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Feb 17, 2021Liked by Wendy Jacobson

I don’t think we should just write Trump off entirely. Maybe his brand, his family, and his legend will be crippled, or even annihilated—but there’s not a doubt that he has reinvigorated something in our country and that’s not going to be as easy to douse, nor is he going to be rendered inert anytime soon.

The genie is out of the bottle. We’re going to need more support from the caucus and they think Trump is their savior. As long as they’re interested in power than democracy, they’re going to keep grabbing at the lowest hanging fruit.

Comparing him to Hitler is also not entirely out of line either. Sure, Trump lacks intellectual prowess and astuteness, but his movement closely mimics Hitler’s Reich unfurled from the Reichswehr—from the “campaign rally”-styled beerhalls in 1919:

"Nevertheless, at this time and in this place, Hitler’s message did capture exactly the uncontainable sense of anger, fear, frustration, resentment, and pent-up aggression of the raucous gatherings in the Munich beerhalls. The compulsive manner of his speaking derived in turn much of its power of persuasion from the strength of conviction that combined with appealingly simple diagnoses of and recipes to Germany’s problems. Above all, what came naturally to Hitler was to stoke up the hatred of others by pouring out to them the hatred that was so deeply embedded in himself." — Hitler: A Biography / Ian Kershaw.—1st American ed.

We have plenty of work to do to clean up this mess, I wouldn’t sit back and wash our hands of Trump just yet—we have to treat him like a toothache.

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Feb 10, 2021Liked by Wendy Jacobson

Sad but true. Another well penned piece, Wendy. GOP spines appear to be checked at the door along with their cell phone & hand guns...

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