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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 4, 2023 at 12:15 am
Republicans have repeatedly utilized the same my-way-or-else “negotiating” strategy as Nazi Germany’s Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler.
And Democrats—out of cowardice or an ignorance of history—have repeatedly refused to publicly make this comparison.
By studying Adolf Hitler’s mindset and “negotiating” methods, we can learn much about the mindset and “negotiating” style of today’s Republican party.
Robert Payne, author of the bestselling biography, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler (1973), described Hitler’s “negotiating” style thus:
“Although Hitler prized his own talents as a negotiator, a man always capable of striking a good bargain, he was totally lacking in finesse.
“He was incapable of bargaining. He was like a man who goes up to a fruit peddler and threatens to blow his brains out if he does not sell his applies at the lowest possible price.”
Republicans have repeatedly threatened to shut down the government unless their constantly escalating demands are met.
A shutdown occurs when Congress fails to approve funding for federal agencies.
In November, 1995, Newt Gingrich, then Speaker of the House of Representatives, carried out his threat to shut down the government. Gingrich unwisely admitted that he did so because President Bill Clinton had put him in the back of Air Force One during a recent trip to Israel.
The shutdown proved a disaster for Republicans. Clinton was handily re-elected in 1996 and Gingrich suddenly resigned from Congress in 1998.
Still, the Republicans continued their policy of my-way-or-else.
In April, 2011, the United States government almost shut down over Republican demands about subsidized pap smears.
During a late-night White House meeting with President Barack Obama and key Congressional leaders, Republican House Speaker John Boehner made this threat: His conference would not approve funding for the government if any money were allowed to flow to Planned Parenthood through Title X legislation.
Facing an April 8 deadline, negotiators worked day and night to strike a compromise—and finally reached one.
Three months later—on July 9—Republican extortionists again threatened the Nation with financial ruin and international disgrace unless their demands were met.
Symbol of the Mafia “Black Hand”
This time, Republicans refused to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agreed to massively cut social programs for the elderly, poor and disabled.
And while Republicans demanded that the disadvantaged tighten their belts, they rejected any raising of taxes on their foremost constituency—the wealthiest 1%.
To raise taxes on the wealthy, they insisted, would be a “jobs-killer.” It would “discourage” corporate CEOs from creating tens of thousands of jobs they supposedly wanted to create.
President Obama had offered to make historic cuts in the federal government and the social safety net—on which millions of Americans depend for their most basic needs.
But House Speaker John Boehner rejected that offer. He could not agree to the tax increases that Democrats wanted to impose on the wealthiest 1% as part of the bargain.
As the calendar moved ever closer to the fateful date of August 2, Republican leaders continued to insist: Any deal that includes taxes “can’t pass the House.”
One senior Republican said talks would go right up to—and maybe beyond—the brink of default.
“I think we’ll be here in August,” said Republican Representative Pete Sessions, of Texas. “We are not going to leave town until a proper deal gets done.”
President Obama had previously insisted on extending the debt ceiling through 2012. But in mid-July, he simply asked congressional leaders to review three options with their members:
- The “Grand Bargain” choice—favored by Obama—would cut deficits by about $4 trillion, including spending cuts and new tax revenues.
- A medium-range plan would aim to reduce the deficit by about $2 trillion.
- The smallest option would cut between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion, without increased tax revenue or any Medicare and Medicaid cuts.
And the Republican response?
Said Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee: “Quite frankly, [Republican] members of Congress are getting tired of what the president won’t do and what the president wants.”
Noted political analyst Chris Matthews summed up the sheer criminality of what happened within the House of Representatives.
Chris Matthews
Speaking on MSNBC’s “Hardball,” on July 28—five days before Congress reached its August 2 deadline to raise the debt-ceiling—Matthews noted:
“The first people to bow to the demands of those threatening to blow up the economy were the Republicans in the House, the leaders. The leaders did what the followers told them to do: meet the demands, hold up the country to get their way.
“Those followers didn’t win the Senate, or the Presidency, just the House. But by using the House they were able to hold up the entire United States government. They threatened to blow things up economically and it worked.
“They said they were willing to do that—just to get their way—not by persuasion, not by politics, not by democratic government, but by threatening the destruction of the country’s finances.
“Right. So what’s next? The power grid? Will they next time threaten to close down the country’s electricity and communications systems?”
With the United States teetering on the brink of national bankruptcy, President Obama caved in to Republican demands.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 3, 2023 at 12:41 am
In facing off against President Donald Trump, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi proved the embodiment of Niccolo Machiavelli’s “lion and the fox.”
Trump couldn’t believe that Pelosi meant it when she politely refused to let him give his State of the Union address in the House of Representatives until he reopened the Federal Government.
He dared her to say plainly that she would deny him access.
So she did—issuing a statement saying that the speech was off until the government reopened.
Donald Trump
Pelosi didn’t let herself be drawn into any Twitter slugfests with a semi-literate dictator. She could well afford to sit out the shutdown, since only the Fascistic Right truly believed she was responsible for it.
And she capitalized on the unexpected help she received from one of Trump’s highest-ranking officials: Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross.
Asked on CNBC if he knew that many Federal employees had been reduced to going to food banks, Ross—a billionaire—said yes, but he didn’t understand why.
His suggestion: They could just take out a loan.
“So the 30 days of pay that some people will be out, there’s no real reason why they shouldn’t be able to get a loan against it, and we’ve seen a number of ads of financial institutions doing that.
“True, the people might have to pay a little bit of interest. But the idea that it’s ‘paycheck or zero’ is not a really valid idea.”
