Posts Tagged ‘RUDY GIULIANI’
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In History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on February 3, 2022 at 12:10 am
It takes courage to stand up to dictators. These Russians—and Americans—did so.
And paid the price.
Next up: Nikolai Sergeyvich Zhilayev (pronounced Zill-lay-ev) was a Russian musicologist and the teacher of several 20th-century Russian composers.
Among these: Dimitri Shostakovich (September 25, 1906 – August 9, 1975)
Among his friends—to his ultimate misfortune—was Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky, the former military hero now falsely condemned and executed as a traitor by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.
In 1938, Zhilayev (November 18, 1881 – January 20, 1938) also became a casualty of what has become known as The Great Terror.
In his posthumously-published memoirs, Testimony, Shostakovich, his pupil and friend, described how Zhilayev faced his end with a calmness that awed even the NKVD (the predecessor to the KGB) secret police sent to arrest him.
Dimitri Shostakovich
“He had a large picture of Tukhachevsky in his room, and after the announcement that Tukhachevsky had been shot as a traitor to the homeland, Zhilayev did not take the picture down.
“I don’t know if I can explain how heroic a deed that was….As soon as the next poor soul was declared an enemy of the people, everyone destroyed in a panic everything connected with that person….
“And naturally, photographs flew into the fire first, because if someone informed on you, reported that you had a picture of an enemy of the people, it meant certain death.
“Zhilayev wasn’t afraid. When they came for him, Tukhachevsky’s prominently hung portrait amazed even the executioners.”
“What, it’s still up?” one of the secret police asked.
“The time will come,” Zhilayev replied, “when they’ll erect a monument to him.”
As, in fact, has happened.
Meanwhile, Stalin has been universally condemned as one of history’s greatest tyrants.
Third hero—Brett Crozier, the former commanding officer of the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt.
Graduating from the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1992, he received his Master’s Degree in National Security and Strategic Studies from the Naval War College in 2007.
From 2017 to 2018 he commanded the USS Blue Ridge. In November, 2019, he was given command of the nuclear aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt.
On March 24, 2020, reports circulated that three members of the crew had tested positive for COVID-19. The next day the number of stricken sailors increased to eight. A few days later, it was “dozens.” The sailors reportedly became ill at sea, two weeks after a port call at Danang, Vietnam.
The initial cases were airlifted to a military hospital. The Roosevelt was ordered to Guam. After the ship docked on March 27, 2020, all 5,000 aboard were ordered to be tested for the virus. But only about 100 stricken sailors were allowed to leave the ship. The rest remained on board.
On March 30, Crozier emailed a four-page internal letter to multiple Naval officials, pleading to have the majority of the crew evacuated and quarantined on shore. Given the crowded sleeping quarters and narrow passageways of the vessel, Crozier wrote that it was impossible to follow social distancing and quarantine procedures:
“This will require a political solution but it is the right thing to do. We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die. If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset—our Sailors….
“This is a necessary risk. Keeping over 4,000 young men and women on board the TR is an unnecessary risk and breaks faith with those Sailors entrusted to our care.”
Brett Crozier
Crozier sent his letter via a non-secure, unclassified email to 20 to 30 recipients, as well as the captain’s immediate chain of command. He reportedly believed that his immediate supervisor would not allow him to send it.
And his superior later confirmed that he would not have allowed Crozier to send it.
On March 31, someone leaked the letter to the San Francisco Chronicle, which published it.
On April 1, the Navy ordered the aircraft carrier evacuated. A skeleton crew of 400 remained aboard to maintain the nuclear reactor, the fire-fighting equipment, and the ship’s galley.
On April 2, Crozier was relieved of command by acting United States Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly.
By that time, about 114 crew members—out of a total of around 4,000—reportedly tested positive for COVID-19.
As Crozier disembarked, sailors loudly saluted him with a standing ovation: “Cap-tain Cro-zier!”
Modly claimed that Crozier’s letter “raised alarm bells unnecessarily. It undermines our efforts and the chain of command’s efforts to address this problem, and creates a panic and this perception that the Navy’s not on the job, that the government’s not on the job, and it’s just not true.”
Actually, the Trump administration had frittered away January and February, with President Donald Trump giving multiple—and misleading—press conferences. In these, he played down the dangers of COVID-19, saying that “we’re on top of it”—even as the virus spread across the country.
“It was a betrayal. And I can tell you one other thing: because he did that he put it in the public’s forum and it is now a big controversy in Washington, DC,” continued Modly. [Italics added]
This was the United States Navy under Donald Trump—who threw “betrayal” and “treason” at anyone who dared reveal the truth about institutional crimes and failures.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on February 2, 2022 at 1:38 am
…A truly great man is ever the same under all circumstances. And if his fortune varies, exalting him at one moment and oppressing him at another, he himself never varies, but always preserves a firm courage, which is so closely interwoven with his character that everyone can readily see that the fickleness of fortune has no power over him.
The conduct of weak men is very different. Made vain and intoxicated by good fortune, they attribute their success to merits which they do not possess. And this makes them odious and insupportable to all around them. And when they have afterwards to meet a reverse of fortune, they quickly fall into the other extreme, and become abject and vile.
—Niccolo Machiavelli, The Discourses
Four heroes, three villains.
Two of the heroes are Russians; three are Americans.
The villains: One Russian (actually, Georgian); two American.
First up—in order of disappearance: Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky (pronounced too-ka-chev-sky).
Tukhachevsky (February 4, 1893 – June 12, 1937) was a major Soviet military leader and theoretician from 1918 to 1937.
He commanded the Soviet Western Front during the Russian-Polish War (1920-21) and served as Chief of Staff of the Red Army (1925-1928).
He fought to modernize Soviet armament, as well as develop airborne, aviation and mechanized forces. Almost singlehandedly, he created the theory of deep operations for Soviet forces.
Mikhail Tukhachevsky
All of these innovations would reap huge dividends when the Soviet Union faced the lethal fury of Adolf Hitler’s Wehrmacht.
In 1936, Tukhachevsky warned Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin that Nazi Germany might attack without warning—and ignite a long and murderous war.
Stalin—the son of a Georgian cobbler—resented Tukhachevsky’s coming from a noble family. A monumental egomaniac, he also hated that Tukhachevesky’s fame rivaled his own.
