Baresark said:
I think people misunderstand when it comes to most important person and Time Magazine. It's an opinion based poll that is not a popularity contest. The most important person is the person that people feel have had the greatest impact on society. That is why people like Hitler and Stalin win these things. It's the person with the greatest impact on society. This person is not usually good, but they can be. Now on to the biggest question: Why did they do this? Just to do it? That seems stupid.
Actually Hitler was amazingly popular before World War II and even had a huge following in the US up, and even during the war, which is one of the reasons why such draconian measures were taken with US security and in terms of information control and propaganda.
Hitler is so quotable, because he was right about 99.9% of the things he said, it was that 00.1% that was bug nuts crazy that snuck up on people. He was able to get people that otherwise hated each other to pretty much fall into line behind him and his regime. Today people like to quote hitler, showing it to be similar to what someone else says, hoping it coutns as a "win", missing the point that Hitler was simply right about that many things.
Incidently the global love for Adolf is one of the reasons so many people who believe in such things agree he was the second Anti-Christ. An Anti-Christ is not some demonic figure that drops a sauron-like shadow accross the world, but someone who rallies the hearts and minds of the people in general and gets them to love him before he fully shows his stripes.
This is also why despite the rhetoric, the people who actually believe that stuff don't consider either Bush or Obama to be on that list. Both came into power on hairsbreadth elections and faced major, constant opposition, neither are thus Anti-Christ material.
Kim Jong Un wouldn't fit for either "Person Of The Year" or "Anti-Christ" (which I'm just mentioning for fun) because globally speaking he's pretty well hated. Some might fear him, but he had no real respect from anyone. He continues to exist because it's easier to occasionally pay him off than step on him, though to be honest that might be changing if his current plans go forth. Right now we have a weak, and ineffective joke of a president when it comes to international and military policy, which means he's been making big moves as far as rocket technology and nuclear power go because he knows Obama will never sent the military in to stop him, giving him 4 years to pretty much run rampant. That's why it's kind of funny.
Stalin is an interesting case, being both hated and venerated by the people he oppressed (even if some will deny this). The bottom line is that "The Steel Angel" saved Russia from communism. After the great uprisings you wound up with a basic situation where nobody wanted to go back to work and do what was nessicary to run society. Everyone interpeted communism as "contribte what you want to society and be provided for" so you wound up with all the people doing hard work putting down their tools and wanting to live easy lives and be provided for, that's what they were promised and what they fought for. To put it bluntly when Stalin took power Russia was falling apart and the people were starving. His Gulags were basically re-education camps that used extreme methods (including torture) to turn people into obeidient workers, loyal to the state. Stalin's basic idea was that socialism was nessicary, as communish wasn't workable, he didn't want to kill anyone specifically, but figured anyone who wasn't willing to work was pretty much useless, he didn't care if 99% of the people who went into the camps died, as long as the 1% that came out went on to become good little socialist drones. The horror of this is obvious, but it's important to understand something, Stalin's steely heart not only saved Russia, but turned it into a global super power, even the remnants of which can't be ignored today. He took a broken, starving, people with no direction and literally built an empire. It's not popular, even with Russians... but well... it is an example where you can see why he'd be "Person Of The Year" based on his accomplishments.
In comparison Kim Jong Un and his daddy might both be crazy, psychotic, megalomaniacs, but really they haven't done much but create a horrible oppressive police state, that largely only gets by through occasionally blackmailing the rest of the world. Stalin build an oppressive regime and was a world mega power, North Korea is pretty much a global joke. Like it or not Stalin did great things... terrible things, but great none the less... (to paraphrase Olivander from "Harry Potter" in regards to Voldemorte)
