"I only know I could never throw roses to Hitler. And I certainly could never sing for him."

[DemocratSinceBirth]

Jan Chamberlin
Yesterday at 2:41am ·
Dear Family and Friends,
This is the message I have sent to Choir:
Dear President Jarrett and Choir,
Today is my birthday. (Happy Birthday to you, happy birthday to you...........)
It is with a sad and heavy heart that I submit my resignation to you and to Choir. I’m am praying that Jesus will help me get through this email before I totally break down.
I thank you all for 5 very meaningful years. There are many memories and experiences which I will cherish and hold dear in my heart.
Since “the announcement”, I have spent several sleepless nights and days in turmoil and agony. I have reflected carefully on both sides of the issue, prayed a lot, talked with family and friends, and searched my soul.
I’ve tried to tell myself that by not going to the inauguration, that I would be able to stay in Choir for all the other good reasons.
I have highly valued the mission of the Choir to be good- will ambassadors for Christ, to share beautiful music and to give hope, inspiration, and comfort to others.
I’ve tried to tell myself that it will be alright and that I can continue in good conscience before God and man.
But it’s no use. I simply cannot continue with the recent turn of events. I could never look myself in the mirror again with self respect.
I love you all, and I know the goodness of your hearts, and your desire to go out there and show that we are politically neutral and share good will. That is the image Choir wishes to present and the message they desperately want to send.
I also know, looking from the outside in, it will appear that Choir is endorsing tyranny and facism by singing for this man.
And Choir’s wonderful image and networking will be severely damaged and that many good people throughout this land and throughout the world already do and will continue to feel betrayed. I believe hereafter our message will not be believed by many that have loved us and adored what we have stood for.
I know that I too feel betrayed.
Tyranny is now on our doorstep; it has been sneaking its way into our lives through stealth. Now it will burst into our homes through storm.
I hope that we and many others will work together with greater dilligence and awareness to calmly and bravely work together to defend our freedoms and our rights for our families, our friends, and our fellow citizens. I hope we can throw off the labels and really listen to each other with respect, love, compassion, and a true desire to bring our energies and souls together in solving the difficult problems that lie in our wake.
In the show Wicked, the Wizard makes a really interesting statement. He says “ I create conflict to stay in power.” This scenario can keep us perpetually distracted and at odds with each other and keep us from working together to solve important issues. This also allows those in office to do whatever they want to unchecked. I believe this has been done to us, both cunningly and intentionally. I believe we have a lot more in common than we have in difference, and if we will listen to each other, we can learn a great deal from one another.
And we can learn to work together to defend our freedoms with sensibility and integrity.
When I first auditioned and entered Choir, it was to follow deep personal impressions, and to honor my late father, who was among the best of men. Now I must leave Choir for the same reasons. My father ( who was an expert airforce bomber) hated tyranny and was extremely distraught over the holocaust. He and Mom both loved people greatly.
I have deep patriotic feelings for this country and for the freedoms of people everywhere throughout the world. I am troubled by the problems we face which seek to destroy our love for liberty and respect for humanity internationally.
History is repeating itself; the same tactics are being used by Hitler (identify a problem, finding a scapegoat target to blame, and stirring up people with a combination of fanaticism, false promises, and fear, and gathering the funding). I plead with everyone to go back and read the books we all know on these topics and review the films produced to help us learn from these gargantuan crimes so that we will not allow them to be repeated. Evil people prosper when good people stand by and do nothing.
We must continue our love and support for the refugees and the oppressed by fighting against these great evils.
For me, this is a HUGELY moral issue. “ as he died to make men holy, let us live to make free” ( The first time I heard this beautiful piece, I was 11 years old; my brother Jim was singing in Honor Choir. IT”S message sent inspirational electricity through my soul and penetrated every fiber of my being. THIS is Choir’s true message, and we don’t want it lost by giving the opposite message).
James 1:27 “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.” This scripture has been resonating with me a lot lately.
I only know I could never “throw roses to Hitler.” And I certainly could never sing for him.
Much love to you all. I wish you all blessings and happiness.
My heart is shattered and broken............. but my conscience is clear. And THAT, really is all that matters.
Respectfully,
Jan Chamberlin
(Happy birthday dear Jannie............ happy birthday..................................to...................... you..............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................


https://www.facebook.com/jan.chamberlin.77/posts/10211891389943594

I am glad I am not the only lonely leftie who sees the parallels between National Socialism and Trumpism.

[Eliot Rosewater]

1. You are not alone, but my fear is we will see a movement, including inside the

Democratic party power structure, of go along to get along.

If that happens, doom wont be strong enough of a word for democracy, America and who knows what else.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

2. That young woman's essay is so powerful

'... I have deep patriotic feelings for this country and for the freedoms of people everywhere throughout the world. I am troubled by the problems we face which seek to destroy our love for liberty and respect for humanity internationally.
History is repeating itself; the same tactics are being used by Hitler (identify a problem, finding a scapegoat target to blame, and stirring up people with a combination of fanaticism, false promises, and fear, and gathering the funding). I plead with everyone to go back and read the books we all know on these topics and review the films produced to help us learn from these gargantuan crimes so that we will not allow them to be repeated. Evil people prosper when good people stand by and do nothing... I only know I could never throw roses to Hitler. And I certainly could never sing for him..."

[yardwork]

4. I am seeing it here on DU.

[PatrickforO]

9. Yes, I have already been put down by Dem Party big dogs on this site.

We have a postmortem room, but if you are a New Deal socialist, as I am, and point out the obvious that both party power structures have the same donor base, etc., the silence is deafening.

They do not wish to hear it.

When I blogged about how we should have single payer a mainstream guy with lots of heft on this site asked me 'so what?'

