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From an Existential Threat to an Existential Disaster

27 Thursday Mar 2025

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From an Existential Threat to an Existential Disaster

Just a few short months ago, many were pointing to Donald Trump and his MAGA band as an existential threat to our democracy.  It was a common theme echoed by President Biden and Presidential candidate Kamala Harris, along with editorial boards and pundits, and millions of citizens.  A Trump presidency would perpetuate the lies that the 2000 election was stolen, that the January 6th attack on the Capitol and attempted coup was a peaceful demonstration, that the Justice Department’s prosecution of those that broke the law was, itself, unlawful.

Some commentators were convinced that was all hyperbole.  “The country will be fine;” “what damage could Trump really do;” “could it really be long lasting;” “of course he disparaged Project 2025 as too extreme.”  The old phrase “it can’t happen here” has disappeared as fast as sky writing over a spring-training ball stadium.    

The existential threat, in just a couple of months, is now a reality.

The Democrats don’t know what to do. In fact, they are in circular firing squad mode, especially after Chuck Schumer announced he would support the horrendous continuing resolution, knowing what a shutdown would mean.  The knives are out with screaming matches behind Senate closed doors and anger coming from House Democrats aimed at the Senators.   

Despite the excellent response by Senator Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) to the Trump political harangue at the joint session, most Democrats sat on their hands with their little paddle signs, looking more like they were at a Sotheby’s auction house. Trump has continuously upended and insulted regular order, common decency, and the fundamentals of American democracy.  The only effective and reasonable response from Democrats at the joint session would have been a wholesale walkout ten minutes into his diatribe. 

Here’s where we are:  the political leadership in Washington is paralyzed.  Democrats have no power, Republicans won’t stand up for a single principle or even cast any votes that take on Trump.  Too many are being intimidated by the bully-in-chief and fear his retribution.

Much of the press is cowering, the major law firms are caving, the money managers are frantically counting their money and urging the public to buy Tesla stock and cars. The sell-out culture is replacing the stand-up culture. 

The overriding impact of the Trump/MAGA world can be summed up by two words:  cruel and incompetent.  Whether gutting education, destroying our environment, removing health and food aid around the world, eliminating help for our veterans and seniors, and cozying up to dictators and despots, Trump has made clear he is out to destroy our government.  His main legislative achievement will be big tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans at the expense of everyone else. But time after time, this is the crew that has shown devastating incompetence.  Trump and Musk and his minions have absolutely no clue what they are doing and no understanding of government. They don’t care about the fallout or the people they hurt.  But now, as they say, the whole world is watching and Americans everywhere are noticing and fired up.

The latest national security nightmare of using the commercial Signal app to lay bare the attack plans on Houthi rebels in Yemen, while inadvertently  including the Editor in Chief of the Atlantic magazine, was possibly the most serious self-imposed security breach in U.S. history. And now they are all lying about it. The National Security Agency (NSA) specifically cautioned not to use the app in February. This all is blatant incompetence.

So, why am I optimistic, or at least hopeful, that we can turn the country around?

Here is how I believe this is going to play out.  While Congress and the Washington elite are initially unable to navigate the ongoing damage, the grassroots are rising up. Sure, the courts are going to push back and determine that much of what Trump is doing is illegal and unconstitutional.  There will be some victories for democracy, but not nearly enough. Those court decisions and the continuation of Trump as an out-of-control dictatorial  executive, wreaking havoc on the country, is pushing citizens to the breaking point.

As Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security are cut people will get angry, very angry.  As food aid and school lunches disappear, people will rebel?  As the tax breaks for billionaires are passed, people will think “I still can’t afford groceries or a new car!” As health care becomes more costly and more difficult to get, people will wonder “who would do this”?  As the chaos grows and the effects multiply, the people will become increasingly fed up.  They will pressure their elected representatives and demand action.

