Trump want us to think he's Napoleon, and probably George Washington too, by Hal M. Brown

Here’s a Google News search for the phrase “he who saves his country does not violate any laws. Trump’s posting this both on Truth Social and X has set off a media tsunami. 

This article in Mediaite includes screehshots of some of the social media reactions to Trump’s post.

Here are two of them:

It is instructive to read the Wikipedia page for the phrase, which has just been updated to include Trump’s post, says about it.

"He who saves his country, violates no law" (or "He who saves his country does not violate any law") is a quote attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte,^[1][2] often interpreted as a justification for extraordinary actions in times of national crisis. The phrase has been cited in various political and ideological contexts to defend or rationalize actions perceived as outside legal or ethical norms but claimed to be in the service of national salvation. It sometimes serves to justify the erosion of legal norms in pursuit of nationalist goals. It was notably used by Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik as justification for the 2011 Norway attacks,^[3] as well as by President Donald Trump in apparent response to accusations that he is bypassing the United States government's checks and balances on the executive branch's power.

Attribution and meaning

The quote is attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte,^[1] though there is no definitive source confirming its exact origin in his writings or speeches. As Celui qui sauve sa patrie ne viole aucune loi, it appears in Maximes et Pensées de Napoléon, a collection compiled by Honoré de Balzac and published under the name of J.-L. Gaudy in an attempt to gain the Légion d'Honneur for Gaudy, but Balzac gives no source.^[4][5]

The sentiment expressed aligns with Napoleon’s belief in strong, decisive leadership and his view that the needs of the state could sometimes supersede legal constraints. The phrase suggests that actions taken to protect or preserve a nation are inherently justified, even if they contravene established laws.

This idea resonates with realpolitik, a political philosophy emphasizing pragmatism and national interest over strict adherence to legal or moral codes. However, such justifications have been widely criticized for providing a pretext for authoritarianism, allowing leaders to bypass democratic institutions under the guise of protecting the nation. This rationale has historically been employed by fascist regimes, including Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, where legal structures were undermined in the name of national salvation. The phrase has also been described as aligned with Vladimir Putin's thinking and governance style.^[6]

Trump posting this in Truth Social and X is not only all over the national news, people around the world are reading about it. If India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, who just met with Trump, is back home he may be reading about it in “India Today.”

I have no doubt that Putin is following the story. It’s in the English edition of Pravda.

I doubt Trump came up with the the idea of using the quote by himself. Whoever gave him the idea of posting it probably didn’t have to explain what it meant since it is straightforward. He thinks he is above the law because he is a dictator. The marketer Trump, once he was told it was a famous Napoleon quote, knew he could use it to sell the idea that he can do anything he wants to do as long as he says it is saving the country. 

He’s already ranted about what and who he is saving the country from. The list is long and includes evil immigrants, woke, DEI, forced childhood gender change surgery, and drag shows. 

I’m waiting for him to compare himself to our most famous law breaker, George Washington. He broke uncountable Britsh laws.

There’s no chance Trump’s cult will float the idea of putting an image of Trump on the dollar bill. However there are two other denominations which could be changed.

I see Trump’s cult making a case for Andrew Jackson or Ulysses S. Grant being replaced. About Jackson, from Wikipedia: “He has been praised as an advocate for working Americans and preserving the union of states, and criticized for his racist policies, particularly towards Native Americans. His political philosophy became the basis for the Democratic Party.” Many people living in the former Confederacy might applaud Grant being replaced by Trump on the $50 bill. This would just be symbolic. Far more people use the $20 so Trump would rather be on that bill. 

I think the $10 bill, with Hamilton on it, would be in jeopardy were it not for him being made more famous than he already was because of the hit musical.

Trump has already proposed getting rid of the penny. He’s getting some resistance for this from the copper industry. He might consider reissuing the $2.00 bill, which never became popular, with his face on it. Non-legal tender versions are already available.

I think that if he did this, many more people would be using it than ever did with the current version. Thomas Jefferson was a worthy patriot to honor on the bill, but he was the principal author of that pesky Declaration of Independenc, so maybe Trump would like to symbolically recognized as surpassing Jefferson as a patriot.

It's not hyperbole to invoke Hitler, albeit with qualifications, anymore, by Hal M. Brown

When we compare Trump with Hitler, we aren’t comparing him to Hitler in the 1940’s. We compare him to Hitler when he was coming into power in the 1930’s. It is never a literal comparison. Both were psychopaths. Both didn’t value all human lives equally. Both demonized certain groups of people including regular people and their enemies. Trump has plans to deport people and makes veiled threats to imprision enemies and not exterminate them. 

