As the Wolf Bursts into the Flock: Godwin’s Law

At the risk of falling victim to Godwin’s law (resorting to comparing one’s adversaries to Nazis), it is worth reflecting on the following quote from Hitler’s minister of propaganda, Goebbels:

We enter parliament in order to supply ourselves, in the arsenal of democracy, with its own weapons. We become members of the Reichstag in order to paralyze the [government] with its own assistance. If democracy is so stupid as to give us free tickets and per diem for this [bear’s work], that is its own affair … We do not come as friend nor even as neutrals. we come as enemies: As the wolf bursts into the flock, so we come

What we observed on January 6th was an attempted coup, under an assumed identity. As with everything associated with Trump, there is always a sleazy, slippery way of reinterpreting what is evident. But with Trump, we must be truthful and declare that his four years in power represented the most dangerous flirtation with fascism the United States has ever faced. At noon today, Trump will cease being president and the world breathes more easily knowing that a madman has not brought about mutually assured nuclear annihilation.

Donald Trump is not and was not an aberration. Donald Trump is the personification of Republican politics and policy since the rise of Reaganism. The scapegoating of people of color and minorities in general is part and parcel of the tone set by Reagan and his acolytes. It is no wonder that in the past four years the party of Reagan fell in lockstep behind Trump. This is why Trump must face the consequences of his actions. If Trump goes unpunished, there is no limit to what subsequent would-be-dictators will do to the US Constitution. And there is no immediate end to the extremes of radical White nationalists. This is a cancer on the American body politic that must be extirpated now.

Trump now enters history as the only president to have been impeached twice. And this is where sane people must intervene: Trump must be prevented from ever holding elected office again. This is the only remedy to ensure the ultimate defeat of Trump. As long as Trump is able to threaten that he will run for office in 2024, he will remain a viable political threat. Convicting him in the Senate and voting to strip him of the right to run for office again is the only way in which he will be neutralized.

Trump sought to invalidate the 2019 election by intimidating Georgia election officials. This was a crime that deserved impeachment. Furthermore, Trump incited the mob of insurrectionists to invade the Capitol two weeks ago. This was not only an impeachable offense: it is also an offense punishable by ten years in prison.

There should be no impunity. Trump must not be allowed to negotiate his way into a peaceful retirement. He must be stripped of his taxpayer-funded pension and all of the benefits former presidents enjoy. This includes Secret Service protection, which he abused to no end while he was President. Furthermore, there should never be a tax-funded Trump Presidential library.

Richard Nixon was pardoned by Gerald Ford and this paved the path for Trump’s rise. Remember, Trump had a direct connection to Roy Cohn (Joe McCarthy‘s right hand man) and Roger Stone, one of Nixon’s dirty tricksters. Trump deserves jail because of his effort to intimidate Georgia officials and he deserves jail for his January 6th seditious incitement of the mob that left five dead. Now that Trump has not self-pardoned himself, President Biden must refrain from intervening on Trump’s behalf and countenance the possibility of Trump being jailed. This is the only way in which the stain of the desecration of the office gets washed clean.