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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 16, 2023 at 12:10 am
It’s probably the most-quoted passage of Niccolo Machiavelli’s infamous book, The Prince:
“From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved than feared, or feared more than loved. The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved.
“For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger and covetous of gain. As long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours: they offer you their blood, their goods, their life and their children, when the necessity is remote, but when it approaches, they revolt.
“And the prince who has relied solely on their words, without making other preparations, is ruined. For the friendship which is gained by purchase and not through grandeur and nobility of spirit is bought but not secured, and at a pinch is not to be expended in your service.
“And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared. For love is held by a chain of obligations which, men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose. But fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.”
Niccolo Machiavelli
So—which is better: To be feared or loved?
In the 1993 film, A Bronx Tale, 17-year-old Calogero (Lillo Brancato) poses that question to his idol, the local Mafia capo, Sonny (Chazz Palminteri).
“That’s a good question,” Sonny replies. “It’s nice to be both, but it’s very difficult. But if I had my choice, I would rather be feared.
“Fear lasts longer than love. Friendships that are bought with money mean nothing. You see how it is around here. I make a joke, everybody laughs. I know I’m funny, but I’m not that funny. It’s fear that keeps them loyal to me.”
Presidents face the same dilemma as Mafia capos—and resolve it in their own ways.
LOVE ME BECAUSE I NEED TO BE LOVED
Bill Clinton believed that he could win over his self-appointed Republican enemies through his sheer charm.
Part of this lay in self-confidence: He had won the 1992 and 1996 elections by convincing voters that “I feel your pain.”
Bill Clinton
And part of it lay in his need to be loved. He once said that if he were in a room with 100 people and 99 of them liked him but one didn’t, he would spend all his time with that one person, trying to win him over.
But while he could charm voters, he could not bring himself to retaliate against his sworn Republican enemies.
On April 19, 1995, Right-wing terrorist Timothy McVeigh drove a truck—packed with 5,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate and nitromethane—to the front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
The explosion killed 168 people, including 19 children in the day care center on the second floor, and injured 684 others.
Suddenly, Republicans were frightened. Since the end of World War II, they had vilified the very Federal Government they belonged to. They had even courted the Right-wing militia groups responsible for the bombing.
So Republicans feared Clinton would now turn their decades of hate against them.
They need not have worried. On April 23, Clinton presided over a memorial service for the victims of the bombing. He gave a moving eulogy—without condemning the hate-filled Republican rhetoric that had at least indirectly led to the slaughter.
Clinton further sought to endear himself to Republicans by:
- Adopting NAFTA—the Republican-sponsored North American Free Trade Act, which later proved so devastating to American workers;
- Siding with Republicans against poor Americans on welfare; and
- Championing the gutting of the Depression-era Glass-Steagall law, which barred investment banks from commercial banking activities.
In 1998, emboldened by Clinton’s refusal to stand up to them, House Republicans moved to impeach him over a sex scandal with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. But his Presidency survived when the Senate refused to convict.
LOVE ME BECAUSE I’LL HURT YOU IF YOU DON’T
Lyndon Johnson wanted desperately to be loved.
Once, he complained to Dean Acheson, the former Secretary of State under Harry S. Truman, about the ingratitude of American voters. He had passed far more legislation than his predecessor, John F. Kennedy, and yet Kennedy remained beloved, while he, Johnson, was not.
Why was that? Johnson demanded.
“You are not a very likable man,” said Acheson truthfully.
Lyndon B. Johnson
Johnson tried to make his subordinates love him. He would humiliate a man, then give him an expensive gift—such a Cadillac. It was his way of binding the man to him.
He was on a first-name basis with J. Edgar Hoover, the longtime director of the FBI. He didn’t hesitate to request—and get–raw FBI files on his political opponents.
On at least one occasion, he told members of his Cabinet: No one would dare walk out on his administration–because if they did, two men would follow their ass to the end of the earth: Mr. J. Edgar Hoover and the head of the Internal Revenue Service.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 10, 2023 at 12:10 am
Lori Tankel had a problem: A lot of angry people thought she was George Zimmerman.
She began getting death threats on her
Unfortunately for Tankel, her number was one digit away from the number Zimmerman used to make his call to police just before he fatally shot Martin.
That phone number had been shown throughout the trial. And, believing the number was Zimmerman’s, someone posted Tankel’s number online.
Just minutes after the verdict, Tankel began getting death threats. “We’re going to kill you. We’re going to get you. Watch your back,” threatened a typical call.
George Zimmerman
Tankel worked as a sales representative for several horse companies. She had grown used to relying on her phone to keep her business going.
But, almost as soon as the Zimmerman verdict came in, “My phone just started to blow up. Phone call after phone call, multiple phone
So she did what any ordinary citizen, faced with multiple death threats, would do: She called the police.
According to her, the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office told her the department itself receives around 400 death threats a minute on social media sites.
In short: Unless you’re wealthy, a politician or—best of all, a cop—don’t expect the police to protect you if your life is threatened.
First, above everyone else, police look out for each other.
Robert Daley bluntly revealed this truth in his 1971 bestseller, Target Blue: An Insider’s View of the N.Y.P.D. A police reporter for the New York Times, he served for one year as a deputy police commissioner.
“A great many solvable crimes in the city were never solved, because not enough men were assigned to the case, or because those assigned were lazy or hardly cared or got sidetracked.
“But when a cop got killed, no other cop got sidetracked. Detectives worked on the case night and day….
“In effect, the citizen who murdered his wife’s lover was sought by a team of detectives, two men. But he who killed a cop was sought by 32,000.”
Second, don’t expect the police to do for you what they’ll do for one another.
In February, 2013, Christopher Dorner declared war on his former fellow officers of the Los Angeles Police Department.
The LAPD assigned security and surveillance details to at least 50 threatened officers and their families. A typical detail consists of two to five or more guards. And those guards must be changed every eight to 12 hours.
Those details stayed in place long after Dorner was killed in a firefight on February 12, 2013.
