Posts Tagged ‘BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE’
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In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on September 5, 2025 at 12:16 am
For all his ruthlessness and duplicity, it’s almost a certainty that Donald Trump has never read the works of Niccolo Machiavelli, the father of modern political science.
Machiavelli (1469 – 1527) is widely thought of as the personification of Satan.
In fact, Machiavelli was a passionate Republican, who spent most of his adult life in the service of his beloved city-state, Florence.
Florence, for all its wealth, lacked a strong army, and thus lay at the mercy of powerful enemies, such as Cesare Borgia. Machiavelli often had to use his wits to keep them at bay.
Niccolo Machiavelli
Contrary to popular belief, Machiavelli did not advocate evil for its own sake.
Rather, he recognized that sometimes there is no perfect solution to a problem. He realized that men—and nations—are not always masters of their fates. And he warned that there is no course of action that is guaranteed safe or successful.
Donald Trump, on the other hand, is a man of simplistic “solutions” for simplistic audiences.
By early April, 2020, he opposed the issuing of a national “stay-at-home” order to contain the spread of the Coronavirus. But, one by one, states began issuing shutdown orders of their own. So he railed against those orders and demanded that “we need to reopen the country.”
Donald Trump
There were two hidden agendas behind this:
First, throughout the first term of his Presidency, Trump claimed sole credit for a booming economy—even though this was largely the result of the administration of President Barack Obama.
Second, Trump wanted to return to his Nuremberg-style rallies, where he could slander anyone he wanted while basking in the worship of thousands of his fanatical followers.
His White House “Coronavirus briefings” had been his pale substitute for dispensing propaganda under the guise of sharing reliable medical information.
Thus he clearly missed this warning, offered in Machiavelli’s masterwork, The Discourses, about safely giving advice:
“For as men only judge of matters by the result, all the blame of failure is charged upon him who first advised it, while in case of success he receives commendations. But the reward never equals the punishment….
“Certainly those who counsel princes and republics are placed between two dangers. If they do not advise what seems to them for the good of the republic or the prince, regardless of the consequences to themselves, then they fail of their duty….
“I see no other course than to take things moderately, and not to undertake to advocate any enterprise with too much zeal, but to give one’s advice calmly and modestly.
“If either then the republic or the prince decides to follow it, they may do so, as it were, of their own will, and not as though they were drawn into it by your importunity.
“In adopting this course it is not reasonable to suppose that either the prince or republic will manifest any ill will towards you on account of a resolution not taken contrary to the wishes of the many.”
By May, 2020, more Americans were wary of “reopening the country” than they were rushing to do so.
On the May 15 edition of The PBS Newshour, New York Times columnist David Brooks noted:
“If you look at actual behavior, people locked themselves down before any politician took a move. And even in those states where the politicians are opening up, people are still locking down….
“You look at the movement based on cell phone tracking. Red and blue states have the same amount of movement. The same number of people basically in state after state are staying home. And red and blue states, there’s no correlation between whether it’s a red and blue state and whether people are doing better or worse.
“And so I think the key decisions right now are not being made in statehouses and certainly not the White House. They’re being made in living rooms, as people decide, is it safe? Can I go out?”
Coronavirus
By pushing his mantra—“America needs to reopen NOW!”—Trump risked the lives of millions of Americans. But he also risked the future of his Presidency.
Several states—such as Wisconsin and Pennsylvania—that re-opened saw swarms of people flooding into bars and restaurants. They weren’t wearing masks or practicing “social distancing.” Packed together like sardines, they offered themselves like a sacrifice to Coronavirus.
If COVID-19 continued to claim more victims after America “reopened,” Trump would be seen—as Machiavelli warned—as the primary instigator of that “reopening.” He would also be seen as the primary cause of that disaster.
That is, in fact, what happened.
Herbert Hoover did not create the Great Depression. But he presided over the first three years of it. And that was enough to elect Franklin D. Roosevelt for 12 years and give Harry S. Truman another eight.
For one year, Trump presided over the outbreak of COVID. He hoped to convince voters to ignore it and give him another four years.
Instead, voters turned him out and elected Joseph Biden, who promised to attack COVID head-on.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on September 3, 2025 at 12:09 am
It’s commonplace to read about the role sex plays in motivating behavior. But the power of ego to determine history is often ignored.
Consider the role that ego played in igniting the American Civil War (1861 – 1865).
According to The Destructive War, by Charles Royster, it wasn’t the cause of “states’ rights” that led 11 Southern states to withdraw from the Union in 1860-61. It was their demand for “respect,” which, in reality, translates into “e-g-o.”
“The respect Southerners demanded did not consist simply of the states’ sovereignty or of the equal rights of Northern and Southern citizens, including slaveholders’ right to take their chattels into Northern territory.
“It entailed, too, respect for their assertion of the moral superiority of slaveholding society over free society,” writes Royster.
It was not enough for Southerners to claim equal standing with Northerners; Northerners must acknowledge it. But this was something that the North was less and less willing to do.
Finally, its citizens dared to elect Abraham Lincoln as President in 1860.
Abraham Lincoln
Lincoln and his new Republican party damned slavery—and slaveholders—as morally evil, obsolete and ultimately doomed. And they were determined to prevent slavery from spreading any further throughout the country.
Southerners found all of this intolerable.
The British author, Anthony Trollope, explained to his readers: “It is no light thing to be told daily, by our fellow citizens…that you are guilty of the one damning sin that cannot be forgiven.
“All this [Southerners] could partly moderate, partly rebuke and partly bear as long as political power remained in their hands. But they have gradually felt that this was going, and were prepared to cut the rope and run as soon as it was gone.”
Only 10% of Southerners owned slaves. The other 90% of the population “had no dog in this fight,” as Southerners liked to say.
Yet they so admired and aspired to be like their “gentleman betters” that they threw in their lot with them.
There were some Southerners who could see what was coming—and vainly warned their fellow citizens against it.
One of these was Sam Houston, the man who had won Texas independence at the 1836 battle of San Jacinto and later served as that state’s governor.
Sam Houston
On April 19, 1860, addressing a crowd in Galveston, he said: “Let me tell you what is coming. After the sacrifice of countless millions of treasure and hundreds of thousands of lives, you may win Southern independence if God be not against you.
