and MLB

So, I think you might want to talk to your high school history teacher because frankly, you might have a lawsuit on your hands. Yes, Germany was treated unfairly in the Versailles Treaty, and yes Hitler invested in the economy, but his wackiness, as you put it, began long before he was put into office, and was implemented almost immediately upon his rise. The Reichstag Fire, for example, happened on Feb. 27, 1933. On April 1, 1933, Jewish doctors, shops, lawyers and stores were boycotted. Within six more days, Jews were banned from working for the government. Beyond legal action against Jews and gays and other groups, there were of course extra legal actions taken by groups like the SA and later the SS. The German economy was improving at this time, but it had already been improving for many months by then as the Depression was slowly lifting. It’s kind of difficult to accredit that to Hitler’s fiscal policies.

What your teacher taught you is oddly reminiscent of a surprisingly popular anti-Hitler argument that says Nazi anti-Semitism was fine, except the concentration camps, now that was going a bit far. I’m trying to be kind here, but I’m having difficulty keeping myself from shouting NO! (This is, incidentally, one of the reasons why the over-emphasis on the concentration camps is not simply stupid, but very dangerous.) That the Germans were treated unfairly in 1919 is about as good a justification for Nazi policy even in 1933 as a woman’s choice of clothes is for her being raped. Even if one believed that the Nazi economic policies helped Germany as a whole, one would be forced to take the position that mass-disenfranchisement, oppression and battery is a moral way to fund economic growth. By that argument, considering slavery was a significant part of the Southern economy, it was therefore also justified. I could take this further, but I would simply strongly recommend that you read much more before quoting that teacher.

She said he “was good in the beginning, but went too far.” What do you think “went too far” means? In any context, I can only read that as “he was good when he just stripped the Jews of their rights and sent them to the ghettos, but went too far in actually killing them all.” I can’t see how you can read it differently. She makes it sound like if she had the chance to, she’d take his place and only employ his anti-Semitism to a point. Nothing about him going wacky… nothing about him being wrong… just that he took it too far.

And then there’s the whole “not hiring black people” and repeatedly referring to them as a certain racial epithet, as well as using “Japs” and “fruits,” and firing Davey Johnson (a fantastic manager) because he moved in with his fiancee before getting married, and the whole umpire fiasco.

She is entirely indefensible, one of the worst human beings to ever have a job in baseball.