This is where the immersing oneself into another man's life and work and thought yields benefits that no amount of quick access and crossreference on line can provide. After surviving over 1100 pages of Shirer's meticulous research, and even absorbing his memories and prejudices subliminally, it is possible to have a grasp of Nazi Germany that benefits enormously from his experience there. In other words, you wind up knowing things you don't even realize you know. I probably have been subtly misled by some his errors too, but that's another story.

I understood that cavalierly equating the Nazis to the Soviets was just plain wrong. It's not that saying one is bad somehow is implying the other isn't because they are ideologically different. The Nazis and the Reds could both be horrible and still be different, and suddenly it becomes clear that what made them both horrible had nothing to do with their similarities, but was in spite of their differences.

I knew this instantly upon reading TBs assertions, in fact, I've known it all along since I read the book 40 years ago and that has stayed with me. I realized I've carried it with me all this time. I just coudn't prove it by research until I had a copy of the book in front of me, and I stumbled on that index entry that gave me direct access to all the relevant quotes that made my point. The Nazis and the Soviets were monsters but they were monsters for very different different reasons.

The point I'm making here is not about TBs assertions, or my objections to them. It is about how human beings process data. Reading a book carries a lot of subliminal information with it, you're exposed to a lot more than you realize by reading it, and it affects you a lot more profoundly than you think.

I've read Shirer's "Berlin Diary", covering his stay in Germany prior to Flannery's arrival, and I read Flannery's book as well. I feel I know more about Nazi Germany now than just "facts". I have been exposed to two intelligent and perceptive men's intellectual and emotional responses to the Reich. I feel like I've been there, in a way, and I get a very disturbing sense of deja vu. I don't think you can really understand what is happening in this country now unless you understand what happened there.