Orwell on ICE II: Parasites

Review by Bill Doughty––

In his typically salty way, Orwell describes his beloved England in one of his essays written 85 years ago this month as a nation whose rulers are “parasites.”

Orwell speaks to us from across “the pond” and beyond the grave with observations still timely, relevant, and enlightening in "England Your England."

He has much to say about inequality within society.

“England is the most class-ridden country under the sun. It is a land of snobbery and privilege, ruled largely by the old and silly,” he writes.

Yet, the people of England showed supreme “emotional unity” during the crisis of the Second World War, when authoritarian forces threatened freedom and England’s very existence as a democratic constitutional monarchy.

Orwell calls his country “a family with the wrong members in charge.” Young people must “kowtow” to the rich and powerful and not question the upper classes’ source of wealth.

“It is a family in which the young are generally thwarted and most of the power is in the hands of irresponsible uncles and bedridden aunts.”

Orwell recounts the evolution of Britain from an empire with a feudal power system to a modern technological society. The people in country estates and castles became “owners” with no direct contribution to the economy, the so-called “idol rich.” Some are celebrities who get power and wealth by being famous for being famous.

'American Millionaires ... Privileges ... Bribery ... Tear Gas'

Referring to the ultra rich and privileged class: “They were simply parasites,” Orwell writes, “less useful to society than his fleas are to a dog.”

“By 1920 there were many people who were aware of all this.

By 1930 millions were aware of it. But the British ruling class obviously could not admit to themselves that their usefulness was at an end. Had they done that they would have had to abdicate. For it was not possible for them to turn themselves into mere bandits, like the American millionaires, consciously clinging to unjust privileges and beating down opposition by bribery and tear-gas bombs. After all, they belonged to a class with a certain tradition, they had been to public schools where the duty of dying for your country, if necessary, is laid down as the first and greatest of the Commandments. They had to feel themselves true patriots, even while they plundered their countrymen. Clearly there was only one escape for them— into stupidity. They could keep society in its existing shape only by being unable to grasp that any improvement was possible. Difficult though this was, they achieved it, largely by fixing their eyes on the past and refusing to notice the changes that were going on round them.

There is much in England that this explains. It explains the decay of country life, due to the keeping-up of a sham feudalism which drives the more spirited workers off the land. It explains the immobility of the public schools, which have barely altered since the eighties of the last century. It explains the military incompetence which has again and again startled the world. Since the 'fifties every war in which England has engaged has started off with a series of disasters, after which the situation has been saved by people comparatively low in the social scale. The higher commanders, drawn from the aristocracy, could never prepare for modern war, because in order to do so they would have had to admit to themselves that the world was changing. They have always clung to obsolete methods and weapons, because they inevitably saw each war as a repetition of the last. Before the Boer War they prepared for the Zulu War, before 1914 for the Boer War, and before the present war for 1914. Even at this moment hundreds of thousands of men in England are being trained with the bayonet, a weapon entirely useless except for opening tins. It is worth noticing that the navy and, latterly, the Air Force, have always been more efficient than the regular army. But the navy is only partially, and the Air Force hardly at all, within the ruling-class orbit.”

That wasn’t the first or last time Orwell exempted the Royal Navy or Royal Air Force from the rampant incompetence of a caste system of leadership based on rich versus poor.

At least, he notes, the country’s rulers had not attempted to establish an authoritarian dictatorship or agitated for a civil war –– with a paramilitary force on the streets of London.

“It must be admitted that so long as things were peaceful the methods of the British ruling class served them well enough. Their own people manifestly tolerated them. However unjustly England might be organized, it was at any rate not torn by class warfare or haunted by secret police.”

Orwell saw a direct line to the Gestapo, Nazism, and spread of fascism as an outcome of the Spanish War of 1939 between Nationalists and Republicans. Although he had fought for the Spanish Republic against Franco’s fascists he later became disillusioned by the Republicans’ ties to Soviet Russia. His disillusionment would inspire his masterwork “1984” against totalitarianism.

While he lauds the fact that there were no secret police roaming London’s streets, he acknowledges, “Everyone knows that there is one law for the rich and another for the poor.”

“Everyone believes in his heart that the law can be, ought to be, and, on the whole, will be impartially administered,” Orwell writes. “The totalitarian idea that there is no such thing as law, there is only power, has never taken root.”

