Posts Tagged ‘2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION’
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 13, 2024 at 12:12 am
On July 20, 1944, Colonel Claus Schenk von Stuaffenberg tried to assassinate Nazi Germany’s Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, with a time bomb.
Stauffenberg appeared at Hitler’s well-guarded military headquarters in East Prussia. Like all his other outposts, Hitler had named it—appropriately enough—“Wolf’s Lair.”
While a war conference was in session, he placed his yellow briefcase next to Hitler—who was standing with his generals at a heavy oaken table. Then he excused himself to take an “urgent” phone call.
“Wolf’s Lair”
But after Stauffenberg left the room, Colonel Heinz Brandt, who stood next to Hitler, found the briefcase blocking his legs. So he moved it—to the other side of the heavy oaken support, thus unknowingly shielding Hitler from the full blast.
At 12:42 p.m. on July 20, 1944, Stauffenberg’s briefcase bomb erupted.
Brandt died, as did two other officers and a stenographer. Hitler not only survived, but the plotters failed to seize the key broadcast facilities of the Reich.
This allowed Hitler to make a late-night speech to the nation, revealing the failed plot and assuring Germans that he was still alive. And he swore to flush out the “traitorous swine” who had tried to kill him.
Mass arrests quickly followed. Among the first victims discovered and executed was the conspiracy’s leader, Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg. Standing before a makeshift firing squad at midnight, he cried: “Long live our sacred Germany!”
Claus von Stauffenberg
At least 7,000 persons were arrested by the Gestapo. Of these, 4,980 were executed.
If the conspiracy had succeeded and Germany had surrendered in July or August, 1944, World War II would have ended eight to nine months earlier. This would have meant:
- The Russians—who didn’t reach Germany until April, 1945—could not have occupied the Eastern part of the country.
- Millions of East Germans would have been spared the misery of living under Communist rule for 44 years.
- Many of the future conflicts between the United States and the Soviet Union over access to West Berlin and/or West Germany would have been prevented.
- Untold numbers of Holocaust victims would have survived because the concentration camps would have been shut down far earlier.
Yet history notes other tyrants whose evil reigns ended prematurely—such as that of Gaius Caligula.
Caligula became Emperor of Rome in 37 A.D. after succeeding the Emperor Tiberius, his uncle.
For three years, he held—and exercised—life-or-death power over the citizens of Italy and beyond. His attitude toward humanity was best summed up by his remark: “Bear in mind that I can treat anyone exactly as I please.”
Gaius Caligula
Carole Raddato from FRANKFURT, Germany, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Among his litany of crimes, according to his biographer, Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus:
- He forced parents to attend the executions of their sons, sending a litter for one man who pleaded ill health. He invited another to dinner immediately after witnessing the execution, and trying to rouse him to gaiety by a great show of affability.
- He watched for several successive days as the manager of his gladiatorial shows was beaten with chains, and ordered him killed only when he was disgusted at the stench of his putrefied brain.
- He appeared at the temple of Castor and Pollux to be worshiped as Jupiter Latiaris.
- He lived in incest with all his three sisters. At a large banquet he placed each of them in turn below him, while his wife reclined above.
- He intended to promote his favorite racehorse, Incitatus (“Swift”), to consul.
Like all Roman emperors, Caligula was constantly protected by the Praetorian Guard, an elite unit of the Roman army comprised of tough legionnaires—especially German ones.
There had not been an assassination of a Roman emperor since the death of Julius Caesar almost 100 years earlier.
The assassins in that case had been motivated by a mixture of
- Personal animosity toward Caesar’s increasing arrogance and
- Genuine fears that he intended to abolish the Roman Republic and set himself up as a dictator.
And Caligula intended to keep a similar fate from overtaking him.
For all his cruelty and egomania, the trait that finally destroyed Caligula was his joy in humiliating others.
Among those he taunted was Cassius Chaerea, a member of his own bodyguard.
Two different historians give two different motives for his decision to assassinate Caligula.
The Jewish historian Josephus claimed that Chaerea was a “noble idealist” deeply committed to “Republican liberties.”
But Suetonius wrote that Caligula considered Chaerea effeminate because of a weak voice and gave him such mocking watchwords as “Priapus” and “Venus.” Whenever Caligula had Chaerea kiss his ring, the emperor would “hold out his hand to kiss, forming and moving it in an obscene fashion.”
On January 22 41 A.D. Chaerea and several other bodyguards hacked Caligula to death with swords before other guards could save him.
The assassination attempts on Adolf Hitler and the successful assassination of Gaius Caligula demonstrate that the greatest danger facing a tyrant is people who:
- Are in frequent and highly personal contact with him; and
- Keep their animosity toward him a secret—until the moment they wish to strike.
Had Secret Service agent Kerry O’Grady kept her revulsion toward Donald Trump to herself, she might now be hailed as an American traitor—or as democracy’s savior.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 12, 2024 at 12:08 am
Where does loyalty leave off and conscience begin?
Specifically: If you’re a bodyguard for a man you know represents a genuine threat to democracy, what are your obligations to defend him? Should you be as willing to “take a bullet” for him as for someone you truly admire?
Members of Adolf Hitler’s bodyguard faced no such qualms. Right up to the bitter end, with Russian forces only blocks from the Fuhrerbunker, they manned their posts, ready to die for the man who had led them—and Germany—into the ultimate catastrophe.
They made Hitler a closely-guarded target.
He was surrounded by fanatical bodyguards who were expert marksmen. He often wore a bulletproof vest and a cap lined with three pounds of laminated steel.
But his single greatest protection—he claimed—was an instinct for danger. He would suddenly change his schedule—to drop in where he was least expected. Or suddenly depart an event where he was expected to stay a long time.
Adolf Hitler
It wasn’t Hitler’s bodyguards who posed a threat to his life. It was the colonels and generals of the German General Staff.
On August 20, 1934, members of the German army, navy and air force were required to swear the “Law On The Allegiance of Civil Servants and Soldiers of the Armed Forces.”
Whereas members of the armed forces had previously sworn loyalty to Germany, the new law required them to swear an oath of loyalty to Hitler personally.
In coming years, this would prove a deadly trap for many German officers—forcing them to choose between betraying a sacred oath and remaining loyal to a man who was clearly driving Germany to ruin.
