Trump's corporate and billionaire supporters are emboldening him as he pursues his path of destruction. History proves the future does not bode well for them.
Spectacular column tonight, Steven. I recently read the whole of Robert Jackson's opening remarks at Nuremberg. (Jackson was given 'sabbatical' from his seat on the Supreme Court to lead the trials, at which General Taylor spoke a year later. ). Jackson said this:
"What makes this inquest significant is that these prisoners represent sinister influences that will lurk in the world long after their bodies have returned to dust. We will show them to be living symbols of racial hatreds, of terrorism and violence, and of the arrogance and cruelty of power."
--Justice Robert Jackson, opening remarks at Nurenburg, Germany, November 21, 1945.
I am ordering Jeffreys' book. Also worth reading as a window into our own time: Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem, in which she reflects on "the banality of evil." Not the upper tier with the enormous wealth, but the army of followers whose orders are to obey, and who do so mindlessly.
Thank You Steven ..No we can't say that what happened in Germany and Europe WW ll is the same as what is happeing in America. But what is happening to us is a screaming nightmare. His blowing up the boats makes him a murderer. His cruelty to migrants is unbearable. Tearing down the East Wing of the WH has finally pushed me over the edge. The goldleaf in the Oval Office looks like something you buy in the dollar store for party decorations.. The patio with the tables and umbrellas is strait out of Mar-a-Lago .Now the ballroom..Maybe he plans to rename the WH Mar-a-Lago ll . If he builds Arc de Trump across from the Lincoln memorial will that be fine with all of his supporters. If we don't do an economic boycott I don't see anything changing, The only thing they understand is money and loss of it. All of us seniors can stay home. No shopping online or in the stores no movies no theater no eating out. The rest of the working population that can stay home should .. We cannot count on SCOTUS or the Congress or the Senate ..My heart can't take much more of this. lost in america.
The historian Heather Cox Richardson sees similarities to the so-called Gilded Age when the uber-wealthy put great pressure on democratic norms and functions. A correction followed, the progressive era of Teddy Roosevelt, if I’ve got this right.
The scale of the current onslaught powered by particularly virulent personalities, gives our time a menace well-described by Prof. Beschloss.
The best way to impact the madness that is this POTUS and his sycophants is to hit them in their pockets. And the only way to do that is with a massive, all encompassing GENERAL STRIKE. They’ve already shut down our federal government it is past time that we shut down the greedy usurpers of power. Let’s not do another NoKings March. Please let’s do a GENERAL STRIKE and bring all of these corporate masters to heel. It’s worked in other countries. It can work here.
Yes, but it needs to be coordinated to have any impact. Other countries have worker protections that the US, as usual, does not have. Everyone would have to assess their own level of risk if they were to walk off their job. BUT, everyone can stop spending their hard earned money on things they don't need. It makes me sick to think how well Apple is doing with it's 177th(?) iPhone. If having the latest iPhone is more important than living in a country where you can be critical of the current regime, the Thought Police are gearing up.
Thank you for this excellent essay, Steven. When I read through the list of "donors" to the ballroom fund yesterday, I wondered (as I have under other circumstances) just how the money was travelling from billionaire's pockets into Trump's, and you've answered the question. Let us not forget to notice that in giving millions to a "non-profit" the wealthy and their corporations get to write all that off on their taxes. This is a good example of how it is that year after year after year these people and corporations pay virtually nothing in taxes. Their palm-greasing is thus at taxpayers expense. They get the benefits of privilege, influence AND tax deductions. I hope I live long enough to see them face trial for their crimes.
Such an important series of historic parallels. I hope with all my heart and soul that we the people rise to the occasion soon and call en masse for justice against this mad king and his evil enablers. Each day, and every grotesque abuse of power, every act of blatant, wanton greed further damages our democracy and our collective identity as a nation of laws. It will only end when all of us say it must end.
Thank you Mr. Beschloss for this history lesson and reminders of past atrocities. The gutting of the East Wing of 'our house' was so painful as the memories created there are gone. I hope the 'yes' men and women who sponsored this unnecessary and unlawful ballroom will be tainted forever in our country's history.
Maybe your very best, sir -- because you've called attention to the $$$ behind Trump and his administration. This administration couldn't pass muster as a middle-school "model U.S. government." Trump himself is barely compos mentis. None of this would be happening without the active encouragement of big corporations and the mega-wealthy. It's never been clearer that they're the unelected fourth branch of government.