Just as people rose up on the issues of civil rights and the war in Vietnam in the 1960s, so too they will take on Trump and the policies that are devastating entire communities, policies that are contrary to what we believe as Americans.  This is what we are seeing in town after town, town meeting after town meeting.  People are finding their voice and it won’t be silenced. This will not stand.  And, yes, it will grow and, yes, elections are just around the corner.

Americans, Focus on the Three C’s: Courts, Congress, Communities

23 Sunday Feb 2025

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Americans, Focus on the Three C’s:  Courts, Congress, Communities

Latest polls show that the worm may be turning – Trump’s negatives are on the rise, Musk is deeply unpopular, voters are increasingly concerned about the trash and burn approach to the first 30 days of the Trump administration.

More and more, these executive orders and Musk raids come across as both cruel and incompetent.  They are not well thought out, they are arbitrary, they are clearly legally questionable and, maybe most important, they hurt everyday people. The actions are “trickling down” and will undermine American’s’ health care, Medicare, Medicaid, education, jobs, incomes, inflation, you name it. 

What Trump and Musk and the MAGA crowd don’t seem to grasp is that wholesale firings and abolishing agencies have real-world implications; they are not just thirty-thousand-foot rhetorical flourishes.  Whether it is fighting bird flu, opening the door for pandemic diseases, taking away people’s health care or nutrition needs or Head Start or housing, whether it is closing National Parks or stopping spending for roads, bridges, water projects, emergency aid, or passing legislation to give huge tax breaks for the uber-wealthy  that the middle class will pay dearly for, this plethora of policies are screwing hard working Americans.  There I said it —  this is the napalming of America, unless you are one of the Trump/Musk oligarchs.

So, how do we fight back and harness the growing rejection of these actions and turn our country around?

The decision to adopt Steve Bannon’s strategy “to flood the zone,” prepared and planned by Project 2025, has meant going everywhere, all at once, right away.  The assumption is that the opposition will be unprepared, stunned, paralyzed by the rapid and ubiquitous collection of executive orders.

The problem with this strategy is two-fold:  first, Trump is not just going after the low hanging fruit, he is chopping down the trees; the second is that the opposition is growing fast, better organized than they thought and the public is responding.  Many voters wanted not normal.  What they fear they are getting is not normal bad, instead of not normal good.

Make no mistake, real damage is being done, at home and abroad.  As Washington Post columnist David Ignatius points out USAID may never be the same again. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/02/21/usaid-trump-freeze-marocco-foreign-aid/ ) Already the international damage has been catastrophic, according to Ignatius and the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition:

“At least 11,500 Americans and 54,575 foreigners have lost their jobs. Nearly $1 billion in payments for work already done has been frozen. Nearly $500 million in food is sitting in ports, ships and warehouses. In Syria, a country struggling to recover from chaos, food and other support for nearly 900,000 people has been suspended. In West Africa, 3.4 million people in 11 countries have lost drug treatment for deadly tropical diseases. At least 328,000 HIV-positive people in 25 countries aren’t getting lifesaving drugs.”

The decision to take a chain saw to USAID and most aspects of government is generating a “flood the zone” response. 

The three key areas for an equal and opposite reaction are: the courts, the congress and our communities.  Democratic Attorneys General in eighteen states were organized and ready to file law suits on many of the executive orders and actions by Trump. Other groups like environmentalists, civil rights organizations, unions and human rights groups also had prepared for the legal battles. More law suits are coming every day and many Americans are donating to groups like the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) and volunteering.  Republican and Democratic lawyers are making their voices heard, some even resigning when told to undermine the rule of law and the constitution.  The more the Trump administration attempts to rule by executive fiat the more lawsuits will be filed and the more the courts will be the bulwark for justice.