Wilbur Ross
It was a remark worthy of Marie Antoinette’s reported (but inaccurate) dismissal of the miseries of impoverished French citizens: “Let them eat cake.”
And Pelosi didn’t hesitate to point it out:
“Is this the ‘Let them eat cake,’ kind of attitude? Or ‘Call your father for money?’ Or ’This is character-building for you; it’s all going to end up very well—just as long as you don’t get your paychecks?’”
As CNN political analyst Chris Cillizza saw it: “What Pelosi seems to understand better than past Trump political opponents is that giving ANY ground is a mistake. You have to not only stand firm, but be willing to go beyond all political norms—like canceling the SOTU—to win.”
And Julian Zelitzer, another CNN political analyst, agreed: “Pelosi did not hesitate to use her political power aggressively. From the start of this process, she has remained steadfast in her insistence that closing the government was not a legitimate way to make demands for new forms of spending.
“While sometimes Democrats become leery about seeming too partisan and not being civil enough, Pelosi and the Democrats stood their ground. She drew a line in the sand and stuck by it.”
When Republicans claim that Democrats aren’t being “civil,” they mean: “They’re not doing exactly as we tell them to do.”
And of course Republicans tried to convince voters that Trump had not threatened to shut down the government—and then had done so. Republicans like Texas United States Senator Rafael “Ted” Cruz repeatedly railed against the “Pelosi-Schumer shutdown.”
But the vast majority of voters weren’t having it. They had seen the original broadcast where Trump made his threat. And if they had missed the original, there were plenty of re-broadcasts of that moment on news networks to alert them.
As Pelosi and Democrats held firm, Republicans began getting desperate.
- They were being depicted in the news as extortionists while 800,000 of their fellow Americans suffered.
- Those businesses that served them—such as grocery stores and auto repair shops—were being starved of revenue.
- There was legitimate fear that the entire airline industry might have to shut down for lack of enough air traffic controllers to regulate air traffic.
- Worst of all for Republicans, chaos at airports threatened the travel plans of hundreds of thousands of people traveling to and from the upcoming Super Bowl. Most Americans might not know the name of their Senator, but they take their sports fetish seriously.
By January 25, the 35th day of the shutdown, an ABC News/Washington Post poll showed that 53% of Americans blamed Trump for the shutdown. His popularity had fallen to a historic low of 37%. And 60% disapproved of how he was handling negotiations to reopen the government.
So, on that same date, Trump did what his Hispanic-hating base thought was impossible: He caved.
He walked into the White House Rose Garden and said he would sign a bill to reopen the government for three weeks.
Nancy Pelosi
Trump had said he would not give the State of the Union address on his originally scheduled date of January 29th. But eventually he did.
Unlike Trump, who revels in bragging about how powerful and brilliant he is, Pelosi didn’t have to.
Simply sitting behind him, probably trying hard to suppress a gleeful smile, she nevertheless reminded the audience that she was the one who had taught this failed businessman “the art of the deal.”
Pelosi turned over the Speakership to Kevin McCarthy (R-Bakersfield) in 2023. There was no guarantee that future Speakers would stand so forthrightly against extortion.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 2, 2023 at 12:16 am
In the waning hours of September 30, the United States averted the latest Republican shutdown of the Federal Government.
President Joseph Biden signed into law the stopgap bill to avert a government shutdown passed by Congress.
Funding for federal agencies was set to run out at midnight on October 1.
The Senate passed the measure after the House of Representatives abruptly reversed course earlier in the day and passed a bipartisan bill to extend government funding.
For weeks, no one knew whether a shutdown could be averted.
So the government will remain open—until November 17.
Then the country will be treated to yet another Republican extortion attempt: “Give us what we want or we’ll shut down the government again.”
The last time a government shutdown occurred was in December, 2019, during the Presidency of Donald J. Trump.
As Speaker of the House (2007 – 2011); (2018 – 2023), Nancy Pelosi proved she was equal to the challenge.
On December 11, 2018, Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer met with Trump in the Oval Office.
And, true to his love of publicity, Trump made sure the meeting was televised live on TV.
Nancy Pelosi
Trump soon moved to the matter he truly cared about: Demanding $5.6 billion to create a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border: “And one way or the other, it’s going to get built. I’d like not to see a government closing, a shutdown. We will see what happens over the next short period of time.”
PELOSI: I think the American people recognize that we must keep government open, that a shutdown is not worth anything, and that you should not have a Trump shutdown. You have the White House—
TRUMP: Did you say Trump—
PELOSI: A Trump shutdown. You have the White House—
TRUMP: I was going to call it a Pelosi shutdown.
Charles Schumer
TRUMP: The wall is a part of border security. You can’t have very good border security without the wall.
PELOSI: That’s simply not true. That is a political promise.
[By “political promise,” Pelosi meant this was an appeal Trump made to his hardcore base. which he expected to re-elect him.]
SCHUMER: Twenty times you have called for, “I will shut down the government if I don’t get my wall.” None of us have said—you’ve said it.
TRUMP: Okay, you want to put that on my—I’ll take it. You know what I’ll say: “Yes, if we don’t get what we want, one way or the other…I will shut down the government. Absolutely.”
Trump, determined to bully Pelosi and Schumer into bending to his will, didn’t realize he had just set himself up for disaster.
Trump shut down the government on December 22. About 380,000 government employees were furloughed and another 420,000 were ordered to work without pay.
And Trump told Congressional leaders the shutdown could last months or even years.
For Trump, “the wall” was absolutely necessary—but not to keep illegal aliens out. They would go over, under or around it.
