Springtime For Dictators October 23, 2019October 22, 2019 According to a recent Pentagon report, Russia is winning. Think about that. “A divided America is failing to counter Moscow’s efforts to undermine democracy and cast doubt on U.S. alliances, says the report, which warns of a surge in ‘political warfare.'” There was a time this would have troubled Republicans. Instead, they back Trump in ignoring the ongoing attack. They even block the paper-ballot back ups that would increase confidence in the integrity of our elections. The press is sharply critical. The Washington Post’s running tally of more than 12,000 false and misleading statements, for example. If, like Trump, you consider a free press “the enemy of the people” then you may share his affinity for Putin and Kim and Edogan and Duterte and M-BS (as in, bone-saw). If, instead, you think Trump . . . . . . is past master at throwing up verbal smoke screens . . . knows equally well the effectiveness of massive oratorical assaults that shake the nerves of his victims or opponents . . . knows how to give pledges that will be broken later but will serve temporarily to divide and confuse . . . uses insults and lies to break through the respectable but often weak front of his adversaries. . . . contradicts himself constantly [in a way that] crushes the best defenses of logic and ordinary morality . . . . . . and that . . . . . . his crudity frequently borders on downright vulgarity* . . . . . . then consider chipping in to get the country back on track — now, while the organizing snowball has 48 weeks to roll down hill before the start of early voting. *From the foreword to a 1,000-page hardcover book of speeches that the publisher would ordinarily have priced at $3 — books were cheaper in 1941 — but which it marked down to $1.89 “to make it immediately available to every American whose, life, home and business are directly affected by what [he] says and does.” Trump himself paid nothing for his copy — it was a gift — but, according to his ex-wife, who later relegated it to her divorce attorney’s safe, it lay by his bedside for years.