To the Editor:
You must be warned this letter is frightening and as a proud American this opinion has to be shared. I respect the office of the President but do not respect the person. This opinion, which I absolutely agree, was written by Burt Newborne who is the Norman Dorsen Professor of Civil Liberties and founding legal director of NYU School of Law’s Brennan Center for Justice and has participated in more than 200 cases in the U.S. Supreme Court. His credentials are impressive. This opinion originated from Forward.com Here is most of his opinion quoted and occasionally paraphrased:
“I hate to put Donald Trump and Adolf Hitler in the same sentence. It trivializes Hitler’s obscene crimes to compare them with Trump’s often pathetic foibles. And it understates our nation’s historic commitment to constitutional democracy to suggest a serious parallel between the twenty first century United States and 1930’s Weimar Germany. But I can’t ignore the fact that Trump’s savagely divisive political rhetoric, both as a candidate and as our 45 Presdent, closely tracks the tropes that Adolf Hitler used from 1932-36 to persuade a critical mass of the German people to trade their democratic birthright for a Nazi pottage of xenophobia, bigotry and scapegoats….. The real risk to American democracy posed by Trump’s talent for invective and divisiveness is not a military putsch. It is the erosion of the bonds of mutual respect and common decency that hold constitutional democracies together.”
I have condensed his article to drive home his important points. The full article can be found in Forward.com
HOW THEY COMMUNICATED THEN AND NOW
Hitler — He distributed miniature radios free of charge by the Nazi Party after 1932. The free radios only had one frequency which gave Hitler his opportunity to spew his witches brew of bigotry and hate directly into the heads of 35-40 percent of the German people.He promised to return Germany to pre-WWI greatness, railing against the international order. And he pulled Germany from the League of Nations. He waged war on objective truth, spewing his lies and half truths. He coined the term “lugenpresse” (lying press) to castigate the mainstream newspapers bent on exposing his lies. Hitler derided scientific experts who disagreed with his crackpot racial and economic theories. He demonized and belittled his political opponents, calling them scum, vermin and parasites.
Trump– He , instead, uses Twitter to communicate with 40 million Americans to stoke mass fears and foment divisive anger on demand. Trump studied Hitler. We know from Ivana Trump’s now sealed testimony at Trump’s first divorce trial that the young Donald slept with a copy of Hitler’s speeches, published in English in 1941 as “My New Order” on his bed-stand. Trump insists that he is the target of “fake news” invented by a lying mainstream press. Trump attacks climate scientists and economists who disagree with his policies. He rants about “the deep state”,” Mexican rapists”,immigrants from “shithole nations” and leads his followers in chants about sending his political opponents “back to their countries”. Like Hitler he spews lies (over 10000 as of 4/26/19 and half truths to make his points.
WHAT THEY DID TO THEIR RESPECTIVE DEMOCRACIES
Hitler– He hardened Germany’s border, restricting travel to and from the country and engaged in trade wars to benefit German industry. He used the pretext of the Reichstag fire in 1933 to declare a “national emergency” justifying the exercise of unilateral Executive power. Hitler viewed women solely as wives and mothers.
Trump– He has used multiple declarations of non-existent national emergencies to ignore Congress. Trump may be the most openly misogynist man to serve as President, treating women little more than sex objects.
Defending constitutional democracy in 2020 against Trumpist erosion won’t be easy. But two mid -20th century generations defended democracy in a hot war against Hitler and cold war against Stalin. ALL WE ARE ASKED TO DO IS STAND UP FOR DEMOCRACY AT THE VOTING BOOTHS.
James Dockham
Village of Hadley
