COMPARING GEORGE W. BUSH AND ADOLF HITLER

Column No. 45 By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH - January 27, 2005

In a dispatch from Berlin on December 12, 2004, John B. Judis of The New Republic wrote:

At a small gathering of officials and intellectuals in Berlin, the guests mull -- and finally reject -- a comparison between Bush's United States and Germany's darker past, but they still worry that the United States could be on a ‘slippery slope’ toward religious fanaticism.”

Indeed.  As Maureen Dowd noted in the (likely little-noted) last two sentences of another one of her superb columns on Georgite policy in Iraq: “[The Iraqis] may choose to live in a theocracy.  Americans did.”  And so there you have it, in The New York Times, not just places like the pages of The 15% Solution.

But what about “comparisons between Bush’s America and Germany’s darker past?”  Is that an automatic “forget it?”  The issue is serious, controversial, and, I believe, does bear careful consideration.  Take the following comparisons just between GW and AH.  They do make one shiver a bit, don’t they?  Yes, there are certainly differences, but examine the similarities.  Not necessarily in order of importance they are:

Bush is not quite as open as Hitler was about what his real aims are.  After all, Hitler had laid them out in a book – widely unread until it was too late, of course.  Bush states his true goals only at closed meetings of his top contributors, or the War Council of the Republican Religious Right, the Council on National Policy, or in public places that nobody (especially Democratic electoral candidates or the Democratic National Committee) ever looks, such as the 2004 Republican National Platform.

In persecuting identity groups, Hitler went after the gays first, most directly, starting in 1934 with the pink triangles gays were forced to wear on their sleeves, moving quickly on to imprisonment and then, shall we say, “elimination.”  It might not be fair to say that Bush’s “anti-gay marriage” amendment amounts to starting down the same road.  However, the newly elected Republican Senator from North Carolina has called for the banning of all homosexual teachers from all school classrooms, which to some might sound like the beginning of a Nuremberg (could that be Charleston?)  Law.  I have not heard that Bush has disavowed that Senator’s sentiment.

Hitler's Ministry of Propaganda (MoP) was part of the government.  Could it be that Bush’s privatized one, Fox”News”Channel, the Washington Times, Hannibaugh, the bought Armstrong Williams, etc., etc., amounts to the same thing?

Hitler's racism was quite out in the open.  Bush's is carried on by winks, nods, and policies that, while they look like one thing, like Civil Rights Act enforcement, are in practice quite another: planning to use the anti-voter fraud provisions of the Civil Rights Act to statutorily limit non-white voting.  So there’s a real difference.

Hitler destroyed the Weimar Constitution in one fell swoop, directly amending it with the post-Reichstag Fire “Enabling Act” of March 1933.  Bush is going after the US Constitution piecemeal, via such steps as the Patriot Act (see TPJ No. 36), and the arrogation of powers not provided to him by the Constitution, via Executive Order (see TPJ Nos. 19 and 43).  So that one might be considered a similarity or a difference.

Hitler mobilized fear, hate, religious bigotry, and intolerance for difference and the "other" as central to his political plan.  So does Bush.

Hitler used religion politically and so does Bush.  Hitler appealed to both Protestants and reactionary Catholics (Hitler being one of them himself).  So does Bush.  Another disquieting similarity is that Hitler too thought he was divinely guided.

Hitler had the support of a major portion of the German industrial class.  The US industrial class is diminishing in importance, but Bush has the support of major industrial sectors: the extractive and chemical industries, some portions of the remaining manufacturing sector, major portions of the financial, information processing, and retail sales groups.  Significant portions of the German ruling elite probably did not agree with Hitler’s racial theories, especially as to his plans for their implementation, and did not think that he ever would get around to implementing them.  The same could well be the case in the U.S. for the ruling elite’s view of Bush’s Christian Rightist ideology.

Both had Time Man-of-the-Year covers, although Hitler was awarded only one.

A big difference, so far, is that Bush has no private army, except ad hoc as in the attack on the Miami/Dade election board in 2000 that stopped the recount there that would have likely given Gore the Presidency.  Hitler had three private armies of significant size, with spiffy uniforms and real weapons: the Sturm Abteiluing (SA), the street-fighting "Brownshirts;" the Schutzstaffel (SS) which began its existence as his personally loyal private guard; and the Stahlhelm (Steel Helmets) the right-wing WW I veterans' street gang.

Finally, a definite difference: Hitler’s trademark photo showed a bad moustache, a bad hairdo, and a scowl.  Bush, in contrast, has good hair and his trademark smirk.

Different?  Similar?  We present.  You decide.

The Bush Second Inaugural: A Preview The Coming 2nd Civil War (Unless), No. 5

Column No. 44 By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH - January 18, 2005

This column is the fifth in this series.  In my view, the projected cataclysm will come to our nation, if it does, because of the ideology, policies, and ever-growing political power of the Republican Religious Right (RRR).  As stated at different times and in different arenas by sources ranging the 2004 Republican Party Platform through George Bush to Jerry Falwell and Grover Norquist, their primary goals are to: impose their religious beliefs on all Americans through the use of the criminal law; reduce the functions of the Federal government to the barest minimum outside of the military-industrial, prison-industrial, and private-thought/behavior-control sectors; and replace Constitutional government as we have known it with Executive Branch dominance operating entirely on its own authority.

