I woke up at 2:15 AM and was - call me obsessed if you like - thinking about a topic for my blog and all I could come up with was writing about Trump from a psychological perspective (again) and asking whether he was a kind of delusional Hitler.
Hitler wasn't a preening grandiose narcisist like Trump, though he did seem to thrive on giving speeches to enormous cheering and NAZI saluting crowds. He was, like Trump, a psychopath. Hitler was not only responsible for the deaths in the Holocaust but also in World War II where the minimum estimate of total deaths is 35 million. Hitler never literally held a gun to anyone's head and enjoyed pulling the trigger and I don't know whether or not he had a sadistic personality disorder and enjoyed knowing about the suffering he was causing.
The evidence that Trump did enjoy thoughts about the suffering was causing is clear. For example, his ideas about securing the southern border reflect this.
Remember, he wanted to shoot migrants in the legs, put flesh-piercing spikes atop an electrified border wall, and dig a moat.and fill it with snakes and alligators. He had no problem with separating families and putting children in cages. (Reference)
As others have noted, the cruelty was the point.
While considering this in the wee hours I thought all this I thought that invoking Hitler was demontrating Godwin's Law and I wanted to avoid this. Then I read what one of my favorite columnists, Chauncey DeVega, wrote in Salon today in Criminal indictments are not enough: Donald Trump must be defeated at the ballot box.
DeVega wrote:
Donald Trump has made Hitler-like threats to crush his and the MAGA movement's perceived "enemies" in a campaign of revenge and terror targeting the Democrats, liberals, progressives, and others once he is back in power. As outlined in Trump's "Agenda 47" plan, he will become a type of de facto dictator if he takes power again
In reaction to his latest criminal indictment, his third handed down just this year, Trump's campaign released a statement likening his prosecution to "Nazi Germany in the 1930s."
What the hell!?!
Did Trump's campaign really make this comparison? It beggered the imagination. I found confirmation that the Trump campagin did this in Rupert Murdoch's NY Daily Post here:
Trump campaign compares indictment over 2020 election interference to Nazi Germany
“The lawlessness of these persecutions of President Trump and his supporters is reminiscent of Nazi Germany in the 1930s, the former Soviet Union, and other authoritarian, dictatorial regimes,” Trump’s 2024 campaign said in a statement.
The comparison shocked and disgusted many.
“Comparing this indictment to Nazi Germany in the 1930s is factually incorrect, completely inappropriate and flat-out offensive,” Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt said in a statement posted to social media. “As we have said time and again, such comparisons have no place in politics and are shameful.”
The Daily Post article included this photo without ellaborating on what it was:
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| Foundation of the Harzburg Front (see below). Bad Harzburg Oct. 11, 1931-Wilhelm Frick, Adolf Hitler, Alfred Hugenberg, Otto Schmidt-Hanover, Theodor Duesterberg. Narodowe Archiwum Cyfrowe Public domain |
The Harzburg Front (German: Harzburger Front) was a short-lived radical right-wing, anti-democratic political alliance in Weimar Germany, formed in 1931 as an attempt to present a unified opposition to the government of Chancellor Heinrich Brüning. It was a coalition of the national conservative German National People's Party (DNVP) under millionaire press-baron Alfred Hugenberg with Adolf Hitler's National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP), the leadership of Der Stahlhelm paramilitary veterans' association, the Agricultural League and the Pan-German League organizations. Wikipedia
What those of us with a clear mind and a love of democracy see when we look at what happened in 1930's Germany is how many Germans enthusiastically supported Hitler as their savior. About 89 years ago Hitler, who was already chancellor, was also elected president of Germany.
A referendum on merging the posts of Chancellor and President was held in Nazi Germany on 19 August 1934, seventeen days after the death of President Paul von Hindenburg. The German leadership sought to gain approval for Adolf Hitler's assumption of supreme power. The referendum was associated with widespread intimidation of voters, and Hitler used the resultant large "yes" vote to claim public support for his activities as the de facto head of state of Germany. In fact, he had assumed these offices and powers immediately upon Hindenburg's death and used the referendum to legitimise that move and take the title Führer und Reichskanzler (Führerand Reich Chancellor). (Wikipedia)
When Trump ran for president in 2016 not enough people could see he was a Hitler in the making.
Now we see not only that he was, but more terrifying, that there is a considerable support for him becoming the American Hitler in the next election.
Addendum:
These are the two tabloid front pages New Yorkers see when they head out today. On top is the Murdoch N.Y. Post and on bottom the anti-Trump N.Y.Daily News:
Recent blog posts:
