Ronna McDaniel was re-elected as the Chair of the Republican National Convention in January. “With us united the Democrats are going to hear us in 2024.” At the podium (TV) she said “We’re the party of faith and freedom.”

We have heard plenty from the Republican Party the last year. Yes, indeed, the party of freedom who use censorship “don’t say gay,” have banned Black history in AP classes, distorted CRT (critical race theory) and banned books others might want to read. Library staff have been threatened and intimidated and in certain states teachers can be fired for covering forbidden content. The decades of the Republican culture wars, now “wokeness” all that stuff Republicans don’t like that makes them feel uncomfortable.

In Germany in 1933 after Hitler was appointed Chancellor he wanted to seize power legally through the Parliamentary system. He won the vote on the “Enabling Act” and immediately started dismantling Germany’s democratic institutions. Education came under threat and Nazi Joseph Goebbels stormed libraries to remove books that were un-German.

Teachers were pressured to conform or were dismissed. Citizens spied on each other and reported to Hitler. Germans by decree turned in other Germans. Texas is now a police state (whistleblower law) with forced reproduction and more Republican controlled states are following with draconian laws.

In 2022 Republican CPAC was held in Hungary as they embraced dictator Viktor Orban and after that he was invited to the convention in Florida. And to think Republicans have called the Democrats “radical.”

Let us not forget, Hitler marched in to Austria in March 1938 and was welcomed by a cheering crowd. Austrians learned their fate to late because Mauthausen was built in August to hold political prisoners, homosexuals, gypsies, and many other groups Hitler despised.

And as the former president stated, “I love the uneducated.”

Debra Becker

Effort