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Now everyone in Heaven will hear those Four Last Songs....
Let the tributes begin.
Follow Ups:
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If we stopped listening to music and reading literary works for the people's behind th emusic's beliefs we'd have a lot less stuff to listen to. Karajan would have to be dumped as well.Read this view http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v17/v17n3p-2_Charles.html
Or the counter about Elizabeth http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/06/29/reviews/970629.29rothstt.html
Bottom line is I'm less worried about people like Elizabeth -- my question is why does anyone buy Ford motor cars. Not only was Henry Ford an Anti-semite he ACTIVELY financially supported Hitler in the gassing of Jews and killing of American soldiers -- the company is just as evil as it has always been. So no -- Elizabeth is hardly on the radar. She used the party for personal gain -- gee most people do that. Was she anti-semetic -- maybe but then you never know. Oscar Schindler used the party to make money -- he was no anti-semite and if he was he changed his mind.
Did you see the Nova program about De Beers? At the start of WWII, US estimators figured that Nazi Germany had enough industrial diamonds to last 6 months to a year. After that, precision grinding would come to a halt, meaning that bearing production would cease. The Nazi's never ran out of diamonds, even though diamonds are not found in Europe or the Fascist field of influence. They pointed out that one key factor of the German observation of Swiss neutrality was that De Beers, an English Company, supplied huge amounts of diamonds to Switzerland and, in fact, refused, even through the darkest hours of the blitz, to stockpile industrial diamonds in the US. Those diamonds funneled their way to the German war machine.
Diamonds are still considered a strategic material in the US,BTW.
Only a year or two ago, the Swiss banking system went through a controversy about accepting Jewish gold and valuables from the Nazi Concentration camps, and pocketing large sums from accounts of the victims of the holocaust. That was the tip of the iceburg.
I do not buy any diamonds for jewelry for any reason. The greed shown by De Beers and the direct damage and pain they caused far outweighs whatever personal gain Swartzkopf may have gained.BTW, Charles Lindberg also supported the Nazi's, but changed his mind after Pearl Harbor.
Not only did DeBeers do that, they also routinely exploit slave labor (wazzat? Not slaves? What do you think those laborers are, then?) and build their powerful empire on the backs and blood of the poor South Africans whose country they have raped.Same thing for gold. Listen to Hugh Masekela's "Stimela". Apropos for an audio forum, that song is superbly performed and recorded and the emotion Hugh puts into it, and the subject matter, brings tears to my eyes each time I hear it.
Also: the entire market for diamonds is a sham. Some ex-Soviet nations produce so many diamonds that DeBeers buys diamonds from them and stockpiles in order to control the world supply and thus, the price.
And speaking of Nazis, isn't it ironically macabre and just a bit weird that so many New York Jews today are heavily invested in the diamond trade? Does the love of lucre transcend all barriers?
I too refuse to buy diamonds or gold. Investing in diamonds is an illusion as the scarcity is artificial. Investing in gold is betting on other peoples' misfortune. Buying either is trading in blood. Consider what this does to your soul, whether or not you are religious.
This applies to all facets of society -- I took a wonderful contemporary moral problems Philisophy course in university and the professor said "don't write your essay on the Death Penalty" because he felt it was a non issue. Shocked at first but as he noted more people die in construction accidents than those on death row. So whether you are for or against the death penalty it's a waste of your time. Why? Let's say that for this purpose 500 people are killed on death row in a year. Meanwhile companies protected with the corporation granting can pretty much do any abysmal crime and only be sentenced with monetary damage. It's too hard to go after...we worry about a serial killer who kills 13 people because it is so "disgusting" and the press is all over it but what about comapnies who do far worse but get off with some fines. PPG&E comes to mind but Ford, Coke and piles of others are up there.The entire jewel market is concocted perception - if the perception of diamonds is diminished so too will be their value. I buy none of it. Now the trick will be to convince the future wife :-)
Company mentality is control, power, and profit. Fascism is the ULTIMATE and desired goal. The cost and price race to the bottom and slave labour is clearly desired and a workforce with no power whatsoever over anything is even more desirable. Which is why Wal-Mart loves to Union Bust.
I'm a philosophy professor. When I teach moral philosophy courses, I always include the death penalty among other topics. I was surprised by the cavalier and dismissive attitude of your professor about it. If you wouldn't mind, I'd like to know which university was home to an instructor who would trivialize the issue of the death penalty by comparing it to construction accidents. Whatever one's beliefs about the matter, such an absurd comparison harms both students and society.