For those officers who could not abide Germany’s coming destruction, the choice was simple: Hitler had to go.
A series of assassination attempts were made against Hitler. All of them involved time-bombs. And all of the would-be assassins were members of the German General Staff.
In one case, a bomb secretly stashed aboard Hitler’s plane failed to explode. In another, an officer who had a bomb strapped to himself unexpectedly found his scheduled meeting with Hitler called off. He had to rush into a bathroom to defuse the bomb before it exploded.
Hitler came closest to death on July 20, 1944.
Colonel Claus Schenk von Stuaffenberg was the driving force in a plot to assassinate Hitler with a time bomb.
Claus von Stauffenberg
He had served with the Wehrmacht in Poland (1939), France (1940) and the Soviet Union (1941). While serving in Tunisa, he was seriously wounded on April 7, 1943, when Allied fighters strafed his vehicle. He lost his left eye, right hand and two fingers of his left hand after surgery.
For most of his fellow officers, the motive was craven: The “happy time” of German victories was over. Germany was losing the war it had unleashed on the world in 1939—and now they feared the worst.
This was especially true now that the numerically superior forces of the Soviet Union had gone onto the offensive.
The Wehrmacht in Russia
The Wehrmacht and Schutzstaffel (SS) had killed millions of Russians. Many had died in combat. Others had been murdered as captives. Still more had been allowed to die by starvation and exposure to the notorious Russian winter.
For Stauffenberg, there was another reason: His disgust at the horrors he had seen committed by his fellow Wehrmacht soldiers upon defenseless POW’s and civilians in Russia.
Thus, Stauffenberg—more than many Germans—knew firsthand the vengeance his country could expect if the “Thousand-Year Reich” fell. Something must be done, he believed, to prove to the world that not all Germans—even members of the Wehrmacht—were criminals.
Most of the conspirators wanted to arrest Hitler and surrender to British and American forces—well before the much-feared Russians gained a toehold in Germany. Stauffenberg didn’t want to arrest Hitler; he wanted to kill him. A live Hitler might eventually be rescued by his Nazi colleagues.
Stauffenberg intended to carry his bomb—hidden in a briefcase—into a “Hitler conference” room packed with military officers. Rigged with a time-fuse, it would be left there while he found an excuse to leave. After the explosion, he would phone one of his fellow conspirators with the news.
Stauffenberg intended to direct the new government that would replace that of the Nazis—and open peace talks with the British and Americans. With Hitler dead, the coup—“Operation Valkyrie”—would be on.
Anti-Nazi conspirators would seize control of key posts of the government. They would inform the British and Americans of Germany’s willingness to surrender. Provided, of course, that the vengeance-seeking Russians did not have a say in its postwar future.
On July 20, 1944, Stauffenberg appeared at Hitler’s well-guarded military headquarters in East Prussia. Like all his other outposts, Hitler had named it—appropriately enough—“Wolf’s Lair.”
Stauffenberg entered the large, concrete building while the conference was in session. He placed his yellow briefcase next to Hitler—who was standing with his generals at a heavy oaken table. Then he excused himself to take an “urgent” phone call.
At 12:42 p.m. on July 20, 1944, Stauffenberg’s briefcase bomb erupted.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 11, 2024 at 12:22 am
In the classic 1969 Western, The Wild Bunch, the outlaw gang is pursued by a posse led by Deke Thornton, one of its own former members.
This triggers a furious exchange between the gang’s two leaders:
DUTCH ENGSTROM: Damn that Deke Thornton to hell!
PIKE BISHOP: What would you do in his place? He gave his word.
DUTCH ENGSTROM: He gave his word to a railroad!
PIKE BISHOP: It’s his word!
DUTCH ENGSTROM: That’s not what counts! It’s who you give it to!
Where does loyalty leave off and conscience begin?
Specifically: If you’re a bodyguard for a man you know represents a genuine threat to democracy, what are your obligations to defend him? Should you be as willing to “take a bullet” for him as for someone you truly admire?
In October, 2016, Kerry O’Grady, a senior agent in the Denver field office of the United States Secret Service, found herself facing such a quandary.
She had made a series of now-deleted postings on Facebook during the 2016 Presidential campaign saying that she supported Democrat Hillary Clinton and that she would not honor a federal law that prevents agents like her from publicly airing their political beliefs.
Kerry O’Grady
“As a public servant for nearly 23 years, I struggle not to violate the Hatch Act. So I keep quiet and skirt the median,” she wrote in one Facebook post. “To do otherwise can be a criminal offense for those in my position. Despite the fact that I am expected to take a bullet for both sides.”
She had also suggested on Facebook that she would not defend President Donald Trump should someone try to shoot him.
“But this world has changed and I have changed. And I would take jail time over a bullet or an endorsement for what I believe to be disaster to this country and the strong and amazing women and minorities who reside here. Hatch Act be damned. I am with Her [Hillary Clinton],” she wrote.
The Secret Service said in a statement that it could not comment on a specific personnel matter but that it was “aware of the postings and the agency is taking quick and appropriate action.
“All Secret Service agents and employees are held to the highest standards of professional and ethical conduct. Any allegations of misconduct are taken seriously and swiftly investigated.”
Secret Service agents
O’Grady was placed on administrative leave on January 28, 2017 and suspended with pay in February. The disciplinary action took months because of her high rank.
In March, 2019, she retired from the Secret Service.
During the next four years—2017 to 2021—Donald Trump came perilously close to becoming an absolute dictator.
Among his infamies and crimes:
- Repeatedly attacking the nation’s free press as “the enemy of the American people” for daring to report his growing list of crimes and disasters.
- Publicly siding with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against American Intelligence agencies—such as the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency—which unanimously agreed that Russia had interfered with the 2016 Presidential election.
- Attacking and alienating America’s oldest allies, such as Canada and Great Britain.
- Firing FBI Director James Comey for refusing to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump—and continuing to investigate Russian subversion of the 2016 election.
Donald Trump
- Shutting down the Federal Government on December 22, 2018, because Democrats refused to fund his useless “border wall” between the United States and Mexico. An estimated 380,000 government employees were furloughed and another 420,000 were ordered to work without pay for 35 days.