This country does have a tradition of resistance to economic power. That's a big part of what the Civil War was about, remember? And the Progressive Era and, later, the New Deal were a reaction to the penchant of Big Money for crashing the economy again and again. The road to Trump goes back at least to the Reagan administration. Are we the people finally ready to acknowledge that economic power can and will eat democracy alive if given half a chance?
I have been wondering for some time when the weight of the corruption will cause the entire groaning machinery of destruction to implode; when the transfer of wealth from the workers to the rich can no longer be sustained. I sense a catastrophe coming - and the only one that will impact on these foul enablers of evil, is a financial catastrophe. I have heard some commentators say that economic disengagement is the only real option to end this nightmare. Perhaps if those who stoke the engines refuse to do it any longer, we can have a future. But it will be unbelievably damaging and cause immense pain.
But consider that this has been going on since at least the Reagan administration. "Economic disengagement", or a general strike, isn't going to undo Citizens United or reform (or re-form) the Supreme Court. It's not going to cure the systemic racism that helped bring about Trump I and Trump II. Our current emergency was decades in the making. A general strike is like putting a Band-Aid on a gaping wound that requires more serious treatment.
What will help make progress is gaining control over our corrupt education system that did this to us by eliminating the called-to-teach teachers who are the soul of our nation. Democracy must be taught. They made sure it wasn’t anymore and people would disrespect their teachers to the point of making them voiceless so you wouldn’t listen to the teachers trying to report administrative wrongdoing. Teacher whistleblowers have been trying to tell you this at WhiteChalkCrime.com and EndTeacherAbuse.org since 2002. We need to learn from these teachers and run for school boards since boards control our schools. We’ve foolishly trusted our administrators when so many of them are stealing democracy from us.
This wouldn’t be a total solution but it
would be a solid start for regaining democracy that we have the power to do.
Plus all we need is one leader who’ll look into what fascists did to our schools and help these devoted teachers restore authentic schools, and we’d unite the good people on both sides with that issue. People care about their schools and don’t want school shootings. The devoted teachers know why there are school shootings but are voiceless.
It’s been my mission to teach people about this since 1995 There is a path for democracy lovers. It’s hidden. But we can open it up and build a strong coalition back to power.
SHAME on every one of these "tech and AI giants, arms manufacturers, crypto financiers and wealthy individuals committed to funding Trump’s grotesque abuse of our history, traditions, values and democratic processes."
Every last penny of their combined wealth is outweighed by the single tear of a solitary child.
As you have so eloquently pointed out, Steven, a nation besotted, above all else, with the accumulation of wealth is bound to fail. The fact of the matter is that our system of unfettered capitalism stands in direct contradiction to human welfare and happiness.
As I keep repeating, if we are to learn anything from our current debacle, may it be to understand that we need to reinvent ourselves and change course dramatically.
Chaucer said it best: "Radix omnium malorum cupiditas est." (The root of all evil is greed.)
Steven, you’re doing a wonderful job of teaching history.
We have had two disappointing parties so some people thought anything else would be the answer and had to learn the hard way that you must learn history and let it be your guide for solving problems.
Although they’re comforting to us, we need to forward these history lessons to the people who need them the most—Trump supporters. Trump’s antics are going to turn people off to him while educating people will turn people onto reality.
Heartrending words and timely comparisons, with the eventuality and actuality of accountability in the past —- succeeding -Thank you 💙🇺🇸💙
Excerpt:
“August of 1947, General Telford Taylor, a chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials:
“…
In this arrogant and supremely criminal adventure, the defendants were eager and leading participants.
They joined in stamping out the flame of liberty, and in subjecting the German people to the monstrous, grinding tyranny of the Third Reich, whose purpose it was to brutalize the nation and fill the people with hate.
They marshaled their imperial resources and focused their formidable talents to forge the weapons and other implements of conquest that spread the German terror.
They were the warp and woof of the dark mantle of death that settled over Europe”…
//-
Repeat:
(…whose purpose it was to brutalize the nation and fill the people with hate.)
Spectacular column tonight, Steven. I recently read the whole of Robert Jackson's opening remarks at Nuremberg. (Jackson was given 'sabbatical' from his seat on the Supreme Court to lead the trials, at which General Taylor spoke a year later. ). Jackson said this:
"What makes this inquest significant is that these prisoners represent sinister influences that will lurk in the world long after their bodies have returned to dust. We will show them to be living symbols of racial hatreds, of terrorism and violence, and of the arrogance and cruelty of power."
