Robert B. Reich, is Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center for Developing Economies. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Although I would pull his name out of the hat, since Allen Clifton wrote about him, I do recall the name and that I liked him at the time. I agree that he was quite influential and smart, as were many people in the Clinton and Obama administrations.
Many people support Trump and the Republican Party, but not all are quiet to the threat that they pose. I for one am not. I called Trump and his party fascist scum for a while, as they are. Anyone who reads my comments or reads my blog knows how I feel about the dangerous scumbag and their party, The American Nazi Party, by any other name. Heck, look who Trump picked to be in his cabinet and who advises him!
I am not one to use Hitler’s name in vain, like many on the right or even the left do. My family was part of the Holocaust and my family was in the death camps. I have traveled to Europe and saw first hand what was done, though I have not been to Auschwitz yet. I know of the parks, which were once mass grave sites. I know the tactics that the Germans used. I am familiar with what the Russians did after the war. I traveled behind the iron curtain several times before Russia “left”.
Most Americans have no comprehension of what fascism is or what the Germans did. You can study it in school, watch films, but unless you were part of that, you cannot know. The same is with being transsexual. People simply do not know. They are ignorant, whether willingly or not. Even I, who was born many years after the war ended, know only a fraction of what was done, but I do know enough.
Many Germans and Jews had no comprehension during that time that it was happening. They had no clue of the death camps. Many Jews said that there is no way that it can happen here. The Germans kept what they did secret. News did not travel. Even after Jews were ordered to wear the Star of David and were placed in ghettos, people did not believe. Many, many people were ignorant.
There is a book, Hitler’s Willing Executioners, which talks on this topic. Many people sympathized with Hitler and were quietly relating to him. Lines like, “Those dirty Jews are stealing our jobs,” and “Jews are not real Germans” were common. The feeling that Jews immigrated to Germany or just came and diluted ethnic Germans was common. We see the same thing today among Trump supporters.
The same forces that propelled Germany to fascism, and the economic toll that Europe placed after WWI was only part of the reason Hitler rose to power, happens here in the United States now. It has been happening for years, just people are ignorant to see. Each passing year, the right becomes more and more outrageous and treacherous. Look at what Republicans are doing?
One incident does not make a pattern, but the Republican Party, has virtually an infinite number of incidents stretching as far back as you want to go. The problem is that the Republican Party is monolithic, as Allen, others, and I talked about recently. They reward loyalty, and thrive on their propaganda ministry (Fox News). Heck, Fox News made its name out of bogus controversy, because their followers are interested in the bedroom behavior of people rather than in running the country. Heck, their ideal President is “someone who is like us” and “someone with whom you can have a beer”.
Trump feeds people his transparent lies and they believe, because it is a lot easier to believe in “contracts”, instant gratification beliefs, and the problem is someone else, not yourself. Believing that Democrats stole American jobs, such as mining, is self deluding and willful ignorance.
Other than people should not work in mines and and switch to less hazardous jobs, the mining jobs that people complain were lost has nothing to do with policy and everything to do with natural gas being cheaper and automation. These two factors, not regulation reduced mining jobs down to 55,000 from the 250,000, as I remember the number, from its heyday.
Farming is another example. Farmers love the bullshit that Republicans talk, all the while shooting themselves in the heart. Trump and Republicans in the current budget proposed radically reducing farm subsidies, just people are dumb.
The Republicans caused the Great Recession. Wait a couple of years along with transparent “no’s” and “Democrats raised the deficit and bailed out Wall Street” and you have millions of zombies believing the crap. Cause and effect sometimes are immediate, a tornado lifting a house and thrusting it to Oz, and others are not. What is never immediate is healing. Republican financial policies, tax breaks to the rich (the Bush tax cuts), allowing banks to engage in derivatives and other speculative behavior, and other things led to the Great Recession. The bailout did not, as I recall raise the debt, as most of it was paid back.
Studying deficit trends and economic policies require education, something the right does not want to do. People may hate the caricature of Clinton, but Bill Clinton produced one of the best economies that we have ever had. Bush caused the deficit and helped the rich.
Each term the Republican agenda becomes more and more egregious and bent on countering the progressive we as Americans made. Their objection to the ACA is that it helps Americans, whereas Republicans want to create death, chaos, and help the rich.
Going back to my thesis of this post, just because there are no obvious death camps, not that it was obvious until after WWII, does not mean that Trump and his minions are not thinking of and researching ways to implement “final solution,” whether in reality or in soft form. Their policies and budgets are just that, just takes longer.
I am not dissing the financial prudence or other topics, as I am a firm believer in multi party democracy. The Republican Party, however, has become evil, and their leader, Trump, is a sociopath, who very well, as Robert Reich and Allen Clifton states, can Wag the Dog us into a war to prop up their regime. We all saw that before with Bush.
Resist, just like Keith Olberman and Allen!