Except in appealing to their base in the Christian Right, the RRR does its best to conceal most of its true goals from the American public, however.  In this “Inaugural Address,” a newly elected President, using only the words of real leaders of the movement, is very open about them.  If the philosophy reflected by these words does fully take hold of our government, then that Second Civil War is truly in the offing.

As many readers of The Political Junkies know, in 1996, under the pseudonym “Jonathan Westminster,” I published a book entitled The 15% Solution: A Political History of American Fascism, 2001-2022.  In it, I postulated that the Presidential election of 2000 would be won by a not-too-bright Republican totally beholden to the Christian Right, and that the election of 2004 would be won by a younger brighter candidate of a new political entity called the Republic Christian Alliance.

The new (future-fictional) President was named Jefferson Da­vis (J.D.) Hague.  He was a great-grand nephew of the pre‑World War II Mayor of Jersey City, NJ, Frank Hague, a man who once said: "You hear about constitutional rights, free speech, and the free press.  Every time I hear these words I say to myself, 'That man is a Red, that man is a Communist!'  You never hear a real American talk like that.”  J.D.'s father, "Big Daddy Hague," was a truck driver who sported the old Confederate States of America flag on the radiator of his 22-wheeler's tractor, and carried a loaded sawed‑off double‑barreled shot­gun underneath the passen­ger seat.  It was there, Big Daddy would confide in friends, "to protect myself from the niggers."  His choice of name for his second‑born son came as no surprise to his friends, espe­cially since his first‑born son "Nat" had been named after the Confederate Gen­er­al Nathan B. Forrest.  This man's principal claim to fame was that a year after the end of the First Civil War he had founded the viru­lently anti‑black terrorist organization known as the Ku Klux Klan.

As one of Hague’s principal staffers, Constance “Connie” Conroy noted at the time, the speech-writers had had a hard time coming up with anything original for Hague to say.  They needed, she wrote, “a new way to say the same old thing he had been saying over and over in the campaign.  And so what did we do?  We went back to some tried and true stuff from our ‘Pa­tron Saints:’ Pat Buchanan, Pat Robert­son, Gary Bauer, Jerry Falwell, the Newt Man.  Just took some of their best stuff, threw it together, nobody was the wiser, especially the Prez, and presto!  The best speech mon­ey could­n't begin to buy.”

And so you have here the “Hague First Inaugural,” made up entirely from excerpts of pre-1996 writings of the gang listed above.  The name of each writer follows the section each “contributed” (references available upon request).  It is offered here as a preview of the Bush Second Inaugural to be delivered on Jan. 20, 2005.  It will be interesting to note the similarities and differences between the Bush Second and the Hague First, especially given the fact, as Karl Rove has told us more than once, that Bush was the candidate of a true-in-everything-but-name Republican-Christian Alliance.

The First Inaugural Address of Presi­dent Jefferson Davis Hague, delivered in the National Cathedral on the newly designated Inauguration Day, December 25, 2004[1]

[1] Note: There is no indication or evidence that any of the historical figures quoted in the Hague First Inaugural Address or elsewhere in this chapter, among whom are Patrick Buchanan, M.G. Robertson, Paul Weyrich, Keith Fournier, Gary Bauer, Jerry Falwell, and Newton Gingrich, would have supported or associ­ated themselves in any way with any of the actual positions or actions that Jeffer­son Davis Hague or any members of his government or political parties took, at that time or in the future.

Mr. President, Mr. Chief Justice, Mr. Speaker, my fellow Amer­i­cans under God.  I stand here before you today, on the birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ, in all humility awaiting my time to do His bid­ding.  And I can tell you that his bidding now is to fight the good fight, for the Lord, and for you the Ameri­can people under God.

For there is a religious war going on in this country.  And we, the Ameri­cans of God, must win it.  We must take back our cit­ies, and take back our culture, and take back our country [Bu­chanan].  To do this, we must return to our Christian roots.  If we do not, we will continue to le­galize sodomy, slaughter inno­cent babies, destroy the minds of our chil­dren, squander our re­sources, and yes, sink into oblivion [Robertson].

We are in an eternal battle.  The battle is between right and wrong, be­tween truth and lies, between life and death.  And if we ever forget what it is about, if we think we are in a battle for elect­ing peo­ple to hold office, simply controlling political parties, then we will not ac­complish what we are to achieve.  We need to hold to our principles, and stick to them re­gardless.

The real enemy is the secular humanist mindset, which seeks to destroy everything that is good in this society.  The fight that we are fighting, the battle we have joined, is one that encom­passes our entire life span.  Re­member, you have God.  You have your families; you have your commu­nity, your church community, your neighborhood, and all the things you are con­cerned about.  They have only power.  That's all that matters to them.  They will fight with everything that's in them to keep that power [Weyrich].

Today we face what I believe is an even greater threat to our lives.  The enemy is more insidious, more chameleon‑like than a Hitler.  And this enemy is even more deadly.  The enemy is lethal and must be stopped [Fournier].  So far from having ended, the cold war has increased in in­ten­si­ty, as sec­tor after sector of American life has been ruth­less­ly cor­rupt­ed by the liber­al ethos.  Now that the other 'Cold War' is over, the real cold war has begun [Kristol, quoted in Starr].