In what way it is obvious that an inveterate psychopath must be kept alive on the public weal while a dozens go hungry, sick, and uneducated for want of equivalent funds.On what fine point does this hing? That s/he might actually be innocent of the specifc crime? That s/he someday might reform his/her self? Or that s/he might simply "burn out" and become harmless as some criminal socialogists have explained it to me?
Is it that s/he is him/herself the victim of a careless society and cannot be fairly condemned by us? Or is telling argument that it demeans us all to kill even one? These latter arguments are obviously grossly hypocritical. I'm sick of them.
He's probably read every argument that can be made on this issue and it has lost interest when world pverty essays could yield something more important involving larger numbers of lives. That I think was what the prof was after. People write about weighty issues where only a few people die then how weighty can it be? After travelling through the Philippines I would rather spend the millions bringing them to Canada setting them up with a nice place giving them a job and knowing they would bust their ass improving the economy - over arguing whether the pig farmer serial killer should get the chair -- of course in Canada we don't have the death penalty so it's a non issue.If people are worried about executing the wrong guy then don't have capital punishment -- the numbers have been argued over and over -- some places have decided that money is more important than people so fry em. As a deterrent it does not work. Raving lunatics still kill, DP or not.
Douglas College and Simon Fraser University -- he sits on the board in Canada I believe.He put forth a life boat model and the number of deaths per year of the death penalty did not warrant the time spet on the matter in his opinion. Note he did not say don't write on the subject - he reminds me of a professor who told us not to write that "Death of a Salesman" was a tragedy. I did anyway and still got an A+ -- his remark at the end was "great paper but it still isn't a tragedy."
Early in the philosophy course he started with a comparison of Adolph Hitler and Mother Teresa as being more similar than they were different. Granted this was largely to get the class riled -- it worked a few dropped out...but those who tuned in the next week would have found the arguments sound.
The death penalty he argued was a non issue because he said it is media driven. Even if we killed 20 people per year "by mistake" or they were really innocent then so what? Mistakes happen -- mistakes happen and people die all the time.
Certainly there is a great paper any way you wish to argue the death penalty and I feel very confident in writing a solid paper no matter which side I was given to argue. I actually ran into some debate later in a Criminology class because I sat on the fence -- everyone was mad at me for even "considering" being FOR the death penalty. But the life boat mentality that we are "protecting" psychopaths giving them 3 meals a day for their rest of their lives at Millions of dollars at tax payers expense (which could instead fly in an African family who would work damn hard and be beneficial to our society for less cash seemed logical). Value added people versus the dregs of the earth. (again I could argue against what I have just said).
...at least half of Switzerland. Difference was, Ford and the Rockefellers gave it up by the late Thirties (although evidence exists that suggests the latter at least retained asset ownership).
it's a mtter of public record that Ford Motor Company aided germany all thru WWII. He even went so far as to set up a factory to rebuild German halftracks and trucks. But G.M. wasn't far behind them as well. They were the nes who set up the Opal truck plants as well as one factory that built ME 109's. Standard Oil refueled U-boats in the Azores as late as early Spring 1945.
Just prior to Pearl Harbor the FBI approached the (then) vice president of G.M. about their interest in Germany, and he flatly said if we entered WWII we'd loose. Suggest you read the book titled "Trading With The Enemy." The author reveals all his sources in very detail, and I might add that no one ever refuted his book.
gary
perhaps it was Dresden can't remember but an entire city levelled "EXCEPT the Ford plant in Germany) - talk about coincidence - nope.That is all bad enough but then you still have the Pinto where they knowingly sent out a product that could kill people and did and instead of saving lives decided that the more financially beneficial thing to do was to fight court battles. The Crown Vics are cop killers and then that Explorer tire thing. Let's blame the tire maker for Ford choosing the wrong ones. Amazing the power that company has over the courts. The Pinto issue should have carried a 20trillion dollar fine payable in cash by close of that day. And the entire board of executives in the decision imprisoned for life with no parole and all assets seized. Corporate protectionism is the biggest problem in the world today -- you can kill rape destroy the planet's ecoystem and rob people blind and there is not thing one the court can do to them tht carries any real scare. Those Enron execs STILL will be multi millionaires at the end of it...where is the so called justice?
I feel pretty much the same way on these matters. How DO they get away with it? And then again, how DO the likes of GWB get elected?Schwartzkof's or Karajan's Nazi Party memberships are a trivial matter to debate, keeping things in perspective.
