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Adam Gopnik’s latest essay for The New Yorker explores how Adolf Hitler was able to rise to power in Nazi Germany—which happened largely because people believed they would be able to control him.
Gopnik tells The New Abnormal co-host Danielle Moodie that the same could be said for Donald Trump leading into the 2024 election.
“You had this character who was regarded as a chaotic clown by everyone around him. The conservative minister of defense called him a psychopath,” he said. “Yet all of those people, the media moguls, the respectable conservatives, ended up aiding and abetting him in every way in his search for power and they did it in a way that is, yes, disconcertingly familiar to us.”
“They all thought they could manage him. They all thought they could control him. They all thought that they could take advantage of his movement for their own ends. And that on the day when it all blew up, because it had to blow up because he was a psychopath and clearly not capable of exercising power, they would be there to inherit,” he said.
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Gopnik says that those who propped up Hitler believed they could “control the beast” and that they would “end up the ultimate victors.” However, as history shows, that wasn’t the case.
“Those patterns are frightening to see emerging again and again throughout history.”
Listen to this full episode of The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Stitcher.