“But I doubt it. I tell you that, while I believe with you in the doctrine of states’ rights, the North is determined to preserve this Union. They are not a fiery, impulsive people as you are, for they live in colder climates.
“But when they begin to move in a given direction, they move with the steady momentum and perseverance of a mighty avalanche; and what I fear is, they will overwhelm the South.”
Four years later, on April 9, 1865, Houston’s warning became history.
Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse.
Huge sections of the South had been laid waste by Union troops and more than 258,000 Southerners had been killed.
And slavery, the mainstay of Southern plantation life, had been ended forever.
The South had paid an expensive price for its fixation on ego.
Even more proved at risk a century later, when President John F. Kennedy faced off with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev.
John F. Kennedy
In August, 1961, faced with the embarrassment of East Berliners fleeing by the thousands into West Germany, the Soviet leader erected the infamous Berlin Wall, sealing off East and West Berlin.
Khrushchev pressed his advantage, threatening Kennedy with nuclear war unless the Americans abandoned their protection of West Berlin.
In April, Kennedy had been humiliated at the Bay of Pigs when a CIA-sponsored invasion failed to overthrow the Cuba’s Fidel Castro. So he was already on the defensive when he and Khrushchev met in Vienna.
Kennedy’s reaction: “If Khrushchev wants to rub my nose in the dirt, it’s all over.”
In short: Kennedy was prepared to incinerate the planet if he felt his almighty ego was about to get smacked.
Nuclear missile in silo
What has proved true for states and nations proves equally true for those leading every other type of institution.
Although most people like to believe they are guided by rationality and morality, all-too-often, what truly decides the course of events is their ego.
For pre-Civil War Southerners, it meant demanding that “Yankees” show respect for slave-owning society. Otherwise, they would leave the Union.
For Kennedy, it meant playing a game of “chicken,” backed up with nuclear missiles, to show Khrushchev who Numero Uno really was.
And during the Cuban Missile Crisis, in October, 1962, humankind almost disappeared as Kennedy set out to make Khrushchev “blink.”
It is well to keep these lessons from history in mind when choosing political leaders—and when making our own major decisions.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on September 1, 2025 at 12:11 am
When William J. Casey was a young attorney during the Great Depression, he learned an important lesson.
Jobs were hard to find, so Casey was glad to be hired by the Tax Research Institute of America in New York.
His task: Study New Deal legislation and write reports explaining it to corporate CEOs.
At first, he thought they wanted detailed legal commentary on the meaning of the new legislation.
But the he quickly learned a blunt truth: Businessmen neither understood nor welcomed President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s efforts at reforming American capitalism. And they didn’t want legal commentary.
Instead, they wanted to know: “What is the bare minimum we have to do to achieve compliance with the law?”
In short: How do we get by FDR’s new programs?
Fifty years later, Casey would bring the same mindset to his duties as director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for President Ronald Reagan.
William J. Casey
He was presiding over the CIA when it deliberately violated Congress’ ban on funding the “Contras,” the Right-wing death squads of Nicaragua.
Casey gave lip service to the demands of Congress. But privately, with the help of Marine Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, he set up an “off-the-shelf” operation to provide arms to overthrow the leftist government of Daniel Ortega.
It was what President Ronald Reagan wanted. So Casey felt he had a duty to get it done, and Congress be damned.
When news of Casey’s—and Reagan’s—illegal behavior leaked, in November, 1986, it almost destroyed the Reagan administration.
Especially damning: Much of the funding directed to the “Contras” had come from Iran, America’s mortal enemy.
To ransom a handful of American hostages who had been kidnapped in Lebanon, Reagan sold them America’s most sophisticated missiles in a weak-kneed exchange for American hostages.
Then he went on television and brazenly denied that any such “arms for hostages” trade had ever happened.
Ronald Reagan
But the “Casey Doctrine” of minimum compliance with the law didn’t die with Casey (who expired of a brain tumor in 1987).
It was very much alive within the American business community as President Barack Obama sought to bring medical coverage to all Americans, and not simply the ultra-wealthy.
The single most important provision of the Affordable Care Act (ACA)—better-known as Obamacare—requires large businesses to provide insurance to fulltime employees who work more than 30 hours a week.
For part-time employees, who work fewer than 30 hours, a company isn’t penalized for failing to provide health insurance coverage.
Obama’s enemies slandered him as a ruthless practitioner of “Chicago politics.” So it’s easy to assume that he took “the Casey Doctrine” into account when he shepherded the ACA through Congress.
Barack Obama
But he didn’t.
The result was predictable. And its consequences quickly became clear.
Employers feel motivated to move fulltime workers into part-time positions, and thus avoid
- Providing their employees with medical insurance; and
- A fine for non-compliance with the law.
Some employers openly showed their contempt for President Obama—and the idea that employers had any obligation to those who make their profits a reality.
John Schnatter, CEO of Papa John’s Pizza, said:
- The price of his pizzas would go up—by 11 to 14 cents per pizza, or 15 to 20 cents per order; and
- He would pass along these costs to his customers.
“If Obamacare is in fact not repealed,” Schnatter told Politico, “we will find tactics to shallow out any Obamacare costs and core strategies to pass that cost onto consumers in order to protect our shareholders’ best interests.”
After all, why should a multibillion dollar company show any concern for those who make its profits a reality?
Consider:
- Papa John’s is the world’s third-largest pizza delivery chain, operating in 49 countries and territories with over 5,500 locations globally
- As of late August 2025, it had a net worth of approximately $1.56 to $1.59 billion.
In May, 2012, Schnatter hosted a fundraising event for Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney at his own Louisville, Kentucky, mansion.
“What a home this is,” gushed Romney. “What grounds these are, the pool, the golf course.
“You know, if a Democrat were here he’d look around and say no one should live like this. Republicans come here and say everyone should live like this.”
Of course, Romney conveniently ignored an ugly fact:
For Papa John’s minimum-wage-earning employees—many of them working only part-time—the odds of their owning a comparable estate are non-existent.
Had Obama been the serious student of Realpolitick that his enemies claimed, he would have predicted that most businesses would seek to avoid compliance with his law.
To counter that, he should have required employers to provide insurance coverage for all of their employees—regardless of their fulltime or part-time status.