They do it every other country that they place a puppet dictator in so why can't they do it in a country with perhaps the most apathetic citizenry in the world. A two party system where the parties are like Ford and GM hardly gives voice to the average citizen - they're like two giants and whichever one you pick really makes no difference to policy or quality anymore.Propaganda worked in Germany for over a decade through force and intimidation by controlling all forms of media and the use of scare tactics. In America it works through fear. The government creates a threat called "terrorism" and yes it is real but no it's not as big a threat as they would have people believe -- and much of it was created by the US government in the first place. Then, you have the population looking for terrorists under their bed afraid to walk down the street (they do this with the black community as well) and poof everyone is willing to let the government have complete power. Oh we don't need a warrant to walk into your house anymore - oh and we can listen to every call you make because YOU might be a terrorist. If it was not so 1984 it would be roll off you seat laughing hilarious.
War is the single greatest thing to make money - the more wars you have and the longer they last the more money and power can be made. Winners call the losers terrorists, war mongers etc. But if there was no wars for America to be involved in ask yourself how their economy would hold up. They can;t sell their crappy cars outside of North America - here in Korea the people laugh at the big three. Americans will not do tough jobs anymore because that requires lots of hard work (so we get illegals from Mexico who work slave labour hours with such pay to keep the entire agricultural industry going -- without them there would be no Oranges sold to anybody). There was some sort of parade in the States where all the illegals took a day off - Many companies completely shut down. The government? Well they make speaches but do nothing.
Anyway, for the problems to be fixed you need highly intellient highly ethical and moral people to run the country. Unfortunately what you get instead are morally bankrupt power hungry sociopaths. Bush is just bad because not only does he fit the problems he is so blatant about it. Clinton was a much better showman and presented a more intellectual and reasoned way of going about things. Bush presents a slack jawed Deliverance gun happy nutbar with a vocabulary which would not have had him pass my grade 5 class.
The president should be in the elite 1% of the best and the brightest and what we get is a failed businessman and poor public speaker. Someone said to me that you can;t judge him by his speaking ability -- of course we can -- that is a HUGE and vitally important part of the president's JOB. His ability to communicate is perhaps the most fundamental thing he has to have. If he even once proved competance in ANY other area it might be different -- but for Heaven sakes he bombs a country over 9-11 that had NOTHING to do with it. He has not attempted to go after Bin Laden (his money buddy) so he diverts the attention to "global terrorism" half of whom his daddy and government created. Bin Laden and Saddam were there BECAUSE of US government funding for heaven sake.
The best and the brightest should be president and if that really is encapsulated in GWB then man America seriously needs to fund its educational institutes (though granted that means less money for those smart bombs that could not hit the right target if they dropped a million of them). Everytime he makes a speech it reflects badly on Yale and Harvard who actually passed this dimbulb ("who does not like to read").
Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice umm umm you can't uhhhhh fol us again.
It's a shame the American public also don't know this saying because they might not have had this moron in a second term. Well that is unfair - he did not truly win the first time.
I wouldn't assume that you mean Kerry was the best and brightest, so if not, who?thanks
No but I watched the US debate. Kerry put forward a highly intellectual answer to his stance on pro-choice. Bush's reply was that Kerry's reply was so hard to understand and nobody could understand it. I had a big chuckle from that because gee it made perfect sense --- and would to anyone with half a brain -- s that rules out Bush and his voters.I am not defending democrats -- they run the robotic Gore out there the first time and then Kerry who the Republicas can beat up on on his track record. I mean the democrats should stop trying to promise righty programs and actually develp an opinion -- but that is of course assuming they are really any different than Republicans. In talk they are but in action I doubt it.
I mean they need someone like Clinton. As much of a used car dealer as he comes across he has Charisma and speaks exceptionlly well. If the worst thing about him is not being able to keep it in his pants that's not so bad...I'd rather a horny president off with his interns than a money hungry protohuman with lots of guns itching to flip the switch.
"Anyway, for the problems to be fixed you need highly intelligent highly ethical and moral people to run the country".Even if the finances for a campaign weren't a problem, such people just wouldn't get elected as the masses want unruffled answers to questions with guarantees and assurances.
Intelligent, ethical and moral people don't come across as potential leaders to Joe Blow, as they'd have to admit some problems couldn't be solved and would get worse, and the most awkward questions would meet with an 'I haven't a clue' response rather than the usual beating around the bush (no pun intended) and avoidance of a straight answer.
Politicians are salesmen, in that they have to sell themselves to you and I.
They have the same body language, the same swagger, the same line of patter, and they'll tell you exactly what you want to hear; if you don't want to hear it they'll tell you something else.
