"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
y.com...
Nick wrote:
"If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" is not one of my principles.

"There he goes, up to his room, to write that hit song
'Alone in my principles."
From "That Thing You Do." NOT by Bulwer-Lytton.

I would not have attempted to join the NSDAP (Nazi Party)
simply because 'everyone else was doing it'.

My general regard toward the trolls here may be expressed as:

'A fly, Sir, may sting a stately horse and make him wince;
but one is an insect, and the other is a horse still.'
--Samuel Johnson

--Nick

"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
.com...

Evidently, even 'a little consideration' is too much to ask for or to
expect
from too many writers here. Abusive writers tend to drive away thoughtful
writers.

Yes, this is all true, and acting like it shouldn't be says you need to
find
somewhere else to post. I'm sorry, but the departure of Susan Polgar and
Mikahil Golubev is just not breaking my heart.

Oh yes. Mikhail Golubev. Wasn't he the joker that said the USA contributed a
small part in the victory over Germany? I guess Stalin's revisionist history
books still exist there. No doubt he thinks we are all in his gratitude for
the USSR B-17s, Red Army Rangers at Omaha beach, and for all those eggs,
Stalin's eggs, they gave to feed us, did to end the war and save freedom.

StanB

Nick wrote:

"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
y.com...
Nick wrote:
"If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" is not one of my principles.

"There he goes, up to his room, to write that hit song
'Alone in my principles."
From "That Thing You Do." NOT by Bulwer-Lytton.

I would not have attempted to join the NSDAP (Nazi Party)
simply because 'everyone else was doing it'.

My general regard toward the trolls here may be expressed as:

'A fly, Sir, may sting a stately horse and make him wince;
but one is an insect, and the other is a horse still.'
--Samuel Johnson

--Nick

And you are the horse's ass.

RAVING LUNATIC vs. SLITHERING SNAKE

By Larry Parr

Ms. Polgar had better never find herself falsely accused of anything because
Mr. Fernandez, as he did with GM Sherzer, will be nipping at her throat. That's
our kid. -- Larry Parr

Both are people who I've interacted very positively with on a personal basis
many times. You, on the other hand, are just some raving lunatic. There's a
difference. -- John Fernandez

No, we are not trying to find a title for a Chinese Kung-fu epic. We are
describing the latest exchange between this writer, the raving lunatic, and
John Fernandez, the slithering snake.

John Fernandez spoke of Alex Sherzer as a friend whom he admired, but
when the case began to appear bad for Sherzer, the kid was there with the venom
for his admirable, ah, friend.

Several others also commented on Mr. Fernandez's treatment of his dear,
ah, admirable friend.

Once again, I offer Susan Polgar this advice: The kid says he likes
you a lot. Translation: if you are ever falsely accused of something and you
appear to be struggling in court, then you'll have an admiring, friendly snake
slithering toward you.

That's our kid.

Which kid?

Mr. Fernandez: the one who had those 36 or so insider Olympic
sources -- oh, there might have been 42 on Monday and as few as 30 on some
other day -- but overall, he had about three dozen insider Olympic sources
telling him that chess would not be dropped from the Beijing Olympics the very
day before chess was dropped from the Beijing Olympics!

The kid's a danged plum doozy, all right.

And those that know me know that I consider democracy to be complete
bull****. -- John Fernandez

Briarroot wrote in message ...
Nick wrote:

"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
y.com...
Nick wrote:
"If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" is not one of my principles.

"There he goes, up to his room, to write that hit song
'Alone in my principles."
From "That Thing You Do." NOT by Bulwer-Lytton.

I would not have attempted to join the NSDAP (Nazi Party)
simply because 'everyone else was doing it'.

My general regard toward the trolls here may be expressed as:

'A fly, Sir, may sting a stately horse and make him wince;
but one is an insect, and the other is a horse still.'
--Samuel Johnson

--Nick

And you are the horse's ass.

