Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 22:26:58 -0400
Subject: Re: M-I: Finkelstein's 'Crazy' Review Essay of *Hitler's 
From: farmelantj-AT-juno.com (James Farmelant)


I have up to now refrained from commenting on the Goldhagen
threads on this list.   Nevertheless if I was scoring the debate over
Goldhagen
on points then clearly Andy wins.  Up to now most of the criticisms of
Goldhagen on this list have been ad hominem.  Lou Godena's
attacks on Goldhagen being the most blatant examples.  Godena
has had the nerve to accuse Andy of engaging in ad hominem
attacks on Goldhagen's critics yet  when it comes to ad hominem
argument no one surpasses Lou Godena.  Godena attacks what
 he sees as Goldhagen's Zionist and reactionary
politics rather than focusing on Goldhagen's methodology, use
of sources, interpretations of etc.  Even if everything Godena says
about Goldhagen's politics and ideological motives is true it would
not  necessarily follow that he necessarily produced a shoddy piece
 of scholarship.  Even hard bitten reactionaries have been known
 to produce worthwhile
scholarship.  Lou Godena himself has been known to quote with
approbation the work of such reactionaries like Samuel Huntington
when he found their work useful for his own purposes.

I am also mystified by Lou Proyect's claim that there was no dissent
in Nazi Germany.  Goldhagen cites several examples of public
protests of Nazi policies and points out instances when such
protests succeeded in forcing the regime to modify or abandon
these policies.  One example was public opposition to the Euthanasia
Program in which German physicians were authorized to take the lives
of people whose were deemed to have a "life unworthy of living"--
primarily people suffering from mental infirmities or congenital physical
defects.  Public outcry eventually forced the regime to abandon this
policy.  In Bavaria attempts by the Nazi government to restrict religious
practices and to remove crucifixes from the schools were beaten
back by protests from Catholics.  Goldhagen also reports that there
were numerous strikes in Germany in the mid-1930's and in some
instances the regime was forced to back down from policies opposed
by workers.  Goldhagen makes the point that protests against
unpopular policies did occur in Nazi Germany but that very few occurred
on behalf of Jews.  He notes one such protest that did occur, when German
women protested in Berlin on behalf of their recently incarcerated
Jewish husbands.  Here too the regime backed down with the release
of six thousand Jewish men.  Unless Lou Proyect can show that
Goldhagen has garbled the facts concerning these incidents I fail
to understand his assertion that "Goldhagen's claim that Germans
could protest is a brazen lie."

			James F.


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