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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 10, 2022 at 12:15 am
Sixty years before an American congress failed to remove a ruthless dictator from its midst, a Russian congress successfully removed their own.
For almost 30 years, from 1924 to 1953, Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili—better known as Stalin—had ruled as absolute dictator over the Soviet Union. Hallmarks of his legacy included mass arrests, repeated purges, forced mass starvation and the imprisonment of millions.
As many as 20 million men, women and children died as his victims.
His reign of terror ended only with his death, of a cerebral hemorrhage, on March 5, 1953, at age 74.
As historian Robert Payne wrote in his monumental 1965 biography The Rise and Fall of Stalin: “The son of an obscure cobbler, he had become during the last years of his life the most powerful man on earth. No emperor had ever enjoyed the power he possessed.
“He had taken the world by the throat, and forced it to do his will. He was one of the world-shakers, and when he died in 1953 it was thought proper that his remains should be exhibited as an object of reverence and worship in the Lenin mausoleum, the holy of holies of the Soviet empire.”
On February 25, 1956, his successor, Nikita Khrushchev, revealed Stalin’s litany of crimes to the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
The speech was the opening shot in Khrushchev’s “de-Stalinization” campaign. He intended to destroy the image of the late dictator as an infallible leader and rein in the infamous KGB secret police.
The speech gave rise to a period of liberalization known as the “Khrushchev thaw” (1956-1964). During this, censorship policy was relaxed, and for the first time books and articles appeared about the huge network of forced labor camps set up by Vladimir Lenin and reaching its peak under Stalin.
Nikita Khrushchev
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
Thousands of political prisoners were released, and thousands more who had perished during Stalin’s reign were officially “rehabilitated.”
By 1961, Khrushchev and those seeking to reform the Soviet political system decided to condemn the horrors of the Stalinist decades in a forceful symbolic act.
On October 31, 1961, the body of Joseph Stalin was removed from its honored resting place in the Lenin mausoleum in Red Square. A new grave was dug for him—among the minor heroes of the Russian Revolution. The re-internment took place secretly—at night—without ceremonies. And his name was removed from the mausoleum.
Historian Robert Payne described that event—and its significance: “A dead god was being transformed into a dead man, a dead emperor was being dethroned, a dead criminal was being executed….
“But more than a ritual murder was at stake. The Supreme Soviet and the Central Committee, which decreed the punishment now being inflicted on the corpse of Stalin, were now attempting to absolve themselves from responsibility for his crimes.
“They were saying: ‘We are not responsible, we are casting him away, he is not one of us! He committed such terrible crimes that we will have none of him.’
“For nearly thirty years Stalin had ruled tyrannically over Russia. History, too, was being consigned to oblivion.”
A series of similar events has erupted within the United States since January 6, 2021.
On that day, thousands of Right-wing supporters of President Donald Trump—ignited by his fiery, lie-riddled rhetoric—overwhelmed police guarding the United States Capitol and occupied the building.
Donald Trump
Their intention: To halt the counting of Electoral College votes that would certify former Vice President Joseph Biden as the next President of the United States.
Since then, Trump’s fortunes have sharply declined:
- Twitter—whose platform he had used during his Presidency to ruthlessly attack hundreds of people—finally cut off his account.
- Deutsche Bank, his business lender since the 1990s, announced that it would not continue to do business with him.
- The PGA of America cut ties with Trump by canceling plans to hold the PGA Championship at his New Jersey golf course in 2022.
- On May 24, David Perdue, Trump’s chosen candidate for Governor of Georgia, failed to secure the nomination over Georgia Governor Brian Kemp.
- A September 2020 AP poll shows that 56% of Republicans want him to run for president in 2024; 44% don’t want Trump to run.
- A special grand jury will determine whether Trump broke the law by unsuccessfully pressuring Georgia officials to throw out President Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.
- New York state Attorney General Letitia James stated in a court filing that her office uncovered evidence that Trump used “fraudulent or misleading” valuations of his golf clubs, skyscrapers and other property to secure loans and tax benefits.
- Federal prosecutors are investigating fake certificates sent to the National Archives with made-up slates of electors who wrongly declared Trump the winner in seven states he lost to Biden.
Herodotus, the Greek historian who chronicled the Greek-Persian wars, offers a still-timely explanation of such reverses of fortune—and a warning for those who dare to ignore history:
“Look to the end, no matter what it is you are considering. Often enough God gives a man a glimpse of happiness, and then utterly ruins him.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 9, 2022 at 12:10 am
On January 13, 2021, for the first time in its history, the United States House of Representatives voted to impeach a President—for the second time during his tenure.
On December 10, 2019, Democratic leaders in the House voted to send two Articles of Impeachment to the House Judiciary Committee.
Their purpose: To remove Donald J. Trump from office as the 45th President of the United States.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler read the charges:
Article 1: Abuse of Power: For pressuring Ukraine to assist him in his re-election campaign by damaging former Vice President Joseph Biden, his possible Democratic rival.
Article 2: Obstruction of Congress: For obstructing Congress by blocking testimony and refusing to provide documents in response to House subpoenas in the impeachment inquiry.
On January 23, 2020, House Intelligence Committee Chairman and Lead Impeachment Manager Adam Schiff (D-CA) tweeted a prophecy—and a warning: “Donald Trump must be convicted and removed from office. Because he will always choose his own personal interest over our national interest. Because in America, right matters. Truth matters. If not, no Constitution can protect us. If not, we are lost.”
Adam Schiff
On February 5, 2020, the Republican-dominated Senate—ignoring the overwhelming evidence against him—acquitted Donald Trump on both impeachment articles: Obstruction of Congress and abuse of power.
Schiff’s prophecy came true on January 6, 2021. On that day, Trump unleashed thousands of Right-wing terrorists on the United States Capitol.
Inside, members of Congress were tabulating the Electoral College votes cast in the 2020 Presidential election.
The winner had been former Vice President Joseph Biden. Trump, seeking a second term, had lost, getting 74,196,153 votes.to 81,255,933 for Biden.
Trump had made repeated—and false—claims of electoral fraud. Yet despite filing 60 court cases seeking to overturn the election’s results, his lawyers had failed to produce any proof of it.
