Roosevelt’s 100 days were an imaginative and improvised effort to restore confidence and put Americans back to work through government legislation. . . . Hitler’s 100 days were to consolidate power around his party, which then spoke for the nation at large. . . . Roosevelt spoke in an inclusive voice, especially when he addressed Americans in fireside chats; Hitler divided Germans into friends and foes, and promised a final reckoning with enemies. Hitler and his conservative allies wanted to smash the Weimar Republic, not save the fiscal or economic ship of state.
Like FDR and Hitler dealing with the horrors of the Great Depression, Donald Trump now also confronts a great crisis. FDR eased people’s fears, generally spoke the truth, acted with vigor, sought to cushion people from absolute economic calamity, sought advice from creative and varied sources, spoke with an “inclusive voice,” had good relations with the press, and came across on the radio as “patient, kind-hearted, and firm of purpose.” Hitler’s main concern, as Fritzsche tells us, was not improving the conditions of the German people, but strengthening his own power by dividing “Germans into friends and foes” (communists, Jews, defenders of the Weimar Republic, etc.). Which previous leader sounds the most like Trump?
To date, Trump has eased few people’s pandemic fears. Truth has long been an alien planet to him. Two recent articles, Frank Rich’s “Trump Lies His Way Through a Pandemic” and James Fallows’ “Trump Is Lying, Blatantly,”indicate that truth remains an alien concept to him.
He has not acted with vigor. Recent reports suggest an Obama-era National Security Council document intended as a pandemic response playbook has gone unread. Meanwhile, as Fallows stated on March 17, for weeks Trump had “been mocking the virus threat—at rallies, in tweets, and in press remarks. [“We have it totally under control,” he said during a Jan. 22 interview.”] But both yesterday and today, he’d suddenly shifted to warning that the public-health and economic problems were real, and would remain so for a long time.” Such shilly-shallying has impeded bold actions and created increasing anxiety. Rather than relying on creative and varied reliable sources, Trump, fearing independent thinkers, has surrounded himself with yes-men (few women) and is becoming increasingly impatient with such truth-tellers as Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984.
Unlike FDR, Trump has seldom spoken with an “inclusive voice” and has poor relations with reporters. During a March 20 press conference, he told Peter Alexander of NBC, “you’re a terrible reporter” and accused him, as well as NBC and Comcast, of sensationalism. He also lamented, as he often has, “fake news.” At a March 21st conference, after a reporter asked him about a Washington Post story criticizing him for insufficient action on the virus in January and February, he stated that “the Washington Post covers . . . me very inaccurately. . . I think it’s a disgrace.” Trump’s main form of communication, tweets, are divisive, rife with insults, and the opposite of FDR’s “patient, kind-hearted” fireside chats.
On March 21, Peter Baker in the New York Times wrote, “Mr. Trump’s performance on the national stage in recent weeks has put on display” such traits as his “profound need for personal praise, the propensity to blame others, the lack of human empathy, the penchant for rewriting history, the disregard for expertise, the distortion of facts, the impatience with scrutiny or criticism.” In the same paper, the following day, David Leonhardt’s “How Trump Is Worsening the Virus Now” appeared. And on March 25, a conservative contributor to The Atlantic, Peter Wehner, wrote one of the most insightful and damning critiques to date of Trump’s coronavirus-crisis failings.
A March 18-22 poll on Trump’s handling of the crisis reflected a deep divide on the question between Republicans and Democrats. On March 25th the Trump administration and the U. S. Senate agreed on a $2 trillion relief package, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi indicated the House of Representatives would soon add its approval. To what extent this package will help Trump’s popularity remains uncertain. Despite such uncertainties, however, Trump’s personality and actions heretofore in the present crises do not inspire confidence. In being narcissistic, primarily concerned with strengthening his own power, and in seeing the world through a we-vs-they lenses, Trump resembles Hitler more than FDR.