Yes, we are engaged in a social, political, and cultural civil war.  There is a lot of talk in America about pluralism.  But you can't have a society whose highest value is merely live and let live.  The bottom line is somebody's values will prevail.  Some­body is going to win this civil war.  And the winner gets the right to teach our children what to believe about things like life and death, love and sex, and freedom and slavery.

As I have traveled the length and breadth of this great God‑given land of ours, I have often run into skep­tics.  They say, "Well, J.D., if there is a civil war going on, where are the two sides?"  And my ex­planation is that on one side there are men and women like Americans under God.  People who be­lieve that God is.  And believing that God is, they are re­quired, they are obli­gated to take the posi­tions they take on a whole host of issues.  And on the other side of this great conflict there are people at very signifi­cant positions in our culture who begin their thinking with the belief that God isn't.  They are our ene­my [Bauer].

Yes, it is time to take America back, from the liberal politi­cians who are attempting to erase every evidence of God from public life, from gov­ern­ment officials who hide their radical, anti‑Christian bigot­ry behind a twist­ed view of "the separation of church and state," from gay and lesbian radicals who not only claim the right to lead their Godless lifestyle, but demand that we support this abominable behav­ior, from the radical fem­i­nists whose "right to choose" has caused the murder of mil­lions of inno­cent unborn little babies, from the militant left which is the fount of all evil—take her back from every group or individ­ual that refuses to recog­nize our beloved nation for what it truly is—a nation under God! [Falwell]

We are the only society in history that says that power comes from God to you . . . and if you don't tell the truth about the role of God and the cen­trality of God in America, you can't explain the rest of our civiliza­tion.  I look forward to the day when a be­lief in God is once more at the center of the defini­tion of being an American [Gingrich, 1].

As to the future, if you think about the notion that the great chal­lenge of our lifetime is first to imagine a future that is worth spending our lives getting to, and then, because of the technolo­gies and the capabilities we have today, to get it up to sort of a virtual state, al­though that's done in terms of actual levels of so­phistication, all that's done in your mind.

And that takes leadership.  Most studies of leadership argue that lead­ers actually are acting out past decisions.  The problem when you get certainty with great leaders is that they have al­ready thor­oughly envisioned the achievement, and now it is just a matter of implementa­tion.  And so it is very different.  And so in a sense, virtuality at the mental level is some­thing I think you find in lead­ership over historical periods.  But in addi­tion, we are not in a new place; it is just becom­ing harder and hard­er to avoid the place where we are [Gingrich, 2].

In fighting this fight to avoid this place, we face an increas­ing­ly mili­tant, radical, socialist left.  And this is how we are going to win the war against this left.  We will use the same strategy Gen­eral Douglas MacArthur em­ployed against the Jap­a­nese in the Pacific in World War II: by‑pass their strong‑holds, then sur­round them, isolate them, bombard them, then blast the individu­als out of their power bunkers with hand‑to‑hand com­bat.  The battle for Iwo Jima [Author's Note: the penul­timate major battle of the Pacific War in 1945] was not pleasant, but our troops won it.  The battle to regain the soul of America won't be pleasant either, but we will win it [Robertson].

Yes, with your help and God's blessing we will win it.  Thank you and good night.

The Georgite Concept of Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law

Column No. 43 By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH - January 13, 2005

On July 1, 2004, my column ran under the title “Counsel to the President.”  It was about the Chief White House Counsel, Alberto Gonzales, and some rather quaint views that he holds about Constitutional government.  “Quaint” was of course the term he used to describe the Geneva Conventions, which just happen, through their ratification by the U.S. Senate over time, to have become part of “the highest law of the land” under provisions of the U.S. Constitution itself.  He thought the Conventions had become outdated.

I use the term quaint to describe Gonzales’ views of the Constitution and the Rule of Law because they pre-date the adoption of the U.S. Constitution, and indeed the proclamations of the English Glorious Revolution of 1688.  That Revolution, from which so many of our nation’s Founding Fathers drew inspiration a century later, happened to have put an end, once and for all, to the doctrine held by certain of the Stuart Kings (including Charles I, who --- literally --- lost his head over it), that is they ruled by Divine Right.  Well, our own George II, not of the House of Hanover, but of the House of Bush, believes that he is divinely inspired.  And his Counsel believes that he can change provisions of the U.S. Constitution, whether they pertain to his own powers or those of the other two supposedly co-equal branches of our government, at his whim and wish --- nothing other than the restoration of the Doctrine of the Divine Right of Kings.

And so, with this introduction, let me return to some of what I had to say about Judge Gonzales about six months ago.  Unfortunately, it still most apt.  Indeed as he has now been nominated as Attorney General, a nomination many see as a prelude to nomination for a seat on the Supreme Court, consideration of these issues is if anything more apt.