Warned of the approaching German danger, Stalin shouted: “What are you trying to do—frighten Soviet authority?”
Joseph Stalin
The attack that Tukhachevsky warned against came five years later—on June 22, 1941, leaving at least 26 million Russians dead.
But Tukhachevsky wasn’t alive to command a defense.
The 1930s were a frightening and dangerous time to be alive in the Soviet Union. In 1934, Stalin, seeing imaginary enemies everywhere, ordered a series of purges that lasted right up to the German invasion.
An example of Stalin’s paranoia occurred one day while the dictator walked through the Kremlin corridors with Admiral Ivan Isakov. Officers of the NKVD (the predecessor to the KGB) stood guard at every corner.
“Every time I walk down the corridors,” said Stalin, “I think: Which one of them is it? If it’s this one, he will shoot me in the back. But if I turn the corner, the next one can shoot me in the face.”
In 1937-38, the Red Army fell prey to Stalin’s paranoia.
Its victims included:
- Three of five marshals (five-star generals);
- Thirteen of 15 army commanders (three- and four-star generals);
- Fifty of 57 army corps commanders; and
- One hundred fifty-four out of 186 division commanders.
And heading the list of those marked for death was Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky.
Arrested on May 22, 1937, he was interrogated and tortured. As a result, he “confessed” to being a German agent plotting to overthrow Stalin and seize power.
On his confession, which survives in the archives, his bloodstains can clearly be seen.
On June 11, 1937, the Soviet Supreme Court convened a special military tribunal to try Tukhachevsky and eight generals for treason.
It was a sham: The accused were denied defense attorneys, and could not appeal the verdict—-which was foregone: Death.
In a Russian version of poetic justice, five of the eight generals who served as Tukhachevsky’s judges were themselves later condemned and executed as traitors.
Within hours of the verdict, Tukhachevsky was summoned from his cell and shot once in the back of the head.
From 1937 until 1956, Tukhachevsky was officially declared a traitor and fifth-columnist.
Then, on February 25, 1957, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev delivered his bombshell “Secret Speech” to the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
In this, he denounced Stalin (who had died in 1953) as a ruthless tyrant responsible for the slaughter of millions of innocent men, women and children. He condemned Stalin for creating a “personality cult” around himself, and for so weakening the Red Army that Nazi Germany was able to easily overrun half of the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1943.
On January 31, 1957, Tukhachevsky and his co-defendants were declared innocent of all charges and were “rehabilitated.”
Today, he is once again—rightly—considered a Russian hero and military genius. And Stalin is universally—and rightly—seen as a blood-stained tyrant.
Mikhail Tukhachevsky appears on a 1963 Soviet Union postage stamp
Next hero: Nikolai Sergeyvich Zhilayev (pronounced Zill-lay-ev)
Zhilayev (November 18, 1881 – January 20, 1938) was a Russian musicologist and the teacher of several 20th-century Russian composers. Among these: Dimitri Shostakovich.
Zhilayev, a member of the Russian Academy of Art-Sciences, taught at the Moscow Conservatory. Among his friends—to his ultimate misfortune—was Mikhail Tukhachevsky.
In 1938, he, too, became a casualty of what has become known as The Great Terror.
In his posthumously-published memoirs, Testimony, Shostakovich, his pupil and friend, described how Zhilayev faced his end with a calmness that awed even the NKVD secret police sent to arrest him.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on January 11, 2022 at 12:11 am
Merrick Brian Garland has served as:
- A special assistant to Attorney General Benjamin Civviletti (1979 – 1981).
- Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (1997 – 2021).
- Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (2013 – 2020).
Yet, as United States Attorney General, he is now presiding over the closing days of the American Republic.
On January 6, 2021, President Donald Trump incited a treasonous attack on the United States Capitol Building. There, the United States Senate, with Vice President Mike Pence presiding, would certify states’ Electoral College results of that election.
Since former Vice President Joseph Biden had gotten 306 votes compared to 232 for Trump, the outcome was already known. And Trump, who had often “joked” about becoming “President-for-Life,” wanted that verdict overturned.
The Stormtrumpers marched to the United States Capitol—and quickly brushed aside Capitol Police, who made little effort to arrest Only or shoot them.
Only one rioter was shot: Ashli Babbitt, as she climbed through a shattered window in a barricaded door
By comparison: At the battle of the Alamo, 200 Texan defenders killed 600 Mexican attackers.
Stormtrumpers attacking Capitol police
After giving his inflammatory speech, Trump returned to the White House. There he gleefully watched his handiwork on television—and refused to call off his supporters or call the National Guard.
More than three hours passed before police—using riot gear, shields and batons—retook control of the Capitol.
By January 5, 2022, more than 700 Stormtrumpers have been arrested and charged.
- More than 150 defendants have pleaded guilty.
- About one-tenth of these—71—have been sentenced by January 1, 2022.
- The most common charge pleaded to is illegally parading or demonstrating in the Capitol, a misdemeanor.
- Of those who have been sentenced, fewer than half have received prison time.
- The median prison sentence to date is 45 days.
- Another
Yet no major Trump supporter has been arrested, let alone indicted. Such as:
- Trump’s attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who cried to the demonstrators, “Let’s have trial by combat!”
- Donald Trump, Jr., who, just hours before the Trump mob stormed Congress, threatened Republican lawmakers at a large rally outside the White House: “These guys better fight for Trump. Because if they’re not, guess what? I’m going to be in your backyard in a couple of months!”
- Rep, Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) who incited the Trump crowd with: “Today is the day American patriots start taking down names and kicking ass!”
- Donald Trump. He not only incited his followers to attack the Capitol, he has spent the last six months spreading poisonous lies that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him through “massive” voter fraud. As a result, he continues to undermine the democratic process as he terrorizes the Republican party to stand behind him.
There is a historical precedent for this, and it does not bode well for our Republic.
On November 9, 1923, Nazi Party Fuhrer Adolf Hitler tried to overthrow the government in Munich, Bavaria.
About 2,000 Nazis marched to the center of Munich, where they confronted heavily-armed police. A shootout erupted, killing 16 Nazis and four policemen.