- Allowing the deadly COVID-19 virus to ravage the country, killing 400,000 Americans by the time he left office.
- Repeatedly lying—while still in office and afterward—that the 2020 election had been “stolen” from him by massive voter fraud.
- Illegally trying to pressure state legislatures and governors to stop the certification of the vote that had made Joe Biden the president-elect.
- Inciting his followers to attack the Capitol Building where Senators and Representatives were meeting to count the Electoral Votes won by himself and Joseph Biden. His objective: Stop the count, which he knew would prove him the loser.
In the classic 1981 crime drama, Prince of the City, Danny Ciello (Treat Williams) turns federal witness against his fellow crime-committing police officers.
His mobbed-up cousin, Nick, warns him that the Mafia wants him dead—but that his greatest danger might come from the bodyguards now surrounding him: “Anyone can be hit. You know that. All a guard has to do is look the wrong way for a second.”
Had that happened while Trump occupied the White House, American democracy would not now be imperiled by a second Trump administration.
Bodyguards for Adolf Hitler faced no such qualms. Right up to the bitter end, with Russian forces only blocks from the Fuhrerbunker, they manned their posts, ready to die for the man who had led them, Germany and the world into the ultimate catastrophe.
Within six years, Hitler had:
- Ignited World War II in 1939 through his invasion of Poland.
- Directly or indirectly caused the deaths of 50 million people worldwide.
- Exterminated six million Jews throughout Eastern Europe and Russia through mass shootings or gassings in a vast system of concentration camps.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 5, 2024 at 12:16 am
Commentators have long speculated on why millions of Americans remain fanatically committed to Donald Trump.
There has been far less speculation on why so many law enforcers have turned a blind eye to Trump’s decades of criminality, if not treason.
Among those guilty:
- The Justice Department did not indict Trump for the series of threats he made—directly and indirectly—against Republicans and Democrats throughout the 2016 Presidential campaign.
- The United States Secret Service did not charge him with threatening the life of Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton: “Hillary [Clinton] wants to abolish, essentially abolish, the Second Amendment. If she gets to pick her [Supreme Court] judges, nothing you can do folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know.”
- The Justice Department did not prosecute Trump for treason, even though he solicited aid from Russia, a nation hostile to the United States. On July 27, 2016. Trump publicly invited “Russia”—i.e., Vladimir Putin—to hack Hillary Clinton’s emails: “I will tell you this, Russia: If you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
There are at least two reasons why Trump has been allowed to insult and even threaten prosecutors and judges without facing the punishment an ordinary citizen would:
Cowardice: They fear Trump will slander them by claiming he’s the victim of a “witch hunt” to remove him from the 2024 Presidential race.
And/or they fear physical attack from his legions of fanatical followers.
Awe of the Presidency: They fear their careers will be tainted by prosecuting or judging a man who won the votes of 70 million Americans.
There are, however, remedies for both cowardice and awe:
Cowardice: Prosecutors and judges should expect threats and slanders from Trump. This is how he has traditionally responded to attempts to hold him legally accountable.
If judges and prosecutors fear violence from Trump’s fanatical followers, they can easily obtain round-the-clock protection by local and/or federal law enforcement agencies.
Awe: Trump is no longer President. He no longer commands Presidential immunity nor the powers of that office—such as being able to cite “executive privilege” to prevent the release of documents or testimony.
His refusals to accept this reality should be bluntly ignored.
More importantly, as President, he:
- Took no action to protect Americans from the deadly COVID-19 virus;
- Constantly sided with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against the United States;
- Attacked the independent judiciary and free press;
- Praised Nazis and Ku Klux Klansmen;
- Fired FBI Director James Comey for refusing to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump and turn the agency into Trump’s private police force;
- Used his position as President to further enrich himself in violation of the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution;
- Attacked and alienated America’s oldest democratic allies, such as Canada and Great Britain;
- Refused to accept the results of a legitimate Presidential election; and
- Incited a deadly attack on Congress so he could illegally remain in office.
Those are only some of the despicable actions he took while in office.
The Presidency has long held most Americans in awe. This is largely because the man (and it’s always been a man) who holds it is elected by all Americans, and not just those of a particular city or state.
And he alone has control of America’s enormous military—the Army, Navy, Marines and Air Force—as well as a nuclear arsenal that can literally destroy all life on Earth.
Americans have long assumed that a victorious Presidential candidate has been blessed by God, and thus automatically commands a respect—if not reverence—denied to ordinary mortals.
But respect must be earned. And anyone guilty of even a small number of the crimes committed by Donald Trump long ago forfeited any right to such regard.
Once a President leaves office, he should be treated as any other American citizen—and held to the same standards as an ordinary citizen.
Niccolo Machiavelli
Niccolo Machiavelli, the Florentine statesman and father of modern political science, has eloquently warned of the dangers of ignoring this truth:
…No well-ordered republic should ever cancel the crimes of its citizens by their merits. But having established rewards for good actions and penalties for evil ones, and having rewarded a citizen for conduct who afterwards commits a wrong, he should be chastised for that without regard to his previous merits. And a state that properly observes this principle will long enjoy its liberty, but if otherwise, it will speedily come to ruin.
For if a citizen who has rendered some eminent service to the state should add to the reputation and influence which he has thereby acquired the confident audacity of being able to commit any wrong without fear of punishment, he will in a little while become so insolent and overbearing as to put an end to all power of the law.
Putting an end to “all power of the law” and setting himself up as “The Law” is precisely what Donald Trump tried to do after losing the 2020 Presidential election—and is still trying to do.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 4, 2024 at 12:13 am
Donald Trump has lost the Presidential immunity shielding him from a wide range of civil lawsuits and criminal prosecutions.
He now faces unprecedented challenges from a legal system that had long ignored his rampant criminality.
Thus, regaining that Presidential immunity is arguably the biggest reason why he wants to become President again.
Although he no longer holds the Presidency, Trump repeatedly acts as though he does. He has asserted “executive privilege” on behalf of former members of his administration to block their testimony before courts, grand juries and even the office of Special Counsel Jack Smith.
He hid behind layers of Secret Service protection while attacking Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and even New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan, who presided over his arraignment and trial in the Stormy Daniels hush money payment case.