This, in turn, would have produced two substantial benefits:
- All employees would have been able to obtain medical coverage; and
- Employers would have been encouraged to provide fulltime positions rather than part-time ones, since they would feel, “I’m paying for fulltime insurance coverage, so I should be getting fulltime work in return.”
The “Casey Doctrine” of minimum compliance should always be remembered when reformers try to protect Americans from predatory employers.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on August 29, 2025 at 12:14 am
The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one—no matter where he lives or what he does—can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on.
–Robert F. Kennedy, April 4, 1968
Senator Robert F. Kennedy announcing the murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
By https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jPYNb4ex6Ko, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=14289385
A total of 262 people had been killed and 1,161 people had been wounded in 268 shootings, as of July 31, 2025.
What should the surviving victims of gun massacres do to seek redress?
And how can the relatives and friends of those who didn’t survive seek justice for those they loved?
Two things:
First, don’t count on politicians to support a ban on assault weapons.
Politicians—with rare exceptions—have only two goals:
- Get elected to office, and
- Stay in office.
And too many of them fear the economic and voting clout of the NRA to risk its wrath.
Consider Mitt Romney and President Barack Obama.
Both rushed to offer condolences to the surviving victims of the massacre at the Century 16 Theater in Aurora, Colorado, on July 20, 2012.
And both steadfastly refused to even discuss gun control—let alone support a ban on the type of assault weapons used by James Holmes, leaving 12 dead and 58 wounded.
Second, those who survived these massacres—and the relatives and friends of those who didn’t—should file wrongful death, class-action lawsuits against the NRA.
There is sound, legal precedent for this.
- For decades, the American tobacco industry peddled death and disability to millions and reaped billions of dollars in profits.
- The industry vigorously claimed there was no evidence that smoking caused cancer, heart disease, emphysema or any other ailment.
- Tobacco companies spent billions on slick advertising campaigns to win new smokers and attack medical warnings about the dangers of smoking.
- Tobacco companies spent millions to elect compliant politicians and block anti-smoking legislation.
- From 1954 to 1994, over 800 private lawsuits were filed against tobacco companies in state courts. But only two plaintiffs prevailed, and both of those decisions were reversed on appeal.
- In 1994, amidst great pessimism, Mississippi Attorney General Mike Moore filed a lawsuit against the tobacco industry. But other states soon followed, ultimately growing to 46.
- Their goal: To seek monetary, equitable and injunctive relief under various consumer-protection and anti-trust laws.
- The theory underlying these lawsuits was: Cigarettes produced by the tobacco industry created health problems among the population, which badly strained the states’ public healthcare systems.
- In 1998, the states settled their Medicaid lawsuits against the tobacco industry for recovery of their tobacco-related, health-care costs. In return, they exempted the companies from private lawsuits for tobacco-related injuries.
- The companies agreed to curtail or cease certain marketing practices. They also agreed to pay, forever, annual payments to the states to compensate some of the medical costs for patients with smoking-related illnesses.
The parallels with the NRA are obvious:
- For decades, the NRA has peddled deadly weapons to millions, reaped billions of dollars in profits and refused to admit the carnage those weapons have produced: “Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.” With guns.
- The NRA has bitterly fought background checks on gun-buyers, in effect granting even criminals and the mentally ill the right to own arsenals of death-dealing weaponry.
- The NRA has spent millions on slick advertising campaigns to win new members and frighten them into buying guns.
- The NRA has spent millions on political contributions to block gun-control legislation.
- The NRA has spent millions attacking political candidates and elected officials who warned about the dangers of unrestricted access to assault and/or concealed weapons.
- The NRA has spent millions pushing “Stand Your Ground” laws in more than half the states, which potentially give every citizen a “license to kill.”
- The NRA receives millions of dollars from online sales of ammunition, high-capacity ammunition magazines, and other accessories through its point-of-sale Round-Up Program—thus directly profiting by selling a product that kills about 30,288 people a year.
- Firearms made indiscriminately available through NRA lobbying have filled hospitals with casualties, and have thus badly strained the states’ public healthcare systems.
It will take a series of highly expensive and well-publicized lawsuits to significantly weaken the NRA, financially and politically.
The first ones will have to be brought by the surviving victims of gun violence—and by the friends and families of those who did not survive it. Only they will have the courage and motivation to take such a risk.
As with the cases first brought against tobacco companies, there will be losses. And the NRA will rejoice with each one.
But, in time, state Attorneys Generals will see the clear parallels between lawsuits filed against those who peddle death by cigarette and those who peddle death by armor-piercing bullet.
And then the NRA—like the tobacco industry—will face an adversary wealthy enough to stand up for the rights of the gun industry’s own victims.
Only then will those politicians supporting reasonable gun controls dare to stand up for the victims of these needless tragedies.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on August 28, 2025 at 12:10 am
Donald Trump, upon taking office as President, appointed Elon Musk the head of a newly-created government agency called DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency). Its stated goal: Eliminating inefficiency and waste within the federal bureaucracy.
DOGE’s activities included shuttering government agencies, defunding programs and firing up to 100,000 federal employees.
Musk initially claimed he would save taxpayers $2 trillion. But financial records now indicate a savings of $175 billion.
Musk’s tenure with DOGE officially ended on May 29.
Elon Musk
The Royal Society, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Musk donated $288 million to Trump’s 2024 Presidential campaign. He repeatedly praised Trump: “This election, I think, is going to decide the fate of America, and along with the fate of America, the fate of Western civilization.”
And Trump praised Musk: “Only Elon can do this,” Trump said of a SpaceX launch. “That’s why I love you, Elon.”
But that lovefest has brutally ended. On June 3, 2025, Musk blasted the massive tax-and-spending bill backed by Trump.
Dubbed the “One Big, Beautiful Bill” by Trump—and thus by House and Senate Republicans—the legislation will:
- Extend the 2017 Trump tax cuts, keeping taxes low on the richest Americans;
- Hurt millions of Americans by slashing $600 billion from Medicaid;
- Cost millions some or all of their food stamp benefits;
- Leave nine to 14 million people without health insurance by 2034;
- Add $3.1 trillion to the nation’s debt.
