Why Today I’m Remembering The World War We Fought Against A Fascist Nazi Madman

Memorial Day: It’s a day of BBQs and dipping your toe in the not-quite-warm-enough pool, and looking around to see everything busting out in glorious technicolor. It’s also the day when  we pause to remember— and honor- those of our parents and grandparents who fought wars to protect the freedoms enshrined in our democracy.

In the U.K. it’s a day in November, called Remembrance Sunday. In Warsaw, Poland, Poles commemorate the heroes of the 1944 Warsaw Rising  on August 1 at 5p.m. when everyone and everything in the city comes to a total standstill for one minute.

My mother, Alicja Ewa was part of that greatest rebellion against the Nazi occupation of her city. My father, Henryk, fought in a Polish regiment, and then subsequently with the Allied Forces in Europe.

On days like these I also remember Grazyna and Gucio, my American “Mom and Dad” who “adopted” me when I first landed in New York in 1969. Grazyna was in the Warsaw Rising fighting in the same Home Army ranks as my mother. Gucio met my father after the Normandy invasion when they were both fighting in Holland and France assigned to Polish regiments in the British Army.

My British bestie’s father, George, also fought in Europe with the British Army. All of them were ready to shed blood and sacrifice their lives to defeat Adolf Hitler, who rose to power as a fascist nazi scumbag in his own country long before sending his goose-stepping troops to march across Europe.

Atrocities in Nazi Germany

So, why not remind ourselves today of some of the atrocities perpetrated by Hitler in Nazi Germany and see if there is, maybe, some, any  resemblance to what’s going on right here on our home turf today?

In 1933, Nazi-dominated student groups carried out public burnings of books which had been banned as “un-German.” Works of prominent Jewish, liberal, and leftist writers ended up in the bonfires.

Jews were the main target of Hitler’s racism and persecution. Boycotts of Jewish doctors, lawyers and shops began in 1933. In 1935, their citizenship was removed including their right to vote. On one night (Kristallnacht) of vandalism and violence in November 1938, 91 Jews were murdered, hundreds of thousands were arrested and sent to concentration camps, and hundreds of synagogues were destroyed. Jewish stores were ransacked and looted.

Hitler’s hatred and persecution of “the other” extended to gay men and transpeople. Between 1937 and 1939 90,000 men were arrested for homosexual activity. Between five and fifteen thousand were imprisoned in concentration camps.

The Nazi regime also controlled access to abortion. Its Lebensborn program was established to propagate the blond-haired, blue-eyed, master Aryan race by forcing births on “racially-pure” German women. As of 1943, any doctor, nurse or midwife performing or aiding in an abortion on a German woman could be sentenced to death.

You may see where I’m going with this. Or maybe not if you haven’t spent recent time in Florida, like I’ve done, and you don’t subscribe to every major Florida newspaper, like I do. So, let me briefly establish the credentials of the sunshine state’s governor, Ron DeSantis who last week officially launched his run for president of the U.S.

Banning books?  ✅

Happening in Florida right now. It’s a result of DeSantis’s anti-woke crackdown forbidding discussion of sexual identity, gender orientation and critical race theory in schools through 12th grade, and even in colleges and universities. Books associated with these topics, authored by black and LGBTQ writers  are being removed from library shelves throughout the state. DeSantis will tell you that news items about book banning are a hoax, but his Parental Rights in Education (aka Don’t Say Gay) Act allows parents to become putrid posses of censorship by simply objecting to any book on a school’s library shelf.

Persecution of “the other?”  ✅

Or as the NAACP put it, creating an “openly  hostile” environment for non-white and LGBTQ+ individuals. Happening in Florida right now to such an extent that the NAACP has issued a travel advisory about visiting the sunshine state. Recently enacted laws ban drag shows in the state and, as mentioned above, target the LGBTQ community. Additionally, new immigration laws pushed for and executed by Governor Ron are all about hounding undocumented, mostly Latino, workers out of the state.

These laws will impose penalties on employers who don’t verify the legal status of his/her employees; and make it a felony for  any individual or group to transport, or provide shelter to an undocumented worker in Florida. Hospitals and emergency rooms must ask about and note for state officials the legal status of every patient seeking treatment.

DeSantis has also interjected himself into redistricting in his state, that is the re-drawing of congressional district maps  — normally the prerogative  of the state legislature. Last year, he disagreed with a redistricting map brought to him by legislators, so he used his own pen to alter it. He eliminated at least two districts which had consistently elected  Black democrats and created four additional Republican-leaning seats.

His laws of exclusion seem already to be contributing to an atmosphere of hate and vindictiveness in the state.  Earlier this year, Florida TV stations broadcast  how Jewish synagogue goers were harassed by anti-semitic thugs in a parking lot as they exited services.  Moreover, incidents of violence –and possibly death– stemming from such racially charged events will inevitably rise given DeSantis’s new concealed carry law where any racist/anti-semite can conceal and carry a firearm on his person without a permit.

Most restrictive abortion ban in the country? ✅

DeSantis signed a six-week abortion ban into law about six weeks ago.  There are exceptions for rape and incest, but only if the girl/woman provides proof that she sought a restraining order or filed a police report about the rape. Denying women the freedom to make decisions about their own bodies for any reason whatsoever is denying them control over their lives and destinies, and simply turning them into incubators for some dystopian universe. Lebensborn, anyone???

Rule of Law? Not For Governor Ron

Oh, and as for the rule of law? Well, that only apparently works for DeSantis if the law is decided in his favor or in the favor of his own kind. When Trump was indicted for his hush money payments to adult film actress, Stormy Daniels, DeSantis declared that, as governor of the state in which Trump was residing, he would not aid in the extradition of the former president. He called the charges — which had not been specified at the time–a “weaponization of the legal system” because they were brought by a Soros-funded District Attorney in Manhattan.

Again, without even knowing the full facts of the killing of a mentally ill black man on a New York City subway, DeSantis applauded Daniel Penny, the Marine accused of the murder, as a Good Samaritan!

He’s also said that, if elected president, he will consider — on the first day he takes office –pardoning some of the Jan 6 convicted offenders involved in the insurrection at the US Capitol. Everyone will surely recall that these offenders were protesting the election results that declared Trump the loser in 2020. Presumably then, DeSantis would be acting on his belief that the election was illegitimate and therefore that the protestors were right to attack the Capitol building. It also raises the question of whether he would accept the 2024 election results if he was the Republican nominee and lost his bid for the White House?

Changing Laws

We don’t have to wait to see any authoritarian power grab, however.  Governor Ron is already an autocrat-in-the-making in his own state. In addition to all the laws he’s enacted restricting a vast array of freedoms mentioned above, he’s pressed for and gotten changes in Florida laws he simply didn’t like.

He signed off on a bill which his fawning, supermajority Republican legislature passed that changed the rule stating that he must resign as governor if he is running for another office. He’s  banned transparency in government, signing off on a law prohibiting the divulging of information about his travel plans (both future and past) and who is paying/providing for his travel and who is signing in as a guest into the governor’s mansion.

And what gives a state official a more authoritarian look than getting the state legislature to pass a super-generous budget for the expansion of the  Florida state guard. Huh? What? What’s a state guard? Who knows? Hitler had his stormtroopers; now DeSantis has his own state law enforcement entity, too.

So, when you see DeSantis campaigning across the country, and hear him urging Americans to vote for him so he can “make America Florida,” you’ll  realize exactly what that means.  Then, hopefully you’ll say: dear god, no. We fought a war against fascism almost 100 years ago. And we won. We don’t want to fight a war like that, again. Ever. Especially not on our home turf. 

Happy Memorial Day.