|
Dear Progressive Reader,
We are living in unprecedented times in this country. That statement may sound hyperbolic, but I do not believe it is. The rapid consolidation of control by Donald Trump and his supporters of almost all of the levers of power in the United States government, combined with the distrust of science, knowledge, and education, and fueled by the accelerant of social media, has led to what can only be viewed as a crisis in our nearly 250-year-old experiment in democracy.
The latest spark in the seemingly unceasing series of attacks on democratic norms, is the memo issued on Friday by Pete Hegseth, now known as Secretary of War, regarding journalists’ ability to cover the Pentagon. According to The New York Times, the newly named Department of War is “requiring [reporters] to pledge not to gather or use any information that had not been formally authorized for release or risk losing their credentials to cover the military.” The action takes “prior restraint” to a new level, extending far beyond the system of press pools and “embedding” that has been developed for battlefield situations since the 1980s, but became fully developed during the 2003 invasion of Iraq. As NPR’s David Folkenflick told listeners this morning, “How will we know what we don’t hear?”
But this is only the latest in a series of attacks and restrictions on the press—from the “media blaming” and threats of Trump’s first campaign in 2016, to the most recent lawsuits against The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. The removal of late night talkshow host Jimmy Kimmel by ABC/Disney, after pressure from FCC chair Brendan Carr, has helped awaken public awareness, but the warning signs have been brewing. As The Forward, a 128-year-old independent Jewish newspaper, wrote earlier this year, “Trump’s assault on the media [has] disturbing flashbacks to the Third Reich. [Adolf] Hitler also consolidated his power by controlling, intimidating and punishing the press.” A February 1939 article in The New York Times described the role of Nazi propaganda minister Joesph Goebbels in the firing of comedians who criticized the regime. “[I]n their public appearances they displayed a lack of any positive attitude toward National Socialism and therewith caused grave annoyance in public and especially to party comrades,” wrote Goebbels in an article in the Nazi party’s newspaper at the time. This past Thursday, as he returned from a trip to the United Kingdom, Trump made a similar statement to reporters on Air Force One, stating, “All they do is hit Trump . . . They're not allowed to do that.”
The attacks on the media, progressive foundations, and ordinary individuals speaking on their personal social media accounts have increased dramatically and viciously since the murder of rightwing influencer Charlie Kirk. In a column for The Seattle Times, cartoonist David Horsey wrote comparing the current moment to the Reichstag fire in Germany. The Reichstag building, similar to chambers of the U.S. Congress, was consumed by fire in an act of arson on February 27, 1933. Hitler, then chancellor of Germany, used the “terrorist incident” to persuade the president to declare a state of emergency that resulted in a curtailing of civil liberties and dramatic restrictions on the press. “The horrific assassination of rightwing influencer Charlie Kirk seems to be offering the Trump Administration its own Reichstag fire,” writes Horsey. A similar warning was issued eight years earlier by Russian-American dissident journalist Masha Gessen, who wrote in a 2017 essay for Harper’s magazine, “The [next] Reichstag fire, it goes almost without saying, will be a terrorist attack, and it will mark our sudden, obvious, and irreversible descent into autocracy.” Gessen also quotes a statement by Hitler following the fire in which he declared, “There will be no mercy now. Anyone standing in our way will be cut down.” Words that sound familiar today in light of Trump’s 2023-2024 campaign speeches, when he told supporters, “I am your justice . . . I am your retribution.”
“It is hard not to conclude we are being governed by a regime that is eager to employ ever-more powerful tools to control information, silence critics, punish opponents, and retain power indefinitely. So, it does not feel alarmist to ask, is this America’s Reichstag moment?,” concludes Horsey in his September 19 Seattle Times article.
This week on our website Christopher Blackwell, an incarcerated journalist, together with writer Jamie Beth Cohen have a conversation about his new book, Ending Isolation, about the use of solitary in the U.S. prison system. Also, Mike Ervin describes the impact of cities not maintaining their sidewalks and curbs; Kayley Corley looks at the failures of the health care system to listen to women; and Sam Stein reports on a hunger strike in Boston that aims to urge lawmakers to end U.S. military supplies to the war on Gaza. Plus Eleanor Bader interviews Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, on her new book about the current attacks on public education; Donna Gaffney and Teri Mills pen an op-ed on their work to promote vaccines for young children; and former intern at The Progressive Caitlin Scialla tells the story of the late Charle Kirk’s group Turning Point USA as it impacted the lives of students on her own college campus, and how “we must confront the mechanisms that sustain political violence in the United States.”
Please keep reading, and we will keep bringing you important articles on these and other issues of our time.
Sincerely,
Norman Stockwell
Publisher
P.S. – If you like this newsletter, please consider forwarding it to a friend. If you know someone who would like to subscribe to this free weekly email, please share this link: http://tiny.cc/ProgressiveNewsletter.
P.P.S. – The NEW August/September issue just went to press! If you don’t already subscribe to The Progressive in print or digital form, please consider doing so today. Also, if you have a friend or relative who you feel should hear from the many voices for progressive change within our pages, please consider giving a gift subscription.
P.P.P.S. – Thank you so much to everyone who has already donated to support The Progressive! We need you now more than ever. If you have not done so already, please take a moment to support hard-hitting, independent reporting on issues that matter to you. Your donation today will keep us on solid ground and will help us continue to grow in the coming years. You can use the wallet envelope in the current issue of the magazine, or click on the “Donate” button below to join your fellow progressives in sustaining The Progressive as a voice for peace, social justice, and the common good.
|