On Jan. 25, 2002, the Counsel to the President, Alberto Gonzales, sent President George Bush a memo in which he warned the President about a United States law, the War Crimes Act of 1996 (18 U.S.C. 2441).  That law prohibits the commission of “war crimes” by any U.S. officials or other personnel.  Included in the definition are any violations of the Geneva Conventions concerning the treatment of prisoners of war.  Gonzales told the President that the Justice Department had concluded that the Geneva Conventions did not apply to any apprehended members of al Qaeda.  He also advised the President that the State Dept. did not agree with Justice.  He proposed to the President that he make a determination that the Conventions did not apply to the Taliban or members of al Qaeda.

In Gonzales’ view, the “war on terror” had rendered certain sections of the Conventions obsolete; “quaint” was a descriptor he used.  One John Yoo, a University of California law professor on leave with the Justice Department, had begun working on ways and means for the US to avoid being charged with war crimes in reference to how certain prisoners taken in Afghanistan were treated in the fall of 2001, as the invasion of Afghanistan was getting under way.  Why might he need to have done this?  Because, according to The New Yorker’s Seymour Hersh’s sources at least, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had authorized an approach to prisoner treatment that included physical coercion and sexual humiliation.  The Pentagon denied these charges, of course.  But if such a plan did not exist, why on earth would they have had a legal defense for its implementation prepared?

The Pentagon, and the CIA, asked for legal rulings justifying the use of what most observers, as well as the usual interpretations of the Geneva Conventions, would term torture.  Article VI of the Constitution says, among other things, that: “This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the Untied States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any thing in the Constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.”  Sect. 2, Article II, empowers the President “. . . by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur. . . .” The clause from Article VI quoted above has always been interpreted to mean that treaties are part of the Constitution.

The oath of office for the President is found in the Constitution, at the end of Article II, Sect 1.  It says: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.”  The impeachment provision is found in Section 4 of the same article: “The President, Vice-President and all civil officers of the United States, shall be removed from office on impeachment for, and conviction of, treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”  One would think that violation of one’s oath, as found in the Constitution itself, would constitute a high crime or at least a misdemeanor.

Jay Bybee, now a Federal Appeals Court judge, of the Office of Legal Council of the Justice Department, the federal government’s ultimate legal advisor, wrote the principal memo that Gonzales used in advising the President, describing certain provisions of the Geneva Conventions as “outdated” and “quaint.”  Further, he told the President that with a simple re-labeling of persons captured in Afghanistan from “prisoners of war” to something else and a redefinition of “torture,” provisions of US law (passed by a Republican Congress and signed by a Democratic President, by the way) concerning the commission of war crimes could be by-passed.  In addition, a group of Pentagon lawyers told Rumsfeld that “inherent” in the President’s power as Commander-in-Chief, in war-time, was the authority to authorize essentially anything he wanted to, regardless of US law or treaties.  In this case too, even if such power could be found anywhere in the Constitution (and I looked hard in Article I, Sect. 2 that defines those powers -- and could not find it) it happens that the only US government entity empowered to declare war is the Congress.  Although the President and Fox News say repeatedly that “we’re at war,” we are not, at least in Constitutional terms.

In the eyes of most of the rest of the world, what Gonzales, Woo, Bybee, Ashcroft, and Rumsfeld’s lawyers did was unilaterally to amend a series of treaties.  And they did this without bothering even to inform, much less negotiate with, our treaty partners (most of the countries in the world).  Since treaties are part of the Constitution, they were thus also unilaterally amending the Constitution without bothering to go through the amendment process.  To this was added the interesting “inherent powers” doctrine that does the same thing.  But the Bush folks are not strangers to amending the Constitution at the stroke of a pen.  According to Ashcroft’s Justice Department, all of these actions, from the endorsement of the use of torture in the face of our treaty obligations, to the suspension of Constitutional rights under the USA Patriot Act, allegedly are and can be done on Presidential authority alone.

There are two major issues here.  One is that if Bush, on Gonzales’ advice, authorized the breaking of the Geneva Conventions, since they are part of the Constitution, he has committed an impeachable offense.  The other, even more important in my view, is that what is going on here is the substitution of the Rule of Man for the Rule of Law.  This is a very serious threat to every US citizen, and other persons for that matter residing in the United States, as well as to US captives abroad, to say nothing of our 200-year history of Constitutional government.  Under this doctrine, the President, on his own authority, labels you, or re-labels you something in some new category his lawyers dream up, and then all of a sudden you live outside of the protections of the US Constitution, whether those protections are to be found in its body or in treaties that become part of it.  All of this is as determined by the President under something called “inherent powers.”  Since the President would have leave to define those powers in any manner he would see fit, to come up with such a concept is to endorse explicitly the substitution of the Rule of Man for the Rule of Law (in Bush’s case a Rule of Man that is divinely inspired, so I guess that makes it OK.  But it does sound an awful lot like the Divine Right of Kings, doesn’t it?)  In so doing, the process also explicitly endorses the eventual end to American Constitutional Democracy, which rests on the bedrock of the Rule of Law, as we have known it.

This, in my view, is the most important single issue facing the nation as the Gonzales nomination is considered in Congress.  That he found ways to authorize torture, when doing so is prohibited by both treaty obligations and U.S. law is bad enough.  In my view, even worse, much worse in fact, is that under Gonzales’ leadership, the Georgites have rewritten the Constitution on their own authority.  “We’ll tell you what rights you have and what rights you don’t have, and once we tell you that you don’t have any, we can do whatever we want to with you, whether it’s torture by another name or indefinite imprisonment without charges and without recourse.”  It seems to me that an Executive undertaking to act in just this manner was a major factor in a Revolution that began around 1776.

