After a career that took him several places with dictatorship and authoritarian governments, Poplar Bluff native and former CNN "Scud Stud" newscaster Charles Jaco said each began with a war on language, press and media.
"The idea behind this is very simple," Jaco said. "If you repeat something over and over and loud enough and persistent enough, then said lie becomes fact."
Stand Indivisible, a grass roots group supporting progressive values, hosted the 1968 Poplar Bluff High School graduate to discuss the First Amendment and what he considers to be the importance of a free press in today's society.
In a pattern used by other authoritative dictators, such as Russian President Vladimir Putin, Jaco said all began because they were able to control the media by the very meaning of language itself.
"Blatant lies will be passed off as the truth and anything critical of the regime will be dubbed 'fake news,'" he said.
Jaco added the war on language began a long time ago and referenced 1964 as the last time the majority of white voters voted for the Democratic presidential candidate. Beginning in 1968, the majority of white voters shifted to the Republican candidate.
Jaco questioned what happened between those four years.
He described current Republican President Donald Trump as "the logical extension of conservative/GOP rhetoric for at least the last half century." He added the GOP has been "flirting" with becoming "the white people party" for decades and with Trump, it happened.
Jaco continued by describing Trump as "blatantly racist" and a "mammothly unfit President of the United States."
While Jaco predicts the attacks on free press, media and Trump's political opponents will intensify, he said a knowledge of history is very useful for a time like this.
"This is precisely the kind of stuff going on in Germany in 1929, 1930 and 1931," he said.
The attack will intensify because no downside has been seen by the administration, Jaco said, and they believe to be "bulletproof."
To counter this, Jaco told the group of about 20 people in attendance at St. Andrew's Lutheran Church it gets down to them.
"Voter registration is the key," he said. "The secret is not to convince 63 million of our fellow Americans that thought electing a fascist was a grand idea."
When looking at the numbers from the last election, Jaco said one-fourth of the votes went to Hillary Clinton, one-fourth went to Trump and one-half of Americans did not vote.
"That's where the sweet spot is," Jaco said for pulling votes.
"I know you guys are tired, but that's what they are counting on," he said. "They are counting on all of us getting tired, throwing in the towel and giving up."
Jaco added Republican candidates may not be able to be defeated in the mainly conservative Eighth Missouri District, but that will not stop him from trying.
"Expand to the groups who have not been voting," Jaco encouraged. "And find out why they are not voting."
Whether it be the voters who need a ride to the polls or who may not have all the required identification to vote, Jaco told the group to do something about the obstacles.
"This is key and now it's in our hands," he said. "We are fighting a war here for the very essence of America."
Adding he is optimistic, Jaco warned the group a change would take a lot of work and problems would not be solved "with the turn of a switch."
"I think the people here (in Poplar Bluff) are good, smart, decent people who really deserve better than the policies they have been getting," Jaco said of his hometown.
After graduating from PBHS in 1968, he graduated from The University of Chicago in 1973, and received a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University in New York in 1976.
He then began freelance writing and worked in a steel mill to pay off student loans.
His career began with his first broadcast job in Chicago, Ill., and "things kind of took off from there," he said, leading to covering the Gulf War on CNN.
His "Scud Stud" nickname was dubbed while reporting outside a bunker while Iraqi scud missiles were being fired.
Jaco is now retired and lives in the St. Louis area.