--Justice Robert Jackson, opening remarks at Nurenburg, Germany, November 21, 1945.
I am ordering Jeffreys' book. Also worth reading as a window into our own time: Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem, in which she reflects on "the banality of evil." Not the upper tier with the enormous wealth, but the army of followers whose orders are to obey, and who do so mindlessly.
Good thought on reading Hannah Arendt.
Thank you for this information Jill.
Excerpt:
..”We will show them to be living symbols of racial hatreds, of terrorism and violence, and of the arrogance and cruelty of power."
--Justice Robert Jackson, opening remarks at Nurenburg, Germany, November 21, 1945.”
(Hatreds Violence Cruelty of power)
Michael? Who is Michael??
Thank You Steven ..No we can't say that what happened in Germany and Europe WW ll is the same as what is happeing in America. But what is happening to us is a screaming nightmare. His blowing up the boats makes him a murderer. His cruelty to migrants is unbearable. Tearing down the East Wing of the WH has finally pushed me over the edge. The goldleaf in the Oval Office looks like something you buy in the dollar store for party decorations.. The patio with the tables and umbrellas is strait out of Mar-a-Lago .Now the ballroom..Maybe he plans to rename the WH Mar-a-Lago ll . If he builds Arc de Trump across from the Lincoln memorial will that be fine with all of his supporters. If we don't do an economic boycott I don't see anything changing, The only thing they understand is money and loss of it. All of us seniors can stay home. No shopping online or in the stores no movies no theater no eating out. The rest of the working population that can stay home should .. We cannot count on SCOTUS or the Congress or the Senate ..My heart can't take much more of this. lost in america.
The historian Heather Cox Richardson sees similarities to the so-called Gilded Age when the uber-wealthy put great pressure on democratic norms and functions. A correction followed, the progressive era of Teddy Roosevelt, if I’ve got this right.
The scale of the current onslaught powered by particularly virulent personalities, gives our time a menace well-described by Prof. Beschloss.
I pray for the day we have our own Nuremberg trials, and we will.
The best way to impact the madness that is this POTUS and his sycophants is to hit them in their pockets. And the only way to do that is with a massive, all encompassing GENERAL STRIKE. They’ve already shut down our federal government it is past time that we shut down the greedy usurpers of power. Let’s not do another NoKings March. Please let’s do a GENERAL STRIKE and bring all of these corporate masters to heel. It’s worked in other countries. It can work here.
Yes, but it needs to be coordinated to have any impact. Other countries have worker protections that the US, as usual, does not have. Everyone would have to assess their own level of risk if they were to walk off their job. BUT, everyone can stop spending their hard earned money on things they don't need. It makes me sick to think how well Apple is doing with it's 177th(?) iPhone. If having the latest iPhone is more important than living in a country where you can be critical of the current regime, the Thought Police are gearing up.
Thank you for this excellent essay, Steven. When I read through the list of "donors" to the ballroom fund yesterday, I wondered (as I have under other circumstances) just how the money was travelling from billionaire's pockets into Trump's, and you've answered the question. Let us not forget to notice that in giving millions to a "non-profit" the wealthy and their corporations get to write all that off on their taxes. This is a good example of how it is that year after year after year these people and corporations pay virtually nothing in taxes. Their palm-greasing is thus at taxpayers expense. They get the benefits of privilege, influence AND tax deductions. I hope I live long enough to see them face trial for their crimes.
Thank you, Carol.
Such an important series of historic parallels. I hope with all my heart and soul that we the people rise to the occasion soon and call en masse for justice against this mad king and his evil enablers. Each day, and every grotesque abuse of power, every act of blatant, wanton greed further damages our democracy and our collective identity as a nation of laws. It will only end when all of us say it must end.
Thank you Mr. Beschloss for this history lesson and reminders of past atrocities. The gutting of the East Wing of 'our house' was so painful as the memories created there are gone. I hope the 'yes' men and women who sponsored this unnecessary and unlawful ballroom will be tainted forever in our country's history.
Maybe your very best, sir -- because you've called attention to the $$$ behind Trump and his administration. This administration couldn't pass muster as a middle-school "model U.S. government." Trump himself is barely compos mentis. None of this would be happening without the active encouragement of big corporations and the mega-wealthy. It's never been clearer that they're the unelected fourth branch of government.
