I would really like to address the points you raised in your reply one by one, but I think you are raising important issues that deserve longer answers. So if you don't mind, I will post a reply to your post. A case for democracy, if you please (although I hope to explain why our democracies do seem to be rather disfunctional). And link it to a reply to this post.

As to what happened to my great grandfather and his family. The events of July 1941 in Nazi occupied Riga are well documented, and we have sound testimonials, based on a research done by the "Yad Va Shem" institute, that my great grandfather and his family were among those who were burnet alive in a tourched sinagouge, at the night of July 4th. In any case, the entire Jewish population of Riga, save 1000 people, was murdered by the Nazis in a matter of few months. Most of them were murderd in shooting pits outside the city.