It's no surprise that political leaders have tended to come from the ranks of lawyers/barristers lately as these are also salesmen/saleswomen in that they have to gain the empathy of a jury/judge and sell their version of events no matter if it is true or not.
When political candidates debate they are addressing a 'jury' and they have to convince you that the 'client' they represent is both YOU and their party, and that the opposition is guilty of not being capable of representing you as well as they.
Of course, many of us can spot sales spiel instantly and the salesman doesn't get his toe in the door, but then again if an intelligent, ethical and moral salesman knocked on your door and told you the hoover he was selling was "great when working although they do have a reliability problem and parts cost a fortune", would you let him in? :0)
Best Regards,
Chris redmond.
the people who are voting -- they are as stupid if not moreso than the people they elect. North America including Canada just so I don;t seem to be America bashing are to be blunt spoiled babies who need everything with a healthy dose of sugar coating -- no one wants to hear truth - they want to hear what they want to hear. If something bad happens to us it is always ALWAYS someone else's fault. My kid is a bully or fails his tests then it's the teahcer's fault, or the coaches or the other kid or whatever but it is never me the parent who did something wrong. No we want everything and we want it now for the lowest price. We expect things as "rights" and when anything goes wrong the other guy is to blame - which explains the sue crazy society already in the US and beginning to erupt in Canada.I was at a lovely restaurant in Korea -- you sit around a barbeque styles table where you are given the raw meat and you kick it yourself. I contemplated a restaurant in the US and thought -- never happen. SOme moron would burn himself and sue the restaurant or undercook his food and sue the restaurant. Always blame others for your own stupidity is the society we have built.
So yes I know why Pierre Trudeu "Go f*** yourself" and "I'll do whatever the hell I want" kind of remarks are not going to fly these days. Instead we get babble that says something everyone wants to hear and nobody has a clue what will really happen.
The worst thing a politician can probably say is "this plan will really work and make society better by completely governmentally refulating and completely controlling (by making the entire drug medical and insurance industry non profit) so the drug that was $100.00 a pill is now the .05 it always SHOULD have been but in order to do it your income tax is going to rise 10% and 30% for the top 1% in society. Sorry top 1% but this money will actually save millions of lives which is more important that you having 8 private jets and 13 homes -- you'll have to make due with 4 private jets and 7 homes but we still feel that you have sufficient motivation to work hard and we have not gone too far into European socialism to make you wretch.
Guess you've never been to an American Korean restaurant. Around here anyway, they all have that feature.Certain of your other views needless to say share that naivete.
But I'm sure on you it looks good.
Well I stand corrected on the restaurant. I have not seen this in North America. Hopefully more will gain in popularity.And of course right wing religious nutters believe in God, Guns and their government without any real reasoned questioning so none of them are going to be swayed by anything... It;s funny how CHristians make fun of the Jehovah Witness for being a cult -- and yet I think that about all of Christianity. The only difference between religions and cults is the size of membership.
what is accomplished by kicking that meat?But what I'd really like to know is: Did you actually manage to graduate from that university that featured that crackerjack philosophy professor?
Hey it was late when I wrote that -- should have said cooking hahaha.Actually that Philisophy professor is a PHD and he actually made a lot more sense than most professors and PHD's I've read. The main point was tackle big issues.
We spend HUNDREDS if not THOUSANDS of hours on one man on death row (ONE person MIGHT be killed if it turns out he was innocent) - now count the hours over that duration where THOUSANDS of kids die daily in South Africa -- the coverage by the media - the money fighting the legal battles to argue over the "principle" of the right or wrong of the death penalty while that money could have gone to something actually useful.
This does not mean I agree with that professor - but his points were reasoned defendable and logically sound and very likely intended to spark debate - which so FEW University classes elicit. Very few classes in 13 years of University had raging debates and had people engaged and arguing philisophical points -- And he practiced what he believed in.
Incidentally, the University I attended we had Ex Harvard and Berkely Instructors and I askedhow we stacked up being a relative no-name. He told me that Students getting an A- at Mal-u would get an A+ at Harvard (though not this is not applicable to law or medicine since our school was not focused here). I said are you serious and he said of course the marks are inflated in tertiary subject areas because it reflected badly on Harvard if they had substandard marks. Which explains Bush graduating.
