Tag: adolf hitler
Why The Trump Cult Is So Appealing To Fundamentalists

Why The Trump Cult Is So Appealing To Fundamentalists

Donald Trump’s MAGA movement is fundamentalist at its core—with fundamentalism being understood as a psychological rather than a religious concept. Pretty much every large-scale public movement, secular or sacred, has its share of extremists, and as the religious columnist Paul Prather has argued: “remove the labels, close your eyes and quickly the fundamentalists in one group start sounding uncannily like the fundamentalists in all other groups, as if they were reading from the same script.”

It's another word for fanatic.

Most Trumpists call themselves “conservative,” which used to signify a belief in limited government, low taxes, free trade and freedom of conscience, but which under Trump signals tribal loyalty and revenge. This explains what some see as the central paradox of the MAGA movement, that a congenital braggart who pretty much embodies what Christianity has traditionally called the Seven Deadly Sins—greed, lust, envy, sloth, gluttony, pride and wrath—has come to seem the embodiment of faith for millions of Republican evangelicals.

Trump spent Christmas Day typing up and posting laments and threats in ALL CAPS on his Truth Social website, targeting “JOE BIDEN’S MISFITS & THUGS, LIKE DERANGED JACK SMITH.” They’re “COMING AFTER ME,” he warned “AT LEVELS OF PERSECUTION NEVER SEEN BEFORE IN OUR COUNTRY???...looking to destroy our once great USA. MAY THEY ROT IN HELL. AGAIN, MERRY CHRISTMAS!”

A bit lacking in the spirit of the holiday, some would say.

Not to mention he's the world's biggest crybaby

But they would be wrong, the MAGA faithful would insist. George Orwell captured the essence of the whiny strongman in reviewing the British edition of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf way back in 1940, after the German dictator had driven Germany to war, but before it was clear that he had doomed his country to catastrophe.

Hitler, Orwell wrote, "knows that human beings don’t only want comfort, safety, [and] short working-hours …they also, at least intermittently, want struggle and self-sacrifice, not to mention drums, flags and loyalty-parades."

Orwell understood Fascism’s appeal to an aggrieved population. While European and North American democracies, he wrote, told people, in effect, that “'I offer you a good time,' Hitler has said to them, 'I offer you struggle, danger, and death,' and as a result a whole nation flings itself at his feet."

Orwell also understood the personal psychology of the crybaby conqueror: “The initial, personal cause of [Hitler’s] grievance against the universe can only be guessed at; but at any rate the grievance is here. He is the martyr, the victim, Prometheus chained to the rock, the self-sacrificing hero who fights single-handed against impossible odds. If he were killing a mouse he would know how to make it seem like a dragon.”

Sound like anybody we know?

That said, I do believe Trump when he says he never read Mein Kampf. Too long, too many big words. Donald Trump never learned anything from a book. He stole his whole act from 1950s professional wrestlers at Sunnyside Gardens in Queens—specifically from Dr. Jerry Graham, who swaggered around boasting that “I have the body men fear and women adore.”

The hairstyle too, a bleach blonde pompadour that taught a generation of wrestling fans how a “heel” behaved—that is, basically like a cartoon Nazi. The man was a masterful showman who aroused thousands to frenzy with balsa wood chairs and fake blood capsules. He was as fat as Trump too, although there was muscle under the lard.

Likewise, Donald Trump needed no books to absorb the lesson that non-white immigrants are “vermin” poisoning the nation’s blood, or that (white) people in Minnesota, as he assured an audience there the other day, are genetically superior. He learned those things at his slumlord father’s knee. Fred Trump was arrested at a Manhattan Ku Klux Klan rally some years before The Donald was born. This business about racehorse genes is straight KKK dogma. It's always appealed to people who fear outsiders.

But back to the great man’s hypnotized fanbase. Paul Prather credits David French with defining fundamentalism’s essential nature. He argues that whether religious or political, all “fundamentalist cultures exhibit three traits: certainty, ferocity, and solidarity. He says certainty is the key to the other two traits.”

“The fundamentalist mind isn’t clouded by doubt,” French has written. “In fact, when people are fully captured by the fundamentalist mind-set, they often can’t even conceive of good-faith disagreement. To fundamentalists, their opponents aren’t just wrong but evil. Critics are derided as weak or cowards or grifters. Only a grave moral defect can explain the failure to agree.”

Doubters should see this column’s e-mail feed, although I must say the Trumpist faction has been relatively restrained of late. Maybe they’ve given up on me, or maybe reality has begun to creep in at the edges.

One way or another, fundamentalist cults always implode; often violently, but sometimes not.

Gene Lyons is a former columnist for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, a winner of the National Magazine Award, and co-author of The Hunting of the President.

