Business As Usual

I recently read a book (published in 1960) by a physician who survived Auschwitz. 

I have read a lot of books about the Holocaust. But this book is different: it was written by a Jewish Hungarian physician who worked with and for the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele. The author did not conduct experiments on the living, and he did try to help other physician prisoners by sneaking medications (taken from the dead) to them. He was responsible for conducting autopsies on prisoners who had either died of disease or who had been killed for the purpose of Mengele's twisted 'research' on dwarfs, twins and those with various congenital abnormalities.

The person who wrote the forward to the book wrote at length about how, when the Nazis were just starting to implement oppressive laws, attack the press, etc, the German people went on with business as usual. When the Nazis started verbally and physically attacking Jews, everybody, including many in the Jewish population, went on with business as usual. "The German people won't stand for this," they thought. "It won't be that bad," some believed. "It's only the Jews," thought still others in a country with a strong anti-Semitic history.

And now, some 80 years later, we in the United States are going about business as usual as our government follows in the footsteps of the Nazis. Don't believe me? Consider these facts:

• Immigrants, like the Jews of Hitler's time, are being blamed for all kinds of imagined transgressions, from rape to stealing jobs from Americans to bringing diseases to America. 
• Immigrant children are locked in cages for indefinite periods of time after being torn from their families. 
• Attacks, both physical (bombings of mosques) and verbal ("Muslims are terrorists and shouldn't be allowed into our country"), are on the rise, led by the person who is supposed to work to unite, not further divide, the country. 
• Attacks on America's news media ("the enemy of the people") are ongoing, while his favorite news media mouthpiece (Fox 'News') gives a voice to the president's rantings.
• Press credentials to the White House are yanked if a media outlet dares to print or air a story less than flattering to the occupant of the White House, or simply if the supreme ruler doesn't like it.
• Efforts to limit the rights of the LGBT community are escalating. 
• The president continues to disregard Congress. He tells his staff (and former staff) to ignore subpoenas to testify before Congress. Like Hitler, he fills vacant positions with those willing to enforce his twisted beliefs.
• He is trying, so far successfully, to seize more and more power for himself. Last week he "directed" American companies to move their manufacturing plants back to the US from China. Somebody needs to tell him that he doesn't have the power to direct private companies and individuals to do anything. 
• He accused American Jews who vote Democratic of being disloyal to the US. German Jews had their citizenship revoked, as they weren't considered to be loyal to the German state (and to Hitler).

There is one difference:

Hitler's hatred, at least, wasn't based on his religion. He was anti-Christian, unlike the current occupant of the White House (I will not utter his name), who continues to pretend to be a good Christian and cozies up to the evangelical branch of American Christianity. He appears to agree with the evangelicals' anti-gay, keep-women-in-their place, anti-abortion beliefs. 

I know that many Americans are upset and angered by these and many other actions that are pushing us toward becoming a fascist nation. Most of us, despite our anger and concern about the growing power-grabbing of the president, his disregard for the Constitution, and his flagrant flouting of laws and norms, feel powerless and helpless. What can we do to stop this megalomaniac who recently declared himself "the king of Israel" and "the chosen one"? He even had the audacity to talk about his 'reign,' although American presidents are supposed to serve, not reign. 

Until and unless the US Senate, which is a Republican-dominated chamber, decides to do something -- anything -- to challenge the president's power grab, or until an organization sues to keep his ambitions in check, nothing will change. We are all being told to wait until the 2020 elections, but he can do so much more damage in the next 14+ months.

So until then, I guess it will be business as usual. And that is a very scary thought.