This is a rare evening edition of Lucid! I delayed publication of today’s essay so I could include this news: I and five democracy scholars have co-signed a brief that has been submitted to the Supreme Court in connection with Donald Trump’s appeal of the Colorado Supreme Court ruling. That court held that Trump is ineligible to hold office under the 14th Amendment to the Constitution, Section 3. We are
Very happy to hear five of you submitted a brief to the Supreme Court. No one knows what small action, or large action, might tip the scales to right our beloved ship of state away from the waves of fascist madness.
Realistically, Americans are sleepwalking into authoritarianism! Or, as I’ve said before,” Fiddling while Rome burns!” The Nero Syndrome is very active! With our voices & votes, Trump & MAGA must be defeated. There may not be a second chance! As cynical as that sounds, I believe it to be true! Thanks Ruth for reminding us!
Thank you for being a signatory of that letter. Hopefully, it will make an impression on the Justices. The 14th Amendment is crystal clear on the matter.
I spent six years writing The Trump Files based my blog that I began in 2005. My day to day writing of Trump while he was in office and shortly after he left was exhausting, like Ruth has pointed out. We must take him seriously. My background as a science educator came into play in the book. Trump played havoc on science and public health. We can and must imagine what Trump 2.0 will be like. Now we must do something. I'm so glad you and colleagues filed Ty the brief we with Supreme Court. The 14th amendment is very clear. He is not eligible. Thank you Ruth
Yes. Thank you. We need to fight the good fight against autocracy. But the burn out it real. I feel it in my gut, my brain, my being. It is so hard for me to remain well in this political climate,AND we must!
2024's consequential election season looms. Psychiatrist Ravi Chandra takes a look at the Far-Right playbook and the choice between autocratic and egalitarian-in-progress choices, with a focus on psychology, propaganda, and dangerous influences that are amplifying chances of violence.
MOSF 18.12: Election Season 2024: Deconstructing the Trump/Far-Right Playbook and Propaganda, and Constructing a Positive Response From Our Shared Humanity and Reality – East Wind ezine (December 1, 2023)
I grew up during WWII. Thought victory in 1945 was the end - been proud to live in a free democracy - thought the Hitler’s and the Mussolini’s were just a bad dream.
Then comes an undisciplined tantrum throwing trump.
Big Media's biggest collective sin in the 2016, 2020 and 2024 election cycles – devoid of conscience or sense of civic duty – has been normalizing Orange Mussolini. All for the sake of profits. How obscene.
Thank you so much for all you do in defense of democracy. It is indeed a challenging time but I don’t feel like authoritarianism is a given. We still have rights and the vote. We just have to use them and we are more powerful than we know.
A very nice essay, as usual Ruth. WE have to try to educate those that are ‘open minded’, - and those seem to be few and far between. I hate to say it, but there are a lot of stupid people out there who aren’t open-minded....but we all have to try!
I wonder how many Americans have read The Plot Against America by Philip Roth? I read it in 2018 and began to see how it could happen here. That's a good one too, It Cant Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis. These are fiction, they take place in 1030's and 1940's America. Sometimes it takes a book to really explain how slowly that it can happen, and it is happening here today in the 2020's. It is up to us to stop it. Trump is no leader, he is a demagogue, and demagoguery has always been a powerful manipulator.
Thank you for submitting the amici. Nearly every one I know is in denial, completely unaware that Trump and his co-conspirators are running the Nazi playbook almost verbatim. Something unique a 2025 Trump administration would have, if SCOTUS removes Chevron Doctrine, is a straight path from the 5th Circuit to SCOTUS to follow through on Bannon’s 2017 promise to dismantle the administrative state.
Another highly notable problem is the total disengagement of the medical community. I am an ER doctor and tried very early to bring the attention of our state medical boards to the problem of the “extremely pro Trump doctors” the 2020 Trump Reelection Campaign created to provide legitimacy to bad ideas like “Herd immunity via mass infection” and support the premature opening of the economy. These doctors are now known as America’s Frontline Doctors who gave us Dr. Simone Gold and Florida State Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo. Gold spent 48 days in prison for her role in the J6 insurrection and Ladapo is manipulating research data to use as his justification to proclaim from his position of authority that COVID19 vaccines are not safe when they absolutely are.
