“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” — wrongly attributed to Sinclair Lewis. (Unattributed).
Donald Trump has been appealing to nativist xenophoia and racism since he entered the GOP primary for president. “The Donald” has proposed a special “deportation force” outside of regular immigration and law enforcement agencies and not subject to any due process of law in the judicial system to deport over 11 million undocumented immigrants. Donald Trump promises ‘deportation force’ to move 11 million.
Will these “Trump Troopers” be uniformed in crisply starched brown shirts with a Trump insignia?
Donald Trump Ejected Latino Reporter Jorge Ramos From his Press Conference, and has had his goons supporters eject pro-immigration protesters, Pro-Immigration Protester Violently Dragged Out Of Trump Rally, and eject Black Lives Matter protesters from his rallies. Trump Fans Filmed Assaulting Black Lives Matter Protesters; Trump on rally protester: ‘Maybe he should have been roughed up’.
On Sunday, Trump retweeted a graphic in a tweet from a neo-Nazi, We Found Where Donald Trump’s “Black Crimes” Graphic Came From, citing data from an organization called Crime Statistics Bureau in San Francisco, suggesting that blacks were responsible for most killings of black people —and most killings of whites. Donald Trump retweeted a very wrong set of numbers on race and murder. There doesn’t appear to be any such organization as the “Crime Statistics Bureau,” and the bogus statistics cited are entirely fabricated. “The leading candidate for the Republican Party’s nomination for president is tweeting absolute nonsense with a blatantly racist slant.”
After the terrorist attacks in Paris, Trump exclaimed ‘Absolutely no choice’ but to close mosques in the U.S., and Donald Trump Says He’d ‘Absolutely’ Require Muslims to Register for a data base of Muslims in the U.S. Asked “how such a database would be different from Jews having to register in Nazi Germany, Mr. Trump repeatedly said, ‘You tell me,’ until he stopped responding to the question.”
Geezus, Donald, what’s next? Making Muslims wear the crescent and star on their clothing and tattooing their registration number on their forearm with a bar code? Inserting a Radio-Frequency IDentification (RFID) tracking device chip under their skin?
Then there is Trump’s outrageous claim that ‘thousands’ of New Jersey Muslims celebrated the 9/11 attacks: Trump insists that with his own eyes he saw [on television] “thousands and thousands” of cheering Arabs in New Jersey celebrating as the World Trade Center collapsed during the Sept. 11 attacks. It never happened.
As the Newark Star-Ledger put it in an article on Sept. 18, 2001, “rumors of rooftop celebrations of the attack by Muslims here proved unfounded.” The Washington Post’s fact checker Glenn Kessler awards “four Pinocchios” for Trump’s defamation of the Muslim communities of New Jersey, and pointedly notes that “Trump has already earned more Four-Pinocchio ratings than any other candidate this year.” Trump simply makes shit up.
Despite the fact that torture is illegal under both U.S. law and international conventions to which the U.S. was both the drafter and signatory to the agreement, Trump says I’d bring back waterboarding and Trump Pledges To Bring Back Torture. Of course, Trump wants to torture Muslims (for now).
Does “The Donald” also share the view of Rhode Island state Sen. Elaine Morgan (R) that Syrian Refugees In U.S. Should Be Segregated In Internment Camps like Japanese-Americans during World War II? How long will it take before Tea-Publicans make the leap to death camps for Muslims for a “final solution”?
The fever-pitch of nativist xenophobia and religious bigotry from the Mass Deportation Party, and their Pied Piper Donald Trump in particular, is revealing the dark side of movement conservatism in this country that the media generally fails to report.
This is a distinctly American brand of Christofascism. What is Christofascism? Christofascism refers to use of the faith of Christianity as a cover for totalitarian [political] ideology. (Christofascism is a concept in Christian theology first mentioned by Dorothee Sölle, a Christian theologian and writer, in her book Beyond Mere Obedience: Reflections on a Christian Ethic for the Future in 1970. See, Christofascism – Wikipedia.)