Hitler was injured during the clash, but managed to escape. Two days later, he was arrested and charged with treason.
Put on trial, he found himself treated as a celebrity by a judge sympathetic to Right-wing groups. He was allowed to brutally cross-examine witnesses and even make inflammatory speeches.
At the end of the trial, he was convicted of treason and sentenced to five years’ imprisonment.
Serving time in Landsberg Prison, in Bavaria. he wrote his infamous book, Mein Kampf-–“My Struggle.” Part autobiography, part political treatise, it laid out his future plans—including the extermination of the Jews and the conquest of the Soviet Union.
Adolf Hitler leaving Landsberg Prison, December, 20, 1924
Nine months later, he was released on parole—by authorities loyal to the authoritarian Right instead of the newly-created Weimar Republic.
Hitler immediately began rebuilding the shattered Nazi party—and deciding on a new strategy to gain power. Never again would he resort to armed force. He would win office by election—or intrigue.
On January 30, 1933, those intrigues made him Chancellor of Germany.
Writes historian Volker Ullrich, in his monumental 2016 biography, Hitler: Ascent 1889 – 1939: “Historians have perennially tried to answer the question of whether Hitler’s rise to power could have been halted….
“There were repeated opportunities to end Hitler’s run of triumphs. The most obvious one was after the failed Putsch of November 1923. Had the Munich rabble-rouser been forced to serve his full five-year term of imprisonment in Landsberg, it is extremely unlikely that he would have been able to restart his political career.”
Thus, it isn’t just what happens that can influence the course of history. Often, it’s what doesn’t happen that has at least as great a result.
A 10- to 20-year prison sentence for Donald Trump would scuttle his chances for becoming dictator—and send a warning message to other Right-wingers.
The United States Justice Department now faces the same choice faced by the judges of the Weimar Republic: Enforce the law against a ruthless tyrant—or stand by while he mounts a comeback.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on January 10, 2022 at 12:10 am
After graduating from Harvard Law School, Merrick Brian Garland served as a special assistant to Attorney General Benjamin Civviletti from 1979 to 1981.
As a federal prosecutor, he played a leading role in the investigation and prosecution of the Oklahoma City bombers.
He then served as judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (1997 – 2021) and then as Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (2013 – 2020).
In 2016, President Barack Obama nominated him to serve as an associate Justice of the Supreme Court to fill the vacancy created by the death of Antonin Scalia. But Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused to hold a hearing or vote on your nomination.
Merrick Garland
Yet, as United States Attorney General, he is now presiding over the closing days of the American Republic.
As the bestselling book, Peril, makes clear:
- There was a detailed plan by Republicans to illegally retain President Donald Trump in office.
- The votes of 81 million Americans who had voted for former Vice President Joseph Biden would have been scrapped in what was intended to be a Right-wing coup.
According to authors Bob Woodward and Robert Costa:
- Attorney John Eastman first proposed the plan to Vice President Mike Pence on January 4 in the Oval Office with Trump in attendance.
- The memo called for throwing out the election results in seven states under the false claim that those states had used alternate electors.
- Eastman’s memo was sent to Senator Mile Lee (R-Utah) and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who served as one of Trump’s attorneys at the time.
- They tried to convince Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) that there was rampant fraud in the 2020 election.
- Both Graham and Lee reportedly argued that the fraud claims had no merit.
On January 6, the United States Senate, with Vice President Mike Pence presiding, would certify states’ Electoral College results of that election.
Since Biden had gotten 306 votes compared to 232 for Trump, the outcome was already known.
On that morning, Trump tried to convince Pence to reject the electoral votes that had been cast for Biden. This would mean flipping the results of the 2020 Presidential election to give him a win.
Pence replied that he lacked the power to overturn those results.
But as Pence went off to the Capitol Building housing the Senate and House of Representatives, Trump had one last card to play.
Mike Pence
For weeks Trump had ordered his legions of Right-wing Stormtrumpers to descend on Washington, D.C. by January 6.
On December 20, he had tweeted: “Statistically impossible to have lost the 2020 Election. Big protest in DC on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!”
In tweets, he promoted the rally again on December 27 and 30, and January 1.
On January 6, Trump appeared at the Ellipse, a 52-acre park south of the White House fence and north of Constitution Avenue and the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
A stage had been set up for him to address tens of thousands of his supporters, who eagerly awaited him.
Trump ordered them to march on the Capitol building to express their anger at the voting process and to intimidate their elected officials to reject the results.
Donald Trump addresses his Stormtrumpers
“All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by a bold and radical left Democrats which is what they are doing and stolen by the fake news media.
“Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore, and that is what this is all about. And to use a favorite term that all of you people really came up with, we will stop the steal….
“And after this, we’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down to the Capitol. And we’re going to cheer on our brave Senators and Congressmen and women and we’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them.
“Because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong. We have come to demand that Congress do the right thing and only count the electors who have been lawfully slated.”
The Stormtrumpers marched to the United States Capitol—and quickly brushed aside Capitol Police.
Capitol Police facing off with Stormtrumpers
Among their outrages:
- Members of the mob attacked police with chemical agents and lead pipes.
- Many of the attackers wore body armor and two-way radio headsets similar to those used by police.
- Many of the lawmakers’ offices were occupied and vandalized—including that of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a favorite Right-wing target.
- Rioters yelled “Hang Mike Pence!” and “Hang Nancy Pelosi”
- Pipe bombs ere found at the Democratic National Committee and Republican National Committee headquarters offices.
- Some rioters carried Confederate flags or Nazi emblems. Others carried crosses and signs saying, “Jesus Saves” and “Jesus 2020.”
- At least 140 police officers were injured.
- More than $1 million dollars of damage was done to the Capitol building.
- Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT) yelled at several fellow Republicans who were challenging President-elect Biden’s electoral votes: “This is what you’ve gotten, guys!”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 6, 2022 at 12:12 am
On January 6, 2021, thousands of Right-wing Donald Trump supporters—many of them armed—stormed the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.
After overwhelming the Capitol Police force, they damaged and occupied parts of the building for several hours. Legislators huddled fearfully while National Guard units from several states finally evicted the insurrectionists.
The Capitol attack marked the first time in American history when a defeated Presidential candidate violently sought to remain in office.