There are not a lot of U.S. licensed physicians leading this movement but all of them remain licensed to practice medicine to this day. Many have also committed fraud, selling ivermectin and/or hydroxychloroquine as COVID19 “cures.” There is no interest in stopping this problem at any institution, private or public, local, state or at the federal level.
The problem is, it’s a little known fact that when Hitler became Chancellor in January 1933, approximately 50% of German doctors joined the Nazi regime, participated in sterilization of handicapped people and other “useless eaters” as well as euthanized babies. They promoted participated in “racial hygiene” and eugenics.
Their justification was they were treating the German population, not the individual.
This led to horrific human experimentation, their role in making selections on the ramps when the trains filled with boxcars of people arrived. Doctors decided who would stay alive to work as slave labor for major industrial facilities and who would be sent directly to the gas chambers. The German Medical Society formally recognized the role so many German Doctors willingly played in the Holocaust and wrote a formal apology in 2012.
Since the COVID19 vaccines came into existence, Trump’s doctors have been telling the MAGA base extremely dangerous conspiracy theories including that vaccines cause AIDS and are killing more people than COVID. These are just two examples these anti-vaccine extremists have integrated into other MAGA victim-persecution narratives of such as the “Great replacement theory” and “White genocide.”
Finally, these doctors constantly threaten vaccine advocates including doctors, scientists and public health workers with “Nuremberg 2.0.” This idea is based on the false belief that the vaccines are “experimental” and vaccine mandates meant forced experimentation, in violation of Nuremberg Code. We get pictures of nooses and gallows, and death threats sent to us on social media. Elsewhere, like in Congressional testimony these same doctors claim they’re being censored for their “alternative viewpoints.”
And with all that being said, not only is the medical community ignoring all of this, per opensecrets.org all medical specialty societies are donating to both political parties for the 2024 election and 10/19 listed are giving more to the Republican Party than the Democratic Party.
Thank you Ruth!
Excellent piece!
Thank you for your continued service to the country with the brief. Any possibility it can be released here as a post?
Very happy to hear five of you submitted a brief to the Supreme Court. No one knows what small action, or large action, might tip the scales to right our beloved ship of state away from the waves of fascist madness.
Realistically, Americans are sleepwalking into authoritarianism! Or, as I’ve said before,” Fiddling while Rome burns!” The Nero Syndrome is very active! With our voices & votes, Trump & MAGA must be defeated. There may not be a second chance! As cynical as that sounds, I believe it to be true! Thanks Ruth for reminding us!
So happy that you filed the brief!!!
Thank you for being a signatory of that letter. Hopefully, it will make an impression on the Justices. The 14th Amendment is crystal clear on the matter.
I spent six years writing The Trump Files based my blog that I began in 2005. My day to day writing of Trump while he was in office and shortly after he left was exhausting, like Ruth has pointed out. We must take him seriously. My background as a science educator came into play in the book. Trump played havoc on science and public health. We can and must imagine what Trump 2.0 will be like. Now we must do something. I'm so glad you and colleagues filed Ty the brief we with Supreme Court. The 14th amendment is very clear. He is not eligible. Thank you Ruth
Yes. Thank you. We need to fight the good fight against autocracy. But the burn out it real. I feel it in my gut, my brain, my being. It is so hard for me to remain well in this political climate,AND we must!
Don’t take this lying down, anyone!!
2024's consequential election season looms. Psychiatrist Ravi Chandra takes a look at the Far-Right playbook and the choice between autocratic and egalitarian-in-progress choices, with a focus on psychology, propaganda, and dangerous influences that are amplifying chances of violence.
MOSF 18.12: Election Season 2024: Deconstructing the Trump/Far-Right Playbook and Propaganda, and Constructing a Positive Response From Our Shared Humanity and Reality – East Wind ezine (December 1, 2023)
https://eastwindezine.com/mosf-18-12-election-season-2024-deconstructing-the-trump-far-right-playbook-and-propaganda/
I grew up during WWII. Thought victory in 1945 was the end - been proud to live in a free democracy - thought the Hitler’s and the Mussolini’s were just a bad dream.