Congress will play an increasing role as budget decisions will determine the scope and size of the tax cuts for the rich and the cuts to programs like Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security, education, food stamps, children’s health, etc.  Many Republicans are seriously uncomfortable with the spending plans of this administration and aren’t buying the projections.  The numbers just don’t add up.  How do you reconcile $4 trillion in tax cuts over ten years, $150 billion more a year for defense, $175 billion more for customs and immigration enforcement, and then balance the budget without gutting health care and food programs?  That wouldn’t take an act of Congress, it would take an act of magic.   Democrats will hold firm and voters will rise up is my guess as Trump policies squeeze most Americans.  https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/19/us/politics/congress-republican-budget-plans.html

All this leads to greater activism in our communities.  Confronting Members of Congress at town meetings, calling and writing their offices, and making constituents’ views known, will only increase.  There is a lot of local politics out there —  when people are fired for no reason or programs eliminated that impact people’s lives, the ripple effects will be substantial.  (About 80% of federal workers live outside the Washington area, less than 20% are in the DC area)

Poll numbers for Trump will continue to decline; Elon Musk and his 20-something DOGE band will be in the doghouse; the newly confirmed cabinet will become increasingly unpopular feeding bad polls and making Trump furious; efforts to undermine the free press will also be unpopular and create a backlash; anger in the heartland will grow.

The problem we have is Republican office holders are being governed and controlled by fear – fear of Trump’s wrath, fear of MAGA beating them in primaries and, to be honest, actual physical fear if they speak out and buck the trend.  This is true of some press outlets, corporate chieftains and ordinary people afraid for their jobs.  There aren’t enough Profiles in Courage out there — look what happened as the JFK Library was forced to shut down when Trump fired employees critical to keeping it open.  Retribution and recrimination is Donald Trump’s MO, always has been, always will be. That playbook will get old — all the more reason to take him on in the courts, stand up to him in Congress, and organize the grass roots in our communities. 

From Democracy to Dictatorship–Is America Going the Way of Hungary

13 Thursday Feb 2025

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From Democracy to Dictatorship—Is America Going the Way of Hungary?

The calamitous first weeks of the second Trump Presidency look very little like his first term.  Aside from the similar rantings and harsh rhetoric of both inaugural addresses this administration is making no effort to adhere to established norms of a modern-day democracy.   Trump and MAGA have rejected reasonable appointments and pragmatic policy prescriptions and, instead, set in motion retribution, revenge and a wholesale executive takeover – blowing up the government – intent on ignoring the law and the constitution and 250 years of democratic tradition.

They are deliberately testing America’s patience, and the world’s.

It is at first hard to believe.  But not if you look at the many signals that have been hiding in plain sight.  His staff and appointees have been clear about their agenda to dismantle government from the get-go.  The blueprint of Project 2025 has been their playbook, with two-thirds of his initial executive orders taken right from it according to CNN, and the focus on demonizing immigrants and government have been front and center since Trump came down that escalator in 2015.  Trump’s coy pre-election denials about Project 2025 last year were always laughable.

If you look at one tell-tale sign of where this is headed look straight to Viktor Orban and what has transpired in Hungary.  Many like to point to past dictatorships such as Hitler and Mussolini but we need to look no further than recent Hungarian history. 

Let me get personal.  In the spring and summer of 1990 I spent quite a bit of time in Hungary after the fall of the Soviet Union, the advent of elections and the growth of Hungary’s political parties.  My colleagues and I were part of a group from the National Endowment for Democracy and the National Democratic Institute to assist in encouraging and helping parties with the elections to establish their fledgling democracy.  We were given barbed wire pieces of the Iron Curtain by the American Ambassador when we met with him as symbols of a hopeful future for Hungary.

We were young; we were energetic; we felt we were doing important work.  We were helping a number of political parties but one that caught our eye was Fidesz, a group of

30-somethings who had formed the Alliance of Young Democrats in 1988, were center left and committed to a civil society.  They were smart, understood politics, and were well educated on policy – and they were fun to drink beer with after the meetings!

