hitler speech
On March 5, 1933, just over a month after gaining office as Chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler gave a frighteningly dark speech on race relations in Germany. Here's what he had to say:
My fellow Germans, ... I am very grateful for the many wonderful opportunities to honor African-German heroes, faith leaders, entrepreneurs and the many others who changed the course of our nation. We are blessed by the lives and examples of those who have made this nation a beacon of freedom, talent, and unbreakable German spirit.

This week I had the privilege of visiting the national museum of African-German history and culture right here in Berlin. It's a new, beautiful ... museum that serves as a shining example of African-Germans' incredible contributions to our culture, our society, and our history. It also tells of the great struggle for freedom and equality that prevailed against the sins of slavery and the injustice of discrimination.

The work and love of the people who helped create such a masterpiece is a testament to the legacy of so many leaders and honors. I left that museum confident that together Germany can overcome any challenge. ... Today and every day I pledge to continue the march towards justice and freedom for all so that every German no matter his background, no matter her background, has the chance to climb that great ladder of success.
Chilling stuff.

Oh, wait! My bad. That wasn't Hitler. That was Trump in his weekly address on February 24, 2017, just over a month after taking office as President of the USA. Forgive me, it's so easy to get them confused this day and age.


Okay, sarcasm off. Trump says stuff like what he just said. Hitler said stuff like this:
"Systematically these black parasites of the nation defile our inexperienced young blond girls and thereby destroy something which can no longer be replaced in this world" (Mein Kampf, p. 562).
That was in 1925, eight years before Hitler came to power. And no, he didn't tone things down once he got into office. From the Nazis' outline of their political agenda in February 1920 to their actual policies of the 30s and 40s, they were consistent. Consistently, unabashedly racist:
FEBRUARY 24, 1920
NAZIS OUTLINE POLITICAL AGENDA
The first public meeting of the Nazi party, then called the German Workers' Party, takes place in Munich, Germany. Adolf Hitler issues a "25 Point Program" outlining the party's political agenda. The party platform embodies racism. It demands racial purity in Germany; proclaims Germany's destiny to rule over inferior races; and identifies Jews as racial enemies. Point 4 concludes that "No Jew, therefore, may be a member of the Nation."

JULY 14, 1933
NAZI STATE ENACTS RACIAL PURITY LAW
Believing that "racial purity" requires state regulation of human reproduction, Adolf Hitler issues the Law to Prevent Hereditarily Diseased Offspring. Among other provisions, the measure prohibits "undesirables" from having children and mandates forced sterilization of certain physically or mentally impaired individuals. The law will affect some 400,000 people over the next 18 months.
And things did not get any better:
nazi black propaganda
© US Holocaust Memorial MuseumNazi propaganda photo depicts friendship between an "Aryan" and a black woman. The caption states: "The result! A loss of racial pride." Germany, prewar.
African German mulatto children were marginalized in German society, isolated socially and economically, and not allowed to attend university. Racial discrimination prohibited them from seeking most jobs, including service in the military. With the Nazi rise to power they became a target of racial and population policy. By 1937, the Gestapo (German secret state police) had secretly rounded up and forcibly sterilized many of them. Some were subjected to medical experiments; others mysteriously "disappeared."
I know what some of you are thinking after reading all that. "Trump is literally Hitler." And if that's what you're thinking, I don't think there's anything I or anyone else can do for you.

In a country where presidential elections are almost always a choice between two evils, I would've thought many would be relieved that at least Trump isn't Hitler. No such luck. Which is actually pretty depressing. Because if or when a real American "Hitler" comes around, the American public will have no idea what hit them. And there will be practically nothing they can do about it.