Juan Merchan
“The criminal is the district attorney because he illegally leaked massive amounts of grand jury information,” Trump told supporters at Mar-a-Lago. “For which he should be prosecuted, or at a minimum he should resign.”
As for Merchan: “I have a Trump-hating judge with a Trump-hating wife and family whose daughter work[ed] for Kamala Harris.”
In Trump’s vocabulary, “Trump-hating” is the absolute worst sin/crime that can be committed.
Another man he has attacked as a “Trump hater” is Special Counsel Jack Smith, who’s also investigating Trump’s role in inciting his followers to attack Congress on January 6, 2021.
Jack Smith
The purpose of that attack: To stop the Electoral College vote count that would certify former Vice President Joseph Biden as the actual winner of the 2020 Presidential election.
In a July 4, 2023 post on his website, Truth Social, Trump falsely claimed:
“As my Poll numbers go higher & higher, the Communists, Marxists, & Fascists get more & more CRAZY with their ridiculous Indictments & Election Interference plans & plots, all controlled by an out of control, & very corrupt, DOJ/FBI. They have WEAPONIZED Law Enforcement in America at a level not seen before.”
Trump’s reference to “Communists, Marxists, & Fascists” as his enemies is particularly noteworthy.
He was, after all, the President who:
- Defended Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against findings by the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency that Russia had interfered in the 2020 Presidential election;
- Boasted that he and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-Un “fell in love” after an exchange of letters; and
- Praised Chinese strongman Xi Jinping for making himself “President-for-Life: “No, he’s great. And look, he was able to do that. I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll have to give that a shot some day.”
Given his subsequent efforts to remain in office despite losing the 2020 Presidential election, it’s clear that he had himself in mind when he “joked” about “giving that a shot some day.”
In his post, Trump continued: “Deranged Jack Smith, who is a sick puppet for A.G. Garland & Crooked Joe Biden, should be DEFUNDED & put out to rest. Republicans must get tough or the Dems will steal another Election. MAGA!”
By “A.G. Garland” Trump meant Attorney General Merrick Garland. By “put out to rest,” he meant that his followers should assassinate Smith.
Despite all this, Trump’s millions of Right-wing followers remain fanatically loyal to him.
Why?
On August 30, 2017, an article in Salon examined why Donald Trump’s base supports him so fanatically: “Most Americans Strongly Dislike Trump, But the Angry Minority That Adores Him Controls Our Politics.”
It described these voters as representing about one-third of the Republican party:
“These are older and more conservative white people, for the most part, who believe he should not listen to other Republicans and should follow his own instincts….
“They like Trump’s coarse personality, and approve of the fact that he treats women like his personal playthings. They enjoy it when he expresses sympathy for neo-Nazis and neo-Confederate white supremacists.
Supporters giving the Nazi “Sieg Heil” salute to Trump
“They cheer when he declares his love for torture, tells the police to rough up suspects and vows to mandate the death penalty for certain crimes. (Which of course the president cannot do.)
“…This cohort of the Republican party didn’t vote for Trump because of his supposed policies on trade or his threat to withdraw from NATO. They voted for him because he said out loud what they were thinking. A petty, sophomoric, crude bully is apparently what they want as a leader.”
What is harder to explain is why so many law enforcers have turned a blind eye to Trump’s decades of criminality, if not treason. Among those who have:
- Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi personally solicited a political contribution from Donald Trump around the same time her office deliberated joining an investigation of alleged fraud at Trump University and its affiliates. After Bondi dropped the Trump University case, he wrote her a $25,000 check for her re-election campaign. The money came from the Donald J. Trump Foundation.
- Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton moved to muzzle a former state regulator who says he was ordered in 2010 to drop a fraud investigation into Trump University for political reasons. After the Texas case was dropped, Trump cut a $35,000 check to the gubernatorial campaign of then-attorney general and now Texas Governor Greg Abbott.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 3, 2024 at 1:09 am
On May 30, 2024 former President Donald Trump was convicted by a Manhattan jury of all 34 charges of falsifying business records He thus became the first current or former president to be convicted of a felony.
He’s also the first major-party presidential nominee to be convicted of a crime in the midst of a campaign for the White House.
On April 1, CNN reported/editorialized: “The Manhattan district attorney’s office has been investigating Trump in connection with his alleged role in a hush money payment scheme and cover-up involving adult film star Stormy Daniels that dates to the 2016 presidential election.”
Throughout the trial—which began on April 15—Trump aggressively attacked Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg as pursuing a leftist agenda to prevent him from running for President in 2024.
“If they can do this to me,” he has thundered in countless fund-raising appeals to his Right-wing followers, “they can do this to you.”
Which raises the question: How many others have tried to illegally pay hush-money to a porn “actress” to silence her during a Presidential campaign?
Nor is that the end of Trump’s prosecutorial troubles.
On June 13, 2023, he became the first ex-President to be formally booked by the Justice Department on federal charges.
Seal of the Department of Justice
He’s now facing 40 felony charges based on his retaining and hiding classified government documents from authorities.
These charges include:
- Willfully retaining national defense information: Storing 31 classified documents at his estate at Mar-a-Lago, in Palm Beach, Florida.
- Conspiring to obstruct justice: Conspiring to keep those documents from the grand jury.
- Withholding a document or a record: Misleading one of his attorneys by moving boxes of classified documents so the attorney could not find or introduce them to the grand jury.
- Concealing a document in a federal investigation: Hiding Trump’s possession of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago from the FBI and causing a false certificate to be submitted to the FBI.
- Scheme to conceal: Hiding his continued possession of documents from the FBI and the grand jury.
Donald Trump
Each charge carries a maximum fine of $250,000, with maximum prison sentences between five and 20 years.
According to Trump, facing 40 felony charges is “an honor because I’m doing it for you, I’m doing it for our country, to show how evil and sinister a place it has become. Make America great again! We’re not going to let them get away with it.”
In short: To save America, Trump has volunteered for this indictment. He isn’t the one who illegally removed and tried to retain almost 300 highly classified documents.
You did.
And he, like Jesus, is taking your sins upon himself.
