PAST TENSE, PRESENT COMPLICATED, FUTURE IMPERFECT

The Trump/Hitler analogy revisited

“We are one movement, one people, one family and one nation under God,” said Trump in Reno last Sunday night

Twenty Four Hours of Trump

It’s not exactly “ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fuhrer,” but close enough for those with a sense of history to acknowledge the former president’s continued adoption of Hitler’s playbook. I pointed that out in 2014 (https://davidlsmith.substack.com/p/trump-adopted-hitlers-playbook-16-09-14), and reiterated its significance in 2022 (https://davidlsmith.substack.com/p/why-the-hitler-analogy-matters-17-01-22).

No wonder. Trump’s first wife, Ivana, claimed Trump kept copies of Hitler’s speeches by their bedside (https://tinyurl.com/mr8mzrnr) along with a copy of Mein Kampf, Hitler’s autobiography political manifesto published before he came to power. The book propounded racial laws, genocide, persecution of “degenerates” (LGBTQ’s in today’s parlance); the end of the parliamentary system, the eastward expansion of Germany (“lebensraum”); and more, all of which he in fact decreed once in power. After Hitler’s ascension to power, Winston Churchill said “No other book than Mein Kampf deserved more intensive scrutiny,” essentially presaging Maya Angelou’s oft-quoted admonition: “When someone shows you who they are believe them the first time.” 

As has been widely noted, Trump has revealed who he is repeatedly on his “revenge presidency” campaign trail in recent months: "root out the communists, Marxists, fascists and the radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country that lie and steal and cheat on elections."; fire local prosecutors; investigate Comcast, NBC and MSNBC for treason and remove them from the airwaves; and terminate the U.S. Constitution; implied former Joint Chief of Staff Chairman, General Mark Miley ought to be executed; bring the Department of Justice (and, therefore, the FBI) under his direct control; replace non-elected federal employees in the upper levels of government with loyalists; cut off military aid to Ukraine; become dictator-for-a-day to close the border and “drill, drill, drill” (when in history has a dictator voluntarily renounced dictatorial control after a short interval in power?) . . . the appalling list goes on and on.

Liz Cheney rightly observed the U.S. is “sleepwalking into dictatorship.” The Democratic messaging apparatus seemingly can’t gain traction against Trump’s Hitlerian propaganda onslaught. Mainstream media grows increasingly pessimistic about Biden’s chances in 2024 and grudgingly warns of the likelihood of Trump’s return to the presidency in 2025. If I had to identify a comparable period in history, I’d say the U.S. in 2024 is about where Weimar Germany was in 1932 with Hitler at the head of a minority Nazi Party about to take power in 1933. What’s to be done? Stay tuned to this space for a promising alternative outcome.