This country does have a tradition of resistance to economic power. That's a big part of what the Civil War was about, remember? And the Progressive Era and, later, the New Deal were a reaction to the penchant of Big Money for crashing the economy again and again. The road to Trump goes back at least to the Reagan administration. Are we the people finally ready to acknowledge that economic power can and will eat democracy alive if given half a chance?
Brilliant as always, Steven.
I have been wondering for some time when the weight of the corruption will cause the entire groaning machinery of destruction to implode; when the transfer of wealth from the workers to the rich can no longer be sustained. I sense a catastrophe coming - and the only one that will impact on these foul enablers of evil, is a financial catastrophe. I have heard some commentators say that economic disengagement is the only real option to end this nightmare. Perhaps if those who stoke the engines refuse to do it any longer, we can have a future. But it will be unbelievably damaging and cause immense pain.
What do you think?
But consider that this has been going on since at least the Reagan administration. "Economic disengagement", or a general strike, isn't going to undo Citizens United or reform (or re-form) the Supreme Court. It's not going to cure the systemic racism that helped bring about Trump I and Trump II. Our current emergency was decades in the making. A general strike is like putting a Band-Aid on a gaping wound that requires more serious treatment.
Hard to disagree. But need to start somewhere - what do you think might help make progress?
What will help make progress is gaining control over our corrupt education system that did this to us by eliminating the called-to-teach teachers who are the soul of our nation. Democracy must be taught. They made sure it wasn’t anymore and people would disrespect their teachers to the point of making them voiceless so you wouldn’t listen to the teachers trying to report administrative wrongdoing. Teacher whistleblowers have been trying to tell you this at WhiteChalkCrime.com and EndTeacherAbuse.org since 2002. We need to learn from these teachers and run for school boards since boards control our schools. We’ve foolishly trusted our administrators when so many of them are stealing democracy from us.
This wouldn’t be a total solution but it
would be a solid start for regaining democracy that we have the power to do.
Plus all we need is one leader who’ll look into what fascists did to our schools and help these devoted teachers restore authentic schools, and we’d unite the good people on both sides with that issue. People care about their schools and don’t want school shootings. The devoted teachers know why there are school shootings but are voiceless.
It’s been my mission to teach people about this since 1995 There is a path for democracy lovers. It’s hidden. But we can open it up and build a strong coalition back to power.
.
Thank you Karen. I wish you all everyone in America all the best in this struggle.
On occasion the only treatment to keep a gaping wound from becoming lethal is to Amputate!!!
SHAME on every one of these "tech and AI giants, arms manufacturers, crypto financiers and wealthy individuals committed to funding Trump’s grotesque abuse of our history, traditions, values and democratic processes."
Every last penny of their combined wealth is outweighed by the single tear of a solitary child.
As you have so eloquently pointed out, Steven, a nation besotted, above all else, with the accumulation of wealth is bound to fail. The fact of the matter is that our system of unfettered capitalism stands in direct contradiction to human welfare and happiness.
As I keep repeating, if we are to learn anything from our current debacle, may it be to understand that we need to reinvent ourselves and change course dramatically.
Chaucer said it best: "Radix omnium malorum cupiditas est." (The root of all evil is greed.)
Steven, you’re doing a wonderful job of teaching history.
We have had two disappointing parties so some people thought anything else would be the answer and had to learn the hard way that you must learn history and let it be your guide for solving problems.
Although they’re comforting to us, we need to forward these history lessons to the people who need them the most—Trump supporters. Trump’s antics are going to turn people off to him while educating people will turn people onto reality.
His enablers should burn. As a former history teacher in high school, I am devastated that SCOTUS and Congress are so complicit.
Steven!
Heartrending words and timely comparisons, with the eventuality and actuality of accountability in the past —- succeeding -Thank you 💙🇺🇸💙
Excerpt:
“August of 1947, General Telford Taylor, a chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials:
“…
In this arrogant and supremely criminal adventure, the defendants were eager and leading participants.
They joined in stamping out the flame of liberty, and in subjecting the German people to the monstrous, grinding tyranny of the Third Reich, whose purpose it was to brutalize the nation and fill the people with hate.
They marshaled their imperial resources and focused their formidable talents to forge the weapons and other implements of conquest that spread the German terror.
They were the warp and woof of the dark mantle of death that settled over Europe”…
//-
Repeat:
(…whose purpose it was to brutalize the nation and fill the people with hate.)
Thank you for the reminders of Russian history. The occupant seems to want to be remembered in a similar way.
And let’s not tell the occupant how things ended for the tsar.
All I can say is: Steven, sooo very well said!