But if your bullying neighbor threatens to kill you, don’t expect the police to send a guard detail over. They’ll claim: ”We can’t do anything until the guy does something. If he does, give us a call.”
Third, the more status and wealth you command, the more likely the police are to address your complaint or solve your case.
If you’re rich, your complaint will likely get top priority and the best service the agency can provide.
But if you’re poor or even middle-class without high-level political or police connections, you’ll be told: “We just don’t have the resources to protect everybody.”
Fourth, don’t expect your police department to operate with the vigor or efficiency of TV police agencies.
“I want this rock [Hawaii] sealed off,” Steve McGarrett (Jack Lord) routinely ordered when pursuing criminals on “Hawaii Five-O.”
Jack Lord as Steve McGarrett
Real-life police departments, on the other hand:
- Often lack state-of-the-art crime labs to analyze evidence.
- Often lose or accidentally destroy important files.
- Are—like all bureaucracies—staffed by those who are lazy, indifferent or incompetent.
- Are notoriously competitive, generally refusing to share information with other police departments-–thus making it easier for criminals to run amok.
Even when police ”solve” a crime, that simply means making an arrest. After that, there are at least three possible outcomes:
- The District Attorney may decide not to file charges.
- Or the perpetrator may plead to a lesser offense and serve only a token sentence—or none at all.
- Or he might be found not guilty by a judge or jury.
Fifth, the result of all this can only be increased disrespect for law enforcement from a deservedly—and increasingly—cynical public.
It is the witnessing of blatant inequities and hypocrisies such as those displayed in the Christopher Dorner case that most damages public support for police at all levels.
When citizens believe police lack the ability—or even the will—to protect them or avenge their victimization, that is a deadly blow to law enforcement.
Police depend on citizens for more than crime tips.
They depend upon them to support hiring more cops and buying state-of-the-art police equipment.
When public support vanishes, so does much of that public funding.
The result can only be a return to the days of the lawless West, where citizens—as individuals or members of vigilante committees—look only to themselves for protection.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 6, 2023 at 12:10 am
Those who have seen the classic 1960 movie, “Judgment at Nuremberg,” will remember its pivotal moment.
That’s when Burt Lancaster, as Ernst Janning, the once distinguished German judge, confesses his guilt and that of Nazi Germany in a controlled, yet emotional, outburst.
Addressing the court—presided over by Chief Judge Dan Haywood (Spencer Tracy)—Janning explains the forces that led to the triumph of evil.
“My counsel would have you believe we were not aware of the concentration camps. Not aware? Where were we?
“Where were we when Hitler began shrieking his hate in the Reichstag? When our neighbors were dragged out in the middle of the night to Dachau?
“Where were we when every village in Germany has a railroad terminal where cattle cars were filled with children being carried off to their extermination? Where were we when they cried out in the night to us? Were we deaf? Dumb? Blind?
“My counsel says we were not aware of the extermination of the millions. He would give you the excuse we were only aware of the extermination of the hundreds. Does that make us any the less guilty?
“Maybe we didn’t know the details, but if we didn’t know, it was because we didn’t want to know.”
It’s possible to imagine an equally conscience-stricken member of the Donald Trump administration making a similar statement:
“My counsel would have you believe we were not aware of the ICE concentration camps. Not aware? Where were we?
“Where were we when Trump began shrieking his hate across the country? When Trump called our free press ‘the enemy of the people’?
“Where were we when Trump openly praised Vladimir Putin and attacked those in the FBI, CIA and other Intelligence agencies sworn to protect us?
“Where were we when the victims of Trump’s hatred cried out in the night to us? Were we deaf? Dumb? Blind?
“My counsel says we were not aware of Trump’s treasonous collusion with Vladimir Putin—and his intention to betray American freedoms in exchange for the Presidency. He would give you the excuse we were misled by the lying rhetoric coming out of the White House.
“Does that make us any the less guilty? Maybe we didn’t know the details—but if we didn’t know, it was because we didn’t want to know.”
Donald Trump
In his bestselling 1973 biography, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler, British historian Robert Payne harshly condemned the German people for the rise of the Nazi dictator:
“[They] allowed themselves to be seduced by him and came to enjoy the experience….[They] followed him with joy and enthusiasm because he gave them license to pillage and murder to their hearts’ content. They were his servile accomplices, his willing victims.”
On November 8, 2016, 62,984,828 ignorant, hate-filled, Right-wing Americans catapulted Donald Trump—a man, charged conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks, with an “odd psychology unleavened by kindness and charity”—into the Presidency.
And on November 3, 2020, 74,223,975 of those same Americans again voted for him.
Upon taking office in January, 2017, Trump began undermining one public or private institution after another.
- Repeatedly and viciously attacking the nation’s free press for daring to report his growing list of crimes and disasters, calling it “the enemy of the American people.”
- Brutally attacking American Intelligence agencies—such as the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency—which unanimously agreed that Russia had interfered with the 2016 Presidential election.
- Firing FBI Director James Comey for refusing to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump—and continuing to investigate Russian subversion of the 2016 election.
- Lying so often—30,573 times in four years—he’s universally distrusted, at home and abroad.
- Shutting down the Federal government from December 22, 2018 to January 25, 2019—because Democrats refused to fund his useless “border wall” between the United States and Mexico. This lasted until January 25, 2019, when Trump caved to public pressure.
- Lying about the dangers of the deadly COVID-19 virus, thus allowing it to ravage the country and kill 400,000 Americans.
- Refusing to accept the outcome of a legitimate Presidential election in 2020 and falsely claiming himself the victim of massive voter fraud.
- Inciting thousands of his followers to storm the United States Capitol Building to prevent the winner, Joe Biden, from being declared President-elect.
**********
So why have millions of Americans stood by Trump despite the wreckage he has made of American foreign and domestic policy?
Their #1 reason: Hatred—of most of their fellow Americans.
Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO) accurately voiced that hatred at the Conservative Political Action Conference (C-PAC) at National Harbor in Oxon Hill, MD.:
“We have to make sure we are undoing everything the left has done legislatively… every diversity, equity and inclusion program, every ESG rule, every woke initiative…must be uprooted and completely de-funded.”
