Comparing Trump with Hitler
There’s a popular knee jerk social norm that needs to die a quick death if America has any hope to survive as a democracy. It’s the idea, according to certain people, that it is forbidden to compare anyone, including Donald Trump, with Adolf Hitler.
Hitler is the most powerful symbol of human evil we have. The notion that it’s somehow antisemitic or blasphemous to the Holocaust to warn people about the rise of a second Hitler is therefore puzzling. After all, what could be more reverential to the greatest tragedy to ever befall the Jewish people than making damned sure it never happens again? It’s as if the same people who smugly warn us about “those who do not learn from history” are hellbent on making sure we do not. To paraphrase Trump himself when referring to nuclear weapons, what good is Hitler if we can’t use him?
I fully intend to, and I think the reasons for doing so aren’t only good ones, they’re essential. Trump came to power surrounded by people who cannot resist the spastic, neurological impulse to give Nazi salutes. (I’m reminded of Dr Strangelove.) He is allergic to democracy and has alienated America’s democratic allies and embraced the world’s dictators. He has asked his justice department to arrest journalists who disagree with him. He has wasted no time sending out brutal thugs to round up American citizens and non-citizens alike and throw them into concentration camps without due process. He has imprisoned the voiceless and innocent inside a wall of hate and provoked his glassy-eyed followers to vilify them as the cause of all their problems. He is on the brink of defying the courts and plunging America into a Constitutional crisis. In short, Trump is dissolving America’s democratic structure, consolidating power and becoming a dictator.
If that isn’t Hitleresque then I don’t know what is. So let’s stop worrying about the niceties of such comparisons and start boldly proclaiming them. Remember, people who compare Trump with Hitler aren’t the moral criminals here, Trump is, and we will go straight to hell if we are confused on that point. We must not permit our misplaced sense of etiquette to deter us.
American exceptionalism sometimes clouds our judgment. The idea that a redux to Nazi Germany could never happen in the good old US of A due to our “inherent and unimpeachable virtue” isn’t just hopelessly naive, it’s dangerous. It paradoxically makes fascism possible in the United States. And not only can it happen, it is happening, and, as they say, we have the receipts.
The idea of the corrupting influence of absolute power was borne out in Hitler. Also, the more powerful Hitler became in Germany, the more confident he was in his belief that his instincts were correct. As with Trump, Hitler’s instincts were in fact deeply flawed and misguided. Trump even more so. Where Hitler’s instincts were occasionally right, for example, his belief in the efficacy of the shock and awe of the blitzkrieg, Trump’s instincts never are.
But it doesn’t seem to matter to his followers, at least not yet. As long as State TV (sometimes referred to as “Fox News”) continues to proclaim Trump and his policies perfect, or nearly so, millions of people will continue to believe in him. Just as they did with Hitler, thanks to the endless lies spewed by Joseph Goebbels.
Trump is beginning his reign (I hesitate to call it a “term of office”) with advantages Hitler did not have. Trump inherited a robust and world-beating economy and the most powerful military force in the world. The fact that he’s set about ruining that economy may ultimately work to our advantage. But make no mistake, Trump is every inch as evil as Hitler, perhaps more so. Another advantage Trump enjoys over Hitler is he is unconstrained by ideology. Trump believes in nothing but Trump, and that is a unique danger.
Robert Harrington is an American expat living in Britain. He is a portrait painter.