The English Civil War was fought over this one.  The conflict that ended with the Glorious Revolution of 1688 was fought over this one.  And so (without in the case of George III his claiming any Divine Right) was the American Revolution.  If the Republican Religious Right is not stopped in its tracks by the political process in our country, and stopped very soon, the chances of that 2nd Civil War become only greater.

THE ‘UNLESS’ OF THE ‘COMING SECOND CIVIL WAR’ SERIES PART II

Column No. 42 By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH - January 6, 2005

This column is the third in this series.  Each entry will be preceded with variations on this brief introduction.  In my view, the projected cataclysm will come to our nation, if it does, because of the ideology, policies, and ever-growing political power of the Republican Religious Right (RRR).  As stated at different times and in different arenas by sources ranging the 2004 Republican Party Platform through George Bush to Jerry Falwell and Grover Norquist, their primary goals are to: impose their religious beliefs on all Americans through the use of the criminal law; reduce the functions of the Federal government to the barest minimum outside of the military-industrial, prison-industrial, and thought/private-behavior-control sectors; and replace Constitutional government as we have known it with Executive Branch dominance operating entirely on its own authority.

Except in appealing to their base in the Christian Right, the RRR does its best to conceal most of its true goals from the American public, to camouflage them alternatively with foreign wars, the “terror” threat, lies, and appeals to the basest instincts of fear and prejudice.  When the American public becomes fully aware of the true aims of the RRR, I am confident that they will reject it.  The rejection may come sooner, as the result of the political process (the “Unless” of the title of the series).  Unfortunately, it may come later as the result of a Second Civil War, which itself could come either before the RRR were able to institute a true fascist dictatorship, or after the occurrence of such a disaster for some period of time.  Some will characterize my position as alarmist and premature.  I fully intend it to be.  We have got to start focusing on what the RRR is really about.  The Firebell, to use Jefferson’s characterization of the Missouri Compromise of 1820 as indicating future bloody conflict over slavery, is ringing in the night.  But first to the topic of this column, Part II of the “Unless” of the Series title.

In 1992, I published a book entitled The New Americanism: How the Democratic Party Can Win the Presidency.  In it, I offered a proposal for that “broad, embracing, expansive vision” for the Democratic Party, for its then present and the nation’s future, that all of the observers and authorities quoted in last week’s column called for.  I believe that it is still very much what the doctor ordered for the Democratic Party.  It may indeed be, in the famous words of the late Republican Sen. Everett Dirksen (who would almost certainly find himself now on the left-wing of his party), “an idea whose time has come.”

In brief, it is a simple concept with a precise mission: to find the new grand vision for the Democratic Party, to find the bed-rock foundation upon which both the traditional agenda and the 21st century agenda of the Democratic Party can be established, to find the language and the civil weapons that our nation needs if the determined Georgite assault on American Constitutional Democracy as we have known it for 200 years is to be halted in its tracks and reversed, without bloodshed.  The New Americanism finds this vision in the very founding documents of our great nation.

The New Americanism projects a grand, integrated, overarching, forward-looking domestic and foreign policy based upon the principles of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.  Together they provide the Statement of Purpose for our nation, the Purpose of our National Government, and the Primary Functions of that Government in achieving in the stated Purpose.

Our National Purpose is made clear by the Declaration: to demonstrate unequivocally that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness . . .”

The primary Purpose of our National Government is also made clear in the Declaration: “[T]o secure these rights, Governments are instituted among men.”

The Primary functions of our National Government in achieving this purpose are spelled out in the Preamble to the Constitution:

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

Why this is enough to make a strict constructionist out of anyone (other than the Republican Religious Right, of course)!

In my view, and in the view of increasing number of other political observers, if the Georgites are to be stopped, control of the Democratic Party must be wrested from the clutches of the “me-too” Democratic Leadership Council and their fellow-traveling “New Democrats.”  In their folly, these interests think that the salvation of both the Democratic Party and our nation is to be found in making our Party look as much like the RRR as possible.  The vision that I propose could be the rallying point around which the objective of recreating the Democratic Party as the true alternative to the RRR, in ideology, policies, and programs, can be achieved.  Then it could become the means by which the Democratic Party can win elections again, and the nation saved from the terrible suffering and bloodshed that will occur both here and abroad if they do not.  And truly, what better weapon to take into battle against the Georgite regime and its primary goal of destroying U.S. Constitutional Democracy than the text of the Constitution itself?

The ‘Unless’ of the ‘Coming Second Civil War’ Series, Part I

Column No. 41 By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH - December 30, 2004

This column is the second in this series.  Each will be preceded with variations on this brief introduction.  In my view, this cataclysm will come to our nation because of the ideology, policies, and ever-growing political power of the Republican Religious Right (RRR).  As stated at different times and in different arenas by sources ranging the 2004 Republican Party Platform through George Bush to Jerry Falwell and Grover Norquist, their primary goals are to: impose their religious beliefs on all Americans through the use of the criminal law; reduce the functions of the Federal government to the barest minimum, outside of the military-industrial, prison-industrial, and thought-control sectors; and replace Constitutional government as we have known it with Executive Branch dominance operating entirely on its own authority.

