By Rudy Barnes, Jr., April 19, 2025
Religions have influenced and shaped politics, none have neutralized nationalism and demagoguery like that promoted by Donald Trump. I’m convinced that God does not support Trump despite the assertions of his misguided supporters; and recent editorials by David Brooks and Thomas Friedman reflect an urgency to end his corrupt regime.
Trump is a 21st century vestige of Hitler, and the religious and political demographics of Germany during the rise of Hitler were similar to those of America today; but the church and German people failed to stop Hitler’s corrupt regime. It took a World War to end Hitler’s Nazi regime, and it may take another civil war in America to end Trump’s immoral and corrupt regime.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a Christian leader who gave his life opposing Hitler, who was never elected Germany’s leader, but who skillfully maneuvered his Nazi regime around Christian opposition to Hitler’s Third Reich and gained absolute political power as Germany’s chancellor. I don’t know of any dictator more relevant to Trump’s politics today than Hitler.
The success of Trump’s regime in the midterm elections of 2026 would end libertarian democracy in America and affirm Trump’s objective to end the rule of law in the Constitution. He has already made Congress impotent as a check and balance on Trump’s power, and has appointed cabinet members who are more loyal to Trump than to the Constitution.
Democracy is only as strong as the people in it; and when an unprincipled politician like Trump finds a willing audience for his political abominations they can end freedom and democracy, much like Putin and Netanyahu did in Russia and Israel. While God is not known for political and military interventions, the church has been party to many of them.
America already had a Civil War, but it was based on the noble goal to end slavery. There is nothing noble about giving billionaires like Trump and Musk the power to berate their political opponents and exploit the public with their narcissistic policies. Democracy and freedom don’t have a future if public officials fail to support and defend the Constitution.
I’m a retired Army lawyer who wore a green beret and taught the Law of War and international humanitarian law. I deeply grieve over Trump’s tendencies to follow Putin’s despotic policies, and I have witnessed an impotent church put popularity above moral principle. I’m not optimistic that a morally complacent public can terminate Trump’s power.
But America has two more elections to save America’s Constitutional democracy from ourselves and Trump’s corrupt regime. I’m an old man who has seen too much evil in the world, and too many complacent voters who have accepted Trump’s immoral regime in our democracy; but I’m not ready to accept the end of American freedom and democracy. Wake up America! Let’s elect Trump nullifiers in 2026 who can restore Constitutional democracy before it’s too late.
Notes:
Trump’s danger to Constitutional democracy is nothing new: In 2016 Richard Cohen predicted a similar scary scenario: “Weimar is the charming German city that gave its name to the parliamentary democracy that was created following World War I and which Hitler crushed in 1933. It was never a robust democracy, but it nevertheless was the government of Europe’s most important — and, in many ways, advanced — country. Berlin in the early 1930s was a tolerant and liberal city. Many a Hollywood filmmaker got a start in Berlin. In a relative snap of the fingers, all that changed. Weimar’s intellectuals, artists, actors, writers, architects (Bauhaus) and others fled. The precipitating event was, of course, Hitler’s appointment as German chancellor. That was Jan. 30, 1933. Almost exactly a month later, the German parliament building, the Reichstag, was consumed by fire. A Dutch communist, Marinus van der Lubbe, was accused of setting it. (He was subsequently guillotined.) Hitler, declaring a vast communist threat, asked President Paul von Hindenburg for emergency powers. He got them. He kept them until he died. Here is the relevance of Weimar. Trump has shown a daunting disregard or ignorance of the Constitution and of law. Regarding the use of torture, he has said that the military must follow his orders — even if they are illegal. More recently, he declared that flag-burning should be a crime and that flag burners be punished by “perhaps loss of citizenship or year in jail.” The remark was one of his off-the-cuff inanities — since 1989, flag-burning has been protected political speech, and citizenship, we’d like to think, is forever. The tweet — so few words, so much meaning — spoke to Trump’s abysmal lack of knowledge but, more important, contained an emotional truth. Trump despises dissent and often reacts emotionally to setbacks or challenges. Yet, I wonder if a compliant Congress and an even more compliant American people would balk at giving Trump any emergency power he seeks. His election was a stunner — an eruption of anger and resentment that is putting an epochally unqualified man in the White House. So great was the urge to trash the status quo that Trump’s lying, bragging, cheating, insulting and breathtaking ignorance did not disqualify him. Indeed, his very unsuitableness for the presidency immensely credentialed him. He is loved by many because he is loathed by others. I have too much faith in America and its institutions to think that Weimar is the future. It is, however, a warning, not something that shouldn’t be discussed, but something that should be mulled. The differences between Weimar Germany and contemporary America are significant but so, increasingly, are the similarities.” See Trump isn’t Hitler. But the United States could be another Germany at
David Brooks and Thomas L. Friedman are two mainstream and respected columnists for the NYTimes who have written current opinions that echo Cohen’s concern. David Brooks has said, “What’s happening Is not Normal. It’s time for an Uprising. That’s not Normal.” Brooks went on to say, “It’s time for “a mass civic movement.” https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/17/opinion/trump-harvard-law-firms.html.
Thomas L. Friedman said “I have never been so afraid for America’s future in my life.” See https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/15/opinion/trump-administration-china.html.
William L. Shirer has written a comprehensive history of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany, copyright 1959, 1960 by William L. Shirer.
Denise Giardina has written a historical fiction account of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s German activities opposing Hitler that’s more fact than fiction. Saints and Villains, W.W. Norton, NY, NY, 1998.
On Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s theology, see The Cost of Discipleship, 1966, Mamilan Paperbacks.
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