The true picture of totalitarianism

It is with disgust that I read a recent letter from David Clark. He attempts to link the Democratic Party to a 60-year-old “Communist Manifesto”. Five minutes of research to find the pages from the Congressional Record showed that the document was read into the record by A. S. Herlong Jr. with the unanimous consent of both Democrats and Republicans at the request of an anti-communist constituent. The clear purpose was to show the dangers of communism.

Whoever dug this up and started spreading it with the incorrect message that it is somehow associated with the goals of the Democratic Party clearly did it in bad faith. Those who continue to spread it either do so out of gullibility or equally bad faith.

Actually much, but not all of this old communist manifesto parallels the goals of the very real and current Project 2025. It seems that would be autocrats have much in common. This document replaces communism with Christian Nationalism. Project 2025 is a roughly 1000-page document that reverses protections for LGBTQ+ people and for health care and bodily autonomy for women with a proposal not only to outlaw abortions but to track pregnancies. It proposes reducing or eliminating health and welfare benefits for low-income families. The document calls for “reform” of Medicare and Social Security which in conservative speak has always meant cutting benefits to people by increasing corporate control and profits.

Of interest in the wake of Hurricane Helene, it proposes to dismantle NOAA which tracks climate change as well as producing the data on which weather forecasts, including hurricane warning are based. In addition, it proposes doing away with FEMA returning response to emergencies to the state and local level.

Project 2025 is a precursor to a kleptocratic autocracy: think Russia under Putin.

Jacqueline Buehring

Naperville