80 years ago this month, Hitler formed his alliance with Italian Fascists. The first people Trump reached out to after winning? French fascists. The French have a saying that has special resonance today: “Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.”
If you think she is alone in welcoming Trump, you are wrong. Geert Wilders is thrilled by a Trump victory. Actually, Geert Wilders is beyond thrilled by Trump's victory. Le Pen and Wilders are not alone.
The alliance with Putin and his minions is already well established. That was purely about money, resources and power. This is different. This is about eliminationist ideology. This is not a possible future. This is the present world. As I noted before , the future we feared has already arrived.
I am not alone in recognizing the threat. I freely admit I have no love lost for Michael Hayden. I reviled him in the past and nothing he has done since has changed my opinion of him. Yet, even he is appalled at Trump’s behavior.
Former CIA and NSA director Mike Hayden, who opposes Trump, told NBC News that in almost four decades in intelligence "I have never seen anything like this before."
He’s not alone.
Michael Morell, a former acting CIA director who was President George W. Bush's briefer and is now a Hillary Clinton supporter, said Trump's comments about his briefing were extraordinary. "This is the first time that I can remember a candidate for president doing a readout from an intelligence briefing, and it's the first time a candidate has politicized their intelligence briefing. Both of those are highly inappropriate and crossed a long standing red line respected by both parties," he said.
They are not alone. Their shock and outrage is spreading throughout the ranks. This is not just in the intelligence community. It is also in the foreign service community. Professionals who have faithfully executed their oath to “protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” are now faced with the unnerving prospect that the next president will take classified information and sell, trade, or gift it to our enemies.
These career professionals are faced with a terrible choice. Refuse to be a party to the betrayal, risking the likely outcome some sycophantic zealot will fill your place, or stay and fight to prevent destruction of everything you hold dear now threatened by the enemy withing?
The stakes can get no higher. This is not about a policy dispute. This is not about abuse of power. This is not about war and peace. We are facing a real existential threat. Nothing in the American experience of the last century has prepared us for this moment.
“Unprecedented” doesn’t begin to cover this. I think we need to retire the term and replace it with a phrase: “No one has ever pulled this crap before.”
