Mark Drnek was, until January 1, Mayor of Oneonta, and owns a business that welcomed our son as an intern in high school, and as an employee afterwards. Our son has moved on, but Mark still speaks well of him.
Mark spoke at the
rally and march in Cooperstown on Saturday. I thought that what he said was important enough to reprint here, and maybe spread around a little.
On behalf of everyone who shares our American values and subscribes to the notion that all men and women are created equal, and due the respect that we would expect for ourselves…
Thank you for being here today.
Thank you for standing up for what’s right.
There has never been an arc taken to dictatorship that has been so transparent or so easily compared to historical precedent as this. And there can be no mistake… Fascism is the path Donald Trump has chosen.
History is their enemy, and they can’t erase it. They’re trying. But they can’t succeed. And the parallels are clear. We’re on a trajectory that will carry us to a place that’s inescapably dark and a perversion of what it means to be an American.
This is not hyperbole.
We’re repeating history. We can see where this is going. We need to abort. We need to shut this down. Now.
In April 1933, Goering rebranded the Prussian Police and turned its focus to the suppression of political opposition. Just as Homeland Security and immigration and Customs Enforcement has been commandeered by the Trump administration, and specifically by the likes of Stephen Miller. Career servants have been pushed out or enlisted to actions they never signed up for. Whatever you may have considered ICE to be, that’s been irreparably corrupted.
ICE needs to be defunded. And disbanded. And our congress needs to rise to this occasion and show the backbone needed to meet this unprecedented challenge to the rule of law.
Trump is looking for the same excuse Hitler took to suspend civil liberties, make arrest without charge, sideline the courts, and label his perceived political opponents as “enemies of the state.” We’re doing our best not to give him the excuse, but guess what? He’s already doing that, and if that makes us enemies of the state… If that makes us enemies of Trump, and Vance, and Miller, and Noem, and Hegseth, and Patel…. I say that’s a badge of honor I’m proud to wear.
In 1934, Himmler seized control of the Gestapo and placed it under the SS. And shortly after, they passed this law:
“The orders and affairs of the Gestapo are not subject to review by the administrative courts.”
That’s chilling. No oversight, no legal appeal, and no accountability. It was the Gestapo that decided who was sent to concentration camps. In this moment, we have camps being constructed in America.
I know that this may seem hysterical, and beyond possibility in the America we grew up in. In the country we love. But… we are witnessing the violence, the abuse, and the murder of those exercising their constitutional rights. Bullies in masks and camouflage are terrorizing whole populations of Americans. It’s happening now. We are skidding down that bloody slope and there’s just one thing that can stop it.
We need courts and congress to act.
We need to shout it from the rooftops.
Defund ICE. Disband ICE. Defund ICE. Disband ICE (crowd joins chant).
Thanks, Mark. It's vital, I think, to understand how history works. There is very clear evidence now that history is rhyming.*
Pay attention.
* - "History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes." Mark Twain