Trump had often “joked” about how great it would be for the United States to have a “President-for-Life”—like China. Now his only hope of remaining in power lay in intimidating Congress into ignoring the election results.
Inspired by Trump’s violence-charged rhetoric, the Stormtrumpers marched to the United States Capitol—and quickly brushed aside outnumbered Capitol Police.
- Members of the mob attacked police with chemical agents or lead pipes.
- A Capitol Hill police officer was knocked off his feet, dragged into the mob surging toward the building, and beaten with the pole of an American flag.
- Several rioters carried plastic handcuffs, possibly intending to take hostages. Others carried treasonous Confederate flags.
Stormtrumpers scaling Capitol Building walls
- Shouts of “Hang Pence!” often rang out.
- Improvised explosive devices were found in several locations in Washington, D.C.
- Members of the House and Senate huddled anxiously behind locked doors barricaded with furniture as seditionists tried to break in.
- Many of the lawmakers’ office buildings were occupied and vandalized—including that of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a favorite Right-wing target.
More than three hours passed before police—using riot gear, shields and batons—retook control of the Capitol.
Meeting again that evening, members of the Senate and House resumed their vote-counting. In the end, Joseph Biden and Kamala Harris were named, respectively, the President-Elect and Vice-President Elect of the United States.
By the next day, members of the House—especially Democrats—were furious at their near-brush with death. And they were ready to seek retribution on the man responsible.
Their initial hope was that Vice President Mike Pence and a majority of Trump’s cabinet would invoke the 25th Amendment. But hopes for this quickly faded.
A growing number of Cabinet officials began resigning:
- Education Secretary Betsy DeVos
- Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao
- Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf
There was a very real danger there wouldn’t be enough Cabinet members left to invoke the Amendment.
But making the use of the Amendment even more unlikely was the obvious unwillingness of Vice President Pence to invoke it.
Mike Pence
This despite the fact that he could have been hanged as a “traitor” by the Stormtrumpers only days ago.
(He had likely been spared this fate by his Secret Service detail, whisking him out of the Senate—and leaving other government officials to their own fates.)
On January 11, Democrats introduced a single impeachment article charging Trump with “incitement of insurrection” in urging his supporters to march on the U.S. Capitol on January 6.
They also introduced a resolution that called on Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to the Constitution to remove him from office before January 20.
On January 13, the House met to debate a single article of impeachment: “Incitement of Insurrection.” Its gist:
“Thus incited by President Trump, members of the crowd he had addressed, in an attempt to, among other objectives, interfere with the Joint Session’s solemn constitutional duty to certify the results of the 2020 Presidential election, unlawfully breached and vandalized the Capitol, injured and killed law enforcement personnel, menaced Members of Congress, the Vice President, and Congressional personnel, and engaged in other violent, deadly, destructive, and seditious acts.”
Thus, the House sought to remove a President who intended to rule as a dictator.
Fifty-nine years earlier, a Russian congress had come face-to-face with the despotism of another tyrant.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 14, 2022 at 12:10 am
“For men in general judge more by the eyes than by the hands, for every one can see, but very few have to feel. Everyone sees what you appear to be, few feel what you are….”
So wrote Niccolo Machiavelli in his famous book, The Prince, on how to attain political power.
And his advice applies directly to the reception given the July 24, 2019 appearance of former Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller before the House Judiciary Committee.
Niccolo Machiavelli
There he testified that Donald Trump, the 45th President of the United States:
- Sought Russian interference during the 2016 Presidential campaign.
- Benefited from that intervention.
- Concealed his close personal economic ties to Vladimir Putin by lying to the public about his hidden attempts to secure a construction project in Moscow.
- Lied to the special prosecutor.
- Directed subordinates to falsify records.
- Tried to exert “undue influence” on law enforcement in order to protect himself and his allies.
A July 26, 2019 article in The Atlantic—entitled “The Press Has Adopted Trump’s Reality-Show Standards”—sums up the general reaction of the nation’s press to these bombshell revelations:
“In any other administration, in any other time, a special prosecutor, former FBI director, and decorated Marine testifying that the president of the United States was an unprosecuted felon who encouraged and then benefited from an attack on American democracy in pursuit of personal and political gain would bring the country to a grinding halt.
“But the American political press found Mueller insufficiently dazzling.”
Among those media:
- The New York Times: “Mueller’s Performance Was a Departure From His Much-Fabled Stamina.”
- The Washington Post: “On Mueller’s Final Day on the National Stage, a Halting, Faltering Performance.” And another reporter dubbed him a “weary old man.”
- The Hill: “Muller’s ‘Blockbuster’ Appearance Turned into ‘Bomb’ of Performance.”
- Politico: “Bob Mueller Is Struggling.”
- Right-wing media openly questioned Mueller’s health. These same media never mention that Trump is grotesquely overweight, never walks when he can ride, and eats a diet high in fats and calories.
In short: The nation’s most influential news media—on which citizens depend for their understanding of national and international personalities and events—has adopted the standards of teenagers.
Summer is when American teenagers lose themselves in movies featuring superheroes such as Batman, Wonder Woman and Spider-Man.
Americans like their heroes young and powerful—preferably invincible. They want their heroes to be handsome and their villains to be ugly. They want to see lots of explosions and collapsing buildings.
And if a superhero can deliver a zinger of a line while throwing a KO punch, so much the better.
Lacking a sense of history—or concern for it—most Americans remain ignorant of the men, women and events that have shaped the era in which they live.
Most of those who watched Robert Mueller testify before Congress knew nothing of the sacrifices he had made for his country:
- As a Marine Vietnam veteran decorated for heroism (1968-1971);
- As a United States Attorney (1986-1987 and 1998-2001);
- As a United States Assistant Attorney General (1990-1993 and 2001); and
- As director of the FBI (2001-2013).
Retiring from the FBI in 2013 at age 69, Mueller’s 27-year career as a dedicated law enforcer seemed at last to be over.
Then President Trump fired FBI Director James Comey for daring to investigate links between Russian Intelligence agents and the Trump 2016 Presidential campaign.