Trump has repeatedly tried to make himself appear the victim of “a Democratic-led witch hunt.” But if politics has tainted the dispensing of justice in Trump’s case, it’s been on his behalf.
As President, he had immunity from criminal and civil lawsuits. He couldn’t be tried at local, state and federal levels.
And he had good reason to avoid facing trial at any level. He was facing at least five cases while he held office:
- The Manhattan District Attorney’s criminal case against the Trump Organization: For falsifying New York business records to conceal his hush money payoff to porn “star” Stormy Daniels for his extramarital tryst with her.
- The New York Attorney General’s civil investigation into the Trump Organization: For engaging in years of financial fraud to obtain a host of economic benefits.
- The E. Jean Carroll defamation lawsuit: For calling her a liar after she claimed he raped her in the 1990s.
- The Mary Trump lawsuit: For defrauding his niece out of millions of dollars.
- The Trump Tower lawsuit: Five people claim that Keith Schiller, the Trump Organization’s then chief of security, hit one of them on the head when they were protesting outside the company’s Manhattan headquarters in 2015.
Since leaving the White House, Trump has seen additional cases pile up against him. Among these:
- The Justice Department’s criminal investigation into Trump’s efforts to illegally overturn the 2020 presidential election.
- The Justice Department’s criminal investigation into Trump’s inciting an attack on Congress on January 6, 2021.
- The Justice Department’s criminal investigation into Trump’s illegally taking classified documents to his Mar-a-Lago estate and refusing to return them to the government.
- The House of Representatives’ January 6 lawsuit for trying to prevent Congress from certifying the Electoral College votes on January 6, 2021.
- The Eric Swalwell lawsuit by the California Representative for trying to block the Electoral College vote count.
- The Capitol Police January 6 lawsuits for emotional and physical injuries sustained by officers during the January 6, 2021 attack by Trump’s followers.
- The Michael Cohen lawsuit by Trump’s former attorney and fixer. He claims Trump retaliated against him after he said he was writing a tell-all about his years working for Trump.
- The Class Action lawsuit against the Trumps [Donald, Don Jr., Ivanka and Eric] and their business. This alleges that “the defendants used their brand name to defraud thousands of working-class individuals by promoting numerous businesses in exchange for ’secret payments.’”
Now his Presidential immunity is gone and he faces unprecedented challenges from a legal system that had long ignored his rampant criminality.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on May 17, 2024 at 12:10 am
Americans live by a series of myths—myths they would be the wiser to abandon. Some are embraced by liberals, others by conservatives, and still others by both.
Myth 4: Americans are knowledgeable about their own history—and that of other nations.
Americans’ ignorance of history—their own and that of other nations—has long been a scandal.
- A 2018 national survey by the Institute for Citizens & Scholars found that only one in three Americans (36%) can actually pass a multiple choice test consisting of items taken from the U.S. Citizenship Test.
- More than half of respondents (60%) didn’t know which countries the United States fought in World War II (Germany, Italy and Japan).
- Only 24% correctly identified one thing Benjamin Franklin was famous for; 37% believed he invented the lightbulb (that inventor was Thomas Edison).
- Twelve percent incorrectly thought WWII General Dwight Eisenhower led troops in the Civil War; six percent thought he was a Vietnam War general.
if Americans are flagrantly ignorant of their own history, they are even worse at the history of other countries.
A major reason for this lies in Americans’ belief that other nations aren’t worth bothering about except when they threaten us. During the Vietnam war, soldiers referred to the United States as “The World”—as if the rest of the planet didn’t exist.
Americans, protected from Europe by the Atlantic Ocean and the Far East by the Pacific Ocean, allowed geography to isolate themselves from the messiness of the rest of the world.
Donald Trump, as President, gave a frightening example of this during a conversation with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi: “It’s not like you’ve got China on your border.” In fact, India does share a border with China.
Myth 5: The “Bible Belt” (the Deep South) is the spiritual capitol of America.
You won’t find these truths on “Green Acres” or “The Andy Griffith Show” but they form a stain on rural America that can’t be ignored:
- A 2015 study published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that religious conservatives search more for online pornography on Google than anyone else.
- Educational attainment and college graduation rates in the Bible Belt are among the lowest in the nation.
- Smoking rates are high in West Virginia, Kentucky, Arkansas, Tennessee, Louisiana, and Mississippi—and so are rates for smoking-related diseases and deaths.
- Heart disease, obesity, homicide and teenage pregnancies are among the highest in the nation.
Myth 6: Americans are health-conscious.
The United States is experiencing an epidemic of drug overdose deaths. In 2020, the age-adjusted rate of drug overdose deaths increased 31% compared to 2019.
Adults aged 35-44 experienced the highest rates of drug overdose deaths while young people aged 15-24 experienced the greatest percentage increase in deaths.
In 2019:
- 12 million Americans 12 or older used marijuana
- 9.1 million Americans used tobacco
- 14.5 million Americans aged 12 or older used alcohol
- 9.7 million people misused pain relievers
- 6 million people misused hallucinogens
- 5.9 million people misused depressants
- 5.5 million people misused cocaine
- 4.9 million people misused prescription stimulants
- 2.1 million people misused inhalants
- 2 million people used meth
- 745,000 Americans used heroin
Myth 7: Americans only support democratic regimes.
The United States has long supported foreign dictators—so long as they’re reliably Right-wing.
- Between 1898 and 1934, the United States repeatedly intervened with military force in Central America and the Caribbean.
- The United States occupied Nicaragua almost continuously from 1912 to 1933. Its legacy was the imposition of the tyrannical Somoza family, which ruled from 1936 to 1979.
- In 1953, the Eisenhower administration ordered the CIA to overthrew the democratically-elected government of of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh. His crime: Nationalizing the Iranian oil industry, which had been under British control since 1913.
- He was succeeded by Mohammad-Reza Shah Phlavi, a dictator who depended on United States government support to retain power until he was overthrown in 1979 by the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.
- In 1954, the CIA overthrew the democratically-elected government of Guatemalan President Jacobo Arbenz. His crime: Installing a series of reforms that expanded the right to vote, allowed workers to organize, legitimized political parties and allowed public debate.
- In 1970, President Richard M. Nixon ordered the CIA to prevent Marxist Salvador Allende from being democratically elected as president of Chile. When that failed, he ordered the CIA to overthrow Allende.
- His crime: A series of liberal reforms, including nationalizing large-scale industries (notably copper mining and banking).
- in 1973, he was overthrown by Chilean army units and national police. He was followed by Right-wing dictator Augusto Pinochet, who slaughtered 3,200 political dissidents, imprisoned 30,000 and forced another 200,000 Chileans into exile.
* * * * * * * * * *
Behind these myths: The belief in “American exceptionalism”—that the United States is unlike other nations in its innocence and steadfast dedication to human rights above all else.
Wrote Christian G. Appy, in his 2015 book, American Reckoning: The Vietnam War and Our National Identity:
“It was still unimaginable to most Americans that their own nation would wage aggressive war and justify it with unfounded claims, that it would support undemocratic governments reviled by their own people, and that American troops would be sent to fight in countries where they were widely regarded not as liberators but as imperialist invaders.”
For millions, that belief died a horrific death during the Vietnam war. Yet so long as millions remain convinced that America is guided by God and that its people are His faithful servants, these myths will remain vividly alive.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on May 16, 2024 at 1:33 am
“The great enemy of truth is very often not the lie—deliberate, contrived and dishonest—but the myth, persistent, persuasive and unrealistic. Too often we hold fast to the clichés of our forebears. We subject all facts to a prefabricated set of interpretations. We enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.”
—John F. Kennedy
Americans live by a series of myths—myths they would be the wiser to abandon. Some are embraced by liberals, others by conservatives, and still others by both.
Myth 1: Americans are highly educated.
According to the 2020 U.S. Census:
- In 2022, the highest level of education of the population age 25 and older in the United States ranged from less than high school to advanced degrees beyond a bachelor’s degree.
- 9% had less than a high school diploma or equivalent;
- 28% had high school as their highest level of school completed;
- 15% had completed some college but didn’t have a degree;
- 10% had an associate degree;
- 23% had a bachelor’s degree;
- 14% had completed advanced education such as a master’s degree, professional degree or doctorate.
Myth 2: Rural America is the repository of old-fashioned virtues.
Years of “hayseed” comedies such as “The Beverly Hillbillies,” “The Real McCoys,” “Green Acres” and “Petticoat Junction” convinced millions of Americans: If you want to find the “real” America, move to rural America.
If rural America is where you’ll find the “real” Americans, the future of the United States lies in peril.
Marshall County, Indiana
Derek Jensen (Tysto), CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
- Rural Americans overwhelmingly support Donald Trump—who refused to accept defeat in a legitimate Presidential election, schemed to overturn the voters’ decision, and finally incited an attack on Congress to illegally remain in office.
- Rural America is home to fundamentalist Christians, who demand an end to legalized abortion and birth control—and thus hope to gain dictatorial control over women’s lives. They brand pro-choice Democrats as “baby killers.”
- During the 2020 Presidential election, Joe Biden won 91 of the nation’s 100 largest counties, but hardly anywhere else.
- Trump won about five times as many counties. Democrats are thriving in major metropolitan areas, but tanking elsewhere.
- Rather than being a Garden of Eden, rural America shares many big-city ills, such as crime, opioid addiction and a decline in life expectancy.
- Nearly all of the economic growth that occurred between the Great Recession and the start of the pandemic happened in a small number of metropolitan areas, making rural residents feel that the recession had never ended.
- Rural Americans refuse to abandon industries that are now dying out—such as in coal mining and steel.
- Trump promised—falsely—to bring those jobs back. Rural voters have forgiven him for this because he delivered on cultural issues—such as appointing anti-abortion Justices to the Supreme Court who overturned Roe v. Wade.
- Nearly half (46.7 percent) of all people living in rural areas are in the South. For a century following the Civil War (1861-1865) the South was accurately known as a Democratic stronghold. But that changed after Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act into law.
- In short: When Democrats went from suppressing black rights to protecting them, the great mass of white, racist rural Southerners moved to the Republican party.
Myth 3: Most Americans take a vital interest in politics.
Most Americans are dismayingly ignorant of politics at all levels—local, state and federal.
- The attempted coup of January 6, 2021, was largely fueled by ignorance. The rioters believed that Donald Trump was the real winner of the 2020 election, and that Joe Biden had “stolen” it through fraud.
- They clung to this belief, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, including numerous court decisions rejecting GOP claims of fraud, many of them authored by conservative, Republican-appointed judges.
- And this ignorance continues: A large majority of rural Republicans still believe that Biden is an illegitimate President—just 21% say that he “probably” or “definitely” won.
Donald Trump
- Most Americans don’t know the names of their state and federal representatives or even the names of the three branches of government.
- Only one third of Americans can name the three branches of our federal government: executive, legislative, judicial.
- Most voters overestimate the percentage of the federal budget spends on foreign aid (actually, about 1%). Yet they underestimate the amount going to entitlement programs, such as Medicare and Social Security. As a result, they believe we can solve our fiscal problems without either cutting entitlements or raising taxes on the vast majority of Americans.
- Voters also often reward or punish elected officials for events they did not cause, such as short-term economic trends or droughts.
Such ignorance makes people more susceptible to lies and conspiracy theories, including those about the 2020 election.
Myth 4: Americans take pride in their history.
Americans’ ignorance of history—their own and that of other nations—has long been a scandal.
- A 2018 national survey by the Institute for Citizens & Scholars found that only one in three Americans (36%) can actually pass a multiple choice test consisting of items taken from the U.S. Citizenship Test.
- More than half of respondents (60%) didn’t know which countries the United States fought in World War II (Germany, Italy and Japan).
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on May 9, 2024 at 12:05 am
And the most glorious exploits do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men. Sometimes a matter of less moment, an expression or a jest, informs us better of their characters and inclinations, than the most famous sieges, the greatest armaments, or the bloodiest battles whatsoever.
—Plutarch, “Life of Alexander”
Hope Hicks served in President Donald Trump’s administration as White House Director of Strategic Communication from January to September, 2017.
Today she’s a prominent witness at his trial for concealing hush money payments in 2016 to porn “actress” Stormy Daniels.
On January 6, 2021, Hicks had a problem: She feared she might never work again.