Moms for Liberty founders, Tiffany Justice and Tina Descovich

Scholars Condemn Philly Museum Over Hosting Of 'Moms For Liberty' Event

The conservative group Moms for Liberty, is set to rent space in Philadelphia's Museum of the American Revolution for an event later this week, and several prominent historical organizations are making their disapproval known, The New York Times reports.

This comes just days after the right-wing organization, known for pushing book bans in schools, issued an apology after including a quote from Adolf Hitler in a newsletter that read, "He alone, who OWNS the youth, GAINS the future," according to the Indianapolis Star.

After receiving significant backlash, NBC reports an Indiana chapter chairwoman, Paige Miller offered a statement, saying, "We condemn Adolf Hitler's actions and his dark place in human history. We should not have quoted him in our newsletter and express our deepest apology."

Per the Times, earlier this month, "dozens of museum employees were calling on the museum to cancel the rental to Moms for Liberty, on the grounds that it undermined the museum's reputation and mission."

The Committee on L.G.B.T.Q. History, according to the report, urged the museum to renege on the rental, calling it "shocking that an organization dedicated to documenting and preserving American history would enter into any relationship with an organization that is so intent upon distorting the American experience."

Additionally, the American Historical Association wrote a letter earlier this week, urging the museum to reconsider hosting the upcoming event, saying, "Moms for Liberty is an organization that has vigorously advocated censorship and harassment of history teachers, banning history books from libraries and classrooms, and legislation that renders it impossible for historians to teach with professional integrity without risking job loss and other penalties."

Referring to the museum, the Organization of American Historians emphasized, "This work and gains that have been made in this space are in many respects fragile, and must be vigorously defended."

The museum responded to all criticism, according to the report, with a statement that "acknowledged the legitimacy of the employees' concerns, but said it could not discriminate on the basis of a group’s political beliefs, which it called 'antithetical to our purpose.'"

It read: "The Museum of the American Revolution strives to create an inclusive and accessible museum experience for visitors with a wide range of viewpoints and beliefs. Consistent with this mission, we make available after-hours and private rentals to groups that organize legally and safely, including federally recognized 501(c)(4) nonprofit organizations."

Deemed an "extremist" organization by the Southern Poverty Law Center earlier this month, the group rejects criticism from the historians, writing, "We expect our national summit in Philadelphia to be a time of training and empowerment for parents to be more active in their child’s school system. We stand for the rights of parents and against anyone trying to silent [sic] parents who want to speak up on behalf of their child's needs."

Per the Times, the National Council on Public History, and the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians also denounced the event.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Obsessed With Hitler For Years, Kanye West Praised Nazi Dictator's 'Power'

Obsessed With Hitler For Years, Kanye West Praised Nazi Dictator's 'Power'

Kanye West had an “obsession” with Adolf Hitler, praised the genocidal fascist dictator responsible for 17 million deaths for all he was able to achieve and for the power he was able accumulate, and even wanted to name his 2018 album “Hitler,” according to a CNN report.

“He would praise Hitler by saying how incredible it was that he was able to accumulate so much power and would talk about all the great things he and the Nazi Party achieved for the German people,” a business executive who worked for West, now known officially as “Ye,” told CNN.

That executive also “told CNN that the artist created a hostile work environment, in part through his ‘obsession’ with Hitler.” He “reached a settlement with West and some of his companies over workplace complaints, including harassment, which CNN has reviewed.”

He also said “that West spoke openly about reading Mein Kampf, Hitler’s 1925 autobiographical manifesto, and expressed his ‘admiration’ for the Nazis and Hitler for their use of propaganda.”

CNN adds that Van Lathan Jr., a former TMZ employee, confirmed he has heard West make antisemitic remarks.

“’I already heard him say that stuff before at TMZ,’” Lathan said during an episode of the ‘Higher Learning’ podcast earlier this month,” CNN reported.

“I mean, I was taken aback because that type of antisemitic talk is disgusting. It’s like, I’m taken aback any time anyone does that, right? But as far as [West], I knew that that was in him because when he came to TMZ, he said that stuff and they took it out of the interview. … He said something like, ‘I love Hitler, I love Nazis.’ Something to that effect when he was there. And they took it out of the interview for whatever reason. It wasn’t my decision.”

West’s antisemitism, which can be traced back nearly a decade, has made top headlines in the past few weeks after VICE reported on leaked antisemitic and other remarks he made to Fox News that were not included in his interview with Tucker Carlson.

West ran for president as an independent in 2020 but reportedly had “regular” conversations with Jared Kushner.

Reprinted with permission from Alternet.