And, once again, on May 17, 2017, Mueller accepted his country’s call to serve as Special Counsel to investigate those links.
Robert Mueller
Since then, Trump, his shills in Congress and Right-wing Fox News had relentlessly attacked Mueller’s integrity and investigative methods.
Never knowing when he might be fired by Trump, Mueller quietly and methodically pursued his investigation.
As a result, Mueller:
- Indicted three companies and 34 individuals.
- Obtained eight guilty pleas to felonies or convictions—including five Trump associates and campaign officials.
- Unveiled the Russians’ determination to elect Trump over Hillary Clinton.
- Discovered that Trump associates knew about Russian outreach efforts during the campaign.
Since the onset of Mueller’s investigation, Trump and his Republican lackeys in the House and Senate ruthlessly tried to smear his name and undermine his findings.
So on July 24, 2019,, a Democratic Congress summoned Mueller to testify publicly about the conclusions he had reached. He was forced to:
- Testify for seven hours before the House Judiciary Committee and the House Intelligence Committee.
- Endure powerful, hot klieg lights needed by television cameras.
- Patiently take questions that were often self-serving
- Respectfully answer questions meant to attack his personal and professional integrity.
- Simplify complex legal scenarios for men and women who have the attention span of a gnat.
Although Mueller was joined by former deputy special counsel Aaron Zebley, Zebley was forbidden to give testimony. He could only serve as Mueller’s counsel, giving quiet advice.
So the entire seven hours of public testimony fell on the shoulders of a 74-year-old man. No wonder he appeared tired by the end of the day.
A news media that prizes glitz over substance has abdicated the role intended for it by the Founding Fathers: To act as a watchdog over the nation’s leaders.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on January 15, 2021 at 12:10 am
Fifty-nine years ago, a Russian congress came face-to-face with the legacy of a ruthless dictator.
For almost 30 years, from 1924 to 1953, Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili—better known as Stalin—had ruled as absolute dictator over the Soviet Union. Hallmarks of his legacy included mass arrests, repeated purges, forced mass starvation and the imprisonment of millions. As many as 20 million men, women and children died as his victims.
His reign of terror ended only with his death, of a cerebral hemorrhage, on March 5, 1953, at age 74.
As historian Robert Payne wrote in his monumental 1965 biography The Rise and Fall of Stalin: “The son of an obscure cobbler, he had become during the last years of his life the most powerful man on earth. No emperor had ever enjoyed the power he possessed.
“He had taken the world by the throat, and forced it to do his will. He was one of the world-shakers, and when he died in 1953 it was thought proper that his remains should be exhibited as an object of reverence and worship in the Lenin mausoleum, the holy of holies of the Soviet empire.”
On February 25, 1956, his successor, Nikita Khrushchev, revealed Stalin’s litany of crimes to the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
The speech was the opening shot in Khrushchev’s “de-Stalinization” campaign. He intended to destroy the image of the late dictator as an infallible leader and rein in the infamous KGB secret police.
The speech gave rise to a period of liberalization known as the “Khrushchev thaw” (1956-1964). During this, censorship policy was relaxed, and for the first time books and articles appeared about the huge network of forced labor camps set up by Vladimir Lenin and reaching its peak under Stalin.
Nikita Khrushchev
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
Thousands of political prisoners were released, and thousands more who had perished during Stalin’s reign were officially “rehabilitated.”
By 1961, Khrushchev and those seeking to reform the Soviet political system decided to condemn the horrors of the Stalinist decades in a forceful symbolic act.
On October 31, 1961, the body of Joseph Stalin was removed from its honored resting place in the Lenin mausoleum in Red Square. A new grave was dug for him—among the minor heroes of the Russian Revolution. The re-internment took place secretly—at night—without ceremonies. And his name was removed from the mausoleum.
Historian Robert Payne described that event—and its significance: “A dead god was being transformed into a dead man, a dead emperor was being dethroned, a dead criminal was being executed….
“But more than a ritual murder was at stake. The Supreme Soviet and the Central Committee, which decreed the punishment now being inflicted on the corpse of Stalin, were now attempting to absolve themselves from responsibility for his crimes.
“They were saying: ‘We are not responsible, we are casting him away, he is not one of us! He committed such terrible crimes that we will have none of him.’
“For nearly thirty years Stalin had ruled tyrannically over Russia. History, too, was being consigned to oblivion.”
A series of similar events has erupted within the United States since January 6.
On that day, thousands of Right-wing supporters of President Donald Trump—ignited by his fiery, lie-riddled rhetoric—overwhelmed police guarding the United States Capitol and occupied the building.
Donald Trump
Their intention: To halt the counting of Electoral College votes that would certify former Vice President Joseph Biden as the next President of the United States.
Americans who held that site sacred as the cradle of democracy were horrified to see rioters:
- Breaking windows and battering down doors;
- Beating police with fire extinguishers and an American flag pole;
- Carrying treasonous Confederate flags in the Capitol;
- Stealing treasures (such as the podium used by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi) and
- Forcing members of Congress to crouch under chairs as police fought off rioters.
Since then, Trump’s fortunes have sharply declined:
- Twitter—whose platform he had used during his Presidency to ruthlessly attack hundreds of people—finally cut off his account.
- A series of Cabinet officials hurriedly resigned from his administration. Among these: Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos and Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf.
- Deutsche Bank, his business lender since the 1990s, announced that it would not continue to do business with him.
- The PGA of America cut ties with Trump by canceling plans to hold the PGA Championship at his New Jersey golf course in 2022.
- And on January 13—one week to the day after his Stormtrumpers attacked the Capitol Building—the House of Representatives voted to impeach Trump for the second time during his Presidency. No other President has ever suffered such a humiliation.
- Adding to this humiliation: Ten Republican House members voted to impeach him.
Herodotus, the Greek historian who chronicled the Greek-Persian wars, offers a still-timely explanation of such reverses of fortune—and a warning for those who dare to ignore history:
“Look to the end, no matter what it is you are considering. Often enough God gives a man a glimpse of happiness, and then utterly ruins him.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on January 14, 2021 at 12:08 am
On January 13, for the first time in its history, the United States House of Representatives voted to impeach a President—for the second time during his tenure.
On December 10, 2019, Democratic leaders in the House voted to send two Articles of Impeachment to the House Judiciary Committee.
Their purpose: To remove Donald J. Trump from office as the 45th President of the United States.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler read the charges:
Article 1: Abuse of Power: For pressuring Ukraine to assist him in his re-election campaign by damaging former Vice President Joseph Biden, his possible Democratic rival.
Article 2: Obstruction of Congress: For obstructing Congress by blocking testimony and refusing to provide documents in response to House subpoenas in the impeachment inquiry.
On January 23, 2020, House Intelligence Committee Chairman and Lead Impeachment Manager Adam Schiff (D-CA) tweeted a prophecy—and a warning: “Donald Trump must be convicted and removed from office. Because he will always choose his own personal interest over our national interest. Because in America, right matters. Truth matters. If not, no Constitution can protect us. If not, we are lost.”
Adam Schiff
On February 5, 2020, the Republican-dominated Senate—ignoring the overwhelming evidence against him—acquitted Donald Trump on both impeachment articles: Obstruction of Congress and abuse of power.
Schiff’s prophecy came true on January 6, 2021. On that day, Trump unleashed thousands of Right-wing terrorists on the United States Capitol.
Inside, members of Congress were tabulating the Electoral College votes cast in the 2020 Presidential election.
The winner had been former Vice President Joseph Biden. Trump, seeking a second term, had lost, getting 74,196,153 votes.to 81,255,933 for Biden.
Trump had made repeated—and false—claims of electoral fraud. Yet despite filing 60 court cases seeking to overturn the election’s results, his lawyers had failed to produce any proof of it.
Trump had often “joked” about how great it would be for the United States to have a “President-for-Life”—like China. Now his only hope of remaining in power lay in intimidating Congress into ignoring the election results.
Inspired by Trump’s violence-charged rhetoric, the Stormtrumpers marched to the United States Capitol—and quickly brushed aside outnumbered Capitol Police.
- Members of the mob attacked police with chemical agents or lead pipes.
- A Capitol Hill police officer was knocked off his feet, dragged into the mob surging toward the building, and beaten with the pole of an American flag.
- Several rioters carried plastic handcuffs, possibly intending to take hostages. Others carried treasonous Confederate flags.
Stormtrumpers scaling Capitol Building walls
- Shouts of “Hang Pence!” often rang out.
- Improvised explosive devices were found in several locations in Washington, D.C.
- Members of the House and Senate huddled anxiously behind locked doors barricaded with furniture as seditionists tried to break in.
- Many of the lawmakers’ office buildings were occupied and vandalized—including that of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a favorite Right-wing target.
More than three hours passed before police—using riot gear, shields and batons—retook control of the Capitol.
Meeting again that evening, members of the Senate and House resumed their vote-counting. In the end, Joseph Biden and Kamala Harris were named, respectively, the President-Elect and Vice-President Elect of the United States.
By the next day, members of the House—especially Democrats—were furious at their near-brush with death. And they were ready to seek retribution on the man responsible.
Their initial hope was that Vice President Mike Pence and a majority of Trump’s cabinet would invoke the 25th Amendment. But hopes for this quickly faded.
A growing number of Cabinet officials began resigning:
- Education Secretary Betsy DeVos
- Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao
- Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Chad Wolf
There was a very real danger there wouldn’t be enough Cabinet members left to invoke the Amendment.
But making the use of the Amendment even more unlikely was the obvious unwillingness of Vice President Pence to invoke it.
Mike Pence
This despite the fact that he could have been hanged as a “traitor” by the Stormtrumpers only days ago.
(He had likely been spared this fate by his Secret Service detail, whisking him out of the Senate—and leaving other government officials to their own fates.)
On January 11, Democrats introduced a single impeachment article charging Trump with “incitement of insurrection” in urging his supporters to march on the U.S. Capitol on January 6.
They also introduced a resolution that called on Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to the Constitution to remove him from office before January 20.
On January 13, the House met to debate a single article of impeachment: “Incitement of Insurrection.” Its gist:
“Thus incited by President Trump, members of the crowd he had addressed, in an attempt to, among other objectives, interfere with the Joint Session’s solemn constitutional duty to certify the results of the 2020 Presidential election, unlawfully breached and vandalized the Capitol, injured and killed law enforcement personnel, menaced Members of Congress, the Vice President, and Congressional personnel, and engaged in other violent, deadly, destructive, and seditious acts.”
Thus, the House sought to remove a President who intended to rule as a dictator.
Fifty-nine years earlier, a Russian congress had come face-to-face with the despotism of another tyrant.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 6, 2021 at 12:20 am
On December 10, 2019, Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives voted to send two Articles of Impeachment to the House Judiciary Committee.
Their purpose: To remove Donald J. Trump from office as the 45th President of the United States.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler read the charges:
Article 1: Abuse of Power: For pressuring Ukraine to assist him in his re-election campaign by damaging former Vice President Joe Biden, his possible Democratic rival.
Article 2: Obstruction of Congress: For obstructing Congress by blocking testimony and refusing to provide documents in response to House subpoenas in the impeachment inquiry.
But it was House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) who put the reason for impeachment in stark, easily understandable perspective:
Adam Schiff
“Why not just wait until you get the documents that the White House refuses to turn over, and people should understand what that argument really means.
“It has taken us eight months to get a lower court ruling that Don McGahn has no right to defy Congress. If it takes another eight months to get a second court or Supreme Court decision, that is not the end of the process.
“It comes back to us, and we ask questions because he no longer has immunity and he claims something else that his answers are privileged and we have to go to court for another eight or 16 months.
“The argument why don’t you just wait amounts to this: Why don’t you just let him [Trump] cheat in one more election? Why not let him cheat just one more time? Why not let him have foreign help just one more time? That is what that argument amounts to.”