"A Horse, of Course" --Don Blazer

"StanB" wrote in message
...
"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
.com...
Nick wrote:
Evidently, even 'a little consideration' is too much to ask for
or to expect from too many writers here....
Abusive writers tend to drive away thoughtful writers.

Yes, this is all true, and acting like it shouldn't be says you need to
find somewhere else to post. I'm sorry, but the departure of Susan Polgar
and Mikahil Golubev is just not breaking my heart.

Oh yes. Mikhail Golubev. Wasn't he the joker that said the USA contributed
a small part in the victory over Germany?

"Yes, US played some secondary *important* role in the victory over Hitler."
--GM Mikhail Golubev (17 April 2003)

I guess Stalin's revisionist history books still exist there.

As far as I know, nearly every (if not every) German general concurred after
1945 that Germany had lost the war *primarily* on its vast front against the
Soviet Union.

For further reading:
"When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler"
by David Glantz and Jonathan House (1995, University of Kansas Press)

David Glantz (Colonel (retired), United States Army) is considered the leading
American military historian on the war between Germany and the Soviet Union.

No doubt he thinks we are all in his gratitude for the USSR B-17s, Red Army
Rangers at Omaha beach, and for all those eggs, Stalin's eggs, they gave to
feed us, did to end the war and save freedom.
StanB

I cannot speak on behalf of GM Mikhail Golubev. But some people outside the
United States do suspect that many, if not most, Americans are ignorantly
convinced that the United States alone deserves all the credit for winning the
Second World War, essentially without any significant support from any allies.

Stan Booz reminds me of the "flag-waving" American (as described by a Russian
acquaintance of mine) who claimed that the United States deserved "full credit"
(yes, that's *full*) for the decisive victory at the Battle of Stalingrad.
I have no doubt that Stan Booz will continue to believe that 'history' must be
always written on sacred stone tablets inscribed with the United States flag.

'Historians are not accountable for the difficulty of learning to read.'
--Jane Austen (Northanger Abbey)

--Nick

"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
y.com...
John Macnab wrote:
...It's the motiveless malignancy I would prefer to do without.

My impression is that some writers may regard maligning other persons as
their primary, if not their only, motive for writing here at all.

As would we all.

Not quite 'we all'.
If 'all' were true, then we should not need to have this discussion.

But the usenet is not the place for civilized chat.
Anonymity and no costs bring out the worst in people.

Or that may bring out something more revealingly characteristic in a person.

Should someone be regarded more as a honest person for not lying when
1) one has been deterred only by the fear of being identified and punished or
2) one has recognised that it's wrong, even when 'safe', to do so?

'This above all: to thine own self be true.'
--William Shakespeare (Hamlet)

--Nick

-remove- (Mhoulsby) wrote in
message ...
From: (Nick)
Message-id:
"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
y.com...
Nick wrote:
"If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" is not one of my principles.

"There he goes, up to his room, to write that hit song
'Alone in my principles."
From "That Thing You Do." NOT by Bulwer-Lytton.

I would not have attempted to join the NSDAP (Nazi Party)
simply because 'everyone else was doing it'.

One can but admire your self-assurance in this regard.

Mr. Houlsby,

My hypothetical decision not to join the NSDAP (if I had been living in 1930s
Germany) should have demanded hardly any moral courage, only a modicum of
self-respect. Most Germans (including Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, a famous
wartime hero) never formally joined the NSDAP.

Evidently, some Germans who did join the NSDAP were mere opportunists, not
necessarily fanatical anti-Semites. A friend of mine comes from a German
Jewish family (his parents left Germany in 1939), which had been quite
conservative and nationalistic. One of his uncles (a highly observant Jew)
had been decorated for bravery after he lost an arm while fighting in the
First World War; he refused to leave his Vaterland under any circumstances.
Fortunately, on account of his status as a 'war hero' (which even the Nazis
respected to some extent), he was not sent to a concentration camp ('one of
the nicer ones', in my friend's words) until late in the war, and he was able
to survive. Anyhow, my friend's father (an engineer) was very nationalistic,
politically conservative, and fiercely anti-Communist. A few of his non-Jewish
friends joined the NSDAP and actually invited him (the son of a rabbi) to
attempt to join it too! According to my friend, if it had not been for the
immutable facts that his father was Jewish and the Nazis were anti-Semitic,
then his father would have seriously considered joining the NSDAP. At that
time, of course, he did not expect the realities of the future Holocaust.
My friend's point was that his father was able to coexist in comparative peace
for some time with some friends or acquaintances who had joined the NSDAP.