Hitler Or Trump? 55 Chances To Test Your Knowledge Of The Fuhrer And The Furor

Hitler Or Trump? 55 Chances To Test Your Knowledge Of The Fuhrer And The Furor

Each of these statements applies to Donald Trump or Adolf Hitler -- or both. The correct answers may be found at the end.

1.His father was a cruel authoritarian.

2.His father was arrested participating in a violent rally of a racist political organization.

3.His father was born illegitimate, had an illegitimate daughter, divorced, married the housemaid, who died, and married his impregnated teenaged cousin.

4.His grandfather ran a whorehouse.

5.His father told him, “Be a killer.”

6.Threw rocks at a baby in a playpen.

7.Adored his mother, sobbed when he learned she was ill and was devastated at her death.

8.He had to be reminded by his siblings to visit his dying mother in the hospital.

9.Sexually obsessed with his niece, he controlled every aspect of her life, forced her to end her affair with his chauffeur, until she committed suicide.

10.Stole the inheritance of his brother, cut off his disabled nephew’s medical insurance and sued by his niece for fraud.

11.Doted on his pet dog.

12.Never had a pet.

13.Separate bedroom from his wife.

14.His wife said, “I want to be a beautiful corpse.”

15.His wife said, “I’m not only a beauty, I’m smart.

16.A vegetarian, carefully watched his diet.

17.Burnt steak with ketchup his favorite dish.

18.Twice decorated for military bravery.

19.Received a medical deferment from military service for bone spurs in his feet as a result of a letter written by a doctor as a favor to his father.

20.Said about Jews, “The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every day. Those are the kind of people I want counting my money. No one else.”

21.Described Nazis who chanted, “Jews will not replace us,” as “fine people.”

22.Wrote his own book.

23.Had a ghostwriter for his book.

24.Had a library of 16,000 books that included Shakespeare, Cervantes and Ibsen.

25.Had a copy of Hitler’s collected speeches by his bed and said, “He did a lot of good things.”

26.Woody Guthrie wrote a song about him entitled “Tear the Fascists Down.”

27.Woody Guthrie wrote a song about his father with lyrics that he “knows just how much racial hate/ He stirred up in that bloodpot of human hearts.”

28.Thought of himself as a builder and architect.

29.Thought of himself as a builder and destroyed historic architecture.

30.Claimed internal enemies stabbed the country in the back.

31.Never won a majority of the votes in an election

32.Betrayed by his generals.

33.Admired the Russian dictator’s ruthlessness and made a deal with him.

34.Exclaimed “What a guy!” after the Russian dictator purged his former allies.

35.Praised the Russian dictator as “a genius” after he invaded a neighboring country.

36.Called journalists “the lying press” and “the enemy of the people.”

37.Promoted the technique of “The Big Lie.”

38.Promised to make his country “great again.”

39.Promoted ethnic purity and warned against contamination.

40.His media adviser relied on the mass propaganda techniques of filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl.

41.Appeared in “The Triumph of the Will.”

42.Appeared in “Home Alone 2.”

43.Surrounded himself with an inner circle of misfits and criminals.

44.A germophobe.

45.Endorsed quack medicine.

46.Appointed a quack as his personal physician.

47.Sent a bodyguard to raid his doctor’s office to steal his medical files and ignored warnings about infection from a deadly disease.

48.His lawyer was known as “The Butcher of Poland.”

49.His lawyer boasted, “My scare value is high.”

50.One of his closest associates was gay and he had him murdered.

51.One of his closest associates was gay and he fired him when he was dying of AIDS.

52.Deployed private militias against a liberal democracy.

53.Staged a coup to overthrow an elected government.

54.Tried, convicted and imprisoned after a failed coup.

55.Admired by convicted Watergate burglar G. Gordon Liddy.

Answers: 1. Both; 2. Trump; 3. Hitler; 4. Trump; 5. Trump. 6. Trump; 7. Hitler; 8. Trump; 9. Hitler; 10. Trump; 11. Hitler; 12. Trump; 13. Both; 14. Hitler; 15. Trump; 16. Hitler; 17. Trump; 18. Hitler; 19. Trump; 20. Trump; 21. Trump; 22. Hitler; 23. Trump; 24. Hitler; 25. Hitler; 26. Trump; 28. Hitler; 29. Trump; 30. Both; 31. Both; 32. Both; 33. Both; 34. Hitler; 35. Trump; 36. Both; 37. Both; 38. Both; 39. Both; 40. Both; 41. Hitler; 42. Trump; 43. Both; 44. Both; 45. Both; 46. Both; 47. Trump; 48. Hitler; 49. Trump; 50. Hitler; 51. Trump; 52. Both; 53. Both; 54. Hitler; 55. Both