Having narrowly passed the House of Representatives by one vote, the bill passed the Senate on July 4, as Trump had demanded.
Elon Musk vigorously dissented. In a post on X, his social media site, he wrote: “I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand it anymore.
“This massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill is a disgusting abomination. Shame on those who voted for it: you know you did wrong. You know it.”
In a follow-up post, he added: “It will massively increase the already gigantic budget deficit to $2.5 trillion (!!!) and burden America citizens with crushingly unsustainable debt.”
Tesla headquarters
Larry D. Moore, CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
Even worse for Republicans, Musk wrote on X: “In November next year, we fire all politicians who betrayed the American people,” suggesting that he would fund campaigns in the upcoming 2026 midterm elections to remove those who voted for the bill.
Many Republicans were expecting Musk to fund their midterm campaigns against Democrats—and their own primary challengers.
Donald Trump
Trump has loudly proclaimed his belief in taking vengeance on those who cross him: “If someone screws you, screw them back 10 times harder,” he told business leaders during a 2005 speech in Colorado.
Trump is an alpha male who enjoys dominating others. So is Musk. As Dan McAdams, a psychology professor at Northwestern University, told Newsweek:
“Two alphas can probably get along well enough as long as they don’t interfere with each other’s respective domain.
“Musk is certainly a narcissist but his self-worth is caught up in what he achieves. He really cares about building electric cars, sending people into space, and so on.
“Trump does not care about anything except himself. His entire self worth depends on others adoring him and fearing him.”
Musk is the world’s richest man, with an estimated net worth of $314 billion as of November 2024, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. He owns Tesla, Inc., X (formerly Twitter), Space X and xAI, an artificial intelligence startup that he founded in 2023.
He commands unlimited resources in money, attorneys and the ability to reach millions through X. He’s received billions of dollars in Federal contracts—among them $733.5 million for the Space Development Agency (SDA) and two for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO).
But Trump commands the Justice Department and Internal Revenue Service. He’s already turned that machinery on former federal officials he hates—such as Chris Krebs, the former director for cybersecurity.
Pam Bondi, Trump’s appointment for Attorney General, has proven her reliability. As Florida Attorney General, she solicited a political contribution from Trump while her office deliberated investigating alleged fraud at Trump University and its affiliates.
After Bondi dropped the Trump University case, Trump wrote her a $25,000 check for her re-election campaign. The money came from the Donald J. Trump Foundation.
And Trump has already started his attack on Musk: On July 1, when reporters asked him if he would deport South Africa-born Musk, Trump said: “We’ll have to take a look. We might have to put DOGE on Elon.”
And on July 3, The New Republic published that Trump was responsible for rumors about Elon Musk’s rampant White House ketamine use: “‘Actually, we dropped a dime to The New York Times….on Elon’s drug taking,’” said Trump, according to his biographer Michael Wolff,
Musk could easily be indicted for corruption—even if it’s totally unwarranted. At the very least, many—if not all—of Musk’s government contracts could be cancelled. At the worst, Musk could find himself locked in combat with Federal prosecutors for the length of Trump’s term and facing huge fines—if not imprisonment.
Ernst Rohm felt invulnerable at the start of 1934. After leaving government with an effusive send-off from Trump, Elon Musk may have felt the same.
Like Rohm, Musk may live to regret the devotion he’s lavished on his choice for Fuhrer.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on August 27, 2025 at 12:18 am
On June 30, 1934, German Chancellor Adolf Hitler ordered a massive purge of his private army, the S.A., (Sturmabteilungor). It was carried out by Hitler’s elite army-within-an-army, the Schutzstaffel, or Protective Squads, better known as the SS.
The Brownshirts (also known as “Storm Troopers”) had been instrumental in securing Hitler’s rise to Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933. They had violently intimidated political opponents (especially Communists) and organized mass rallies for the Nazi Party.
But after Hitler reached the pinnacle of power, they became a liability.
Ernst Rohm, their commander, had served as a tough army officer during World War 1. He was one of the few men allowed to use “du,” the personal form of “you” in German, when addressing Hitler.
Rohm urged Hitler to disband the regular German army, the Reichswehr, and replace it with his own undisciplined paramilitary legions as the nation’s defense force.
By 1934, the Storm Troopers numbered approximately three million. By contrast, about 100,000 soldiers served in the Reichswehr, owing to restrictions imposed by the 1919 Versailles Treaty which ended World War 1.
Ernst Rohm
Frightened by Rohm’s ambitions, the generals of the Reichswehr gave Hitler an ultimatum: Get rid of Rohm—or they would get rid of him.
Hitler didn’t hesitate. Backed by armed thugs, he stormed into Rohm’s apartment, catching him in bed with a young S.A. Storm Trooper.
Accusing his onetime friend of treasonously plotting to overthrow him, Hitler screamed: “You’re going to be shot!”
Rohm was not plotting a coup. But the generals had the whip hand—and, for Hitler, that was enough to literally sign Rohm’s death warrant.
Hours later, sitting in a prison cell, Rohm was offered a pistol with a single bullet.
“Adolf himself should do the dirty work,” said Rohm, adding: “All revolutions devour their own children.”
One hour later, Rohm died in a hail of SS bullets.
Earlier throughout that day, so had several hundred of his longtime S.A. cronies. Many of them yelled “Heil Hitler!” as they stood against barracks walls waiting to be shot.
SS soldiers marching
Thirteen days later, addressing the Reichstag, Germany’s parliament, Hitler justified his purge in a nationally broadcast speech:
“If anyone reproaches me and asks why I did not resort to the regular courts of justice, then all I can say is this: In this hour I was responsible for the fate of the German people, and thereby I became the Supreme Judge of the German people!
“I gave the order to shoot the ringleaders in this treason, and I further gave the order to cauterize down to the raw flesh the ulcers of this poisoning of the wells in our domestic life.
“Let the nation know that its existence—which depends on its internal order and security—cannot be threatened with impunity by anyone! And let it be known for all time to come that if anyone raises his hand to strike the State, then certain death is his lot.”
Adolf Hitler addressing parliament
Bundesarchiv, Bild 183-E11354 / 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
Ninety-one years after Adolf Hitler declared himself “the Supreme Judge of the German people,” the United States faces the same fate under re-elected President Donald J. Trump.