I'm not sure that I would have had the chutzpah of a Bielenberg or a
Bonhoffer if I had found myself in such difficult historical circumstances.

After the failure of the plot to assassinate Hitler on 20 July 1944,
Adam von Trott zu Solz (a diplomat) was arrested and tortured by the Nazis.
Peter Bielenberg (a close friend of Trott) devised a daring plan for Trott's
escape, but that plan was betrayed, and Bielenberg was sent to a concentration
camp. His British wife, Christabel (nee Burton), was able to meet a prominent
Nazi late in the war. Then she implied, carefully but clearly, that the war
would end soon, and that then a once prominent Nazi would need any friend that
he could find among the victorious Allies. She mentioned that her family was
well-connected in the United Kingdom, and if anything more unpleasant were to
happen to her husband, then she would later do her utmost to make that Nazi
personally regret the consequences. Adam von Trott zu Solz was executed,
but Peter Bielenberg was able to survive. After the war, the Bielenbergs
decided to settle in Ireland.

'Certain good qualities are like the senses: people entirely lacking in
them can neither perceive nor comprehend them.'
--La Rochefoucauld (Maxims, 1665)

--Nick

Hey Nick, I'm sure we're all mightily impressed by your ability to flip
through the Oxford Book of Quotations, but why don't you just speak for
yourself, and let poor old Jane Austen alone?

TMB

(Nick) wrote in message . com...
-remove- (Mhoulsby) wrote in
message ...
From: (Nick)
Message-id:
"The Masked Bishop" wrote in message
y.com...
Nick wrote:
"If you can't beat 'em, join 'em" is not one of my principles.

"There he goes, up to his room, to write that hit song
'Alone in my principles."
From "That Thing You Do." NOT by Bulwer-Lytton.

I would not have attempted to join the NSDAP (Nazi Party)
simply because 'everyone else was doing it'.

One can but admire your self-assurance in this regard.

Mr. Houlsby,

My hypothetical decision not to join the NSDAP (if I had been living in 1930s
Germany) should have demanded hardly any moral courage, only a modicum of
self-respect. Most Germans (including Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, a famous
wartime hero) never formally joined the NSDAP.

Evidently, some Germans who did join the NSDAP were mere opportunists, not
necessarily fanatical anti-Semites. A friend of mine comes from a German
Jewish family (his parents left Germany in 1939), which had been quite
conservative and nationalistic. One of his uncles (a highly observant Jew)
had been decorated for bravery after he lost an arm while fighting in the
First World War; he refused to leave his Vaterland under any circumstances.
Fortunately, on account of his status as a 'war hero' (which even the Nazis
respected to some extent), he was not sent to a concentration camp ('one of
the nicer ones', in my friend's words) until late in the war, and he was able
to survive. Anyhow, my friend's father (an engineer) was very nationalistic,
politically conservative, and fiercely anti-Communist. A few of his non-Jewish
friends joined the NSDAP and actually invited him (the son of a rabbi) to
attempt to join it too! According to my friend, if it had not been for the
immutable facts that his father was Jewish and the Nazis were anti-Semitic,
then his father would have seriously considered joining the NSDAP. At that
time, of course, he did not expect the realities of the future Holocaust.
My friend's point was that his father was able to coexist in comparative peace
for some time with some friends or acquaintances who had joined the NSDAP.

I'm not sure that I would have had the chutzpah of a Bielenberg or a
Bonhoffer if I had found myself in such difficult historical circumstances.