It may also mark a desperately-needed change in the priorities of American law enforcement, which has traditionally focused on Left-wingers—and especially blacks—as the country’s mortal enemies.
Option 2: The Justice Department could begin waging all-out war on Right-wing militia groups planning to unleash violence in 2024.
Numerous commentators have noted the contrast between the tepid police response to the Capitol attack by white Right-wingers and the brutal crackdown on peaceful liberal blacks protesting the murder of George Floyd in Washington D.C. on June 1, 2020.
U.S. Park Police and National Guard troops used tear gas, rubber bullets, flash-bang grenades, horses, shields and batons to clear protesters from Lafayette Square—so Trump could stage a photo-op at St. John’s Episcopal Church.
After 9/11, American law enforcement and Intelligence agencies initiated major reforms to focus on Islamic terrorism.
A similar reform effort, focusing on Right-wing terrorism, could include the following:
- The FBI’s designating Right-wing political and terrorist groups as the Nation’s #1 enemy.
- Reviving the FBI’s legendary COINTELPRO (“Counterintelligence Program”) that destroyed the Ku Klux Klan in the late 1960s. Among the methods that can be used:
- Turning the Bureau’s powerful arsenal—bugs, wiretaps, informants, SWAT teams—on them.
- Buying the cooperation of informants within Right-wing organizations.
- Conducting “black bag jobs” to steal membership lists of of Right-wing organizations.
- Breaking up the marriages of prominent Right-wingers by circulating rumors of their infidelity among their wives.
- Informing the employers of known Right-wing terrorists of their employees’ criminal activity, resulting in the firing of untold numbers of them.
- Contacting the news media to publicize the arrests of prominent Right-wing leaders.
- When Right-wing terrorists target Federal law enforcement agents and/or their families for harassment or worse, they can be targeted for similar intimidation or removal.
FBI SWAT member
A revised COINTELPRO could be supplemented by the following:
- Creating tip hotlines for reporting illegal Right-wing activities—and offering rewards for information that leads to arrests.
- Prosecuting militia groups for violating Federal firearms laws.
- Treating calls for the murder of members of Congress—as Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene has done—as felonies punishable by lengthy imprisonment.
- Prosecuting Right-wing leaders involved in the treasonous assault on the United States Capitol Building.
- Prosecuting as “accessories to treason” all those Republican members of Congress who stoked Right-wing anger by lying that the 2020 Presidential election had been stolen from Donald Trump, although every objective news source proved he had lost.
- Directing the Treasury Department’s Terrorist Finance Tracking Program (TFTP) at fundamentalist Christian churches that finance Right-wing terrorism-–just as it halts the financing of Islamic terrorist groups by Islamic organizations.
- Using drones, planes and/or helicopters to provide security against similar Right-wing terror demonstrations—especially in Washington, D.C.
- Using the Federal Communications Commission to ban Fox News—the Nation’s #1 Right-wing propaganda network—from representing itself as a legitimate news network, and requiring that its stories carry labels warning viewers: “This is Right-wing propaganda, NOT news.”
- Encouraging victims of Right-wing hate-speech to file libel/slander lawsuits against their abusers—such as the parents of murdered children at Sandy Hook Elementary School successfully did against Alex Jones.
- Using Federal anti-terrorist laws to arrest, prosecute and imprison Right-wingers who openly carry firearms and threaten violence, even if states allow such display of firearms.
- Seizing the assets of individuals and organizations found guilty of Right-wing terrorism offenses.
Option 3: The “Caligula Solution.”
Like Donald Trump, the Roman emperor Gaius Caligula delighted in humiliating others. His fatal mistake was taunting Cassius Chaerea, a member of his own bodyguard.
On January 22 41 A.D. Chaerea and several other bodyguards hacked Caligula to death with swords before other guards could save him.
Trump has similarly behaved arrogantly toward his Secret Service guards.
- He forced them to work without pay during his 35-day government shutdown in 2018.
- He also forced them to accompany him to COVID-infected states—both during the Presidential campaign and afterward.
- Many of them have been stricken with this often lethal disease as a result.
Even as an ex-President, Trump continues to insult anyone who challenges him. This includes not only Democrats but Republicans he feels don’t pay him sufficient homage—or, worse, dare to oppose him for the party’s 2024 Presidential nomination.
At the same time, he publicly exposes himself to a potential assassin virtually every day. And the mere presence of bodyguards is no guarantee against assassination.
Presidential candidate George C. Wallace was shot and paralyzed by a gunman while mingling with supporters in a Maryland shopping center in 1972. And President Ronald Reagan was shot and almost killed in 1981 while walking to his bulletproof limousine in Washington, D.C.
Both men were under protection by the U.S. Secret Service at the time.
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In Bureaucracy, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Social commentary on January 5, 2022 at 12:16 am
Can a Republican coup—or a Republican-inspired civil war—be prevented?
In theory, yes—if the administration of President Joseph Biden is willing to use the same methods America has applied against foreign enemies.
Option 1: The Justice Department could wage all-out war on state and Federal Republican politicians plotting to subvert American democracy.
By December 14, 2021—11 months after the January 6 attack on the United States Capitol—more than 726 Stormtrumper rioters had been arrested and charged.
Yet no major Donald Trump supporter has been arrested, let alone criminally indicted.
- NOT Trump’s attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who cried to the demonstrators, “Let’s have trial by combat!”
- NOT Donald Trump, Jr., who, just hours before the Trump mob stormed Congress, threatened Republican lawmakers at a large rally outside the White House: “These guys better fight for Trump. Because if they’re not, guess what? I’m going to be in your backyard in a couple of months!”
- And, above all, NOT Donald Trump. He not only incited his followers to attack the Capitol, he has spent the last year spreading poisonous lies that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him through “massive” voter fraud. As a result, he continues to undermine the democratic process as he terrorizes the Republican party to stand behind him.
Had anyone but a President orchestrated such an attack on Congress, the Justice Department would have come down on him with a vengeance.
Obstructing Congressional or administrative proceedings is a Federal offense. According to 18 U.S.C 1505: It’s a felony, punishable by imprisonment of five to eight years if domestic or international terrorism is involved.