It is chilling that reasonable people like us, who avoid using hyperbole just for the sake of using hyperbole, say things like "what they will do when Trump starts ordering Putin-style assassinations? Some will try to thwart him and some will pull the trigger, as they have throughout centuries." This is from a Sabrina Haake reply to a comment I made on one of her Substacks.

I think the "Putin the assassin” analogy is appropriate. So are many Nazi analogies as long as they are qualified and explained.

It isn't just the wrtten word where Nazi comparisons are made. Sometimes we just post photos. Do a Google Image search for Stephen Miller and Joseph Goebels:

Some of us, me for example, put Hitler moustaches on Trump and Tom Homan on BlueSky:

There may be a time when even mockery like mine, above, isn’t remotely amusing. If things get as deadly serious as they might become so dire that even those desperate to find something to smile about will realize that they are trying to fiddle while the country burns. For example, two weeks ago I wrote that it was time for Rachel Maddow to stop chuckling and get deadly serious. Now things have gotten so much worse that even smiling over a major Trump failure or faux pas is, at least to me, disquieting.

Part of my sensitivity to this is being Jewish and growing hearing my partent talk about the Holocaust. I think about a Jewish family in Nazi German listening to a comedy show on Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft (Nazi radio)) while they see that down the street the Gestopo is dragging their neighbor’s family into a van.

As for the “Morning Joe” show, I see a time when they will eliminate their sports chatter and show biz coverage. 

While on the topic of MSNBC I found something I approved of. Joy Reid had Nayyera Haq on this morning. She was a senior advisor in the State Department and also worked in the White House ( Here's her website bio: https://www.nayyera.com/about The panel was discussing how Vance met with the far-right German party leader and not the chancelor. What I found gratifying and noteworthy is when another panelist asked her what she made of this, she said it was an embrace of Nazis and Nazism. This is the first time I've heard the word Nazi on an MSNBC show.

Here in our Substack-sphere many of us don't hesitate to say, basically, that if someone walks like a Nazi, talks like a Nazi, and acts like a Nazi, they are Nazi.

Obviously, I don’t mean one of those wackos like Hitler loving Holocaust denying Kanye West. I mean small “n” nazi:

From my online dictionary here’s the defintion of Nazi “Not a member of the far-right National Socialist German Workers' Party, rather a person with extreme racist or authoritarian views. or a person who seeks to impose their views on others in a very autocratic or inflexible way.”

Because most people aren't that familiar with the abbreviations for the agencies that replaced the KGB - the SVR, FSB, FSO, and GRU, I always use the term Gestapo to describe the personal enforcement group of thugs Trump wants at his command to carry out his psychopathic orders.

Hitler had Himmler, Göring, and lesser known names, to run his Gestapo and SS. We will have Thom Homan and, if he is approved, will have Kash Patel.

Hardly a week goes by that I don't replay the final scene of "Apocalypse Now" in my mind with a dying h Brando saying "the horror, the horror."

Addendum:

There is a place for finely honed satire and humor devised to send a message to a population which is being propagandized by a despotic regime. Here’s an article about how the British did this during World War II.

Excerpts:

The BBC’s German Service used satire to reach ordinary Germans in World War Two. Its aim was to break the Nazi monopoly on news within the Third Reich.

It’s a late night in London in 1940, and Austrian exile Robert Lucas is writing at his desk. Bombs are raining down on the city every night, Hitler’s army is winning throughout Europe and the invasion of England has become a genuine prospect. In spite of the air-raid sirens and, as he put it “the hell’s noise of the war machinery" going off all around him, Lucas is focused on the job at hand: to “fight for the souls of the Germans”. He is composing a radio broadcast aimed at citizens of the Third Reich. But this is not a passionate plea for them to come to their senses. This is an attempt to make them laugh.

Example:

The quirky content of the programmes should be understood in the context of this curious alliance. Adolf Hirnschal is a series of fictitious letters written by a German corporal on the front line to his wife. The protagonist reads the letters to his fighting comrade before they are posted. On the surface Adolf Hirnschal is devoted to his “beloved Führer”. Yet so far-fetched are his exclamations of loyalty that the intention is clear: to expose the shallowness and mendacity of Nazi proclamations. In his first letter after war is declared on Russia in 1941 he tells his wife how he welcomed the news from his lieutenant that they are being transferred to the Russian border:

I jump up in joy and say: ‘Mr Lieutenant, kindly asking for permission to express that I am tremendously pleased that we are now fraternising with the Russians. Did not our beloved Führer already say in 1939 that our friendship with the Russians is irrevocable and irreversible?’

Thus Hirnschal exposes the hypocrisy of Hitler’s policy towards Russia, all under the cover of absolute loyalty.