After the failure of the plot to assassinate Hitler on 20 July 1944,
Adam von Trott zu Solz (a diplomat) was arrested and tortured by the Nazis.
Peter Bielenberg (a close friend of Trott) devised a daring plan for Trott's
escape, but that plan was betrayed, and Bielenberg was sent to a concentration
camp. His British wife, Christabel (nee Burton), was able to meet a prominent
Nazi late in the war. Then she implied, carefully but clearly, that the war
would end soon, and that then a once prominent Nazi would need any friend that
he could find among the victorious Allies. She mentioned that her family was
well-connected in the United Kingdom, and if anything more unpleasant were to
happen to her husband, then she would later do her utmost to make that Nazi
personally regret the consequences. Adam von Trott zu Solz was executed,
but Peter Bielenberg was able to survive. After the war, the Bielenbergs
decided to settle in Ireland.

'Certain good qualities are like the senses: people entirely lacking in
them can neither perceive nor comprehend them.'
--La Rochefoucauld (Maxims, 1665)

--Nick

Nick, believe me, Mark's "I Know, Interesting, I know" comment was
more interesting than the following response:

"In 1919 Anton Drexler, Gottfried Feder and Dietrich Eckart formed the
German Worker's Party (GPW) in Munich. The German Army was worried
that it was a left-wing revolutionary group and sent Adolf Hitler, one
of its education officers, to spy on the organization. Hitler
discovered that the party's political ideas were similar to his own.
He approved of Drexler's German nationalism and anti-Semitism but was
unimpressed with the way the party was organized. Although there as a
spy, Hitler could not restrain himself when a member made a point he
disagreed with, and he stood up and made a passionate speech on the
subject.

Anton Drexler was impressed with Hitler's abilities as an orator and
invited him to join the party. At first Hitler was reluctant, but
urged on by his commanding officer, Captain Karl Mayr, he eventually
agreed. He was only the fifty-fourth person to join the German
Worker's Party. Hitler was immediately asked to join the executive
committee and was later appointed the party's propaganda manager.

In the next few weeks Hitler brought several members of his army into
the party, including one of his commanding officers, Captain Ernst
Roehm. The arrival of Roehm was an important development as he had
access to the army political fund and was able to transfer some of the
money into the GWP.

The German Worker's Party used some of this money to advertise their
meetings. Adolf Hitler was often the main speaker and it was during
this period that he developed the techniques that made him into such a
persuasive orator.

Hitler's reputation as an orator grew and it soon became clear that he
was the main reason why people were joining the party. This gave
Hitler tremendous power within the organization as they knew they
could not afford to lose him.

In April, 1920, Hitler advocated that the party should change its name
to the National Socialist German Workers Party (NSDAP). Hitler had
always been hostile to socialist ideas, especially those that involved
racial or sexual equality. However, socialism was a popular political
philosophy in Germany after the First World War. This was reflected in
the growth in the German Social Democrat Party (SDP), the largest
political party in Germany.

Hitler, therefore redefined socialism by placing the word 'National'
before it. He claimed he was only in favour of equality for those who
had "German blood". Jews and other "aliens" would lose their rights of
citizenship, and immigration of non-Germans should be brought to an
end.

In February 1920, the NSDAP published its first programme which became
known as the "Twenty-Five Points". In the programme the party refused
to accept the terms of the Versailles Treaty and called for the
reunification of all German people. To reinforce their ideas on
nationalism, equal rights were only to be given to German citizens.
"Foreigners" and "aliens" would be denied these rights.

To appeal to the working class and socialists, the programme included
several measures that would redistribute income and war profits,
profit-sharing in large industries, nationalization of trusts,
increases in old-age pensions and free education.

On 24th February, 1920, the NSDAP (later nicknamed the Nazi Party)
held a mass rally where it announced its new programme. The rally was
attended by over 2,000 people, a great improvement on the 25 people
who were at Hitler's first party meeting."

It would be deemed boring by the multitudes of chessplayers, who are
lurking in these forums in their clamor to further quench their
thirsts in the learning of their game.

Lance Smith