Here is the always entertaining and informative James Lileks talking about Viktor Klemperer’s memoir of Nazi-era Germany:
Some of the details are offhand and precise (“In a pharmacy toothpaste with the swastika”) and others are murky and random, such as the ways in which academic life is poisoned by an incessant stream of laws and decrees. (So many laws: the hallmark of a lawless state.)
What a great insight. As regulations proliferate, it’s impossible to enforce them all fairly. Enforcement becomes selective and capricious. Micromanagement is the road to tyranny.