There were a number of key leaders of Fidesz — at the top, Viktor Orban, and close behind Gabor Fodor, Peter Molnar and Klara Ingar. They were committed in the early 1990s to civil rights, joined the Liberal International and were considered an example of an open, progressive, pro-democracy youth movement. In the late 1980s they were an underground collection of anti-communists who rejected authoritarianism.

That changed quickly as Viktor Orban moved the party to the right, and leaders like Fodor, Molnar and Ingar left the party in the late ‘90s.  Orban increasingly became a strongman but not quite strong enough as he lost power in 2002 due to scandals and splits within his coalition.  Not a good first term (1998-2002), sound familiar?

By 2010, Viktor Orban was back in power – no longer the young Oxford-educated disciple of the George Soros Foundation where he worked, but very much a changed man.  For the last 15 years Orban has put in place a plan of “Christian illiberal democracy” that has become the MAGA example for Donald Trump, Steve Bannon, Tucker Carlson and the members of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) which will be part of Hungary CPAC for the fourth consecutive year at the end of May.  They are joined at the hip.

Orban and Hungary are also the model for the Heritage Society’s Project 2025.  The President of the Heritage Foundation, Kevin Roberts, said in December of 2022:

“Modern Hungary is not just a model for conservative statecraft but the model for Americans, Brits, Spaniards, Australians—everyone should learn from it.”

Learn from it they have.  What we are seeing at the beginning of Trump’s second term is just what we have seen from Orban’s lengthy second term:

*A PARTY BUILT ON ANGER TOWARD GOVERNMENT AND SUPPORT FOR RIGHT WING POPULISM

*A PARTY BUILT ON ANTI-IMMIGRANT FERVOR

*A PARTY COMMITTED TO UNDERMINING THE JUDICIARY AND THE RULE OF LAW

*A PARTY THAT REJECTS CHECKS AND BALANCES AND USES “EMERGENCY MEASURES” TO EXERT EXECUTIVE AUTHORITY

*A PARTY THAT CONDEMNS THE MEDIA AND TAKES OVER THE TRADITIONAL FACT BASED, FREE PRESS

*A PARTY THAT UNDERMINES FREE AND FAIR ELECTIONS

*A PARTY THAT FANS THE FLAMES OF VIOLENCE AND GOVERNS BY FEAR

What is the result? An electoral autocracy that uses the unitary executive power theory to control a nation. 

What Orban did in Hungary to fire up his base with right wing populism and demonizing immigrants and focusing on so-called government “corruption”, Trump is doing in the United States. What Orban did to the judiciary with appointments and upending the entire judicial system, Trump is attempting by co-opting the Justice Department  and appointing and electing loyalists.  What Orban did in Hungary by creating a Media Authority and taking over independent media, Trump is intent on doing by embracing  favored outlets and undermining and intimidating media that isn’t favorable to him. What Orban did by condemning elections that did not go his way and then changing the rules, Trump is fast becoming a master of manipulation.  And, finally, what Orban has done to exert ultimate executive authority, Trump and Musk and their MAGA minions believe is coming quicker than you could ever imagine.

“There is a great leader in Europe—Viktor Orban…he is the prime minister of Hungary.  He is a very great leader, a very strong man.”  Donald Trump, January 2024.

“I think Orban made smart decisions that we could learn from in the U.S.”  J.D. Vance, June 2024

“We have entered the programme-writing system of President Donald Trump’s team, and we have deep involvement there.”  Viktor Orban, July 2024

As each day passes, Trump joins the “Dictator’s Club.”  He snubs our democratic allies and embraces Vladimir Putin and Viktor Orban and turns over the people’s house to the richest man in the world and lead oligarch, Elon Musk. Trump and Musk attack the courts where over 50 lawsuits are pending against their illegal and unconstitutional actions to gut the safety net, fire federal workers and shut down agencies and programs that help Americans every day. 

