I’m in the mall, taking a bagel break with my friend Jack.
You see, for years, Jack’s been a Republican, a vocal Trump supporter, a viewer of Fox Propaganda and a listener to right-wing AM radio.
Jack also, happens to be a non-practicing Jew.
Jack sips his coffee and proudly announces, “Ya know Mort, I’m now a registered independent.”
I scratch my scalp wondering, “Does that mean he’s not voting for Trump in 2024?” But he’s not saying and I’m not asking.
And then I say, with all the emotion that I could muster, “You know Jack, Trump has surrounded himself with a bunch of fascists and when they come to round us up, you and your family are going to the camps. You’re a Jew in their eyes.”
Jack listens, feels my pain and keeps his mouth shut.
I want to tell him about Trump’s Proud Boys.
I want to tell him stuff he’s not going to hear on Fox or on right-wing radio.
Like that the insurrectionists tried to destroy America.
Like that Trump is going to release the convicted Proud Boys from prison if he’s reelectedOne of those Proud Boys, who stormed the Capitol and who sits in prison, told an undercover FBI agent about his admiration for Adolf Hitler and discussed a plan to “wipe out” the nation’s Jewish population.
And I bet Trump—G-d forbid— will give them government jobs in law enforcement.
Jack doesn’t know that the 33-year-old right-wing Dallas, Texas mall murderer, Mauricio Garcia, wore a patch that read “RWDS.” as he killed eight innocent victims in the mall, including a three-year old. Mauricio also wore Nazi tattoos, one of a swastika and one of SS lightning bolts.
“Right-Wing Death Squad” doesn’t sound familiar to Jack.
But it should, for in the 30’s and the 40’s fascist, Iron Guard Romanians created “death squads” in order to kill Jews.
And they did.
But Fox won’t teach Jack or any of its viewers about what these “death squads” did.
But, “An American minister to Romania, Franklin Mott Gunther did. He toured a meat-packing plant where the Jews were slaughtered with the placards reading “Kosher meat” on them and reported back to Washington: “Sixty Jewish corpses were discovered on the hooks used for carcasses. They were all skinned….and the quantity of blood about was evidence that they had been skinned alive”. Gunther wrote he was especially shocked that one of the Jewish victims hanging on the meat hooks was a 5-year-old girl, writing that the cruelty displayed was unbelievable.” (Wikipedia)
And I think, “If Jack stood in front of the Kosher meat placards, and saw those 60 Jewish corpses hanging on those meat hooks, and stepped into that blood on that slaughter-house floor, and cried at the sight of the body of that five-year-old girl would he have registered as a Democrat.”
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Author Reading Recommendation—–“Peekskill: USA” by Howard Fast.
A beautifully written story about a race riot in 1949 in the small town of Peekskill, New York. This story is as important today as it was in 1949. The faces may have changed but the issues continue to haunt us.