Schiff was alluding to Trump’s infamous efforts during the 2016 Presidential campaign to enlist Russian aid against his rival, Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
Among those efforts:
On July 9, 2016, high-ranking members of his Presidential campaign met at Trump Tower with at least two lobbyists with ties to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. The participants included:
- Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr.;
- His son-in-law, Jared Kushner;
- His then-campaign manager, Paul Manafort;
- Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer with ties to Putin; and
- Rinat Akhmetshin, a former Soviet counterintelligence officer suspected of “having ongoing ties to Russian Intelligence.”
The purpose of that meeting: To gain access to any “dirt” Russian Intelligence could supply on Clinton.
Donald Trump
On July 22, 2016, during his campaign for President, Trump said at a press conference in Doral, Florida: “Russia, if you are listening, I hope you are able to find the 33,000 emails that are missing [from Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s computer]. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
This was nothing less than treason—calling upon a foreign power, hostile to the United States, to interfere in its Presidential election.
Hours later, the Main Intelligence Directorate in Moscow targeted Clinton’s personal office and hit more than 70 other Clinton campaign accounts.
On January 23, 2020, Schiff tweeted a prophecy—and a warning: “Donald Trump must be convicted and removed from office. Because he will always choose his own personal interest over our national interest. Because in America, right matters. Truth matters. If not, no Constitution can protect us. If not, we are lost.”
It was a concise summary of his closing argument to the Senate. And an accurate prediction of Trump’s future behavior if he escaped conviction and removal.
On February 5, 2020, the Republican-dominated Senate—ignoring the overwhelming evidence against him—acquitted Donald Trump on both impeachment articles: Obstruction of Congress and abuse of power.
It was on a par with those racist, all-white juries which had freed Ku Klux Klansmen for the murders of blacks.
On January 2, 2021, Schiff’s prediction came true: Trump called the office of Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. The reason: To pressure him to “find” enough votes to overturn former Vice President Joe Biden’s win in the state’s presidential election.
“All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have,” Trump said. “Because we won the state.”
Actually, Trump didn’t win the state. Biden carried Georgia by an 11,779-vote margin—which has been certified three times.
Trump repeatedly cited disproven claims of fraud in the election—and threatened Raffensperger and Ryan Germany, the secretary of state’s legal counsel, that they could be criminally prosecuted if they did not change the vote count in his favor: “That’s a criminal offense. And you can’t let that happen.”
The phone call was recorded. And shortly afterward, the Washington Post obtained a copy of that recording—which, in turn, was soon leaked to CNN.
David Shafer, chairman of the Georgia Republican Party, responded with two tweets after the Washington Post released excerpts from the recording:
“President @realDonaldTrump has filed two lawsuits – federal and state – against @GaSecofState. The telephone conference call @GaSecofState secretly recorded was a ‘confidential settlement discussion’ of that litigation, which is still pending.”
Thus, Trump’s reaction to being exposed for his latest illegal act was that of a Mafia boss finding out that his phone has been tapped: He doesn’t deny his evil; he simply wants the evidence of it suppressed.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Politics, Social commentary on January 31, 2020 at 12:05 am
On July 24, 2019, former Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III finally addressed Congress on Russia’s subversion of the 2016 Presidential election.
Mueller had spent almost two years uncovering links between Russian Intelligence agents and members of Donald Trump’s Presidential campaign.
In his report, Mueller documented years of meddling in American politics by the Internet Research Agency, which runs the Kremlin’s online disinformation efforts from its headquarters in St. Petersburg.
Robert Mueller
During the 2016 Presidential campaign, the Agency reached 126 million Americans through fake accounts on Facebook.
Hours later that same day, Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Mississippi) blocked the passage of three bills designed to tighten election security at the federal level. She claimed that Congress had already responded to election security needs for the 2020 Presidential election.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) came to the Senate floor the next day to personally object to House-passed legislation backed by Democrats.
From 1945 to 2015, it was unthinkable for a Republican Presidential candidate to pay tribute to a Soviet dictator.
But that utterly changed when Donald J. Trump, a “reality TV” host with longstanding financial ties to Russian oligarchs, ran for President of the United States.
Donald Trump
Trump lavishly praised Russian President Vladimir Putin—and even invited him to directly interfere in the 2016 Presidential race.
The reason for the Trump-Putin bromance: Each had something to offer the other.
Putin wanted the United States to ditch the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) alliance, which had preserved Western Europe from Russian aggression since World War II. And Trump had often attacked America’s funding of NATO as a drain on the American economy.
And Trump wanted to be President. For this, Putin could supply Internet trolls to confuse voters with falsified news—and even the hacking of key voting centers.
And monies. These Russian monies were officially classified as “campaign contributions,” not bribes.
On July 22, 2016, Wikileaks released 19,252 emails and 8,034 attachments hacked from computers of the highest-ranking officials of the Democratic National Committee (DNC). Early reports traced the leak to Russian hackers.
On July 27, Trump said at a press conference in Doral, Florida: “Russia, if you are listening, I hope you are able to find the 33,000 emails that are missing [from Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s computer]. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Hours later, the Main Intelligence Directorate in Moscow targeted Clinton’s personal office and hit more than 70 other Clinton campaign accounts.
This is treason—calling upon a foreign power, hostile to the United States, to interfere in its Presidential election.
Nor is Trump the only Republican receiving “help” from Putin. A network of Russian oligarchs—all of them answerable to Putin—has been increasingly contributing to top Republicans.
According to the Federal Election Commission:
One such major contributor is Len Blavatnik, who holds citizenship in both the United States and the United Kingdom. During the 2015-16 election cycle, he proved one of the largest donors to GOP Political Action Committees (PACs).
Blavatnik’s net worth is estimated at $20 billion. Before 2016, he donated to both Democrats and Republicans in meager amounts. But in 2016, he gave $6.35 million to GOP PACs.
Millions of dollars went to top Republican leaders—such as Senators Mitch McConnell (Kentucky), Marco Rubio (Florida) and Lindsey Graham (South Carolina).
Specifically, he contributed:
- A total of $1.5 million to PACs associated with Rubio.
- $1 million to Trump’s Inaugural Committee.
- $41,000 to both Republicans and Democrats in 2017.
- $1 million to McConnell’s Senate Leadership Fund.
- $3.5 million to a PAC associated with McConnell.
- $1.1 million to Unintimidated PAC, associated with Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.
