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Donald Trump has called the free press "The enemy of the American People".
How far off are the Gulags?
Last edited by Goose (2/18/2017 8:22 am)
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There I go again,,,,, Taking Trump literally.
"Taking Trump literally" is the Trumpers' term for someone who listens to what Trump says and Tweets.
Apparently actually holding someone accountable for the stuff they say is soooooo 2015.
'Enemies of the people': Trump remark echoes history's worst tyrants
Being branded an "enemy of the people" by the likes of Stalin or Mao brought at best suspicion and stigma, at worst hard labour or death.
Now the chilling phrase - which is at least as old as Emperor Nero, who was called "hostis publicus", enemy of the public, by the Senate in AD 68 - is making something of a comeback.
In November, the UK Daily Mail used its entire front page to brand three judges "enemies of the people" following a legal ruling on the Brexit process.
Then on Friday, President Donald Trump deployed the epithet against mainstream US media outlets that he sees as hostile.
"The FAKE NEWS media (failing New York Times, NBC News, ABC, CBS, CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!" he wrote on Twitter.
The reaction was swift. "Every president is irritated by the news media. No other president would have described the media as 'the enemy of the people'", tweeted David Axelrod, a former adviser to President Barack Obama.
Gabriel Sherman, national affairs editor at New York magazine, called the phrase a "chilling" example of "full-on dictator speak".
Steve Silberman, an award-winning writer and journalist, wondered whether the remark would prompt Trump supporters to shoot at journalists.
And that might not be a far-fetched concern. Late last year, a Trump supporter opened fire in a pizza restaurant at the centre of a bizarre conspiracy theory about child abuse.
The US president's use of "enemies of the people" raises unavoidable echoes of some of history's most murderous dictators.
Under Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, out-of-favour artists and politicians were designated enemies and many were sent to hard labour camps or killed. Others were stigmatised and denied access to education and employment.
And Chairman Mao, the leader of China who presided over the deaths of millions of people in a famine brought about by his Great Leap Forward, was also known to use the phrase against anyone who opposed him, with terrible consequences.
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The Great Uniter !
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"They get started by suppressing free press, in other words, a consolidation of power -- when you look at history, the first thing that dictators do is shut down the press,"
McCain: Dictators 'get started by suppressing free press'
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We are not there yet, but the Trump administration is trying to take us there by controlling the message.
It is for sure that the press has been very hard on Trump, but IMHO deservedly so. Most of the things Trump complains about in the press were things that he himself caused with the own words and actions.
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"Two minutes of Hate"
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Will we see a return of the Alien and Sedition Act?
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It IS true "Making America HATE again" !