The writing is on the wall. It is up to us to see it and understand it and do something about it. Now, it is up to us to flood the zone.  All hands on deck – fund and support the legal challenges, elect leaders who will battle the march toward authoritarianism at the local level and in Congress, protest the actions and stand up for health care, education, the environment, and lobby our elected officials to stay strong.  Flood the zone with phone calls and visits and attendance at town meetings. Rise up and don’t give up.

It is time to save our courts, save our free press, save our government that has saved us and the world for over two centuries.  We are not a dictatorship. We are not Hungary or 1930s Germany.  We are a beacon for democracy and freedom.  Let’s keep it that way.

For a thorough and enlightening history of Orban’s takeover of Hungary and the Trump link see:

https://ecfr.eu/publication/the-orbanisation-of-america-hungarys-lessons-for-donald-trump/

Also:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67832416

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fidesz

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viktor_Orb%C3%A1n

Where Do Democrats Go From Here?

15 Wednesday Jan 2025

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Where Do Democrats Go From Here?

Inauguration day, January 20th, or as we are wont to say, the Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday, is almost here.

Most of my political colleagues and friends are struggling with what strategies and approaches to take as we begin a second Trump term.

First, let’s stipulate a few things.  This is going to be bad. Bad if you are Black, Hispanic, poor, or even just struggling to make ends meet, let alone LGBTQ, an immigrant, a Democrat or anyone who questions the MAGA paradigm. It is going to be hard on the press who don’t tow the line, government workers who try and serve the public interest, fair minded election officials who believe in our election system and try to run it with integrity. And, basically, it is going to be very bad for those who believe in the truth, adhere to the facts and reject the MAGA modus operandi of lying to the American people.  Buckle your seat belts, if you thought you faced a barrage of Trump lies the last ten years, you ain’t seen nothing yet. (Over 30,000 lies/untruths in his first term alone. See –https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_or_misleading_statements_by_Donald_Trump)

If you aren’t a Trump supporter, this incoming administration is intent on wearing you down, depressing you, causing angst at every turn.  They want steam coming out your ears, more lines in your forehead, more muscle pain, so that you give up and give in.  This is about overwhelming the population so that they will decide to go along to get along. Whether they are Silicon Valley or tech giants, corporate heads, media honchos, Republican office holders, or just plain ol’ folks.  The goal is capitulation and submission or, at the very least, drifting into the woodwork.

There is a clear and present danger that many, even those who have been politically active, will throw up their hands, eschew the news on current events, and focus on anything but politics. The authors of the seminal 2018 work, How Democracies Die, Stephen Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt point out in the recent issue of the New Republic that MAGA investigations “may send a message to people to keep their heads down (Ziblatt).”  They suggest that there could be a cultural shift in terms of the political opposition.  “Young lawyers will not jump into politics, but rather stay in the law firm.  Young journalists will decide to stick to the sports beat rather than cover politics.  Young CEOs will decide that it’s better just not to donate to the Democratic Party (Levitsky).”

Or maybe we will see a complete about-face when it comes to attitudes toward MAGA and Donald Trump.  As the Washington Post reported on January 12, 2025 in an article headlined “Big Tech now giving millions to Trump”:

“On January 7, 2021, when Meta suspended Donald Trump’s Facebook account after the U.S. Capitol riot, company chief Mark Zuckerberg said the risks of allowing the then-president to keep using the service after inciting a “violent insurrection” were “simply too great.” Trump would go on to blame Zuckerberg for his 2020 election loss, threatening him with life in prison.

“On Tuesday, exactly four years later, Zuckerberg sang a different tune. As part of an announcement shared first with Fox News, Zuckerberg said that Trump’s win in the November election marked “a cultural tipping point” on speech and that he was terminating Facebook’s “politically biased” fact-checkers, who he said had destroyed public trust.”

Zuckerberg also gave a million dollars to the Trump Inaugural fund and appointed a Trump acolyte, Ultimate Fighting Championship chief Dana White to its board, and Republican lobbyist Joel Kaplan as head of Meta global affairs. It wasn’t just Zuckerberg, as the Washington Post points out, million-dollar donations also came from Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, and Tim Cook of Apple.