Here's the kind of things Hitler (and fellow Nazis) had to say about Jews in Mein Kampf (again, he'd been saying this stuff for years before actually becoming Fuhrer). Keep them in mind. "Jew" is just a placeholder for the future scapegoat of choice:
"The best characterization is provided by the product of this religious education, the Jew himself. His life is only of this world, and his spirit is inwardly as alien to true Christianity as his nature two thousand years previous was to the great founder of the new doctrine. Of course, the latter made no secret of his attitude toward the Jewish people, and when necessary he even took the whip to drive from the temple of the Lord this adversary of all humanity, who then as always saw in religion nothing but an instrument for his business existence. In return, Christ was nailed to the cross, while our present-day party Christians debase themselves to begging for Jewish votes at elections and later try to arrange political swindles with atheistic Jewish parties--and this against their own nation."

"The black-haired Jewish youth lies in wait for hours on end, satanically glaring at and spying on the unsuspicious girl whom he plans to seduce, adulterating her blood and removing her from the bosom of her own people. The Jew uses every possible means to undermine the racial foundations of a subjugated people."

"...the personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew."
I've been listening closely, and have yet to hear Trump say anything so Hitlerian. I doubt he ever will. Even when it comes to Muslims, I haven't heard him approach this level of identity-politics-based rhetoric. Trump says he loves Blacks and Hispanics (many love him too). He also talks about inclusion, and making America great for "all" its citizens. Last I checked, that means white, black, brown, Christian, Jew, Muslim.

Hitler never said any such thing about Blacks, Jews, or any other groups that didn't conform to his idiotic ideas about racial purity. Trump talks about "bad hombres" from across the border (i.e., non-citizen criminals) and radical Islamic terrorists (i.e., the 1% or less of Muslims who are violent revolutionaries). He sounds like a conservative, not a Nazi.

Of course, it's possible he doesn't mean it. And if that's true, how does that make him any different than, say, Lyndon Johnson? It says a lot that - if that were the case - Trump still speaks the way he does about inclusion. That tells me he couldn't get away with saying otherwise even if he wanted to. Hitler got away with it. That's what made him Hitler. All of which is just to repeat: Trump is not Hitler, literally or figuratively. People saying so either do not know, or are ignoring, the most essential features of what made Hitler and the Nazis so odious. They were violent revolutionaries with a totalitarian ideology that was easily exploited by psychopaths like Hitler, Bormann, Goering, etc. The U.S. has yet to see something comparable.

And that's not to say that things are peachy in the U.S. (or the West in general), or that all of Trump's policies are great. It's just to say that Trump is not as bad as the people calling him Hitler think he is. Hitler and the Nazis were able to institute a policy of racial purity and violent terrorism with mass support - by vocally and publicly advocating for racial purity and violent terrorism. The Bolsheviks did the same thing, and both camps had ideological justifications ready at hand to excuse even the most heinous implementations of their "policies".

That said, I have heard and read plenty of statements with the same flavor as those from Hitler, from "ordinary people" on Internet forums, YouTube, Twitter, in the alt-media, in protests, etc. If the above statements horrify you, see what you think of these:
"The Muslim spirit is completely alien to true Western Christian values."

"The black-haired refugee lies in wait for hours on end, satanically glaring at and spying on the unsuspicious European girl whom he plans to seduce. The Muslim uses every possible means to undermine the cultural foundations of a subjugated people."

"The personification of the devil as the symbol of evil assumes the living shape of a Muslim."
Shocking? Not so much? I've seen plenty of comments just like them.

What about the violent revolutionary ideology and behavior of so-called "anti-fascist", anti-Trump groups?

The real seeds of a totalitarian nightmare are sprouting in the West - just not in Trump's brain. They're alive and well in the intelligence agencies (who allied with Nazis before, during, and after WWII), and in the revolutionary fervor taking root in (mostly) grassroots organizations on the Right and the Left. Actually, the Left has the advantage when it comes to nightmare creation. Conservatives tend towards authoritarianism. Liberals, with their postmodern philosophical underpinnings, tend towards radical restructuring of society that cares not how many millions of "its own" it has to kill in order to get there.