Bill Maher on evil:

Exorcism … is a popular theme nowadays because it reinforces the comforting notion that evil resides outside of us. Well, I’m sorry, but it doesn’t.

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Is George Bush purely evil? Of course not. And that’s what’s so evil about him. He doesn’t twirl a mustache and smirk and cackle — well, he doesn’t twirl a mustache. He’s like the Peanuts character Pigpen. Wherever he goes, he stirs up such a humongous mess it can only be cleaned up by Halliburton.

But he’s not pure evil, because evil is a chain.

Did any one person doom New Orleans? No. It’s a chain. People vote for a corrupt leader. A corrupt leader puts unqualified cronies in high places, and when those cronies f*** up, evil gets done. The devil didn’t fly up from Hell and knock a hole in that levee. The levee just didn’t get built, because the money for it went to rich people’s tax cuts, and pork projects, and corporate welfare.

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This week an ailing American bald eagle was found to be dying from mercury poisoning. (Republicans immediately tried to blame it on the eagle’s lifestyle choices.) But it’s worth noting that, also this week, the White House threatened to veto limits on mercury pollution.

Now, pure evil would be if George Bush sat around the White House saying, “Let’s poison eagles,” and even I don’t believe George Bush would do that. Cheney would do that. And even he is not pure evil. Dick Cheney doesn’t hate poor children and caribou. They’re just in the way.

I just watched a remarkable movie called Downfall. It’s about the final days of Adolf Hitler and his Nazi regime.

One thing that makes it remarkable is that it was made by German filmmakers. While Alec Guinness and Anthony Hopkins portrayed Hitler in his bunker decades ago, many Germans preferred to treat the whole Nazi era as nothing more than a bad dream. Even now, Downfall is controversial in Germany. Critics complain that the film shows Hitler and his close companions as human beings.

The filmmakers say that’s just the point: the Nazis did not have horns or tails or cloven hooves. They were human beings just like us, and that’s the scary thing.

Downfall shows that Hitler thought himself infallible. He ignored advice from his generals. He ignored facts that didn’t fit his fanciful view of the situation. When his ill-considered orders didn’t work, he accused his officers of disloyalty rather than endure criticism of his plans. He fired, and sometimes executed, those who dared to stand their ground when he was wrong. As the Russians closed in on Berlin, he declared that they were falling into his trap, and would be destroyed by a massive pincer movement — by two German army groups that had already been wiped out.

A handful of those around him shared his delusions. More understood the true situation, but did nothing and said nothing. They were Hitler’s men, and they would drag the whole country down with them before they would contradict their leader.

Human nature doesn’t change. We must struggle today against the same dark tendencies within us that the Nazis allowed to govern their lives. We must not place our trust in deluded leaders, nor in those who turn their backs on truth and sign on to their leader’s happy delusions.