The real intent of the wall was to keep Trump in—the White House.
Trump’s fanatical base believed that a wall across the U.S.-Mexico border would stop all illegal immigration. And he knew that if he didn’t build it, they wouldn’t re-elect him.
The effects of the shutdown quickly became evident:
- For weeks, hundreds of thousands of government workers missed paychecks.
- Increasing numbers of employees of the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA)—which provides security against airline terrorism—began refusing to come to work, claiming to be sick.
- At the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) many air traffic controllers called in “sick.” Those who showed up to work without pay grew increasingly frazzled as they feared being evicted for being unable to make rent or house payments.
- Due to the shortage of air traffic controllers, many planes weren’t able to land safely at places like New York’s LaGuardia Airport.
- Many Federal employees—such as FBI agents—were forced to rely on soup kitchens to feed their families.
- Celebrity chef Jose Andres launched ChefsForFeds, which offered free hot meals for government employees and their families at restaurants across the country.
- Many workers tried to bring in money by babysitting or driving for Uber,
Pelosi, unlike many Democrats, realized this was America’s version of the Munich Conference: Democrats must hold firm against a tyrant’s extortionate demands. Otherwise, every time Trump didn’t get his way, there would be no end to such shutdowns in the future.
From the start, Pelosi insisted that Democrats would not surrender to threats of a government shutdown. And Democrats held firm, refusing to make concessions on the wall.
Second, Pelosi publicly stated that Trump could not make his annual State of the Union speech in the House of Representatives until the government was re-opened.
She politely cited as her reason that the building would not be “secure” owing to the shutdown and the nonpayment of the men and women who would be charged with its protection.
Since both the House and Senate must jointly issue an invitation to the President to make such an address, Pelosi’s veto effectively scotched Trump’s appearance.
For the publicity-addicted Trump, who revels in pontificating to adoring crowds, this was a major—and unexpected—blow.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 31, 2023 at 12:13 am
Once he became the 45th President of the United States, Donald Trump began undermining one public or private institution after another.
On November 3, 2020, 80 million voters decided they wanted a change—and elected former Vice President Joe Biden as the 46th President of the United States.
Trump refused to accept that verdict.
Speaking from the White House in the early hours of November 4, he said:
“Millions and millions of people voted for us tonight, and a very sad group of people is trying to disenfranchise that group of people and we won’t stand for it.”
For the first time in American history, a President demanded a halt to the counting of votes while the outcome of an election hung in doubt.
States ignored his demand and kept counting.
Next, Trump ordered his attorneys to file lawsuits to overturn the election results, charging electoral fraud.
Specifically:
- Illegal aliens had been allowed to vote.
- Trump ballots had been systematically destroyed.
- Tampered voting machines had turned Trump votes into Biden ones.
Throughout November and December, cases were filed in Wisconsin, Arizona, Nevada, Michigan, Minnesota and Georgia challenging the election results. And, one by one, more than 30 cases were withdrawn by Trump’s attorneys or dismissed by Federal judges—some of them appointed by Trump himself.
For 20 days, General Services Administrator Emily Murphy refused to release $7.3 million in transition funding and Federal resources to the President-elect’s team.
Under the law governing presidential transitions, Murphy was responsible for determining the winner based on publicly available information before the actual Electoral College vote.
Finally, on November 23, Murphy released the transition funding and resources.
Losing in the courts, Trump invited two Republican legislative leaders from Michigan to the White House to persuade them to stop the state from certifying the vote.
Nothing changed.
On December 5, Trump called Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and asked him to call a special legislative session and convince state legislators to select their own electors that would support him, thus overturning Biden’s win.
Kemp refused, saying he lacked the authority to do so.
Meanwhile, top Republicans—such as Vice President Mike Pence and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell—refused to congratulate Biden as the winner.
None of them branded Trump’s efforts to overturn the election as those of a tyrant.
Just as Germans did nothing to stop Adolf Hitler’s inexorable march toward war—and the destruction of millions of lives and Germany itself—so, too, did Americans seem paralyzed to put an end to the equally self-destructive reign of the man often dubbed “Carrot Caligula.”
Gaius Caligula was “the mad emperor” of ancient Rome. Like Trump, he lived by a philosophy of “Let them hate me, so long as they fear me.”
He ruled as the most powerful man of his time—three years, 10 months and eight days. And all but the first six months of his reign were drenched in slaughter and debauchery.
There are basically three ways America’s continuing slide into tyranny could have been stopped:
Congressional Republicans could have revolted against Trump’s authority and/or agenda.
They could, for example, have demanded that Trump accept the verdict of the electorate—as every other past President had. But they didn’t.
Invoking the Twenty-Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution.
This allows the Vice President and a majority of the Cabinet to recommend the removal of the President in cases where he is “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office.” It also allows the House and Senate to confirm the recommendation over the President’s objection by two-thirds vote.
The Vice President then takes over as President.
A case could easily have been made that Trump, emotionally distraught over his loss and determined to circumvent the will of the electorate, had been rendered unfit to continue in office. But, once again, Republicans let fear be their guide.
He had fired FBI Director James Comey in 2017 and publicly humiliated his Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, for more than a year until firing him in 2018. Vice President Mike Pence in particular had set new records for sycophancy.
The “Caligula solution.” Like Trump, Roman emperor Gaius Caligula delighted in humiliating others. His fatal mistake was taunting Cassius Chaerea, a member of his own bodyguard. Caligula considered Chaerea effeminate because of a weak voice and mocked him with names like “Priapus” and “Venus.”