Actually, they want more than that.
Republicans know that if you deprive those you detest of food, clothing, shelter—and medical care—you don’t need gas chambers or firing squads. Or even rigged vote-counts.
That’s why they campaign furiously to eliminate Social Security, Food Stamps, Medicare and the Affordable Care Act.
Far more than the once fear-inspiring Communist Party, Republican voters now pose a “clear and present danger” to American liberties.
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In Bureaucracy, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on March 1, 2023 at 12:12 am
Given the all-out Republican assault on their liberties, gays could become convinced that they are becoming the targets of state-sponsored terrorism—as were Jews in Nazi Germany.
In such a case, they may turn to a more drastic means than elections and the courts to protect themselves: Violence.
Political violence has a long and deadly history in the United States.
Before the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, violence was commonplace along the Kansas-Missouri border as pro- and anti-slavery elements slaughtered one another.
After the Civil War ended in 1865, Ku Klux Klansmen across the South terrorized blacks into submission even though slavery was now illegal.
With the advent of the civil rights movement in 1960, blacks and their supporters once again became targets for violence.
A minority of black leaders like Malcom X and H. Rapp Brown told blacks they should violently defend themselves. But the vast majority of blacks—including bloodied civil rights workers—adhered to Martin Luther King’s call for non-violence.
Martin Luther King (left), Malcom X (right)
Still, there is no guarantee that those who suffer persecution and violence will remain non-violent. Their motive could be revenge—or to send a message to ward off future attacks.
Such was the fate of SS-Obergruppenfuhrer Reinhard Heydrich..
A tall, blond-haired formal naval officer, he was both a champion fencer and talented violinist. Heydrich joined the Schutzstaffel, or Protective Squads, better known as the SS, in 1931, and quickly became head of its counterintelligence service.
Reinhard Heydrich
In September, 1941, Heydrich was appointed “Reich Protector” of Czechoslovakia, which had fallen prey to Germany in 1938 but whose citizens were growing restless under Nazi rule.
Heydrich immediately ordered a purge, executing 92 people within the first three days of his arrival in Prague. By February, 1942, 4,000-5,000 people had been arrested.
In January, 1942, Heydrich convened a meeting of high-ranking political and military leaders in Wannsee, Germany, to streamline “the Final Solution to the Jewish Question.”
An estimated six million Jews were thus slaughtered.
On May 27, 1942, two British-trained Czech commandos—Jan Kubis and Joseph Gabcik—waited in Prague at a hairpin turn in the road always taken by Heydrich. When Heydrich’s Mercedes slowed down, Gabcik raised his machinegun—which jammed.
Heydrich ordered his driver to halt so he could take aim at his would-be assassins. It proved a fatal mistake.
Rising in his seat, he aimed his revolver at Gabcik—as Kubis lobbed a hand grenade at the car. The explosion drove steel and leather fragments of the car’s upholstery into Heydrich’s diaphragm, spleen and lung.
Hitler dispatched doctors from Berlin to save the Reich Protector. But infection set in, and on June 4, Heydrich died at age 38.
Heydrich’s wrecked Mercedes
The assassination sent shockwaves through the upper echelons of the Third Reich. No one had dared assault—much less assassinate—a high-ranking Nazi official.
The Nazis had slaughtered tens of thousands without hesitation—or fear that the same might happen to them.
Suddenly they realized that the fury they had aroused could be turned against themselves.
Which brings us to the leaders of America’s own Right-wing.
The names of infamous Nazis were widely known:
- Reichsmarshall Hermann Goering;
- Propaganda Minister Paul Joseph Goebbels;
- SS-Reichsfuhrer Heinrich Himmler;
- Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop;
- SS Obergruppenfuhrer Reinhard Heydrich;
- Adolf Hitler.
And so are the names of infamous leaders of the American Right:
- Texas Senator Ted Cruz;
- Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas;
- Commentator Tucker Carlson;
- Evangelist Franklin Graham;
- Florida Governor Ron DeSantis;
- Former President Donald Trump.
The differences between these two infamous groups are these:
In Nazi Germany, ordinary Germans could not learn about the personal lives of their dictators—including their home addresses—and conspire against them.
In the United States, ordinary citizens can learn about the personal lives of their would-be dictators by newspapers, Internet and TV—even on the Right’s own propaganda network, Fox News. “People finder” websites, for a modest price, provide names and addresses of potential targets—and their relatives.
In Nazi Germany, firearms were tightly controlled.
In the United States, the Right-wing National Rifle Association has successfully lobbied to put lethal firepower into the hands of virtually anyone who wants it.
Since their reversal of abortion rights in Roe v. Wade on June 24, 2022, at least six Right-wing Supreme Court Justices have lived under heavy guard by the U.S. Marshals Service. They may well be forced to do so for the rest of their lives.
But radical evangelists like Franklin Graham and Right-wing propagandists like Tucker Carlson cannot expect lifelong government protection. They would have to provide their own security—or take their chances.
So many Republicans are calling for an all-out war on gays that any number of them could become the targets—and victims—of retaliation.
Republicans boast that they want to “get the government off the backs of the people.” Yet they are waging war against people for the most intimate of reasons: Their choice of sex partners.
Reinhard Heydrich believed he was invulnerable to the hatred of the enemies he had raised against himself. That arrogance cost him his life.
The day may soon come when America’s own Right-wingers start learning the same lesson.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on February 28, 2023 at 12:13 am
The politics of “smear and fear” have been good to Republicans—and their Right-wing allies.
Meanwhile, the Republican “base” refuses to learn that those who portray themselves as morally superior are usually:
- Hypocrites, who are in effect saying: “Do as I say, not as I do,” or
- Fanatics, who intend to force their version of morality on others.
So long as millions of hate-filled Right-wingers support the endless succession of “two minute hates,” Republicans will continue to target an endless series of victims.
And Right-wingers who are stirred up by Republicans’ anti-gay rhetoric often target gays, lesbians and transgenders in violent attacks.
