Posts Tagged ‘MEIN KAMPF’
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on April 5, 2024 at 12:13 am
To understand Republicans’ behavior, you need to understand the word “projection.”
As defined by psychologists, “projection” means unconsciously taking unwanted emotions or traits you don’t like about yourself and attributing them to someone else.
Except that, with Republicans, there is nothing unconscious about attributing their own evil intentions and/or actions to those they hate.
To cite a current example: “Weaponizing” is a word now in vogue among Republicans. As in: “By appointing a Special Counsel to investigate former President Donald Trump, the Department of Justice (DOJ) proves that Democrats have weaponized Federal law enforcement.”
Republicans conveniently refuse to say why the Justice Department appointed former DOJ official Jack Smith to that position: Because, before leaving the White House, Trump shipped more than 300 highly classified documents in 15 boxes to his estate in Mar-a-Lago.
Jack Smith
As an ex-President, he had no right to possess any of these documents.
Moreover, he not only illegally took these documents, he lied to government investigators that he had done so. It took an August 8, 2022 FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago to retrieve them.
Then there’s the matter of the January 6, 2021 defendants.
They are so named because, on that date, Trump 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 former Vice President Joe Biden: 306 votes for Biden, compared with 232 for Trump.
The Stormtrumpers marched to the United States Capitol—and quickly brushed aside Capitol Police, who made little effort to arrest or shoot them.
Capitol Police facing off with Stormtrumpers
- Approximately 140 police officers were assaulted.
- A gallows was erected in front of the Capitol.
- Members of the mob attacked police with chemical agents or lead pipes.
- Improvised explosive devices were found in several locations in Washington, D.C.
- 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.
- Blue-and-white TRUMP flags floated above the crowd.
- Shouts of “Hang [Vice President Mike Pence!” often rang out.
- Many of the lawmakers’ office buildings were occupied and vandalized—including that of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a favorite Right-wing target.
Stormtrumpers inside the Capitol Building
More than three hours passed before police—using riot gear, shields and batons—retook control of the Capitol.
By December, 2023, 728 participants in the coup attempt had pleaded guilty. Another 166 defendants had been convicted at trial; a total of 745 defendants have been sentenced.
Yet Republicans—most notably Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA)—have depicted these coup supporters as persecuted martyrs.
On March 24, 2022, members of the Republicans’ House Oversight Committee toured a Washington, D.C. jail where some of these defendants were held.
“Their due process rights are being violated. And they have been mistreated and treated as political prisoners,” Greene told reporters after the tour.
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), another member of the tour, exchanged hugs with with Micki Witthoeft, the mother of Ashli Babbitt. Babbitt had been shot by police as she forced her way into the House Chamber where members of Congress were sheltering in place.
Republicans‘ fixation on “weaponization” centers on the Trump’s facing 91 criminal offenses in four criminal cases.
These relate to Trump’s
- Attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election
- Election interference in Georgia
- Falsifying business records in New York, and
- Mishandling classified records after leaving the presidency.
Donald Trump is the first former president in American history to be criminally indicted.
For Republicans, prosecutors’ daring to hold Trump accountable for his litany of crimes amounts to “election interference.” As if winning office through the efforts of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin has conferred “untouchable” status upon him.
As a result, Republicans have made unprecedented efforts to undermine these prosecutions.
Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., a Trump ally who sits on the Appropriations Committee, introduced two amendments to eliminate federal funding for all three of Trump’s prosecutors—Special Counsel Jack Smith, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., is also trying to cut off funding for Smith’s office.
Republicans have in the past championed “states’ rights” against “federal overreach.” But now that their former President finds himself facing the consequences of his own criminality, they are eager to abort state-level prosecutions.
At the same time, they slander President Joseph Biden as “weaponizing” the Justice Department against his political rival.
In George Orwell’s classic novel, 1984, the dictatorship ruling Oceania offers the following slogan for its citizens:
WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
Republicans would have Americans believe
- The attempted overturning of a legitimate Presidential election was an act of patriotism;
- An ex-President taking classified materials to which he had no right was entirely justified; and
- Donald Trump has an absolute right to commit any crime he desires.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on April 4, 2024 at 12:14 am
The electoral success of Senator Joseph McCarthy’s Red-baiting treason slanders proved too alluring for other Republicans to resist.
Joseph McCarthy
Among those who have greatly profited from hurling similar charges are:
- President Richard Nixon
- His vice president, Spiro Agnew
- Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich
- Former Congressman Dick Armey
- President George W. Bush
- Vice Presidential candidate Sarah Palin
- Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann
- Rush Limbaugh
- Sean Hannity
- Bill O’Reilly.
During the 1992 Presidential campaign, Republicans tried to paint Bill Clinton as a brainwashed “Manchurian candidate” because he had briefly visited the Soviet Union during his college years.
After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Republicans lost their “soft on Communism” slander-line. So they tried to persuade voters that Democrats were “soft on crime.”
When riots flared in 1992 after the acquittal of LAPD officers who had savagely beaten Rodney King, President George H.W. Bush blamed the carnage on the “Great Society” programs of the 1960s.
George H.W. Bush
After losing the White House to Clinton at the polls in 1992 and 1996, Republicans tried to oust him another way: By impeaching him over a tryst with a penis-loving intern named Monica Lewinsky.
The Republican-controlled House of Representatives voted to impeach, but the effort was defeated in the Democratically-controlled Senate.
The 2008 election of Barack Obama pushed the Republican “treason chorus” to new heights of infamy.
Barack Obama
Almost immediately after Obama took office, he came under attack by an industry of right-wing book authors such as Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh.
The following titles vividly reveal the hates, fears and ambitions of their authors—and audience:
- Conservative Victory: Defeating Obama’s Radical Agenda by Sean Hannity
- Obama Zombies: How the Liberal Machine Brainwashed My Generation by Jason Mattera
- How Barack Obama is Bankrupting the U.S. Economy by Stephen Moore
- Let Freedom Ring: Winning the War of Liberty over Liberalism by Sean Hannity
- The Manchurian President: Barack Obama’s Ties to Communists,Socialists and Other Anti-American Extremists by Aaron Klein
- The Blueprint: Obama’s Plan to Subvert the Constitution and Build an Imperial Presidency by Ken Blackwell
- Culture of Corruption: Obama and His Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks, and Croniesby Michelle Malkin
- Why Obama’s Government Takeover of Health Care Will Be a Disaster by David Gratzer
- To Save America: Stopping Obama’s Secular-Socialist Machine by Newt Gingrich
- Obama’s Radical Transformation of America: Year One by Joshua Muravchik
- How the Obama Administration Threatens to Undermine Our Elections by John Fund
- Power Grab: How Obama’s Green Policicies Will Steal Your Freedom and Bankrupt America by Christopher C. Horner
- The Bad Science and Bad Policy of Obama’s Global Warning Agenda by Roy W. Spencer
- America’s March to Socialism: Why We’re One Step Closer to Giant Missile Parades by Glenn Beck
- Obama’s Betrayal of Israel by Michael Ledeen
- The Obama Nation: Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality by Jerome R. Corsi
- The Case Against Barack Obama: The Unlikely Rise and Unexamined Agenda of the Media’s Favorite Candidate by David Freddoso
- Censorship: The Threat to Silence Talk Radio by Brian Jennings
- The War On Success: How the Obama Agenda Is Shattering the American Dream by Tommy Newberry
- Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them by Steven Milloy
- Liberalism is a Mental Disorder: Savage Solutions by Michael Savage
- Treason: Liberal Treachery from the Cold War to the War on Terrorism by Ann Coulter
- How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must): The World According to Ann Coulter by Ann Coulter
- Slander: Liberal Lies About the American Right by Ann Coulter
- If Democrats Had Any Brains, They’d Be Republicans by Ann Coulter
- Guilty: Liberal “Victims” and Their Assault on America by Ann Coulter
- Catastrophe: How Obama, Congress and the Special Interests Are Transforming…a Slump into a Crash, Freedom Into Socialism and a Disaster into a Catastrophe….And How to Fight Back by Dick Morris
Consider the vocabulary Right-wingers use to describe their political adversaries:
“Liberals,” “radicals, “bankrupting,” “treason,” subversion,” “slander,” “terrorism,” “betrayal,” “catastrophe,” “shattering the American dream,” “leftists,” “Communists,” “government takeover,” “socialism,” “power grab,” “secularism,” “environmentalism.”