Gaius Caligula
On January 22 41 A.D. Chaerea and several other bodyguards hacked Caligula to death with swords before other guards could save him.
Trump had similarly behaved arrogantly toward his Secret Service guards. He forced them to work without pay during his 35-day government shutdown in 2018. He also forced them to accompany him to COVID-infected states—both during the Presidential campaign and afterward. Many of them were stricken with this often lethal disease as a result.
During the 12 years that Adolf Hitler ruled Nazi Germany, at least 42 assassination plots were launched against him.
The best-known of these literally exploded on July 20, 1944, when Colonel Count Claus Shenk von Stauffenberg planted a bomb in a conference room attended by Hitler and his generals. Hitler survived only by sheer luck.
By contrast, no similar plot was aimed at Donald Trump.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 30, 2023 at 12:13 am
“Why are we letting one man systematically destroy our nation before our eyes?”
It’s a question millions of Americans asked themselves since Donald Trump became President of the United States.
Millions of Germans asked themselves the same question throughout the six years of World War II.
In September, 1938, as Adolf Hitler threatened to go to war against France and England over Czechoslovakia, most Germans feared he would. They knew that Germany was not ready for war, despite all of their Fuhrer’s boasts about how invincible the Third Reich was.
A group of high-ranking German army officers was prepared to overthrow Hitler—provided that England and France held firm and handed him a major diplomatic reverse.
But then England and France—though more powerful than Germany—flinched at the thought of war.
They surrendered to Hitler’s demands that he be given the “Sudetenland”—the northern, southwest and western regions of Czechoslovakia, inhabited mostly by ethnic Germans.
Hitler’s popularity among Germans soared. He had expanded the territories of the Reich by absorbing Austria and Czechoslovakia—without a shot being fired!
The plotters in the German high command, realizing that public opinion stood overwhelmingly against them, abandoned their plans for a coup. They decided to wait for a more favorable time.
It never came.
Adolf Hitler and his generals
Less than one year after the infamous “Munich conference,” England and France were at war—and fighting for the lives of their peoples.
As for the Germans: Most of them blindly followed their Fuhrer right to the end—believing his lies (or at least wanting to believe them), serving in his legions, defending his rampant criminality.
And then, in April, 1945, with Russian armies pouring into Berlin, it was too late for conspiracies against the man who had led them to total destruction.
Soviet flag waves over defeated Nazi Germany
Berliners paid the price for their loyalty to a murderous dictator—through countless rapes, murders and the wholesale destruction of their city. And from 1945 to 1989, Germans living in the eastern part of their country paid the price as slaves to the Soviet Union.
Have Americans learned anything from this warning from history about subservience to a madman?
The answer seems to be half-no, half-yes.
Half-no: In 2016, almost 63 million Americans elected Donald Trump—a racist, serial adulterer and longtime fraudster—as President.
On November 3, 2020, 81,255,933 Democratic voters outvoted 74,196,153 Republican voters to elect former Vice President Joseph Biden as the 46th President of the United States.
Donald Trump
Upon taking office on January 20, 2017, Trump began undermining one public or private institution after another.
- Repeatedly attacking the nation’s free press for daring to report his growing list of crimes and disasters, calling it “the enemy of the American people.”
- Siding with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency which unanimously agreed that Russia had subverted the 2016 Presidential election.
- Firing FBI Director James Comey for investigating that subversion.
- Giving Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak highly classified CIA Intelligence about an Islamic State plot to turn laptops into concealable bombs.
- Shutting down the Federal Government for 35 days because Democrats refused to fund his ineffective “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. The shutdown ended due to public outrage—without Trump getting the funding amount he had demanded.
- Trying to coerce Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to smear former Vice President Joe Biden, who was likely to be his Democratic opponent in the 2020 Presidential election.
- Allowing the deadly COVID-19 virus to ravage the country, infecting (to date) 14.8 million Americans and killing 282,000.
- Attacking medical experts and governors who urged Americans to wear masks and socially distance to protect themselves from COVID-19.
- Ordering his Right-wing followers to defy states’ orders to citizens to “stay-at-home” and wear of masks in public to halt surging COVID-19 rates.
And throughout all those outrages, House and Senate Republican majorities remained silent or vigorously supported him.
A typical example:
On June 4, 2020, during protests over the police murder of black security guard George Floyd, a curfew was imposed on Buffalo, New York. As police swept through Niagara Square, Martin Gugino, a 75-year-old peace activist with the Catholic Worker Movement, walked into their path as if attempting to speak with them.
Two officers pushed him and he fell backwards, hitting the back of his head on the pavement and losing consciousness.
On June 9, Trump charged that Gugino was part of a radical leftist “set up.” Trump offered no evidence to back up his slander.
Typical Republican responses included:
- Kentucky Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused to say whether Trump’s tweet was appropriate.
- Texas Senator Ted Cruz: “I don’t comment on the tweets.”
- Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson said he hadn’t seen the tweet—and didn’t want it read to him: “I would rather not hear it.”
- Tennessee Senator Lamar Alexander: “Voters can evaluate that. I’m not going to give a running commentary on the President’s tweets.”
Half-yes: On November 3, 2020, 80 million voters decided they wanted a change—and elected former Vice President Joe Biden as the 46th President of the United States.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary, Uncategorized on March 24, 2023 at 12:10 am
In his coming war against Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, Donald Trump may have the last word.
The former President has warned that if he can’t be the Republican Presidential nominee in 2024, “he’s willing to burn it all down.”