- According to the Southern Poverty Law Center: “In the first six months of 2022, the Proud Boys counterprotested or harassed people on at least 28 separate occasions at LGBTQ and reproductive justice events around the country – together acting as a coordinated attack on gender equity and bodily autonomy….
- “On June 26, library patrons attending a drag queen story hour at a public library in Sparks, Nevada, encountered what has now become an increasingly regular sight: a group of men clad in the Proud Boys’ black-and-yellow uniform.
- “They held signs that accused participants of ‘grooming’ children and yelled at parents that they were ‘sick.’ One of those Proud Boys allegedly approached the building with a gun, causing patrons – including a number of children – to flee inside to safety. ‘We had some people who were visibly shaken and sobbing,’ a librarian told a local reporter.”
Proud Boys Flag
Anthony Crider, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
According to a December 10, 2022 story in Business Insider:
- “By the end of November, far-right activists took part in at least 55 public actions targeting members of the LGBT+ community — up from 16 the year before, an increase of some 340% — with a corresponding rise in violent attacks on people perceived to be gay or transgender, according to a report released this week by the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, or ACLED….
- “While racism remains the primary driver of the far right, anti-LGBTQ actions have ‘fueled the largest increase in far-right protest activity,’ [according to an FBI annual risk assessment for 2022] with the rise in such activity ‘strongly’ correlating with a rise in violent attacks, of which there have been no fewer than 20, including the murder….of five people at a gay nightclub in Colorado Springs. Though we don’t have a specific motive the suspect has a history of online and offline bigotry.”
So what’s the reason for the GOP’s constantly dialing up fear and hatred of gays?
“They have an interest in keeping the base riled up about one thing or another, and when one issue fades, as with same-sex relationships and same-sex marriage, they’ve got to find something else. It’s almost frantic,” said Randall Balmer, a Dartmouth professor who authored Bad Faith: Race and the Rise of the Religious Right.
According to Balmer, the rise of the Religious Right was now driving Republican support for anti-trans legislation.
White Right-wing evangelicals backed Ronald Reagan against Jimmy Carter in 1980 and catapulted him to the White House.
Any Republican who wanted to gain the Presidency had to pay homage to the evangelical base, Balmer says.
In 2015, Donald Trump initially campaigned on welcoming gays and lesbians into the Republican platform. But he soon dropped this stance to win support from Right-wing evangelicals.
Donald Trump
That support proved crucial to his gaining the White House—just as it had proved crucial to Reagan in 1980 and 1984.
Gays have fought back on political and legal fronts, with mixed success.
According to move.org, among the best states for gays are: California, Oregon, Colorado and New York.
It’s no coincidence that these states have a majority Democratic population and legislature.
Among the worst states for gays are: Arizona, Idaho, Texas, Oklahoma, Wyoming, Arkansas and South Carolina.
Gays increasingly fear that the Supreme Court’s reversal of Roe v. Wade could lead to a reversal of its previous legalizing of same-sex marriage.
And this could very well happen. For decades, abortion rights advocates believed the Court wouldn’t dare strike down a right it had recognized as far back as 1973.
Immediately following the Court’s decision on Roe, Justice Clarence Thomas said that the landmark high court rulings that legalized same-sex marriage and contraception rights should be reconsidered.
Clarence Thomas
Thomas’ remark has been widely interpreted as an invitation to Right-wing states to bring challenges to those rulings.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton hopes the state legislature enacts a law that criminalizes sodomy so he can defend it at the Supreme Court.
And Stuart Adams, the Republican president of the State Senate, would support Utah’s joining other states to press the Supreme Court’s ending the right to same-sex marriage.
Given the all-out Republican assault on their liberties, gays could become convinced that they are becoming the targets of state-sponsored terrorism—as were Jews in Nazi Germany.
In such a case, they may turn to a more drastic means than elections and the courts to protect themselves: Violence.
“Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable,” said President John F. Kennedy in a 1962 address on the first anniversary of the Alliance for Progress.
His warning remains as valid today as it did 61 years ago.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on February 27, 2023 at 12:12 am
In a June 19, 2015 editorial, Rolling Stone magazine writer Jeb Lund noted:
“The Republican Party has weaponized its supporters, made violence a virtue and, with almost every pronouncement for 50 years, given them an enemy politicized, racialized and indivisible.
“Movement conservatives have fetishized a tendentious and ahistorical reading of the Second Amendment to the point that the Constitution itself somehow paradoxically ‘legitimizes’ an armed insurrection against the government created by it.
“Those leading said insurrection are swaddled by the blanket exculpation of patriotism. At the same time, they have synonymized the Democratic Party with illegitimacy and abuse of the American order.
“This is no longer an argument about whether one party’s beliefs are beneficial or harmful, but an attitude that labels leftism so antithetical to the American idea that empowering it on any level is an act of usurpation.”
Not content with this, Republicans have aimed slander and hatred at those who dare to vote Democratic. In the past, this has included:
- Blacks
- Women
- The disabled
- Environmentalists
- Liberals
More recently, the groups Republicans most delight in vilifying are:
- Hispanics
- Gays
- Lesbians
- Transgenders
George Orwell’s classic 1949 novel, 1984, serves as a better guide to Republican electioneering strategy than any official statement of the GOP.
1984 is set in a futuristic dictatorship called Oceania, whose constantly alternating mortal enemies are Eurasia and Eastasia.
A daily fixture of life in Oceania is the “Two Minutes Hate.” During this, Party members must watch a film depicting the Party’s enemies and express their hatred for them in exactly two minutes.
Chief among these is Emmanuel Goldstein, who is obviously based on Leon Trotsky, the longtime antagonist of Joseph Stalin, dictator of the Soviet Union for almost 30 years.
The “Two Minutes Hate” serves as a form of brainwashing, whose purpose is to whip ordinary citizens into a frenzy of hatred and loathing for whoever the Party designates as its—and their—-mortal enemies.
It fully describes the motivations—and effects—of Republicans’ attacks on their self-proclaimed enemies.
Without a speck of evidence to back up such defamatory claims, Republicans—both politicians and their followers—attack Democratic candidates as “groomers” and “pedophiles.”
