Interesting piece on Hitler's rise to power. He wasn't voted in technically.

Rand Paul may not have been right about Hitler being elected. It would be fairer to say that Hitler got enough of the popular vote to ensure his role in any kind of coalition government. It's also telling that a conservative government would prefer fascist and dangerous partners as opposed to leftists who weren't violent. What's also telling: 

The vote often times held up as the “Hitler was elected” proof, was the August 19th, 1934 vote which had a ballot that read simply Do you approve the consolidation of the offices of President and Chancellor in a single Leader-Chancellor? It was as legitimate as Saddam Hussein’s 100% victory, as any opposition to Hitler was met with public execution. He had already stripped the rights of Jews, the mentally ill, women, any minority group he could, which made it far easier to rig the election. During attempts to validate the votes, the number of votes cast against the dictator more than doubled during initial reviews, but then the vote validation was shut down by Hitler’s office. It did not hurt his cause when Hitler posted armed SS guards outside of each polling place with banners encouraging citizens to vote for the unification of the offices.

You might note that this is the same thing that the republicans are doing  in this country with their massive voter suppression efforts. I mean they're not killing those voters, yet. But with Scalia on the court who knows. Read the whole thing at Addicting Info.

Related: Why some of us are worried about this particular pattern. Because we've seen it before and there are those on the theocratic right that would love to import that here. See Democracy Now for the real news.