New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman, who has intimately covered Trump for years, has tweeted:
“Yes, Trump is more vulnerable than he’s been in a long time. But that has happened before and he’s survived.”
Maggie Haberman
Andrew Lih, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
“Trump has extremely few major donors who want to do anything for him right now and a number of them are having active conversations about the best way to stop him. But. Again….sound familiar?
“Trump has made clear he’s willing to burn it all down if he doesn’t get what he wants, which is maintaining his grip on the product line he’s been developing for six years: the Republican party. So a lot of electeds will have to make a choice they’ve not had to before.”
There is precedent for this. After serving two terms in the White House (1901-1909) Theodore Roosevelt became increasingly disillusioned with his handpicked successor: William Howard Taft.
Theodore Roosevelt
By 1912, he decided to run for a third term as a third-party candidate. His candidacy split the Republican vote—and enabled Democrats to elect Woodrow Wilson President.
No doubt many Democrats are now salivating at the possibility of the same occurring in 2024.
And even more of them are looking forward to seeing two would-be tyrants—Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis—trading lethal blows for most of the Presidential year.
Their reaction would be similar to that expressed by then-Senator Harry S. Truman when Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941: “If we see that Germany is winning the war, we ought to help Russia; and if that Russia is winning, we ought to help Germany, and in that way let them kill as many as possible.”
* * * * *
As the Third Reich came to its fiery end, its dictator, Adolf Hitler, sought to punish the German people for being “unworthy” of his “genius” and losing the war he had started.
His attitude was: “If I can’t rule Germany, then there won’t be a Germany.”
In his infamous “Nero Order,” he decreed the destruction of everything still remaining–industries, ships, harbors, communications, roads, mines, bridges, stores, utility plants, food stuffs.
Fortunately for Germany, one man–Albert Speer–finally broke ranks with his Fuhrer.
Albert Speer
Risking death, he refused to carry out Hitler’s “scorched earth” order. Even more important, he mounted a successful effort to block such destruction and persuade influential military and civilian leaders to disobey the order as well.
As a result, those targets slated for destruction were spared.
Throughout his four years in office, President Donald Trump made it clear that America faced a stark choice: It could remain a constitutional democracy—or allow him to become an all-powerful “President-for-Life.”
Among his outrages:
- Repeatedly attacking the nation’s free press for daring to report his growing list of crimes and disasters, calling it “the enemy of the American people.”
- Siding with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin against the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency which unanimously agreed that Russia had subverted the 2016 Presidential election.
- Firing FBI Director James Comey for investigating that subversion.
- Giving Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak highly classified CIA Intelligence about an Islamic State plot to turn laptops into concealable bombs.
- Shutting down the Federal Government for 35 days in 2018-19 because Democrats refused to fund his ineffective “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. The shutdown ended due to public outrage—without Trump getting the funding amount he had demanded.
- Trying to coerce Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to smear former Vice President Joe Biden, who was likely to be his Democratic opponent in the 2020 Presidential election.
- Repeatedly lying about the dangers posed by the COVID-19 virus, and thus enabling it to ravage the country and ultimately kill 400,000 by the time Trump left office.
- Attacking medical experts and governors who urged Americans to wear masks and socially distance to protect themselves from COVID-19.
Trump’s ultimate act of criminality and treason came on January 6, 2021, when he incited his followers to violently attack the United States Capitol Building. Their goal: To prevent Republicans and Democrats from counting the Electoral Votes cast in the 2020 Presidential election.
Trump fully understood that an accurate count of those votes would reveal his loss to Joe Biden: 306 votes for Biden, compared with 232 for Trump.
Fortunately for American democracy, there were enough patriots determined to prevent Trump from becoming the absolute dictator he clearly intended to be.
Like Adolf Hitler, Donald Trump’s attitude was: “If I can’t rule America, there won’t be an America.”
Deprived of his chance to destroy the country he claimed to love, Trump now threatens to destroy the political party that brought him to near-absolute power in 2016.
And Ron DeSantis stands ready to establish himself as an equally Trumpian dictator.
Their party is still waiting for a Republican Albert Speer to step forward and save America from the self-destructive brutalities of its own Right-wing fanatics.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 23, 2023 at 12:10 am
For Americans, it may turn out to be the equivalent of the deathmatch between German Fuhrer Adolf Hitler and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin.
At the very least, it promises to be the Right-wing heavyweight championship of the decade, if not the century: An all-out slugfest between former President Donald J. Trump and Florida Governor Ron D. DeSantis.
On November 10, Trump publicly attacked DeSantis as “Ron DeSanctimonious” and took credit for DeSantis’ success after endorsing him in 2018.
This was only two days after DeSantis was soundly re-elected Governor—and the much-hyped “Red wave” failed to sweep Democrats out of state and federal offices in the 2022 midterm elections.
On his website, Truth Social, Trump posted that DeSantis had been a political lightweight who had come to him “in desperate shape” when running for his first term in office in 2017.
Donald Trump
“Ron had low approval, bad polls, and no money, but he said that if I would Endorse [sic] him, he could win. also fixed his campaign, which had completely fallen apart.”
For Trump, DeSantis’ worst sin was refusing to say whether he would run for President in 2024.
Having been defeated for a second term by Joe Biden in 2020, Trump believes he has an absolute right to regain that office in another two years.
“Ron DeSanctimonious is playing games! The Fake News asks him if he’s going to run if President Trump runs, and he says, ‘I’m only focused on the Governor’s race, I’m not looking into the future.’ Well, in terms of loyalty and class, that’s really not the right answer.”
By “loyalty” Trump meant: Loyalty to himself.