And his Number One victim may turn out to be Elon Musk, the man who played a pivotal role in sending him back to the White House.
Musk, the leader of Space X Tesla and X (formerly Twitter), had donated tens of millions of dollars to pro-Trump super PACs, jumped around the stage behind Trump during campaign rallies, and turned X into a Right-wing cheering squad for Trump.
Trump, upon taking office, appointed Musk the head of a fictional government agency called DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency). Its official goal: Eliminating inefficiency and waste within the federal bureaucracy.
But some—like former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen—had a warning for Musk: “Donald Trump is loyal to one person and one person only…himself.
“The moment Elon steps an inch out of Trump’s line, despite all he might have done for him, Donald will cut him off, disparage and denigrate him. Elon is no different than me or anyone else similarly situated. It’s just a matter of when.”
Cohen speaks from bitter personal experience.
A longtime executive of the Trump Organization, Cohen told ABC news in 2011: “If somebody does something Mr. Trump doesn’t like, I do everything in my power to resolve it to Mr. Trump’s benefit.”
In April 2018, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York began investigating Cohen. Charges reportedly included bank fraud, wire fraud and violations of campaign finance law.
Michael Cohen
By IowaPolitics.com (Trump executive Michael Cohen 012) [CC BY-SA 2.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons
On April 9, 2018, the FBI, executing a federal search warrant, raided Cohen’s office at the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs, as well as at his home and his room in the Loews Regency Hotel in New York City.
Agents seized emails, tax and business records and recordings of phone conversations that Cohen had made.
Trump’s response: “Michael Cohen only handled a tiny, tiny fraction of my legal work.”
Thus Trump undermined the argument of Cohen’s lawyers that he was the President’s personal attorney—and therefore everything Cohen did was protected by attorney-client privilege.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on August 26, 2025 at 12:06 am
On August 22, the PBS Newshour website carried the following headline: HEGSETH FIRES GENERAL WHOSE AGENCY’S INTEL ASSESSMENT OF U.S. STRIKES ON IRAN ANGERED TRUMP.
The story opened: “Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has fired a general whose agency’s initial intelligence assessment of damage to Iranian nuclear sites from U.S. strikes angered President Donald Trump, according to two people familiar with the decision and a White House official.”
“Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Kruse will no longer serve as head of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, according to the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it publicly.
“The firing is the latest upheaval in military leadership and in the country’s intelligence agencies, and comes a few months after details of the preliminary assessment leaked to the media. It found that Iran’s nuclear program has been set back only a few months by the U.S. strikes, contradicting assertions from Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.”
Donald Trump
After the June 21 strikes, Hegseth attacked the press, claiming that it had an anti-military bias . But he refused to provide evidence that proved the nuclear sites had been wiped out.
Since re-taking office on January 20, Trump has fired more than 10 senior military leaders. Critics have called this an unprecedented purge of the Pentagon.
Among those fired:
- General Charles “CQ” Brown Jr.: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Brown was the nation’s highest-ranking military officer.
- Admiral Lisa Franchetti: The Chief of Naval Operations and the first woman to lead the U.S. Navy.
- General James Slife: The Vice Chief of Staff of the Air Force was fired along with Brown and Franchetti.
- General Timothy Haugh: The head of U.S. Cyber Command and the director of the National Security Agency (NSA)
- Vice Admiral Shoshana Chatfield: The U.S. military representative to NATO.
- Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse: The director of the Defense Intelligence Agency
Trump’s determination to remake the armed forces in his own image reflects he mindset of an earlier dictator whose rage and egotism carried him—and his country—to ruin: Adolf Hitler.
Bevin Alexander provides an overall—but colorful—view of Hitler’s generalship in How Hitler Could have Won World War II.
Among the fatal military mistakes that led to the defeat of the Third Reich:
- Wasting hundreds of Luftwaffe [air force] pilots, fighters and bombers in a halfhearted attempt to conquer England.
- Ignoring the pleas of generals like Erwin Rommel to conquer Syria, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, which would have given Germany control of most of the world’s oil.
- Attacking his ally, the Soviet Union, while still at war with Great Britain.
- Turning millions of Russians into enemies rather than allies by his brutal and murderous policies.
- Needlessly declaring war on the United States after the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. (Had he not done so, Americans would have focused all their attention on defeating Japan.)
- Refusing to negotiate a separate peace with Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin—thus granting Germany a large portion of captured Russian territory in exchange for letting Stalin remain in power.
- Insisting on a “not-one-step-back” military “strategy” that led to the needless surrounding, capture and/or deaths of hundreds of thousands of German servicemen.
As the war turned increasingly against him, Hitler became ever more rigid in his thinking.
He demanded absolute control over the smallest details of his forces. This, in turn, led to astonishing and unnecessary losses among their ranks.
On June 6, 1944, General Gerd von Rundstedt insisted that Panzer tanks be released to drive the Allies from the Normandy beaches. But these could not be released except on direct orders of the Fuehrer.
Panzer tank
Hitler’s chief of staff, General Alfred Jodl, informed Rundstedt: The Fuhrer was asleep-–and was not to be awakened. By the time Hitler awoke and issued the order, it was too late.
Nor could Hitler accept responsibility for the policies that were leading Germany to certain defeat. He blamed his generals, accused them of cowardice, and relieved many of the best ones from command.
Among those sacked was Heinz Guderian, creator of the German Panzer corps—and responsible for the blitzkreig victory against France in 1940.
Heinz Guderian
Another was Erich von Manstein, designer of the strategy that defeated France in six weeks—which Germany had failed to do during four years of World War 1.
Erich von Manstein
Finally, on April 29, 1945—with the Russians only blocks from his underground Berlin bunker—Hitler dictated his “Last Political Testament.”
Once again, he refused to accept responsibility for unleashing a war that ultimately consumed 50 million lives:
“It is untrue that I or anyone else in Germany wanted war in 1939. It was desired and instigated exclusively by those international statesmen who either were of Jewish origin or worked for Jewish interests.”
Hitler had launched the invasion of Poland—and World War II—with a lie: That Poland had attacked Germany.
Fittingly, he closed the war—and his life—with a final lie.
The ancient Greeks believed that “a man’s character is his destiny.”
For Adolf Hitler—and the nations he ravaged—that proved fatally true.
It remains to be seen whether the same will prove true for Donald Trump—and the United States.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on August 25, 2025 at 12:22 am
President Donald Trump is notorious as a non-reader. Nevertheless, he seems poised to re-enact one of the most fateful events in 20th century history.
First, that event: On August 2, 1934, the aged German President Paul von Hindenburg died.
Adolf Hitler had been serving as Reich Chancellor—the equivalent of attorney general—since January 30, 1933. Within hours, the Nazi Reichstag [parliament] announced the following law, back-dated to August 1st:
“The office of Reich President will be combined with that of Reich Chancellor. The existing authority of the Reich President will consequently be transferred to the Führer and Reich Chancellor, Adolf Hitler.”
Immediately following the announcement of the new Führer law, the German Officer Corps and every individual soldier in the German Army was made to swear a brand new oath of allegiance:
“I swear by God this holy oath, that I will render to Adolf Hitler, Führer of the German Reich and People, Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, unconditional obedience, and that I am ready, as a brave soldier, to risk my life at any time for this oath.”
Soldiers swearing the Fuhrer Oath
In the past, German soldiers had sworn loyalty to Germany. Now they had sworn it to a single man.
For men of honor in uniform, conspiracy against the Führer now meant betrayal of the Fatherland itself. They considered this oath sacred, overriding all others. And the vast majority would fanatically obey it right to the end of the disastrous war Hitler was leading them into.
Yet even that didn’t give Hitler the absolute control over the Armed Forces that he sought.
Since taking command of Germany in the summer of 1934, Hitler wanted to replace two high-ranking military officials: General Werner von Fritsch and Colonel General Werner von Blomberg. Both were convinced that Hitler’s increasingly aggressive foreign policy was putting Germany on a collision course with war—a war the Fatherland could not win.
Hitler, in fact, meant to go to war—and despised Fritsch’s and Blomberg’s hesitation to do so. He decided to rid himself of both men.
But how?
Accident played a part in the case of Blomberg.
On January 12, 1938, Blomberg married Erna Gruhn, with Hitler and Reichsmarshall Hermann Goring attending as witnesses. Soon afterward, Berlin police discovered that Gruhn had a criminal record as a prostitute and had posed for pornographic photographs.
Marrying a woman with such a background violated the standard of conduct expected of German officers. Hitler was infuriated at having served as a witness to the ceremony.
But he also saw the scandal as an opportunity to dispose of Blomberg—who was forced to resign.
Shortly after Blomberg was forced out in disgrace, the SS—Hitler’s private police force—presented Hitler with a file that falsely accused Werner von Fritsch of homosexuality. Fritsch angrily denied the accusation but resigned on February 4, 1938.
From that point on, Hitler was in de facto command of the German Armed Services.
Adolf Hitler
Hitler had a timetable of conquest:
- On March 7, 1936, he seized the Rhineland, the demilitarized zone between Germany and its arch-enemy, France.
- On March 12, 1838, he “unified” Austria with Germany by annexing it.
- In September, 1938, he seized a large portion of western Czechoslovakia after that nation’s British and French “allies” sold it out at the infamous Munich Conference.
- On March 15, 1939, he ordered the Wehrmacht to occupy the rest of Czechoslovakia.
- On September 1, 1939, he ordered the invasion of Poland—unintentionally igniting World War II and the eventual destruction of Nazi Germany.
No one yet knows if Donald Trump has a plan of military conquest outside the United States. But since taking office on January 20, he has repeatedly threatened the economic—if not the military—security of:
- Canada
- Mexico
- Panama
- Greenland.
Donald Trump
On December 25, 2024, Trump told a conservative conference in Arizona that Panama was charging U.S. ships “ridiculous, highly unfair” fees to use its namesake canal.
The United States built the canal during the administration of President Theodore Roosevelt and opened it in 1914. It remained controlled by the United States until President Jimmy Carter signed a a 1977 agreement for its eventual handover to Panama in 1999.
On December 25, Trump posted on his website, Truth Social: “Merry Christmas to all, including to the wonderful soldiers of China, who are lovingly, but illegally, operating the Panama Canal.”
“There is not a single Chinese soldier in the canal,” the president of Panama, José Raúl Mulino, told reporters the next day, adding that there is “absolutely no Chinese interference.”
Another country that Trump has rushed to make an enemy of is America’s longtime ally—Canada.
At a November 30 dinner at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s estate in Palm Beach, Florida, he told Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that Canada could become the 51st state of the United States.
Canada’s Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc, who attended the dinner, insisted that Trump was joking.
But on December 2, Trump threatened to impose a 25% tax on all products entering the United States from Canada and Mexico unless they stopped the flow of drugs and illegal aliens.
And on December 3, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform an AI-generated image of himself standing on a mountain with a Canadian flag beside him. Its caption: “Oh Canada!”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on August 22, 2025 at 12:08 am
It’s the racism and sexism, stupid!
That’s how Lilliana Mason, an associate professor of political science at Johns Hopkins University’s SNF Agora Institute, sees the reason for the animosity between Republicans and Democrats.
“Part of the reason that partisan animosity between Democrats and Republicans is so terrible right now is because what the parties are fighting over are really matters of racial and gender equality—the traditional social hierarchy—and whether we’re going to go back to being a country where White Christian men were always at the top of that hierarchy or become a more egalitarian, multiethnic democracy.”
Lilliana Mason
Referring to the book she co-wrote with fellow political scientist Nathan P. Kalmoe, Radical American Partisanship: Mapping Violent Hostility, Its Causes, and the Consequences for Democracy, she said:
“What we found in our data was that, particularly on the right, Republicans who really hated Democrats the most were also the highest in racial resentment and sexism.
“And those who hated Democrats the least were those who were lowest in racial resentment and sexism. Actually, in our data, racial resentment is one of the most powerful predictors of Republicans hating Democrats.”
Once again—as in the years leading to the Civil War—it’s the South trying to impose a slavocracy mentality and control over the rest of the nation.
From 1860 to 1865, the South—Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia-–produced the greatest case of mass treason in America’s history.
