I fear that the most recent ICE shooting event has become a breaking point for many of us in our ability, even desire, to engage with those who disagree with us and try to find common ground upon which we can build. On the surface it is yet another politicized moment in which different people of different beliefs have their say. But scratch that surface and it feels like what is underneath has passed an inflection point at which it still can be formed and shaped into something useful.
I’m no longer concerned about generalizing. The problem has become too big for all of us to worry about someone’s individual sensitivities. Far too many on the political right simply have lost all semblance of human compassion and empathy and understanding of our system of community for it to survive intact, even for our system of laws to be effective. The required element of cooperation and shared standards of decency are no longer in place when something as fundamental as needless loss of life becomes a rallying point for a bloodthirsty culture to promote its agenda of divide and conquer. As usual, social media is where these self-proclaimed patriots and saviors of morality go to say out loud what they do not vocalize openly in public spaces otherwise. It is where their ugliest selves go to find companionship and support for levels of anger and hatred that can have no good end. Suggest that surely we can agree that what happened in Minneapolis should not have risen to the level of a spontaneous death sentence, and get called every profane name and ethnic slur in the book, and then some, as these supposedly fine Christians and parents of impressionable children morph into an irrational, inhuman, threatening life form that argues for a judgment that they should not be walking around loose, outside of a cage. This is the starting point with them. One reasonably fears what they would do upon escalation if they cannot control themselves on such a basic level to start with.
I have stopped trying to reach these people with mature, adult appeals to their better nature and attempts to identify common ground. It has become impossible. And, so, now what? I have never been more cynical about how low our society can and will go, especially when our political leadership practices no restraint anymore and influencers run around unchecked in profiting personally from the strife and discord. I often ask myself what would happen if our nation had to endure another Pearl Harbor or September 11 moment at this point. Historically we have come together at such inflection points. Now I’m inclined to think that 40 percent of our population would simply say that stupid libtards are behind it and Biden, Obama, and Hillary created the conditions for it to happen. Never before have we been so ripe for takeover by foreign governments who rejoice in our inability to have even civil discussions about shared problems. This cannot end well. The only question has become the timing and the depth of how much they can take advantage of the societal suicide of both democracy and mature adult behavior in our nation.
I’m guessing none of our Founding Fathers had any of this on their Bingo cards in the 1770s, if they even tried to envision what America in the 2020s would become, on our watch. Shame on us collectively as we dishonor the yeoman’s work that they did to gift us a nation worthy of our best instincts instead of our worst behavior.
Just to be clear, I “liked” your take on all of this insanity, not the fact that this level of insanity is now a palpable reality in this once proud nation.
Sadly, we are all witness to the destruction of norms, institutions, and fundamental values that have served as guideposts and aspirational touchstones for 250 years, at least. I figured out a long time ago - all on my own - that it’s a whole lot easier to tear something down than it is to build and maintain it.
I cannot deny that I experience waves of despair as I see one thing after another crumble, with no relief in sight. The grotesque demolition and planned reconstruction in trump’s image of the White House is jarringly emblematic of what is happening to every element of our political and economic system.
And Renee Good’s children have been orphaned at the hands of a masked gunman in service to the duly elected “leader” of our country. WTF has happened to this nation?
More than that. She is damned and vilified by the likes of Noem, Trump, and Fox with not a shred of information to back them up. Even seeing the film, Felon Trump did not alter his statement. This group is out of control.
Believe it or not, I'm working on a philosophical project concerning the origins of morality. Current events appear to be cooperating with my hypothesis.
Noem (and those of her ilk) thought of Renee Nicole Good like she thought of her dog, Cricket. Cricket didn't do exactly what Noem wanted, when she wanted. So, that dog deserved to die. Period.
Makes sense. Noem is not up there among the great humanitarians. She’ll be pardoned by the felon like all the others either before he leaves office or before he is impeached and removed. Threes the charm! I hope.
I am so incensed about this in general that I have to rant. No one can watch the videos and definitively say she was trying to ram the agent on purpose so for Trump, Noem, Vance, and the other influencers to even say what they did within the first 24 hours of the incident is monumentally wrong and frankly I think it's just another example of why they are poor excuses for human beings (now as a religious person I will go repent for saying that)
I was reading The Boston Globe today, and I counted 3-4 different fools saying that Ms Good aimed her car toward the man. This after she was shot! No body could tell them anything. And these were responses to the article where it is standard police procedure to not stand in front of or near a vehicle. This procedure started with the NY City police and is 25 years in practice. Keep ranting. We should form a chorus.
Heather Cox Richardson said it unequivocally in her message yesterday; we are living under fascism.
I’ll be attending the protest in my little town today, organized by Indivisible. But I’m really thinking about something Adam Kinzinger said yesterday; “The chaos that exhausts us, energizes them”. Which makes me think boycotts and strikes might be a better tool.
The founding fathers were so intellectual I think they weren't privy to how stupid the rabble could get in their own country. They feared the singular tyrant with infinite wealth and power at his fingertips. They didn't fear the bloodthirsty mob that could be stirred up by the Tyrant.
If you read Lincoln's Lyceum Address you can learn how, at age 28, he understood how violent lawless mobs attack and undermine the rule of law. Lincoln's Lyceum Address describes with stunning accuracy and clarity our current crisis and I have never been able to persuade anyone to actually read it. (Which I guess, in a way proves your point.) I think of Lincoln as being one of the founders of our Republic because he shepherded and brought about necessary corrections in the founding of our republic, to bring us closer to aligning with the father of all of our American civil moral values, namely, dedication to the proposition that all people are created equal. Fascism as a system of government that is dedicated to the opposite proposition that all people are NOT created equal. I can think of no better way to describe and understand the Trump regime.
I have to agree with how this feels. So much of what this administration has done has been increasingly shocking and disturbing if not surprising, but the level of blatant falsehood and disregard has really ramped up between this and Venezuela.
Seeing right-wing takes after Caracas was wild and head scratching. Seeing their take on Good's shooting is one of the few things I'd call horrific on the level of something like Jan 6th, and completely demoralizing. Anyone who can engage in such bad faith after seeing that footage is beyond help or reconciliation.
It's mob mentality online - wherever people have gathered in groups, through all time, get enough together with a combination of emotion and ignorance and we lose all rational restraints. Except we've gone from pitchforks to profane insults from anonymous angry people. Progress?
I do so enjoy reading your words. They flow like the paint of a fine artist or the notes of fine musician. I ask that you and the others in The Bulwark community who share your talent. (There are many that I enjoy) refrain from participating in what may come to this country. This country will need as many of you and those like you when it is over.
Some will need to keep their hands clean, while others get theirs dirty. Ain't nothing good coming. Thank you.
Thank you, Mickey. I appreciate your kind words. What I find myself doing is moving to a more subtle but, hopefully, more effective form of legal resistance to the regime. Instead of wasting valuable time and sanity arguing with people who will not be moved, I ask myself which individuals or groups of people can be helped best and most by what skill sets I do have, and then going to them as an ally in both spirit and deed with an engaged mind and hands that are capable of some heavy lifting. The operative question is whom those on the far right would not want for us to assist in their time of need, and then act accordingly. It is legal, it is ethical, and it is morally right. I urge others to join me in this quest to build up others via a strength-in-numbers approach and create a stronger sense of community around us, where it is needed. Each one, reach one, or ten, or a hundred, where both talent and desire allow it. It is much better math for our democracy in the end.
Your assessment is spot on. Yet I'm afraid that we're all afraid to look at the obvious: Can humans do democracy - and keep it? Being able to see contingencies "down the road" doesn't appear to be our strong suit.
I had some women friends for lunch yesterday, and we all sadly agreed that we are now citizens of a rogue nation. The question now is what to do about it. We agreed to keep demonstrating. It's about the only thing we can do, along with donating to good Democratic candidates. But even then, that assumes there will actually be elections.
Well said, although I’d posit they feared exactly the type of person Trump is: The mad king.
The problem was that they couldn’t envision a democracy under the control of two parties, and an inept Congress unwilling to do their constitutionally mandated jobs! Or a SCOTUS willing to do the bidding of a tyrant; even carving out an unconstitutional immunity clause in the constitution for such a man!
After all, when asked what type of government we have, Benjamin Franklin calmly replied, “a republic, if we can hold it”; hence, the American experiment! IMHO…:)
Counter-inuitively your post gives me hope. I would have said we're past the point of worrying about generalizations years ago. Perhaps I was pre-mature to be so certain about it but even still it is quite clear that is what needs to happen to have a chance of resisting an opposing group hell bent on dominating you, civility and rule of law be damned. The fact that the hold outs on the Dem side are starting to come around gives me some hope that *if* we are lucky enough to have legit elections and win a majority of power in 2026 and 2028 we will actually exercise it to combat MAGA rather than electing another appeasement candidate like Joe Biden. It will likely mean great strife but that is the only realistic chance we have of saving the rule of law and democracy.
Not arguing with you but how do you define appeasement? If it is to try to get things done on a bipartisan basis under the traditional rules, is this even possible? If that is the definition, who, among the Dems, is not an appeasement candidate? Maybe Gavin Newsom? If the Dems are going to switch to a combat philosophy, who can carry that out? How long before we can purge the house and senate of the appeasers and elect combatants? I will admit I have no answers and have been accused of "giving up" but how does it work?