I know, I know, shocking…in Washington people sucking up to those in political power!  But the question now is more basic than political influence peddling.  As we rapidly drift away from a working democracy and find the elites capitulating to a demagogue, what should Democrats and concerned citizens do.

Fundamentally,  three things  —  1.  Don’t be afraid to take Trump and this administration on at every turn;  2. Win back the House of Representatives in 2026;  3.  Organize, organize, organize, locally and nationally.

Here are a number of specific ideas:

  1. Ignore the latest shiny object. Don’t obsess on the small stuff or the latest lie or slur or bombastic statement.  Keep your focus on Trump’s policies and plans and legislative proposals.
  2. Democrats are in the minority.  You are not in charge. Act like it. How can you stop what is bad and propose an alternative that is good. 
  3. Stay focused on what matters to people – to their daily lives, to their economic well-being, to helping them with the problems of health care, housing, day care, their kids’ education and future, and keeping them safe.
  4. Keep the message simple:  If you are in the top 1% you’re a winner under Trump, everyone else, grab your wallet.  …. Under Trump, hardworking families lose….
  5. Elections do matter, especially at the local level.  Democrats must shift their focus to working in the states and providing some of the billions they give to federal races on state legislatures, mayors, city councils, school boards, judges. Still, concentrate on getting the House back in 2026 and gaining Senate seats.
  6. These are year around campaigns, they need fully organized, staffed, professional, party operations. Build them in red, blue and mixed states. We have a 50 state problem not a seven state problem.
  7. Organize volunteer legal experts to take on Trump and his executive orders and legislative proposals:  on education, on immigration, on the environment, on labor, on justice, LGBTQ, civil rights, etc.  These need to be well funded and organized similar to many of our current legal advocacy groups. (ACLU, Lawyers Committee for Justice, Southern Poverty Law Center)  Recruit people who are committed and want desperately to be engaged.
  8. Pull together progressive groups in regular meetings to share strategy and information and plans for upcoming elections. Coordinate the opposition to Trump.
  9. Ramp up non-traditional methods of communication with voters and prospective voters.   It isn’t your grandparents’ news anymore.  Do the research.  Target. Know your audience. It isn’t always about politics, either, understand the culture.
  10. Have a longer-term plan.  What are the trends? What is happening in the states and localities? How are the demographics changing and where? What kinds of organizations are needed to adapt?
  11. Conduct thorough polling and focus groups at the DNC to examine the key messages that will bring working class Americans back to the Democratic fold, solidify support from young people and women, and understand the slippage with men and people of color. What are the best ways to communicate using the current technology and the new ways people get and digest information.

If Democrats are going to come back, as they did after the Reagan bloodbath of 1980, they will need to come out from under the covers, leave the fetal position and engage.  With Trump, they can’t be afraid or reluctant to take on the school yard bully, fighting back is the only answer.

IS THE BIG LIE WORKING? WHAT DOES IT SAY ABOUT THE FUTURE?

18 Friday Oct 2024

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I am of two minds when it comes to Donald Trump’s constant reliance on the Big Lie and his derogatory language of hate.

Part of me believes that after nearly a decade of this constant barrage the American people will say enough, too much, we are done with Donald Trump.  It will be similar to the rejection of Joe McCarthy and McCarthyism in the 1950s.  For a while he was riding high with his anti-communist crusade and his accusations and attacks, then people caught on, and he was exposed for what he was: a demagogue and purveyor of the Big Lie.

