Flirting with neo-Nazi fascism is dangerous
America is imploding, or so it seems. In the last couple of
weeks we saw a wave of top-level hirings, firings, resignations and feuds.
And then, we also witnessed neo-Nazi violence in Charlottesville,
Virginia. First came the not-too-well publicized rally by white supremacists on
the University of Virginia campus bearing torches and chanting white
nationalistic – or more correctly Christian fascist - slogans. The march was a
precursor to a much larger, nastier and virulent rally in Charlottesville the
next day where a 32-year old woman was killed by a neo-Nazi activist.
Many analysts blame the POTUS for the violence that ensured
there by waking up or giving new life to the once dormant fascist, racist and
bigoted elements within the USA. Remember Trump’s hateful speeches and comments
during the presidential campaign? His campaign was full of bigotry and racism,
which saw its culmination with the travel bans he imposed as soon as he was sworn
in as the President. His core message has been all about saving White America –
a far cry from the current makeup within the USA, which has steadily been
becoming very diverse.
The all-exclusive supremacist ideology anywhere, including apartheid
Myanmar, in our time exploits Darwinist fearmongering about the ‘other’ race or
religion. That is, unless the ‘others’ are eliminated or their growth minimized
the ‘supreme’ race is in danger of extinction; it will lose its identity or
(more properly) the privileged status – thus, becoming a second or third-class
entity. So, here in the USA the white supremacists, like their counterparts in
Europe, have been selling the fearmongering statistics that unless the influx
of the outsiders – legal immigrants and illegals alike - from Asia, Africa and
Latin America - is totally stopped, they
will become a minority in the USA within the next 25 years. With that change in
demography they see an existential threat to their white race.
With Trump in the Oval Office the fascist, neo-Nazis see him
as their avatar. Trump’s “Making America great again” echoes slogans from the fascist
movements of the past. For them, it’s now or never moment to stop their ‘abandonment’
by the White House. They are emboldened to
organize such neo-Nazi rallies in various parts of the USA. Already we are
seeing the rise of vigilantism in the streets and subways across many American
cities, and attacks and vandalism of mosques and Jewish cemeteries with the
president rationalizing violence on the right. Additionally, the Department of
Justice is run by a man – Jeff Sessions – known for his cavorting with the KKK in his
youth. Lest we forget, the Trump administration has also cut
funding for groups dedicated to spotlighting and fighting white
supremacy.
When asked about Charlottesville violence, President Trump was
unable to schmooze like a normal politician. As a matter of fact, he did a terrible
job in condemning white supremacists shouting slogans like "blood and
soil" and "Jews will not replace us." He tried to equate the
behavior of those evil, divisive neo-Nazi forces in Charlottesville with those
that rallied against their hateful message of racism and bigotry by insisting
that there were ‘many sides’ to blame for the violence. “We condemn in the
strongest possible terms this egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence
on many sides, on many sides,” Trump said.
His initial condemnation of violence “on many sides” suggested
a willful ignorance of the mere fact that one side seeks the extermination and ethnic
cleansing of the non-whites via genocidal violence, and are willing to use
violence to achieve these goals. The other side, on the other hand, offers a
principled stand against fascism, seeking to eliminate the threat of fascist
violence. Equating the intent and purpose of the two groups is simply
disingenuous.
Facing mounting pressure from political leaders, Trump issued
a second statement, nearly 48 hours after the incident. “Racism is evil, and
those who cause violence in its name are criminal and thugs, including the KKK,
neo-Nazis and white supremacists and other hate groups that are repugnant to
everything we hold dear as Americans,” Trump said. While this was a powerful
and the right message, during his press conference a day later, however, he flip-flopped
and tried to downplay the role of white nationalists, neo-Nazis and white
supremacists who participated in the rally and brought violence to the idyllic
college town by saying that there were some “very fine people” mixed among
them. Obviously, he tried to humanize inhumane neo-Nazi protesters by saying
that “not all of those people were neo-Nazis…Not all of those people were white
supremacists by any stretch.” This framing once again revealed his deplorable blindness
to a rally that was, at its core, motivated by extreme hate, as seen in the
mass chants of “blood and soil” (a reference to historic Nazi rhetoric seeking
to create a right to land for “indigenous” whites only), by protesters wielding
torches and yelling “Jews will not replace us!”, and engaging in mass violence
against counter-protesters.
Trump’s freewheeling remarks ultimately walked back the
positive statement he had made a day earlier. His equivocation or failure to condemn
neo-Nazism and bigotry is simply repugnant. Even some Trump supporters and
Jewish Republicans have condemned the president’s spread-the-blame response and
statement.
“There are no good Nazis and no good members of the [Ku Klux]
Klan,” the Republican Jewish Coalition said in a statement. “We join with our
political and religious brethren in calling upon President Trump to provide
greater moral clarity in rejecting racism, bigotry, and antisemitism,” the
statement said.
