Hitlerism as a word never became popular. There is now such a thing as Trumpism. Move over, Nazism. This is the ism that will describe America. By Hal M. Brown

 

This is the Wikipedia entry for Trumpism. The term is a part of the current lexicon.

Hitlerism never became a popularly used word. Nazism did. I am not sure why. Hitler achieved a cult of personality the same way Trump has done. Maybe it is just that the term didn't have a ring to it.

This is from Wikipedia:

Nazism, formally named National Socialism (NS; German: Nationalsozialismus, is the far-right totalitariansocio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party in Germany. During Hitler's rise to power in 1930s Europe, it was frequently referred to as Hitler Fascism (German: Hitlerfaschismus) and Hitlerism (German: Hitlerismus). The later related term "neo-Nazism" is applied to other far-right groups with similar ideas which formed after the Second World War and therefore after Nazi Germany collapsed.

Nazism is a form of fascism, with disdain for liberal democracy and the parliamentary system. Its beliefs include support for dictatorship, fervent antisemitism, anti-communism, anti-Slavism, anti-Romani sentiment, scientific racism, white supremacy, Nordicism, social Darwinism, homophobia, ableism, and the use of eugenics.

It took Trump the four years leading up to the election to position himself to achieve his dictatorial power. He did it differently than Hitler, but the result is the same. Read: 

In January 1933, Hitler did not immediately become a dictator. When he became chancellor, Germany’s democratic constitution was still in effect. However, Hitler transformed Germany by manipulating the democratic political system. Hitler and other Nazi leaders used existing laws to destroy German democracy and create a dictatorship.

In August 1934, President Hindenburg died. Hitler proclaimed himself Führer (meaning “leader”) of Germany. From that point forward, Hitler was the dictator of Germany. Read entire article.

If you are reading this Substack, and have read my previous essays recently, it probably needs no further explanation as to why I have posted the excerpt from this article.

I watch people on TV and in Substack videos and many of them are still smiling as they report on one or another victory against Trump and Trumpism. I only manage to smile, and even laugh these days, when playing pool volleyball and watching a good comedy on TV. I never smile when learning about a victory achived by the anti-Trump movement.

One of the first articles I read this morning was Trump 'clearly' threatening his own people in public: CNN analyst.This is how it begins:

CNN political analyst Mark Preston on Thursday said that President Donald Trump appeared to be openly threatening his own cabinet officials not to get in the way of X owner Elon Musk's efforts to take a wrecking ball to the federal government.

During an interview with host Sara Sidner, Preston said that Trump's first gambit to shut down the United States Agency for International Development looks like just the opening salvo in a broader attack on the government as a whole.

"I think this spells trouble, because this is going to be the first step in really Donald Trump successfully dismantling the government," he said. "Now, everything that he does try to do, Sarah, is not going to be successful but in this first step, he appears to be successful."

The last paragraph is what jumps out. I won’t explain why.

It is hopefully no longer considered by anyone reading this, and many others, to be hyperbole to compare what happened in Germany in the 1930’s to what has happened in the United States in the previous 10+ years. Those of use who see the parallels do not suffer from the pseudo-psychiatric disorder Trump and his allies called Trump derangement syndrome. This legitimately made it into Wikipedia (here), not because it is a real disorder but because it was a political reality.

Coining this term in regard to Trump was an attempt to gaslight his critics, i.e., to manipulate them into questioning their own perception of reality.

What we do suffer, actually suffer from, is seeing things clearly and as a consequence experience anxiety and depression, real disorders, because we see the fate of our democracy.

Addendum:

It isn’t reassuring that the report that a Trump official moved to change the poem on the Statue of Liberty was only deemed partially true by Snopes. Lady Liberty and Hitler are two of the most common themes political cartoonist are using these days.

None of the cartoons which you find when you do an image search for Trump and the Statue of Liberty are funny (Google image search): 

I want to thank all of my readers and my Substack subscribers. You can read all of my Substack posts here. If you subscribe you will recieve an email every time I post. Respectful comments are always welcome even if you disagree with me.