Except to their base in the Christian Right, the RRR does its best to conceal most of its true aims from the American public as a whole, to camouflage them alternatively with foreign wars, lies, slogans, and appeals to the basest instincts of fear and prejudice.  When the American public becomes fully aware of the true aims of the RRR, I am confident that they will reject it.  The rejection may come sooner, as the result of the political process (the “Unless” of the title of the series).  Unfortunately, it may come later as the result of a Second Civil War, which itself could come either before the RRR were able to institute as true fascist dictatorship, or after some period of national suffering from the occurrence of such an event.  My position can be characterized as bold, alarmist, totally premature.  I fully intend it to be.  We have got to start focusing on what the RRR is really about.  And so to the topic of this column.

On the Op-Ed page of The New York Times of November 4, 2004, Andrei Cherny, a former senior staffer for both Sen. Gore and Sen. Kerry, wrote:

“The overarching problem Democrats have today is the lack of a clear sense of what the party stands for. . . . Democrats have a collection of policy positions that are sensible and right. . . . What we don’t have and what we sorely need is . . . a worldview that makes a thematic argument about where America is headed and where we want to take it.”

Many observers have been saying essentially the same thing for many years past.  In The New York Times of May 26, 2003, there was a front-page story by my high school classmate Adam Clymer about the state of the Democratic Party.  Adam told us that what all of the Democratic Party leaders and outside observers alike, even the DLC people quoted, agreed upon is that what we need is: a new "clear identity," the ability "to think strategically" (Peter Hart), a "better message," to "stand for something" (Bob Strauss), to be able to "show that we can make progressive government work" (Will Marshall), "to move away from incremental new reforms to big and broad issues" (Bill Carrick).

In a New York Times article on September 25, 1987, the journalist E.J. Dionne wrote:  “All Democrats have been searching for language to call America away from the individualism of the Reagan years to a new sense of community.”  Bob Kuttner had this to say just before the 1988 election: “Democrats do best when they develop broad, embracing, expansive visions combining national purpose with economic advancement, and rally masses of non-rich voters.”

We Democrats have not found that language, that vision, yet.  If we had, we have won the Presidency this time around.  Bush’s post-election approval numbers are the worst on record, according to none other than "Fox and Friends" on the Fox”News”Channel on 12/20/04.  In an article in The Washington Post of Nov. 9, 2004, Dionne pointed out that a significant number of people who agreed with the Democrats and disagreed with Bush on individual policy issues voted for him anyway, in part because of the lack of an overall vision on the part of the Democrats and the presence of one (although we would strongly disagree with its content) on the part of the Georgites.  Finally finding that vision will be crucially important for beginning the Democratic comeback in 2006 that will be necessary if our country is to be saved from the worst outcomes of Georgite policies down the road of history.

For some time now, I have had on the table a proposal for that grand vision.  I will present it next week in Part II of this current series-within-a-series.

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THE COMING SECOND CIVIL WAR (UNLESS)

This column is the first of a series on this subject that will appear intermittently over time in this space.  The columns in the series will be interspersed with columns on other matters that strike me of worthy of attention.

In my view, a Second Civil War will come to plague our country regardless of whether Bush or Kerry had won the 2004 election, Unless.  While something totally unexpected still could happen, Bush has almost certainly retained his grip on the White House.  Apparently, he did this with the use of massive cheating of all kinds across the country at the polls and within the guts of many voting machines.  Given Republican control of most of the courts through which any challenges in the key states must flow, it is highly unlikely that the outcome will be changed.  Of course, if the matter does somehow get to the Supreme Court again, just as in 2000 the final decision would come down to just one vote, that of  Sandra Day O’Connor, who, being an avowed Republican, would most likely vote just as she did in 2000.

In any event, regardless of the results of this election, as I said in my view our country faces the very real threat of a Second Civil War sometime in the foreseeable future.  With the Georgites remaining in power, this war is likely to occur sooner.  If Sen. Kerry were somehow to ultimately win, unless he were to make certain critical policy and political decisions early in his Presidency (which, based on his performance both before and after November 2 he would be highly unlikely to do), this war would still come, although somewhat later.

The reason, and the only reason, that we face this cataclysm is the ever-growing political power of the Republican Religious Right.  At its core is Karl Rove’s “base,” the Fundamentalist Christian movement, that is becoming stronger by the day.  The primary agenda of these people, and they tell us what it is every day in their speeches, sermons, and writings, is to gain complete control over the personal behavior and religious beliefs of every single American, through the use of the criminal law.  If they are not stopped, eventually the implementation of their agenda will lead either to civil war or to open, national, fascism and complete oppression of the all elements of the population that does not find favor with them.