The same thing could be said about nearly all of the first 250 years of the United States’s history.

Fascist Diversity

In his essay “Looking Back on the Spanish War” Orwell says “When one thinks of all the people who support or have supported Fascism, one stands amazed at their diversity. What a crew!”

He mentions a varied array of powerful men including Germany’s Führer/Chancellor Adolf Hitler, Vichy France’s Philippe Pétain, Croatian fascist leader Ante Pavelic, American media tycoon William Randolph Hearst, American expatriate and Mussolini supporter Ezra Pound, Palestinian Arab nationalism and Nazi collaborator Mufti of Jerusalem, Canadian-American Christian Supremacist and America First isolationist Father Charles Coughlin, among others.

“They are all people with something to lose, or people who long for a hierarchical society and dread the prospect of a world of free and equal human beings,” Orwell writes.

[Interestingly, in another essay he decries his country’s discrimination against hiring immigrants to work in coal mines. Although he acknowledges the “wasteful, dirty and inefficient” nature of coal fires, he celebrates the idea of families of any “class” gathered around a fireplace.]

The ultra wealthy privileged caste, many of whom would be considered part of the “Epstein Class” today, tend to show disdain for immigrants, poor people, and workers. And what do working people ask for?

“All that the workingman demands is what these others would consider the indispensable minimum without which human life cannot be lived at all. Enough to eat, freedom from the haunting terror of unemployment, the knowledge that your children will get a fair chance, a bath once a day, clean linen reasonably often, a roof that doesn't leak, and short enough working hours to leave you with a little energy when the day is done. Not one of those who preach against ‘materialism’ would consider life livable without these things. And how easily that minimum could be attained if we chose to set our minds to it for only twenty years! To raise the standard of living of the whole world to that of Britain would not be a greater undertaking than this war we are now fighting … The major problem of our time is the decay of the belief in personal immortality, and it cannot be dealt with while the average human being is either drudging like an ox or shivering in fear of the secret police.”

Orwell staunchly believed in the rule of law and protection of voting rights within a culture of income inequality.

Regarding the English electoral system: “In a dozen obvious ways it is gerrymandered in the interest of the moneyed class” but “not completely corrupt,” Orwell contends. “You do not arrive at the polling booth to find men with revolvers telling you which way to vote, nor are the votes miscounted nor is there any direct bribery.”

But income inequality can lead to corruption, autocracy, voter suppression, and war –– both on foreign and domestic soil.

More about that in our next Navy Reads post.

By the way… 

Today we saw another gift from across the pond from musical artists whose roots are from the "working class" and lower-middle classes:

The islands that gave us The Beatles, Rolling Stones, and Led Zeppelin just delivered the Irish band U2’s “Days of Ash” EP with the lead song “American Obituary,” recounting ICE’s killing of Renee Good in Minneapolis with these powerful lyrics: “What you can’t kill can’t die, America will rise against the people of the lie;” “I love you more than hate loves war;” and “the power of the people is so much stronger than the people in power.” U2’s timely and exceptionally good set of songs complement to America's Bruce Springsteen’s recent tribute to Renee Good and Alex Pretti, “The Streets of Minneapolis.”

Orwell on ICE: ’Facing Unpleasant Facts’

Review by Bill Doughty

“There is no such thing as a naval dictatorship.”

Those are the words of George Orwell in his essay “England Your England,” written February 19, 1941, shortly after the United States entered the Second World War along with its Allies against Fascism and totalitarianism.

No naval power, he contended, could survive as an authoritarian dictatorship.

Orwell’s words are within the context of England as the world’s imperial superpower of its time, as well as his observations about his countrymen. Orwell addresses the English people’s ambivalence toward waging war, with many actively against serving in the military.

“After all, the English have absorbed a quarter of the earth and held on to it by means of a huge navy,” he writes. “How dare they then turn round and say that war is wicked?”

“It is quite true that the English are hypocritical about their Empire. In the working class this hypocrisy takes the form of not knowing that the Empire exists. But their dislike of standing armies is a perfectly sound instinct. A navy employs comparatively few people, and it is an external weapon which cannot affect home politics directly. Military dictatorships exist everywhere, but there is no such thing as a naval dictatorship. What English people of nearly all classes loathe from the bottom of their hearts is the swaggering officer type, the jingle of spurs and the crash of boots.”

