https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/october-21-2024
"On Saturday, September 7, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump
predicted that his plan to deport 15 to 20 million people currently living in
the United States would be “bloody.” He also promised to prosecute his
political opponents, including, he wrote, lawyers, political operatives,
donors, illegal voters, and election officials. Retired chair of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley told journalist Bob Woodward that Trump is “a
fascist to the core…the most dangerous person to this country.”
On October 14, Trump told
Fox News Channel host Maria Bartiromo that he
thought enemies within the United States were more dangerous than foreign
adversaries and that he thought the military should stop those “radical left
lunatics” on Election Day. Since then, he has been talking a lot about “the
enemy from within,” specifically naming Representative Adam Schiff and former
House speaker Nancy Pelosi, both Democrats from California, as “bad people.”
Schiff was the chair of the House Intelligence Committee that broke the 2019
story of Trump’s attempt to extort Volodymyr Zelensky that led to Trump’s first
impeachment.
Trump’s references to the “enemy from within” have become so frequent that
former White House press secretary turned political analyst Jen Psaki has
called them his closing argument for the 2024 election, and she warned that his
construction of those who oppose him as “enemies” might sweep in virtually
anyone he feels is a threat.
In a searing article today, political scientist Rachel Bitecofer of
The Cycle
explored exactly what that means in a piece titled “What (Really) Happens If
Trump Wins?” Bitecofer outlined Adolf Hitler’s January 30, 1933, oath of
office, in which he promised Germans he would uphold the constitution, and the
three months he took to dismantle that constitution.
By March, she notes, the concentration camp Dachau was open. Its first
prisoners were not Jews, but rather Hitler’s prominent political opponents. By
April, Jews had been purged from the civil service, and opposition political
parties were illegal. By May, labor unions were banned and students were
burning banned books. Within the year, public criticism of Hitler and the Nazis
was illegal, and denouncing violators paid well for those who did it.
Bitecofer writes that Trump has promised mass deportations “that he cannot
deliver unless he violates both the Constitution and federal law.” To enable
that policy, Trump will need to dismantle the merit-based civil service and put
into office those loyal to him rather than the Constitution. And then he will
purge his political opponents, for once those who would stand against him are
purged, Trump can act as he wishes against immigrants, for example, and
others."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
