Mark Twain supposedly once said, “History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes,” and I think he was onto something.
The United States is not Weimar Germany, but there are some non-trivial similarities that ought not to be dismissed.
While Americans are not post-Great War Germans half-starved by years of reparations payments, I suspect a decent fraction of Donald Trump’s followers are working-class whites who are increasingly finding themselves left behind by a “globalization” that is eager to expose their wages to competition from people who will work in the rest of the world for a small fraction of what they are paid. Deprive someone of the ability to improve his economic situation, and rage is the understandable result.
Trump, like the National Socialists in the 1920s and 1930s, has encouraged his followers to aim that rage at scapegoats: for the Nazis, it was the Jews (and some others); for Trump, it is Latinos and Muslims.
There is a long tradition in the United States of the ruling class using race to divide people whose economic and class interests would otherwise tend to unite them. As my friend and Catholic author Mark Shea has said more than once, the tactic can be summarized as, “Let’s you and him fight.”
The Democratic Party in America bears a significant share of the blame for the rise of Trump, as the more bourgeois part of the German political left did for the rise of Adolf Hitler. As Thomas Frank describes in his new book, “Listen, Liberal: Whatever Happened to the Party of the People?” It has become too much the party of the “Professional Class”- those with graduate degrees – and has all but abandoned its historical role as the party of labor and the little guy:
“(T)oday the Democrats are the party of the professional class. The party has other constituencies, to be sure—minorities, women, and the young, for example, the other pieces of the “coalition of the ascendant”—but professionals are the ones whose technocratic outlook tends to prevail. It is their tastes that are celebrated by liberal newspapers and it is their particular way of regarding the world that is taken for granted by liberals as being objectively true. Professionals dominate liberalism and the Democratic Party in the same way that Ivy Leaguers dominate the Obama cabinet. In fact, it is not going too far to say that the views of the modern-day Democratic Party reflect, in virtually every detail, the ideological idiosyncrasies of the professional-managerial class.
“Liberalism itself has changed to accommodate its new constituents’ technocratic views. Today, liberalism is the philosophy not of the sons of toil but of the “knowledge economy” and, specifically, of the knowledge economy’s winners.”
Frank describes how, up until about the Carter presidency, organized labor was the largest and most powerful constituency of the Democratic Party, and their interests were reliably reflected in Democratic legislation and rhetoric – and the result was that as the country became more prosperous, workers had the power to negotiate for a fair share of the gains.
I’ve mentioned before in this space that 35 or 40 years ago, it used to be a commonplace occurrence for blue-collar workers and white-collar workers to live in the same neighborhoods (white collars having the nicer houses in the tract, and the blue collars the more basic models.)
When I was a kid in the 1960s and 1970s, the distinction between blue- and white-collar workers had more to do with taste than with economics. White collars golfed; blue collars bowled. White collars drove Cadillacs; blue collars drove Chevys and Pontiacs. White collars hunted quail; blue collars hunted deer. White collars were Andy Williams; blue collars were Ralph Kramden.
As that world recedes further from the living memory of Americans, our politics have taken a decidedly darker turn.
Former New York Times war correspondent Chris Hedges recently described the parallels between Donald Trump’s impact and the fascist movements of the 1930s:
“Fascist movements build their base not from the politically active but the politically inactive, the ‘losers’ who feel, often correctly, they have no voice or role to play in the political establishment. The sociologist Émile Durkheim warned that the disenfranchisement of a class of people from the structures of society produced a state of ‘anomie’—a ‘condition in which society provides little moral guidance to individuals.’ Those trapped in this ‘anomie,’ he wrote, are easy prey to propaganda and emotionally driven mass movements. Hannah Arendt, echoing Durkheim, noted that ‘the chief characteristic of the mass man is not brutality and backwardness, but his isolation and lack of normal social relationships.’
“In fascism the politically disempowered and disengaged, ignored and reviled by the establishment, discover a voice and a sense of empowerment.
“…Fascism is aided and advanced by the apathy of those who are tired of being conned and lied to by a bankrupt liberal establishment, whose only reason to vote for a politician or support a political party is to elect the least worst
“…Fascism expresses itself in familiar and comforting national and religious symbols, which is why it comes in various varieties and forms. Italian fascism, which looked back to the glory of the Roman Empire, for example, never shared the Nazis’ love of Teutonic and Nordic myths. American fascism too will reach back to traditional patriotic symbols, narratives and beliefs.”
I have said it before and I will say it here: the rise of DonaldTrump is a bright, flashing warning that American politics is broken, and deeply so.