Before a prosecution can be initiated, three essential conditions must be met:
- There must be a proceeding pending before a department or agency of the United States.
- The defendant must know that a proceeding was occurring.
- S/he must have intentionally tried to “corruptly” influence, obstruct or impede the pending proceeding.
Every one of the men and women who stormed the Capitol Building stands guilty of violating U.S.C. 1505.
And so do those who egged them on—such as Missouri Rep. Mo Brooks and Missouri Senator Josh Hawley.
Still other Republican Congressional members played a coup-supporting role in trying to overturn the results of a legitimate Presidential election.
Hours after the Capitol attack, 147 Republicans who hid during the attempted coup returned to the House and Senate floors and voted just as Trump wanted them to: To overturn the election results in his favor, based on lies about widespread voter fraud.
The Justice Department could charge every one of these Congressional members as an accessory to terrorism under the USA Patriot Act for “activities that…appear to be intended…to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion [and]…occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.”
United States Department of Justice
Had this happened early in 2021—by March or April at the latest—this would have sent a message that even the most ardent Trump supporters would have understood.
In addition, this would have deprived Republicans of the numerical power to obstruct the legislative agenda of the Joseph Biden administration.
Those members indicted would have been forced to spend most of their time strategizing with their attorneys to stay out of prison. They would have been forced to pony up huge legal fees—which would have had to come from funds intended for re-election campaigns.
(Contrary to popular belief, indictment—or even a felony conviction—of a member of Congress does not force him to vacate his seat.)
Option 2: The Justice Department could begin waging all-out war on Right-wing militia groups planning to unleash violence in 2024.
According to American political scientist George Michael: “Right-wing terrorism and violence has a long history in America.”
The Supreme Court’s decision, in Brown v. Board of Education (1954), striking down segregated facilities, unleashed a wave of Ku Klux Klan violence against blacks, civil rights activists and Jews. Between 1956 and 1963, an estimated 130 bombings ravaged the South.
Ku Klux Klan flag
During the 1980s, more than 75 Right-wing extremists were prosecuted in the United States for acts of terrorism, carrying out six attacks.
The April 19, 1995 attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City by Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols killed 168 people. It was the deadliest act of domestic terrorism in the history of the United States until 9/11.
By 2020, Right-wing terrorism accounted for the majority of terrorist attacks and plots in the United States. A 2017 Government Accountability Office report stated that Right-wing extremist groups were responsible for 73% of violent extremist incidents resulting in deaths since September 12, 2001.
Right-wing violence rose sharply during the Barack Obama administration and especially during the Presidency of Donald Trump. His remark after the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that there were “some very fine people on both sides” convinced white supremacists that he favored their goals, if not their methods.
On January 6, 2021, thousands of Right-wing Donald Trump supporters—many of them armed—stormed the Capitol Building in Washington, D.C.
Their goal: To stop members of Congress from counting Electoral Votes cast in the 2020 Presidential election, from which former Vice President Joseph R. Biden was expected to emerge the winner.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 4, 2022 at 12:54 am
“For more than a year now, with tacit and explicit support from their party’s national leaders, state Republican operatives have been building an apparatus of election theft. Elected officials in Arizona, Texas, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and other states have studied Donald Trump’s crusade to overturn the 2020 election.”
So opened a frightening, December 9, 2021 article in The Atlantic: “Trump’s Next Coup Has Already Begun.”
Wrote Barton Gellman:
“They have noted the points of failure and have taken concrete steps to avoid failure next time. Some of them have rewritten statutes to seize partisan control of decisions about which ballots to count and which to discard, which results to certify and which to reject.
“They are driving out or stripping power from election officials who refused to go along with the plot last November, aiming to replace them with exponents of the Big Lie. They are fine-tuning a legal argument that purports to allow state legislators to override the choice of the voters.”
Can this be pre-empted?
In theory, yes—provided those in the administration of President Joseph Biden are willing to use the same methods America has applied against foreign enemies.
Option 1: The Justice Department could wage all-out war on state and Federal Republican politicians plotting to subvert American democracy.
Seal of the Justice Department
The place to start would be with former President Donald Trump.
On January 6, 2021, he incited—on TV—thousands of his fanatical supporters to storm the United States Capitol Building where Electoral College votes in the 2020 Presidential election were being counted.
Trump knew that former Vice President Joseph Biden had received more Electoral College votes than he had—306 to 232.
And he wanted that vote-count stopped—thus allowing him to remain in office as “President-for-Life.”
For weeks Trump had ordered his legions of Right-wing Stormtrumpers to descend on Washington, D.C. on January 6.
On December 20, 2020, he had tweeted: “Statistically impossible to have lost the 2020 Election. Big protest in DC on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!”
In tweets, he promoted the rally again on December 27 and 30, and January 1.
Thus, through his lies, he had aroused the fury of his Right-wing supporters.
It would take only his command to send it hurtling at his perceived enemies: Those who would dare elect Joseph Biden in his place.
Donald Trump addresses his Stormtrumpers
On January 6, Trump appeared at the Ellipse, a 52-acre park south of the White House fence and north of Constitution Avenue and the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
A stage had been set up for him to address tens of thousands of his supporters, who eagerly awaited him.
Trump ordered them to march on the Capitol building to express their anger at the voting process and to intimidate their elected officials to reject the results:
“And after this, we’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down to the Capitol. And we’re going to cheer on our brave Senators and Congressmen and women and we’re probably not going to be cheering so much for some of them.
“Because you’ll never take back our country with weakness. You have to show strength and you have to be strong. We have come to demand that Congress do the right thing and only count the electors who have been lawfully slated.”
The Stormtrumpers marched to the United States Capitol—and quickly overwhelmed Capitol Police.
- Members of the mob attacked police with chemical agents or lead pipes.
- Many of the lawmakers’ office buildings were occupied and vandalized—including that of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a favorite Right-wing target.
- Shouts of “Hang Pence!” and “Hang Pelosi!” often rang out.
- According to CBS News, more than 150 officers were injured in the attack.
- Several rioters carried plastic handcuffs, possibly intending to take hostages.
- Others carried treasonous Confederate flags.
Stormtrumpers scaling Capitol Building walls
After more than three hours, police—using riot gear, shields and batons—retook control of the Capitol.