Some think Trump's aura of invincibility is fading. By Hal M. Brown (Not me. I think he's as invincible as he ever was. He controls the people with guns.)

 .

This is a reaction to reading The Aura of Invincibility is Fading in The Contrarian (here).

The meaning of the word aura is “the distinctive atmosphere or quality that seems to surround and be generated by a person.” The title of Jeniffer Rubin’s essay in today’s edition of The Contratian, published in SubStack, suggests that the aura of invincibility around Trump is fading. Her subtitle accurately says that “plenty of people are taking swings at Trump.”

If you’ve been reading my Substacks, you know I have not been basking in warm sunshine of optimism. Quite the contrary, I am in the wilds bundled up in my roaring blizzard togs. I am feeling the stinging icy wind against my face. I am not face down in the snow, but I don’t see the way to the warm safety of my cabin. I don’t need the weather channel to tell me that this is such an unprecedented storm that there’s no way to tell when, if ever, it will end. 

There have been lot's of losses for Trump & Co. and many wins for our side, but there is this chilling quote from Gen. Barry McCaffrery: "It is all a "consolidation of power with the people who have the guns."

I think of the heroic World War II Resistance. They had many victories thoughout the war. They even had guns. But for every one German officer killed, the Nazis made civilians pay with their lives 10-20 times over. If the Resistance had explosives, too, but when they blew up a bridge the Nazis destroyed an entire nearby village.

The only way the Nazis were defeated was for the Allies to amass huge military might. I don't see us as being anywhere near to D-Day. 

My partner and I are 81. We may not live to to see the Allied victory.

I think Trump and his henchmen will learn from their mistakes and focus their efforts on doing things that they believe will help them the most to achieve their final goal. We know what this is.

They will realize that their mistake was mounting a blizkrieg-like juggernaut. This was overreach where, using Project 2025, as a plan, they tried to do everything at once. But this wasn't actual warfare where Hitler's "lightening war" made sense. This was a planned takeover of a democracy and they treated it like they were invading countries.

DOGE, as well as killing woke and DEI, weren't necessary for them once they installed people like Pete Hegeseth, Kash Patel, Pam Bondi, and others to lead the departments and agencies which had guns. They probably now know that RFK Jr. was a mistake. (The first person just died of measles.) His department doesn't have guns. The same could be said for cutting USAID. Their workers don’t have guns either. 

Greenland, Panama Canal, Canadian statehood, even tariffs, all were unnecessary except as distractions which they didn’t need. Vance’s speech was blowing smoke. Likewise, cozying up to Putin, made no real sense.

Once Musk gave him the millions to help win the election there was no need to let him anywhere near the Oval Office. Like he’s done with others, Trump should have cut him loose without any payback for his services.

Trump & Co. continues to squander their power and waste their energy. For example there was no need to attack the media, kick the AP off Air Force One, and take over selection of the members of the White House Press Corps. They don’t need to control the media. Reporters don’t have guns.

I see this as the the consequence of the personal psychopatholgy of Trump, Musk, and others. Mostly it was Trump who, after the humiliation of losing the election, had his burning need for revenge festered through the E. Jean Carroll trial and literally hit home when the FBI raided Mar-a-Lago.

Trump has a need he can’t control. He has to put on a show. He has to scream “look at me!” He does this every day whether it is through his social media posts, his press appearances, or his signing executive orders making such photos of him doing so with his smiling face this are plastered everywhere. I’ll spare you photos since you’ve seen so many of them.

I predict you will see Trump backing off from many of the unnecessary assaults on democracy and norms, and focus on using the incredible power of the presidency, and the control of the people with guns, to become the monarch he's always wanted to be.

Trump is itching for an excuse to declare a national emergency and to declare martial law. All it will take is for something to happen during a protest rally for him to justify this. There are already are rallies across the country and there will be more and more of them. Some of them have resulted in a few people being arrested. Eventually someone will be hurt, or there will be looting and vandalism. It doesn’t have to be particularly bad, all Trump has to do is say that it was bad.