And while the Right lusts to constantly compare Democrats and liberals (the two aren’t always the same) to Adolf Hitler, its propaganda campaign draws heavily on the Nazi leader’s own advice.
In Mein Kampf, Hitler laid out his formula for successful propaganda: “All effective propaganda must be confined to a few bare essentials.
“Those must be expressed as far as possible in stereotypical formulas. These slogans should be persistently repeated until the very last individual has come to grasp the idea that has been put forward.”
“[The masses] more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods.”
Thus, Republicans spent the eight years of Barack Obama’s Presidency repeating the lie that he was born in Kenya—not Hawaii, as the long-form version of his birth certificate attests.
The reason: To “prove” that he was an illegitimate President, and should be removed from office.
To Republicans’ dismay, their slander campaign didn’t prevent Obama from being elected in 2008—and re-elected in 2012.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on April 3, 2024 at 12:16 am
“The Republican Party has weaponized its supporters, made violence a virtue and, with almost every pronouncement for 50 years, given them an enemy politicized, radicalized and indivisible.”
So wrote Rolling Stone writer in a blistering June 19, 2015 editorial. The touchstone was the slaughter of nine black worshipers by a white supremacist at a South Carolina black church.
But the proof of Republican culpability in political violence goes back much further.
Consider:
Gabrille Giffords, 40, is a moderate Democrat who narrowly wins re-election in November, 2010, against a Republican Tea Party candidate.
Her support of President Barack Obama’s health care reform law has made her a target for violent rhetoric–-especially from former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.
In March, 2010, Palin releases a map featuring 20 House Democrats that uses cross-hairs images to show their districts. In case her supporters don’t get the message, she later writes on Twitter: “Don’t Retreat, Instead – RELOAD!”
Sarah Palin’s “Crosshairs” Map
As the campaign continues, Giffords finds her Tucson office vandalized after the House passes the healthcare overhaul in March.
Giffords senses that she has become a target for removal—in more than political terms. In an interview after the vandalizing of her office, she refers to the animosity against her by conservatives.
She specifically cites Palin’s decision to list her seat as one of the top “targets” in the midterm elections.
“For example, we’re on Sarah Palin’s targeted list, but the thing is, that the way that she has it depicted has the cross-hairs of a gun sight over our district. When people do that, they have to realize that there are consequences to that action,” Giffords tells MSNBC.
At one of her rallies, her aides call the police after an attendee drops a gun.
Giffords may have seen the spectre of violence closing in on her. In April, 2010, she supported Rep. Raúl Grijalva after he had to close two offices when he and his staff received threats.
Raúl Grijalva
He had called for a boycott of Arizona businesses in opposition to the state’s controversial immigration law.
“I am deeply troubled about reports that Congressman Grijalva and members of his staff have been subjected to death threats,” Giffords said.
“This is not how we, as Americans, express our political differences. Intimidation has no place in our representative democracy. Such acts only make it more difficult for us to resolve our differences.”
But intimidation—-and worse—-does have a place among the tactics used by influential Republicans in the pursuit of absolute power.
Increasingly, Republicans have repeatedly aimed violent—-and violence-arousing—-rhetoric at their Democratic opponents. This is not a case of careless language that is simply misinterpreted, with tragic results.
Republicans like Sarah Palin fully understand the constituency they are trying to reach: Those masses of alienated, uneducated Americans who live only for their guns and hardline religious beliefs—and who can be easily manipulated by perceived threats to either.
Sarah Palin
Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ, United States of America, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
If a “nutcases” assaults a Democratic politician and misses, then the Republican establishment claims to be shocked—-shocked!—that such a thing could have happened.
And if the attempt proves successful—as the January 8, 2011 Tucson shootings did—then Republicans weep crocodile tears for public consumption.
The difference is that, in this case, they rejoice in knowing that Democratic ranks have been thinned and their opponents are even more on the defensive, for fear of the same happening to them.
Consider the following:
- Rep. Randy Neugebauer (R-Tex.) yelled “baby killer” at Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) on the House floor.
- Florida GOP Congressional candidate Allen West, referring to his Democratic opponent, Rep. Ron Klein, told Tea Party activists: You’ve got to make the fellow scared to come out of his house. That’s the only way that you’re going to win. That’s the only way you’re going to get these people’s attention.”
- Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) said Tea Partiers had “every right” to use racist and homophobic slurs against Democrats, justifying it via Democrats’ “totalitarian tactics.”
- Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-Minn.) said she wanted her constituents “armed and dangerous” against the Obama administration.
- Sarah Palin told her supporters: “Get in their face and argue with them. No matter how tough it gets, never retreat, instead RELOAD!”
- Right-wing pundit Ann Coulter: “My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times building.”
- Senator Phil Gramm (R-Tex.) “We’re going to keep building the party until we’re hunting Democrats with dogs.”
- Rep. Louisa M. Slauter (D-NY) received a phone message threatening sniper attacks against lawmakers and their families.
Since the end of World War 11, Republicans have regularly hurled the charge of “treason” against anyone who dared to run against them for office or think other than Republican-sponsored thoughts.
Republicans had been locked out of the White House from 1933 to 1952, during the administrations of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman.
Determined to regain the Presidency by any means, they found that attacking the integrity of their fellow Americans a highly effective tactic.
During the 1950s, Wisconsin Senator Joseph R. McCarthy rode a wave of paranoia to national prominence–by attacking the patriotism of anyone who disagreed with him.
The fact that McCarthy never uncovered one actual case of treason was conveniently overlooked during his lifetime.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on April 2, 2024 at 12:10 am
On June 17, 2015, Dylann Roof, a white high school dropout, gunned down three black men and six black women at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina.
At 21, Roof was unemployed, dividing his time between playing video games and taking drugs.
Dylann Roof
The signs of Roof’s malignant racism were evident long before he turned mass murderer:
- He had posed for a photo sitting on the hood of his parents’ car—whose license plate bore a Confederate flag.
