The Peripatetic Preacher The Protocols of the Elders of Trump

In 1903 a scurrilous pamphlet was published in Russian, “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” purporting to be a much older document describing the supposed plot hatched by unnamed powerful Jews for world domination. Though the essay was revealed as a lie by The London Times in 1921 and the Frankfurter Zeitung in Germany in 1924, and though Henry Ford, a notorious anti-Semite, paid for 500,000 copies of this rag to be distributed in the US during the 1920’s, it continued to pop up in many countries, most notably in Nazi Germany that used its absurd and noxious untruths to support their belief that Jews were in reality behind all the world’s evils and thus needed extermination. As all know too well, these ridiculous ideas found their monstrous fulfillment in places like Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen, among other spots of mass murder. Thus did a complete fabrication become the origin of unspeakable acts against an entire group of humans.

We 21st century US Americans may be witnessing a similar spread of lies and falsehoods that might well become the source of dangerous and palpable acts of violence against groups of people who refuse to be taken in by the absurdities of the moment. After Donald Trump’s proven defeat at the polls by Joe Biden, and after numerous recounts in several states, after all 50 states have affirmed the accuracy of their counts on the 6 days prior to the selection of the electoral delegates, as required by law, after any number of election officials of both parties have determined the election to be free and fair, judged by one Republican official to be “the fairest election in the history of the country,” on Dec.9, the Attorney General of the State of Texas, Ken Paxton, filed a legal brief with the Supreme Court of the US to overturn the results of this election in six states, thus disenfranchising millions of voters, and tossing aside ballots cast fairly and honestly by those same millions. Paxton’s brief was joined in “amicus” briefs by 20 other states’ Attorneys General, and, yes, by the president of the US himself, that same Donald J. Trump. Like the authors of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Paxton and his fellow cabalists are in the process of assaulting and undermining the very heart of our democracy in their absurd attempt to steal a second term for the losing candidate. On Dec.14, the Electoral College will meet to finalize their delegate totals, and Biden’s 302 delegate total, far in excess of the 270 needed for victory, will be announced. In addition, Biden won the popular vote by just over 7 million, a huge margin to be sure. In every way, Donald Trump will not have a second term. Yet, his “elders” are still at it, beating on the doors of the Supreme Court to plead their specious case for a Trump victory.

On what do they base that case? Their “arguments,” if such a lofty term may be debased to include their claims, boil down to this: Biden just could not have won! After all, at midnight or so on election night, Nov.3, Trump was well ahead of his challenger in many of those states he needed to win in order to secure his win. And if the election had ended then, Trump would indeed have been reelected. However, in the months prior to the election, Trump had said over and over that “mail-in ballots were subject to fraud” (he himself had voted by mail many times as has the American military for decades); as a result, a great majority of his Republican supporters voted in person, while a large majority of Biden followers voted by mail, attempting thereby to remain safe during the COVID-19 pandemic. In several states, Pennsylvania for example, by law mail-in ballots could not be counted until the polls closed on election day. Thus, those ballots cast on the day of the election were counted first, while the mail-in ballots were counted later. As was predicted by numerous commentators, the public could readily expect that the president would take an early lead in many places, but when the mail-in ballots were counted, Biden could be expected to catch up and perhaps take a lead. That is exactly what happened in the so-called “battleground” states: Michigan, Wisconsin, Nevada, Arizona, Pennsylvania, Georgia. Biden won each of those after falling behind early.

The “elders” add the absurd and incorrect “argument” that no candidate has ever been elected who lost both Ohio and Florida. In1960, John Kennedy lost both, yet was elected. Another claim is that in so-called “bell weather counties,” counties that in the past have often determined elections one way or another; Trump won those, and Biden did poorly. And one must say, “So what?” Past voter actions hardly determine for all time what happens in a subsequent election. Georgia was once part of the “solid south,” but migration patterns have changed the state significantly. Arizona was for decades a reliable Republican stronghold, but not any more. Biden’s win there was not a surprise for anyone who has looked carefully at the actual population of that state. Here is a fact to contemplate; early voter polls suggest that about 32% of voters in the country voted for Biden because they simply wanted Trump to be gone. That is nearly 1/3 of the electorate. Has any president seeking a second term ever had such a high disapproval rate? Not in anyone’s memory.

These claims are hardly legal ones; they are partisan impressions, whining expectations, spurious assertions. Finally, they are deceptions, pure and simple, dressed up as truths that all point to massive fraud and electoral shenanigans on a huge scale. There is exactly no proof of that, and these “elders” can offer, and have offered, none. But like the anti-Semitic purveyors of the “Protocols,” their ridiculous assertions may have numerous deleterious effects.

Polls have suggested that as many as 70% of Republicans believe that the presidential election was “rigged” or was rife with fraud. If that is so, and even if that figure be somewhat inflated, it means that a significant part of the nation no longer trusts the most basic action that we are asked to do: vote fairly, securely, and privately. If they imagine that US America now resembles some kind of banana republic, where voter fraud is a given, and where dictators stage election theater periodically to offer a semblance of democratic action, then we as a nation are in serious trouble. The Bible said long ago, “the truth will make you free,” and if that is so, then the opposite may well be just as true: a lie will put you in chains.

I hope sincerely that the Supreme Court will take one look at Paxton’s brief, and laugh him right out of the court. This is not legal reasoning, but slipshod foolishness, not worth the trees that were pulped to make the paper on which it is written. I also sincerely hope that Senator Ted Cruz of that same Texas will never get the opportunity to make an oral argument in defense of Paxton’s nonsense, though he has agreed to do so, according to reports. Perhaps, deep down, Cruz too hopes it does not come to that; it may be enough for him to portray himself a Trump loyalist now, since that may help him in some later run for the presidency, as he did, and failed in, not so long ago. This whole sham is a repeat of the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” coughed up by monsters over 100 years ago. May it have no similar long-term effects. May it die quickly and quietly. Yet, all of us must stay vigilant, for such “Protocols” have a way of appearing again and again with different targets yet similar means, both ridiculous and dangerous.

(Images from Wikimedia Commons)