One can imagine what Orwell would say about masked paramilitary agents acting as a “standing army” asking for citizens for identification, separating families, terrorizing children, beating people in the streets, and worse. 

He was clear about his disdain for thuggish bullying behavior in the name of law and order, especially ostentatious shows of force, including goose-stepping parades.

“Decades before Hitler was ever heard of, the word 'Prussian' had much the same significance in England as 'Nazi' has today. So deep does this feeling go that for a hundred years past the officers of the British army, in peace-time, have always worn civilian clothes when off duty.

One rapid but fairly sure guide to the social atmosphere of a country is the parade-step of its army. A military parade is really a kind of ritual dance, something like a ballet, expressing a certain philosophy of life. The goose-step, for instance, is one of the most horrible sights in the world, far more terrifying than a dive-bomber. It is simply an affirmation of naked power; contained in it, quite consciously and intentionally, is the vision of a boot crashing down on a face. Its ugliness is part of its essence, for what it is saying is 'Yes, I am ugly, and you daren't laugh at me,' like the bully who makes faces at his victim. Why is the goose-step not used in England? There are, heaven knows, plenty of army officers Who would be only too glad to introduce some such thing. It is not used because the people in the street would laugh. Beyond a certain point, military display is only possible in countries where the common people dare not laugh at the army.”

Dictators and would-be dictators hate to be laughed at.

Common traits of autocrats include attacking critics, rewriting history, subverting the judiciary, worshipping themselves, interfering in elections, and accumulating wealth through corruption.

Dictators also embrace the power of patriotism and promote nationalist “patriots” with misplaced loyalty to the Leader. Witness the attempted coup of January 6, 2021 at the United States Capitol and pardoned participants, including violent extremists who brutalized law enforcement personnel.

Absolution from Evil

Orwell’s “England Your England” essay opens with a powerful image as German bombers attacked Great Britain:

“As I write, highly civilized human beings are flying overhead, trying to kill me.

They do not feel any enmity against me as [an] individual, nor I against them. They are ‘only doing their duty’ as the saying goes. Most of them, I have no doubt, are kind-hearted law-abiding men who would never dream of committing murder in private life. On the other hand, if one of them succeeds in blowing me to pieces with a well-placed bomb, he will never sleep any the worse for it. He is serving his country, which has the power to absolve him from evil.

One cannot see the modern world as it is unless one recognizes the overwhelming strength of patriotism, national loyalty. In certain circumstances it can break down, at certain levels of civilization it does not exist, but as a positive force there is nothing to set beside it. Christianity and international Socialism are as weak as straw in comparison with it. Hitler and Mussolini rose to power in their own countries very largely because they could grasp this fact and their opponents could not.”

Orwell would say the right kind of patriotism relies on truth, justice, accountability, and respect for the law and the people of a nation.

He questioned authority but wore a variety of uniforms to defend freedom and liberty. As a military officer, he demonstrated his commitment to serve with humility, kindness, and compassion –– characteristics of the best members of the military or in law enforcement.

Orwell’s gift for self-reflection is clear in two other essays, “A Hanging” and “Shooting an Elephant.” In A Hanging, Orwell witnesses in stunning detail the hanging of a prisoner and considers the reality of purposefully ending another human’s life. In Shooting an Elephant, he reflects on his time as a police officer serving in then-Burma, where the local population, even the Buddhist priests, openly rejected his presence.

“In Moulmein, in Lower Burma, I was hated by large numbers of people –– the only time in my life that I have been important enough for this to happen to me,” he writes. He was openly jeered, mocked, and disrespected, much like ICE and Border Patrol agents are treated today in American cities.

Baited and Hated

“As a police officer I was an obvious target and was baited whenever it seemed safe to do so,” Orwell writes.

“All this was perplexing and upsetting. For at that time I had already made up my mind that imperialism was an evil thing and the sooner I chucked up my job and got out of it the better. Theoretically –– and secretly, of course  –– I was all for the Burmese and all against their oppressors, the British. As for the job I was doing, I hated it more bitterly than I can perhaps make clear. In a job like that you see the dirty work of Empire at close quarters.