Let's get that part straight. Also, "It was Henry Ford who in the 1930s built the Soviet Union's first modern automobile plant." The Ford Motor Company was active around the world, not just in Germany, another point to get straight.The perfidy must be situated in a larger context, and the book for that is by Anthony Sutton (pointered below). "Professor Antony C. Sutton proves that World War II was not only well planned, it was also extremely profitable—for a select group of financial insiders." These included the Kuhn, Loeb company, themselves Jewish. All very distressing, but all way more important than old Henry Ford.
clark
"The f***ing Jews are responsible for all the f***ing wars!"
z
Didn't they have a hand in financing the Bolshevik Revolution as well? It seems like they were playing both sides.
s
They're willing bankers to both sides in any conflict. They don't take sides.I find the American connection to the Bolshevik Revolution far more intriguing, considering that the USSR was our mortal enemy for so many years. Helping to fund the Bolsheviks were high-ranking members of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, people who should be expected to act in the best interests of the United States.
nt
Who Is Elizabeth Schwarzkopf ??
What are the 4 last songs ???
You serious?Off the top of my head...
1.) Austrian Elizabeth Schwarzkopf was one of the great sopranos of the 20th century, as well as one of the most highly regarded/best loved singers of all time. Many fine recorings of her are available and are still considered among the very best. (Schwarzkopf recorded much during the stereo era.) She was particularly identified with the songs/operas of Strauss - most significantly in her signature role as the Marschalin in Der Rosenkavelier (one of the greatest operas of the 20th century and a sublime work IMO).
She was not without her faults as a person (Nazi party affiliation, ego-centric, etc.) but as an artist she was possessed of an extraordinarily beautiful, silvery soprano. She excelled in both lieder (German art songs) and operatic repertoir. She was both technically and dramatically superb. She was also adept at operetta and lighter music.
She was also easy to look at in her day.
2.) Strauss' Four Last Songs is a great work of art, distinctly elegiac in tone. The work is for soprano solo and symphony.orchestra Schwarzkopf's recording with George Szell (mentioned below) remains one the best recordings of this work to be found.
has a poster of her, a Wagner poster and a poster of Mel Gibson on her wall. We call it her 'wall of anti-semitism'.
... she probably had the Gibson poster up before the DUI arrest. I wouldn't be surprised if it was constant harasssment as a result of the "Passion of the Christ" that finally caused him to lose it while under the influence. This anti-semitism thing is geting to be like the little boy who cried wolf.
Funny how we dismiss stuff.
I can't recall reading anything about opera stars killing people.
She never fled to get away from the movement either.
seriously now, I hope we are not judged, as registered voters in our democracy, for the civilian lives we have taken in Vietnam, Iraq and elsewhere.
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And, that's okay as long as she is talented and "easy on the eyes"??? Please explain further. My father served in 3 German prison camps as a POW during WWII, and I can tell you he wouldn't give a crap how good looking this dame was, nor how talented. Neither would I.DDM
...not even because she was a brilliant artist - and make no mistake, Elizabeth Shwarzkopf was a very great singer, even if her moral choices were corrupt.BTW, I was merely trying to give that inmate who inquired a capsule bio of ES. Which is why I included the remark about her looks, which is undoubtedly the least important thing about her.
Former Nazi affiliation in Germany can be more complex than one can imagine - I have distant relatives in Germany who were imprisoned during WWII as well as ones who fought for the Reich. Undoubtedly some of those were party members.
I can understand your feelings as well as your father's. One of my dear friends was a POW in the Pacific theater and hated all things Japanese until the end of his life.
I'm not offerng excuses for Schwarzkpf. She did what she did, which implies a tacit consent to the aims of the 3rd Reich or a turing of a blind eye to their agenda at the very least, all for furthering her career. The Third Recih was a monstrous regime, but not all Nazis were monsters. However, if you cannot abide her, that is your privelege.
I do listen to some of her recordings, as I do to those of Furtwengler, Fisher-Dieskau and von Karajan. That is *my* privelege.
served in WWII. They fought in the most decorated US combat regiment of all time, gaining most of their awards from Purple Hearts. I was lucky they survived. Between the Germans, and the the fact that the American commanders sent them into the toughest situations, undermanned and out numbered because they were not white; both sent all too many of the regiment to early deaths. I hold no grudge against anyone.War is Hell, Sherman said, even as he burned Atlanta..... It sometimes brings out the worse in human nature. Let's not add to it.
