And crown thy good with brotherhood?

As our country descends into autocracy, how is this different from Germany in 1933? The atrocities are delivered in a slightly different order, but the similarities are apparent. For example, we are being “cleansed,” ostensibly to benefit the country, to rid us of waste, fraud and abuse. Most of our critical services are being eliminated or dangerously scaled back, e.g., FEMA.

Charity can no longer be tolerated, so the sick and starving are dying in African countries, at our hands. Here in the U.S., people may fall into the same category under the direction of the Trump administration, including seniors, the sick, children, the disabled and handicapped. Isn’t the cost of care considered wasteful, better transferred to the wealthy, and to create containment centers for thousands of people detained primarily because of skin color, deprived of “due process” taken, often brutally, by unidentified, armed masked men, and transported to our newly constructed camp, proudly titled “Alligator Alcatraz.” Is this a moment of great pride or monumental shame?

How are these ICE officers different from Hitler’s SS? How are the detention camps not a polished version of Hitler’s concentration camps, built to prevent undesirables, also labeled criminals, from contaminating the country? In 1933, they were Jews. Today, they are people with brown skin. Both seen as defiling the blood of their respective countries, both the victims of atrocities at the hands of autocratic dictators whose lies dupe their citizens into compliance.

So, I ask, how are we different?

Patricia Fogg
Greene