I define it as governing with a primary focus on avoiding any conflict with MAGA. In practice that meant pretty much only tackling kitchen table issues (by which I mean tangible but surface level issues; not a bad thing and has immediate impact but also doesn't fix much if anything long term) or issues at least some marginal MAGA voters care about while avoiding most other policy issues. In the case of immigration it meant giving up almost all Dem priorities on the issue simply to make the issue go away (and still not closing the deal).
It certainly meant avoiding/slow pedaling tackling any structural issues with our system of government, punishing/shaming/containing criminals and bad actors on the MAGA side, or addressing an policy that might help in this struggle but might also inflame some element of MAGA. At a messaging level it meant throwing other members of the pro-democracy coalition that MAGA doesn't like under the bus where possible rather than prioritizing strengthening the coalition.
"If that is the definition, who, among the Dems, is not an appeasement candidate?"
Almost no traditional Dems which is why I have been voting Progressives almost regardless of policy preference for a decade. They've been the only ones willing. I wouldn't mind the old guard if they changed their tactics significantly though I have my doubts that is humanly possible.
As for your other questions, I have no answers. I'll be honest the hope I have been gaining at seeing the appeasement theory of politics, which has been ascendant in Dem circles at least since the Tea party started us down this path towards fascism, start to crumble are still small drops in a large bucket of dispair. Hopefully Dems are ready for something new in the primaries this year and we can get them elected but even if the Dem party turns on a dime is it too little too late? That seems quite possible to me. There is nothing else to be done but plod forward in that direction for now but I'm definitely keeping my eyes open for alternatives.
"...some hope that *if* we are lucky enough to have legit elections..."
We Never-Trumpers can, and had better, "make our own luck." The cult doesn't even pretend not to try to rig, steal or even ban elections. But they are cowards, emboldened only by sheer mass, not strength. We are stronger, braver and greater in number. We need to stop being distracted by Epstein, TACO's mental and physical health, and yes, even ICE. And especially our own destructive internal disagreements. Rather we must focus like a laser beam on the only issue that matters in the long run: making sure future elections are free and fair. The cult knows it can't win fairly in '26 or '28, and if it can't cheat, will be forced to "eat its own." In fact, a bit of that has started already with MTG and a few others. Let's exploit that. Divide & conquer!
Man, I've not worried so much about the state of the world since the very early 80s when I would lie in bed thinking bombs were going to drop any time. Yesterday was as sure a sign as any, right up their with Kent State and George Floyd, that shit's going sideways. The problem isn't just us here in the USA. It's everybody, everywhere! I don't think there's a corner of the world you can go to now to get away from it.
I can see massive global conflict erupting within the next year, let alone before the end of Trump's time in office. I've certainly said it before, but even if Trump dropped off the face of the earth today, we'll be spiraling for the next 30? 50? 80 years? Hell, maybe those time frames are optimistic, because we've all but ensured that we're rushing towards a Skynet/Weyland-Yutani lead future state, picking our way every day through a tangle of fiber optic cables, and ducking every time a drone flies overhead. There may not be a skinsuit cyborg in our midst, but that Amazon drone flying overhead was hacked and is now carrying a bomb. Meanwhile, your enemy isn't just North Korea, but an INCEL twenty something living in the neighborhood over that's enraged that he isn't getting any attention from girls or his parents.
The tech giants and their insidious algorithms are killing American decency and sense of benevolent community. As long as they continue to prosper and allow this anonymous culture to flourish, we are in trouble. I may sound like a weirdo, but the more I see how damaging social media is, the more I feel like it is the all-encompassing Beast predicted in Revelations.
I have to agree with your points, but more so the last being the eventuality of us suffering through an attack of epic proportions is an absolute eventuality because we are so divided. Too many shiny objects to distract us and with our CIA, FBI and NSC being laser focused on black and brown people to get rid of, this probability is epically high. Trump is working to secure the western hemisphere and let Europe and Eurasia have their kingdom. We have to be prepared that even a mid-term election is more than likely not going to happen, let alone another election in 2028...example is the ballroom and add-on of the west wing. Need I say more? America is a failed state but too many have failed to recognize it and it gives me no pleasure in recognizing it.
“But 47 percent said Trump “creates chaos and makes things worse.” If young men saw Trump as a change agent last November, it seems they no longer do.”
Sadly, I’m not sure this changes the dynamic. They may not like Trump, but it seems they hate democrats more.
I’ll keep an open mind, but unfortunately, this group is fickle, and are easily triggered; so their opinions can change on a dime! IMHO…:)
I don’t disagree, but unfocused and undisciplined energy; is energy wasted.
When I speak of the youth, I’m talking about young union members for Trump. They support him because they see immigration as a threat to their way of life; fair enough!
However, they aren’t educated enough to understand how economies thrive; they don’t understand that using a mix of immigrant and union members means more projects and more jobs, reducing the risk they may one day be unemployed.
Instead, they’re focused on their own interests, which in the end, will be their death kneel.
As far as the rest of the youth, college educated or not, they’re learning quickly as the college kids are saddled with debt and no job, while the high school graduate watches all his options disappear overnight.
I’m not suggesting the entire economy will suffer; the top ten to 20 percent will continue to live up luxury, while everyone else competes for the scraps.
That said, even during the Great Depression only 25% of Americans were unemployed. The problem was that the jobs available just barely kept the lights on for most workers and families. IMHO…:)
I’m starting to think small protests are in your category of wasted energy. The big, nationwide “Hands Off” and “No Kings” were effective, but the random small ones are questionable.
As to workers’ fears and the economy, as we march onward in misogyny - Trump fired a disproportionate number of female bureaucrats - there’s a fact that the Christian Nationalists don’t understand; all countries that disenfranchise women are third world economies. Or maybe they do understand it and prefer to rule tyrannically over a wasteland than to share power over an advanced society.
JF, strong disagree on the value of small protests.
Handfuls of protesters on street corners are keeping the message of resistance front and center for everyone who drives past.
In a fragmented media environment, these rallies reach out to countless citizens who aren’t following The Bulwark, Heather Cox Richardson, Aaron Parnas, Robert Hubbell, etc, etc.
Small protests invite everyone to join in, even if just by honking, and reassure people that they are not the crazy ones.
Without small protests, big protests couldn’t be as big.
Thank you, Marcia. I really hope you are right. Sometimes I feel like we are dismissed as silly Boomer hippies. In truth, it’s mostly elders who have the time to attend small protests. I can’t say I’m fired up, but I am ready to go. Being among strangers who share values is good medicine,
There does seem to be a lot of ridicule of protests being full of fellow oldsters. But the way I see it, in addition to having more time than those still in the work/kids phases of life, as a white woman born in the literal post-WWII era I have lived my whole life with the post WWII liberal order in place, and have benefited mightily from it. Seems like I ought to be doing something more to try to pay it forward.
Agreed, as for Christian nationalists, they understand completely; it’s their worldview. They just don’t understand the impacts, not unlike Trump’s “Bull in a China shop” foreign policy; eventually the chickens come home to roost!…:)
Yes, we are in agreement; they don’t understand the impacts. The right was so freaked out that Muslim immigrants would bring and demand Sharia Law. Hah! Christian Nationalism will yield the same results.
Exactly. Unfortunately, they’ve been indoctrinated and lied to their entire lives; it takes years to indoctrinate, and even more years to deprogram these people; so good luck with that!..:)
That must be it, in a nutshell. I recently read a piece from The Rational League here on Substack, that took a deep dive into the mindset of MAGA women. Brief takeaway; they want the racism to feel higher status than minorities, and they want the protection of MAGA males. The second one is a weird calculus because domestic violence is much higher in places that vote MAGA.
I have to disagree as well. This shooting was a terrible tragedy but the small ICE protests in the communities they are raiding have been extremely effective in hampering their work and protecting potential targets. I also feel when I see the boomers are out there every day or a few times a week, I am with them in spirit even if I'm too busy to be out there with them all the time
In a larger sense, the US is going through an (male) adolescent rebellion. Tired of being confined by sissy rules. They want to dominate or have their leader dominate, act on impulse rather than thinking too much, and watch the demolition of all the old stuff that they feel is confining them.
Yep, this reminds me of all the people I know who insist they hate Trump but continue voting for him anyway. Until I see an actual change at the ballot box I'm not convinced.
Chaos or change is there really that much difference? If you think there isn’t then the French Revolution would like to have word. But more seriously despite all the chaos which tends to mask things, Trump has wrought more change in his first year than any prior president in our lifetime.
Change done in response to chaos is not necessarily the sort of change that makes things better than they were. Many times the change is just something different with no perceivable improvement in the situation.
I didn’t say the change was better. There is chaos from the Trump administration, but there has been deliberate change in long standing policy and to how the Executive Branch functions. This was deliberate if chaotically implemented. Two things should have been clear about a 2nd Trump presidency 1) it would be chaotic as everything with Trump is, and 2) he was advocating radical change to the relationship between government and the people for whom the government is supposed to serve. Was it going to be harmful and chaotic? Yes, but also deliberate.
Fortunately, young men as a group are low-propensity voters. Approximately 40% voted in 2024, and only slightly more than half voted for Trump. I’m not going to lose much sleep worrying about what 20% of generally idiotic young men (I was one!) say or think. I’d even wager that many “influencers” in their cohort didn’t vote. They just make a lot of noise and say stupid shit.
Agreed, but this group as you know is easily triggered; that’s the problem. We have no idea what “October Surprise” these goons have in store, but given their record, you can be sure it will be a doozy!…:)
They are kind of like Susan Collins: Concerned. But not enough to abandon ship. They still see Trump as merely a slightly wayward relative, and continue to believe we need a strongman to battle those evil vicious Democrats.
Remember in 2016 when many of us felt worried and anxious about a potential Trump presidency? Remember when Comey made his "October Surprise" that some claim derailed Sen. Clinton's presidential run? Our anxiety ran higher than normal. We were feeling something in our gut that we couldn't name. Was it intuition? Was it visionary dread? No. It wasn't fuzzy supernaturalism. For those of us that knew just a little about Trump, we knew he had no moral compass.
I suspect that few of us know people who aren't possessed with an innate moral direction. Most humans are. Most of us know when we tell a lie, we feel an emotional pin prick, or maybe a little whisper reminding us that the lie we told wasn't the right thing to do. There are a few of us that don't have that kind of internal voice.
When Trump was elected, it wasn't just that we disliked his ideas. It wasn't that we hated his positions on issues. It was that he didn't have something that almost every human has - a moral voice. We felt anxiety, fear, dread, concern, and we were called, "deranged."
It turns out that derangement wasn't our problem. We have something built within us that detects people or animals that have destruction or harm in mind. We know what it is, if only by an emotional sense. It is a disquieting fear that cannot find words. This is an intuitive power that can save lives. Our leader is who we felt he would be. Our 2016 fears have come home to roost.
This. I remember the comment “ I paid no/ less taxes,and that makes me smart”comment from Trump before the election, and it bugged me. Of all the things, it was relatively minor. I shared this concern with my dad, a small business owner, who looked at me like I had two heads. Well of course I feel that way too, thought my dad. What I couldn’t express at the time is that to be president you are serving the country. If you are bragging about how you mooch or cut corners on service to the country, you have no business in offfice. You have no concept of the social contract between people and their government.
RE: "...no concept of the social contract between people and their government."
Pretty sure based just on his record as a (so-called) businessman that Trump looks at *any* contract as binding only so long as it suits his purpose and as something to casually be broken for his own gain and / or convenience.
A question is, why didn’t Trump voters see and fear what we feared? I think an awful lot of Americans have dark hearts. That’s a huge source of my own grief. I’m now scared of my fellows; especially those I don’t know. It’s very subtly isolating.
Some saw him as a successful businessman and accepted his tax evasion as just what a smart businessman does. Plus he didn't talk like a "politician" but rather talks like a lot of people do when they don't really understand what government is or does but have plenty of opinions about it. Plus he shared their grievances. People resent hearing Spanish spoken by their fellow customers in the grocery store.
But so many saw that! And were all in. Scary many. Many apparently have reconsidered, but still....so many so quickly were lapping up what Trump was. I was horrified watching the election returns come in. I'll never understand.
I'm convinced that the most educated Trump apologists see his contempt for rules and norms and ethics and basic human decency as an advantage in attacking their political opponents. They have chosen amoral means to achieve what they claim is a higher moral purpose,
Others of us have believed from the beginning that any movement that sees a sociopath as its heroic standard bearer cannot be guided by moral purpose.
(2) the aggrieved and bigoted malcontents with authoritarian leanings,
(3) the cynical, nihilistic opportunists
Those are the three legs of the stool of Trumpism. Trump pulls it together organically in ways that other politicians have a hard time emulating because I think all three describe Trump himself.
I am experiencing something similar. Though I admit, I'm not surprised by the perception that short term gains are better than long term ones. The short term views have an obscuring affect.
The sense of identity is something reporters at MAGA rallies have written about. I guess their churches aren’t enough? (Actually, I think a lot of self-proclaimed “Christians” rarely attend services. What a surprise. To them religion is a cudgel for control, not a set of virtues.)
Really, what else do people have these days? I mean, the NFL is taking their teams to foreign countries anymore, so does it really mean anything to be a Chiefs fan? That's where people went to find identity, after they stopped going to church, stopped talking to their neighbors, etc., etc. Chevy vs Ford? Boring, because nearly anyone can build a half decent car these days (except maybe Stellantis). They needed something. They choose fascism.
I feel you. After watching the shooting video I immediately sent to to my MAGA family and cut them off for good. I told them I was scared of what people complicit with this regime could eventually do, and that includes them . It is so very painful and isolating.
Trump has proven he's a vessel completely empty of the most basic positive and generally productive human traits and is filled instead with nothing but an insatiable appetite for that which he will never, ever have: the satisfaction borne of recognizing one's own self-worth (along with one's "success" in life) in relation to one's own judgement about the worth and "success" of others.
That sounds a bit cringy, I know. But we *all* sit in judgement of ourselves heavily informed by what we think of others and the values and behaviors *they* possess and exhibit. And Trump can never fill the void within himself which his unrelenting hunger for riches, power and attention creates, all born, I believe, of a defect in his nature regarding his self-esteem, of which he's unaware but wouldn't attempt to change in the slightest if he were.
Because he likes being always "hungry". He *needs* to always be hungry. He wouldn't know what the hell to do with himself if he weren't.
My own value judgement about Donald Trump is simple, straight forward and admittedly severe, but I believe well-deserved - formed starting nearly 4 decades ago as I became more and more aware of who and what he was, and confirmed and solidified over the past decade:
As a man, as a human being, he possesses no redeeming value whatsoever. Period.
Yes, many of us were up close and personal with malignant narcissists growing up, but nobody would listen. But many of us came from cultures of abuse, especially in our churches. Churches fraught with sexual abuse cover it up and do nothing to help victims of sexual assaults inside the church. That attitude is conveyed to the faithful. Do not help victims, always stay on the side of the abusers. As long as churches follow THAT golden rule, people like Trump will always rise to the top.
Yes. I cried in 2016. Not that I loved Hilary Clinton that much, but I just felt the doom that Americans as a whole had lost their moral compass. I knew he’d get elected in 2024 while still striving and hoping for Kamala.
Since the inauguration I have tried to build more of a community around myself. We aren’t going to change any minds. All we can do is help those in our communities that need it and behave like the Christians (I’m agnostic) that they claim to be.
I should say that I continue to speak out and protest, but fighting online is pointless.
Absolutely SPOT ON! I knew what trump was like back in the 80's - a total sham, freak as well as immoral but moreover corrupt as fuck and I was in my 20's in the 80's...my GUT has always been my guide and NEVER EVER steered me wrong!
I want to add another important point to Bill’s comments on Trump’s disregard for the and the fact that Republicans are not trying to force him to follow the Constitution. He is using his pardon power to undo convictions of dangerous criminals and drug dealers as well as more minor criminals who likely bribe him.
Marvin, I'm Garvin, and I'd like to build on what you're touching on here.
Over the past year or so it has become abundantly clear that Trump holds the very idea of laws in contempt. He just does not believe that the "losers" in the general population have any right to pass judgment on anyone's activities through the courts - especially if those convicted people are otherwise "winners." He feels like he, a winner, was betrayed by the court system and now he sees himself in just about everyone who was ever convicted of anything.
He won't pardon everyone, of course - I suspect as a real estate developer he'd draw the line at many property crimes, for instance, and he does have his general distrust of minorities - but for him every conviction is suspect and every sentence should be reconsidered (probably for a price).
Even outside of the graft and grift, though, I think he truly considers only his self-vaunted "morality" to be the arbiter of justice. It is the thinking of a "super-man" - the dangerous kind.
Bill, Andrew and Jim-Thank you for this piece and for The Bulwark’s position on this type of issue generally. Many of the other supposed Never Trumpers out there just natter on about desirable ends (without regard to means) and the benefits of a Unitary Executive, while disregarding or downplaying all the damage to the U.S. system being done.
This may sound radical, but I’m gonna say Trump is not an authoritarian. He’s merely a mafia don want to be. He’s the head of a crime family. Authoritarian implies some level of politics or political structure. None of that exists with him. Everything is a crime. His motivations are all criminal. There’s zero ideology. There’s just appearing strong so he can exert power and self enrich. He’s shaking down other countries like an enforcer would shake down businesses in a neighborhood for protection money. There’s nothing more than that. Stop over analyzing. Assume everything he does is criminal. Invading Venezuela is not some neo conservative policy, it’s just a way to steal their oil.
But unlike mob bosses, he wants crowds of adoring people coming up to him, “with tears in their eyes, saying Sir you are wonderful.” He needs this like oxygen.
Yes, there is that. But it’s not driven from politics. Think about it, a politician that wants people to love them does things that are good for the people. He has never done that. It’s always been a sham. He does short term things that are long-term killers. And besides, here’s the secret. If the people stop loving him, the elected Republicans will stop supporting him and he will be gone tomorrow. So he needs to be popular with the people in order to hold onto his power.
Totally agree Robert. It’s just that after following his trajectory for a lot of years, there is some mental disconnect. Politicians have learned to give the illusion of doing things for the people. Some people yes, but the people, not so much. That’s the Republican way. With Felon Trump, his rallies were love fests. He was tied to them, and they carried him to his second term. In his addled brain, this need is growing. He made campaign promises that he will never keep, but he wants them to stay with him just as before. The people love him so party members should bow down. If he looses a large portion of his base, in my opinion, he will have serious mental issues and he will start melting down publicly.
But isn’t that from their members, cronies, and maybe family? I can’t see any mob boss having the rallies that Felon Trump had. My parents told me of a wedding they attended, held at a venue associated with one of the “families.” Very subdued, and subpar in services. No body was raving, and people left as quickly as they could.
I suppose I tend to think of the Mafia as always wanting approval from the Church. "I said my Hail Marys, I tithe, why are they still persecuting me?" Then they donate to colleges and museums to get their names on things. But I would hope that some bosses are smart enough to lay low. There's probably an intelligence spectrum.
The unending arrogance of the media trying to figure this guy out when it’s so painfully clear that he’s just a common criminal. I saw an Instagram reel of Jonathan Karl. I guess of ABC News reporting that Trump had told the New York Times that his morality was running the show. This guy actually makes a salary telling us what the news is about? Are you out of your mind? The press can’t get behind the idea that a street thug slipped into the White House not once but twice. It trivializes their contribution to the American experiment so they just can’t accept it so they keep rolling their eyes and saying how could this be? This is unprecedented. He’s a criminal. It’s not a criminal presidency. It’s a presidential criminal!
Yes and no. There is Trump the thuggish criminal, and there is Trump the straw man that FOX created. A good portion of his voters voted for Fox Trump, not Real Trump. These voters can also be characterized as the gullible and uninformed. The voters who enjoy and admire his cruelty are certainly there, but if you got rid of Fox News, you would get rid of many of the destructive, immoral, spineless Republicans now in office. I think that was front and center in Murdoch's mind when he created Fox. He could see that Republican values did not resonate with the majority of voters, so he created Fox to whitewash their candidates and make them look more user-friendly so he could get more pro-business politicians into government. I blame Murdoch for a lot of what is wrong with America today.
Yes, there’s a fundamental problem with who we are as a people I agree. But people plan careers and politics for 25 or 30 years so they could become president he just did the whole thing on a lark. And yeah, why is popularity? The two reasons that I believe our number 30 years of Fox News pumping propaganda and unopposed. Secondly income disparity/affordability incrementally, squeezing the middle class over the last 30 years (likely due to Republican deregulation policies). America was living through a slow motion, Weimar republic scenario.
Might be true. If you take all of the bad qualities of all of these people and then inject them into a James Bond level sociopathic narcissist well then you get Donald Trump.
You have a point. But regardless of Trump's venality, there are intelligent and motivated cabinet and administrative members who DO have an authoritarian agenda and they are the ones we need to be worried about. Stephen Miller has way too much power over the rest of Trump's goons. The only thing we can hope for is self-implosion as the thirst for influence and power causes a massive back-stabbing incident.
Mob bosses have ideologies, and being a mob boss (there's no 'wanna be' here for Trump, just 'is') is not at all mutually exclusive to being an authoritarian. But I absolutely agree that 'mob boss' is the best frame to understand many Trumpian actions.
Not all those actions, e.g. ICE which is straight up fascist, but that may be e.g. the sensibility of Steven Miller passing through Trump's endorsement. This is how the Administration addresses the masses of regular people.
Trump doesn't concern himself with regular people. He only cares about people or institutions of some means, that have something he wants.
So yes the foreign policy is ABSOLUTELY shaking down other countries like the mob shakes down a business. But the mob does not limit this to protection money, also forcing the business to aid in various aspects of the larger criminal enterprise. The owners of the businesses remain in place formally, but act under the watchful eye of an enforcer who insures they'll comply when called on 'to return a favor'.
This is not just a parallel of how Trump deals with other countries, but how he deals with media companies, law firms, universities... I suspect it's how he'll deal with the oil companies reluctant to go back into Venezuela.
The problem is that the pundits are applying other frames to the 'Donroe Doctrine' conquest agenda. MAGA is not going to 'run Venezuela' by replacing the regimes functionaries with Americans, or putting our military boots on the ground. Nor will we invade Greenland. Trump will simply make sure Maduro's gang, or the Danes, or whoever will 'do him a favor' when he asks by 'making them an offer they don't refuse'.
I’m going to disagree. He’s just a sociopath narcissistic criminal who has only one objective to make himself more powerful to make himself richer. Hitler’s prime goal was to be the most powerful person in the world. I’m not sure that Trump puts that on the top of the list. Money is more important to him. And how he gets it is entirely criminal. Why does it matter? Because if you were covering a mafia kingpin like John Gotti, you wouldn’t be trying to figure out what his underlying political ideology was. Oh, this looks like a Neo conservative intervention in South America. Or that’s odd tariffs are a democratic thing not a free trade Republican thing. He’s a heterodox politician. All that is painfully naïve. Tariffs for instance are just an extortion racket. That’s all that’s been behind at the entire time. That’s why he’s lying about where the money comes from. He’s just using it to shake down other governments and industry for more power so he can get more money and maybe stay on.
But Mussolini was basically a career politician that started a party. Trump was running for office to increase his profile so he could negotiate a better deal for the next season of apprentice. This is the accidental presidential criminal.
He attempted a coup to stay out of prison. He didn’t really create the current party. He just said all the quiet parts out loud. This was always Republicans. Or at least Republicans since LBJ. When the Dixiecrats ran over to the other side that was it.
Bernie Sanders said Trump was a good politician? I don’t think he meant he was a good person, I don’t think he meant he supported his policies, I think what he said was that he’s able to get his message across and sway people. Trump is profoundly ignorant, but exceedingly clever. He’s not stupid. He’s just enormously ignorant. He also doesn’t buy into any world view that looks anything different than might is right and law of the jungle. He’s basically a street thug.
Putin has the Epstein files sitting on his desk. That’s what’s ultimately changed geopolitics. Well yeah, I agree, but the radical part is to look at this not through the lens of a political authoritarian, but through the lens of a criminal organization. Nobody would ever sit there and try to think of Al Capone‘s motivations. They’re pretty obvious. So if we ditch the authoritarian nonsense I just think of him as sociopathic narcissistic criminal. Everything else is really easy to figure out. Don’t you think?
Criminal organization is correct. I don't believe Putin has the Epstein files on his desk, I believe he has proof positive of Donald's money laundering operations for his Russian oligarch friends. Been going on for decades.
“So which is it to be? A stand for liberty in the spirit of Thomas Paine, or acquiescence to the depredations of our own mad King George? The rule of law or the rule of Trump?”
Is this a trick question? For two thirds of this country I would say the rule of law; however, the last third; not so much!
In 1941, Dorothy Thomson wrote an article in Harper’s Bizarre (JVL wrote about it in a past Triad): Who goes Nazi. I think it’s fair to say we know exactly who these people are in our society; starting with Miller and Hegseth; although in those cases, they were always Nazi’s; or at least fascists, playing the part! IMHO…:)
Trump is a self-proclaimed king. He doesn't have centuries of traditional lore of benevolent kings to measure himself with. He has no sense of noblesse oblige. He has no honor.
Making the West Wing the same height as the ballroom, which is the same height as the residence will do exactly nothing to make these changes in balance or aesthetic. The whole thing will be a monstrosity, much like Trump himself.
RE: "The rule of law was central to the American experiment. Is it still?"
The rule of law (not men) IS the American experiment.
Without it - and the "liberal" in liberal democracy - America will simply be not an "experiment" but a 21st century version of rehashed royal and aristocratic authoritarianism, with oligarchs forming the court of a dimwitted, ego-driven monarch wearing a stupid trucker hat instead of a crown.
This raises an old question: Are we 'evolved' enough to hold a democracy together? Can we rule ourselves with reason and equanimity? Or, are we too brutish and naive to expect something like democracy to work?
Well, the way I look at it is that democracy has worked for us a for a quarter of a millennium... nowhere near perfectly, and we completely "broke it" once, creating a civil war, but then managed to put it back together again.
So, I think the answer is Yes, we *are* actually evolved "enough" to hold a democracy together. And even to fix it if it becomes damaged or breaks. The larger and more pertinent question might be: Are there enough of us who *want* either of those things "enough" to make them happen, with the challenges of the 21st century being different than those of the 19th?
Yes. I gave that some thought. We almost lost it in the 1860s and Europe has tried and struggled with democracy in the 20th century. South American countries go back and forth with it.
I currently see it as an aspirational goal for those who can envision society whose vision is not obscured by the need for immediate gratification.
In societies where complexity and variety aren't valued, democracy has an uphill climb. Or so it appears.
I think that last is the key about the value(s) that makes a democracy of any stripe possible, but particularly and especially a 'liberal' democracy with decentralized power and serious and effective checks and balances on that power to prevent exactly what we are now experiencing.
We obviously now need something "more" in that regard that doesn't depend so much on the good faith and conscience of those in power to respect not only rules and traditions but the very law itself, though I have no idea what, exactly, that "more" would be. Somehow making the pardon power of the president not exclusively his alone would be a start, perhaps involving the co-approval of a completely independent body of some sort. NOT the Congress, obviously. Nor the Supremes.
Would probably get better decisions from a kindergarten class than either of those two. Seriously.
I also think the climb is *always* uphill for democracy, liberty and freedom. History paints democracy and democratic liberty and freedom as the exception and not the rule for the world writ-large for most of its existence. The U.S. is actually an aberration in the history of men's desires to rule over their fellow men.
BTW... What's your theory of the development of morality, if you can do sort of a summary to give me some idea of it. Having discussed a few things with you in the past, I'd be interested in hearing about it.
Thomas Paine and his cohort were highly educated men passing on concepts of governance to people who were intelligent enough (even if not formally educated) to engage with those concepts and make an informed decision about what they wanted for themselves and their neighbors.
That is no longer descriptive of half the population in this country.
Too many of us are loathe to call Trump supporters stupid, ignorant, uneducated, uninformed, etc. because it is offensive, it is unknowable, it is unkind, yada, yada, yada, but I think until there is an accounting for how many of our citizens were duped by a con man and continue to ride that ride rather than face reality, we will never move beyond this horror show.
I agree, Mary. We were endlessly lectured by legacy media (NYT, WaPo) to try harder to understand Trump voters. Interesting that such advice never was applied to them.
How many are willing to back authoritarianism if it will benefit them? How many want some sort of white male strongman? How many of these people like that "blue" (so "enemy" in their minds) cities are being occupied like conquered land? We don't want to admit how many people there are who think like this, but it clearly is quite a few.
Mary, Thomas Paine was a singular individual. At times his views meshed with his cohort and he was very inspirational. He also was very radical in ways that put him outside the mainstream and he ended his life alone and mostly forgotten. His story is worth thinking about.
I am aware. I am also willing to say that “radicals” are often seen as dangerous. I guess I would argue that taking a stance because you want to be remembered is not really what we should be aiming for. The status quo is a powerful force that allows most people to simply put their heads down and remain uninformed.
I am thinking of millions of Germans (and others) in the 1930’s…..
It seems to me that the ultimate answer to all of the rulings SCOTUS has to make is whether they understand that what THEY believe the Unitary Presidency to be, the Felon has his own idea and they do not mesh. They believe that a Unitary President combines Executive and Legislative powers, to hell with the Constitution. He believes that, even further into Hell with that abominal limitation on him, it encorporates all three branches into one, his and his alone. Ipso facto, this also means he is free to ignore what the other two want if it contradicts his own idea of what his "morality" (man, it is an abomination to use that word with him, the most immoral President we have ever had) says he should do, as he said in his interview with the New York Times.
yes but the justices clearly believe in the unitary executive powers of presidents they like, not so much if the president is black, female or in any way liberal and Trump believes in Trump’s executive powers not in anybody else’s the same way he believes in the power of his justices to make decisions in his favour
The Roberts Court decided to endow the presidency with broadly defined immunity for illegal acts. One can’t help but wonder if SCOTUS would have reached this decision if it seemed unlikely that Donald Trump would regain the presidency. We do know that Robert, Alito and apparently others on court were adherents to the unitary executive theory (textualists, try to find that in the Constitution). Do they also believe in the divine right of Donald?
They believe in their particular strain of Christianity holding sway in America and themselves remaining in their seats until they're ready to leave, and their pension.
Whatever they might think about the "divine right" of Donald, they think that's better than letting the left have power if they can possibly prevent it and not end up with pitchforks and scythes not only on the steps of their court but the steps of their own homes.
Another reason to be angry at Biden. He had the same executive immunity, and he never even touched it. He could have put Trump under house arrest, as a possible test of the theory.
Whenever I read about Trump becoming a monarch, I am always reminded of Trumpkins' comments when, in 2017, NPR did their annual reading of the Declaration of Independence. Trump voters were angry that NPR would denigrate Trump with this reading. Boy, were they onto something. I would bet examples of Trump's usurpations could be found for almost each one listed.
“Cheap shots: I agree with Andrew; “when Kirk was shot, these people considered us complicit in the violence.”
That said, this is why I always said that holding our tongues will play right into their hands. They even used Kirk’s memorial to demonize democrats further. And Trump, always the showmen, uses his pulley pulpit to demonize democrats and critics alike, as well as to further his own selfish ambitions.
Now with Trump signing NSPM-7, we’re all domestic terrorists; if we even have the audacity to look at an ICE agents cross eyed! This national security memorandum is illegal. We need to sue, because this is the Trump card Trump will use to hold all of us to account.; no pun intended!
They can deem anyone who criticizes Ice as a domestic threat. They can put you on the no fly list and run investigations to silence us all. So stay vigilant and get out the vote!
Lastly, does anyone still think ICE is a legitimate agency, and not a bunch of stormtroopers under the president’s control, without any congressional oversight? Today we stand on perilous grounds; the midterms may be our last hope! IMHO…:)
I fear that the most recent ICE shooting event has become a breaking point for many of us in our ability, even desire, to engage with those who disagree with us and try to find common ground upon which we can build. On the surface it is yet another politicized moment in which different people of different beliefs have their say. But scratch that surface and it feels like what is underneath has passed an inflection point at which it still can be formed and shaped into something useful.
I’m no longer concerned about generalizing. The problem has become too big for all of us to worry about someone’s individual sensitivities. Far too many on the political right simply have lost all semblance of human compassion and empathy and understanding of our system of community for it to survive intact, even for our system of laws to be effective. The required element of cooperation and shared standards of decency are no longer in place when something as fundamental as needless loss of life becomes a rallying point for a bloodthirsty culture to promote its agenda of divide and conquer. As usual, social media is where these self-proclaimed patriots and saviors of morality go to say out loud what they do not vocalize openly in public spaces otherwise. It is where their ugliest selves go to find companionship and support for levels of anger and hatred that can have no good end. Suggest that surely we can agree that what happened in Minneapolis should not have risen to the level of a spontaneous death sentence, and get called every profane name and ethnic slur in the book, and then some, as these supposedly fine Christians and parents of impressionable children morph into an irrational, inhuman, threatening life form that argues for a judgment that they should not be walking around loose, outside of a cage. This is the starting point with them. One reasonably fears what they would do upon escalation if they cannot control themselves on such a basic level to start with.
I have stopped trying to reach these people with mature, adult appeals to their better nature and attempts to identify common ground. It has become impossible. And, so, now what? I have never been more cynical about how low our society can and will go, especially when our political leadership practices no restraint anymore and influencers run around unchecked in profiting personally from the strife and discord. I often ask myself what would happen if our nation had to endure another Pearl Harbor or September 11 moment at this point. Historically we have come together at such inflection points. Now I’m inclined to think that 40 percent of our population would simply say that stupid libtards are behind it and Biden, Obama, and Hillary created the conditions for it to happen. Never before have we been so ripe for takeover by foreign governments who rejoice in our inability to have even civil discussions about shared problems. This cannot end well. The only question has become the timing and the depth of how much they can take advantage of the societal suicide of both democracy and mature adult behavior in our nation.
I’m guessing none of our Founding Fathers had any of this on their Bingo cards in the 1770s, if they even tried to envision what America in the 2020s would become, on our watch. Shame on us collectively as we dishonor the yeoman’s work that they did to gift us a nation worthy of our best instincts instead of our worst behavior.
Just to be clear, I “liked” your take on all of this insanity, not the fact that this level of insanity is now a palpable reality in this once proud nation.
Sadly, we are all witness to the destruction of norms, institutions, and fundamental values that have served as guideposts and aspirational touchstones for 250 years, at least. I figured out a long time ago - all on my own - that it’s a whole lot easier to tear something down than it is to build and maintain it.
I cannot deny that I experience waves of despair as I see one thing after another crumble, with no relief in sight. The grotesque demolition and planned reconstruction in trump’s image of the White House is jarringly emblematic of what is happening to every element of our political and economic system.
And Renee Good’s children have been orphaned at the hands of a masked gunman in service to the duly elected “leader” of our country. WTF has happened to this nation?
More than that. She is damned and vilified by the likes of Noem, Trump, and Fox with not a shred of information to back them up. Even seeing the film, Felon Trump did not alter his statement. This group is out of control.
"...out of control..." = amoral.
and Imoral
You fixed my comment for the better. Thanks.
Believe it or not, I'm working on a philosophical project concerning the origins of morality. Current events appear to be cooperating with my hypothesis.
Best of luck. I hope to read it some day.
Noem (and those of her ilk) thought of Renee Nicole Good like she thought of her dog, Cricket. Cricket didn't do exactly what Noem wanted, when she wanted. So, that dog deserved to die. Period.
Makes sense. Noem is not up there among the great humanitarians. She’ll be pardoned by the felon like all the others either before he leaves office or before he is impeached and removed. Threes the charm! I hope.
I'm pretty sure Trump didn't watch the video. He just said other's talking points
I am so incensed about this in general that I have to rant. No one can watch the videos and definitively say she was trying to ram the agent on purpose so for Trump, Noem, Vance, and the other influencers to even say what they did within the first 24 hours of the incident is monumentally wrong and frankly I think it's just another example of why they are poor excuses for human beings (now as a religious person I will go repent for saying that)
I think that you’re correct. Vance and Trump are both fueled by their narcissistic resentments, and Noem is someone I think is a genuine psychopath.
I was reading The Boston Globe today, and I counted 3-4 different fools saying that Ms Good aimed her car toward the man. This after she was shot! No body could tell them anything. And these were responses to the article where it is standard police procedure to not stand in front of or near a vehicle. This procedure started with the NY City police and is 25 years in practice. Keep ranting. We should form a chorus.
Same
Heather Cox Richardson said it unequivocally in her message yesterday; we are living under fascism.
I’ll be attending the protest in my little town today, organized by Indivisible. But I’m really thinking about something Adam Kinzinger said yesterday; “The chaos that exhausts us, energizes them”. Which makes me think boycotts and strikes might be a better tool.
Agreed. We now live in a fascist state.
The founding fathers were so intellectual I think they weren't privy to how stupid the rabble could get in their own country. They feared the singular tyrant with infinite wealth and power at his fingertips. They didn't fear the bloodthirsty mob that could be stirred up by the Tyrant.
If you read Lincoln's Lyceum Address you can learn how, at age 28, he understood how violent lawless mobs attack and undermine the rule of law. Lincoln's Lyceum Address describes with stunning accuracy and clarity our current crisis and I have never been able to persuade anyone to actually read it. (Which I guess, in a way proves your point.) I think of Lincoln as being one of the founders of our Republic because he shepherded and brought about necessary corrections in the founding of our republic, to bring us closer to aligning with the father of all of our American civil moral values, namely, dedication to the proposition that all people are created equal. Fascism as a system of government that is dedicated to the opposite proposition that all people are NOT created equal. I can think of no better way to describe and understand the Trump regime.
The whole reason the electoral college exists is because they did not trust the "mob" at all...
I have to agree with how this feels. So much of what this administration has done has been increasingly shocking and disturbing if not surprising, but the level of blatant falsehood and disregard has really ramped up between this and Venezuela.
Seeing right-wing takes after Caracas was wild and head scratching. Seeing their take on Good's shooting is one of the few things I'd call horrific on the level of something like Jan 6th, and completely demoralizing. Anyone who can engage in such bad faith after seeing that footage is beyond help or reconciliation.
It's mob mentality online - wherever people have gathered in groups, through all time, get enough together with a combination of emotion and ignorance and we lose all rational restraints. Except we've gone from pitchforks to profane insults from anonymous angry people. Progress?
Like Sonny Bunch said in his recent pod: All the weirdos have found each other. So, now they can flash mob anything.
I do so enjoy reading your words. They flow like the paint of a fine artist or the notes of fine musician. I ask that you and the others in The Bulwark community who share your talent. (There are many that I enjoy) refrain from participating in what may come to this country. This country will need as many of you and those like you when it is over.
Some will need to keep their hands clean, while others get theirs dirty. Ain't nothing good coming. Thank you.
Thank you, Mickey. I appreciate your kind words. What I find myself doing is moving to a more subtle but, hopefully, more effective form of legal resistance to the regime. Instead of wasting valuable time and sanity arguing with people who will not be moved, I ask myself which individuals or groups of people can be helped best and most by what skill sets I do have, and then going to them as an ally in both spirit and deed with an engaged mind and hands that are capable of some heavy lifting. The operative question is whom those on the far right would not want for us to assist in their time of need, and then act accordingly. It is legal, it is ethical, and it is morally right. I urge others to join me in this quest to build up others via a strength-in-numbers approach and create a stronger sense of community around us, where it is needed. Each one, reach one, or ten, or a hundred, where both talent and desire allow it. It is much better math for our democracy in the end.
Subscribe to Tim.
Your assessment is spot on. Yet I'm afraid that we're all afraid to look at the obvious: Can humans do democracy - and keep it? Being able to see contingencies "down the road" doesn't appear to be our strong suit.
I had some women friends for lunch yesterday, and we all sadly agreed that we are now citizens of a rogue nation. The question now is what to do about it. We agreed to keep demonstrating. It's about the only thing we can do, along with donating to good Democratic candidates. But even then, that assumes there will actually be elections.
General Strike. If the half that doesn't want this stops doing anything and everything, then this will maybe come to a stop.
Well said, although I’d posit they feared exactly the type of person Trump is: The mad king.
The problem was that they couldn’t envision a democracy under the control of two parties, and an inept Congress unwilling to do their constitutionally mandated jobs! Or a SCOTUS willing to do the bidding of a tyrant; even carving out an unconstitutional immunity clause in the constitution for such a man!
After all, when asked what type of government we have, Benjamin Franklin calmly replied, “a republic, if we can hold it”; hence, the American experiment! IMHO…:)
Counter-inuitively your post gives me hope. I would have said we're past the point of worrying about generalizations years ago. Perhaps I was pre-mature to be so certain about it but even still it is quite clear that is what needs to happen to have a chance of resisting an opposing group hell bent on dominating you, civility and rule of law be damned. The fact that the hold outs on the Dem side are starting to come around gives me some hope that *if* we are lucky enough to have legit elections and win a majority of power in 2026 and 2028 we will actually exercise it to combat MAGA rather than electing another appeasement candidate like Joe Biden. It will likely mean great strife but that is the only realistic chance we have of saving the rule of law and democracy.
Not arguing with you but how do you define appeasement? If it is to try to get things done on a bipartisan basis under the traditional rules, is this even possible? If that is the definition, who, among the Dems, is not an appeasement candidate? Maybe Gavin Newsom? If the Dems are going to switch to a combat philosophy, who can carry that out? How long before we can purge the house and senate of the appeasers and elect combatants? I will admit I have no answers and have been accused of "giving up" but how does it work?
I define it as governing with a primary focus on avoiding any conflict with MAGA. In practice that meant pretty much only tackling kitchen table issues (by which I mean tangible but surface level issues; not a bad thing and has immediate impact but also doesn't fix much if anything long term) or issues at least some marginal MAGA voters care about while avoiding most other policy issues. In the case of immigration it meant giving up almost all Dem priorities on the issue simply to make the issue go away (and still not closing the deal).
It certainly meant avoiding/slow pedaling tackling any structural issues with our system of government, punishing/shaming/containing criminals and bad actors on the MAGA side, or addressing an policy that might help in this struggle but might also inflame some element of MAGA. At a messaging level it meant throwing other members of the pro-democracy coalition that MAGA doesn't like under the bus where possible rather than prioritizing strengthening the coalition.
"If that is the definition, who, among the Dems, is not an appeasement candidate?"
Almost no traditional Dems which is why I have been voting Progressives almost regardless of policy preference for a decade. They've been the only ones willing. I wouldn't mind the old guard if they changed their tactics significantly though I have my doubts that is humanly possible.
As for your other questions, I have no answers. I'll be honest the hope I have been gaining at seeing the appeasement theory of politics, which has been ascendant in Dem circles at least since the Tea party started us down this path towards fascism, start to crumble are still small drops in a large bucket of dispair. Hopefully Dems are ready for something new in the primaries this year and we can get them elected but even if the Dem party turns on a dime is it too little too late? That seems quite possible to me. There is nothing else to be done but plod forward in that direction for now but I'm definitely keeping my eyes open for alternatives.
"...some hope that *if* we are lucky enough to have legit elections..."
We Never-Trumpers can, and had better, "make our own luck." The cult doesn't even pretend not to try to rig, steal or even ban elections. But they are cowards, emboldened only by sheer mass, not strength. We are stronger, braver and greater in number. We need to stop being distracted by Epstein, TACO's mental and physical health, and yes, even ICE. And especially our own destructive internal disagreements. Rather we must focus like a laser beam on the only issue that matters in the long run: making sure future elections are free and fair. The cult knows it can't win fairly in '26 or '28, and if it can't cheat, will be forced to "eat its own." In fact, a bit of that has started already with MTG and a few others. Let's exploit that. Divide & conquer!
Man, I've not worried so much about the state of the world since the very early 80s when I would lie in bed thinking bombs were going to drop any time. Yesterday was as sure a sign as any, right up their with Kent State and George Floyd, that shit's going sideways. The problem isn't just us here in the USA. It's everybody, everywhere! I don't think there's a corner of the world you can go to now to get away from it.
I can see massive global conflict erupting within the next year, let alone before the end of Trump's time in office. I've certainly said it before, but even if Trump dropped off the face of the earth today, we'll be spiraling for the next 30? 50? 80 years? Hell, maybe those time frames are optimistic, because we've all but ensured that we're rushing towards a Skynet/Weyland-Yutani lead future state, picking our way every day through a tangle of fiber optic cables, and ducking every time a drone flies overhead. There may not be a skinsuit cyborg in our midst, but that Amazon drone flying overhead was hacked and is now carrying a bomb. Meanwhile, your enemy isn't just North Korea, but an INCEL twenty something living in the neighborhood over that's enraged that he isn't getting any attention from girls or his parents.
The tech giants and their insidious algorithms are killing American decency and sense of benevolent community. As long as they continue to prosper and allow this anonymous culture to flourish, we are in trouble. I may sound like a weirdo, but the more I see how damaging social media is, the more I feel like it is the all-encompassing Beast predicted in Revelations.
10 thumbs up, Tim!
I could have written this about me. Very well stated.
I have to agree with your points, but more so the last being the eventuality of us suffering through an attack of epic proportions is an absolute eventuality because we are so divided. Too many shiny objects to distract us and with our CIA, FBI and NSC being laser focused on black and brown people to get rid of, this probability is epically high. Trump is working to secure the western hemisphere and let Europe and Eurasia have their kingdom. We have to be prepared that even a mid-term election is more than likely not going to happen, let alone another election in 2028...example is the ballroom and add-on of the west wing. Need I say more? America is a failed state but too many have failed to recognize it and it gives me no pleasure in recognizing it.
“But 47 percent said Trump “creates chaos and makes things worse.” If young men saw Trump as a change agent last November, it seems they no longer do.”
Sadly, I’m not sure this changes the dynamic. They may not like Trump, but it seems they hate democrats more.
I’ll keep an open mind, but unfortunately, this group is fickle, and are easily triggered; so their opinions can change on a dime! IMHO…:)
More likely is they go back to just not voting.
Agreed!…:)
I'd take it.
The problem is, of course, that they don't go away. Their fear and angst and anger will not dissipate by ignoring it.
And they reappear when the next demagogue shows up.
Like cicadas they burrow down into the earth (their parent's basements) and then erupt forth when the time is right.
Young men seem to seek chaos. As I wrote above, Adam Kinzinger noted that the chaos exhausts us, but energizes them.
I don’t disagree, but unfocused and undisciplined energy; is energy wasted.
When I speak of the youth, I’m talking about young union members for Trump. They support him because they see immigration as a threat to their way of life; fair enough!
However, they aren’t educated enough to understand how economies thrive; they don’t understand that using a mix of immigrant and union members means more projects and more jobs, reducing the risk they may one day be unemployed.
Instead, they’re focused on their own interests, which in the end, will be their death kneel.
As far as the rest of the youth, college educated or not, they’re learning quickly as the college kids are saddled with debt and no job, while the high school graduate watches all his options disappear overnight.
I’m not suggesting the entire economy will suffer; the top ten to 20 percent will continue to live up luxury, while everyone else competes for the scraps.
That said, even during the Great Depression only 25% of Americans were unemployed. The problem was that the jobs available just barely kept the lights on for most workers and families. IMHO…:)
I’m starting to think small protests are in your category of wasted energy. The big, nationwide “Hands Off” and “No Kings” were effective, but the random small ones are questionable.
As to workers’ fears and the economy, as we march onward in misogyny - Trump fired a disproportionate number of female bureaucrats - there’s a fact that the Christian Nationalists don’t understand; all countries that disenfranchise women are third world economies. Or maybe they do understand it and prefer to rule tyrannically over a wasteland than to share power over an advanced society.
JF, strong disagree on the value of small protests.
Handfuls of protesters on street corners are keeping the message of resistance front and center for everyone who drives past.
In a fragmented media environment, these rallies reach out to countless citizens who aren’t following The Bulwark, Heather Cox Richardson, Aaron Parnas, Robert Hubbell, etc, etc.
Small protests invite everyone to join in, even if just by honking, and reassure people that they are not the crazy ones.
Without small protests, big protests couldn’t be as big.
Thank you, Marcia. I really hope you are right. Sometimes I feel like we are dismissed as silly Boomer hippies. In truth, it’s mostly elders who have the time to attend small protests. I can’t say I’m fired up, but I am ready to go. Being among strangers who share values is good medicine,
There does seem to be a lot of ridicule of protests being full of fellow oldsters. But the way I see it, in addition to having more time than those still in the work/kids phases of life, as a white woman born in the literal post-WWII era I have lived my whole life with the post WWII liberal order in place, and have benefited mightily from it. Seems like I ought to be doing something more to try to pay it forward.
And the protests are important for morale. Keeping the momentum going is crucial. (Taking mental health breaks from the news is even more important.)
Agreed, as for Christian nationalists, they understand completely; it’s their worldview. They just don’t understand the impacts, not unlike Trump’s “Bull in a China shop” foreign policy; eventually the chickens come home to roost!…:)
Yes, we are in agreement; they don’t understand the impacts. The right was so freaked out that Muslim immigrants would bring and demand Sharia Law. Hah! Christian Nationalism will yield the same results.
Exactly. Unfortunately, they’ve been indoctrinated and lied to their entire lives; it takes years to indoctrinate, and even more years to deprogram these people; so good luck with that!..:)
I think they're OK with the USA being a thrid world country if they feel like they have personal power.
That must be it, in a nutshell. I recently read a piece from The Rational League here on Substack, that took a deep dive into the mindset of MAGA women. Brief takeaway; they want the racism to feel higher status than minorities, and they want the protection of MAGA males. The second one is a weird calculus because domestic violence is much higher in places that vote MAGA.
But it "feels" so alive!
Brownian motion in a stead state fluid isn't all that exciting. Throw in a high temperature delta and things get interesting.
I have to disagree as well. This shooting was a terrible tragedy but the small ICE protests in the communities they are raiding have been extremely effective in hampering their work and protecting potential targets. I also feel when I see the boomers are out there every day or a few times a week, I am with them in spirit even if I'm too busy to be out there with them all the time
In a larger sense, the US is going through an (male) adolescent rebellion. Tired of being confined by sissy rules. They want to dominate or have their leader dominate, act on impulse rather than thinking too much, and watch the demolition of all the old stuff that they feel is confining them.
Yep, this reminds me of all the people I know who insist they hate Trump but continue voting for him anyway. Until I see an actual change at the ballot box I'm not convinced.
Chaos or change is there really that much difference? If you think there isn’t then the French Revolution would like to have word. But more seriously despite all the chaos which tends to mask things, Trump has wrought more change in his first year than any prior president in our lifetime.
Indeed, just not in a good way…:)
Change done in response to chaos is not necessarily the sort of change that makes things better than they were. Many times the change is just something different with no perceivable improvement in the situation.
I didn’t say the change was better. There is chaos from the Trump administration, but there has been deliberate change in long standing policy and to how the Executive Branch functions. This was deliberate if chaotically implemented. Two things should have been clear about a 2nd Trump presidency 1) it would be chaotic as everything with Trump is, and 2) he was advocating radical change to the relationship between government and the people for whom the government is supposed to serve. Was it going to be harmful and chaotic? Yes, but also deliberate.
No guardrails + Project 2025 owners’manual.
Fortunately, young men as a group are low-propensity voters. Approximately 40% voted in 2024, and only slightly more than half voted for Trump. I’m not going to lose much sleep worrying about what 20% of generally idiotic young men (I was one!) say or think. I’d even wager that many “influencers” in their cohort didn’t vote. They just make a lot of noise and say stupid shit.
Agreed, but this group as you know is easily triggered; that’s the problem. We have no idea what “October Surprise” these goons have in store, but given their record, you can be sure it will be a doozy!…:)
They are kind of like Susan Collins: Concerned. But not enough to abandon ship. They still see Trump as merely a slightly wayward relative, and continue to believe we need a strongman to battle those evil vicious Democrats.
Agreed, and sadly, we are no longer the opposition; we’re the enemy!…:)
Remember in 2016 when many of us felt worried and anxious about a potential Trump presidency? Remember when Comey made his "October Surprise" that some claim derailed Sen. Clinton's presidential run? Our anxiety ran higher than normal. We were feeling something in our gut that we couldn't name. Was it intuition? Was it visionary dread? No. It wasn't fuzzy supernaturalism. For those of us that knew just a little about Trump, we knew he had no moral compass.
I suspect that few of us know people who aren't possessed with an innate moral direction. Most humans are. Most of us know when we tell a lie, we feel an emotional pin prick, or maybe a little whisper reminding us that the lie we told wasn't the right thing to do. There are a few of us that don't have that kind of internal voice.
When Trump was elected, it wasn't just that we disliked his ideas. It wasn't that we hated his positions on issues. It was that he didn't have something that almost every human has - a moral voice. We felt anxiety, fear, dread, concern, and we were called, "deranged."
It turns out that derangement wasn't our problem. We have something built within us that detects people or animals that have destruction or harm in mind. We know what it is, if only by an emotional sense. It is a disquieting fear that cannot find words. This is an intuitive power that can save lives. Our leader is who we felt he would be. Our 2016 fears have come home to roost.
This. I remember the comment “ I paid no/ less taxes,and that makes me smart”comment from Trump before the election, and it bugged me. Of all the things, it was relatively minor. I shared this concern with my dad, a small business owner, who looked at me like I had two heads. Well of course I feel that way too, thought my dad. What I couldn’t express at the time is that to be president you are serving the country. If you are bragging about how you mooch or cut corners on service to the country, you have no business in offfice. You have no concept of the social contract between people and their government.
RE: "...no concept of the social contract between people and their government."
Pretty sure based just on his record as a (so-called) businessman that Trump looks at *any* contract as binding only so long as it suits his purpose and as something to casually be broken for his own gain and / or convenience.
