Final Word from Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Ronald Lauder, well known to Czechs as principal owner of TV Nova, told the Financial Times that he fears the financial crisis looks like the beginning of Hitler's rise in 1938. This is an alarming comment, given that Lauder is president of the World Jewish Congress. To most Czechs, 1938 means mainly the Munich Agreement, but Lauder apparently had more in mind Kristallnacht a month later. The Jews were singled out by the Nazis as the internal enemy responsible for Germany's defeat in World War I and its ensuing economic troubles. If Czechs, 70 years later, decide to blame anyone for the difficulties they're facing, who will it be? Jews aren't likely the first to come to mind. A more-likely target are the nomenklatura and former StB agents who glided seamlessly from communism to capitalism and helped create an economy dominated by a small number of powerful groups. Lauder's TV Nova might be one of them, but Czechs won't harbor any animosity for a television station that brought them "Dallas" and "SuperStar."[Czech Republic Sudetenland]