Sadly, part of me is afraid that Trump’s tactic of lying and engaging in deliberate disinformation may be working in America with enough voters to allow him to emerge victorious on November 5th.  As we approach the end of this campaign, in all his rallies and interviews, he has ratcheted up the lies—insisting ad nauseum that he won in 2020, demonizing our democracy, accusing immigrants of eating cats and dogs, using language that is right out of the Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin playbook as Anne Applebaum so correctly chronicles. (https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/10/trump-authoritarian-rhetoric-hitler-mussolini/680296/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=the-atlantic-am&utm_term=The%20Atlantic%20AM)

At some level, nearly a majority of Americans seem immune or at least numbed to the lies and the language.  They were in pre-war Germany and Italy, they were under Stalin too.  But the key may be to confront what Donald Trump and his cohorts plan to do if elected. It is the actions that will ensue that we must clearly understand.

Here is a partial, but terrifying, list. Admittedly, this is draconian but sadly, pretty close to the mark.

1 Trump will pardon those convicted of breaking the law on January 6, 2021 in the attack on the U.S. Capitol. An attack he now calls “a day of love.”

2 Trump will end all legal proceedings against him for violating the law.

3 Trump will take full control of the Justice Department, and it will be his personal and political arm. He will likely seek to prosecute those he disagrees with, possibly including the Biden family.

4 Trump will attempt to implement nearly all of the recommendations in the Project 2025 plan.

5 Trump will arrest and deport as many Hispanics, Haitians, and those he considers “undesirable” as he possibly can, no matter what the cost. He says 10 million people. CBS estimates the cost of deporting one million would be $20 billion, let alone the effect on the economy. Each person deported costs $19,599.  https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-plan-deport-immigrants-cost/

6 Trump will completely upend the tariffs on goods throwing our relations around the world and our economy into chaos. His projections—10%, 20%, 100% etc.—are staggering and absurd.

7 Trump will attempt to abolish agencies like EPA, Education, even the Fed, if he can’t find a way to control them by upending the civil service and installing idealogues who pledge their loyalty to him.

8 Trump will abandon the Ukraine and President Zelensky, allowing Russia and Putin to take over, threatening all of Europe.

9 Trump will abandon NATO and other international security agreements.

10 Trump will go all in for Netanyahu and support his aggressive policies in the middle east, rejecting a two-state solution.

11 Trump will continue his tax policies extending big breaks for the wealthy and basically nothing for the middle class or the poor, exploding the deficits by $7.5 trillion.

12 Trump will continue to describe climate change as a “hoax” and halt nearly all efforts to seek alternative sources of energy, increasing the policy of drilling and extracting fossil fuels.

13 Trump will appoint more extremist judges to the courts who will further erode a woman’s right to an abortion, increase criminal penalties and harm our basic freedoms. LGBTQ rights will also be under attack under a Trump administration.

14 Trump will turn the clock back on voting rights, civil rights and do his best to undermine the traditions of representative democracy by contesting elections that he and his allies do not win.

15 Trump will demonize and attack the free press and shut down those who question his authority. In contrast, he will embrace those like Elon Musk who support him and seek to control what people see, hear and read.

16 Trump will continue his personal grifting schemes to enrich himself and his family by creating companies like Trump Media and Truth Social, a cryptocurrency firm World Liberty Financial, selling gold sneakers, $100,000 watches, autographed bibles, renting out whole floors of his hotels to foreign governments, and on and on.  With Donald Trump the famous sign on Harry Truman’s desk, “The Buck Stops Here”, has a whole new meaning.

The words of Donald Trump are abhorrent and demeaning; his promised actions would serve to destroy our country and all it has stood for, for over 250 years. I would hope this is hyperbole and pray that it is, but those really are the stakes on November 5th.

FennMessengerTrump&Rs

26 Friday Jan 2024

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OPINION

THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE MESSENGER

How to Put Democracy First and Defeat Donald Trump

Published 01/19/24 09:00 AM ET|Updated 01/19/24 02:38 PM ET

Peter Fenn

The results in Iowa show that Donald Trump is on a roll with his Republican base, winning over 50% of the vote in a multi-candidate field.