- He had posed for pictures wearing a jacket sporting the white supremacist flags of Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa.
- He told a friend that he hoped “to start a civil war” between the black and white races.
- Roof reportedly told friends and neighbors of his plans to kill people.
- In the midst of his massacre of unarmed worshipers, he told one of his victims: “You’ve raped our women, and you are taking over the country.” Then Roof shot him.
The evidence made clear that Roof’s slaughter was racially motivated. Yet no 2016 Republican Presidential candidate dared acknowledge it:
- Jeb Bush, former governor of Florida: “I don’t know what was on the mind or the heart of the man who committed these atrocious crimes.”
- Rick Santorum, former United States Senator from Pennsylvania: “You talk about the importance of prayer in this time and we’re now seeing assaults on our religious liberty we’ve never seen before. It’s a time for deeper reflection beyond this horrible situation.”
- Bobby Jindal, former governor of Louisiana: “I don’t think we’ll ever know what was going on in his mind.”
But Rolling Stone magazine writer Jeb Lund left no doubt as to what—and who—was ultimately responsible for this crime: Racism and Republicans.
In a June 19, 2015 editorial—published two days after the massacre—Lund noted: “This [crime] is political because American movement conservatism has already made these kinds of killings political.
“The Republican Party has weaponized its supporters, made violence a virtue and, with almost every pronouncement for 50 years, given them an enemy politicized, racialized and indivisible.
“Movement conservatives have fetishized a tendentious and ahistorical reading of the Second Amendment to the point that the Constitution itself somehow paradoxically ‘legitimizes’ an armed insurrection against the government created by it.
“Those leading said insurrection are swaddled by the blanket exculpation of patriotism. At the same time, they have synonymized the Democratic Party with illegitimacy and abuse of the American order.
“This is no longer an argument about whether one party’s beliefs are beneficial or harmful, but an attitude that labels leftism so antithetical to the American idea that empowering it on any level is an act of usurpation.”
On December 15, 2016, Dylann Roof was convicted of 33 Federal hate crime charges. On January 11, 2017, he was sentenced to death. He remains on Death Row to this day.
Yet the leadership of the Republican party whose hate-filled rhetoric inspired Root escaped indictment—and even widespread condemnation.
The evidence that Republicans have weaponized hatred—with deadly results—was on display long before Dylann Roof opened fire on “uppity blacks” praying in their own church.
Consider:
On January 8, 2011, Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot in the head while meeting with constituents outside a grocery store in Tucson, Arizona. After a miraculous recovery, she continues to struggle with language and has lost 50% of her vision in both eyes.
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords
She vowed to return to her former Congressional duties, but was forced to resign for health reasons in 2012.
Giffords was only one victim of a shooting spree that claimed the lives of six people and left 13 others wounded.
Also killed was Arizona’s chief U.S. District judge, John Roll, who had just stopped by to see his friend Giffords after celebrating Mass.
Although the actual shooter, Jared Lee Loughner, was immediately arrested, those who fanned the flames of political violence that consumed 19 people that day have remained unpunished.
Consider the circumstances behind the shootings:
John Roll is Arizona’s chief federal judge. Appointed in 2006, he wins acclaim as a respected jurist and leader who pushes to beef up the court’s strained bench to handle a growing number of border crime-related cases.
In 2009, he becomes a target for threats after allowing a $32 million civil-rights lawsuit by illegal aliens to proceed against a local rancher. The case arouses the fury of local talk radio hosts, who encourage their audiences to threaten Roll’s life.
In one afternoon, Roll logs more than 200 threatening phone calls. Callers threaten the judge and his family. They post personal information about Roll online.
Roll and his wife are placed under fulltime protection by deputy U.S. marshals. Roll finds living under security “unnerving and invasive.”
Authorities identify four men believed responsible for the threats. But Roll declines to press charges on the advice of the Marshals Service.
2016 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN, 2020 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN, ABC NEWS, ADAM SCHIFF, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BORDER WALL, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHARLES DE GAULLE, CHINA, CHRIS CHRISTIE, CHRISTI GRIMM, CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, CIA, CNN, CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL ACTION CONFERENCE, CONVERSATION WITH AN AMERICAN WRITER (POEM), CORONAVIRUS RELIEF MONIES, COVID-19, CROOKS AND LIARS, CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, DAILY KOS, DAN BOWMAN, DAN SULLIVAN, DAVID BROOKS, DEMOCRATS, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, DONALD TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP JUNIOR, DRUDGE RETORT, EXTORTION, FBI, FIRST AMENDMENT, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, GEORGE FLOYD, GEORGE W. BUSH, GLENN FINE, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE, GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HILLARY CLINTON, HOUSE FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE, HOUSE OVERSIGHT AND REFORM COMMITTEE, HUNTER BIDEN, IMMIGRANTS, IMPEACHMENT, IMPOUNDMENT CONTROL ACT, INSPECTORS GENERAL, INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY, JAKE SULLIVAN, JAKE TAPPER, JAMAL KHASHOGGI, JAMES COMEY, JAMES ROBART, JARED KUSHNER, JEFF SESSIONS, JOHN CORNYN, JOHN F. KENNEDY, JOHN ROBERTS, JON S. TIGAR, JOSEPH BIDEN, KELLY LOEFFER, KEVIN CRAMER, LAFAYETTE SQUARE, LAMAR ALEXANDER, LEON PANETTA, LINDSEY GRAHAM, MARCO RUBIO, MARTIN GUGINO, MEDIA MATTERS, MEIN KAMPF, MEXICO, MICHAEL FLYNN, MICHAEL HAYDEN, MICHAEL K. ATKINSON, MICK MULVANEY, MIKE PENCE, MITCH MCCONNELL, MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, NANCY PELOSI, NATALIA VESELNITSKAYA, NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NIKKI HALEY, NPR, PAUL MANAFORT, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REPUBLICANS, REUTERS, RINAT AKHMETSHIN, ROBERT MUELLER, ROBERT PAYNE, ROD ROSENSTEIN, ROGER STONE, RON DESANTIS, RON JOHNSON, RUSSIA, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SERGEY KISLYAK, SERGEY LAVROV, SLATE, ST. JOHN’S CHURCH, STEVE DAINES, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TED CRUZ, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE JUDICIARY, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOI), THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOK), THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE PRESS, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TREASON, TRUMP TOWER MEETING, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UKRAINE, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, UNITED STATES SENATE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, WHISTLEBLOWER, WHITE HOUSE BUDGET OFFICE, WONKETTE, YEVGENEY YEVTUSHENKO
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 19, 2024 at 12:11 am
Throughout his Presidency, Republicans have continued to support Donald Trump despite a series of actions that would have normally resulted in impeachment.
Forgiven Crime #19: After being acquitted of impeachable offenses by the Senate, Trump fired the Inspectors General (IG) of five cabinet departments in six weeks. Among these:
- Michael K. Atkinson – The IG of the Intelligence Community. The reason: Atkinson had forwarded the whistleblower complaint which led to Trump’s impeachment.
- Glenn Fine – Appointed to oversee funds voted by Congress to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic ravaging the United States. His dismissal ensured that Trump–who had admitted to defrauding students at his notorious “Trump University”–could spend the $2 trillion in relief monies any way he wished.
Glenn Fine
- Christi Grimm – As IG at the Department of Health and Human Services, she outraged Trump by contradicting him by agreeing—accurately—that the nation’s hospitals were suffering from severe shortages of personal protective equipment and testing supplies for COVID-19.
Forgiven Crime #20: After losing the Presidential election on November 3, 2020, Trump became the first American President to refuse to accept the verdict.
Forgiven Crime #21: From November 3 to December 14, 2020, Trump and his allies challenged the election results, filing—and losing—59 cases in court, either withdrawing cases or having them dismissed by Federal and state judges.
Forgiven Crime #22: On December 5, 2021, 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.
Brian Kemp
Forgiven Crime 23: On January 6, 2021, Trump ordered his assembled followers to attack the Capitol Building where House and Senate members were counting Electoral Votes—that were certain to certify Joseph R. Biden as the legitimate winner of the 2020 Presidential election.
Their goal: To stop the counting of those votes—and enable Trump to serve as “President-for-Life.”
Many of the lawmakers’ offices were occupied and vandalized. One Capitol police officer was killed and 114 others were injured.
This was, in effect, a treasonous coup attempt.
On February 13, 2021, the Republican-dominated Senate once again acquitted Trump—of “incitement of insurrection” against the United States government.
Forgiven Crime 24: In 2022, Trump became the first ex-President to be indicted for crimes committed during his four-year administration: 2017-2021. He faces 91 criminal charges across four jurisdictions: Georgia, Florida, New York and the District of Columbia.
Yet even as he viciously attacks his rivals for the 2024 Republican Presidential nomination, all but one—former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie—refuse to condemn him as an indicted criminal.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley have promised to pardon Trump if he is convicted and either one of them is elected President.
Forgiven Crime 25: Trump has echoed Adolf Hitler in attacking immigrants: “They’re poisoning the blood of our country. They’ve poisoned mental institutions and prisons all over the world, not just in South America, not just the three or four countries that we think about, but all over the world.”
Republicans have refused to condemn those remarks—or the original source—Mein Kampf-–of those remarks.
* * * * *
Why have Republicans almost unanimously stood by Donald Trump despite the wreckage he made of American foreign and domestic policy?
Fear—that they will lose their privileged positions in Congress if they don’t.
This could happen by:
- Their being voted out of Congress by Trump’s fanatical base; or
- Their being voted out of Congress by anti-Trump voters fed up with Trump’s appalling behavior.
House and Senate Republicans’ support for Trump hinges on one question: “Can I hold onto my power and all the privileges that accompany it by sticking—or breaking—with him?”
In his bestselling 1973 biography, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler, British historian Robert Payne harshly condemned the German people for the rise of the Nazi dictator:
“[They] allowed themselves to be seduced by him and came to enjoy the experience….[They] followed him with joy and enthusiasm because he gave them license to pillage and murder to their hearts’ content. They were his servile accomplices, his willing victims.”
Like Hitler, Trump offered his Republican voters and Congressional allies intoxicating dreams: “I will enrich all of you. And I will humiliate and destroy those Americans you most hate.”
For his white, Fascistic, largely elderly audience, those enemies included blacks, atheists, Hispanics, non-Christians, Muslims, liberals, “uppity” women, Asians.
For most of the first three years of his Presidency, he faced little opposition. What cost Trump the White House wasn’t Democratic or Republican courage but a deadly disease—COVID-19—which Trump refused to take seriously.
Democrats cowered before Trump’s slanders—thereby ensuring more assaults.
Most of the press quailed before Trump. Only a few media outlets—notably the New York Times, CNN and the Washington Post-–dared investigate his crimes and blunders.
In 1960, the Russian poet, Yevgeney Yevtushenko, published “Conversation With an American Writer”—a stinging indictment of the cowardly opportunists who had supported the brutal tyranny of Joseph Stalin:
“You have courage,” they tell me.
It’s not true. I was never courageous.
I simply felt it unbecoming
to stoop to the cowardice of my colleagues.
Too many Republicans know all-too-well how it feels to stoop to the cowardice of their colleagues for a transitory hold on power and privilege.
2016 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN, 2020 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN, ABC NEWS, ADAM SCHIFF, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BORDER WALL, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHARLES DE GAULLE, CHINA, CHRIS CHRISTIE, CHRISTI GRIMM, CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, CIA, CNN, CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL ACTION CONFERENCE, CONVERSATION WITH AN AMERICAN WRITER (POEM), CORONAVIRUS RELIEF MONIES, COVID-19, CROOKS AND LIARS, CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, DAILY KOS, DAN BOWMAN, DAN SULLIVAN, DAVID BROOKS, DEMOCRATS, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, DONALD TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP JUNIOR, DRUDGE RETORT, EXTORTION, FBI, FIRST AMENDMENT, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, GENN FINE, GEORGE FLOYD, GEORGE W. BUSH, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE, GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HILLARY CLINTON, HOUSE FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE, HOUSE OVERSIGHT AND REFORM COMMITTEE, HUNTER BIDEN, IMMIGRANTS, IMPEACHMENT, IMPOUNDMENT CONTROL ACT, INSPECTORS GENERAL, INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY, JAKE SULLIVAN, JAKE TAPPER, JAMAL KHASHOGGI, JAMES COMEY, JAMES ROBART, JARED KUSHNER, JEFF SESSIONS, JOHN CORNYN, JOHN F. KENNEDY, JOHN ROBERTS, JON S. TIGAR, JOSEPH BIDEN, KELLY LOEFFER, KEVIN CRAMER, LAFAYETTE SQUARE, LAMAR ALEXANDER, LEON PANETTA, LINDSEY GRAHAM, MARCO RUBIO, MARTIN GUGINO, MEDIA MATTERS, MEIN KAMPF, MEXICO, MICHAEL FLYNN, MICHAEL HAYDEN, MICHAEL K. ATKINSON, MICK MULVANEY, MIKE PENCE, MITCH MCCONNELL, MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, NANCY PELOSI, NATALIA VESELNITSKAYA, NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NIKKI HALEY, NPR, PAUL MANAFORT, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REPUBLICANS, REUTERS, RINAT AKHMETSHIN, ROBERT MUELLER, ROBERT PAYNE, ROD ROSENSTEIN, ROGER STONE, RON DESANTIS, RON JOHNSON, RUSSIA, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SERGEY KISLYAK, SERGEY LAVROV, SLATE, ST. JOHN’S CHURCH, STEVE DAINES, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TED CRUZ, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE JUDICIARY, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOI), THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOK), THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE PRESS, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TREASON, TRUMP TOWER MEETING, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UKRAINE, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, UNITED STATES SENATE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, WHISTLEBLOWER, WHITE HOUSE BUDGET OFFICE, WONKETTE, YEVGENEY YEVTUSHENKO
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 18, 2024 at 12:37 am
Throughout his Presidency, Republicans continued to support Donald Trump despite a series of actions that would have normally resulted in impeachment.