For Trump, there was only one “right” answer DeSantis could have given: “I will not be a candidate for President in 2024 and I will totally support President Trump for that office.”
And that was not the response that DeSantis gave.
Even worse for Trump: Several of his loudly-supported candidates across the country lost their electoral bids.
To add to his rage and sense of betrayal: Conservative media sided with DeSantis—such as Fox News and the New York Post, which ran a front page headline calling DeSantis “DeFuture” the day after the election.
New York Post, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Responded Trump: “NewsCorp, which is Fox, the Wall Street Journal, and the no longer great New York Post, is all in for Governor Ron DeSanctimonious.”
A Trump advisor, speaking off-the-record, told Politico: “Obviously he is escalating. It is total shots fired. It is not what I would have done if it were totally up to me, but you can’t argue with Donald Trump’s tactics. They work. He is savage but effective. He was never going to stay restrained for long.”
“He is obviously threatened by a DeSantis presidential run,” said a longtime Florida Republican consultant speaking of Trump. “And by doing this, I think he will lose a lot of his base support.”
Trump’s advisors are trying to persuade him to soften his image. They fear that his angry and divisive rhetoric is turning off many voters who like his policies but desire some normalcy.
They are also trying to persuade Trump to focus less on his 2020 election loss and offer solutions to voters’ problems.
At the DeSantis victory rally, chants resounded: “Two more years!”—meaning that his supporters want him to run for President in 2024.
DeSantis has not responded to the attacks Trump has made on him.
Two Florida Republicans close to DeSantis told Yahoo News that the governor would be wary of attacking Trump. He wants to focus on policy issues and Florida’s recovery from Hurricane Ian.
By doing so, they said, DeSantis will highlight how his governing style differs from Trump’s more combative and less policy-focused approach.
It also prevents him from getting sucked into an endless tit-for-tat war of insults with the insult-happy ex-President.
The Donald Trump-Ron DeSantis relationship wasn’t always so hostile.
Trump’s endorsement played a huge role in DeSantis’ winning the 2018 GOP primary against former Florida Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam, who was an early favorite.
And DeSantis quickly showed his gratitude with a campaign video that was a naked Valentine to Trump’s ego—and the base that worshiped him.
Released on July 30, 2018, the ad was narrated by DeSantis’ wife, Casey.
CASEY DESANTIS: Everyone knows my husband, Ron DeSantis, is endorsed by President Trump. But he’s also an amazing dad. Ron loves playing with the kids.
DESANTIS: “Build the wall” [as his son uses colored plastic bricks to build a wall. This was a line right out of Trump’s repeated demands for a wall separating the United States from Mexico.]
CASEY: He reads stories.
DESANTIS: “Then Mr. Trump said ‘You’re fired.’ I love that part'” [as he reads a book to his son].
CASEY: He’s teaching Madison to talk.
DESANTIS: “Make America great again” [as he holds up a “Trump” sign that says exactly that].
CASEY: People say Ron’s all Trump, but he’s so much more.
DESANTIS: “Bigly. So good” [as he’s looking at his son in a crib].
CASEY: I just thought you should know.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on February 2, 2023 at 12:10 am
The year 2022 proved a disastrous one for dictators.
The first of these profiled in this two-part series was Russian President Vladimir Putin.
But the United States is not immune to those with dictatorial ambitions. Easily the most dangerous of these is former President Donald Trump.
But after escaping justice for decades, he now stands in danger of its catching up with him.
- Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg won a resounding verdict against two Trump Organization companies for criminal tax fraud. Their executives had falsified business records in a 15-year scheme to defraud tax authorities by failing to report and pay taxes on compensation for top executives.
- New York Attorney General Letitia James filed a lawsuit against Trump and the Trump Organization for engaging in years of financial fraud to obtain a wide range of economic benefits. Also named in the suit: His children Donald Trump, Jr., Ivanka Trump, and Eric Trump.
- E. Jean Carroll sued Trump for defamation in 2019 after he accused her of lying when she alleged he raped her in a New York City department store dressing room in the ’90s. Shielded from lawsuits during his Presidency, he lost that immunity when he left office.
- In 2022, Carroll sued Trump again under the Adult Survivors Act, a newly-passed New York state law that re-opens the statute of limitations for sexual abuse claims in the state.
- Altogether, Trump is now a defendant in 17 lawsuits at the local, state and Federal level.
Dictator #3: Elon Musk
Elon Musk had made himself the wealthiest man on the planet through his ownership of Tesla, the premier electric car company. But it wasn’t enough for him.
In October, he bought Twitter for $44 billion.
Immediately afterward, he careened from one self-inflicted crisis to another. Among these:
- Laying off about half of Twitter’s 7,500 staffers.
- Giving an ultimatum to the remaining staff that they must do “extremely hardcore” work or leave—causing about 1,000 employees to head for the exits.
- Firing employees who openly disagreed with him.
Elon Musk
The Royal Society, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
- Frequently and arbitrarily changing Twitter’s rules and banning people who violated them—including several tech journalists.
- Allowing Right-wingers to engage in misinformation, conspiracy theories and hate speech, and restoring permanently banned accounts—such as Donald Trump’s.
As a result:
- According to Media Matters for America, Twitter lost half of its top 100 advertisers, which spent $750 million on ads in 2022.
- Several current and former employees sued Twitter for violating the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act of 1988 for Musk’s failing to provide a 60-day notice prior to mass firings.
- As Twitter’s fortunes have increasingly declined, several Twitter alternatives have appeared. One of these is Mastodon, with 2.5 million members. Another is Tribel. Both emphasize their freedom from Right-wing hate speech and conspiracy theories.