But for many Jews, the violence in Charlottesville on Saturday
(August 12) and Trump’s vacillating response were of a whole other order. “No
one, whether Republican, independent or a Democrat … wants to see the Klan or Nazis
parading down the streets of the United States, as if they’re taking over,”
said Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of Los Angeles’ Simon Wiesenthal
Center, named after the famed Nazi hunter, and its Museum of Tolerance. “No one
could ever compare neo-Nazis, the Klan and white supremacists to demonstrators
that are demonstrating against them,” said Hier, who delivered one of several
prayers at Trump’s inauguration. “To equate the two sides,” he went on, “is
preposterous.”
The leading organization of Orthodox rabbis also weighed in
with a statement condemning the president’s comparing white supremacist
marchers to counter-demonstrators in Charlottesville. “There is no moral
comparison,” said Rabbi Elazar Muskin, president of the Rabbinical Council of
America. “Failure to unequivocally reject hatred and bias is a failing of moral
leadership and fans the flames of intolerance and chauvinism.” The statement
was particularly notable given Trump’s support among Orthodox Jews, who, unlike
more secular Jews, supported the president in large numbers. (Jews constitute
about 3% of the electorate.) His son-in-law Jared Kushner is a practicing
Orthodox Jew.
If President Trump loved his daughter Ivanka, who had
converted to Judaism before marrying Jared, one is simply bewildered to understand
his rhetoric! With almost universal condemnation of his mixed messaging, Trump
has since then tried to recapture moral high ground, which he never had, by
condemning racism and bigotry. I wish he had come out unambiguous much earlier!
No one should, however, misconstrue where Trump’s heart is. It is with the fascists. Thus, he had no qualms about the alleged virtues of their
cause when he compared Southern Confederate General Robert E. Lee to George
Washington, and lamented the
tearing down of “our beautiful statues and monuments” that iconize slavery,
segregation, and white supremacy. Trump wondered “where
does it stop?” with regard to pulling down the statues, a clear wink to the
fascist right he continues to court.
The admiration for neo-Nazi fascism is nothing new in the USA.
These admirers are not and were never aliens; they come from all facets of the American
society, as it’s the case today and as it was back then during the heydays of the
Third Reich.
On the night of February 20, 1939, some 20,000 Nazi sympathizers
gathered at a “Pro-America Rally” inside Madison Square Garden in New York City
proclaiming that George Washington was the “first fascist” and mocking FDR -
the man who was then president as “Franklin D. Rosenfeld.” They characterized
his New Deal as a “Jew Deal.”
That day, some 80,000 anti-fascist protesters gathered outside
the hall. Some fought with police while trying to get inside the Garden to shut
down the Nazi event. History shows that those anti-Nazi protesters were on the
right side of history.
I am glad that there are many such activists throughout the
USA. It was no accident that when thirty White Supremacists rallied in Boston last
Saturday, August 19, there were thousands of Bostonians – whites and nonwhites
alike - that showed up to protest their message of hatred. Only after 90
minutes the neo-Nazis had to pack up and leave.
Fascism is a cancerous ideology and must be fought to save
humanity – irrespective of whether it is showing its ugly face in Suu Kyi’s
Myanmar or Trump’s America. Sadly though, most Americans are poorly educated
about their country’s past. Most of them are unaware that in the 1930s,
thousands of Adolph Hitler’s American admirers were politically active
throughout the country. They are unaware of the Silver Legion of America, an
anti-Semitic, white supremacist group that ran William Dudley Pelley for
president on a third-party ticket in 1936.
While a sympathizer to fascism and white supremacy may not
find faults with white-robed Ku Klux Klan members marching down the American
streets (with or without the hoods) chanting their hateful slogans, but such events
create anxiety amongst American Blacks.
It was quite natural, therefore, for men of conscious to
condemn Trump’s equivocation. One after another many members of President
Trump’s advisory boards have resigned. Thanks to Kenneth Frazier, the CEO of
Merck & Company – one of the biggest drug-makers in the USA, to start the
process by resigning from the American Manufacturing Council (AMC). [Nearly ten
years ago, I had the privilege of meeting him while he was the President of the
manufacturing division, and I was the Director of Center of Excellence within the
research division of Merck.]
As white nationalists, the American fascists, clashed with
counter-protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia while the POTUS Trump was
equivocating sending mixed messages, Ken decided to act. If Mr. Trump could not
condemn the hate groups, Ken Frazier – the son of a janitor and grandson of a
man born into slavery - could not support him. As the only Afro-American CEO in
the group, Ken resigned from Trump’s American Manufacturing Council, one of
several advisory groups Trump formed in an effort to forge alliances with big
businesses. His decision required guts, and thanks God that he had plenty of
such, which motivated many other members to resign from Trump’s advisory
groups.