My father was sent into as tough a situation as any member of the military would face during WWII, and on numerous occasions. He was involved in many situations where they were undermanned and outnumbered. You have ZERO knowledge of what my father and his crew went through (only one survived besides my father) after being shot down for a THIRD time, nor what my father has been through in his life as the result of the torture and beatings experienced at the hands of the German officers and Nazi party members. Because of the extreme cruelty experienced at Stalag Luft III and Stalag Luft VIIa, and seeing many he knew killed upon the whim of the German soldiers, my father has dealt with severe psychological and physical war injuries all of his life. Being a POW still haunts him to this day. He was diagnosed with Alzheimer's in February 2006...on many days he doesn't recall anything familiar in his life...but he ALWAYS remembers that he was in a German Prison camp.I'll leave you with a quote from General Patton, which he made on April 29, 1945, the day he liberated my father and many POWs at Stalag Luft VIIa: "Your country is grateful for your service and regrets the severe cruelty you have experienced at the hands of these ignorant bastards. You have EVERY right to despise these cowards the rest of your life."
My father is entitled to his feelings. So am I. If you don't like 'em, don't read 'em.
I am not condemning you nor your father for your feelings. And yes, you are very correct in that you are entitled to them. Personal dealings with victims can and will scar you for a lifetime. I do not not know what sufferings your father endured, and I assume the worse. I give all soldiers who served the highest respect, and to be very truthful, they more than deserve it, and are woefully under compensated for their sufferings in my humble opinion. I honestly greatly respect the sacrifice your father has given: no one can or should expect anything more.It would be rude and extremely insulting to ask anything from either you or your father.
I just don't like hatred. It actually caused the rise of Hitler and and while it in no way exonerates anything the Nazis have done, it is an emotion that, frankly, scares me, because I have also seen what horrible things it has done to my circle of relations. I won't go into it, but wrongs on all sides have been committed in the heat of emotion. None of us are totally immune to it. I only hope that we all can work to eliminate it.
Peace,
Stu
My father has never voiced a feeling of hatred towards the Germans or even said an unkind word about his captors. He does not harbor intense anger either. He has simply described his experiences about his captivity, and only began doing that in the last five years. Further, my family does not participate in hatred...it is an emotion that hurts the one harboring it as much as it does the one it is directed towards.Back to the original point of my first post, my father would not have an inclination to support someone who was a member of the Nazi party...regardless of their vocation, regardless of their beauty, regardless of their talent. That is his choice, and I believe he earned it.
Were they with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, the Japanese-American unit? Ironically, I just saw mention of them last night, on a PBS broadcast about WWII and the early use of color film during that conflict.It struck me that those soldiers, and their civilian counterparts who remained behind in the internment camps, bore their circumstances with exceptional dignity.
Good for them.
for your complement. My relatives would have been honored (they've all passed on now).
They never really talked about their experiences: well, maybe only after perhaps one too many beers, and never very long. You could see the effort it took to say very little. My relatives were very lucky in that they were replacements sent in at close to the end of the war, where they fortunately missed most of the heavy action.
Figure in their action to rescue the 1st battalion of the 36th division, they lost 800 men of 1300 to save 220.....
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Presumably a lot were communist party members, as were certain European and American composers, specifically when Stalin was running the Soviet Union and the Soviet Union was running the local parties. Stalin managed to murder some 20 million "class enemies" with his gulags, show trials and mass executions, while party members lied about it. Mao, whom Stalin helped come to power, did even better. Cambodia's Pol Pot has them all beat if you weight for population. Yet nobody blames this on Prokofiev or Copland, and I don't think they should, any more than the average Republican is to blame for Abu Ghraib. It depends on the specifics.
Most who were in the spotlight at all didn't have much of a choice but to be a "party member" at the time.
one of the reasons the brothers split up- one wanted to supply the Nazis and the other founded Puma
nt
IBSmiester
Open Your Ears....
Nazi Party membership was not a party affiliation such as US Democrat or Republican. It was a mark of status such as Soviet Communist Party membership.By the closing years of WWII, the German goverment made "Hitler Youth" membership mandatory for all teenaged boys, as a feeder system for military conscription.
I believe that the historical truth is that when he was a teenager, Joseph Ratzinger at first complied with the mandate to join Hitler Youth and then broke the law by deserting the military unit his group was assigned to aid, and that he never was an actual member of the NSDAP.
# # #
Porsche was a different can of worms. He had a symbiotic relationship with Hitler that advanced his own career agenda. However, the holier-than-thou French, smarting from their own collaboration, jailed Porsche on arguable grounds, and kept him in conditions that ruined his health and led to his death.
if you ever happen to get a chance to visit the VW factory or the Porsche/Audi place you will still pictures of Hitler on the walls.
gary
...
There are silent Popes while our elders are sent to concentration camps and bombs are showered on innocent children.
I would also suggest that E Schwarzkopf did not become a party member based on political views she held, but rather social status.
... the car of the people.
in Action.
.
