Gentle Reader – I am pretty sure that no explanation is needed.
I have not kept up with this section of my blog. In fact, the past two years – and especially the past year – has been overwhelming. With a piece I’ve written today (5 November, 2018), I attempt to re-start. I look forward to your comments. And by the way, vote tomorrow, 11/6 (if you live in the US).
1. A Wave of Harassment After Trump’s Victory
Hundreds of incidents of harassment and intimidation have been reported across the country since Election Day. Below are just a few:
• In Wellsville, N.Y., a softball dugout was spray-painted with a swastika and the words “Make America White Again.”
https://ajlayon.com/2016/11/30/nytimes-a-wave-of-harassment-after-trumps-victory
What would you do if you saw someone yelling at a woman on a bus, telling her to take off her hijab? If you saw someone attack an African-American man and tell him Donald Trump could deport him? If you saw a man throw a woman off the sidewalk as she walked her dogs?
https://ajlayon.com/2016/11/30/nytimes-how-to-help-if-someone-is-being-harassed
3. No, Trump, We Can’t Just Get Along
Donald Trump schlepped across town on Tuesday to meet with the publisher of The New York Times and some editors, columnists and reporters at the paper.
As The Times reported, Trump actually seemed to soften some of his positions:
He seemed to indicate that he wouldn’t seek to prosecute Hillary Clinton. But he should never have said that he was going to do that in the first place.
He seemed to indicate that he wouldn’t encourage the military to use torture. But he should never have said that he would do that in the first place.
He said that he would have an “open mind” on climate change. But that should always have been his position.
You don’t get a pat on the back for ratcheting down from rabid after exploiting that very radicalism to your advantage. Unrepentant opportunism belies a staggering lack of character and caring that can’t simply be vanquished from memory. You did real harm to this country and many of its citizens, and I will never — never — forget that.
https://ajlayon.com/2016/11/30/nytimes-no-trump-we-cant-just-get-along
4. What Is a Country For? Fighting for the Good Life in Trumplandia
Rebecca Gordon
https://ajlayon.com/2017/01/10/what-is-a-country-for-fighting-for-the-good-life-in-trumplandia
5. How Did We Get Here? – Violent Authoritarianism or Fascism in America?
AJ Layon
(This is Version 3. Hopefully a little tighter)
“…Speculations about the future depend upon an accurate analysis of the past…”[*]
Sweeping through our country today is a serious menace. One of racism and its brother, anti-Semitism; abuse of refugees and their children; separation of children from parents – horribly reminiscent of German rail-head camps in the 1940s in style if not practice; placing children in cages; “losing” the children so that they cannot be re-united with parents in compliance with Court orders; encouraging violence against opponents and our press; the use of terms such as “fake news” (lügen presse) and “enemies of the people” to refer to our press, similar to such use by Hitler and other fascists; and the undermining of the rule of law through the degradation of our Department of Justice (DOJ), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the Courts, the Special Prosecutor’s Office, and most recently, the Constitution of the United States itself (the declaration that by Presidential Executive Order the 14th Amendment can be abrogated).
http://ajlayon.com/2018/11/05/how-did-we-get-here-violent-authoritarianism-or-fascism-in-america-2
6. What Can Happen While Our Attention is Elsewhere – Mike Stuchbery
Gentle Reader – I need to explain a couple of things. Firstly, this started as a Health Blog and continues to be one. Yet as you can see from the Headers of the “Home” page, I define health rather broadly. In that context, I have posted, in the past, the UK Government’s analysis of the initiation of the War on Iraq, among other things.
Secondly, after the present occupant of the White House was elected, I initiated a section of the blog entitled “Survival Tools for a Fascist Era”. More than one person commented to me that use of the word “Fascist” in conjunction with the WH occupant was premature. I think and have written (see Post #5 in this section) that this is no longer the case, the Occupant fulfills the standard criteria for a fascist, even if our government does not, despite his best efforts. None-the-less, I have not been as active as I should have been at keeping this section up to date. While I will add my own pieces in future, I have “discovered” – and on Twitter no less ! – a brilliant colleague whose work I will post – with his permission – going forward, that of Mike Stuchbery.
Mike is a former high school history teacher and professional researcher now based in Luton, England. He has a special interest in the Nazi era and resistance to authoritarian governments, as well as wider German history. He may be found at: @mikestuchbery_
Mike has a Patreon site at: https://www.patreon.com/mikestuchbery_
Here is a piece he posted on Twitter this morning 12 November, 2018.
——————————————————————
This is going to be an angry thread. It’s angry, because of what I see, compared to what I’ve been spending the last few days researching. Let me tell you about what happened shortly after the Nazi Party were voted into office, and how your both-sides-are-bad inertia is criminally naive.
http://ajlayon.com/2018/11/12/what-can-happen-while-our-attention-is-elsewhere-mike-stuchbery/
7. They Lied, It Really Is That Simple – Viet Nam
“…Even as [President Johnson] resisted JCS requests to intensify the air campaign, he emphasized the ground war in the South. Sending US troops to fight in the South seemed the least expensive course of action [italics mine] in terms of domestic political reaction, even though McNamara and the president were aware of predictions that an expansion of the American effort on the ground would lead to a protracted, indecisive war that the United States would ultimately lose…” (1)
Recently, a piece (authoritarianism-or-fascism) questioning how we arrived at this Trumpian moment was posted by me on this web site. This “moment” was tied historically – hopefully successfully – to events reaching a climax in 1945 – 1949, particularly the success of the Chinese Communist Party’s revolution, driving out the Nationalist forces against which they had been arrayed after the Japanese defeat. This, and the passage of the National Security Act of September 18, 1947 (50 USC Ch 15 § 401, amended 1949), which initiated the national security state, under which we are still encumbered, led us, inexorably, to this moment.
With the success of the Chinese Revolution, the United States turned inward and began…
http://ajlayon.com/2018/11/29/they-lied-it-rea…-simple-viet-nam/