The wretched prisoners huddling in the stinking cages of the lock-ups, the grey, cowed faces of the long-term convicts, the scarred buttocks of the men who had been flogged with bamboos—all these oppressed me with an intolerable sense of guilt. But I could get nothing into perspective. I was young and ill-educated and I had had to think out my problems in the utter silence that is imposed on every Englishman in the East. I did not even know that the British Empire is dying, still less did I know that it is a great deal better than the younger empires that are going to supplant it.

All I knew was that I was stuck between my hatred of the empire I served and my rage against the evil-spirited little beasts who tried to make my job impossible.”

Orwell opposed the monarchy but later came to respect figurehead leaders as a control –– denying power from runaway politicians who would subvert the people’s will in a democracy. He would most certainly applaud calls for accountability and justice as relates to the "Epstein Class."

What would he say about the arrest today of Britain’s former Prince Andrew? 

Andrew, who is accused of passing confidential information to convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein,  is a Royal Navy veteran who served in the Falklands. (He is brother to King Charles III and the youngest son of a Royal Navy hero, Prince Phillip, who fought in World War II and was present for Japan’s surrender in Tokyo Bay aboard USS Missouri (BB-63).)

Although Orwell did not serve in the Royal Navy, he saw firsthand the differences between the army and the sea services. Hence, his comment that there are no naval powers with dictatorships –– true at least during the middle of the last century.

Orwell lived in a time of great disparity between the haves and have-nots, with poor people drawn into the lower ranks of military service. His warnings about over-militarized autocracy as well as the effects of income inequality resonate with us today, nearly a century later. [More about that in the next review.]

The essays cited here are found in “George Orwell: Facing Unpleasant Facts –– Narrative Essays,” compiled with an introduction by George Packer (Harcourt Books, 2008).

Military Role in Fascism ‘Prequel’

Review by Bill Doughty––

It wasn’t until Imperial Japan attacked Pearl Harbor and Germany declared war on the United States in December 1945, that the burning embers of fascism dimmed and hot coals of active antisemitism, Christian nationalism, and Nazi support –– even in the U.S. Congress –– lost their glow.

But the fire never completely went cold.

Prior to World War II and even after, brave Americans sought to root out the supporters of fascism who went so far as to try to recruit members of the military as well as military veterans to their cause. One fighter of domestic fascism was a WWI veteran named Leon Lewis. 

Lewis sought to uncover a conspiracy of violent extremism targeting Jewish Americans and institutions. It’s one of the stories recounted in “Prequel: An American Fight Against Fascism” by Rachel Maddow (Crow, Penguin Random House, 2023).

“What Leon Lewis decided to do was something incredible. And incredibly dangerous. He went out and recruited a small group of men, picked from the exact same pool the Nazis were after –– disgruntled non-Jewish American veterans of the recent war [World War I],” Maddow writes.

“But the Lewis operation did more than simply investigate and report. Before long, Lewis and his team scuttled a plot by U.S. Marines to sell guns and ammunition to the American fascists. Lewis and his underground team could not be credited in public for their part in this operation, but it did earn them the enduring and crucial admiration of high-ranking naval intelligence officers. They also exposed an elaborate inside-job scheme to take control of U.S. military armories on the West Coast. That plan was run by Dietrich Gefken, a German national who had been one of the early organizers of Hitler’s Brownshirts in Munich. After joining the California National Guard and inventorying the cache of rifles, machine guns, and coastal artillery pieces on hand at the San Francisco armory, Gefken had drawn up ‘the Armory plans, floor plans, location of ammunition and lockers and rifles, the list of addresses of the officers and all that was needed to take over the Armory on a given notice.’ Lewis’s spies handed over their evidence of Gefken’s plot to military intelligence officials, who shut it down.”

How Naval intelligence officers at the Navy base in San Diego helped bring the wider plot to light is almost an aside, but the story should be of great interest to military readers.

On the East Coast, more than 20,000 people attended an antisemitic pro-Nazi rally at Madison Square Garden in 1939. One of the banners visible in the above photo reads, "Stop Jewish Domination of Christian America." The rally was dubbed a patriotic pro-American event tied, without irony, to George Washington’s birthday. [General/President Washington rejected calls from supporters to become dictator of the young United States.]

How could the rising flames of fascism in the United States in the 1930s be forgotten in time? In interviews promoting “Prequel,” Maddow notes how the bigger story of the war in Europe (and the Pacific) eclipsed the story of homegrown fascism and Nazism and the quiet patriots who battled the threat to democracy here.

