“Fascism is capitalism plus murder.”
― Upton Sinclair
― Upton Sinclair
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Trump Timeline ... Trumpocalypse
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Zweig noted that he could not remember when he first heard Hitler’s name. It was an era of confusion, filled with ugly agitators. During the early years of Hitler’s rise, Zweig was at the height of his career, and a renowned champion of causes that sought to promote solidarity among European nations. He called for the founding of an international university with branches in all the major European capitals, with a rotating exchange program intended to expose young people to other communities, ethnicities, and religions.
He was only too aware that the nationalistic passions expressed in the First World War had been compounded by new racist ideologies in the intervening years. The economic hardship and sense of humiliation that the German citizenry experienced as a consequence of the Versailles Treaty had created a pervasive resentment that could be enlisted to fuel any number of radical, bloodthirsty projects.
Zweig did take notice of the discipline and financial resources on display at the rallies of the National Socialists—their eerily synchronized drilling and spanking-new uniforms, and the remarkable fleets of automobiles, motorcycles, and trucks they paraded. Zweig often travelled across the German border to the little resort town of Berchtesgaden, where he saw “small but ever-growing squads of young fellows in riding boots and brown shirts, each with a loud-colored swastika on his sleeve.”
These young men were clearly trained for attack, Zweig recalled. But after the crushing of Hitler’s attempted putsch, in 1923, Zweig seems hardly to have given the National Socialists another thought until the elections of 1930, when support for the Party exploded—from under a million votes two years earlier to more than six million. At that point, still oblivious to what this popular affirmation might portend, Zweig applauded the enthusiastic passion expressed in the elections. He blamed the stuffiness of the country’s old-fashioned democrats for the Nazi victory, calling the results at the time “a perhaps unwise but fundamentally sound and approvable revolt of youth against the slowness and irresolution of ‘high politics.’ ”
In his memoir, Zweig did not excuse himself or his intellectual peers for failing early on to reckon with Hitler’s significance. “The few among writers who had taken the trouble to read Hitler’s book, ridiculed the bombast of his stilted prose instead of occupying themselves with his program,” he wrote. They took him neither seriously nor literally. Even into the nineteen-thirties, “the big democratic newspapers, instead of warning their readers, reassured them day by day, that the movement . . . would inevitably collapse in no time.”
Prideful of their own higher learning and cultivation, the intellectual classes could not absorb the idea that, thanks to “invisible wire-pullers”—the self-interested groups and individuals who believed they could manipulate the charismatic maverick for their own gain—this uneducated “beer-hall agitator” had already amassed vast support. After all, Germany was a state where the law rested on a firm foundation, where a majority in parliament was opposed to Hitler, and where every citizen believed that “his liberty and equal rights were secured by the solemnly affirmed constitution.”
Zweig recognized that propaganda had played a crucial role in eroding the conscience of the world. He described how, as the tide of propaganda rose during the First World War, saturating newspapers, magazines, and radio, the sensibilities of readers became deadened. Eventually, even well-meaning journalists and intellectuals became guilty of what he called “the ‘doping’ of excitement”—an artificial incitement of emotion that culminated, inevitably, in mass hatred and fear.
Describing the healthy uproar that ensued after one artist’s eloquent outcry against the war in the autumn of 1914, Zweig observed that, at that point, “the word still had power. It had not yet been done to death by the organization of lies, by ‘propaganda.’ ” But Hitler “elevated lying to a matter of course,” Zweig wrote, just as he turned “anti-humanitarianism to law.” By 1939, he observed, “Not a single pronouncement by any writer had the slightest effect . . . no book, pamphlet, essay, or poem” could inspire the masses to resist Hitler’s push to war.
Propaganda both whipped up Hitler’s base and provided cover for his regime’s most brutal aggressions. …
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The indictment of Roger Stone alleges serious crimes to obstruct Congress’ investigation into Russian election interference. Beyond that, it also provides clues that more charges are likely.
Some suggest that special counsel Robert Mueller indicted Stone to create leverage to obtain his cooperation. Maybe. He has successfully used that tactic before. But Mueller likely views this possibility as remote, as evidenced by the need to arrest Stone and execute search warrants at his residences. No doubt, Mueller’s team had already reached out to Stone’s lawyer to explore cooperation without success. Mueller persisted with the charges anyway, so flipping Stone does not seem to be Mueller’s primary goal.
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Together, these two paragraphs allege that when this directive was made, the Trump campaign knew that WikiLeaks was working with Russia. It further suggests that the directive was made by a high-level official in the campaign. Who would have the authority to direct a senior Trump campaign official but an even more senior Trump campaign official, or even Trump himself?
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The sentencing memo lists areas in which Cohen’s cooperation had been particularly valuable in the investigation, including information about “preparing and circulating his response to the congressional inquiries.” If Mueller finds that Cohen worked with other Trump associates to coordinate their lies, you can expect charges to follow.
Standing alone, the Stone indictment charges serious crimes. In context, it portends more charges to come.
The Trump administration on Sunday lifted sanctions on three companies, including the aluminum giant Rusal, linked to Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska. Democrats had led a push in Congress to continue the restrictions.
