After only two weeks in office, President Donald Trump has scared many Americans about what will become of this country if changes he has projected continue unabated. Regardless of the legitimacy and plausibility of the President’s bluster, he appears to be moving ahead without any compunctions for the consequences for his actions or the damage it may cause. One accepts the normal shifting during a presidential transition, but this month Washington is undergoing a disquieting period of heightened anxiety and nervousness—at least in some circles. Added to the President’s traditional disruptive modus operandi, one is also witnessing a Congress led by a weak sycophant neophyte in the House and a new untested leader in the Senate. There is little sense that the Republican trifecta in Washington is ready to stand up and question or oppose anything championed by Donald Trump.
Into this scene of firings of life-time bureaucrats, suspending of historic programs, attempting to eliminate funding for programs which he opposes, President Trump appears to have unleashed the most dangerous anti-democratic force Washington has seen since Senator Huey Long, aviation hero Charles Lindbergh, and Senator Joseph McCarthy. Elon Musk knows no rules or guidelines. He respects no traditions or assumes no responsibilities. The richest man in the world is accountable to only one person and appears to already have cowed Washington to give him free rein over the town.
Elon Musk has demonstrated the ability to play Donald Trump. When he speaks or posts he talks in the royal “We.” The President is so enamored with the fact that he has Musk on his side, that he appears prepared to grant the billionaire the run of the Washington candy store. Together with the most ill-prepared, un-trained Cabinet members--and pending nominees--, Musk has been given full license to carry out his goals which are cloaked in the name of making Government “more efficient.”
To date all that the Trump/Musk duo appear to be lacking is a genuine para-legal secret military police operation. Unlike Hitler and the Nazis who had the S.A. and the S.S. in place before they took over the Government, Trump and Musk are only beginning to organize their forces. They have in mind to do considerably more than merely reorganize military functions and heightened border surveillance.
The significance of President Trump’s pardoning or commuting the sentences of approximately 1500 convicted January 6 criminal rioters, was to make them and their followers prepare themselves for the next round. The Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers give hope and credibility to their legions that their time is coming once again to stand proud with President Trump (and Elon Musk) as they take over America. When packaged impressively and granted total access to the heart of Government, they can form the core of a secret police that enables every fascist state.
The direction is present already on the global stage in addition to the disruption that Musk has commenced within the federal bureaucracy. President Trump already has watched during the weeks of the transition and now his first weeks in office, Musk’s persistence playful engagement with some of the most extreme right-wing leaders in the world. The German people have no need for the encouragement which Musk has extended to the extreme AfD Party in Germany, as the country prepares for its February 23 elections. One cannot dismiss Musk’s conscious use of a Nazi salute at the Presidential rally on Inauguration Day. It was hardly an inadvertent, misuse of the Roman salute. It was clearly intended to look like the Seig heil salute used by Hitler.
While Great Britain is not about to bring Nigel Farage into the cabinet, Musk’s flirtation with this right-wing politician, now a Member of the House of Commons, is no idle Musk flirtation. As with everything else Musk does, it has purpose and design. Perhaps what should be most alarming, however, is that the President has no interest in putting the brakes on his partner, any more than he appears prepared to accept any limits on his own quest for power.
This Trump Administration has come into office not only with an agenda and a determination to seek retribution, but it is also prepared to recast the purpose, the goals, and the values of the nation. President Trump has demonstrated already his determination to stretch the Constitution and the legal system as far as he possibly can take it. Even the Courts will take a long time to eventually halt Trump’s rampage—if at all.
Trump is convinced that he and his MAGA followers, accompanied by the evil manipulator Elon Musk, can mobilize the country to grant him carte blanche to do his will. If political and legal forces get in Trump’s way, his para-military forces will be prepared to follow him in re-shaping the United States to his will.
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