Forgiven Crime #12: On July 16, 2018, Trump attended a press conference in Helsinki, Finland, with Russian President Vladimir Putin. There he blamed American Intelligence agencies—such as the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency—instead of Putin for Russia’s subversion of the 2016 Presidential election.
“I have President Putin,” said Trump. “He just said it’s not Russia. I will say this: I don’t see any reason why it would be.”
Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin in Helsinki
Forgiven Crime #13: Waging all-out war on the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of the press.
On February 17, 2017, Trump tweeted: “The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!”
Seven days later, appearing before the Conservative Political Action Conference on February 24, Trump said: “I want you all to know that we are fighting the fake news. It’s fake, phony, fake….I’m against the people that make up stories and make up sources. They shouldn’t be allowed to use sources unless they use somebody’s name. Let their name be put out there.”
Forgiven Crime #14: Waging all-out war on the independent judiciary
Trump repeatedly attacked Seattle U.S. District Judge James Robart, who halted Trump’s first anti-Islamic travel ban: “Just cannot believe a judge would put our country in such peril. If something happens blame him and court system. People pouring in. Bad!”
On October 20, 2018, Trump attacked U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar as an “Obama judge.” Tigar had ruled that the administration must consider asylum claims no matter where migrants cross the U.S. border.
The next day, Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts told the Associated Press: “We do not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges or Clinton judges. What we have is an extraordinary group of dedicated judges doing their level best to do equal right to those appearing before them.”
On Thanksgiving Day, 2018, Trump attacked Roberts—appointed by Republican President George W. Bush—on Twitter: “Sorry Chief Justice John Roberts, but you do indeed have ‘Obama judges,’ and they have a much different point of view than the people who are charged with the safety of our country.”
Forgiven Crime #15: Threatening members of Congress with treason charges for daring to challenge him.
Furious that Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) mocked him during a session of the House Intelligence Committee, Trump tweeted: “I want Schiff questioned at the highest level for Fraud & Treason…..”
“Rep. Adam Schiff illegally made up a FAKE & terrible statement, pretended it to be mine as the most important part of my call to the Ukrainian President, and read it aloud to Congress and the American people. It bore NO relationship to what I said on the call. Arrest for Treason?”
Adam Schiff
He judged House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “every bit as guilty as Liddle’ Adam Schiff for High Crimes and Misdemeanors, and even Treason. I guess that means that they, along with all of those that evilly ‘Colluded’ with them, must all be immediately Impeached!”
Forgiven Crime #16: He has lied so often—30,573 times by the end of his term, according to the Washington Post—that he’s universally distrusted, at home and abroad.
During the Cuban Missile Crisis, French President Charles de Gaulle was offered photographs taken by American spy planes of Russian missile emplacements in Cuba. De Gaulle waved them away, saying that, for him, the word of the President of the United States was enough.
Charles de Gaulle and John F. Kennedy
Today, no free world leader would take Trump’s word for anything.
Forgiven Crime #17: On December 22, 2018, Trump shut down the Federal government—because Democrats refused to fund his “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 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.”
- 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.
This lasted until January 25, 2019, when Trump caved to public pressure.
Forgiven Crime #18: Even while being investigated by Congress for trying to extort Ukraine to investigate his 2020 Presidential rival, Joseph Biden, Trump publicly urged China to investigate Biden and his son, Hunter.
Trump repeatedly denied he had strong-armed Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to smear former Vice President Joseph Biden. But on October 3, 2019, on the White House lawn, with TV cameras whirring, Trump said: “China should start an investigation into the Bidens.”
And to drive home the message, Trump warned: “I have a lot of options on China, but if they don’t do what we want, we have tremendous power.”
2016 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN, 2020 PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN, ABC NEWS, ADAM SCHIFF, ADOLF HITLER, ALTERNET, AMERICABLOG, AP, ARTICLES OF IMPEACHMENT, BABY BOOMER RESISTANCE, BORDER WALL, BUZZFEED, CBS NEWS, CHARLES DE GAULLE, CHINA, CHRIS CHRISTIE, CHRISTI GRIMM, CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, CIA, CNN, CONSERVATIVE POLITICAL ACTION CONFERENCE, CONVERSATION WITH AN AMERICAN WRITER (POEM), CORONAVIRUS RELIEF MONIES, COVID-19, CROOKS AND LIARS, CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, DAILY KOS, DAN BOWMAN, DAN SULLIVAN, DAVID BROOKS, DEMOCRATS, DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, DONALD TRUMP, DONALD TRUMP JUNIOR, DRUDGE RETORT, EXTORTION, FBI, FIRST AMENDMENT, FIVETHIRTYEIGHT, GENN FINE, GEORGE FLOYD, GEORGE W. BUSH, GOVERNMENT ACCOUNTABILITY OFFICE, GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN, HARPER’S MAGAZINE, HILLARY CLINTON, HOUSE FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE, HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE, HOUSE OVERSIGHT AND REFORM COMMITTEE, HUNTER BIDEN, IMMIGRANTS, IMPEACHMENT, IMPOUNDMENT CONTROL ACT, INSPECTORS GENERAL, INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY, JAKE SULLIVAN, JAKE TAPPER, JAMAL KHASHOGGI, JAMES COMEY, JAMES ROBART, JARED KUSHNER, JEFF SESSIONS, JOHN CORNYN, JOHN F. KENNEDY, JOHN ROBERTS, JON S. TIGAR, JOSEPH BIDEN, KELLY LOEFFER, KEVIN CRAMER, LAFAYETTE SQUARE, LAMAR ALEXANDER, LEON PANETTA, LINDSEY GRAHAM, MARCO RUBIO, MARTIN GUGINO, MEDIA MATTERS, MEIN KAMPF, MEXICO, MICHAEL FLYNN, MICHAEL HAYDEN, MICHAEL K. ATKINSON, MICK MULVANEY, MIKE PENCE, MITCH MCCONNELL, MOHAMMED BIN SALMAN, MOTHER JONES, MOVEON, MSNBC, NANCY PELOSI, NATALIA VESELNITSKAYA, NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY, NBC NEWS, NEWSWEEK, NIKKI HALEY, NPR, PAUL MANAFORT, PBS NEWSHOUR, POLITICO, POLITICUSUSA, RAW STORY, REPUBLICANS, REUTERS, RINAT AKHMETSHIN, ROBERT MUELLER, ROBERT PAYNE, ROD ROSENSTEIN, ROGER STONE, RON DESANTIS, RON JOHNSON, RUSSIA, SALON, SEATTLE TIMES, SERGEY KISLYAK, SERGEY LAVROV, SLATE, ST. JOHN’S CHURCH, STEVE DAINES, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TED CRUZ, THE ATLANTIC, THE CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE, THE DAILY BEAST, THE DAILY BLOG, THE GUARDIAN, THE HILL, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE JUDICIARY, THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOI), THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLF HITLER (BOOK), THE LOS ANGELES TIMES, THE NATION, THE NEW REPUBLIC, THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE PRESS, THE VILLAGE VOICE, THE WASHINGTON POST, THINKPROGRESS, TIME, TREASON, TRUMP TOWER MEETING, TRUTHDIG, TRUTHOUT, TWITTER, TWO POLITICAL JUNKIES, U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT, UKRAINE, UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, UNITED STATES SENATE, UPI, USA TODAY, VLADIMIR PUTIN, VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY, WHISTLEBLOWER, WHITE HOUSE BUDGET OFFICE, WONKETTE, YEVGENEY YEVTUSHENKO
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 17, 2024 at 12:12 am
Republicans have a long and shameful history of excusing Donald Trump’s vicious slanders and law-breaking.
