|
I’m not trying to be provocative, but I do want to be honest.
I’m a U.S. citizen and Navy veteran, and I’ve lived in the United States for more than 40 years. I’m also a German immigrant. And the comparisons I keep seeing online—between modern ICE enforcement and the Gestapo—have stopped me in my tracks. It’s easy to dismiss these comparisons as hyperbole. But before we do that, we need to understand what the Gestapo actually was. The Geheime Staatspolizei—better known as the Gestapo—was the Nazi regime’s secret police. It emerged from the Prussian state police and became the engine of surveillance, intimidation, and state-sponsored fear in Germany during the Third Reich. Despite the “secret” label, everyone knew of their presence. And that was the point. One of my great-grandmothers hid her disabled cousin during the Nazi euthanasia campaign of the early 1940s that targeted the disabled, and later even the elderly. The terror was real and absolute. You didn’t know who might report you. You didn’t know who to trust. And once the Gestapo came for you, there was no appeal. No due process. No help. The question is: Is ICE becoming something similar? 🛑 Similarities and Differences Here is what’s not the same:
But the tactics? The erosion of trust? That’s where things get uncomfortably close.
⚖️ Legal vs. Just Is ICE legal? Yes. But is it operating justly? That’s murkier. The Gestapo cloaked its horrors in laws too—laws that were designed to criminalize dissent, difference, and disability. Legality isn’t the same as justice. We have due process for a reason. But when ICE agents can operate in plainclothes, arrest people at court, and detain families—including children—without clear justification, it’s time to ask: Are we honoring the spirit of our laws, or finding ways to bypass them? 🚨 Are We Powerless? The Gestapo thrived because people were afraid to resist. But in a democracy, we’re not powerless:
📣 Final Thought Comparing ICE to the Gestapo may feel extreme, but ignoring the warning signs would be worse. Authoritarianism doesn’t arrive all at once. It creeps in when we justify fear, silence dissent, and look the other way. Let’s not. Let’s speak up, stay informed, and make sure we never become the country others have fled. Sources & Citations:
0 Comments
What Happened to the Social Contract? Why Our Democracy Feels Broken—and How We Might Fix It5/29/2025 In 2025, many Americans sense that something fundamental is off. Trust in institutions is in free fall. Political fights aren’t just noisy—they’re existential. And somewhere along the way, we stopped believing the people in charge are actually working for us.
That feeling? That unease? It might be because the Social Contract—the invisible handshake between citizens and government—has been torn up. Or worse, forgotten. 🧐 What Is the Social Contract? (Plain English, Promise) The Social Contract is basically this: We give up a little freedom and agree to live by shared rules. In return, the government protects our rights and works for the common good. That’s it. It’s the foundation of everything from stoplights to civil rights. It’s not written in stone, but it’s supposed to guide how power is used, how laws are made, and how justice works. 📚 The Originals: Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau Here’s why this isn’t just some political theory class. These guys came up with the ideas behind the Social Contract in the middle of disaster:
These weren’t ivory-tower ideas. They were blueprints for fixing broken systems. 🇺🇸 America’s Founding and the Contract When Jefferson, Franklin, Madison, and company sat down to write our founding documents, they were basically remixing Locke and Rousseau. The Declaration of Independence? Pure Locke: "Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed." The Constitution? A practical attempt to make the Social Contract real. Checks and balances. Representation. Rule of law. These weren’t buzzwords—they were the structure of mutual accountability. ⚠️ When the Social Contract Breaks History doesn’t mess around when this deal falls apart:
When people stop believing the system serves them, they either check out or burn it down. Sometimes both. 🚨 Right Now, It’s Breaking Sound familiar?
We’re not in a revolution—but we’re skating the edges of the contract. 🛠️ Can We Still Fix This? (A Real Talk on Restoration) Here’s the thing: the guys who came up with Social Contract Theory weren’t just tossing around abstract ideas. They were writing from pain, fear, and upheaval. They were trying to make sense of the broken systems they lived in, and offer ideas for something better. And maybe that’s where we are right now—pain, fear, and upheaval. The good news? History shows that when people get fed up enough, they can push things back onto the rails. But it starts with understanding that we’re not helpless. The Social Contract only works when people believe in it—and are willing to speak up when it’s being shredded. So what can we do?
Jefferson once warned us: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." That quote is intense, but it is a stern reminder that democracy isn't self-sustaining. When things stop working for the people, people start looking for ways to fix it. Hopefully peacefully. But history says: not always. We start by pushing back against the forces that want to reduce our role to consumers or bystanders. We're citizens, nothing less. 🤍 Final Thought I don’t think the Social Contract is some dusty, academic idea I picked up in my political theory class 35 years ago. I think it’s exactly what we’re missing—and why things feel so off. It’s the invisible glue that keeps governments legit and makes progress possible. Ignore it, and we’re going to lose more than civility—we’ll lose the very thing that holds the American experiment together. But if we remember and revive it—it might just save us. 🔗 Sources In Part I, I drew the historical line between Charles X of France and Donald Trump. Both rose to power on promises of restoration. Both alienated legislatures. Both flirted with silencing dissent. Charles went too far. Trump might, too.