Dictator #4: Mark Zuckerberg
Since he created Facebook in 2004, Zuckerberg has ruled as its unchallenged dictator. But his all-consuming drive for absolute control over not only Facebook but other domains has led to a series of highly publicized scandals.
According to the company’s profile on Wikipedia:
“Facebook has often been criticized over issues such as user privacy (as with the Cambridge Analytica data scandal), political manipulation (as with the 2016 U.S. elections) and mass surveillance….
“Facebook has also been subject to criticism over psychological effects such as addiction and low self-esteem, and various controversies over content such as fake news, conspiracy theories, copyright infringement, and hate speech. Commentators have accused Facebook of willingly facilitating the spread of such content as well as exaggerating its number of users to appeal to advertisers.”
Mark Zuckerberg
Anthony Quintano from Westminster, United States, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
In 2021-22, retribution began catching up with Zuckerberg’s empire.
- Frances Haugen, a former Facebook employee, disclosed tens of thousands of Facebook’s internal documents to the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Wall Street Journal in 2021. She testified before Congress that Facebook promotes conflict to increase its readership and keep them reading—and buying.
- Haugen’s revelations included that since at least 2019, Facebook had studied the negative impact that its photo and video sharing social networking service, Instagram, had on teenage girls. Yet the company did nothing to mitigate the harms and publicly denied that was the case.
- In response to Haugen’s testimony, Congress promised legislation and drafted several bills to address Facebook’s power.
- In April, 2021, Apple launched a new alert system to warn its users how Facebook was tracking their browsing habits. Facebook’s advertising profits have fallen, because a lack of data makes it hard to target people using iPhones.
- Zuckerberg has spent at least $38 billion to expand his empire and create an immersive, virtual “Metaverse.” So far, however, the gamble has not paid off.
- TikTok has siphoned off a large part of Facebook’s original audience.
- “I think Facebook is not going to do well as long as [Zuckerberg]’s there,” said Bill George, a senior fellow at Harvard Business School. “He’s likely one of the reasons so many people are turning away from the company. He’s really lost his way.”
“Look to the end,” Solon the Athenian warned King Croesus of Lydia. “Often enough, God gives a man a glimpse of happiness and then utterly ruins him.”
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In Bureaucracy, Business, Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on February 1, 2023 at 12:15 am
The year 2022 was not a good one for dictators.
Four of them—one Russian, three American—suffered humiliating defeats. If these didn’t herald their coming overthrow, they certainly erased these dictators’ pretense at invincibility.
Dictator #1: Russian President Vladimir Putin
When he attacked Ukraine with 200,000 soldiers on February 24, Putin had every reason to believe that his unprovoked war would be a cakewalk.
Intent on restoring the borders of the former Soviet Union, he had swept from one successful war to the next:
- In 1999-2000, he waged the Second Chechen War, restoring federal control of Chechnya.
- In 2008, he invaded the Republic of Georgia, which had declared its independence as the Soviet Union began to crumble. By war’s end, Russia occupied 20% of Georgia’s territory.
- In 2014, Putin invaded and annexed the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine.
Meanwhile, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) launched only verbal condemnations.
The reasons:
- Fear of igniting a nuclear war;
- Belief that Russia was simply acting within its own sphere of influence; and/or
- Then-President Donald Trump’s repeated attacks on NATO and displays of subservience to Putin.
The assault on Ukraine opened with missiles and artillery, striking major Ukrainian cities, including its capitol, Kiev.
Vladimir Putin
Kremlin.ru, CC BY 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
When Russia invaded, the United States—now led by anti-Putin President Joe Biden—and its Western European allies retaliated with unprecedented economic sanctions.
Among the resulting casualties:
- The ruble crashed.
- Russia’s central bank more than doubled interest rates to 20%.
- The European subsidiary of Russia’s biggest bank almost collapsed in a massive Depression-era run by savers.
- Economists predicted the Russian economy could decline by five percent.
- The West—especially the United States—froze at least half of the $630 billion in international reserves that Putin had amassed to stave off tough sanctions.
Meanwhile, on the battlefield, fierce Ukrainian resistance staggered the Russians:
- Kiev remained unconquered.
- In late August, using missile systems supplied by the United States, Ukrainian forces destroyed Russian ammunition dumps and a Russian air base in Crimea.
- In September, Ukraine reclaimed 3,090 square miles of northeastern territory from Russian forces.
- On September 21, with Russian forces bogged down or retreating, Putin announced the partial mobilization of 300,000 military reservists. All male citizens below 60 are now eligible to be drafted.
- Ukrainian forces retook the key city of Kherson in November; Russian forces, which had occupied the city since March, withdrew.
Ukraine vs. Russia
- On December 11, Putin’s infamous mercenary army, the Wagner Group, suffered “significant losses” after its Luhansk headquarters was hit during a Ukraine artillery strike.
- Tensions have flared between the regular Russian army and Wagner Group, with each blaming the other for continuing defeats.
- Unable to win on the battlefield, Putin has turned to terroristic bombings and drone attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure to break the will of the populace. Defiant Ukrainians continue to hunker down in makeshift shelters against cold and hunger.
- Putin has been plagued by widespread reports that he’s suffering from cancer, Parkinson’s or some other disabling malady. Most embarrassing of all: A report that, going down a flight of stairs, he tripped and soiled himself upon landing at the bottom.
- Most importantly: Putin’s attack on Ukraine triggered the danger he most feared: A hardening of the NATO alliance against Russia.