From 2017 to 2018 she served as White House Communications Director. After leaving the White House, she returned to serve as Counselor to the President from 2020 to 2021.
Hope Hicks
And then came the Trump-inspired attack on Congress on January 6.
Among the infamies and crimes Trump committed—and Hicks witnessed—during his four years as President:
- Repeatedly attacking the nation’s free press as “the enemy of the American people” for daring to report his growing list of crimes and disasters.
- Publicly siding with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against American Intelligence agencies—such as the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency—which unanimously agreed that Russia had interfered with the 2016 Presidential election.
- Giving highly classified CIA Intelligence to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
- Using his position as President to further enrich himself, in violation of the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution.
- Firing FBI Director James Comey for refusing to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump—and continuing to investigate Russian subversion of the 2016 election.
- Shutting down the Federal Government on December 22, 2018, because Democrats refused to fund his useless “border wall” between the United States and Mexico. An estimated 380,000 government employees were furloughed and another 420,000 were ordered to work without pay for 35 days.
- Allowing the deadly COVID-19 virus to ravage the country, killing 400,000 Americans by the time he left office.
- Attacking medical experts and governors who urged Americans to wear masks and socially distance to protect themselves against the deadly COVID-19 virus.
- Repeatedly lying—while still in office and afterward—that the 2020 election had been “stolen” from him by massive voter fraud.
- Illegally trying to pressure state legislatures and governors to stop the certification of the vote that had made Joe Biden the president-elect.
- Inciting his followers to attack the Capitol Building where Senators and Representatives were meeting to count the Electoral Votes won by himself and Joe Biden. His objective: Stop the count, which he knew would prove him the loser.
So Hope had plenty to feel tormented about.
Yet it wasn’t any of these offenses that upset her.
It was something far more personal: She feared that the public’s association of her with Trump’s attack on Congress would doom her, at age 32, to permanent unemployment.
On January 6, 2021, she exchanged a series of texts with Julie Radford, First Daughter Ivanka Trump’s chief of staff.
HICKS: “In one day he [Trump] ended every future opportunity that doesn’t include speaking engagements at the local proud boys [sic] chapter
“And all of us that didn’t have jobs lined up will be perpetually unemployed
“I’m so mad and upset
“We all look like domestic terrorists now”
RADFORD: “Oh yes I’ve been crying for an hour”
HICKS: “This made us all unemployable
“Like untouchable
“God I’m so fucking mad”
RADFORD: “I know there isn’t a chance of finding a job
“Visa also sent me a blow off email today
“Already”
HICKS: “Nope. Not being dramatic, but we are all fucked.
[Referring to Trump]: “Attacking the VP [Vice President Mike Pence]?
“Wtf is wrong with him”
Albert Speer, former architect and Minister of Armaments for his late Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, would have fully empathized.
Albert Speer
Bundesarchiv, Bild 146II-277 / Binder / CC-BY-SA 3.0, CC BY-SA 3.0 DE <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en>, via Wikimedia Commons
With the collapse of the Third Reich, he found himself hurled from power and facing trial as a war criminal at Nuremberg.
His prosecutor, Robert H. Jackson, said: “Speer joined in planning and executing the program to dragoon prisoners of war and foreign workers into German war industries, which waxed in output while the workers waned in starvation.”
Yet Speer falsely claimed he had simply been an apolitical architect who had been drafted into serving as Minister of Armaments—and hadn’t known about the Holocaust.
The prosecution couldn’t prove he had. So he escaped a death sentence—and was sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment.
Emerging from prison in 1966, Speer lamented that no architectural firm in postwar Germany would hire “Hitler’s architect.”
So he spent the rest of his life writing—at great profit—about his 12 years as a high-ranking official in the Third Reich. As “The Good Nazi,” he portrayed himself as a political innocent deceived into hell by a Mephistopheles-like Hitler.
Like Speer, Hope Hicks has repudiated her own former Fuhrer—after serving him during his worst infamies.
And, like Speer, she isn’t facing the dangers of poverty. Her net worth is estimated at $1 million, owing to her past work as a model and public relations agent.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on April 23, 2024 at 12:10 am
….A man who wishes to make a profession of goodness in everything must inevitably come to grief among so many who are not good. And therefore it is necessary, for a prince who wishes to maintain himself, to learn how not to be good, and to use this knowledge and not use it, according to the necessity of the case.
—Niccolo Machiavelli’s advice to President Joseph Biden in “The Prince”
Niccolo Machiavelli
Republicans, having won control of the House of Representatives, are eagerly seeking to destroy whatever legacy President Joseph R. Biden hopes to leave.
Intending to abuse their new-found powers to the utmost, their topmost goals include:
- Bringing false impeachment charges against Biden;
- Investigating FBI officials who rightly investigated evidence of Donald Trump’s collaboration with Russia;
- Investigating the President’s son, Hunter, for unspecified offenses, to damage his father’s credibility; and
- Holding America’s economy hostage by refusing to raise the debt ceiling unless Biden makes cuts in taxes and aid programs for the poor and middle class.
Yet their dictatorial ambitions—lavishly funded by Russian “campaign contributions” (i.e., bribes)—can be thwarted.
Two methods for achieving this have already been discussed in Part one of this series:
- Attack Republicans as traitors selling out the country to Vladimir Putin, and
- Concede NOTHING to Republicans
Here are two more:
Counterattack Strategy #3: Open Senate Investigations on the Trumps
House Republicans have ruthlessly attacked Biden’s son, Hunter, to damage the President’s credibility.
“What’s on Hunter’s laptop?” has become their latest version of “Who promoted Peress?”
Irving Peress was a New York City dentist who became a primary target for Red-baiting Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy during the 1954 Army-McCarthy hearings.
Democrats can effectively blunt this attack: Senatorial Democrats can hold similar investigative hearings on the actions of Donald Trump, Jr., and Eric Trump during their father’s White House tenure.
Both were highly involved with President Trump’s finances during his four years in office. And Trump never hesitated to violate the Emoluments Clause of the United States Constitution.
United States Constitution
Article I, Section 9, Paragraph 8 prohibits federal office holders from receiving gifts, payments, or anything of value from a foreign state or its rulers, officers, or representatives.