Forgiven Crime #6: Republicans refused to condemn Trump’s blatant “bromance” with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
Since the end of World War II, no Republican Presidential candidate had repeatedly exchanged fulsome praise with a foreign leader hostile to the United States. Yet that is precisely what happened between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.
Thus Putin on Trump: “He is a bright personality, a talented person, no doubt about it. It is not up to us to appraise his positive sides, it is up to the U.S. voters. but, as we can see, he is an absolute leader in the presidential race.”
Vladimir Putin
And Trump on Putin: “It is always a great honor to be so nicely complimented by a man so highly respected within his own country and beyond. He’s running his country, and at least he’s a leader. Unlike what we have in this country”—a clear attack on then-President Barack Obama.
Donald Trump
Forgiven Crime #7: Republicans supported the treasonous meeting between Trump’s campaign managers and Russian Intelligence agents.
On July 9, 2016, high-ranking members of Trump’s Presidential campaign met with lobbyists tied to Putin. The meeting took place at Trump tower and 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 Democratic Presidential Nominee Hillary Clinton.
Forgiven Crime #8: Republicans supported Trump’s open—and treasonous—solicitation of Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election.
On July 22, 2016, at a press conference in Doral, Florida, Trump said: “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 has to be the first time that a major presidential candidate has actively encouraged a foreign power to conduct espionage against his political opponent,” Hillary for America policy adviser Jake Sullivan said in a statement. “That’s not hyperbole, those are just the facts. This has gone from being a matter of curiosity, and a matter of politics, to being a national security issue.”
“I find those kinds of statements to be totally outrageous because you’ve got now a presidential candidate who is, in fact, asking the Russians to engage in American politics,” said former CIA Director Leon Panetta, a Clinton surrogate. “I just think that’s beyond the pale.”
Hours later, the Main Intelligence Directorate in Moscow targeted Clinton’s personal office and hit more than 70 other Clinton campaign accounts.
Forgiven Crime #9: On May 9, 2017, Trump fired FBI Director James Comey for investigating Russia’s subversion of the 2016 Presidential race.
There were four reasons for this:
- Comey had refused to pledge his personal loyalty to Trump. Trump had made the “request” during a private dinner at the White House in January.
- Comey told Trump that he would always be honest with him. But that didn’t satisfy Trump’s demand that the head of the FBI act as his personal secret police chief—as was the case in the former Soviet Union.
- Trump had tried to coerce Comey into dropping the FBI’s investigation into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, for his secret ties to Russia and Turkey. Comey had similarly resisted that demand.
- Comey had recently asked the Justice Department to fund an expanded FBI investigation into well-documented contacts between Trump’s 2016 Presidential campaign and Russian Intelligence agents. The goal of that collaboration: To elect Trump over Hillary Clinton, a longtime foe of Russian President Putin.
James Comey
Forgiven Crime #10: On May 10, 2017. Trump met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak in the Oval Office—and gave them highly classified Israeli Intelligence about an Islamic State plot to turn laptops into concealable bombs.
Kislyak is reportedly a top recruiter for Russia’s SVR foreign intelligence agency. He has been closely linked with Jeff Sessions, then Attorney General, and fired National Security Adviser Mike Flynn.
“I just fired the head of the FBI,” Trump told the two dignitaries. “He was crazy, a real nut job. I faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off.”
Then, on May 11, Trump gave away his real reason for firing Comey:
Interviewed on NBC News by reporter Lester Holt, Trump said: “And in fact when I decided to just do it, I said to myself, I said ‘you know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made-up story, it’s an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should have won.'”
Forgiven Crime #11: Blatantly lying about the CIA’s findings in the brutal murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
On Thanksgiving Day, 2018, Trump said that the CIA hadn’t concluded that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had ordered it.
This was a lie—the agency had reached such a conclusion, based on a recording provided by the Turkish government and American Intelligence.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on January 16, 2024 at 12:11 am
On February 5, 2020, the Republican-dominated Senate—as expected—absolved President Donald Trump from trying to extort Ukraine into smearing a possible rival for the White House.
Only one Republican—Utah Senator Mitt Romney—had the moral courage to vote for conviction.
But this was not the first time Republicans sought to excuse Trump’s litany of crimes. Those efforts go back to the 2016 Presidential election.
Forgiven Crime #1: Not demanding that Trump quit the 2016 Presidential race—or demanding that he be indicted—for making a terrorist threat against his own party.
On March 16, 2016, Trump, the front-runner for the Republican Presidential nomination, issued a warning to his fellow Right-wingers: If he didn’t win the GOP nomination at the convention in July, his supporters would literally riot.
“I think we’ll win before getting to the convention. But I can tell you if we didn’t, if we’re 20 votes short or if we’re 100 short and we’re at 1,100 and somebody else is at 500 or 400…I don’t think you can say that we don’t get it automatically. I think you’d have riots.
“I think you would see problems like you’ve never seen before. I think bad things would happen. I really do. I wouldn’t lead it, but I think bad things would happen.”
Donald Trump
An NBC reporter summed it up as follows: “As Trump indicated, there is a very real possibility he might lose the nomination if he wins only a plurality of delegates thanks to party rules that allow delegates to support different candidates after the initial ballot.
“In that context, the message to Republicans was clear on [March 16]: ‘Nice convention you got there, shame if something happened to it.’”
Threatening his Republican and Democratic opponents with violence played a major role in Donald Trump’s campaign for President.
Forgiven Crime #2: Supporting his “dog-whistle” call for the assassination of Democratic Nominee Hillary Clinton.
On August 9, 2016, at a rally in Wilmington, North Carolina, Trump said: “Hillary [Clinton] wants to abolish, essentially abolish, the Second Amendment. If she gets to pick her [Supreme Court] judges, nothing you can do folks. Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know.”
Democrats—and responsible news media—immediately saw this for the “dog-whistle” signal it was.
“Don’t treat this as a political misstep,” Senator Christopher S. Murphy of Connecticut, who has called for stiffer gun laws, wrote on Twitter. “It’s an assassination threat, seriously upping the possibility of a national tragedy & crisis.”
“Well, let me say if someone else said that outside of the hall, he’d be in the back of a police wagon now, with the Secret Service questioning him,” said Michael Hayden, former head of the CIA and National Security Agency (NSA).
Hillary Clinton
Threats of violence continued to be made by Trump supporters right up to the day of the election.
- On July 29, Roger Stone, a notorious Right-wing political consultant acting as a Trump strategist, told Breitbart News: “The first thing Trump needs to do is begin talking about [voter fraud] constantly. If there’s voter fraud, this election will be illegitimate, the election of the winner will be illegitimate, we will have a constitutional crisis, widespread civil disobedience, and the government will no longer be the government.”