Then we come down to the question as to whether or not soldiers will follow unconstitutional orders. This sets the country up for a military coup, but I doubt this would happen because it would mean the military throwing out the elected leaders of the country and replacing them with generals who would govern until there could be truly free elections. That would be a step too far for them. I see generals and admirals resigning before they would do this.

Nobody can do more than imagine how far this will go. One thing I believe is that the United States that was envisioned by the Founders is in grave danger of disappearing. Democrats are hoping that they will take control of the Congress in 2026. If they do, this is no quarantee that Congress will act as a check on Executive Department excess. By 2026 Trump may have consolidated so much power he will just ignore Congress. He’s already breaking laws. 

The same applies to the Supreme Court. If they try to rein in the implications of the previously enacted presidential immunity ruling and rule that the president doesn’t have imperial power, Trump can just ignore them. After all, the Supreme Court doesn’t have guns.

..

There won't be a mea culpa big enough for those trying to normalize Trump if you're wrong. This means you, Jon Stewart. By Hal M. Brown

 

This RawStory article, "Trump's plan to jam through appointments enters new 'extreme' phase: says expert" prompted me to react.

Excerpt:

The plan already being discussed among a group of House Republicans involves Trump dismissing the Senate “against its will,” which would allow him to stack the government with whomever he chooses in the resulting "recess," wrote Akhil Reed Amar, a constitutional law professor at Yale University. 

“This is flagrantly unlawful,” he told readers in an op-ed published Friday in The Atlantic. Even more than that, Amar said the threat from House Republicans should be exposed as “an autocratic move that is not just unlawful but contemptuous of constitutionalism.”

The scheme, according to the Yale professor, would see House Republicans manufacture an “illusory” disagreement to spark the president’s adjournment power.

“First, the House of Representatives would pass a resolution calling for a recess,” he wrote. “The Senate would then (in all likelihood) refuse to pass the resolution. Trump would then declare the houses to be in ‘disagreement’ and adjourn both houses for as long as he likes.”

The "recess-appointments spree" would ensue from there, Amar said.

He noted the other Washington maneuver gaining traction that Trump could pull to get his nominations through the finish line – through a Senate vote to recess itself after the incoming president’s inauguration, “allowing him to unilaterally make a series of ‘recess’ appointments.”

“That plan may formally be legal, but it is plainly improper,” Amar wrote.

My reaction:

What would keep Trump from pressing the fast forward button on becoming an American Hitler? If he is thwarted in his nominations by Congress his next step could be to dissolve the body permanently.

Whether Congress would stop meeting if ordered to do so would remain to be seen. If they did meet and voted against him he could ignore their votes.

This would certainly lead to mass protests and there's a good chance it would cause him to declare a national emergency and invoke martial law and order the armed forces to break up demonstrations. People  likely would die if his orders are followed. The Kent State Massacre would look like a picnic. 

The big if is whether the military would go along with this. If they decided not to this could lead to a quiet, that is a non-compliant coup, or an active coup. 

If it was a active coup, instead of tanks protecting the White House and attacking Congress they could be surrounding the White House with cannons pointing at it.

 

If all this came to pass, the generals would install a temporary president. I don't see Trump as being literally arrested. Trump, protected by the Supreme Court for these acts, could not be prosecuted but this would be still be a coup. 

Despite being protected by the Secret Service faced with an overwhelming force military would not be engage in battle. They would have no choice but to stand by if the White House was surrounded and soldiers demanded Trump be surrended or they would enter and remove him. 

Thus Trump, if he didn't leave voluntarily, would be physically removed by a cadre of soldiers who would allow his Secret Service detail to accompany him. They'd all be flown to Mar-a-Lago in a military transport, not Air Force One. The Supreme Court would probably call an emergency meeting and declare that this was unconstitutional, which it would be, but they'd have no power.

New presidential elections would be called to be held in six to nine months. Trump would be allowed to run but the elections would be supervised by the military and be fair. If the people who believed Trump's promises that he'd make their lives better decided they wanted a ruthless dictatorship the generals would have to accede and allow Trump to become president again. 