So what happened when Charles X crossed the line? The answer lies in events that started 26 July 1830. Charles issued a set of repressive orders known as the July Ordinances, which:
By the morning of July 27, Parisians revolted. Workers, students, and even some middle-class citizens took to the streets. What followed wasn’t a chaotic civil war—but a highly focused push to defend civil rights and constitutional government. Despite personal risk, the media took the lead in keeping citizens of France informed and helped kick off the revolution. Tradesmen, workers and merchants followed suit. Charles abdicated, fled to Britain, and the monarchy was replaced (briefly) by a constitutional regime. What can that teach us? Resisting Autocracy Doesn't Require Violence The July Revolution worked not because it burned everything down, but because it focused on defending institutions, not destroying them. The press played a critical role. So did moderate politicians who refused to accept illegal decrees. Today, we’re not facing royal ordinances, but we are looking at:
The Power of Civil Society In 1830 France, it was the teachers, printers, municipal workers--not just elites—who resisted. They refused to implement illegal orders, slowed down compliance, and gave people space to act. Here in the U.S., we’ll need:
Final Thought: The Resistance Is Already Here If President Trump continues to try to govern like Charles X, the institutions that survive will be the ones willing to say "no"—even when it’s hard. The American republic won’t be saved by spectacle. It will be saved by professionals, institutional guardians, people who know their history and hopefully the rest of us. The July Revolution was three days. But its effects rippled across Europe. Let’s learn something from it. Sources & Citations: Back in college, I took a politics class on revolutionary France. Not just Robespierre and guillotines, but what came after: republic, monarchy, collapse, and more monarchy, etc. That's when I first encountered Charles X (or Charles the Dull), the last Bourbon king of France. At the time, I thought of him as just another bland royal with a bad legacy. But these days? He looks a lot like the current occupant of the White House.
Many compare President Trump to the Austrian Corporal that had a hold on Germany in the 1930s and early 1940s. I get it—the nationalist tone, the loyalty tests, the disregard for institutions. But if you're going to pull from European history, Charles X might be the better analog. Charles X ruled France from 1824 to 1830, and spent his time in power trying to return France to a bygone "golden" age. He:
Eventually, his obsession with restoring the past and bypassing elected bodies triggered the July Revolution of 1830. After just three days of unrest, Charles abdicated and fled. Donald Trump’s playbook doesn’t look so different:
Like Charles, Trump seems focused on loyalty over competency, legacy over liberty, and personal grievance over public service. Where This Could Go? History doesn’t repeat, but it rhymes (Mark Twain) . Charles X's France didn’t fall into civil war, but it did spiral into political instability, reactionary succession, and eventually authoritarianism under Napoleon III. His attempt to restore an imagined past created a vacuum of leadership and legitimacy. Will the second Trump term follow a similar path? Maybe not in three days like the July Revolution—but it could erode American institutions to the point where something more unstable replaces them. This is Part I of a two-part series. In Part II, I’ll explore what Charles X’s downfall and the July Revolution teach us about resistance, resilience, and recovery. Sources & Citations: I work in the digital healthcare business — helping healthcare organizations build systems that talk to each other, share data, and ideally reduce friction for both patients and care teams. I’ve also spent time working on digital front doors—the slick, app-like experiences many hospitals and other providers now use to engage patients. These solutions are effective, but they’re not too cheap, both in licensing costs and the services required to put them together.
Recently, I’ve been thinking about what happens to all of this infrastructure—the APIs, middleware, and patient portals—when the funding starts to disappear. The signals are there: pressure on Medicaid, Medicare, VA services, and public health agencies is rising. In previous posts, I’ve explored the downstream risks (The Big Beautiful Bill, Can We Automate Our Way Out, The Cost of Early Death). But it’s clear that interoperability itself may also be in the crosshairs. What Interoperability Meant—And Why It Might Be Changing Interoperability has been around for a while, but was supercharged about 15 years ago with the HITECH Act (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health). The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) define interoperability across four levels:
These definitions assume continued growth and investment—backed by Meaningful Use, Cures Act mandates, and adoption of EHRs. However, if federal reimbursement begin to shrink, this framework may no longer hold up. Digital Front Doors—What Happens When the Budget Gets Tight? Digital front doors, including mobile apps, chatbots, appointment engines, and patient access APIs, are not free. In fact, a 2023 Chilmark Research report noted that digital front door initiatives often exceed $500K in upfront investment for midsize systems—not including maintenance and integration costs (Chilmark Research, 2023). If funding goes away, some possible outcomes may be:
This is not theoretical--state-level Medicaid agencies have already pulled back on HIE access in some cases (KFF, 2024). Have We Engineered Ourselves Into a Privacy Trap? Modern interoperability assumes real-time, cross-entity data sharing. The Trusted Exchange Framework and Common Agreement (TEFCA) is supposed to enable this while protecting consent and governance (ONC TEFCA Overview, 2024). But things have gotten messier.
Interoperability doesn’t inherently weaken privacy, poor implementation and deregulation can. What Happens When the Money Dries Up? If proposed federal cuts materialize, the interoperability ecosystem will feel it in three key ways:
We should expect increased demand for cloud-native integration platforms, Pay-as-you-go API solutions, and simplified FHIR middleware that minimizes custom development. How We As Consultants, Product Teams, and Strategists Can Respond For Consultants & Integrators:
Where the Market Is Shifting This took some research on my part, but it looks like a number companies are well-positioned for what’s next:
Final Thought: Strategy Over Nostalgia Interoperability isn’t collapsing—but it looks like it is evolving. Consultants, technologists, and product leaders will need to adjust expectations, revise architectures, and help clients prioritize privacy and value over perfection. This new era we are in is marked by constrained budgets, decentralization, and (not always strategic) tradeoffs. We are going to have to build things differently. Sources & Citations
|
AuthorAxel Newe is a strategic partnerships and GTM leader with a background in healthcare, SaaS, and digital transformation. He’s also a Navy veteran, cyclist, and lifelong problem solver. Lately, he’s been writing not just from the field and the road—but from the gut—on democracy, civic engagement, and current events (minus the rage memes). This blog is where clarity meets commentary, one honest post at a time. ArchivesCategories
All
|
RSS Feed