Letter: Where anger and fear can lead

I read this in a recently published novel, “Winter Men,” by Jesper Bugge Kold: “It was as though everyone in Germany (1938) had become paralyzed. They’d screamed for change until their voices were hoarse, and they’d gotten the change they’d clamored for. But what happened when that change wasn’t for the better?”

As a young American living in the mid-20th century I wondered how two great constitutional democracies could succumb to the base appeal of demagogues preaching mostly anger, fear and hatred.

What weakness in the populace of those modern, civilized societies could lead them to embrace enthusiastically the sort of belligerent leadership that thrived on resentment and hatred of the “other,” that promoted a seductive pseudo-patriotism, that fed a paranoia beyond reason and stoked the distrust of duly-elected government, offering only dangerously simplistic solutions? I wondered how Italy and Germany, home to some of the world’s greatest scientists, philosophers and musicians, could have gone so wrong.

On Feb. 10 President Obama said, “We’ve always gone through periods when our democracy seems stuck. And when that happens, we have to find a new way of doing business. We’re in one of those moments.”

In the next few months may we who live in the world’s greatest constitutional democracy turn away from anger, fear and hatred, keeping the clamor and screaming to a minimum as we seek a new way of doing our governmental business. Let us behave well and choose wisely.

This story was originally published March 16, 2016 at 7:24 AM with the headline "Letter: Where anger and fear can lead."