Germans saw a decline in their real wages by 25% from 1933 to 1938, and obviously things only got worse from there.
Additionally many undesirable people were forced out of high skill jobs or had their business taken away. Robbing businesses of effective managers and workers. Leading to loss of productivity and a fall in GDP.
Both Nazi Germany and post war divided Germany made for very interesting natural experiments in economics. Weirdly because it would be unethical to do them as a controlled studying…
That actually is the core Nazi ideology. Honest work building something up by the rules is not cool, means weakness and degeneracy. Fraud and robbery is cool, means strength and cunning. But at the same time putting yourself into something sacrificial is cool too. “We do not sow” and all that.
So it was fraud, but I think most of the Germans loyal to that ideology understood that emotionally.
Many people in the Middle East and Africa have such worldview today.
sigh
Fine.
Hitler-loving demented rapist fraud.
You forgot:
Orange Hitler-loving demented rapist fraud.
Right?? I was shocked to find that he’s still looking the same in the news from using that ridiculous tanner. He looks so fake and gaudy, I can’t.
Because he probably looks like a reanimated corpse without all that makeup.
Treasonous orange Hitler-loving demented rapist fraud.
I am pretty sure you could fit speed freak in there somewhere
This will not sway republicans from voting for him.
I wonder how they’d react if “Trump” was switched with “Biden”. Or, LOL, “Obama”.
Surely Jordan Klepper or someone like him have read quotes by Trump and attributed them to Biden, Hillary, etc only to witness the hypocritical reactions
Kelpper has done something like this but, to my knowledge, not something as dramatic as this Hitler stuff.
Remember when spelling potato wrong ended a man’s political career?
Kanye is his ghostwriter