Matt Talbot is a writer and poet, as well as an old Benicia hand.
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Should DT become the first orange president, I’m sure the term “fascism” will be bandied about to an equal degree that the term “socialism” has been for the last eight years. And, by that I mean recklessly and without much thought.
O assume MATT this a chapter of a new novel you are writing. It is complete nonsense trying to make your self sound like an intellect which you are not. Nothing of value in the article.
Matt, Have you ever thought about getting a gig on The Price Is Right?
From the piece:”the rise of Donald Trump is a bright, flashing warning that American politics is broken, and deeply so”. – Chris Hedges
I would not disagree with that observation. However, let’s not think for one minute that Trump is the cause, his rise is indeed a result. In this election the two probable contenders: Trump vs. Clinton are probably the two least qualified candidates in history. Trump has no experience and what experience Hillary does have has proved to be ineffective (Hillary Care, a zero has a Senator and no accomplishments as SOS).
The solutions will not come from DC, as both parties are guilty of making DC, along with running the country, their primary source of enrichment.
“President Obama calls on teachers to help identify mental health disorders in students.”
When I did this, I was censored and punished by the school district in which I taught.
My Turn: ‘You are not liked here.”
Vallejo Times Herald
Years ago, after area newspapers printed my commentary about the school district’s indifference to serving emotionally disturbed students, it didn’t take long for the administrators to hold a meeting to inform me that I had committed a sin.
I met with legal counsel provided by my union, and was advised not to repeat anything that was said at that meeting. Strikingly, what wasn’t mentioned in the meeting made the biggest impression on me: The safety and well-being of the students and their teachers.
It seemed that the image of the school district and its own town took precedence. One thing was clear: They couldn’t get rid of me fast enough.
That was 2007,
(www.contracostatimes.com/opinion/ci_7241927?source=email),
and I needed to work until 2012 if I wanted to retire with the pension for which I worked so hard.
Teachers in California don’t receive Social Security. If I made any more waves, I could kiss that pension goodbye.
But the wheels of retaliation were already set in motion to drive me away.
Before I became a whistleblower, I was a creative, hard-working and well-liked teacher. I loved my job.
But that changed when the school principal began filling my classes with a disproportionate number of students with behavior or emotional problems, the kind of students I had addressed in my article.
One year of having this kind of class takes a toll on a teacher’s physical and emotional health. But having this kind of class for five consecutive years, without anyone’s support, almost killed my soul and faith in people.
There was no support when a large boy threw a chair across the room, and his foster mother verbally abused me. There was no support when an emotionally disturbed girl threw tantrums. There was no support when I asked for help with the student who verbalized 75 % of his thoughts during instruction and quiet work times. There was no support when a boy begged me not to tell his dad about fights he had with other kids, because his dad would hit him with the belt.
The principal retaliated against me every way she could. I couldn’t even get faulty electrical wiring fixed in my classroom. Frustrated that it still hadn’t been repaired after my third written request, I asked her in person.
She was leaning back in the office manager’s chair, a favorite parent and janitor sitting on chairs facing her.
“Now, now, Jane, ask nicely!” were the next words I heard the principal say, as the janitor and parent laughed along while she ridiculed me.
Gradually my health did suffer from a toxic work environment. I was physically exhausted and became anxious and depressed.
There was nothing left inside of me to create lesson plans, correct papers, have good judgement and be the good, well-liked teacher I had been for the 18 years prior to this nightmare.
That was unfortunate for the student teacher assigned to me in my final year. Rather than watching me demonstrate good teaching, he took my place. My personality had changed so drastically during those final years that I didn’t recognize myself. Behind my back, untrue rumors were circulated among some staff and parents. Eventually I was ostracized by most of the staff.
Teaching at the end of my career took all the will and perseverance I could muster. I was numb and operating on automatic. To this day, I don’t know how I made it to the finish line.
It felt like a miracle when I could finally retire in 2012, as I had planned. On my last day, one of the teachers looked me in the eye and said, “You are not liked here.”
After I retired, therapy helped me recover and heal.
In counseling I learned that I was in a crisis for five years, and anyone or anything associated with the school became triggers that brought terrible feelings back, a symptom of post trauma.
I paid a huge price by sticking it out until the brutal end, but whistleblowers always do. I am proud that I spoke out when my first piece published.
I would do it again in a heartbeat … and I guess I just did.
Jane Hara/Recovering teacher
Matt, You should do a column on the big time weed-smoking presidential candidate Gary “Sativa” Johnson, and why many conservatives are surprisingly coming out in support of him as an alternative.