- $200,000 to the Arizona Grassroots Action PAC, associated with the late Arizona Senator John McCain.
- $250,000 to New Day for America PAC, associated with Ohio Governor John Kasich.
- $800,000 to the Security is Strength PAC, associated with Senator Lindsey Graham.
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Another Russian oligarch, Alexander Shustorovich, contributed $1 million to Trump’s Inaugural Committee.
Altogether, four Russian oligarchs—Blavatnik, Shustorovich, Andrew Intrater and Simon Kukes—contributed $10.4 million from the start of the 2015-16 election cycle through September 2017. Of this, 99% went to Republicans.
As Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell participated in high-level intelligence briefings in 2016. From agencies such as the FBI, CIA and the code-cracking National Security Agency, he learned that the Russians were trying to subvert the electoral process.
In October, 2016, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) issued a joint statement: The Russian government had directed the effort to subvert the 2016 Presidential election.
Two weeks later, McConnell’s PAC accepted a $1 million donation from Blavatnik.
On March 30, 2017, McConnell’s PAC accepted another $1 million from Blavatnik.
This is just 10 days after former FBI Director James Comey testified before the House Intelligence Committee about Russia’s efforts to subvert the 2016 election.
So, what has changed in the Republican Party? Essentially nothing.
Its enemies changed—from Russian Communists to American liberals—but its goal remains the same: The quest for absolute power.
When Americans feared Communism, Republicans depicted themselves as the only ones who could be trusted to protect the United States. Big contributions poured in from Right-wing billionaires like H.L. Hunt and Howard Hughes.
But when Republicans found they could enrich themselves and stay in power via Russian “campaign contributions,” they decided: Better Red than un-elected.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on December 17, 2019 at 12:04 am
The Emperor-President has no clothes.
On December 10, 2019, Sarah Jones, editor-in-chief of PoliticusUSA, stripped him bare.
She did what the vast majority of American political columnists have feared to do: She openly declared Donald J. Trump to be an illegitimate President.
She did so in an editorial titled, “Adam Schiff Tells Trump That He Won’t Be Allowed To Cheat In 2020.”
“On Tuesday as House Democrats made the formal announcement of articles of impeachment against President Trump, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff gave a perfectly accurate rebuttal to the plea that Democrats should ‘just wait’ on impeachment, saying that those who argue ‘just wait’ are actually arguing ‘just let him cheat in one more election’ and ‘let him have foreign help just one more time,’” wrote Jones. [Italics added]
To underscore her point, Jones concluded: “Trump’s cheating is finally being acknowledged and punished.
“This matters because after three years of pretending that Trump is the rightful president, it is finally being acknowledged that not only is he trying to cheat in 2020, but it is again, because he cheated in 2016.
“For three years this nation has endured the abuses of this pretender and his entire party of lock step enablers, save for Rep. Amash of Michigan.
“For three long years those who suggested Trump was not a legitimate president were shamed and silenced, even after the Mueller report made it clear that the Trump campaign sought illegal help and took illegal help from Russia in the 2016 election.
“Now that Trump is again seeking foreign help to undermine our elections and in so doing, attacking our national security and core values — and only due to the bravery of whistleblowers got caught red-handed — the entitled, privileged, faux-wealthy con artist poorly playing president has finally been called what he is: A cheat.
“A cheating cheater.
“A loser.
“A man who can’t win an election and did not win an election of the people fairly.
“Donald Trump can’t win an election without cheating. He knows that, and that’s why it upsets him so much to be called out for his illegal actions.
Donald Trump
“Trump is used to getting away with his criminal entitlements, but today, even if just for a moment before Republicans in the Senate betray their country again by letting Trump off as he attacks the United States, justice has been spoken and served.” [Italics added]
Before Republicans in the Senate betray their country again by letting Trump off….
Jones clearly has no patience for those who insist on playing a game of “Let’s Pretend.” As in: “Let’s pretend that Republicans care more about the Constitution and the security of the nation than about attaining dictatorial power.”
Since September, the House Intelligence Committee has investigated Trump’s attempt to coerce Ukraine to smear a 2020 political rival for the White House—former Vice President Joe Biden.
And every day of its hearings, Republicans have loudly and brutally defended that extortion.
They haven’t offered any evidence that Trump didn’t try to extort an ally. They simply attacked the witnesses who dared to come forward and testify to their own knowledge of it. They attacked Schiff, who heads that committee, demanding self-righteously that he resign.
There is absolutely no reason to doubt that the Republican-dominated Senate (53 to 47 Democrats) will once again serve as Trump’s “party of lock step enablers.”
But there is a way to put the impeachment effort into historical perspective.
In 1960, David Hackworth was a young Army captain stationed in West Germany. The end of World War II had revealed the horror of Nazi death camps and the extermination of millions. To everyone, that is, but the Germans.
David Hackworth
One winter’s day, Hackworth took his wife, Patty, to Dachau, the infamous concentration camp. In his 1989 memoir, About Face: The Odyssey of an American Warrior, he describes the experience:
“The horror of Hitler’s vision was alive and well in this grim death camp: the barracks, the ovens, the electrified barbed wire fences, remained intact. A mound here held the bones of 10,000 Jews; one over there held the bones of 12,000 more.
“The place was a monument to the darkest side of man, and yet—despite the smoke and ash that rained down on their homes from camp incinerators, despite the sickly smell of burning flesh and hair….the villagers claimed they hadn’t known. I couldn’t square it….”
Nor could Hackworth accept that “not one of the laughing, backslapping, congenial comrades I met…had fought the Americans in the West. All assured me they’d been on the Eastern Front, fighting ‘the real enemy,’ the Russians….
“In 15 years the Germans had come a long way in their rewrite of history. But at least there’s Dachau, I thought to myself, to remind them of the truth.“
So, too, will the coming impeachment of Donald Trump stand as a monument to the sheer evil and infamy of himself and his party. And it will remind future generations of a time when decent Americans dared to confront that evil in a stand as hopeless and glorious as that at Thermopylae and the Alamo.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on December 16, 2019 at 1:20 am
“Some say why don’t you just wait? Why don’t you just wait until you get the witnesses that the White House refuses to produce?”