This has led to deadly attacks on gays, lesbians and transgenders.
In December, 2014, Republicans in the Michigan House of Representatives passed “The Religious Freedom Restoration Act.”
The bill allows public agencies and private businesses to refuse service to anyone under the claim that their “religious beliefs” had been affronted.
And the State government is legally prevented from intervening if a person claimed that his/her “deeply-held religious beliefs” was the reason for acting—or not acting—in a certain way.
Thus:
- An emergency room doctor can refuse service to a gay or lesbian needing medical care.
- A pharmacist can refuse to fill a doctor’s prescription for birth control or HIV medication.
- A DMV clerk can refuse to give a driver’s license to someone who’s divorced.
- An employer can deny equal pay to women.
Republicans have introduced similar “right-to-discriminate” legislation in other states as well:
- On March 28, 2022, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law the “Parental Rights in Education” bill. This bans public school teachers from holding classroom instruction about sexual orientation or gender identity in kindergarten through grade three.
- In October, 33 Congressional Republicans introduced a similar “Don’t Say Gay” bill that would prohibit, on a nationwide basis, the use of federal funds “to develop, implement, facilitate, or fund any sexually-oriented program, event, or literature for children under the age of 10, and for other purposes.”
- On June 24, 2022, the Supreme Court’s reversed Roe v. Wade, guaranteeing a woman’s legal right to abortion. Soon afterward, Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton said that he would willingly defend at the Supreme Court any law the Legislature enacted that criminalized sodomy.
- In Utah, Stuart Adams, the Republican president of the State Senate, said he would support Utah’s joining with other states to press the Supreme Court to end the right to same-sex marriage.
Republicans have defended such legislation by equating gays with child predators.
In fact, the Child Molestation Research & Prevention Institute states that 90% of child molesters target children in their network of family and friends, and the majority are men married to women.
Yet Republicans and their Rightist allies have refused to condemn such heterosexual—and Right-wing—child molesters as Dennis Hastert and Josh Duggar.
Josh Duggar, the “all-American” child molester
On May 21, 2015, responding to press leaks, Duggar resigned as director of the Family Research Council, a Right-wing organization dedicated to fighting sexually-oriented issues such as same-sex marriage, abortion and pornography.
In 2002-3, as a 14-15 year-old, Duggar had fondled the breasts and vaginas of five underage girls—four of whom were his own sisters.
And on October 28, 2015, Hastert—Speaker of the House of Representatives from 1999 to 2007–pleaded guilty to structuring money transactions in a way to avoid requirements to report where the money was going.
The reason: One of his victims had started blackmailing him.
Dennis Hastert
The reason: To conceal the truth about his past as a child molester. Hastert had abused four young boys when he was their high school wrestling coach. One was only 14 years old.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on February 21, 2023 at 12:21 am
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) chairs the powerful House Judiciary Committee, which oversees the Justice Department and the FBI.
He comes to office with a unique mission: To attack the investigative agencies which proved that Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign received support from Russian Intelligence agents.
Jordan believes there should not have been any investigation into this unholy alliance.
Rep. Jim Jordan
Now, armed with the power of subpoena, Jordan is moving on several investigative fronts at once.
One of his major targets: The FBI.
Jordan is outraged that the Bureau raided Trump’s home in Mar-a-Lago on August 8, 2022, to retrieve classified documents the ex-President illegally took after leaving office.
“They raided Trump’s home. They haven’t raided Biden’s home,” Jordan said on the January 29 edition of “Meet the Press.”
“Because Biden didn’t defy a subpoena, Congressman,” its moderator, Chuck Todd, replied, adding that Trump had 60 days to comply before the FBI executed a search warrant.
Papers from Biden’s time as Vice Presidential under Barack Obama had turned up at Biden’s Delaware home and a Washington office.
Another of Jordan’s targets is Big Tech, which he accuses (without evidence) of suppressing free speech. By this, he means there is anti-Right-wing bias at some of the top social media companies in the country.
In fact, Right-wing hate speech and misinformation are commonly found on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Facebook and Twitter have reinstated Donald Trump’s accounts—which were suspended after he incited the treasonous January 6, 2021 riot against Congress.
But the fact that Right-wing propaganda has not been suppressed on the Internet means nothing to Jordan. The claim has become a rallying cry for the Right—just like “The Big Lie” that Trump was cheated of a second term by massive voter fraud in 2020.
And when confronted head-on by the brutal truth of its falsity, Right-wingers simply ignore it and shout even louder that they’re being oppressed.
“The Germans,” said Winston Churchill, “are either at your throat or at your feet.” This has proven equally true for Republicans—especially the most infamous one of all: Donald Trump.
When he held the whip hand, he was arrogance personified—as when he ordered the tear-gassing of peaceful protesters in Lafayette Park on June 1, 2020. The reason: So he could take a photo-op at St. John’s Episcopal Church following the police murder of George Floyd.
Yet when faced with investigation by Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller, Trump called himself “the most persecuted President in history.” Even Abraham Lincoln, he claimed, never suffered such harsh attacks.
Robert S. Mueller
Meanwhile, Jim Jordan is being haunted by a scandal of his own.
Jordan served as an assistant coach at Ohio State University (OSU) from 1987 to 1995. Several former OSU wrestlers claim Jordan ignored sexual abuse of students by the team’s doctor.
In April, 2018, OSU announced it was investigating charges that Richard Strauss had abused team wrestlers while he served as the team doctor from the mid-1970s to the late 1990s. Strauss died in 2005.
Jordan claims he didn’t know about the abuse.
Yet several former wrestlers assert that they told Jordan about the abuse or remember Jordan being a part of conversations about the abuse.
“I considered Jim Jordan a friend,” Mike DiSabato, a former wrestler, told NBC. It was DiSabato’s allegations against Strauss that led OSU to open the investigation. “But at the end of the day, he is absolutely lying if he says he doesn’t know what was going on.”
In an email to Ohio State’s legal counsel, DiSabato wrote: “Strauss sexually assaulted male athletes in at least fifteen varsity sports during his employment at OSU from 1978 through 1998.”