- At a town hall meeting where Trump’s Vice Presidential nominee Mike Pence appeared, a woman named Rhonda said: “For me personally, if Hillary Clinton gets in, I myself am ready for a revolution.”
- In Cincinnati, a Trump supporter threatened to forcibly remove Clinton from the White House if she won the race: “If she’s in office, I hope we can start a coup. She should be in prison or shot. That’s how I feel about it,”
- Dan Bowman, a 50-year-old contractor, said of Hillary Clinton, the Democratic nominee. “We’re going to have a revolution and take them out of office if that’s what it takes. There’s going to be a lot of bloodshed. But that’s what it’s going to take….I would do whatever I can for my country.”
Forgiven Crime #3: Republicans supported Trump’s call for his followers to intimidate Democratic voters at election time.
Trump encouraged his mostly white supporters to sign up online to be “election observers” to stop “Crooked Hillary from rigging this election.” He urged them to act as poll watchers in “other” [non-white] communities to ensure that things are “on the up and up.”
Many of his supporters promised to do so.
“Trump said to watch your precincts. I’m going to go, for sure,” said Steve Webb, a 61-year-old carpenter from Fairfield, Ohio.
“I’ll look for…well, it’s called racial profiling. Mexicans. Syrians. People who can’t speak American,” he said. “I’m going to go right up behind them. I’ll do everything legally. I want to see if they are accountable. I’m not going to do anything illegal. I’m going to make them a little bit nervous.”
Forgiven Crime #4 Threatening to fire Rod J. Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, who oversaw Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian subversion of the 2016 election.
Forgiven Crime #5: Threatening to fire Independent Counsel Robert Mueller during the summer of 2017, but was talked out of it by aides fearful that it would set off calls for his impeachment.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on January 15, 2024 at 12:39 am
“One man with courage makes a majority.”
—-Andrew Jackson
Donald Trump—facing four indictments and 91 criminal charges—is the clear front runner for the 2024 Republican Presidential nomination.
Since 2015, Republicans have a shameful history of excusing his blunders and criminality.
A classic example of this occurred on June 9, 2020.
That was when then-President Trump charged that a 75-year-old man who was seriously injured by police officers in Buffalo, New York, was part of a radical leftist “set up.”
The victim, Martin Gugino, is described as a peace activist associated with the Catholic Worker Movement.
On June 4, 2020, during nationwide 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, Gugino walked directly 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. The line of officers walked past Gugino as he lay on the ground with blood pooling around his head. One officer tried to check on him, but another patrolman told him to move on, and he did.
Martin Gugino falls backward
Enter Trump, who had been severely criticized for sending police and National Guardsmen to remove peaceful protesters from Lafayette Square so he could stage a photo-op at nearby St. John’s Church.
On June 9 he tweeted: “Buffalo protester shoved by Police could be an ANTIFA provocateur. 75 year old Martin Gugino was pushed away after appearing to scan police communications in order to black out the equipment. @OANN I watched, he fell harder than was pushed. Was aiming scanner. Could be a set up?”
As usual, Trump offered no evidence to back up his slander. And, as usual, Republicans refused to condemn him for his latest outrage.
Among those competing for “Most Cowardly Sycophant of the Year”:
- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (KY) refused to say whether Trump’s tweet was appropriate.
- Texas Senator John Cornyn claimed he had missed it, adding: “A lot of this stuff just goes over my head.”
- Georgia Senator Kelly Loeffler refused to answer a question about the President’s tweet as she hopped on an elevator along with an aide in the Capitol.
- Texas Senator Ted Cruz: “I don’t comment on the tweets.”
- Florida Senator Marco Rubio: “I didn’t see it. You’re telling me about it. I don’t read Twitter. I only write on it.”
- Alaska Senator Dan Sullivan said he hadn’t seen it, and then said: “I don’t want to comment right now. I’m on my way to a meeting. I’ll see it when I see it.”
- North Dakota Senator Kevin Cramer: “I’ll say this: I worry more about the country itself than I do about what President Trump 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.”
- Montana Senator Steve Daines refused to say whether Trump should have tweeted about the Buffalo incident.
So much for Republican profiles in courage.
On December 18, 2019, the House of Representatives approved two Articles of Impeachment against Trump for:
Article 1: Abuse of Power: For pressuring the president of Ukraine to assist his re-election campaign by smearing a potential rival for the White House.
Article 2: Obstruction of Congress: For obstructing Congress by blocking testimony of subpoenaed witnesses and refusing to provide documents in response to House subpoenas in the impeachment inquiry.
On July 25, 2019, Trump had “asked” Ukraine President Volodymir Zelensky to do him a “favor”: Find embarrassing “dirt” on former Vice President Joseph Biden and his son, Hunter.
Hunter had had business dealings in Ukraine. And Joseph Biden might be Trump’s Democratic opponent for the White House in 2020.
To underline the seriousness of his “request,” earlier in July Trump had told Mick Mulvaney, his White House chief of staff, to withhold $400 million in military aid Congress had approved for Ukraine, which is facing an increasingly aggressive Russia
But then a CIA whistleblower filed a complaint about the extortion attempt—and the media and Congress soon learned of it. And ever since, the evidence linking Trump to impeachable offenses had mushroomed.
On January 16, 2020, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) announced that the Trump administration broke the law when it withheld security aid to Ukraine.
Joseph Biden with Barack Obama
As Senate trial proceedings unfolded, the 53-majority Republican Senators:
- Refused to hear from eyewitnesses who could prove that Trump had committed impeachable offenses,
- Refused to provide evidence on Trump’s behalf—but attacked witnesses who had testified against him in the House.
- Attacked Joseph Biden and his son, Hunter, as if they were on trial—instead of having been the targets of Trump’s smear-attempt.
On February 5, 2020, the Republican-dominated Senate—as expected—absolved President Donald Trump from trying to extort Ukraine into smearing a possible rival for the White House.
Only one Republican—Utah Senator Mitt Romney—had the moral courage to vote for conviction.
But this was not the first time Republicans sought to excuse Trump’s litany of crimes. Those efforts date to the 2016 Presidential election.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on December 1, 2023 at 12:10 am
Most Americans believe the United States is immune from the same fates of democracies that have become dictatorships.
Not so New York University historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat. Appearing on the November 13 edition of The PBS Newshour, she warned:
“Since 2015, [Donald Trump] started….using his rallies and campaign events for radicalizing people. And he started saying, oh, in the old days, you used to hurt people. The problem is, Americans don’t hurt each other anymore.
Ruth Ben-Ghiat
Humblewarrior, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
“So now he’s going into a new phase of openly dehumanizing his targets so that will lessen the taboos in the future. And we see that, in 2025, he’s got plans for mass deportations, mass imprisonments and giant camps.
“So you need people to be less sensitive about violence, either committing it themselves or tolerating it. And I see that as….the reason he’s using this dehumanizing rhetoric now, to prepare people.”
A historical example: The Weimar Republic, the constitutional federal republic in Germany which lasted from November 9, 1918 to March 23, 1933.
During its 14-year existence, the Republic granted Germans rights they had never enjoyed—and which would be ruthlessly suppressed during the 12-year Third Reich that replaced it.