The Founders wanted to ensure that the country’s leaders would not be corrupted, even unconsciously, through bribes. At that time, bribery was a common practice among European rulers and diplomats.
Trump encouraged diplomats, lobbyists and insiders to stay at his Washington, D.C. hotel—which lay only a short walk from the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue.
And the prices charged there weren’t cheap:
- Cocktails ran from $23 for a gin and tonic to $100 for a vodka concoction with raw oysters and caviar.
- A seafood pyramid called “the Trump Tower” cost $120.
- A salt-aged Kansas City strip steak cost $59.
It’s a certainty that Trump’s sons, Eric and Donald, Jr., oversaw the profits sheet for this hotel—and other Trump properties across the country visited by members of foreign governments.
Thus, there are legitimate avenues for investigation open to Senatorial subcommittees—just as Robert F. Kennedy once probed financial ties between the Mafia and the International Brother of Teamsters Union.
The Justice Department might even be persuaded to launch its own investigation—not only into possible financial corruption during the Trump administration but into widespread reports of cocaine use by Donald, Jr.
Donald Trump, Jr.
Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
The House cannot bring criminal penalties against anyone. But the Justice Department can.
Counterattack Strategy #4: Open Justice Department Investigations on Congress members who supported Trump’s 2020 Coup Attempt
After Donald Trump refused to concede the 2020 Presidential election, 17 Republican state Attorney Generals—and 126 Republican members from both houses of Congress—supported a Texas lawsuit to overturn the results in four battleground states: Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
This was nothing less than a Right-wing coup attempt to overturn the results of a legitimate election. As a result, every one of these men and women can be legitimately indicted for treason—provided the Biden Justice Department has has the courage to do so.
Had the Justice Department brought such indictments in 2021 or 2022, the Republican party would now be facing legal and financial ruin. There is still time to do this.
Even if some of its members escape conviction, they will be forced to spend tens of thousands of dollars to stay out of prison.
And those who are convicted and sent to prison will serve notice on to the Right of the dangers of treason and abuse of power.
For decades, Republicans have turned Carl von Clausewitz’ famous dictum—“War is the continuation of politics by other means”—on its head: “Politics is a continuation of war by other means.”
That strategy has given the United States Richard Nixon, Spiro Agnew, George W. Bush, Donald Trump—and a Republican Congress willing to destroy the country it claims to love.
By contrast, Democrats have too often adhered to the Michelle Obama mantra: “When they go low, we go high.”
That strategy has allowed Republicans to give the United States needless wars, an exploding national debt and the near destruction of democracy.
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LOYALTY VS. CONSCIENCE: PART THREE (END)
In Bureaucracy, History, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on June 13, 2024 at 12:12 amOn July 20, 1944, Colonel Claus Schenk von Stuaffenberg tried to assassinate Nazi Germany’s Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, with a time bomb.
Stauffenberg appeared at Hitler’s well-guarded military headquarters in East Prussia. Like all his other outposts, Hitler had named it—appropriately enough—“Wolf’s Lair.”
While a war conference was in session, he placed his yellow briefcase next to Hitler—who was standing with his generals at a heavy oaken table. Then he excused himself to take an “urgent” phone call.
“Wolf’s Lair”
But after Stauffenberg left the room, Colonel Heinz Brandt, who stood next to Hitler, found the briefcase blocking his legs. So he moved it—to the other side of the heavy oaken support, thus unknowingly shielding Hitler from the full blast.
At 12:42 p.m. on July 20, 1944, Stauffenberg’s briefcase bomb erupted.
Brandt died, as did two other officers and a stenographer. Hitler not only survived, but the plotters failed to seize the key broadcast facilities of the Reich.
This allowed Hitler to make a late-night speech to the nation, revealing the failed plot and assuring Germans that he was still alive. And he swore to flush out the “traitorous swine” who had tried to kill him.
Mass arrests quickly followed. Among the first victims discovered and executed was the conspiracy’s leader, Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg. Standing before a makeshift firing squad at midnight, he cried: “Long live our sacred Germany!”
Claus von Stauffenberg
At least 7,000 persons were arrested by the Gestapo. Of these, 4,980 were executed.
If the conspiracy had succeeded and Germany had surrendered in July or August, 1944, World War II would have ended eight to nine months earlier. This would have meant:
Yet history notes other tyrants whose evil reigns ended prematurely—such as that of Gaius Caligula.
Caligula became Emperor of Rome in 37 A.D. after succeeding the Emperor Tiberius, his uncle.
For three years, he held—and exercised—life-or-death power over the citizens of Italy and beyond. His attitude toward humanity was best summed up by his remark: “Bear in mind that I can treat anyone exactly as I please.”
Gaius Caligula
Carole Raddato from FRANKFURT, Germany, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Among his litany of crimes, according to his biographer, Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus:
Like all Roman emperors, Caligula was constantly protected by the Praetorian Guard, an elite unit of the Roman army comprised of tough legionnaires—especially German ones.
There had not been an assassination of a Roman emperor since the death of Julius Caesar almost 100 years earlier.
The assassins in that case had been motivated by a mixture of
And Caligula intended to keep a similar fate from overtaking him.
For all his cruelty and egomania, the trait that finally destroyed Caligula was his joy in humiliating others.
Among those he taunted was Cassius Chaerea, a member of his own bodyguard.
Two different historians give two different motives for his decision to assassinate Caligula.
The Jewish historian Josephus claimed that Chaerea was a “noble idealist” deeply committed to “Republican liberties.”
But Suetonius wrote that Caligula considered Chaerea effeminate because of a weak voice and gave him such mocking watchwords as “Priapus” and “Venus.” Whenever Caligula had Chaerea kiss his ring, the emperor would “hold out his hand to kiss, forming and moving it in an obscene fashion.”
On January 22 41 A.D. Chaerea and several other bodyguards hacked Caligula to death with swords before other guards could save him.
The assassination attempts on Adolf Hitler and the successful assassination of Gaius Caligula demonstrate that the greatest danger facing a tyrant is people who:
Had Secret Service agent Kerry O’Grady kept her revulsion toward Donald Trump to herself, she might now be hailed as an American traitor—or as democracy’s savior.
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