Mr. Trump – who had hitherto tried to sell himself as a
darling amongst the business executives who could make ‘America great’ again –
had no option but to disband two CEO councils after a slew of major business leaders quit last week to protest what
they said was the president’s failure to sufficiently condemn the neo-Nazi and
other racist groups in Charlottesville clashes.
The fallout is not limited to the AMC alone. Even within Trump’s
Christian evangelical base that voted overwhelmingly (80%) for him during the
presidential election, New York City mega-church pastor A.R. Bernard
has stepped down. Carl Icahn, Trump’s advisor on Regulatory Affairs has also stepped
down last Friday.
Last Friday, all 17 members of the White House advisory commission on the arts and humanities,
including several from Hollywood, resigned en masse to protest President Trump's divisive comments on the
deadly violence in Charlottesville, Va. "Reproach and censure in the
strongest possible terms are necessary following your support of the hate
groups and terrorists who killed and injured fellow Americans in Charlottesville,"
the arts group wrote in a letter to Trump. "The false equivalencies you
push cannot stand." "Supremacy, discrimination, and vitriol are not
American values," they wrote. "Your values are not American
values."
The collapse of the President’s Committee on the Arts and the
Humanities marks the latest break between the Trump White House and the arts
community, which had widely embraced President Obama, and marks his further
isolation. The committee was created in 1982 under President Reagan and acts as
an advisory panel on cultural issues. It is among dozens of mostly ceremonial
White House panels that advise the president on business, education and other
issues. It draws from Hollywood, Broadway and the broader arts and
entertainment community. First Lady Melania Trump is the honorary
chairwoman.
The committee works with the National Endowment for the Arts,
the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Institute of Museum and
Library Services, along with other federal partners and the private sector.
These resignations and counter-protests against white
supremacist rallies speak volumes about what is wrong with Trump presidency. No
wonder his job approval rate has sunk below 30%.
Shake-ups within the White House is nothing new. But perhaps
never in the last four decades have we seen so many high-level shuffles in such
a short time as we saw in the last four weeks. Steve Bannon, Trump’s Chief
Strategist, has stepped out of the White House. He has been a very polarizing
figure in the Trump inner circle, accused often of being a White House leaker
and in bad terms with Jared Kushner, Trump’s trusted advisor and even the new
Chief-of-staff John Kelly. Bannon was an influential voice inside the White
House, feeding and encouraging Trump's (white) nationalist and populist
instincts.
In the process, Bannon reaped an infamous reputation as a
puppet master pulling the strings in the Oval Office, with pop culture
portrayals ranging from the moniker "President Bannon" to his
depiction as the grim reaper on "Saturday Night Live." Those
portrayals -- coupled with a Time Magazine cover that declared him "the
great manipulator" -- often angered Trump, who chafes at being outshined.
Since his inclusion as a powerful advisor to the president,
there have been repeated calls to fire him – even from the GOP, which never
died down. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders confirmed
Bannon's departure, but claimed the decision for him to leave was mutual.
"We still have a huge movement, and we will make
something of this Trump presidency," Bannon told The Weekly Standard after
his departure from the White House. He still has his buddies like Gorka and
Miller within the White House.
As hinted above, the dark forces have tried to control American
society since the country’s inception. Racists, anti-Semites, anti-Muslim and
anti-immigrant bigots have always been there. Sometimes they have been on the
fringes; other times, they have held power in many states and in Congress. The
reason new manifestations of these dreadful ideologies need to be resisted is
that they are never completely defeated, and, if not opposed, they can gain in
popularity and power.
Confederate statues and monuments are symbols of slavery, racism
and bigotry. They cannot be brushed away as part of American history. There is
a very real danger in the Trump administration’s toying with fascism via threats to
criminalize journalists, his support for physical assault against leftist
protesters, and his providing of cover to violent right-wing militants
in Charlottesville. Considering Trump’s latent fascist tendencies, the
emergence of a full-blown fascist state is something we can no longer afford to
ignore.
As recently noted by
Professor Anthony DiMaggio of Lehigh University, the Southern Poverty Law
Center estimates that
there are hundreds of thousands of far-right militia members across the
country, and more than 900 individual groups. If the rise of armed
insurrections by Cliven and Ammon Bundy and their supporters, in addition to
the dozens of acts of right-wing terrorism that have occurred in
recent years have not jolted our mind, let the events in Charlottesville be a
sufficient wakeup call that the far right is willing to use extreme methods to
pursue their political goals.
We can defeat such dark forces by educating each other about
the harms of their evil agenda. Ours may be a slow process and a long march, but
is essential to save our humanity. I am sure if Americans know about harms of
exclusivist white supremacy they would be less inclined to fall for it. Surely,
we cannot afford any politician flirting with the dark forces and their toxic
ideology no matter how it is packaged.
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