I have always been a bit reluctant to call Donald Trump a fascist. But now something happened that is tilting me to go all out.
As reported on CNN and reported as well by the New York Times, John Kelly Trump’s former White House Chief of Staff recently said,
“Certainly the former president is in the far-right area, he’s certainly an authoritarian, admires people who are dictators—he has said that. So certainly, he falls into the general definition of fascist, for sure.”
As White House Chief of staff in the Trump administration in which he served as a loyal lieutenant to now come out and warn us that Trump is a fascist is a game changer. He worked with Trump for a long time. He is not bleeding-heart liberal. To say his former boss is a fascist a very powerful statement.
Kelly is no bleeding-heart liberal. He is a former American General who served as Secretary of Homeland Security before taking the position as White House Chief of Staff in the Trump administration for about a year and a half. And he says Trump is a fascist. How can we not take that seriously?
There is even more. Trump’s former Defense Secretary Mark Esper said this to CNN, “Clearly, he has a predilection for leaders he perceives to be strong. And that’s just how he breaks the world down. He breaks things down between strong and weak.” That is precisely, the essential element of fascism, in my view. Fascism is the political philosophy of the bully. And Donald Trump is clearly the quintessential bully.
Jacob Heilbrunn the Editor of The National Interest said, this, “he fantasizes the strong man. And that’s the blue print. Crush the media. Eviscerate the independent judiciary and establish his own rule over the country.”
Trump himself, said, “as president you have extreme power.” In his own words, he makes it clear that he has a deep fascination with power and in fact, worships power. And his own lawyers have persuaded the US Supreme court to adopt this view of presidential power. No one should assume he won’t abuse that extreme power. His words have made it clear that he intends to go after his enemies this time around, if he is elected president. Esper said we should take Trump’s words seriously when he says he will use the military against private American citizens. And, as his Defense Secretary, Esper knew Trump well.
Trump has said the country is being pressed by “leftist lunatics…who, if necessary, should be handled by the national guard…or the military.”
According to Kelly, Donald Trump also said, “Hitler did some good things too.” That might be literally true—after all no one is purely evil just as no one is perfectly good—but politically it is dynamite to say so without proper exceptions. How can America Jews vote for Trump? How can we avoid inferring that Donald Trump is a fascist?
Now I am convinced that none of this will make any difference to Trump’s support, except perhaps to inflate it. His supporters don’t take anything from liberal chatter except that they are out to get Trump and every time they mention such things his support just rises. The more liberals yell, the more Trumpsters are joyful. Liberal squealing is the music they want to hear. As CNN commentator and Republican strategist Erin Perrine said, “Everybody has already seen this before from Donald Trump or stories about Donald Trump and it hasn’t moved the voters.” She said Kamala Harris should not waste her time trying to drumbeat opposition to Trump. She should instead push her positive optimistic story instead. Others think it will remind Democrats why they must show up to vote. We will have to wait for election results. Let me say, I am not optimistic about that. I fear that deep racial unease and hatred in the US will rise to the surface and hand political victory to Trump. I hope I am wrong. Thank goodness I am wrong so often.