“There’s no way unless [Jordan’s] got dementia or something that he’s got no recollection of what was going on at Ohio State,” former Ultimate Fighting Championship world champion Mark Coleman told the Wall Street Journal. “I have nothing but respect for this man, I love this man, but he knew as far as I’m concerned.”
Which immediately raises the question: How can you respect and love a man who knew that students were being sexually abused—and did nothing to stop it?
Speaking with reporters in Ohio, Jordan offered a Sergeant Schultz “I know nothing” defense:
“We knew of no abuse, never heard of abuse. If we had, we would have reported it. If, in fact, there’s problems, we want justice for the people who were victims, obviously, and as I said, we are happy to talk with the folks who are doing the investigation. But the things they said about me just were flat-out not true.”
As President, Trump said he believed his ally Jordan “100 percent”: “I don’t believe them at all,” Trump told reporters, referring to the wrestlers who have come forward.
Thus, a President accused of moral depravity found himself defended by a man accused of ignoring the sexual abuse of young men.
And today, elevated by a Republican House win in 2022, a man who defended wholesale corruption by Trump now holds investigative authority over those law enforcement agencies who fought to expose that corruption.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on February 20, 2023 at 12:10 am
Ever heard of “polygraph by copier”?
If you haven’t, here’s how it works:
A detective loads three sheets of paper into a Xerox machine.
“Truth” has been typed onto the first sheet.
“Truth” has been typed onto the second sheet.
“Lie” has been typed onto the third sheet.
Then a criminal suspect is led into the room and told to put his hand against the side of the machine.
“What is your name?” asks the detective.
The suspect gives it.
The detective hits the copy button, and a page comes out: “Truth.”
“Where do you live?” asks the detective.
The suspect gives an address, the detective again hits the copy button, and a second page appears: “Truth.”
Then comes the bonus question: “Did you or did you not kill Big Jim Tate on the evening of….?”
The suspect answers. The detective presses the copy button one last time, and the sheet appears: “Lie.”
“Well, well, well, you lying little bastard,” says the detective.
Convinced that the police have found some mysterious way to peer into the darkest recesses of his criminality, the suspect “gives it up” and makes a full confession.
Yes, contrary to what many believe, police can legally use deceit to obtain a confession.
In 1973, the Supreme Court ruled, in United States v. Russell: “Nor will the mere fact of deceit defeat a prosecution, for there are circumstances when the use of deceit is the only practicable law enforcement technique available.”
In that case, the Court narrowly upheld a conviction for methamphetamine production even though the defendant had argued entrapment.
So what types of interrogative deceit might a police officer use to develop admissible evidence of a suspect’s guilt?
Police interrogation
The general rule is that deception can be used so long as it’s not likely to cause an innocent person to commit a crime or confess to a crime that s/he didn’t commit.
Click here: The Lawful Use of Deception – Article – POLICE Magazine
Consider the following examples:
- A detective is interviewing a suspect in a rape case. “Oh, that girl,” he says, thus implying that the victim was a slut and had it coming. The suspect, thinking he’s dealing with a sympathetic listener, starts bragging about his latest conquest—only to learn, too late, that his listener isn’t so simpatico after all.
- “We found your prints on the gun”—or on any number of other surfaces. Actually, there are few good places on a pistol to leave prints. And those that are left can be smeared. The same goes for other surfaces. But if a suspect can be led to believe the cops have his prints, a confession is often forthcoming.
- A police officer is interrogating a suspect in a murder case. “He came at you, didn’t he?” asks the cop. The suspect, who murdered the victim in cold blood, thinks he has an escape route. “Yeah, he came at me”—this confirming that, yes, he did kill the deceased.
- “Your partner just gave you up” is a favorite police stratagey when there is more than one suspect involved. If one suspect can be made to “flip”—turn–against the other, the case is essentially wrapped up.
- Interrogating a bank robbery suspect, a cop might say: “We know you didn’t do the shooting, that you were only the wheelman.” This implies that the penalty for driving the getaway car is far less than that for killing someone during a robbery. In fact, criminal law allows every member of the conspiracy to be charged as a principal.
- “I don’t give a damn what you did,” says the detective. “Just tell me why you did it.” For some suspects, this offers a cathartic release, a chance to justify their guilt.
- The “good cop/bad cop” routine is known to everyone who has ever seen a police drama. Yet it continues to yield results so often it continues to be routinely used. “Look, I believe you,” says the “good” cop, “but my partner’s a real asshole. Just tell me what happened so we can clear this up and you can go.”
- “So,” says the detective, “why do you think the police believe you did it?” “I have no idea,” says the suspect, confident that he isn’t giving up anything that might come back to haunt him. “Well,” says the cop, “I guess you’ll just have to make something up.” Make something up sounds easy, but is actually a trap. The suspect may end up giving away details that could incriminate him—or lying so brazenly that his lies can be used against him.
So is there a best way for a suspect to deal with an invitation to waive his Miranda right to remain silent?
Yes, there is. It’s to refuse to say anything and to ask for permission to call a lawyer.
That’s the preferred method for Mafia hitmen—and accused police officers.
Any cop who finds himself under investigation by his department’s Internal Affairs unit automatically shuts up—and calls his lawyer.
Any other respon—no matter how well-intentioned—may well result in a lengthy prison sentence.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on February 17, 2023 at 12:16 am
Americans are suckers for children. Even if many of them might come wrapped in suicide vests.
On September 2, 2015, the body of a three-year old Syrian boy named Alan Kurdi washed ashore on a beach in Bodrum, Turkey.
He and his family had boarded a small rubber boat to reach Europe amid the carnage of the Syrian civil war. The boat capsized.
The resulting photo flashed around the world and triggered international demands by humanitarian organizations that the West “do something.”
Drowned Alan Kurdi lies on a Turkish beach
Only eight days later, on September 10, 2015, the administration of President Barack Obama announced that it would take in at least 10,000 displaced Syrian refugees over the next year. That was in addition to the 2,000 Islamic refugees the United States had already accepted.