I was blocked from two rooms.

So, yeah, those of us who are waiting for gross expansion of the NSA into three parts (secret police, military force not affiliated with other US armed forces, and camp guards), camps to be built and roundups to begin don't have that much company from the Democratic Party establishment, simply because they, with the Republican Party establishment, share so many donors and are beholden to the same MIC, big pharma and other multi-national corporations. These big business people believe they can control Trump, you know.

Just like German big business people felt they could control Hitler.

In the meantime, Trump has signaled a new nuclear arms race (gosh, THAT'S a good idea!) and lurched from one foreign policy disaster to the next, AND HAS NOT EVEN BEEN SWORN IN YET.

There's nothing good about this - it is the beginning of the fall of a nation that really could be the light on the hill.

The truth? as long as we organize around human greed instead of human need in this utopia the big capitalists have created, we will never be more than a shadow of what we could be.

I've been called a unicorn, a 'lib-tard,' a polly-anna and told over and over and over that doing the right thing simply isn't practical.

WHY??????

[Eliot Rosewater]

10. That is all well and good, but my post should not be confused at all with

my sincere and deep support of Hillary Clinton.

I saw her, once the primaries were over, as the only way to avoid certain annihilation of everything I hold dear.

Were she running against someone like Bernie in a race where they were the two candidates for anything, I would always pick Bernie, but that was NOT the case.

[bekkilyn]

11. Humans tend to have a "we can't" mindset

Especially in this day and age. People come up with fantastic ideas and then comes the shower of "but but but" and "It would never work" etc. etc. from all sides. I think the worst are those who agree that they are good ideas and yet come up with every excuse why it could never happen.

Thank goodness there have been "radical" politicians, scientists, adventurers, explorers who remained stubborn against the "we can't" onslaught and decided that "Yes, we can." Si se puede.

We need to instead get into the mindset of deciding what's good and right, deciding to do it, and only *then* coming up with how we are going to get there.

If we really want to do something, we CAN.

What I fear more than anything is that the droves of "we can't" really just mean "we won't" because people are too apathetic or afraid to want anything better, so we are told that we must fail even before we start.

So what if something's not practical? Neither was any other great thing that obstinate humans managed to accomplish despite the great obstacles thrown against them, even from those who weren't designated as enemies.

No, it's NOT better to keep your head down and cooperate. Nothing great ever comes from doing that.

We do NOT need to normalize and go along with the so-called administration of Trump and his goons. No more playing nice with these people.

[George II]

12. I don't think so. There have been dark days in our 240 year history....

....somehow we find a way of getting through them. Think back to as recently as the Reagan administration, would you have thought that within 20 years of that we'd have both the Clinton and Obama administrations? I was a lot younger back in 1980, with Reagan's rhetoric I thought we were doomed. But we got through it all.

[Eliot Rosewater]

14. Probably not

how minorities or Jewish people or gay people or black people or Latino's or Muslim's see it though, do you wonder why?

Sure not all people in those categories see the Trump situation as horrific, but most do and for very good reason.

[bekkilyn]

15. Aren't you getting tired of just "getting through" though?

I know I am. Having to keep starting over again from the beginning every time someone comes along and tears down everything. We need to find a way where we're not just "getting through" over and over again. As much as I enjoy reading 19th century literature, I really don't want to go back there all over again.

[Botany]

3. Thanx to DU a new twitter account is up ..... #rosestohitler

https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&q=%23Rosestohitler&src=typd

[renate]

5. this is 100% inspirational, but this is my favorite part:

"In the show Wicked, the Wizard makes a really interesting statement. He says “ I create conflict to stay in power.” This scenario can keep us perpetually distracted and at odds with each other and keep us from working together to solve important issues. This also allows those in office to do whatever they want to unchecked. I believe this has been done to us, both cunningly and intentionally. I believe we have a lot more in common than we have in difference, and if we will listen to each other, we can learn a great deal from one another."

I know I'm guilty of being distracted by the conflict between parties and as a result being distracted from the possibility of working together to solve problems. This is the Republican leaders' specific and expressed game plan (decided upon as a bedrock principle by McConnell the night after Obama's inauguration), and I fell for it, becoming as focused on their outrageous behavior as by the existence of the problems we should have worked on together, when in reality one is so much more important than the other.

But I don't want to make this about me. This is an incredibly eloquent letter. Thank you for sharing it.

[MFM008]

6. She nailed it.

..........

[Blue Idaho]

7. Sadly the Mormon church won't see it that way...

But then it's more of a money worshiping pyramid scheme than an actual religion.

[Hekate]

17. Perhaps you are mistaking them for the Scientologists?

[Blue Idaho]

19. Nope...

The Mormon church owns more shopping malls, apartment complexes, and condos than they do churches. Their tithing system extracts 10% on gross earnings for anyone to be considered a member in "good standing." Unlike the US government, the Mormon church expects members to tithe 10% on all their capital gains each year.

The Scientologists are pikers compared to the Mormons.

[IAMSPARTICUS]

8. yes.

bad start---misspelled Spartacus. The reference is to the movie's last scene..."i am spartacus." When the muslim registry comes, remember...we are all spartacus. Jan, people like you give me some hope. Very brave thing to do. Us Jews, whose relatives have been through this, applaud you.

[annabanana]

20. Welcome to DU

We will have to hang together, or we will surely hang separately. .
~ Ben Franklin

[ismnotwasm]

13. K&R

[Hekate]

16. This is a wonderful and heartfelt letter, and much appreciated in these dark days.

[Angry Dragon]

18. The republicans have been working towards this for many years

[fleabiscuit]

21. Brave woman. Kick.