The speaker was Adam Schiff (D-CA), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. And it was on a day he—and the nation—would never forget: December 10, 2019.
Democratic leaders in the House of Representatives had just voted to send two Articles of Impeachment to the Judiciary Committee. Their purpose: To remove Donald J. Trump from office as the 45th President of the United States.
Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler read the charges:
Article 1: Abuse of Power: For pressuring Ukraine to assist him in his re-election campaign by damaging former Vice President Joe Biden, his possible Democratic rival.
“Donald J. Trump has abused the powers of the Presidency, in that: Using the powers of his high office, President Trump solicited the interference of a foreign government, Ukraine, in the 2020 United States presidential election.
“Wherefore President Trump, by such conduct, has demonstrated that he will remain a threat to national security and the Constitution if allowed to remain in office, has acted in a manner grossly incompatible with self-governance and the rule of law.”
Article 2: Obstruction of Congress: For obstructing Congress by blocking testimony and refusing to provide documents in response to House subpoenas in the impeachment inquiry.
“Donald J. Trump has directed the unprecedented, categorical, and indiscriminate defiance of subpoenas issued by the House of Representatives pursuant to its ‘sole Power of Impeachment.'”
But it was House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff who put the reason for impeachment in stark, easily understandable perspective:
Adam Schiff
“Why not just wait until you get the documents that the White House refuses to turn over, and people should understand what that argument really means.
“It has taken us eight months to get a lower court ruling that Don McGahn has no right to defy Congress. If it takes another eight months to get a second court or Supreme Court decision, that is not the end of the process.
“It comes back to us, and we ask questions because he no longer has immunity and he claims something else that his answers are privileged and we have to go to court for another eight or 16 months.
“The argument why don’t you just wait amounts to this: Why don’t you just let him [Trump] cheat in one more election? Why not late him cheat just one more time? Why not let him have foreign help just one more time? That is what that argument amounts to.”
Schiff was alluding to Trump’s infamous efforts during the 2016 Presidential campaign to enlist Russian aid against his rival, Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
Among those efforts:
Example 1: On July 9, 2016, high-ranking members of his Presidential campaign met at Trump Tower with at least two lobbyists with ties to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. The participants included:
- Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr.;
- His son-in-law, Jared Kushner;
- His then-campaign manager, Paul Manafort;
- Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer with ties to Putin; and
- Rinat Akhmetshin, a former Soviet counterintelligence officer suspected of “having ongoing ties to Russian Intelligence.”
The purpose of that meeting: To gain access to any “dirt” Russian Intelligence could supply on Clinton.
Donald Trump
Example 2: On July 22, 2016, during his campaign for President, Trump said at a press conference in Doral, Florida: “Russia, if you are listening, I hope you are able to find the 33,000 emails that are missing [from Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s computer]. I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
This was nothing less than treason—calling upon a foreign power, hostile to the United States, to interfere in its Presidential election.
Hours later, the Main Intelligence Directorate in Moscow targeted Clinton’s personal office and hit more than 70 other Clinton campaign accounts.
Example 3: Throughout 2016, the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency (NSA) found numerous ties between officials of the Trump Presidential campaign and Russian Intelligence agents.
On October 7, 2016, the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence issued a joint statement blaming the Russian government for the hacking of Democratic National Committee emails. Its motive: “To interfere with the US election process.”
Two days later, Trump publicly stated: “But I notice, anytime anything wrong happens, they like to say the Russians are—Maybe there is no hacking. But they always blame Russia.”
Example 4: On December 16, 2016, then-FBI Director James B. Comey and Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. agreed with a CIA assessment that Russia intervened in the 2016 election in part to help Donald Trump win the White House.
Trump, however, steadfastly denied any such role by Russia: “I think it’s ridiculous,” he told “Fox News Sunday.” “I think it’s just another excuse. I don’t believe it….No, I don’t believe it at all.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Military, Politics, Social commentary on November 5, 2019 at 12:10 am
From 1945 to 2015, it was unthinkable for a Republican Presidential candidate to pay tribute to a Soviet dictator.
But that utterly changed when Donald J. Trump, a “reality TV” host with longstanding financial ties to Russian oligarchs, ran for President of the United States.
Donald Trump
The reason for the Trump-Putin bromance: Each had something to offer the other.
Putin wanted the United States to ditch the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) alliance, which had preserved Western Europe from Russian aggression since World War II. And Trump had often attacked America’s funding of NATO as a drain on the American economy.
And Trump wanted to be President. For this, Putin could supply Internet trolls to confuse voters with falsified news—and even the hacking of key voting centers.
And monies. These Russian monies were officially classified as “campaign contributions,” not bribes.
Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller III Mueller spent almost two years uncovering links between Russian Intelligence agents and members of Donald Trump’s Presidential campaign.
On July 24, he addressed Congress on Russia’s subversion of the 2016 Presidential election.
“Over the course of my career, I’ve seen a number of challenges to our democracy,” Mueller declared to members of the House Judiciary Committee.
“The Russian government’s effort to interfere in our election is among the most serious. As I said on May 29, this deserves the attention of every American.
“It wasn’t a single attempt. They’re doing it as we sit here. And they expect to do it during the next campaign.”
Robert Mueller
In his report, Mueller documented years of meddling in American politics by the Internet Research Agency, which runs the Kremlin’s online disinformation efforts from its headquarters in St. Petersburg.
The Agency reached 126 million Americans through fake accounts on Facebook. Its messages communicated with unaware members of the Trump campaign, and even prompted real-life rallies that mobilized crowds of unwitting voters.
Hours later that same day, Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Mississippi) blocked the passage of three bills designed to tighten election security at the federal level. She claimed that Congress had already responded to election security needs for the 2020 Presidential election.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) came to the Senate floor the next day to personally object to House-passed legislation backed by Democrats.
Nor is Trump the only Republican receiving “help” from Putin. A network of Russian oligarchs—all of them answerable to Putin—has been increasingly contributing to top Republicans.
These Russian monies are officially classified as “campaign contributions,” not bribes—which, in fact, they are.