I would hope that by this time enough gullible Trump voters would have realized they'd been betrayed and misled, and that this was not what they voted for. Thus iff he did end up running he'd lose. The Republicans would be given a second chace to free themselves from Trump and MAGA and nominate someone else. This would also give the Democrats time to have an open convention and hopefully nominate a better candidate than Kamala Harris.

Of course Trump is making sure he is portrayed as Mister President-to-be Nice Guy Normal as evidenced by his meeting with President Macron to celebrate the reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral today and having a a 60 Minutes interview with Kristen Welker tomorrow.

Maybe all of this glory will mute Trump's dictatorial desires to exact revenge against his enemies and spitefully ram though the 2025 Agenda to turn our federal goverment into a heartless freedom-chipping machine where people are like dead trees and would be reduced to wood chips and disposed of. 

I think Jon Stewart is naive and misguided when he rips into the media for scaring people about Trump (read article).

Excerpt:

Jon Stewart decried the media’s panicked coverage of President-elect Donald Trump’s upcoming second term, saying that it’s not helpful to get the public “s***ting our pants this early.”

Before interviewing Vermont senator Bernie Sanders on his latest Weekly Showpodcast episode, the Comedy Central comedian, 62, opened the hour acknowledging that America is currently in a “transitional period where we are not sure about whether the ground we are standing on is solid.”

“Although the news media seems convinced that we are the Roadrunner and the Coyote and the Coyote has run over the cliff, and we just looked down and realized there’s nothing under our feet and now we are plunging to our deaths,” Stewart quipped in reference to the famous Looney Tunes characters. “Because the news media is always very circumspect.

“We don’t know what’s going to happen when Donald Trump takes over,” he said, adding that while “we should be prepared” for all outcomes, “I don’t know how helpful it is to get us s***ting our pants this much, this early.”

Using a metaphor to describe his feelings about the Democrats losing the election, he said: “In the joint custody agreement that we now have in America, the kids are going to live with Dad for the summer and you just have to f***in’ eat it.”

Jon, I hope you think about this. There is good cause for freedom loving Americans to be (no asterisks) shitting in their pants. Stewart's summer with Dad won't be merely three months of Hell. It will last at least four years.

There is a very good chance Stewart and everyone else trying to normalize Trump are dead wrong. Maybe in the next year or two they will rue the day they helped people let their guard down and helped pave the way for the end of the American experiment in democracy. 

Dishonorable mention for trying to normalize Trump: Joe Scarborough and MikeBrzezinski for going to Mar-a-Lago to kiss the ring, and kudos to Rachel Maddow for calling them out on this.

Trump, not merely through his words, but through his nominees, has shown us what he wants to do. There will be no mea culpa big enough to come from people not taking this seriously.

Previous list of blogs here.

Primary Hal Brown's Blog website is halbrown.org (if you are reading this anywhere else any additions or corrections will be at this address)

Why Christofascist Hegseth is so important to Trump, By Hal M. Brown

 

To answer the question in my title: the reason Hegseth is so important is the last part of the word Christofascist. Forget the Christo, it is the fascist part that counts. For a fascist leader to succeed he must have control of the military which must be led by committed fascists. 

As of today, Trump is all in on Pete Hegseth - (the image above his Truth Social is my AI) and well he should be. He needs him. Perhaps more than anyone else in his administration Trump needs to have a yesman as Secretary of Defense.

The Senate dare not disagree. After all, he claims to have a mandate to do whatever he wants to do with the country. Of course, Homer Donald, you did not win a mandate....

Putin can more or less honestly claim he had an electoral mandate. Hitler eventually did have an electoral mandate. Trump insists that he also has a mandate. Of all his many lies this may be the most egregious. With his claiming a mandate he is justifying everything he intends to do to drastically change the way the country is governed. 

In the process of staffing his government prior to taking office he is facing his first test. He is getting minimal, but significant, pushback from enough Republicans in the Senate to stop some of his nominations. This gets me to the following:

The words above jumped out when I saw them in the Salon article 

Trump ushers in a Christian "deep state": MAGA moves to gut the Constitution.