Union (blue) and Confederate (red) states: 1860 – 1865
According to The Destructive War, by Charles Royster, it wasn’t the cause of “states’ rights” that led 11 Southern states to withdraw from the Union in 1860-61. It was their demand for “respect.”
“The respect Southerners demanded did not consist simply of the states’ sovereignty or of the equal rights of Northern and Southern citizens, including slaveholders’ right to take their chattels into Northern territory.
“It entailed, too, respect for their assertion of the moral superiority of slaveholding society over free society,” writes Royster.
It was not enough for Southerners to claim equal standing with Northerners; Northerners must acknowledge it. But this was something that the North increasingly refused to do.
Finally, its citizens dared to elect Abraham Lincoln President in 1860.
Abraham Lincoln
Lincoln and his new Republican party damned slavery—and slaveholders—as morally evil, obsolete and ultimately doomed. And they were determined to prevent slavery from spreading any further throughout the country.
Southerners found all of this intolerable.
On April 12, 1861—just over a month since Lincoln’s inauguration on March 4—Southern batteries opened fire on Union Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, South Carolina, triggering the Civil War.
More than 750,000.Americans died—when the population of the United States stood at 31,443,321.
Four years later, on April 9, 1865, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse.
Now Southerners are trying to win through political manipulation what they couldn’t by open treason.
Red states are adopting Fascistic social policies on such issues as abortion, gay rights and classroom censorship. And they are trying to prevent the federal government or their own largest metro areas to resist those policies.
In the case of abortion, Red states are not only outlawing it within their own borders but trying to prevent states where abortion is legal from providing that service.
Thus Republicans, who began as the party of freedom, have mutated into the party now trying to end it.
According to Donald Kettl, the former dean of the public policy school at the University of Maryland:
“The only time I can recall in American history even remotely like this [divergence] was after the Civil War when the separate but equal doctrine began to emerge” across the South as a backlash against the attempts of the 13th, 14th and 15th Constitutional amendments to ensure equality for the freed slaves.”
CNN Correspondent Ronald Brownstein warns of this development:
“The real threat in the red state effort to set their own course may be less an advantage for one side or another than a challenge to the nation’s underlying cohesion.
“As red states grow more aggressive about going their own way, while working to preempt challenges from above (the federal government) or below (blue local governments), they are testing how much divergence the nation’s fundamental cohesion can take before it begins to unravel.”
Thirty-one states voted for Donald Trump in 2024. Of these:
- Twenty-four rank in the bottom 25 for the percentage of adults holding at least a four-year college degree;
- Twenty-seven fall into the top half when ranked by the share of their population that are White Christians of who own guns;
- Twenty-one rank in the top 26 states for total energy-related CO₂ emissions;
- These states have long sought to reverse the “rights revolution” of the last 60 years—on such issues as abortion, same-sex marriage and contraception.
Today’s Republican party is no longer the party of Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and Dwight D. Eisenhower.
It has become the party of John Wilkes Booth, Benito Mussolini and Donald Trump.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on August 21, 2025 at 12:10 am
From June 15, 2015, when he launched his first Presidential campaign, until October 24, 2016, Donald Trump fired almost 4,000 angry, insulting tweets at 281 people and institutions that had somehow offended him— in politics, journalism, TV and films.
The New York Times needed two full pages of its print edition to showcase them.
Among his targets:
- Hillary Clinton
- President Barack Obama
- Actress Meryl Streep
- Actor Arnold Schwarzenegger
- Comedian John Oliver
- News organizations
- The State of New Jersey
- Beauty pageant contestants
Donald Trump
Recently, Trump resurrected his longstanding feuds with megastars Taylor Swift and Bruce Springsteen.
On May 19, he spent several hours on his website, Truth Social, attacking Bruce Springsteen, Beyonce and Bono for having supported Vice President Kamala Harris during the 2024 Presidential campaign.
In a 2 a.m. post on May 16, he charged that Harris could have paid Springsteen for an “illegal campaign contribution”––without providing any evidence to support it:
“HOW MUCH DID KAMALA HARRIS PAY BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN FOR HIS POOR PERFORMANCE DURING HER CAMPAIGN FOR PRESIDENT?,” Trump wrote. “WHY DID HE ACCEPT THAT MONEY IF HE IS SUCH A FAN OF HERS? ISN’T THAT A MAJOR AND ILLEGAL CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTION? WHAT ABOUT BEYONCÉ? …AND HOW MUCH WENT TO OPRAH, AND BONO???
“I am going to call for a major investigation into this matter. Candidates aren’t allowed to pay for ENDORSEMENTS, which is what Kamala did, under the guise of paying for entertainment. In addition, this was a very expensive and desperate effort to artificially build up her sparse crowds. IT’S NOT LEGAL! For these unpatriotic “entertainers,” this was just a CORRUPT & UNLAWFUL way to capitalize on a broken system. Thank you for your attention to this matter!!!”
And he added: “This dried out ‘prune’ of a rocker (his skin is all atrophied!) ought to KEEP HIS MOUTH SHUT until he gets back into the Country, that’s just “standard fare.” Then we’ll all see how it goes for him!”
Bruce Springsteen
Raph_PH, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
When a 34-times convicted criminal controls the Justice Department and threatens to investigate a singer for endorsing a political candidate, there is nothing to prevent him from persecuting anyone.
Trump’s rant was triggered by Springsteen’s comment to a crowd a week earlier in Manchester, England: “In my home, the America I love, the America I’ve written about, that has been a beacon of hope and liberty for 250 years, is currently in the hands of a corrupt, incompetent and treasonous administration.
“They’re rolling back historic civil rights legislation that led to a more just and plural society. They’re abandoning our great allies and siding with dictators against those struggling for their freedom.”
Nor was Springsteen the only celebrity Trump declared war on. On May 16, he posted: “Has anyone noticed that, since I said ‘I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT,’ she’s no longer ‘HOT?’”
At least in the past, Trump clearly had a soft spot in his pants for Swift. In November, 2023, he told Variety co-editor-in-chief Ramin Setoodeh: “I think she’s beautiful—very beautiful! I find her very beautiful. I think she’s liberal. She probably doesn’t like Trump. I hear she’s very talented. I think she’s very beautiful, actually—unusually beautiful!”
