In any election, there are some winners who feel morally superior and losers who feel cheated. Then there are the 90% remaining who just move on with their lives. People who don’t care about the give and take of politics and who need to make a living to feed their families. The Orange Peril is, doesn’t cate where we fall into this spectrum because this propaganda wasn’t just geared to win an election, it was created to change the mindset of Americans.
In the 1930’s, the Nazis perpetrated and accelerated the stereotype of Jews as non-Germans who were leeches that poisoned the culture and sucked money out of the economy. In 2016, Muslims have become the scapegoat when they are all portrayed as violent terrorists or revolutionaries seeking to impose Sharia law in the U.S. In both cases, an attempt was made to clearly identify a particular group of people who stood in opposition to everything that the host culture valued. In addition to the fact that the accusations were mostly untrue, they were magnified and applied to everyone identified as a member of the group. Is this just to get people (you know, the ones doing the work most Americans don’t want to do) deported, or is there some ulterior motive?
One of the wedges the Nazis used on their people was evoking guilt by continually referencing the Treaty of Versailles which they claimed was unfair burden on the people of Germany after World War I. They used the shame as motivation and rationalization for building up their armed forces and aggressive behavior towards their neighbors. The Orange Peril uses the specter of lost and losing manufacturing jobs to Mexico, China, and elsewhere as something Americans should be ashamed of because we can do the work better than any foreigner. What is never mentioned is that most jobs taken overseas are never coming back because either wages can’t cover the costs or automation has eliminated the need for human labor.
Key to the Nazi strategy was maintaining a mentality of “us versus them” through development and application of the term Aryan. Although they were mistaken regarding its origin, that didn’t stop them from using it to describe white, blond-haired, and blue-eyed people who they considered the superior “race”. Anyone not fitting this description was immediately suspect. For Trump, while his campaign slogan was “make America great again”, the undertone was always “make white America great again”. And while it can be debated exactly how he did this, the election results clearly showed that 9 out of 10 votes for him were white voters. Then again, it’s hard to imagine why minorities didn’t support him when, at just about every turn, he insulted, denigrated, and threatened immigrants with deportation. It was abundantly clear who “us” was when a surrogate suggested that Japanese internment camps from WW II were a precedent on how to deal with immigrants today.
The common element in the strategies listed above is that they were geared to set the populace on edge and have them ready to explode into action on command. For the Nazis, this took the form of storm-troopers in the blitzkrieg, Hitler youth, and the Brown Shirts. For Trump, the results were volatile campaign stops where violence could erupt spontaneously, shouting matches with dissenters, and eventually the combustion that took place on election day. In the post-election period, we now have a private security force supplanting the Secrete Service which may well be a parallel to the Brown Shirts. For the Nazis who masked an entire genocide behind their propaganda, no lie was too outrageous, no conspiracy too far fetched, and no atrocity too much. In 2016, we now have a president who would say anything to get a vote, told outright lies about his opponents, made promises he will never be able to fulfill, and now has the U.S. on the verge of global conflicts with China, Russia, and even our long-time ally Israel.
How does this end? If we’re lucky, we come to our senses in 4 years and vote this huckster out. If not, and the public remains blind to the manipulation of a Trump administration, we could be led into either civil or global war. Our only hope is to open our eyes to what they are attempting to do and resist the urge to give in to our basest instincts. We need real leaders, not a snake oil salesman who cribbed notes from the master propagandists of the 20th century. Keep your eyes open for that leader and when you do find one, tell everyone.
So That's Life? 
Open Letter to All Elected Officials and Appointees
04/17/2020April 18, 2020
Elected Officials and Appointees,
Who would ever have imagined that our country and the world would ever be in the grip of a worldwide pandemic that threatens the very lives of untold thousands of people? If it isn’t obvious, it’s the medical and social scientists who study these things and have warned us about it for many years. The situation today was not unknowable and anyone who bothered to read and listen would have known that this was possible, if not inevitable. But most of you pretend that this is just an act of God and now scramble to put out fires in hopes of saving both lives and your reputations. You ignore years of declining investment in the public health infrastructure and throw your hands up when asked to explain the severe shortages of equipment and trained professionals or when computer systems are overwhelmed by the unemployed who are unable to file claims.
Even more disturbing are the statistics showing that COVID-19 is hitting minority communities the hardest but your reaction is mostly faux shock. Isn’t it obvious that people of color would be susceptible because they are most at risk of living at the edge of poverty in jobs that don’t provide health care and who can’t afford to get an education that would teach them about nutrition and basic health maintenance? Did you also think that over 200 years of oppression heaped on the African American community wouldn’t serve as a figurative noose around their necks holding them back from attaining a position in our society that would keep them on par with the white majority? The same goes for al the other communities of color who have been stigmatized and marginalized throughout the history of our nation. If you’re concerned now, why weren’t you just as concerned before, when tax dollars were being distributed to the wrong people?
The thing is, you have an opportunity to make good on the promise that this is a country founded on the principle that all men are created equal. In 2020, amidst the death and suffering of the pandemic, the U.S. government has shown a willingness to spend whatever it takes to get the country back on its feet again. Trillions of dollars will be allocated to resuscitate an economy that is dying not because of some financial crisis, but because people are dying and the rest are unable to safely return to work. This is money that, if it weren’t a national crisis, would be labeled a socialist handout. Money that in good times would be doled out to the rich as tax breaks. Already, the President has seen fit to allow his cronies license to pick and choose who receives money currently allocated and it is clear that they are not especially interested in helping the people most in need. The circumstances are radically different and you have an opportunity (an obligation) to see that big business is held accountable for every dollar they receive through provisions like banning stock buybacks. You need to ensure that not only small businesses but their employees and the too numerous contract and gig workers are supported and there must be sufficient testing capacity to make every person feel safe to return to work. Lastly, if we’re going to spend this tremendous amount of money, why not require every business that takes funds to pay their employees a living wage and create a method where every American can obtain reasonably priced health insurance? Surely the insurance companies and hospitals will be asking for money too.
Let me leave you with this. The vast majority of the country is sick and tired of partisan lines that obstruct any progress from being made in anything remotely connected with the government. The lies, obfuscation, and deception along with your stubborn adherence to party strictures is not only tiresome but also enraging. All of you need to swallow your pride and do what is right for all the people you represent and not just the supporters and donors that you currently pander to. And that means you need to work together and compromise like you’ve not done in what seems like forever. You also need to fortify your resolve and demand that the President perform his sworn duty to the Constitution and the people. If you do, you can achieve what is right and not only get the U.S. going again but also fix so many of the things that were wrong before this disaster and make it a better, stronger country.
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