Walter G. Moss is a professor emeritus of history at Eastern Michigan University and a Contributing Editor of HNN. For a list of his recent books and online publications click here. His most recent book is In the Face of Fear: Laughing All the Way to Wisdom (2019), which treats humor from a historical perspective.
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This article was originally published at History News Network
Like FDR and Hitler dealing with the horrors of the Great Depression, Donald Trump now also confronts a great crisis. FDR eased people’s fears, generally spoke the truth, acted with vigor, sought to cushion people from absolute economic calamity, sought advice from creative and varied sources, spoke with an “inclusive voice,” had good relations with the press, and came across on the radio as “patient, kind-hearted, and firm of purpose.” Hitler’s main concern, as Fritzsche tells us, was not improving the conditions of the German people, but strengthening his own power by dividing “Germans into friends and foes” (communists, Jews, defenders of the Weimar Republic, etc.). Which previous leader sounds the most like Trump?
To date, Trump has eased few people’s pandemic fears. Truth has long been an alien planet to him. Two recent articles, Frank Rich’s “Trump Lies His Way Through a Pandemic” and James Fallows’ “Trump Is Lying, Blatantly,”indicate that truth remains an alien concept to him.
He has not acted with vigor. Recent reports suggest an Obama-era National Security Council document intended as a pandemic response playbook has gone unread. Meanwhile, as Fallows stated on March 17, for weeks Trump had “been mocking the virus threat—at rallies, in tweets, and in press remarks. [“We have it totally under control,” he said during a Jan. 22 interview.”] But both yesterday and today, he’d suddenly shifted to warning that the public-health and economic problems were real, and would remain so for a long time.” Such shilly-shallying has impeded bold actions and created increasing anxiety. Rather than relying on creative and varied reliable sources, Trump, fearing independent thinkers, has surrounded himself with yes-men (few women) and is becoming increasingly impatient with such truth-tellers as Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases since 1984.
Unlike FDR, Trump has seldom spoken with an “inclusive voice” and has poor relations with reporters. During a March 20 press conference, he told Peter Alexander of NBC, “you’re a terrible reporter” and accused him, as well as NBC and Comcast, of sensationalism. He also lamented, as he often has, “fake news.” At a March 21st conference, after a reporter asked him about a Washington Post story criticizing him for insufficient action on the virus in January and February, he stated that “the Washington Post covers . . . me very inaccurately. . . I think it’s a disgrace.” Trump’s main form of communication, tweets, are divisive, rife with insults, and the opposite of FDR’s “patient, kind-hearted” fireside chats.
On March 21, Peter Baker in the New York Times wrote, “Mr. Trump’s performance on the national stage in recent weeks has put on display” such traits as his “profound need for personal praise, the propensity to blame others, the lack of human empathy, the penchant for rewriting history, the disregard for expertise, the distortion of facts, the impatience with scrutiny or criticism.” In the same paper, the following day, David Leonhardt’s “How Trump Is Worsening the Virus Now” appeared. And on March 25, a conservative contributor to The Atlantic, Peter Wehner, wrote one of the most insightful and damning critiques to date of Trump’s coronavirus-crisis failings.
A March 18-22 poll on Trump’s handling of the crisis reflected a deep divide on the question between Republicans and Democrats. On March 25th the Trump administration and the U. S. Senate agreed on a $2 trillion relief package, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi indicated the House of Representatives would soon add its approval. To what extent this package will help Trump’s popularity remains uncertain. Despite such uncertainties, however, Trump’s personality and actions heretofore in the present crises do not inspire confidence. In being narcissistic, primarily concerned with strengthening his own power, and in seeing the world through a we-vs-they lenses, Trump resembles Hitler more than FDR.
Walter G. Moss is a professor emeritus of history at Eastern Michigan University and a Contributing Editor of HNN. For a list of his recent books and online publications click here. His most recent book is In the Face of Fear: Laughing All the Way to Wisdom (2019), which treats humor from a historical perspective.
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This article was originally published at History News Network