Almost one year later—on August 17, 2016—another photo captured the world’s attention.
It depicted a five-year-old Syrian boy named Omran Daqneesh sitting in an ambulance. Covered head to toe in dust, his face bloodied, he seemed dazed. He had been pulled out of a building hit by an airstrike in Aleppo, Syria.
Once again, demands arose among liberal interventionists, especially in the United States: “We must do something.”
All of which overlooks the increasing threat posed to the United States by Islamic terrorism.
According to U.S. Census data, America legally welcomes about 100,000 Muslim immigrants each year. This represents the fastest growing segment of immigrants coming to the United States.
The Pew Research Center estimates there are at least 3.45 million Islamics in the United States. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) puts the figure at seven million.
Meanwhile, the FBI is being overwhelmed by the demands of countering Islamic terrorism against the United States.
On July 8, 2015, then-FBI director James Comey testified before Congress about the increasing burdens his agency faced in combating terrorism.
“We are stopping these things [Islamic terror plots] so far through tremendous hard work, the use of sources, the use of online undercovers. But it is incredibly difficult. I cannot see [the FBI’s] stopping these [plots] indefinitely.”
The FBI has only 35,000 agents and analysts—against seven million potential suspects. And only a portion of those agents and analysts are charged with investigating terrorism.
And even children, for all their supposed innocence, are not to be ignored as potential weapons of Islamic terrorist organizations.
On August 20, 2016, a suicide bomber aged between 12 and 14 attacked a Kurdish wedding party in Gaziantep, Turkey, killing at least 51 people. Preliminary evidence indicated that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was behind the attack.
Palestinian child suicide bomber
America may well become a similar target for child suicide bombers.
How did all of this come to be?
On March 15, 2011, protests broke out in Syria, with demonstrators demanding political reforms and the ouster of dictator Bashar al-Assad.
These protests, met with government repression, continued to grow into a wholesale civil war. By December, 2022, it was estimated that 580,000 Syrians had so far died in the conflict.
Put in a positive way:
- More than 580,000 potential or actual Islamic terrorists will never again pose a threat to the United States or Western Europe.
- Additional thousands are certain to follow their example.
- And the United States cannot be held in any way responsible for it.
But Americans and Europeans have chosen to see these positives as negatives.
The United Nations refugee Agency, UNHCR, estimates that, in 2021, 123,300 refugees and migrants crossed the Mediterranean to Europe. .
And while the West has thrown open its doors to fleeing Syrians, the reaction of neighboring Islamic nations has been entirely different.
This was brutally but accurately depicted in a cartoon of wealthy Arab rulers looking on indifferently at the body of Alan Kurdi.
While European nations are being swamped by hundreds of thousands of these uninvited “guests,” the Arab world’s wealthiest nations are doing almost nothing for their Islamic brethren.
According to Amnesty International, the “six Gulf countries—Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman and Bahrain—have offered zero resettlement places to Syrian refugees.”
These nations are far closer to Syria than are Europe and the United States. And they contain some of the Arab world’s largest military budgets and its highest standards of living.
Meanwhile, democratic, non-Islamic countries are exposing themselves to increasing numbers of potential—if not actual—Islamic terrorists.
* * * * *
On February 6, a 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit Turkey and Syria, killing more than 40,000 people to date in both countries.
Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Turkey—long a staunch NATO ally—has tilted increasingly toward Russia. Syria, meanwhile, remains an international pariah owing to the dictatorship of Bashar al-Assad and his support of anti-Western terrorism.
Yet that hasn’t prevented both countries from pleading with the “infidel” West to sacrifice money and resources on their behalf. And, once again, the West is responding with unearned generosity.
As always, the type of aid most sought is money. In response, Doctors Without Borders, for example, is running full-page ads soliciting donations from $5 to $1,000.
As Karl Marx once famously said—but in another context: “The last capitalist we hang shall be the one who sold us the rope.”
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on February 16, 2023 at 12:10 am
Next to the American flag, Republicans have loudly pledged their loyalty to the nuclear family.
And Florida United States Senator Rick Scott, in his “11 Point Plan to Rescue America,” is no exception.
Point 8: We will protect, defend, and promote the American Family at all costs. The nuclear family is crucial to civilization, it is God’s design for humanity, and it must be protected and celebrated. To say otherwise is to deny science.
Scott claims that the nuclear family is “God’s design for humanity”—and that to disagree is to “deny science.”
Here are the facts:
First of all, there is no scientific proof for the existence of God. It is simply a belief.
Second, the nuclear family—a married couple and their dependent children under the age of 18—is a fast-disappearing species.
Nuclear family – 1955
Seattle Municipal Archives from Seattle, WA, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
There are currently just 23.1 million American homes with “nuclear families,’ which is the fewest since 1959. So much for “God’s design for humanity.”
Point 9: Men are men, women are women, and unborn babies are babies.
“Men are men, women are women”: Republicans seek to frighten voters into voting for them by appealing to the fear that “Gays and transgenders are coming for your children.”
Without offering proof, they slander their opponents as “groomers”—pedophiles who befriend children and build their trust, leading to their sexual abuse.
Actually, gays don’t prey on heterosexuals but seek out others of their own sexual persuasion. The same is true for transgenders.
Meanwhile, the Republican party has had its own share of closeted pedophiles.
Among them:
- Josh (“18 Kids and Counting”) Duggar, recently sentenced to 12 years’ imprisonment for possession of child pornography;
- Dennis Hastert, former Speaker of the House of Representatives, who sexually molested four young boys when he was their high school wrestling coach.
Josh Duggar
As for “Unborn babies are babies”: Those who have not yet been born are fetuses.
While Republicans have waged an almost 50-year war against legalized abortion, they have waged an equally aggressive war against Social Security, Medicare, the Affordable Care Act, food stamps, affordable housing, and aid to the blind and disabled.
In short: They oppose all those programs intended to help those who have already been born.
Point 10: Americans will be free to welcome God into all aspects of our lives, and we will stop all government efforts to deny our religious freedom and freedom of speech.
