ROGER SIMON: Should the Real ‘Resistance’ Start Now?

Literally within minutes of the 2016 election of Donald J. Trump, his opponents took to the streets declaring themselves “The Resistance.”

Some of us, myself included, considered that an act of what the “woke” like to call “cultural appropriation,” indeed an extreme—I would even say obscene—one.

CA is a term, many will recall, applied to those insensitive souls who allegedly steal from another group for their own gain or amusement, as in fraternity boys donning sombreros and drinking margaritas for Cinco de Mayo.

What was appropriated back in 2016 was something quite serious—“La Résistance”—the clandestine and highly-dangerous underground movement to subvert Nazi Germany’s control of France during the Second World War.

Although an astonishing number of younger Americans have little or no knowledge of the Holocaust, I would imagine most readers of this outlet realize that Germany’s takeover with the Vichy government’s compliance resulted in such events as the notorious July 1942 night time roundup in suburban Paris of 7000 Jews, including 4000 children, before they were shipped off for extermination.

Comparing that to the election of Donald Trump really is obscene, and also wildly anti-Semitic, unless, of course, you think saying nasty things about your opponents on Twitter is the equivalent of Auschwitz.

Many of our supposedly “progressive” friends evidently did, overwhelmed by a delusional case of moral narcissism all out of proportion to reality, allowing them to “act out” in the most self-aggrandizing manner, identifying with the true heroes of “La Résistance” when there was no discernible threat to them whatsoever.

Indeed, what actually happened to the daily lives of our liberal friends during the Trump administration was next to nothing.

Until COVID came along, they got to enjoy the lowest unemployment virtually ever, including minorities, with actual wages going up for the lower classes for the first time in years, a booming stock market, lower gas prices through energy independence, peace in the Middle East and peace in general.

They weren’t censored in any way and maintained control of most of the media, entertainment, and the schools throughout.

Yet still they raged.

But to continue with the French analogy, what’s going on today is “toute autre chose,” entirely different.

The now victorious left is attempting to erase the right, to drive it out of existence forever.

We see signs of this everywhere, from the clearly fascistic actions of Big Tech in destroying upstart Parler on grounds of hosting some violent posts (something they themselves have been doing for years) to ridiculous virtue signaling like Macaulay Culkin signing on for having Donald Trump’s cameo removed from “Home Alone 2.”

Communist Chinese-style “social credit” controls are being instituted across our economy with the likes of Master Card, PayPal and Stripe canceling conservative groups that protested the election and automated business email systems doing the same.

In many ways this is more effective and dangerous than the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution because we are so reliant on technology now and because it is so sub rosa. No need for prancing around in dunce caps. An individuals’ access to his or her daily needs can be turned off with the click of an invisible mouse.

American versions of “Good Germans” are coming out of the woodwork as many are beginning to live in fear of what this could do to their lives. Others have been asked to recant or soon will be.

The traditional Republican Party politicians have been of little help, disconnected, as many, maybe most, are from their rank-and-file.

So is this time for a new, and more justified, “Resistance”?

As Caroline Glick writes, Biden is continuing the left’s shopworn tradition of comparing conservative Republicans to National Socialists: Goebbels and the New American Terror.

What purpose did it serve for President-elect Joe Biden to liken Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Josh Hawley (R-MO) to Adolf Hitler’s top propagandist Joseph Goebbels?

In response to a question about the two Republican lawmakers following remarks on January 8, Biden said, “I was being reminded by a friend of mine…when we’re told [about] Goebbels and the great lie, you keep repeating the lie, repeating the lie.”

Although Biden’s comparison was imperfectly stated, it was clear enough to follow. He was saying that the lawmakers’ efforts to challenge the Electoral College votes from disputed states was a Nazi-like effort.

By speaking this way, Biden did many things at once. First, he whitewashed Goebbels’ barbaric crimes. Goebbels was the chief architect of totalitarianism in Nazi Germany and one of the lead architects of the Holocaust.

In his literary warning about the fragility of freedom and the allure of totalitarianism, 1984, George Orwell demonstrated that total control over a society is achieved through total control over the information its members can see.

Goebbels implemented this in Nazi Germany. As Hitler’s propagandist, Goebbels exerted total control over information. He ensured that Germans would view Hitler as their infallible savior. He conditioned them to view Jews as subhuman vermin, to be exterminated like cockroaches. And he made them believe that all Germans who didn’t accept what they were told were enemies of the people.

Goebbels achieved all of these things by blocking public access to accurate information while inundating the Germans with images and words that repeated and amplified his monstrous lies. Goebbels’ success in controlling information was the necessary precondition for all he and his comrades unleashed on Jews, and on humanity as a whole.

The second thing Biden did by comparing Hawley and Cruz to Goebbels was to whitewash the unspeakable crimes of Nazi Germany. After all, if merely questioning certain election returns is the moral equivalent of Goebbels’ “Big Lie,” then the Big Lie was actually no big deal.

The third thing Biden did by comparing Hawley and Cruz to Goebbels was set them up for what Orwell referred to as “un-personing”—or in today’s culture, “canceling.”

Obviously, if Cruz and Hawley are Goebbels, then all right-thinking people must work to silence them and remove them from positions of influence in the Senate and larger society.

As if on cue, shortly after Biden said what he did, Senate Democrats began debating whether to censure the lawmakers. Senate Republicans, for their part, began discussing the possibility of denying the two members cherished committee assignments. According to Senate officials, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is leaning toward denying the two their subcommittee chairmanships—thereby removing them from the line of seniority.

As Glick writes, “A sense of foreboding and fear now grips millions of Americans—and, indeed, conservatives worldwide. Unless something is done quickly by those who wield power to restore freedom, it is impossible to see a happy end to this story.” #Unity!