I just started reading William L. Shirer’s “The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich“–written in 1950– and I was immediately taken aback by  something written at the end of the forward, which seems mighty prescient.

In our new age  of terrifying, lethal gadgets, which supplanted so swiftly the old one, the first great aggressive war, if it should come, will be launched by suicidal little madmen pressing an electronic button.

Mr. Shirer might as well have mentioned Ahmadinejad by name.

I wonder  what Mr. Shirer would think if he were told that less than 70 years after World War II, another madman–one who denies the existence of the Holocaust–would be threatening to wipe out the Jews, and that there would be people (Ron Paul) who thought we should not prevent this madman from acquiring nuclear weapons.

He probably would not believe it.