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Echoes of dark past

Donald Trump’s proposals to bar any Muslim (including U.S. citizens) from entering the country, requiring Muslim citizens to register in a U.S. database and having them tracked, is indeed “without parallel in recent political history (Dec. 8 article “Trump’s anti-Muslim talk fits with rest of campaign”) by a candidate of Trump’s prominence.

However, there is a fairly recent equivalent to the path he espouses, that being the Nuremberg Laws passed in 1930s Germany by a prominent politician. These laws also targeted a religious minority.

Following this line of thinking, it won’t be long before Trump will want to bar Muslims from various occupations, restrict them to designated areas of our cities and perhaps require them to wear a yellow crescent on their clothing for ease of identification by their fellow citizens.

Indeed, as philosopher George Santayana stated, “Those who don’t remember history are condemned to repeat it.”

Kirk Jackson

Spokane

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