And Trump? After giving his inflammatory speech, he returned to the White House to watch his handiwork on television. Although he received multiple pleas to publicly call for his supporter to stand down, he refused to do so.
Eleven months later—by December 14—more than 726 Stormtrumper rioters had been arrested and charged.
Yet no major Trump supporter has been arrested, let alone indicted.
- NOT Trump’s attorney, Rudy Giuliani, who cried to the demonstrators, “Let’s have trial by combat!”
- NOT Donald Trump, Jr., who, just hours before the Trump mob stormed Congress, threatened Republican lawmakers at a large rally outside the White House: “These guys better fight for Trump. Because if they’re not, guess what? I’m going to be in your backyard in a couple of months!”
- And, above all, NOT Donald Trump. He not only incited his followers to attack the Capitol, he has spent the last year spreading poisonous lies that the 2020 election was “stolen” from him through “massive” voter fraud. To this day, he continues to undermine the democratic process as he terrorizes the Republican party to stand behind him.
NEXT UP: How to prosecute Trump-supporting Republican politicians.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on January 3, 2022 at 12:11 am
If a second American Civil War erupts, it will be vastly different from the first one.
The first one lasted from 1861 to 1865. It pitted 13 Southern states against 19 fighting for the Union.
The Southern states consisted of: South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, North Carolina, Kentucky and Missouri.
The states fighting for the Union consisted of: Maine, New York, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Kansas, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, California, Nevada, and Oregon.
Civil War America
Júlio Reis, CC BY-SA 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
It’s estimated that 750,000 Americans lost their lives during the Civil War—110,000 Union soldiers died in battle as opposed to 258,000 Confederates.
The overwhelming reason for the war: Slavery. Southern states wanted to preserve it. Northern ones wanted to abolish it. And, in 1860, Northern states had elected Abraham Lincoln—an anti-slavery candidate—the 16th President of the United States.
But the blunt truth remained: Lincoln had no authority to abolish slavery—which had been legally upheld by the United States Supreme Court. And, in his Inaugural Address, he said exactly that:
“I have no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so.”
But he warned that he would not allow the Union to be peacefully dissolved. “We cannot separate. …The Union….will constitutionally defend, and maintain itself.
“In your hands, my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not in mine, is the momentous issue of civil war. The government will not assail you. You can have no conflict, without being yourselves the aggressors.”
Abraham Lincoln
Ultimately, the South wanted to secede from the Union to preserve its “peculiar institution.” It did not seek to conquer the North and made no military moves against it—until April 12, 1861.
That was when Confederate batteries in South Carolina’s Charleston Harbor opened fire on Union Fort Sumter. The next day, the fort surrendered.
The attack led directly to the outbreak of the American Civil War, which lasted until April 9, 1865. Confederate general Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Union general Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House.
A second Civil War would erupt with an entirely different goal in mind. Republican states do not want to be “left alone” by Washington and/or Democratic-controlled states. They want to rule Democratically-controlled states from Washington.
And their populations believe that, through Donald Trump, they can achieve just such control.
Donald Trump
To achieve victory in the 2024 Presidential election, legislators in Republican-controlled states are now working to nullify the votes of millions of Democratic voters.
Thousands—or millions—of votes will be thrown away, to ensure that the Democratic winner will be declared the loser. The Republican loser will be certified president-elect.
According to a December 9, 2021 article in The Atlantic—“Trump’s Next Coup Has Already Begun”-–while those who believe in democracy are blissfully ignoring the approaching threat:
“Democrats, big and small D, are not behaving as if they believe the threat is real. Some of them, including President Joe Biden, have taken passing rhetorical notice, but their attention wanders. They are making a grievous mistake.”
“The democratic emergency is already here,” says Richard L. Hasen, a professor of law and political science at UC Irvine. “We face a serious risk that American democracy as we know it will come to an end in 2024, but urgent action is not happening.”
And retiring journalist Brian Williams echoes this fear:
“My biggest worry is for my country. I’m not a liberal or a conservative. I’m an institutionalist. I believe in this place. And in my love of my country I yield to no one, but the darkness on the edge of town has spread to the main roads and highways and neighborhoods. It’s now at the local bar and the bowling alley, the school broad and the grocery store. It must be acknowledged and answered for.
“Grown men and women who swore an oath to our constitution, elected by our constituents, possessing the kinds of college degrees I can only dream of, have decided to join the mob and become something they are not, while hoping we somehow forget who they were. They’ve decided to burn it all down with us inside. That should scare you to no end as much as it scares an aging volunteer fireman.”
Brian Williams
From The Atlantic:
“For more than a year now, with tacit and explicit support from their party’s national leaders, state Republican operatives have been building an apparatus of election theft. Elected officials in Arizona, Texas, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and other states have studied Donald Trump’s crusade to overturn the 2020 election.
“They have noted the points of failure and have taken concrete steps to avoid failure next time. Some of them have rewritten statutes to seize partisan control of decisions about which ballots to count and which to discard, which results to certify and which to reject.”
NEXT UP: How the coming Donald Trump dictatorship can be prevented.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on November 10, 2021 at 12:13 am
SACRIFICE YOUR CHILDREN FOR ME
On July 10, 2020, Paula Reid, White House correspondent for CBS News, warned on the PBS program, Washington Week.
“But one of the most significant things out of the administration this week is the fact that Dr. [Deborah] Birx [Coronavirus Response Coordinator for the White House Coronavirus Task Force] said that we really don’t have that much data on COVID in children because the under-10 set is really the least tested.”
Just as the ancient Canaanites sacrificed their children to the god Moloch, so President Donald J. Trump expected his followers—and opponents—to risk their children’s lives for him.
A child sacrifice to Moloch
On August 10, CBS News reported:
“Nearly 100,000 children tested positive for the Coronavirus in the last two weeks of July, a new report from the American Academy of Pediatrics finds. Just over 97,000 children tested positive for the Coronavirus from July 16 to July 30, according to the association.”
By October, 2020, no vaccine had been invented. Nor had a national system of testing or contact tracing.
Hospitals began overflowing with COVID cases. Doctors and nurses were overwhelmed with fatigue. Many of them had become COVID victims.
