BOOK REVIEW By Kim Janousek
HOW DO YOU KILL 11 MILLION PEOPLE?
WHY THE TRUTH MATTERS MORE THAN YOU THINK
By Andy Andrews
The title alone is enough to get your attention and when a friend of mine urged me to get a copy of this book I did just that. The author, Andy Andrews, is a highly regarded motivational speaker who has written numerous New York Times bestsellers such as The Noticer, The Traveler’s Gift and The Butterfly Effect.
This book is short, blunt and extremely sobering. The first 20 pages (80 pages total) reveal some staggering numbers that show what populations allowed to be done to themselves in the last century. Consider the number of people exterminated by their own government from 1914 to 2000.
Mexico, Pakistan, Baltic States - 1 million people each
Turkey – 2 million Armenians
Cambodia – 3 million people (almost half the population)
Soviet Union – 69,911,000 people
Nazi Germany – 11,283,000
The author tells us to study the past and learn from it. His premise is that in many ways the Holocaust victims of Nazi Germany “allowed” themselves to be killed. He presents the question this way:
From page 20: Why, for month after month and year after year, did millions of intelligent human beings – guarded by relatively few Nazi soldiers – willingly load their families into ….cattle cars to be transported by rail to one of the many death camps scattered across Europe? How can a condemned group of people headed for a gas chamber be compelled to act in a docile manner?
The answer to this question is so simple….you lie to them. A complex web of lies, told in various stages. The Nazi’s told the Jews that they wanted only the best for them. Good jobs, fine homes, good schools for their children. They were told this over and over again until they began to believe it. And finally they found themselves on the train cars heading for the death camps.
The message of this book is as direct as the title. Andrews suggests that the danger to America does not rest with a single politician or even a group of them. But what does threaten a nation is a citizenry that trusts a liar to lead them. The liar can be voted out of office, but the citizens who believe the liar must come to their senses or the nation is doomed.
Think about it: WE hear every day on the news that the economy is getting better. IS IT? Unemployment is down. REALLY? We must have energy independence. HOWEVER, THE KEYSTONE PIPELINE HAS NOT BEEN APPROVED! We must create new jobs. THOSE MUST BE GOVERNMENT JOBS!
We all want what is best for our country, The United States of America. And we all want a safe, secure and prosperous future for our children. With that said, I urge you to buy this book. Read it. Talk about it. Pass it along to others so they can read it. Remember, the burden is on us, the American citizens, to become informed and judge the integrity of all our elected officials.