Danger in Trump rantings

I am disgusted by Donald Trump’s latest rantings, and I find a chilling foreboding in the loudly enthusiastic response of his followers.

His apparent delight in describing punishments he would inflict on whomever he deemed an enemy, his fantasy of a secure country surrounded by an insurmountable wall, his belief in his supreme authority to decide who has rights and who does not — all the hyperbole without substance echoes something from the pages of our history books. Another figure once rose up in a land struggling in the aftermath of war, a place of fear — fear of poverty, of hunger, of outsiders. He won over the masses because he understood what they wanted to hear.

“The broad masses are more amenable to the appeal of rhetoric than any other force.” — Adolf Hitler

This story was originally published March 1, 2016 at 7:11 PM with the headline "Danger in Trump rantings."