Do a Google search for “Trump and fascism” and there have already a disturbing number of articles written about this topic. Here is just a brief sampling:
Is Donald Trump a Fascist? – Newsweek (July 17, 2015)
Donald Trump is an actual fascist: What his surging popularity says about the GOP base – Salon (July 25, 2015)
Is Donald Trump leading a proto-fascist movement? – The Week (August 28, 2015)
Donald Trump and the “F-Word”—by Rick Perlstein – The Washington Spectator (September 30, 2015)
Is Trump on a Slippery Slope to Fascism? | The Fiscal Times (November 19, 2015)
Yes, Donald Trump is a fascist. | New Republic (November 19, 2015)
Donald Trump Drifts Closer to Anti-Muslim Fascism – US News (November 20, 2015)
Donald Trump’s Anti-Muslim, Fascist Flirtation Means He’s Not Funny Anymore – U.S. News & World Report (November 20, 2015)
Absolutely right — Donald Trump is “not funny anymore” because he continues to expand his lead among Tea-Publican base voters in early primary states. A new CBS News polls find Donald Trump leading in Iowa and New Hampshire by sizable margins: In Iowa, he has 30 percent of likely GOP primary voters, to 21 percent for Ted Cruz, 19 for Ben Carson and 11 for Marco Rubio. In New Hampshire, Trump has 32 percent, Rubio has 13 percent, and Cruz and Carson each have 10 percent. Trump also holds a large lead in South Carolina.
Donald Trump is a dangerous demagogue who is not even particularly religious, but he is playing the GOP’s Christian Right base who vote in GOP primaries like a fiddle with appeals to their ignorance, intolerance, irrational fear and hatred of “others.” He is appealing to Christofascism.
This is what Sinclair Lewis warned Americans about in his satirical It Can’t Happen Here. It can, and it is happening today.
UPDATE (11/24/15): The Washington Post has some good reporting today about How anti-immigrant attitudes are fueling support for Donald Trump, and It’s not just Donald Trump: Half of Republicans share his views on immigrants and refugees: “Almost half of Republican voters favor deporting all immigrants here illegally and barring Syrian refugees from entering the United States — a fact that helps explain Donald Trump’s resilient campaign for the party’s presidential nomination.”
We have long known How racism explains Republicans’ rise in the South.
steve you must live in the biosphere every white person I talk to supports trump. in my business (I am a capitalist wage slave master ;but run the business myself so I don’t have any capitalist wage slaves) I meet a lot of poor and lower middle class white people in my business and they all love trump and hate obama because he is black though they say for other reasons.
No, I live in what I think is mainstream America. I, too, own my business, although I do take a salary. It is possible that our businesses operate in different segments of society, but my Company has a rather broad spectrum of clients and customers and when they choose to talk about the Presidential Race, they are all baffled by the Trump factor. Of course, I never start such discussions because it is hard enough to keep clients happy without accidentally insulting them about their choice of politician. ;o)
Regarding your familiars…why do you assume they don’t like Obama because he is black, even though they give you different reasons. You do realize it is possible to dislike Obama for reasons other than his race. For instance, his stand on gun control. Or his stand on immigration. Or his stand on international trade. Or his stand on national monetary policy. Or his stand on any of a hundred other subjects. He has done some things I approve of, but by and large, he has done more things I don’t like than things I do. And it has NOTHING to do with the fact he is half black.
they say that too until you dig a little deeper most white racist don’t believe they are. in december 2008 I met an older couple in my business who had just gotten out of jail they may of had three teeth between the two of them. they told me that damn expletive Obama put us in jail. I said excuse me ;but while Obama has been elected he hasn’t taken office yet it was the republicans in arizona who put you in jail they run arizona. they told me they don’t hate republicans they are white!
Are you suggesting these are “typical” Trump supporters? They don’t look like the people I see on TV cheering for Trump.
By the way, if this couple represents your typical customer base, then we probably don’t operate in the same client circles, so perhaps I do live in a sort of biosphere. ;o)
the democratic party is crying crocodile tears. he could pull a reagan but demographics are against him bet on another goldwater.
I was certain by this time Trump would have been laughed out of the race. I was wrong and I don’t know why I was wrong. Where are these people who support him coming from? I don’t know anyone who supports him, or at least admits to supporting him, and I don’t understand the mindset that allows people to buy into the BS he is peddling. I don’t care at all for Hillary, but at least I understand why people would support her. But TRUMP?!?!?!? I just don’t get it.