My position can be characterized as bold, alarmist, totally premature.  I fully intend it to be.  We have got to start focusing on what these people are really about, and it has nothing to do with “values,” whatever that vaguest of vague terms means.  In this series, I am going to deal with what I see as the issues rending the civil fabric of our nation that may well eventually lead to violent conflict, if they are not confronted forthrightly and directly and soon.  In my view, together they form the present “Firebell in the Night,” warning of future civil war, the term that Thomas Jefferson used in describing the Missouri Compromise of 1820 as a warning of just such a forthcoming event.  That Compromise dealt with the issue of the expansion of slavery into the territories and the new states that would over time be formed in them.  Among the issues today that are similarly threatening our national social fabric are those of: race, sexual identity and its civil expression, the status of women, freedom of religious belief, the role of government in our nation, and Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law versus the Rule of Man.

In examining the parallels between the present situation in our country and those that existed on the rocky and convoluted pathway that lead to the First Civil War, in my view it is especially important to note the following.  The Civil War of 1861-65 did not begin as a contest over slavery, per se.  Abraham Lincoln came to see it as such by the time he wrote his Second Inaugural Address in 1864.  But the principal slavery-referenced issue that he campaigned on in the election of 1860 was the matter of its further expansion into the territories.  He wanted to stop it; the South wanted to promote it.

They wanted to force the slavery concept into all of the remaining lands of the original Louisiana Purchase and those conquered from Mexico in 1846-8 that had not already been incorporated in the Union as States.  In a similar way, the Republican Religious Right wants to force its concepts of what it calls “morality,” such issues of belief as to when life begins and of personal identity and behavior as to sexual orientation, onto our society and into the minds of every member of it by the use of the criminal law.  If they get their way, there will eventually be the death penalty for anyone providing an abortion, prison for women who have them, prison or worse for homosexuals who “refuse to recant,” some contemporary version of the Inquisition for “finding the heretics” who don’t happen to believe in their particular version of Christianity and then punishing them.  Don’t believe me?  Go to “Christian Reconstructionism” (which is the fundamental theology of the majority of Christian Fundamentalists) on the web.  Falwell would start with the “secular humanists,” Coulter with the “liberal traitors.”

Forcing the concept of white supremacy and thus black slavery onto all the territory of the United States other than that protected from it up until 1850, and forcing a particular view of “morality” upon everyone in the country by the use of the criminal law, are to my mind very similar, both in their effects and in their potential for leading to civil war.  In this series, I will be dealing with this primary issue and the others listed above.  But first, in the next two weeks, I will present a brief introduction to the “Unless” in the title of the series.

THE REAL MEANING OF THE ‘FAITH-BASED PRESIDENCY’, PART II

Column  No. 40

By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH - December 23, 2004

As I noted two weeks ago, in The New York Times Magazine of October 17, 2004, Ron Suskind gave the most comprehensive picture yet of George W. Bush’s concept of the “faith-based Presidency” and how it operates.  George Bush apparently really believes that he is on a mission from God, that his decision-making is based on God’s wishes, and that he is carrying out God’s vision.  A major and well-known feature of this approach to governing is that Bush acts with absolute certainty.  He makes decisions that he just knows are right, because God is in his mind and Bush knows that God is right.  Part I (see below) of this two-part series discussed some of the implications for past Georgite policy of this approach to governance.

The critical issue now facing our country in the wake of Bush’s garnering of a second term (whether by a true electoral win or by cheating) is: what are the implications of the Bush “faith-based” theory of governance for American constitutional government and its future?

First, the theory can mean that, indeed, somewhere out in that immense Universe a God exists who is cognizant of humans and their affairs down to a fairly micro level and who takes a direct interest in their daily conduct.  In such a case, the leader of a country can really be guided by God and his/her/its wishes/plans for it and its citizens.  Whatever such wishes/plans are, of course, they are transmitted privately to The Leader who states that he/she has access to this God.  No one else is privy to the being, can confirm its existence, or affirm that any ‘other’ listener got the instructions right.  Second, “faith-based” governance can mean that even if there is fact no such a “God” as described above, the person in authority who rules based on “faith” truly believes that there is, and that in making all the decisions of the office, he/she is “carrying out God’s will.”

Nevertheless, whether or not there is a God, or at least one who gets involved at a detailed level in human affairs, the ruler who claims this authority is really making decisions and giving orders based solely on what he/she thinks is right and what he/she wants to do, based solely on his/her own authority.  Whether or not the thoughts are coming from God, the thinking process is going on in the ruler’s own mind.  Because that person is convinced that the thinking is produced by God or at least reflects God’s will, there is no reference either to evidence or (heaven help him) rational analysis, or to any binding human laws, such as the U.S. Constitution.

In reality such a ruler, in this case Bush, may or may not be doing “God’s will” (and Bush really seems to think he is).  But that matter is irrelevant.  In practice, the rules of governance have become Bush’s Rules (in this case proudly made without recourse to evidence, analysis, and the process of reasoning, as one source told Mr. Suskind).  So far as Bush is concerned the rules “come from God,” and in the well-known Scalia-Thomas way of thinking “Natural Law,” that is “God’s Law,” stands above the Constitution.  Thus in Bush’s mind, since he is “doing God’s will” the Constitution no longer needs to be adhered to.  On such matters as: individual rights (The Patriot Act), abiding by international treaties that just happen to be part of the Constitution (the endorsement of the use of torture on prisoners in violation of the Geneva Conventions), or the declaration of war (Bush’s “war on terror,” self-, and not Congressionally, declared), Bush has just ignored both the process and the content required by the Constitution and the traditional US Constitutional form of government and governing.