Trump accomplished this by doubling down on his MAGA message and repeating his falsehoods about the 2020 elections and January 6. In fact, nearly two-thirds of all Iowa caucus voters said Biden did not legitimately win the presidency in 2020. Trump’s victory was by no means due to tacking towards the middle — appealing to moderate Republicans. If anything, his rhetoric got more strident and extreme.

Edison Research, which surveyed Iowa caucus voters in 2016 and 2024, showed the only major demographic where Trump lost support from 2016 to 2024 was among Republican moderates. He dropped from 34% to 20%, a loss of 14 points.

Trump may be on a roll with Republicans, but he may get rolled by mainstream voters as the campaign progresses. 

Trump’s frontal assault on “rigged” elections, the courts, the rule of law, and democratic values may turn out be his Achilles heel. 

Here’s why: a vocal, united and bipartisan voice for democracy is growing throughout the country as Trump’s nomination becomes increasingly inevitable. This will be one of the longest general election campaigns in American history, starting in March and extending for eight months. Trump will not be able to escape the scrutiny of such a long campaign. As the existential threat of a second Trump presidency is seen as a real possibility, more leaders and voters may find it unacceptable. 

Here’s an example of how the issue of preserving and protecting democracy may undercut Trump’s message. In the summer and fall of 2023, a poll was conducted of nearly 300 former members of Congress on issues related to the 2020 Presidential election, the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol and political violence. The poll was sponsored by the Association of Former Members of Congress (FMC) and done by the University of Massachusetts. Similar questions were asked of a national sample of the American public.

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What was remarkable in the polling of former members was how alike the views were of the Democrats and Republicans and how former Republican members differed from current members and Republicans in the general public.

Democratic former members were nearly universal in their view that Joe Biden’s victory was legitimate, but surprisingly over 80% of Republican former members also agreed. Among national polls, only about 30% of voting-age Republicans believe Biden legitimately won in 2020.

In addition, about two-thirds of Republican former members believe Trump’s efforts to claim he won the 2020 elections threaten democracy. Yet, around 20% or fewer of voting-age Republicans generally said the same. Few current Republican members are willing to call out Trump, but the same may not be true for former members.

The question this survey raises is whether former office holders across the country,

Republican or Democrat, are concerned enough to confront Trump in 2024. A strong argument could be made that former local officials who are respected in their communities and have no political ambitions ahead of them would participate in an organized effort to influence the 2024 presidential election and deny Trump four more years. 

In an unprecedented action last fall, 13 Republican and Democratic presidential libraries from Hoover to Bush and FDR to Obama signed a strong statement to warn of the fragile state of American democracy and to recognize the importance of dealing with widespread rejection of our election results, attacks on our judicial system, and propensity for increased violence. This bipartisan effort, of nearly a century of American presidents, sent a clear message outlining the threat we face.

What would be the impact of a 50-state project to bring together ex-elected officials who are free to speak their minds, regardless of party?

In addition to former members of Congress this could include state legislators, former statewide office holders (governors, attorneys general, secretaries of state, etc.), former mayors, city council members, school board members, and other local officials. These would be women and men who care deeply about their country, who are respected in their communities, and who will take a stand as we approach November of 2024. In short, these would be people who are willing to reject the politics and persona of Donald Trump for the sake of preserving democracy.

Yes, it would take courage for many, but it is a cause worthy of the calling.

The key would be to build up this opposition, involve them in grassroots activity, get large amounts of press attention, use their networks, and form a bipartisan coalition to influence soft Republicans and independents. Ads, literature drops, rallies, blitzing news outlets, get-out-the-vote activity — March to November is plenty of time to get it done.

Peter Fenn is a long-time Democratic political strategist who served on the Senate Intelligence Committee, was a top aide to Sen. Frank Church and was the first director of Democrats for the 80s, founded by Pamela Harriman. He also co-founded the Center for Responsive Politics/Open Secrets. He serves on the board of the Frank Church Institute. Follow him on Twitter @peterhfenn.