Then comes an undisciplined tantrum throwing trump.
DUMP TRUMP
Big Media's biggest collective sin in the 2016, 2020 and 2024 election cycles – devoid of conscience or sense of civic duty – has been normalizing Orange Mussolini. All for the sake of profits. How obscene.
Thank you so much for all you do in defense of democracy. It is indeed a challenging time but I don’t feel like authoritarianism is a given. We still have rights and the vote. We just have to use them and we are more powerful than we know.
This is beautifully written. Thank you. I hope they read it carefully and take it to heart.
A very nice essay, as usual Ruth. WE have to try to educate those that are ‘open minded’, - and those seem to be few and far between. I hate to say it, but there are a lot of stupid people out there who aren’t open-minded....but we all have to try!
I wonder how many Americans have read The Plot Against America by Philip Roth? I read it in 2018 and began to see how it could happen here. That's a good one too, It Cant Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis. These are fiction, they take place in 1030's and 1940's America. Sometimes it takes a book to really explain how slowly that it can happen, and it is happening here today in the 2020's. It is up to us to stop it. Trump is no leader, he is a demagogue, and demagoguery has always been a powerful manipulator.
Thank you for your work on the amicus brief.
Thank you for submitting the amici. Nearly every one I know is in denial, completely unaware that Trump and his co-conspirators are running the Nazi playbook almost verbatim. Something unique a 2025 Trump administration would have, if SCOTUS removes Chevron Doctrine, is a straight path from the 5th Circuit to SCOTUS to follow through on Bannon’s 2017 promise to dismantle the administrative state.
Another highly notable problem is the total disengagement of the medical community. I am an ER doctor and tried very early to bring the attention of our state medical boards to the problem of the “extremely pro Trump doctors” the 2020 Trump Reelection Campaign created to provide legitimacy to bad ideas like “Herd immunity via mass infection” and support the premature opening of the economy. These doctors are now known as America’s Frontline Doctors who gave us Dr. Simone Gold and Florida State Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo. Gold spent 48 days in prison for her role in the J6 insurrection and Ladapo is manipulating research data to use as his justification to proclaim from his position of authority that COVID19 vaccines are not safe when they absolutely are.
There are not a lot of U.S. licensed physicians leading this movement but all of them remain licensed to practice medicine to this day. Many have also committed fraud, selling ivermectin and/or hydroxychloroquine as COVID19 “cures.” There is no interest in stopping this problem at any institution, private or public, local, state or at the federal level.
The problem is, it’s a little known fact that when Hitler became Chancellor in January 1933, approximately 50% of German doctors joined the Nazi regime, participated in sterilization of handicapped people and other “useless eaters” as well as euthanized babies. They promoted participated in “racial hygiene” and eugenics.
Their justification was they were treating the German population, not the individual.
This led to horrific human experimentation, their role in making selections on the ramps when the trains filled with boxcars of people arrived. Doctors decided who would stay alive to work as slave labor for major industrial facilities and who would be sent directly to the gas chambers. The German Medical Society formally recognized the role so many German Doctors willingly played in the Holocaust and wrote a formal apology in 2012.
Since the COVID19 vaccines came into existence, Trump’s doctors have been telling the MAGA base extremely dangerous conspiracy theories including that vaccines cause AIDS and are killing more people than COVID. These are just two examples these anti-vaccine extremists have integrated into other MAGA victim-persecution narratives of such as the “Great replacement theory” and “White genocide.”
Finally, these doctors constantly threaten vaccine advocates including doctors, scientists and public health workers with “Nuremberg 2.0.” This idea is based on the false belief that the vaccines are “experimental” and vaccine mandates meant forced experimentation, in violation of Nuremberg Code. We get pictures of nooses and gallows, and death threats sent to us on social media. Elsewhere, like in Congressional testimony these same doctors claim they’re being censored for their “alternative viewpoints.”
And with all that being said, not only is the medical community ignoring all of this, per opensecrets.org all medical specialty societies are donating to both political parties for the 2024 election and 10/19 listed are giving more to the Republican Party than the Democratic Party.