I don't see the danger of the United States being governed by something like a Taliban with nukes and 3,400 fighter/jets, even though we see articles like another article in Salon:

How Christofascists became the heart of the MAGA movement

The reason I take issue with this is shown in the photo above. The two people flanking Trump may be Christofascists, but Trump is only a transactional Christofacist. He's no Mullah 

Hibatullah Akhundzada.

As long as Trump is president, Christian Nationalism will not be as dominant as people like Hegseth and others in the movement want it to be. Trump is basically a transactional person in all ways and I have little doubt that he is an atheist. He fakes being religious, but what anybody with any sense knows what he is really thinking when he's posing for pictures with religious leading praying over him especially if he hasn't had lunch yet.

This is from a Pew 2020 poll: "Most Americans don’t see Trump as religious; fewer than half say they think he’s Christian."

There are no indications that Trump has any kind of religious faith. Whether or not Trump stays in office until he dies the presumed next in line to lead the nation as president, or by then the position may have another name, is J.D. Vance. My impression is that he's as transactional as Trump and when it comes to Christian Nationalism. I think his views are more nuanced. He went from being an athiest to an orthodox Catholic. Read the following:

J.D. Vance Used to Be an Atheist. What He Believes Now Is Telling.

He’s not an evangelical Christian. He’s a Catholic—of a very specific type.

It may be especially relevant that Vance is married to a Hindu. 

Where does this leave the country? If we are not on the brink of becoming a Christofascist country we are well on the road to becoming a fascist country of a type unique to America. Fascism is simply defined as an authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government. For us to become truly fascist Trump has to geld Congress.

What we have in common with nascent fascist regimes is that the rising dictator plans to centralize power under the leader and turn any elected governing body into a ceremonial rubber stamp for public consumption. For example Wiki tells us the following:

Greater German Reichstag (German: Großdeutscher Reichstag) after 1938, was the national parliament of Nazi Germany from 1933 to 1945. Following the Nazi seizure of power and the enactment of the Enabling Act of 1933, it functioned purely as a rubber stamp for the actions of Adolf Hitler's dictatorship — always by unanimous consent — and as a forum to listen to Hitler's speeches. In this purely ceremonial role, the Reichstag convened only 20 times, the last on 26 April 1942. The President of the Reichstag (Reichstagspräsident) throughout this period was Hermann Göring.

Likewise Wiki tells us that the Russian Federal Assembly since the 2003 elections, the Federal Assembly (of Russia) has been referred to by analysts and observers as being a rubber stamp institution.

What all countries that turned into fascist regimes have in common is that they had a military to back them. Trump needs Hegseth to make sure, or try to make sure, that the military does his will. If Trump has to pray with Hegseth and say it is God's will to obey his commands he will do it.

So far Trump is only on the verge of ignoring what Congress, particularly the Senate, may do to thwart his plans. He's a psychopathic megalomanic and doesn't tolerate people who stand up to him. It remains to be seen whether he'll play the democracy game if some of his nominees don't get approved by the Senate. 

I have no doubt he has advisors like stone-cold sociopath Steve Miller who will explain to him that as president he has incredible power and shouldn't put off using it and take the first step to neutering Congress by doing what he can to force them into recess to make his appointments. If he can't manage to pull this off I can see him going full bore dictator and declaring a national emergency and initiating martial law. He couldn't get his crowd to do it,  but now could order soldiers to shut down the US Capitol. 

This would be the final test of whether the line against tyranny will hold and stop the forces of fascism. It would be up to the military to decide whether they are loyal to a person or to the Constitution. 

The Capitol isn't far from the White House. Military leaders would be faced with a stark choice. Instead of watching tanks heading to the Capitol Trump could look out the window and see them with their cannons pointed towards, not away from, the White House.

Here are more of the images that came up when I looked for Trump and Hegseth hugging. Note that none of the hands look right. Bottom right is closest to real but Trump's fingers a too long. I dediced to look into this and found a couple of articles.

Why AI-generated hands are the stuff of nightmares, explained by a scientist

Why Are AI-Generated Hands So Messed Up?

Previous list of blogs here.

Primary Hal Brown's Blog website is halbrown.org (if you are reading this anywhere else any additions or corrections will be at this address)

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