When the Kaiser Does the Goose-Step to a Good Old American Rag

[IzanVonWeiner]

where can i get a pickelhaube at?

[Keeper1st]

@IzanVonWeiner Probably a costume shop -- at least a plastic one.

[abola2121]

Was this the WW1 version of "Der Fuehrer's face"? lol 

[PonyExpressTHIS]

Bravo! What an adroit and rousing performance. The surprising vehemence of the comments seems to comprise a testament to reincarnation; one would think that we had all been present during WWI. Perhaps it is so. Now, let us wind up our phonographs, listen to it again, and hope that all this froth doesn't bring on a resurgence of the Spanish flu.

[nadiaff]

I'm not sure if Germans should be throwing stones about World War I after what their country did to Belgium. Seriously, that shit was fucked up. American's can't say shit either because they took a lesson right out of the German handbook on mindlessly massacring civilian populations starting with WWII right up through Vietnam. Face it, both countries are bathed in the blood of innocents. At least now we have policies against it.

[Jackbart1]

This vid is outrageous! Long live the Kaiser!

[VictorLepanto]

this discussion is really quite silly. The U.S. declared war on the Germans in WWI because the Germans kept sinking our ships & we needed to stop them. When you already have too many enemies, making new ones hardly makes sense.

[shriramvenu]

thats not entirely true. woodrow wilson was a war mongerer. the singking of the luistania happened in 1915...so why wait till 1917 to declare war? The german navy was sinking ships from america because they were brining supplies to britain - while the royal navy was blockading germany. likewise germany was also attempting to starve britain into submission.the us had no legitimate reason to go to war

[VictorLepanto]

So, in your "mind," waiting 2yrs to go to war after such a gross provocation makes him a "war mongererer?" I suppose if he had stayed out of the war entirely he would be a war criminal?

It is called the right of neutral shipping. We went to war w/ the British over it in 1812. We will conduct our trade as seems fitting to us & to maximize our profits. It is hardly our fault that the Kaiser was bankrupting & starving his people after blundering his nation into this pointless war.

[shriramvenu]

i dont deny that sinking shipping is a provocation. but from the german point of view continuously supplying britain whilst actively discouraging trade with germany is also a provocation). The way I see it theUS went to war because france and britain had borrowed large sums of money from the US and it would be disastrous if they lost. After the war with mexico he chose to go to war against germany for economic and personal reasons. in my view thats war mongering

[VictorLepanto]

Germany had already lost the war. They had lost when they allowed themselves to get bogged down in France. It was only a matter of how utterly Germany was going to be defeated. It is precisely b/c Germany had their back against the wall that they resorted to these insane desperation tactics, like attacking neutral ships.

We engage in trade to make a profit. We don't engage wars to be even handed w/ the greatest trading empire in history & an insane German inbred German aristocrat, Wilhelm

[shriramvenu]

I can see that there is little point in arguing with someone wo has so clearly made up their mind. i shall drop the subject

[VictorLepanto]

Why shouldn't I make up my mind on a no brainer like this one? We have a right to trade w/ whom we please. Our president has a sworn constitutional duty to protect American citizens from those who woud attack them. If Wilson had waited any longer, he should have been impeached.

The Kaiser should have consulted his Bible (Luke 14:31-32). he should have calculated the cost bf blundering into this adventure.

[glengrant]

@VictorLepanto neutral ships with weapons on it... or the illegal trade embargo which was installed by the british fleet (against international law)... even now a days the propaganda still works... what happend in belgium was bad but today it would be named "a collateral damage"... look at irak or afganistan what happens there or pakistan... dropping bombs through drones without declaring war... would be nice to know how the americans would react if the same happens there...

[VictorLepanto]

@glengrant: I doubt if discussing matters w/ a mentallity such as yours is at all fruitful. It is obviously you decide matters based on your prejudices & collect what ever facts are useful to re-enforce them. The Kaiser was attacking all kinds of our ships b/c he wanted to deny material aid to Britain. His nation was starving & he was lashing out irrationally. We acted bring the matter to a swift end. We acted bring about swift peace & to protect those who were attacking us.

[glengrant]

@VictorLepanto at the point of war germany was one of the well educated states on earth, lower childhood dying than other nations. it was top of the economical and social well-fare. it is easy to blame the best in class, the same way happens with nations. 

[VictorLepanto]

@glengrant: This only proves that an education doesn't necessarily give one any good sense. Not the the Germans had any real say in the matter. Their "betters" marched them off to a useless war & kept them dying beyond the point of any good sense b/c of those leaders egotism. As for welfare, this supposed to be a sign of the better intellect?

[DiVeronica]

lmao woodrow wilson a war mongerer? that's hilarious.

[joed0423]

You can't preach empathy today without having it for those who lived in a time past. Much was wrong then and is still today. But the WWI era, through the relief of Belgium, established an American precedent for global humanitarianism. No lyric here glorifies Wilson's horrific racism. Now go get off Pernassus and stop looking down on your fellow man and woman.

[stalin1666]

You can't look at history with modern values. It just doesn't work. What happened in the past is exactly that the past. And if all Whites were so morally bankrupt why then are there equality laws that came out of white dominated politics?

[Keeper1st]

Indeed. And isn't it amusing how this guy demands us to "join the 21st century" yet he is so filled with rage over 19th-century imperialism? There are places in the world where we can see what happens when generation after generation bears a grudge for things that happened several generations before them. They are not considered the most civilized of places.

[stalin1666]

All we can really do is stand back and hope others come to the same conclusions. I have faith that a some point it will happen. As far as hate over past events it starts with teaching people just the facts history with no spin. We weren't there so we can't really say anything about feelings or intent with reasonable accuracy for it to be taught to children.

[decomodiste]

Yup, we're stupid, alright. Stupid enough to have won.

[decomodiste]

Sorry, pal. The Kaiser didn't do much to prevent the blockackade and starvation of Belgium or the zeppelin bombings of civilian London. Give some understanding of the Allied side.

[Keeper1st]

If such a song had existed in 1917, it would be taken with as much historical interest as this one.

[Keeper1st]

It could be worse. They could have sung songs like "We Are Out for the Scalp of the Kaiser" or "We're Going to Hang the Kaiser From the Linden Tree". This, by sharp contrast, is a harmless song that says nothing more than ragtime music will make him stop the war. Of course, nobody knew then that he was opposed to the war to begin with.

[redfan45x]

kaiser is cool shut up

[Rawego]

sweet! and to all of you "serious critics" - take a pill and chill out :))

[Eskadron22]

What is this vulgar trash supposed to be? Laughing with Kaiser Wilhelm is funny? And laughing with the victims who were burned alive on 9/11, is that funny too?

[Keeper1st]

Your analogy is flawed. It's laughing at -- not with -- and the correct 9/11 analogy would be to make funny songs about Osama bin Laden. And, what do you know, people do. But I would question whether you are right to compare Kaiser Wilhelm to Osama bin Laden. You could make the comparison between Hitler and bin Laden, I suppose. But that would open up a question of modern politics which has no relevance to this 80-year-old song.

[Eskadron22]

War propganda against other people was never a good thing. You hinted yourself at what happened (or rather, which regime installed itself) by removing the Kaiser. I don't think the holocaust was funny at all. Seeing these stereotypes presented here as something "very funny" is poor taste in the least.

[Keeper1st]

It's historical context -- same as presenting Looney Tunes wartime cartoons like "Tokio Jokio" or "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips". This video is from a presentation of songs from WW1, in the way one might have seen them performed at the time. As one in 1917 could not have predicted what was to come 20 years later, such a discussion is irrelevant.

[joed0423]

Try to remember that these songs were written in 1918, and the mindset of the people who were alive then. Any criticism of recreating the reality of the time is worthwhile--but there has to be some measure of empathy for the people who lived then. And in the United States, a lot of them were European, and thought there was a lot of good in laughing at Old Europe monarchs--particularly the ones who thought that starving the Belgians or running Zeppelin raids over London were good ideas.

[tdub1941]

This one is delightful! Somehow I missed attending this show and I'm sure glad you captured some of it! Ann really belts this tune out! GREAT !

RagJazzMonkey

Tom Warner

[HarborGuy]

What a fun "spoof" to a WW1 hit - It would be great to hear the original recording.

[Keeper1st]

The term "original recording" almost doesn't apply to music this old. Music was first released in sheet or piano-roll form, unlike today where it's written for a specific band to record. I can't find any reference to a period recording of this song, but there very well may have been at least one.