The ruling elites are painfully aware that the foundations of American power are rotting. The outsourcing of manufacturing in the United States and the plunging of over half the population into poverty will, they know, not be reversed. The self-destructive government shutdown has been only one of numerous assaults on the efficiency of the administrative state.
The failing roads, bridges and public transportation are making commerce and communications more difficult. The soaring government deficit, now almost a trillion dollars thanks to the Trump administration’s massive corporate tax cuts, cannot be eliminated.
The seizure of the financial system by global speculators ensures, sooner rather than later, another financial meltdown. The dysfunction of democratic institutions, which vomit up con artists such as Donald Trump and hold as alternatives inept, corporate-indentured politicians such as Joe Biden and Nancy Pelosi, is cementing into place a new authoritarianism.
The hollowing out of the pillars of the state, including the diplomatic corps and regulatory agencies, leaves the blunt force of the military as the only response to foreign disputes and fuels endless and futile foreign wars.
Just as ominous as the visible rot is the internal decay. Among all social classes there is a loss of faith in the government, widespread frustration, a sense of stagnation and entrapment, bitterness over unfulfilled expectations and promises, and a merging of fact and fiction so that civil and political discourse is no longer rooted in reality.
The nation’s isolation by its traditional allies and its inability, especially in the face of environmental catastrophe, to articulate rational and visionary policies have shattered the mystique that is vital to power. “A society becomes totalitarian when its structure becomes flagrantly artificial,” George Orwell wrote. “That is when its ruling class has lost its function but succeeds in clinging to power by force or fraud.” Our elites have exhausted fraud. Force is all they have left.
The United States is a wounded beast, bellowing and thrashing in its death throes. It can inflict tremendous damage, but it cannot recover. These are the last, agonizing days of the American Empire. The death blow will come when the dollar is dropped as the world’s reserve currency, a process already underway. The value of the dollar will plummet, setting off a severe depression and demanding instant contraction of the military overseas.
“Totalitarianism, however, does not so much promise an age of faith as an age of schizophrenia. A society becomes totalitarian when its structure becomes flagrantly artificial: that is, when its ruling class has lost its function but succeeds in clinging to power by force or fraud. Such a society, no matter how long it persists, can never afford to become either tolerant or intellectually stable.”
George Orwell, The Prevention of Literature George Orwell: The Prevention of Literature
George Orwell, The Prevention of Literature George Orwell: The Prevention of Literature
A https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/midway-through-first-term-trump-is-not-meeting-the-publics-modest-expectations-for-his-job-performance-poll-finds/2019/01/27/09d95210-20dc-11e9-9145-3f74070bbdb9_story.html?utm_term=.816561c4971f (new Post/ABC News poll finds) that most Americans believe President Trump is failing spectacularly by many different metrics. Large majorities say he doesn’t have the temperament to be president; lack confidence that he’ll make the right decisions for the country’s future; and (this one will really sting) say he isn’t good at making deals.
At the same time, new reporting indicates that Trump’s media and political allies are working overtime to erect a protective bubble around Trump, one designed to prevent him from grasping the most basic political realities of the moment.
This effort has two goals: To create an alternative narrative that portrays Trump’s cave in the shutdown fight as a sign that he holds a strengthened hand, which in turn is designed to gird him to refuse real compromise in the next round of talks.
Needless to say, the poll numbers showing Trump cratering amid his handling of the shutdown will not pierce that bubble. And that makes a disastrous outcome in the next round more likely.
First, let’s look at the https://www.washingtonpost.com/page/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2019/01/28/National-Politics/Polling/release_541.xml (new Post/ABC polling). Some highlights:
- 57 percent rate Trump’s handling of border security negatively, a remarkable indictment of Trump on his signature issue.
- 61 percent say Trump is not honest or trustworthy.
- 58 percent say Trump lacks the personality and temperament to serve effectively as president.
- 56 percent say Trump has not brought needed change to Washington.
- 65 percent say Trump does not understand the problems of people like them.
- 58 percent say Trump is not good at making political deals.
- 64 percent do not have a lot of confidence that Trump will make the right decisions for the country’s future.
President Trump gave his blessing Monday to lawmakers in several states who are pushing legislation to allow Bible literacy classes in public schools.
“Numerous states introducing Bible Literacy classes, giving students the option of studying the Bible,” Trump wrote in a morning tweet. “Starting to make a turn back? Great!”
As president, Trump has no formal say in state legislative processes.
His tweet came shortly after a segment on Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends” reporting that bills have been introduced in at least six states that would allow public school children to study the historical significance of the Bible.
The legislation has drawn objections from groups seeking to protect the separation of church and state. The groups argue that the bills are backdoor attempts to promote Christianity in public schools.
The “Fox & Friends” segment included an interview with Aaron McWilliams, a Republican state representative from North Dakota, one of the states where lawmakers are weighing such bills.
“There’s a separation of church and state, but there’s not a separation of books from education,” McWilliams said.
The other states where such bills are under consideration include Missouri, Indiana, West Virginia, Virginia and Florida, according to the Fox News report.
