“America First” means a more dangerous world
The Nazis told the world precisely what they would do to the Jews for nearly 20 years in January of 1942, when Reinhard Heydrich convened a lunch meeting in Wansee outside of Berlin to make it final. Literally.
This is where the “Final Solution of the Jewish Question” became policy. Within months, Operation Reinhard was underway with the killing camps at Chelmno, Belzec and Treblinka operating at a continuous and ceaseless level of murderous frenzy.
While the Nazis were killing at an industrialized scale, they continued to deny the mistreatment of the Jews that they simultaneously and openly celebrated. The world didn’t seem to care much about the contradictions.
When the Nazis needed to show the International Red Cross how good the Jews had it in the Reich, they needed a stage. They needed something that would impress the cynical, gullible and naive. The place to which the Nazis took their moral dupes was the fortress town of Terezin. Here they built Theresienstadt, the show camp.
I am writing this sitting on a bench outside of the school Jewish children attended, listening to a bevy of birds sing and an owl hoot. I know the story of this place. I have been here before, and I know that nearly every person who was imprisoned here either died of disease, or was shipped east to Auschwitz, and killed on arrival. Certainly, that was the case for nearly all of the children. Barely any survived resettlement in the east. They did not survive a monstrous lie and its marriage to political power and the authority of the state.
Democracy is what keeps us safe. It is the only moral form of government because it is the only faith that holds the human being as supreme and higher as an individual than a collective that serves a state, a man, a party or a dogma.
More than anything else, the American president must be an apostle of this faith — and must never, ever waver in his (or her) testimony.
All over the world, wherever people are oppressed and downtrodden, trampled and abused, they must know that there is a place that rejects their oppression and tormentors in the name of freedom and the rights of each human being. They must know that in the darkest nights that we stand with them, and that we see them.
Freedom is the most powerful force in the world, but it is fueled by hope. Hope can be smothered and strangled by indifference. The election ahead will test the faith of the American people. It is a pass or fail exam because only one party in America has maintained a faith in our creed. There is no America without elections, and what that means is simple: the humility to lose is as deeply necessary as the wisdom needed to govern. What a concession demonstrates is restraint, and an assertion that something is bigger than the result. What matters is the continuity of the system that maintains the supremacy of majoritarian rule under a system of law, rules, traditions and norms that protects minority rights.
This is what the election is about. We must decide again.
The world needs America. We should never delude ourselves into believing that “America First” means anything other than America alone and a more dangerous world.
We must learn the lessons of the 20th century to survive the 21st. Our greatest danger may well be that we have forgotten what was once so clearly seen and widely known.
There have always been forces that seek to take away control from others by imposing on them rules, dogmas, and sometimes, insanity in the name of power. Always, there are lies. The sustainment of a con of such profound dimensions is always accompanied by a legion of lies and liars. It breaks my heart that anyone might be fooled by the siren songs of grievance, scapegoating and revenge, but they are, and always have been.
Don’t be fooled. There is truth in the world, and the greatest truth of all is human freedom. I can see that perfectly clearly from a bench in Theresienstadt, in the shadow of Auschwitz, Treblinka and Majdanek, and so much suffering in the world.
Trump, MAGA, Project 2025….. they’re really clear about their goals. Yet, too many either pay no attention or totally disregard what they say! If they’re successful, Americans will deeply regret their lack of concern!
Without American, the world would be a much sadder and dangerous place. Trump is a dangerous individual who with his MAGA base would put the world in that position while of course enriching himself. He does not care about the world or even America and its citizens. MAGA will wake up some day, hopefully not too late. We can help in any way we can, but the best way will be to help Biden win in November.