Brave and truly patriotic men such as Lewis, O. John Rogge, Dillard Stokes, Henry Hoke, Eric Sevareid, Drew Pearson, and William Power Maloney stood up and spoke out against antisemitism and against indifference and obstruction by the Truman Administration, as demonstrated by Attorney General Francis Biddle and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.

Federal prosecutor Rogge

“The plain truth is that the FBI was missing in action as fascism and Nazism took root and grew  in the United States in the mid-1930s,” Maddow notes.

Despite having the rug pulled out from under them in their prosecution of the fascists, both Maloney and Rogge continued with honor, courage, and commitment to uncover and report domestic enemies and violent extremists.

“Maloney and his investigators had discovered the double helix of the violent, Nazi-supporting, and Nazi-supported threat in the United States; it was part foreign and part domestic, part propaganda and part armed paramilitary movement.” He had led the investigation into Nazi propagandists using frank privileges at taxpayers’ expense. After federal service, he continued a career as a colorful and successful prosecutor.

“Rogge’s new charging document, like Maloney’s, alleged violations of the Smith Act –– an effort to demoralize America’s armed forces. But Rogge had sharpened the case, alleging targeted effort by the defendants to recruit National Guardsmen, reservists, and even active-duty U.S. troops into these ultra-right groups, where they could use their military skills, connections, and access to weapons to help arm and train paramilitary fascists for the overthrow of the U.S. government.”

Rogge uncovered evidence against American fascists and Nazi-supporters when he provided support to the Nuremberg trials after the war.

Men of character like Lewis, Rogge, Stokes, Hoke and others were seemingly outnumbered by questionable characters –– men (and some women) who placed greed, power, and religion above the Constitution, people like:

• George Deatherage: “He saw himself a red-blooded, real-American patriot, a dedicated Christian, a fierce protector of (white) Western civilization.”
• Huey Long: This Louisiana politician was an early version of the charismatic narcissistic populist and would-be dictator who formed his own militia and embraced violence against his detractors.
• Father Charles Coughlin: The Rush Limbaugh or Alex Jones of his generation, he was a Catholic priest with a wildly popular radio show who called for violence against “tyrants” after naming FDR and jews as tyrants.
• John Cassidy: He was a self-described "Christian martyr" who wanted to become the "American Fuhrer."
• Senator Ernest Lundeen (R) of Minnesota: Was as corrupt as they come, even taking payroll kickbacks from his own staff, instrumental in promoting support for Hitler in America. Maddow’s description of his death in a suspicious plane crash is as graphic and horrible as can be imagined. Readers may want to look away.
• George Sylvester Viereck: The Nazi agent. He was convicted in June 1943 for violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act. While he was in jail, Viereck's eldest son and namesake, a corporal in the U.S. Army, fought and died for the Allies in Italy.
• Major General George Van Horn Moseley: He was pro-gun but against FDR and anti-redistribution of wealth; he called for the sterilization of any jews who immigrated to the United States.
• Senator Robert Rice Reynolds (D) of North Carolina: He wanted to build a wall around the entire United States, in part to keep out Jews.
• Representative Hamilton Fish (R) of New York: He supported Hitler’s Germany and “was hopeful that tensions over Germany’s designs on Poland could be resolved peacefully, and that Germany’s claims were ‘just.’” His calls: “AWAKE CHRISTIAN AMERICA” and “LET’S SAVE U.S. FOR US.”
• Senator William “Wild Bill” Langer (R) of North Dakota: As governor he was charged, convicted, and sentenced to 18 months in prison, but who declared martial law and tried to declare North Dakota’s independence from the United States. As senator, he sabotaged the investigation of rising fascism.
• Senator Burton K. Wheeler (D) of Montana: an isolationist and propagandist for Germany who was eventually accused of treason. He attempted to use his position in Congress to influence the military, especially the Lend-Lease Act, and prevent America’s support to Britain in WWII.
• Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh: Both were champions of Adolf Hitler and vice versa. Lindbergh zeig heiled at an America First rally with Wheeler. Ford was lauded by Adolf Hitler, who kept a photo of the white Christian nationalist CEO in his office.

America Firsters Wheeler and Lindbergh

There were many more who sought to weaken the Constitution and democracy in favor of autocracy and theocracy.