On October 20, more than 70,450 new coronavirus cases were reported in the United States in a day for the first time.
On October 25, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union”: “We are not going to control the pandemic. We are going to control the fact that we get vaccines, therapeutics and other mitigation areas,”
By October 28, more than 8.8 million Americans had been diagnosed with COVID, and at least 227,673 had died from it.
Meanwhile, Trump kept barnstorming the country in a relentless re-election effort. Although infected with COVID-19 in September, he refused to wear a mask in public. His rallies reflected this same contempt for public health, with most attendees refusing to wear masks and/or socially distance.
Critics dubbed these rallies: “Super-spreader events.”
DECLARING VICTORY OVER CORONAVIRUS
In an October 27 press release from the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy., “Advisor to the President” and First Daughter Ivanka Trump noted her father’s signature achievement:
“ENDING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC. From the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Administration has taken decisive action to engage scientists and health professionals in academia, industry, and government to understand, treat and defeat the disease.”
Ivanka Trump has absolutely no scientific or technology background.
* * * * * * * * * *
Donald Trump has spent his life trading on the greed or fear of others. For example:
- Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi personally solicited a political contribution from Trump around the same time her office deliberated joining an investigation of alleged fraud at Trump University and its affiliates.
- After Bondi dropped the Trump University case against Trump, he wrote her a $25,000 check for her re-election campaign.
- According to an April 14, 2019 story by ABC News, a nationwide review uncovered at least 36 criminal cases where Trump was invoked in direct connection with violent acts, threats of violence or allegations of assault.
- In nine cases, attackers hailed Trump in the midst or immediate aftermath of physically assaulting victims. In 10 more cases, perpetrators cheered or defended Trump while taunting or threatening others. And in another 10 cases, Trump and his rhetoric were cited in court to explain a defendant’s violent or threatening behavior.
But in January, 2020, Trump confronted an enemy—to his re-election—that he couldn’t bribe or intimidate.
Unable to apply his trademark solutions, he was forced to improvise one attempted remedy after another. Chief among these:
- Denial
- Lies
- Extortion
- Propaganda as news
- Attacking science
- Reopening the country
- Resignation.
Ultimately, the virus—far more than Democratic nominee Joseph Biden—proved his fatal enemy.
Millions of Americans didn’t care that Trump had criminally fired an FBI director and tried to coerce the president of Ukraine to smear Biden. Nor that he had antagonized America’s closest allies while paying homage to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
But when COVID-19 wiped out their jobs, their children had to stay home because schools were closed, and they couldn’t pay their mortgage, Trump’s “President-for-Life” ambitions were doomed.
One of the harshest—and most poignant—attacks on Donald Trump came on August 17, 2020. It was delivered at the Democratic National Convention by Kristin Urquiza—the daughter of one of Trump’s 2016 supporters.
That supporter, Mark Anthony Urquiza, had died—from COVID-19.
Kristin Urquiza
In early June, he contracted the disease, shortly after Arizona lifted its stay-at-home order. He visited a karaoke bar with friends—and died, alone, after five days on a ventilator.
“My dad, Mark Anthony Urquiza, should be here today, but he isn’t,” Kristin said during a televised segment. “He had faith in Donald Trump.
“He voted for him, listened to him, believed him and his mouthpieces when they said that Coronavirus was under control and going to disappear; that it was OK to end social distancing rules before it was safe; and that if you had no underlying health conditions, you’d probably be fine.
“My dad was a healthy 65-year-old. His only preexisting condition was trusting Donald Trump, and for that he paid with his life.”
That, ultimately, will be the real Trump legacy to America.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on November 9, 2021 at 12:41 am
Once states across the country began “reopening,” President Donald J. Trump scheduled his first 2020 re-election rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
DEFYING SCIENCE
Then, to celebrate Independence Day, Trump scheduled yet another rally at Mount Rushmore, in Keystone, South Dakota, on July 3, 2020.
Although health experts expressed fears about large gatherings during the Coronavirus pandemic, South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem said people would “not be social distancing” during the celebration:
“In South Dakota, we’ve told people to focus on personal responsibility….Those who want to come and join us, we’ll be giving out free face masks, if they choose to wear one. But we won’t be social distancing.”
“JUST LIVE WITH IT”
According to a July 3 story by NBC News: “Eager to move forward and reopen the economy amid a recession and a looming presidential election, the White House is now pushing acceptance. ‘The virus is with us, but we need to live with it,’ is how one official said the administration plans to message on the pandemic.”
Administration officials would promote a new study they said showed promising results on therapeutics. They would also emphasize high survival rates, particularly for Americans who were within certain age groups and didn’t have underlying conditions.
On June 30, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, testified before the U.S. Senate: “We are now having 40-plus thousand new cases a day. I would not be surprised if we go up to 100,000 a day if this does not turn around.”
Fauci warned that the infection surge across the South and West “puts the entire country at risk.” Much of that increase was being fueled by young adults testing positive for COVID-19.
The United States had become the country worst-affected by Coronavirus—with more than 6.88 million Americans diagnosed cases and at least 200,000 deaths.
CHILD SACRIFICES
But Trump wanted children to return to school—and not through virtual classes at home.
And he wasn’t asking parents to send their children back to school after summer. He was ordering them to.
On July 8, 2020, he tweeted that he might withhold federal funding from schools that did not resume in-person classes this fall:
“In Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and many other countries, SCHOOLS ARE OPEN WITH NO PROBLEMS. The Dems think it would be bad for them politically if U.S. schools open before the November Election, but is important for the children & families. May cut off funding if not open!”
Donald Trump
Most school funding in America comes from states and municipalities, not the federal government. Nonetheless, the White House was exploring ways to use the next Coronavirus relief bill to tie the slice of school funding that did come from Washington to the pace of different schools’ reopenings.
And moments after making that threat, Trump said the guidelines of his own Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) for safely reopening schools were too expensive and impractical:
“I disagree with @CDCgov on their very tough & expensive guidelines for opening schools. While they want them open, they are asking schools to do very impractical things. I will be meeting with them!!!”
Among those guidelines:
- Schools should have markings on sidewalks and walls, that mark off six feet, and signs reminding students of protective measures.
- Masks should be worn by students and faculty, “as feasible,” and especially when keeping a distance isn’t possible.
