Donald Trump is no Hitler, as David Harsanyi reminds Reason readers. But the writer adds that those who fear the role Trump could play at the head of the federal government should look beyond the Donald.
Donald Trump’s idiotic, undoable and probably unconstitutional immigration proposal (if we can call it that) is not comparable to the genocide of 6 million Jews. Trump is not comparable to Adolf Hitler. The Art of the Deal is not Mein Kampf. You can save your histrionic riffs of Martin Niemoller, for now. Trump’s statist suggestions and nativist populism, though often reprehensible in their own special way, are not nearly so morally corrupt as the policies of National Socialism or Stalinism or even the theocracies that litter the Middle East right now. …
… Many Americans feel that they’re under attack. Many blame all Muslims, but some won’t blame Islam at all. Both are preposterous and dangerous positions. Trump’s crass populism—the crassiest—feeds off this fear. It’s an ugly overreaction to President Barack Obama’s underreaction regarding terrorism, though there is one incredibly important distinction: Both of these men have proposed actions that intrude on the Constitution this week—with the president proposing to use an arbitrary no-fly list to take due process away from potential gun owners—but only one will ever have been president.
Trump is never going to make a decision for the American people. Neither major party will support his run for the presidency, should he somehow win the Republican nomination, which is highly doubtful. But if you don’t buy all that and if you’re truly concerned that Trump is going to turn America into the next Nazi Germany, there is an answer: You should become a vocal opponent of abusive executive power no matter who is president. That includes the one we have right now. Because it’s the precedents we set today that would make it easier for Trump to have his own Schutzstaffel.