Among those rights:
- Freedom of speech
- Freedom of assembly
- Privacy of mail, telegraph, and telephone
- Free and secret elections
- All citizens were eligible for public office
But the Republic had dangerous enemies—Communists on the Left, and Nazis on the Right. And it was plagued by charges of illegitimacy and even treason—for its members’ having signed the Treaty of Versailles ending World War 1.
Adolf Hitler, joined the National Socialist German Workers (Nazi) Party in 1919—the year after World War 1 ended.
Adolf Hitler
In 1923, he staged a coup attempt in Bavaria—which was quickly and brutally put down by police. He was arrested and sentenced to less than a year in prison.
After that, Hitler decided that winning power through violence was no longer an option. He must win it through election—or appointment.
He repeatedly ran for the highest office in Germany—President—but never got a clear majority in a free election.
When the 1929 Depression struck Germany, the fortunes of Hitler’s Nazi party rose as the life savings of ordinary Germans fell. Streets echoed with bloody clashes between members of Hitler’s Nazi Stormtroopers and those of the German Communist Party.
Germany seemed on the verge of collapsing.
Germans desperately looked for a leader—a Fuhrer—who could somehow deliver them from the threat of financial ruin and Communist takeover.
In early 1933, members of his own cabinet persuaded aging German president, Paul von Hindenburg, that only Hitler’s appointment as Chancellor could do this.
Paul von Hindenburg
Hindenburg considered Hitler a dangerous radical. But he allowed himself to be convinced that, by putting Hitler in the Cabinet, he could be “boxed in” and thus controlled.
So, on January 30, 1933, he reluctantly appointed Adolf Hitler Chancellor—the equivalent of Attorney General.
On August 2, 1934, Hindenburg died, and Hitler immediately assumed the titles—and duties—of the offices of Chancellor and President.
His rise to total power was now complete.
In 2015, Donald Trump declared his candidacy for President.
At that time:
- The country was technically at war in the Middle East—but the fate of the United States was never threatened, as it had been during the Cold War.
- There was no draft; if you didn’t know someone in the military, you didn’t care about the casualties taking place.
- Thanks to government loans from Barack Obama, American capitalism had been saved from its own excesses during the George W. Bush administration.
- In contrast to the scandals of the Ronald Reagan Presidency, the Obama administration had been scandal-free.
- Nor had there been any major terrorist attacks on the country—as had occurred on 9/11 under President George W. Bush.
Yet—not 17 months after announcing his candidacy for President—enough Americans fervently embraced Donald Trump to give him the most powerful position in the country and the world.
.jpg/220px-Donald_Trump_August_19,_2015_(cropped).jpg)
Donald Trump
The message of Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign had been one of hope—“Yes, We Can!”
That of Donald Trump’s campaign was one of hatred toward everyone who was not an avid Trump supporter: “No, You Can’t!”
White supremacists comprised the overwhelming majority of the audiences at Trump rallies. They knew that demographics were steadily working against them. Birthrates among nonwhites were rising. By 2045, whites would make up less than 50 percent of the American population.
The 2008 election of the first black President had shocked Fascistic whites. His 2012 re-election had deprived them of the hope that 2008 had been an accident.
Then came 2016—and the possibility that a black President might be followed by a woman: Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
And the idea of a woman dictating to men was strictly too much for them to bear.
President Joseph Biden is 80—six years younger than Paul von Hindenburg when he died—and capable of dying literally any day.
His Vice President, Kamala Harris, is widely perceived as unprepared for the Presidency.
Meanwhile, Donald Trump—like Adolf Hitler—is waging an all-out campaign to make himself dictator. And—like Hitler—he’s using the democratic system to destroy democracy.
The year 2024 will see the re-election of Joseph Biden—or the end of American democracy.
Bureaucracybuster's Blog 
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REPUBLICANS: WEAPONIZING HATRED: PART FOUR (END)
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on April 5, 2024 at 12:13 amTo understand Republicans’ behavior, you need to understand the word “projection.”
As defined by psychologists, “projection” means unconsciously taking unwanted emotions or traits you don’t like about yourself and attributing them to someone else.
Except that, with Republicans, there is nothing unconscious about attributing their own evil intentions and/or actions to those they hate.
To cite a current example: “Weaponizing” is a word now in vogue among Republicans. As in: “By appointing a Special Counsel to investigate former President Donald Trump, the Department of Justice (DOJ) proves that Democrats have weaponized Federal law enforcement.”
Republicans conveniently refuse to say why the Justice Department appointed former DOJ official Jack Smith to that position: Because, before leaving the White House, Trump shipped more than 300 highly classified documents in 15 boxes to his estate in Mar-a-Lago.
Jack Smith
As an ex-President, he had no right to possess any of these documents.
Moreover, he not only illegally took these documents, he lied to government investigators that he had done so. It took an August 8, 2022 FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago to retrieve them.
Then there’s the matter of the January 6, 2021 defendants.
They are so named because, on that date, Trump 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 former Vice President Joe Biden: 306 votes for Biden, compared with 232 for Trump.
The Stormtrumpers marched to the United States Capitol—and quickly brushed aside Capitol Police, who made little effort to arrest or shoot them.
Capitol Police facing off with Stormtrumpers
Stormtrumpers inside the Capitol Building
More than three hours passed before police—using riot gear, shields and batons—retook control of the Capitol.
By December, 2023, 728 participants in the coup attempt had pleaded guilty. Another 166 defendants had been convicted at trial; a total of 745 defendants have been sentenced.
Yet Republicans—most notably Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA)—have depicted these coup supporters as persecuted martyrs.
On March 24, 2022, members of the Republicans’ House Oversight Committee toured a Washington, D.C. jail where some of these defendants were held.
“Their due process rights are being violated. And they have been mistreated and treated as political prisoners,” Greene told reporters after the tour.
Marjorie Taylor Greene
Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), another member of the tour, exchanged hugs with with Micki Witthoeft, the mother of Ashli Babbitt. Babbitt had been shot by police as she forced her way into the House Chamber where members of Congress were sheltering in place.
Republicans‘ fixation on “weaponization” centers on the Trump’s facing 91 criminal offenses in four criminal cases.
These relate to Trump’s
Donald Trump is the first former president in American history to be criminally indicted.
For Republicans, prosecutors’ daring to hold Trump accountable for his litany of crimes amounts to “election interference.” As if winning office through the efforts of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin has conferred “untouchable” status upon him.
As a result, Republicans have made unprecedented efforts to undermine these prosecutions.
Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., a Trump ally who sits on the Appropriations Committee, introduced two amendments to eliminate federal funding for all three of Trump’s prosecutors—Special Counsel Jack Smith, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis and Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.
Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., is also trying to cut off funding for Smith’s office.
Republicans have in the past championed “states’ rights” against “federal overreach.” But now that their former President finds himself facing the consequences of his own criminality, they are eager to abort state-level prosecutions.
At the same time, they slander President Joseph Biden as “weaponizing” the Justice Department against his political rival.
In George Orwell’s classic novel, 1984, the dictatorship ruling Oceania offers the following slogan for its citizens:
WAR IS PEACE
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
Republicans would have Americans believe
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