Dictator #2: Donald Trump
The United States has its own share of would-be dictators. Of these, the most dangerous was former President Donald Trump.
For decades, Trump escaped justice for a litany of infamies—including those committed while he was President. Among these:
- 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.
Donald Trump
- 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 COVID-19.
- 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.
In 2022, Trump found the law finally closing in on him:
- Attorney General Merrick Garland launched an investigation into his illegally taking—before he left the White House—11 boxes of highly classified documents. If found guilty for obstruction of justice, mishandling government records and violating the Espionage Act, Trump could go to prison for decades.
- After waiting 22 months, Garland finally appointed a Special Counsel to determine if Trump incited a treasonous riot against the United States Capitol on January 6, 2021 to prevent Congressional members from determining the winner of the 2020 Presidential election.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on January 19, 2023 at 12:10 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”
On January 6, 2021, Hope Hicks had a problem: She feared she might never work again.
She had served in President Donald Trump’s administration as White House Director of Strategic Communication from January to September, 2017.
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.
- 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.
Two Fuhrers: Adolf Hitler and 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.
- Attacking medical experts and governors who urged Americans to wear masks and socially distance to protect themselves against the deadly COVID-19 virus.
- Urging his followers to illegally vote twice for him in the upcoming 2020 Presidential election.
- 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.
Bureaucracybuster's Blog 
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PREVENTING THE NEXT REPUBLICAN SHUTDOWN: PART THREE (OF FIVE)
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on October 4, 2023 at 12:15 amRepublicans have repeatedly utilized the same my-way-or-else “negotiating” strategy as Nazi Germany’s Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler.
And Democrats—out of cowardice or an ignorance of history—have repeatedly refused to publicly make this comparison.
By studying Adolf Hitler’s mindset and “negotiating” methods, we can learn much about the mindset and “negotiating” style of today’s Republican party.
Robert Payne, author of the bestselling biography, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler (1973), described Hitler’s “negotiating” style thus:
“Although Hitler prized his own talents as a negotiator, a man always capable of striking a good bargain, he was totally lacking in finesse.
“He was incapable of bargaining. He was like a man who goes up to a fruit peddler and threatens to blow his brains out if he does not sell his applies at the lowest possible price.”
Republicans have repeatedly threatened to shut down the government unless their constantly escalating demands are met.
A shutdown occurs when Congress fails to approve funding for federal agencies.
In November, 1995, Newt Gingrich, then Speaker of the House of Representatives, carried out his threat to shut down the government. Gingrich unwisely admitted that he did so because President Bill Clinton had put him in the back of Air Force One during a recent trip to Israel.
The shutdown proved a disaster for Republicans. Clinton was handily re-elected in 1996 and Gingrich suddenly resigned from Congress in 1998.
Still, the Republicans continued their policy of my-way-or-else.
In April, 2011, the United States government almost shut down over Republican demands about subsidized pap smears.
During a late-night White House meeting with President Barack Obama and key Congressional leaders, Republican House Speaker John Boehner made this threat: His conference would not approve funding for the government if any money were allowed to flow to Planned Parenthood through Title X legislation.
Facing an April 8 deadline, negotiators worked day and night to strike a compromise—and finally reached one.
Three months later—on July 9—Republican extortionists again threatened the Nation with financial ruin and international disgrace unless their demands were met.
Symbol of the Mafia “Black Hand”
This time, Republicans refused to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agreed to massively cut social programs for the elderly, poor and disabled.
And while Republicans demanded that the disadvantaged tighten their belts, they rejected any raising of taxes on their foremost constituency—the wealthiest 1%.
To raise taxes on the wealthy, they insisted, would be a “jobs-killer.” It would “discourage” corporate CEOs from creating tens of thousands of jobs they supposedly wanted to create.
President Obama had offered to make historic cuts in the federal government and the social safety net—on which millions of Americans depend for their most basic needs.
But House Speaker John Boehner rejected that offer. He could not agree to the tax increases that Democrats wanted to impose on the wealthiest 1% as part of the bargain.
As the calendar moved ever closer to the fateful date of August 2, Republican leaders continued to insist: Any deal that includes taxes “can’t pass the House.”
One senior Republican said talks would go right up to—and maybe beyond—the brink of default.
“I think we’ll be here in August,” said Republican Representative Pete Sessions, of Texas. “We are not going to leave town until a proper deal gets done.”
President Obama had previously insisted on extending the debt ceiling through 2012. But in mid-July, he simply asked congressional leaders to review three options with their members:
And the Republican response?
Said Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee: “Quite frankly, [Republican] members of Congress are getting tired of what the president won’t do and what the president wants.”
Noted political analyst Chris Matthews summed up the sheer criminality of what happened within the House of Representatives.
Chris Matthews
Speaking on MSNBC’s “Hardball,” on July 28—five days before Congress reached its August 2 deadline to raise the debt-ceiling—Matthews noted:
“The first people to bow to the demands of those threatening to blow up the economy were the Republicans in the House, the leaders. The leaders did what the followers told them to do: meet the demands, hold up the country to get their way.
“Those followers didn’t win the Senate, or the Presidency, just the House. But by using the House they were able to hold up the entire United States government. They threatened to blow things up economically and it worked.
“They said they were willing to do that—just to get their way—not by persuasion, not by politics, not by democratic government, but by threatening the destruction of the country’s finances.
“Right. So what’s next? The power grid? Will they next time threaten to close down the country’s electricity and communications systems?”
With the United States teetering on the brink of national bankruptcy, President Obama caved in to Republican demands.
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