- Sharing equipment, games and supplies should be avoided. If that’s not possible, they should be cleaned after each use.
- Playgrounds, cafeterias and dining halls should be shut. Students eat in their classrooms.
- Rooms should be well-ventilated.
- Schools should allow sick staff members to “stay home when they are sick, have been exposed, or caring for someone who is sick,” without being punished for staying home.
Coronavirus
Many Americans asked: “How can President Trump demand that children return to school in the midst of a deadly plague? Especially when we don’t have adequate testing facilities—and, most importantly, a reliable vaccine?”
There was an answer—and it was brutally ugly.
On July 10, 2020, Paula Reid, White House correspondent for CBS News, provided the answer on the PBS program, Washington Week:
“Well, up until now the administration has really deferred to local leaders to determine when they want to reopen their communities based on the situation on the ground. But then you saw this week, when it comes to schools, the president issuing this broad mandate that all schools must open in the fall or else potentially he will cut funding, when in fact we know most schools are locally funded, and he’s also made other threats.
Paula Reid
“He’s made it clear that he is putting pressure on governors, and the question is: Why is he taking this approach to schools specifically when he’s deferred to states on so many other aspects of this pandemic?
“And just speaking with White House advisers, I’m told the president knows that in order to get parents back to work you need to get kids back to class, and for the president a lot of this is about hoping that that would give an economic boost to the U.S. ahead of his reelection in November.”
For which he could then claim credit.
Bureaucracybuster's Blog 
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INTEGRITY IN A TIME OF TYRANNY: PART TWO (OF THREE)
In History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Military, Politics, Social commentary on February 3, 2022 at 12:10 amIt takes courage to stand up to dictators. These Russians—and Americans—did so.
And paid the price.
Next up: Nikolai Sergeyvich Zhilayev (pronounced Zill-lay-ev) was a Russian musicologist and the teacher of several 20th-century Russian composers.
Among these: Dimitri Shostakovich (September 25, 1906 – August 9, 1975)
Among his friends—to his ultimate misfortune—was Mikhail Nikolayevich Tukhachevsky, the former military hero now falsely condemned and executed as a traitor by Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.
In 1938, Zhilayev (November 18, 1881 – January 20, 1938) also became a casualty of what has become known as The Great Terror.
In his posthumously-published memoirs, Testimony, Shostakovich, his pupil and friend, described how Zhilayev faced his end with a calmness that awed even the NKVD (the predecessor to the KGB) secret police sent to arrest him.
Dimitri Shostakovich
“He had a large picture of Tukhachevsky in his room, and after the announcement that Tukhachevsky had been shot as a traitor to the homeland, Zhilayev did not take the picture down.
“I don’t know if I can explain how heroic a deed that was….As soon as the next poor soul was declared an enemy of the people, everyone destroyed in a panic everything connected with that person….
“And naturally, photographs flew into the fire first, because if someone informed on you, reported that you had a picture of an enemy of the people, it meant certain death.
“Zhilayev wasn’t afraid. When they came for him, Tukhachevsky’s prominently hung portrait amazed even the executioners.”
“What, it’s still up?” one of the secret police asked.
“The time will come,” Zhilayev replied, “when they’ll erect a monument to him.”
As, in fact, has happened.
Meanwhile, Stalin has been universally condemned as one of history’s greatest tyrants.
Third hero—Brett Crozier, the former commanding officer of the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt.
Graduating from the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1992, he received his Master’s Degree in National Security and Strategic Studies from the Naval War College in 2007.
From 2017 to 2018 he commanded the USS Blue Ridge. In November, 2019, he was given command of the nuclear aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt.
On March 24, 2020, reports circulated that three members of the crew had tested positive for COVID-19. The next day the number of stricken sailors increased to eight. A few days later, it was “dozens.” The sailors reportedly became ill at sea, two weeks after a port call at Danang, Vietnam.
The initial cases were airlifted to a military hospital. The Roosevelt was ordered to Guam. After the ship docked on March 27, 2020, all 5,000 aboard were ordered to be tested for the virus. But only about 100 stricken sailors were allowed to leave the ship. The rest remained on board.
On March 30, Crozier emailed a four-page internal letter to multiple Naval officials, pleading to have the majority of the crew evacuated and quarantined on shore. Given the crowded sleeping quarters and narrow passageways of the vessel, Crozier wrote that it was impossible to follow social distancing and quarantine procedures:
“This will require a political solution but it is the right thing to do. We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die. If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset—our Sailors….
“This is a necessary risk. Keeping over 4,000 young men and women on board the TR is an unnecessary risk and breaks faith with those Sailors entrusted to our care.”
Brett Crozier
Crozier sent his letter via a non-secure, unclassified email to 20 to 30 recipients, as well as the captain’s immediate chain of command. He reportedly believed that his immediate supervisor would not allow him to send it.
And his superior later confirmed that he would not have allowed Crozier to send it.
On March 31, someone leaked the letter to the San Francisco Chronicle, which published it.
On April 1, the Navy ordered the aircraft carrier evacuated. A skeleton crew of 400 remained aboard to maintain the nuclear reactor, the fire-fighting equipment, and the ship’s galley.
On April 2, Crozier was relieved of command by acting United States Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly.
By that time, about 114 crew members—out of a total of around 4,000—reportedly tested positive for COVID-19.
As Crozier disembarked, sailors loudly saluted him with a standing ovation: “Cap-tain Cro-zier!”
Modly claimed that Crozier’s letter “raised alarm bells unnecessarily. It undermines our efforts and the chain of command’s efforts to address this problem, and creates a panic and this perception that the Navy’s not on the job, that the government’s not on the job, and it’s just not true.”
Actually, the Trump administration had frittered away January and February, with President Donald Trump giving multiple—and misleading—press conferences. In these, he played down the dangers of COVID-19, saying that “we’re on top of it”—even as the virus spread across the country.
“It was a betrayal. And I can tell you one other thing: because he did that he put it in the public’s forum and it is now a big controversy in Washington, DC,” continued Modly. [Italics added]
This was the United States Navy under Donald Trump—who threw “betrayal” and “treason” at anyone who dared reveal the truth about institutional crimes and failures.
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