Expressions of outright antisemitism and fascism by elected officials led to plots of violence on the home front.

Groups such as the “Christian Front” and “Country Gentlemen” planned an armed insurrection, including bombings of Jewish and Leftist establishments as well as newspaper offices. Their hope was similar to Timothy McVeigh’s goal –– to start a race war that would bring down the federal government.

“It was what we’d call today an ‘accelerationist’ strategy,” Maddow explains.

“Much as white supremacists hope terroristic, spectacular, cruel acts toward racial minorities will provoke retaliation and reprisal to touch off a wholesale race war that they are sure they will win, the Christian Fronters believed American could easily be tipped into a war against Jews and communists in which they themselves not only would end up on the winning side, but would be hailed as a heroic vanguard.

“George Van Horn Moseley’s name kept coming up in planning meetings for the attack, because they were still counting on the general to take the reins as America’s new military dictator after the coup was complete.”

There are numerous parallels from the 1930s and ‘40s that continue to smolder: the coup attempt of January 6, other acts of violent extremism in the name of the former President (who calls opponents “vermin” that poison the “blood” of America), and Trump’s desire to call for the Insurrection Act in order to use the military against U.S. citizens in violation of posse comitatus.

Germany justified war in Europe based on grievances and a Big Lie about Jews. Putin did the same thing. And Trump builds his power and funding on perceived grievances and the Big Lie of a stolen election. It is no accident that Trump launched his current presidential campaign at Waco, Texas, on the 30th anniversary of the Branch Davidian tragedy, which was the basis for Timothy McVeigh's grievances.

There are other parallels and similarities linking past and present. Accusers and their two dozen or more sympathizers in Congress chose to investigate the investigators. They called for President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s impeachment based on conspiracies and conjecture without evidence. They used various tactics to disrupt and delay justice in the courts. And they attacked the free press.

The propagandists supported Germany’s efforts to divide American citizens: “A partisan, bickering, demoralized America, the Nazis believed, would be incapable of mounting a successful war effort in Europe.”

Fascists and fundamentalists –– past and present –– tried to recruit military service members and veterans. Eighty and ninety years ago a disproportionate number of law enforcement (“law and ORDER”) personnel supported fascists. Meanwhile, Hollywood –– led by MGM –– and the mainstream media –– led by the Washington Post –– shined a light on the lawbreakers and seditionists. When caught up in the scandal, perpetrators tried to burn evidence, (albeit not in a White House fireplace).

In 1942, federal prosecutors indicted 28 people and charged them (almost RICO-style) with sedition with “intent to interfere with, impair, and influence the loyalty, morale, and discipline of the military and naval forces of the United States.” Prosecutors received hate mail and death threats.

Greedy and self-serving politicians stoked conspiracies and fears to hold on to power, especially fear of immigrants, communists, socialists, and Jewish people. Father Coughlin and others attempted to form a third party of Christian nationalists to compete against President Roosevelt, claiming FDR was a Jew.

But there could be signs of hope: The election of Nov. 7, 1944 proved the strength of democracy over the glowing coals of fascism, when FDR won a landslide victory. “The president who had been leading the country in the war against the Nazis, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, won an unprecedented fourth term, with 432 electoral votes to Thomas E. Dewey’s 99,” Maddow writes. “Roosevelt’s Democrats gained twenty-two seats in the House and protected their whopping nineteen-vote cushion in the Senate.”

Rachel Maddow speaks with Lt. Col. Andy Gerlach of the South Dakota Army National Guard in Afghanistan in July 2010. (Sgt. Rebecca Linder)

Maddow is also author of “Bagman” and “Drift.” She is a big supporter of military service members, veterans, and the Constitution. She bemoans the gap between civilians and their military, and she calls for accountability, transparency, and maximal diplomacy before American men and women are sent into war.

Both the Prequel book and preceding Ultra podcast feature Maddow’s storytelling at its best, but the book may better. While the serialized Prequel podcast broke ground on the compelling story of the threat to democracy from within, the book really fleshes out the story as only a book can, complete with extensive notes, a helpful index, compelling photos, and detail we can read and will want to re-read. This is a book that can help every American understand the threat of the fires of antisemitism, fascism, and authoritarianism.

In 2023 and 2024 the embers are glowing brighter.