According to the Federal Election Commission:
One such major contributor is Len Blavatnik, who holds citizenship in both the United States and the United Kingdom. During the 2015-16 election cycle, he proved one of the largest donors to GOP Political Action Committees (PACs).
Blavatnik’s net worth is estimated at $20 billion. Before 2016, he donated to both Democrats and Republicans in meager amounts. But in 2016, he gave $6.35 million to GOP PACs.
Millions of dollars went to top Republican leaders—such as Senators Mitch McConnell (Kentucky), Marco Rubio (Florida) and Lindsey Graham (South Carolina).
Specifically, he contributed:
- A total of $1.5 million to PACs associated with Rubio.
- $1 million to Trump’s Inaugural Committee.
- $41,000 to both Republicans and Democrats in 2017.
- $1 million to McConnell’s Senate Leadership Fund.
- $3.5 million to a PAC associated with McConnell.
- $1.1 million to Unintimidated PAC, associated with Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.
- $200,000 to the Arizona Grassroots Action PAC, associated with the late Arizona Senator John McCain.
- $250,000 to New Day for America PAC, associated with Ohio Governor John Kasich.
- $800,000 to the Security is Strength PAC, associated with Senator Lindsey Graham.
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Another Russian oligarch, Alexander Shustorovich, contributed $1 million to Trump’s Inaugural Committee.
Altogether, four Russian oligarchs—Blavatnik, Shustorovich, Andrew Intrater and Simon Kukes—contributed $10.4 million from the start of the 2015-16 election cycle through September 2017. Of this, 99% went to Republicans.
As Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell participated in high-level intelligence briefings in 2016. From agencies such as the FBI, CIA and the code-cracking National Security Agency, he learned that the Russians were trying to subvert the electoral process.
In October, 2016, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) issued a joint statement: The Russian government had directed the effort to subvert the 2016 Presidential election.
Two weeks later, McConnell’s PAC accepted a $1 million donation from Blavatnik.
On March 30, 2017, McConnell’s PAC accepted another $1 million from Blavatnik.
This is just 10 days after former FBI Director James Comey testified before the House Intelligence Committee about Russia’s efforts to subvert the 2016 election.
So, what has changed in the Republican Party? Essentially nothing.
Its enemies changed—from Russian Communists to American liberals. But its goal remains the same: The quest for absolute power.
When Americans feared Communism, Republicans depicted themselves as the only ones who could be trusted to protect the United States. Big contributions poured in from Right-wing billionaires like H.L. Hunt and Howard Hughes.
But then Republicans found they could enrich themselves and stay in power via Russian “campaign contributions.” So long as they did Putin’s bidding, the rubles would roll in.
So for a party of power-drunk would-be dictators, the decision was simple: Better Red than un-elected.
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BURYING TRUMP–AND STALIN: PART TWO (END)
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on June 10, 2022 at 12:15 amSixty years before an American congress failed to remove a ruthless dictator from its midst, a Russian congress successfully removed their own.
For almost 30 years, from 1924 to 1953, Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili—better known as Stalin—had ruled as absolute dictator over the Soviet Union. Hallmarks of his legacy included mass arrests, repeated purges, forced mass starvation and the imprisonment of millions.
As many as 20 million men, women and children died as his victims.
His reign of terror ended only with his death, of a cerebral hemorrhage, on March 5, 1953, at age 74.
Joseph Stalin
As historian Robert Payne wrote in his monumental 1965 biography The Rise and Fall of Stalin: “The son of an obscure cobbler, he had become during the last years of his life the most powerful man on earth. No emperor had ever enjoyed the power he possessed.
“He had taken the world by the throat, and forced it to do his will. He was one of the world-shakers, and when he died in 1953 it was thought proper that his remains should be exhibited as an object of reverence and worship in the Lenin mausoleum, the holy of holies of the Soviet empire.”
On February 25, 1956, his successor, Nikita Khrushchev, revealed Stalin’s litany of crimes to the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
The speech was the opening shot in Khrushchev’s “de-Stalinization” campaign. He intended to destroy the image of the late dictator as an infallible leader and rein in the infamous KGB secret police.
The speech gave rise to a period of liberalization known as the “Khrushchev thaw” (1956-1964). During this, censorship policy was relaxed, and for the first time books and articles appeared about the huge network of forced labor camps set up by Vladimir Lenin and reaching its peak under Stalin.
Nikita Khrushchev
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.
Thousands of political prisoners were released, and thousands more who had perished during Stalin’s reign were officially “rehabilitated.”
By 1961, Khrushchev and those seeking to reform the Soviet political system decided to condemn the horrors of the Stalinist decades in a forceful symbolic act.
On October 31, 1961, the body of Joseph Stalin was removed from its honored resting place in the Lenin mausoleum in Red Square. A new grave was dug for him—among the minor heroes of the Russian Revolution. The re-internment took place secretly—at night—without ceremonies. And his name was removed from the mausoleum.
Historian Robert Payne described that event—and its significance: “A dead god was being transformed into a dead man, a dead emperor was being dethroned, a dead criminal was being executed….
“But more than a ritual murder was at stake. The Supreme Soviet and the Central Committee, which decreed the punishment now being inflicted on the corpse of Stalin, were now attempting to absolve themselves from responsibility for his crimes.
“They were saying: ‘We are not responsible, we are casting him away, he is not one of us! He committed such terrible crimes that we will have none of him.’
“For nearly thirty years Stalin had ruled tyrannically over Russia. History, too, was being consigned to oblivion.”
A series of similar events has erupted within the United States since January 6, 2021.
On that day, thousands of Right-wing supporters of President Donald Trump—ignited by his fiery, lie-riddled rhetoric—overwhelmed police guarding the United States Capitol and occupied the building.
Donald Trump
Their intention: To halt the counting of Electoral College votes that would certify former Vice President Joseph Biden as the next President of the United States.
Since then, Trump’s fortunes have sharply declined:
Herodotus, the Greek historian who chronicled the Greek-Persian wars, offers a still-timely explanation of such reverses of fortune—and a warning for those who dare to ignore history:
“Look to the end, no matter what it is you are considering. Often enough God gives a man a glimpse of happiness, and then utterly ruins him.”
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