I wonder about Thomas Edison because he was a close friend of Ford.
And I wonder about anyone who drives a Ford automobile!Geez, that makes about as much sense, doesn't it?
... who was Jewish, didn't hold that against her.....
NT
lifting a mug in tribute to her.....
Let's keep politics out of music.
One might want to watch what one says about the H.A.s online.FYI
...feet of clay.The fact that she was blindly ambitious, self-absorbed and willing to ally herself with the fascists & war mongers (when she was all of 22) doesn't tarnish my admiration for her undeniable talent.
just like the issue with Chinese amps, imo. People to cite that about HvK, Bohm and W.Furtwangler. Depending on your preferences artistically, does it really matter now? They're all dead.
I originally tried to post the comments below in response to John Marks but his post was deleted in the time between when I started and finished typing so I'll post them here instead. For what it's worth, however, I don't think artistic preferences have anything to do with the issue.So here's my original comments which failed to get posted:
In my view, what matters now about a person is what they are now. There isn't a single one of us who hasn't done bad things in the past but we don't necessarily keep repeating them. Sometimes we learn, sometimes we make amends for past wrongs. Sometimes, sad to say, we don't.
But if what we did in the past counts, whether that be for good or bad, what we've done since then counts equally also. Condemning people out of hand for something done over 50 years ago with no consideration given to why they did it or what they've done since then is simply vindictiveness.
And, if one wishes to raise the question of religious virtues, compassion and forgiveness rate highly in pretty well every religion. It's also worth while remembering that forgiveness doesn't require the other person to do anything, it's an act on our part and it's something we choose to do. Yes it's hard, and sometimes we simply can't manage it, but at the least it can be something we strive to do. Condemning others outright was something the Nazis did, and we don't have to follow in their footsteps.
So, yes, I will disagree with John.
"compassion and forgiveness rate highly in pretty well every religion"That has to have been written in jest. You left out "tolerance"
and thank goodness, for I can't imagine living life in a world that judged people for past acts. I feel like it's time to go public with this - back in college I took part in beating up a bum for no reason whatsoever. We left him in pretty bad shape. He died the next day.But now I'm a successfull business executive and all is forgiven.
Here is the distinction.An artist I greatly admire, K. F. Dahmen, served in the Wermacht. He was drafted, he had no choice, he suffered during his service. Having been in the army did his career no good. Indeed, Dahmen's generally dark and brooding works seem to suggest that he was haunted by that experience.
Von Karajan, Riefenstahl, Schwarzkopf and others all used their sucking up to Nazis to advance their personal career agendas, and then got bad cases of amnesia.
For the Good Lord's sake, von Karajan conducted an orchestral version of the Horst Wessel Lied, a song that contains the words "our knives will drip with Jewish blood."
So, that is the distinction I would draw. Someone who was very young, or passive, or under compulsion (such as the case with the young Benedict XVI's Hitler Youth membership) does not have in my book anything to apologize for, just things to regret.
I certainly never held it against Fischer-Dieskau that he was "discovered" when he was a Prisoner of War.
But someone who climbed over dead bodies to rise higher in their career, I think, has some public repenting to do. And until they do so, don't go to their concerts or tout their records.
Sincerely,
John Marks
Please point out the line in this song that translates to "our knives will drip with Jewish blood."Horst Wessel Lied
Die Fahne hoch die Reihen fest geschlossen
S. A. marschiert mit ruhig festem Schritt
Kam'raden die Rotfront und Reaktion erschossen
Marschier'n im Geist in unsern Reihen mitDie Strasse frei den braunen Batallionen
Die Strasse frei dem Sturmabteilungsmann
Es schau'n auf's Hackenkreuz voll Hoffung schon Millionen
Der Tag fur Freiheit und fur Brot bricht anZum letzen Mal wird nun Appell geblasen
Zum Kampfe steh'n wir alle schon bereit
Bald flattern Hitler-fahnen Uber allen Strassen
Die Knechtschaft dauert nur mehr kurze ZeitDie Fahne hoch die Reihen fest geschlossen
S. A. marschiert mit ruhig festem Schritt
Kam'raden die Rotfront und Reaktion erschossen
Marschier'n im Geist in unsern Reihen mit
I don't have a copy of all the verses of the Horst Wessel Lied handy, but I did pull down Lebrecht's book, which was widely reviewed all over the world. Many disagreed with his conclusions but I do not recall him ever being impeached on the facts.Here's the quote from the middle of p.115:
"Karajan initially was everything they could desire: a talented and obedient musician who conducted tributes for Hitler's birthday, a special "Fidelio" to celebrate the Anschluss and odious works of musical propaganda such as Richard Trunk's "Celebration of the New Front," whose chorale finale was wound around the murderous "Horst Wessel Lied" in which 'Jewish blood spurts from our knives'. He was sent off to conduct opera at La Scala and concerts in Rome, the perfect cultural ambassador of one Fascist nation to another. In countries overrun by German forces he appeared with captive orchestras, making a fiery Strauss recording with the Concertgebouw, and performing the Wessel anthem in Paris."