The Democratic party is not trying to “deny our religious freedom and freedom of speech.”
On the contrary: It’s Republicans who have crafted laws to turn claimed religious beliefs into a weapon of discrimination.
A classic example: On March 26, 2015, Indiana’s then-Governor Mike Pence signed into law the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.
Mike Pence
This allows any individual or corporation to cite its religious beliefs as a defense when sued by a private party.
Thus, a bakery that doesn’t want to make a cake to be used at a gay wedding or a restaurant that doesn’t want to serve lesbian patrons can legally refuse to do so.
Republicans have introduced similar “right-to-discriminate” legislation in other states as well—such as Kansas, Arizona and South Dakota. So far, all have failed to win passage.
Republicans claim they want to “get the government off the backs of the people.” But their fixation on regulating the sexual lives of Americans ensures government intrusions of the most intimate kind.
Point 11: We are Americans, not globalists. America will be dependent on NO other country. We will conduct no trade that takes away jobs or displaces American workers.
This would be laughable except for the bitter truth: Countless numbers of Americans have lost their jobs because their companies deserted the United States for Third World nations like China, Vietnam or Mexico.
Employers have done this for three reasons:
- To pay their employees far less than they would be paid in the United States;
- To avoid American health and safety restrictions on how employees can be treated; and
- To avoid enforcement of quality control regulations which ensure that products are safe and effective for use.
During Donald Trump’s Presidency, the Chinese government granted 18 trademarks to companies linked to him and his daughter, Ivanka, within two months.
In addition, Trump won approval to register three dozen trademarks in China covering everything from bars and hotels to child-care and massage services, raising further concerns over potential conflicts of interest.
From 2005 to 2017, Trump filed for 126 trademarks in China for his business empire.
As for Scott’s claim, “America will be dependent on NO other country”:
Despite Right-wing rhetoric, the United States can no longer separate itself from the rest of the world.
The ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine has badly affected American imports of grain products from Ukraine. And America’s continued reliance on fossil fuels forces it to depend on despotic Middle East oil kingdoms.
Finally, the Coronavirus pandemic has led to crucial shortages in goods America has long imported: Medicines, electronics, auto parts, solar panels, toys, air conditioners.
Thus, this provision—like the rest of Scott’s plan—runs head-on into the ugliness of sheer reality.
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LOVE VS. FEAR: PART ONE (OF TWO)
In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 16, 2023 at 12:10 amIt’s probably the most-quoted passage of Niccolo Machiavelli’s infamous book, The Prince:
“From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved than feared, or feared more than loved. The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved.
“For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger and covetous of gain. As long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours: they offer you their blood, their goods, their life and their children, when the necessity is remote, but when it approaches, they revolt.
“And the prince who has relied solely on their words, without making other preparations, is ruined. For the friendship which is gained by purchase and not through grandeur and nobility of spirit is bought but not secured, and at a pinch is not to be expended in your service.
“And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared. For love is held by a chain of obligations which, men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose. But fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.”
Niccolo Machiavelli
So—which is better: To be feared or loved?
In the 1993 film, A Bronx Tale, 17-year-old Calogero (Lillo Brancato) poses that question to his idol, the local Mafia capo, Sonny (Chazz Palminteri).
“That’s a good question,” Sonny replies. “It’s nice to be both, but it’s very difficult. But if I had my choice, I would rather be feared.
“Fear lasts longer than love. Friendships that are bought with money mean nothing. You see how it is around here. I make a joke, everybody laughs. I know I’m funny, but I’m not that funny. It’s fear that keeps them loyal to me.”
Presidents face the same dilemma as Mafia capos—and resolve it in their own ways.
LOVE ME BECAUSE I NEED TO BE LOVED
Bill Clinton believed that he could win over his self-appointed Republican enemies through his sheer charm.
Part of this lay in self-confidence: He had won the 1992 and 1996 elections by convincing voters that “I feel your pain.”
Bill Clinton
And part of it lay in his need to be loved. He once said that if he were in a room with 100 people and 99 of them liked him but one didn’t, he would spend all his time with that one person, trying to win him over.
But while he could charm voters, he could not bring himself to retaliate against his sworn Republican enemies.
On April 19, 1995, Right-wing terrorist Timothy McVeigh drove a truck—packed with 5,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate and nitromethane—to the front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
The explosion killed 168 people, including 19 children in the day care center on the second floor, and injured 684 others.
Suddenly, Republicans were frightened. Since the end of World War II, they had vilified the very Federal Government they belonged to. They had even courted the Right-wing militia groups responsible for the bombing.
So Republicans feared Clinton would now turn their decades of hate against them.
They need not have worried. On April 23, Clinton presided over a memorial service for the victims of the bombing. He gave a moving eulogy—without condemning the hate-filled Republican rhetoric that had at least indirectly led to the slaughter.
Clinton further sought to endear himself to Republicans by:
In 1998, emboldened by Clinton’s refusal to stand up to them, House Republicans moved to impeach him over a sex scandal with White House intern Monica Lewinsky. But his Presidency survived when the Senate refused to convict.
LOVE ME BECAUSE I’LL HURT YOU IF YOU DON’T
Lyndon Johnson wanted desperately to be loved.
Once, he complained to Dean Acheson, the former Secretary of State under Harry S. Truman, about the ingratitude of American voters. He had passed far more legislation than his predecessor, John F. Kennedy, and yet Kennedy remained beloved, while he, Johnson, was not.
Why was that? Johnson demanded.
“You are not a very likable man,” said Acheson truthfully.
Lyndon B. Johnson
Johnson tried to make his subordinates love him. He would humiliate a man, then give him an expensive gift—such a Cadillac. It was his way of binding the man to him.
He was on a first-name basis with J. Edgar Hoover, the longtime director of the FBI. He didn’t hesitate to request—and get–raw FBI files on his political opponents.
On at least one occasion, he told members of his Cabinet: No one would dare walk out on his administration–because if they did, two men would follow their ass to the end of the earth: Mr. J. Edgar Hoover and the head of the Internal Revenue Service.
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