Whether Bush is “carrying out God’s purpose” or not, he has substituted his say-so for that of the Constitution.  He has substituted the Rule of Man, his own, for the Rule of Law, the Constitution.  When Bush says, “God’s will be done,” whether he recognizes it or not, in reality what he is saying: “MY will be done.”  This is an entirely new element in the American system of governance.  This theory of governance stands at the entrance to the road to dictatorship and fascism.

This is what a “faith-based” Presidency really means.  We have got a “faith-based” leadership in the House of Representatives as well, for Tom DeLay has publicly said that he is also “doing God’s work.”  This is what at its core the Republican Religious Right is all about: the substitution of the Rule of Man for the Rule of Law.  This is the battle that must be joined, and joined soon, if our beloved country is not to sink into the abyss into which this kind of thinking has lead every country ever governed by it in the course of history.

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This is Part I of the Dr. Jonas’ two part series.

December 9, 2004

THE REAL MEANING OF THE ‘FAITH-BASED PRESIDENCY’

In The New York Times Magazine of October 17, 2004, Ron Suskind gave the most comprehensive picture yet of George W. Bush’s concept of the “faith-based Presidency” and how it operates.  George Bush apparently really believes that he is on a mission from God, that his decision-making is based on God’s wishes, and that he is carrying out God’s vision.  A major and well-known feature of this approach to governing is that Bush acts with absolute certainty.  He makes decisions that he just knows are right, because God is in his mind and Bush knows that God is right.

Once made, therefore, Bush’s decisions are right, because, expressing the will of God, Bush made them. (In the minds of religious people of the Georgite persuasion, circular reasoning has a very important place.)  Ergo his inability to see that he has ever made a mistake, at least since being ‘born again’.  So naturally, we witnessed the famous news conference and Presidential debate episodes in which he could not think of a single mistake that he had made.  If you never made one, there is nothing to admit, is there?  Another well-known feature of Bush’s approach to governance is that facts do not matter unless they happen to conform to or confirm his preconceived notion of what God’s vision is that he is carrying out.  A third major aspect of his approach, confirmed by Suskind, is that Bush wants a staff that has been trained not to question and not to offer data, evidence, or analysis, apparently either before or after he has made a decision.  This aspect explains thoroughly the character of the changes he is in the process of making in his Cabinet.

For example, Colin Powell was willing to lie at the UN for him, and thus throw his own reputation into the dustbin of history.  But apparently, on occasion, Powell would privately offer a contrary view on policy or pass along some information/analysis from the State Department staff that did not jibe with Bush’s already firmly-held conclusions.  And so, Powell had to go.  As did George Tenet at the CIA.  While he apparently tried hard to play good soldier, Tenet seems to have had the temerity on occasion to suggest that intelligence might influence policy, even if that intelligence went against Georgite preconceived notions.  Bush’s man Porter Goss has already issued an order that everything coming up from the CIA must be in accord with already set White House policy.  So absolutely gone are the days when knowledge and data might actually help formulate policy.  Policy will, rather, formulate intelligence.

Mr. Suskind explained and illustrated the major characteristics of Bush-think in great depth.  His writing and conclusions are based on interviews with many different sources who confirm the overall picture.  A number of those sources were willing to let their names be used.  It is fascinating that, to my knowledge, the White House never issued a single denial of any of the content of Mr. Suskind’s report.  Nor did they, as they usually do when negatives appear, furiously, viciously, and repeatedly attack the messenger through their privatized Ministry of Propaganda, Fox “News” Channel, Washington Times, HanniBaugh, and etc.  Of course, even if what Suskind wrote were false, the Bush people would be hard pressed to deny it -- because what he reported is exactly how Bush’s base wants him to think and be as President: “God’s emissary.”  It reflects exactly how the Christian Right has portrayed the source of his “victory”: God.  Given what we know from this article, and indeed from many other reports, the picture is indeed an accurate one.

Despite what is generally recognized as Bush’s approach to governance that leads to his decisions and his unchanging commitment to them once made, in fact, he does change his mind on what are to him relatively unimportant matters.  For example, whether global warming is real or not, whether there should be a 9/11 Commission or not, and whether the nation’s intelligence system should be reformed or not.  He can do this because he knows that nothing coming out of such position changes is going to alter his policies or his representations of reality anyway.

However, on his big issues, such as: waging war on Iraq; cutting taxes for the rich and the large corporations; ending Social Security as we know it; opening up as much of the US environment to corporate plunder as possible; making the Courts as right-wing as he can so that the Christian Right can get its way on gay marriage and abortion rights; eventually destroying the whole of the Federal government as we know it, in accord with the policies of Grover Norquist; changing the Constitution without bothering to go through the amendment process, in accord with the policies of Karl Rove (Sidney Blumenthal, The Guardian UK, 11/25/04); he is indeed unchanging.

The critical issue now facing our country in the wake of Bush’s garnering of a second term (whether by a true electoral win or by cheating) is: what are the implications of the Bush “faith-based” theory of governance for American constitutional government and its future?  I shall offer some answers to this question next week, in Part II of this essay, and it is a subject to which I shall return in more depth from time to time.