# # #
Now, perhaps it is the case the Trunk added the phrase in question to his work, but my point was the Karajan conducted a choral piece with those words. If those words do not "properly" belong in the Horst Wessel Lied it hardly gets Mr. Karajannis off the hook for sucking up to murderers.
If a country singer of today who was in thrall to a Klan politician sang a ballad about dragging Negroes to death behind pickup trucks, well, actually, it would be no different from what Karajannis did.
I trust this answers your question.
Some get a pass for associating with the NSDAP, but others don't.Karajanis
Do you regularly refer to Kirk Douglas as Issur Demsky
BTW, the war has been over for 60 years.
I read German. The line about knives dripping is not in the stanzas you quote.
I Googled for "Horst Wessel Lied" and that's all that came up.
Same here. Such a line would read "Unsere Messer tropfen Judenblut".
Don't see it.
"But someone who climbed over dead bodies to rise higher in their career, I think, has some public repenting to do. And until they do so, don't go to their concerts or tout their records."I can understand that point of view but I remain unconvinced that it is the best approach. It amounts to a form of shunning and I think it's as likely to keep some people unrepentant as it is to coerce others into a public repentance unaccompanied by a private change of view.
Frankly, John, for all that we talk about the desirability of people "getting what they deserve" in both the good and the bad sense of that, I think most of us would actually like to be treated better than we deserve and we have no chance of that if we don't offer the same treatment to others. The 'golden rule' is to 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you', not to do unto them as you think they deserve. It's not an easy rule to live up to and we all fail at it frequently, but at least we can try rather than simply saying that there are cases where it simply doesn't apply so we don't have to bother there.
...
NT
Wish everyone else took this approach. Hatred is not supposed to be the Christian approach, although I am not Christian.
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That record with Szell is in the basement somewhere. Shame on me!
As a matter of fact, my local NPR station is playing Autumn right now.
especially the Christmas album and Szell/Four Last Songs already mentioned. She lasted a long time! I'll play those albums tonight for a memorial.Interesting, the linked Wikpedia already lists her death yesterday at age 90.
Damn.....She sure is boneable !!!
If you want to hear her closer to the peak of her prowess, get the 1954 version of Four Last Songs (It's available on CD). Not as moody or as dark and evocative as the Szell version, but being much younger, she has a remarkable flexibility in the range and takes the pieces in much faster tempo (perhaps her voice was in better shape?). Where the Szell version sounds like she contemplating the end, the earlier version reeks of youth and life. I like both, but her vocal suppleness on the earlier version continues to amaze me.
I felt that darkness also. I have the cd version and somewhere we have a EMI English copy (Dad's house?).
Her personality, on the other hand?...
I was present at the UK launch of the record industry " Home Taping is Killing Music" (yawn) campaign at BAFTA in London. Sitting in the seat in front of me was Elizabeth Schwarzkopf. I'll tell you it is an experience impossible to forget to be that close to a legend. As for her personality - no problem on that day. I think that you may be referring to her Desert Island Disc selection when (if my memory is correct), all of her choices were her own recordings!
Several folk (and admirers of her talents) who had met her in person reluctantly came to the common conclusion, rather underlined by her selections, that she was probably the most self-focused, self-referential personality they had ever met...That she had enrolled as a member of the Nazi party and had "a relationship" with a prominent fascist during the Hungarian occupation would not help her plead her cause...
Radio 4's "Front Row" programme gave a few minutes to discussing her voice and her life, and signed off this feature by observing that there may be many that would be sorry to lose a voice like hers, and also a number who would not be sorry to note her passing...
And no, your memory is indeed accurate in terms of her "Desert Island Discs" selections...
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Thanks for the additional information Bill. I hadn't known that she was actually a Nazi party member. Artistically? I love the operas (especially the Mozart/Da Ponte ones) recorded with her husband Walter Legge (another with certain personality defects according to legend.) The oft quoted Strauss Four Last Songs by her are not my favourite (Jessye Norman? Lucia Popp?), but I'll listen again in the light of this news.
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