03-07-2023, 07:18 AM
Presidential Historian Michael Beschloss Torches 'Local Mussolini' Ron DeSantis
The author highlighted the "scariest thing of all" about the potential 2024 GOP presidential candidate.
Mar 7, 2023, 03:06 AM EST
NBC News presidential historian and author Michael Beschloss warned how Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ® poses more of a threat to democracy than former President Donald Trump.
Appearing on MSNBC at the weekend, Beschloss noted how political candidates try to win nominations “by trying to appeal to what they think will work.”
And potential 2024 GOP presidential candidate DeSantis has tried to transform himself from “a sort of nondescript political leader and member of Congress” into “a local Mussolini in Florida with the book banning and the brutal tactics and even this week this suggestion that bloggers have to register with the state for the honor of writing about the governor and other political leaders,” he said.
“We have to call this what this is,” Beschloss added. “This is fascism and authoritarianism that goes even beyond what Trump has talked about. That’s what he thinks is going to work in that party and in a way that’s the scariest thing of all.”
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/president...6db70fa0e5
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Comment: it is regrettable that anyone needs to compare Governor Ron De Santis to a Bad Guy of similar ethnicity. It is more unfortunate, though, that the comparison has validity. I would have no problem in comparing a neo-Nazi of German origin to Nazis. We all must reject our own rogues for their evil.
In Why We Fight, the Italian-American film director Frank Capra skewered fascism, whether German, Italian, or Japanese, with a conclusion about the fascist demand that people under fascist rule not think but instead credere, obbedire, e combattere (believe, obey, and fight). Contrast what is necessary for democracy: we must sort out the truth for ourselves, rejecting nonsense, madness, and outright lies. Communism may be an abject failure for economic results and the body count, but for good reason we need to have the Communist Manifesto in the public library. Nazism may be demonic evil, but how can we know if we do not have Mein Kampf to leave no question? Protocols of the Learned Elders is absurd in its contention that people generally competent in many fields of endeavor comprise a monolithic plot that includes all Jews from babbling infants to senile people awaiting the end from Alzheimer's and even the drunks and beggars along with the alleged plotters of exploitation and degradation of all gentiles. (Conspiracies are generally for losers such as semi-literate mobsters and people seeking gain from such pathetic methods of enrichment as insurance fraud, as shown in the cinematic masterpiece Double Indemnity).
We have people who would take away our freedom so that they could get more profits from economic shortcuts, wage cuts and harsher terms of employment, the quashing of competition, corrupt privatization, and wars for profit. Such people have backed fascism in Germany, Italy, and Japan, but they are in America too. They find people who market this vile 'product' much as ad agencies sell tobacco and alcoholism. They find disgruntled people who see opportunity by taking away opportunities and assets of others. They convince cranky people that fascism is on the side of ideas that they never examined.
Truth is never an easy achievement except if trivial. Neither is thrift, self-control, integrity, investment, nor the honing of talent. We seek the truth and do the other necessities of personal success if we are to have a chance -- and to let others have their chances.
The author highlighted the "scariest thing of all" about the potential 2024 GOP presidential candidate.
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![[Image: 5d243183250000b21ae9cc35.jpg?ops=100_100]](https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/5d243183250000b21ae9cc35.jpg?ops=100_100)
By
[url=https://www.huffpost.com/author/lee-moran]Lee Moran
By
[url=https://www.huffpost.com/author/lee-moran]Lee Moran
Mar 7, 2023, 03:06 AM EST
NBC News presidential historian and author Michael Beschloss warned how Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis ® poses more of a threat to democracy than former President Donald Trump.
Appearing on MSNBC at the weekend, Beschloss noted how political candidates try to win nominations “by trying to appeal to what they think will work.”
And potential 2024 GOP presidential candidate DeSantis has tried to transform himself from “a sort of nondescript political leader and member of Congress” into “a local Mussolini in Florida with the book banning and the brutal tactics and even this week this suggestion that bloggers have to register with the state for the honor of writing about the governor and other political leaders,” he said.
“We have to call this what this is,” Beschloss added. “This is fascism and authoritarianism that goes even beyond what Trump has talked about. That’s what he thinks is going to work in that party and in a way that’s the scariest thing of all.”
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/president...6db70fa0e5
-------------------
Comment: it is regrettable that anyone needs to compare Governor Ron De Santis to a Bad Guy of similar ethnicity. It is more unfortunate, though, that the comparison has validity. I would have no problem in comparing a neo-Nazi of German origin to Nazis. We all must reject our own rogues for their evil.
In Why We Fight, the Italian-American film director Frank Capra skewered fascism, whether German, Italian, or Japanese, with a conclusion about the fascist demand that people under fascist rule not think but instead credere, obbedire, e combattere (believe, obey, and fight). Contrast what is necessary for democracy: we must sort out the truth for ourselves, rejecting nonsense, madness, and outright lies. Communism may be an abject failure for economic results and the body count, but for good reason we need to have the Communist Manifesto in the public library. Nazism may be demonic evil, but how can we know if we do not have Mein Kampf to leave no question? Protocols of the Learned Elders is absurd in its contention that people generally competent in many fields of endeavor comprise a monolithic plot that includes all Jews from babbling infants to senile people awaiting the end from Alzheimer's and even the drunks and beggars along with the alleged plotters of exploitation and degradation of all gentiles. (Conspiracies are generally for losers such as semi-literate mobsters and people seeking gain from such pathetic methods of enrichment as insurance fraud, as shown in the cinematic masterpiece Double Indemnity).
We have people who would take away our freedom so that they could get more profits from economic shortcuts, wage cuts and harsher terms of employment, the quashing of competition, corrupt privatization, and wars for profit. Such people have backed fascism in Germany, Italy, and Japan, but they are in America too. They find people who market this vile 'product' much as ad agencies sell tobacco and alcoholism. They find disgruntled people who see opportunity by taking away opportunities and assets of others. They convince cranky people that fascism is on the side of ideas that they never examined.
Truth is never an easy achievement except if trivial. Neither is thrift, self-control, integrity, investment, nor the honing of talent. We seek the truth and do the other necessities of personal success if we are to have a chance -- and to let others have their chances.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.