Taylor Swift
iHeartRadioCA, CC BY 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
That apparent one-sided infatuation ended on August 18, 2024, when Trump posted AI-generated images that falsely suggested that Swift endorsed his presidential campaign. The images showed women wearing “Swifties for Trump” t-shirts.
In turn, Swift posted on Instagram: “Recently I was made aware that AI of ‘me’ falsely endorsing Donald Trump’s presidential run was posted to his site. It really conjured up my fears around AI, and the dangers of spreading misinformation.
“It brought me to the conclusion that I need to be very transparent about my actual plans for this election as a voter. The simplest way to combat misinformation is with the truth. I’m voting for @kamalaharris because she fights for the rights and causes I believe need a warrior to champion them.”
Five days after Swift endorsed Harris, Trump, like a spurned lover, posted on Truth Social in all caps, “I HATE TAYLOR SWIFT!”
Republicans have shown they’re willing to tolerate—if not enthusiastically support—Trump’s
- Brazen pardoning of about 1,500 criminals for attacking the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021;
- Supporting Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s brutal invasion of Ukraine;
- Attacking America’s allies Canada and Greenland;
- Slashing Medicaid, which provides medical care for the poor.
But they might—at last—be unnerved by the spectacle of Trump’s unhinged attacks on musical superstars Taylor Swift and Bruce Springsteen.
Both are more than entertainers; they are role models who command huge influence among even conservative voters Republicans fear alienating.
When Albert Anastasia threatened to become a liability to the ruling chieftains of the Mafia, they decided it was time for him to go—in a hail of bullets.
House and Senate Republicans won’t put a contract out on Trump. But they may decide that it’s time to stop reflexively supporting his every act of aggression, cruelty and egomania.
It’s also possible that members of his Cabinet—including his ambitions Vice President J.D. Vance—may decide it’s time to invoke the Twenty-fifth Amendment. They could issue a written declaration that Trump is emotionally unable to discharge his duties.
And cite his increasingly erratic behavior—such as his feud with Springsteen and Swift—as evidence.
Only time—and Right-wing ambition—will tell.
Bureaucracybuster's Blog 
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TRUMP: IGNORING MACHIAVELLI AT HIS PERIL
In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on September 5, 2025 at 12:16 amFor all his ruthlessness and duplicity, it’s almost a certainty that Donald Trump has never read the works of Niccolo Machiavelli, the father of modern political science.
Machiavelli (1469 – 1527) is widely thought of as the personification of Satan.
In fact, Machiavelli was a passionate Republican, who spent most of his adult life in the service of his beloved city-state, Florence.
Florence, for all its wealth, lacked a strong army, and thus lay at the mercy of powerful enemies, such as Cesare Borgia. Machiavelli often had to use his wits to keep them at bay.
Niccolo Machiavelli
Contrary to popular belief, Machiavelli did not advocate evil for its own sake.
Rather, he recognized that sometimes there is no perfect solution to a problem. He realized that men—and nations—are not always masters of their fates. And he warned that there is no course of action that is guaranteed safe or successful.
Donald Trump, on the other hand, is a man of simplistic “solutions” for simplistic audiences.
By early April, 2020, he opposed the issuing of a national “stay-at-home” order to contain the spread of the Coronavirus. But, one by one, states began issuing shutdown orders of their own. So he railed against those orders and demanded that “we need to reopen the country.”
Donald Trump
There were two hidden agendas behind this:
First, throughout the first term of his Presidency, Trump claimed sole credit for a booming economy—even though this was largely the result of the administration of President Barack Obama.
Second, Trump wanted to return to his Nuremberg-style rallies, where he could slander anyone he wanted while basking in the worship of thousands of his fanatical followers.
His White House “Coronavirus briefings” had been his pale substitute for dispensing propaganda under the guise of sharing reliable medical information.
Thus he clearly missed this warning, offered in Machiavelli’s masterwork, The Discourses, about safely giving advice:
“For as men only judge of matters by the result, all the blame of failure is charged upon him who first advised it, while in case of success he receives commendations. But the reward never equals the punishment….
“Certainly those who counsel princes and republics are placed between two dangers. If they do not advise what seems to them for the good of the republic or the prince, regardless of the consequences to themselves, then they fail of their duty….
“I see no other course than to take things moderately, and not to undertake to advocate any enterprise with too much zeal, but to give one’s advice calmly and modestly.
“If either then the republic or the prince decides to follow it, they may do so, as it were, of their own will, and not as though they were drawn into it by your importunity.
“In adopting this course it is not reasonable to suppose that either the prince or republic will manifest any ill will towards you on account of a resolution not taken contrary to the wishes of the many.”
By May, 2020, more Americans were wary of “reopening the country” than they were rushing to do so.
On the May 15 edition of The PBS Newshour, New York Times columnist David Brooks noted:
“If you look at actual behavior, people locked themselves down before any politician took a move. And even in those states where the politicians are opening up, people are still locking down….
“You look at the movement based on cell phone tracking. Red and blue states have the same amount of movement. The same number of people basically in state after state are staying home. And red and blue states, there’s no correlation between whether it’s a red and blue state and whether people are doing better or worse.
“And so I think the key decisions right now are not being made in statehouses and certainly not the White House. They’re being made in living rooms, as people decide, is it safe? Can I go out?”
Coronavirus
By pushing his mantra—“America needs to reopen NOW!”—Trump risked the lives of millions of Americans. But he also risked the future of his Presidency.
Several states—such as Wisconsin and Pennsylvania—that re-opened saw swarms of people flooding into bars and restaurants. They weren’t wearing masks or practicing “social distancing.” Packed together like sardines, they offered themselves like a sacrifice to Coronavirus.
If COVID-19 continued to claim more victims after America “reopened,” Trump would be seen—as Machiavelli warned—as the primary instigator of that “reopening.” He would also be seen as the primary cause of that disaster.
That is, in fact, what happened.
Herbert Hoover did not create the Great Depression. But he presided over the first three years of it. And that was enough to elect Franklin D. Roosevelt for 12 years and give Harry S. Truman another eight.
For one year, Trump presided over the outbreak of COVID. He hoped to convince voters to ignore it and give him another four years.
Instead, voters turned him out and elected Joseph Biden, who promised to attack COVID head-on.
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