Teddy Roosevelt, The Weimar Republic, and Modern World

The political implications of the comparison are obvious. Are current conditions conducive to political power being seized by a populist totalitarian party? But dimensions of this comparison include far more than populist politics & paramilitary partnership: economics, culture, and moral fiber, but do all these conditions simply reflect a deeper root cause?

 

In his article The Ghost of Theodore Roosevelt, Cameron Hilditch outlines the logic of populist politics and compares the “Progressive” Bull Moose Party to modern times. In effect, he asks if Donald Trump does not get the Republican nomination in 2024, will he form a third party, split the conservative vote, and ensure continuing Democratic hegemony in Washington? Hilditch does not address the Weimar Republic, in which  the November 1932 election resulted in no clear majority for any party, but enough Nazi power in the Reichstag to eventually make Hitler chancellor and rend democracy asunder. And the significance of the role of paramilitary actions by the SA in the ultimate outcome. 

Economics were clearly different from modern circumstances at present. The Weimar Republic was paying reparations imposed by the victors of the World War in 1918. This plus economic policy that resulted in runaway inflation damaged the postwar German economy far more than one year of pandemic-driven-panic policy vectors. But the runaway inflation of the Weimar Republic had a cultural implication. It removed any possible incentive to save, motivating everyone to spend money the same day they got it.  

This was likely a strong factor in the profligate lifestyle exemplified in the movie Cabaret, which was based on real life. (Not that lifestyles were much different in the U.S. in the roaring 20’s). A reasonable question would be whether the lifting of restrictions post-pandemic will trigger such profligacy worldwide (assuming there is a post-pandemic). 

Weimar culture included academic dimensions as well. “Critical theory” was developed to link social problems to social structures, rather than individual psychological factors. In other words, blame your problems on society and don’t accept responsibility for your own actions. Logical positivism advanced the theory that philosophy should adopt the bases and structure of empirical sciences. “Follow the science” - worship as truth our current understanding of nature. Heiddigger and Marcuse advanced other theories; one wearies trying to figure out what philosophers taught. 

What was at the time considered moral degeneration multiplied, including homosexual venues, prostitution, and drug use. And where were people of faith, who might have set the standard?  “Higher Criticism” advanced source criticism, form criticism, and redaction. We remember  Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who was executed by the Nazis at the end of World War 2, but he was only active a few years at the end of the Weimar Republic. What happened to the Lutheran Church, the Catholic Church, Germany the bastion of faith in Western Europe? Perhaps sectarian warfare over the centuries that had degenerated into jousting for political advantage alienated so many people that the Freethinkers League had 500,000 members in 1933; people so sick of Church politics that they joined together to advocate a theology of atheism. But that seems a symptom of the reality that churches, on the whole, were focused on power and theological points about doctrine.  Salvation through faith in Christ and His atoning sacrifice, and  development of an individual relationship with Jesus ceased to be their mission. Is this the underlying root cause of all the symptoms above?

Where do we stand today in the West? Have economic conditions resulting from pandemic panic further enhanced populist demagoguery and emboldened militias? Has religious hypocrisy so sickened the general public that any religion or lack of it is preferable over the truth about the creator and redeemer of humankind?