A question is, why didn’t Trump voters see and fear what we feared? I think an awful lot of Americans have dark hearts. That’s a huge source of my own grief. I’m now scared of my fellows; especially those I don’t know. It’s very subtly isolating.
They saw it and they wanted it. He hated the same people they did - the "others", those that are different.
Some saw him as a successful businessman and accepted his tax evasion as just what a smart businessman does. Plus he didn't talk like a "politician" but rather talks like a lot of people do when they don't really understand what government is or does but have plenty of opinions about it. Plus he shared their grievances. People resent hearing Spanish spoken by their fellow customers in the grocery store.
But so many saw that! And were all in. Scary many. Many apparently have reconsidered, but still....so many so quickly were lapping up what Trump was. I was horrified watching the election returns come in. I'll never understand.
I guess that’s how more primitive brains operate.
I'm convinced that the most educated Trump apologists see his contempt for rules and norms and ethics and basic human decency as an advantage in attacking their political opponents. They have chosen amoral means to achieve what they claim is a higher moral purpose,
Others of us have believed from the beginning that any movement that sees a sociopath as its heroic standard bearer cannot be guided by moral purpose.
Trumpism is an alliance of:
(1) the under-educated/ignorant/distractable,
(2) the aggrieved and bigoted malcontents with authoritarian leanings,
(3) the cynical, nihilistic opportunists
Those are the three legs of the stool of Trumpism. Trump pulls it together organically in ways that other politicians have a hard time emulating because I think all three describe Trump himself.
You've left out the "genial, yet gullible". I know many of these.
I am experiencing something similar. Though I admit, I'm not surprised by the perception that short term gains are better than long term ones. The short term views have an obscuring affect.
As a society we have lost an important element of stability; delayed gratification. It’s a virtue both individually and societally.
It gave them a sense of identity. They also thought, "I want the same, so maybe some of the spoils will rain down upon me too."
The sense of identity is something reporters at MAGA rallies have written about. I guess their churches aren’t enough? (Actually, I think a lot of self-proclaimed “Christians” rarely attend services. What a surprise. To them religion is a cudgel for control, not a set of virtues.)
Really, what else do people have these days? I mean, the NFL is taking their teams to foreign countries anymore, so does it really mean anything to be a Chiefs fan? That's where people went to find identity, after they stopped going to church, stopped talking to their neighbors, etc., etc. Chevy vs Ford? Boring, because nearly anyone can build a half decent car these days (except maybe Stellantis). They needed something. They choose fascism.
I feel you. After watching the shooting video I immediately sent to to my MAGA family and cut them off for good. I told them I was scared of what people complicit with this regime could eventually do, and that includes them . It is so very painful and isolating.
Exactly. And very well said.
Trump has proven he's a vessel completely empty of the most basic positive and generally productive human traits and is filled instead with nothing but an insatiable appetite for that which he will never, ever have: the satisfaction borne of recognizing one's own self-worth (along with one's "success" in life) in relation to one's own judgement about the worth and "success" of others.
That sounds a bit cringy, I know. But we *all* sit in judgement of ourselves heavily informed by what we think of others and the values and behaviors *they* possess and exhibit. And Trump can never fill the void within himself which his unrelenting hunger for riches, power and attention creates, all born, I believe, of a defect in his nature regarding his self-esteem, of which he's unaware but wouldn't attempt to change in the slightest if he were.
Because he likes being always "hungry". He *needs* to always be hungry. He wouldn't know what the hell to do with himself if he weren't.
My own value judgement about Donald Trump is simple, straight forward and admittedly severe, but I believe well-deserved - formed starting nearly 4 decades ago as I became more and more aware of who and what he was, and confirmed and solidified over the past decade:
As a man, as a human being, he possesses no redeeming value whatsoever. Period.
He's a net negative.
The Minus Man. Sans the smarts and soft-spokeness.
And, of course, the fact that he lets others do the killing for him.
YES. I had never felt such existential dread and fear as I felt when it was clear that he had won. The second time was even worse.
Yes, many of us were up close and personal with malignant narcissists growing up, but nobody would listen. But many of us came from cultures of abuse, especially in our churches. Churches fraught with sexual abuse cover it up and do nothing to help victims of sexual assaults inside the church. That attitude is conveyed to the faithful. Do not help victims, always stay on the side of the abusers. As long as churches follow THAT golden rule, people like Trump will always rise to the top.
Yes. I cried in 2016. Not that I loved Hilary Clinton that much, but I just felt the doom that Americans as a whole had lost their moral compass. I knew he’d get elected in 2024 while still striving and hoping for Kamala.
Since the inauguration I have tried to build more of a community around myself. We aren’t going to change any minds. All we can do is help those in our communities that need it and behave like the Christians (I’m agnostic) that they claim to be.
I should say that I continue to speak out and protest, but fighting online is pointless.
Absolutely SPOT ON! I knew what trump was like back in the 80's - a total sham, freak as well as immoral but moreover corrupt as fuck and I was in my 20's in the 80's...my GUT has always been my guide and NEVER EVER steered me wrong!
I want to add another important point to Bill’s comments on Trump’s disregard for the and the fact that Republicans are not trying to force him to follow the Constitution. He is using his pardon power to undo convictions of dangerous criminals and drug dealers as well as more minor criminals who likely bribe him.
Marvin, I'm Garvin, and I'd like to build on what you're touching on here.
Over the past year or so it has become abundantly clear that Trump holds the very idea of laws in contempt. He just does not believe that the "losers" in the general population have any right to pass judgment on anyone's activities through the courts - especially if those convicted people are otherwise "winners." He feels like he, a winner, was betrayed by the court system and now he sees himself in just about everyone who was ever convicted of anything.
He won't pardon everyone, of course - I suspect as a real estate developer he'd draw the line at many property crimes, for instance, and he does have his general distrust of minorities - but for him every conviction is suspect and every sentence should be reconsidered (probably for a price).
Even outside of the graft and grift, though, I think he truly considers only his self-vaunted "morality" to be the arbiter of justice. It is the thinking of a "super-man" - the dangerous kind.
Bill, Andrew and Jim-Thank you for this piece and for The Bulwark’s position on this type of issue generally. Many of the other supposed Never Trumpers out there just natter on about desirable ends (without regard to means) and the benefits of a Unitary Executive, while disregarding or downplaying all the damage to the U.S. system being done.
This may sound radical, but I’m gonna say Trump is not an authoritarian. He’s merely a mafia don want to be. He’s the head of a crime family. Authoritarian implies some level of politics or political structure. None of that exists with him. Everything is a crime. His motivations are all criminal. There’s zero ideology. There’s just appearing strong so he can exert power and self enrich. He’s shaking down other countries like an enforcer would shake down businesses in a neighborhood for protection money. There’s nothing more than that. Stop over analyzing. Assume everything he does is criminal. Invading Venezuela is not some neo conservative policy, it’s just a way to steal their oil.
But unlike mob bosses, he wants crowds of adoring people coming up to him, “with tears in their eyes, saying Sir you are wonderful.” He needs this like oxygen.
Yes, there is that. But it’s not driven from politics. Think about it, a politician that wants people to love them does things that are good for the people. He has never done that. It’s always been a sham. He does short term things that are long-term killers. And besides, here’s the secret. If the people stop loving him, the elected Republicans will stop supporting him and he will be gone tomorrow. So he needs to be popular with the people in order to hold onto his power.
Totally agree Robert. It’s just that after following his trajectory for a lot of years, there is some mental disconnect. Politicians have learned to give the illusion of doing things for the people. Some people yes, but the people, not so much. That’s the Republican way. With Felon Trump, his rallies were love fests. He was tied to them, and they carried him to his second term. In his addled brain, this need is growing. He made campaign promises that he will never keep, but he wants them to stay with him just as before. The people love him so party members should bow down. If he looses a large portion of his base, in my opinion, he will have serious mental issues and he will start melting down publicly.
I think you need to rewatch Godfather 1 & 2.
Read the book. Did see two parts of the trilogy. My father was on Grand Juries when Gotti was being investigated. That’s enough for me.
Mob bosses want eternal praise. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, no exceptions.
But isn’t that from their members, cronies, and maybe family? I can’t see any mob boss having the rallies that Felon Trump had. My parents told me of a wedding they attended, held at a venue associated with one of the “families.” Very subdued, and subpar in services. No body was raving, and people left as quickly as they could.
I suppose I tend to think of the Mafia as always wanting approval from the Church. "I said my Hail Marys, I tithe, why are they still persecuting me?" Then they donate to colleges and museums to get their names on things. But I would hope that some bosses are smart enough to lay low. There's probably an intelligence spectrum.
Watch it? I wrote it!
The unending arrogance of the media trying to figure this guy out when it’s so painfully clear that he’s just a common criminal. I saw an Instagram reel of Jonathan Karl. I guess of ABC News reporting that Trump had told the New York Times that his morality was running the show. This guy actually makes a salary telling us what the news is about? Are you out of your mind? The press can’t get behind the idea that a street thug slipped into the White House not once but twice. It trivializes their contribution to the American experiment so they just can’t accept it so they keep rolling their eyes and saying how could this be? This is unprecedented. He’s a criminal. It’s not a criminal presidency. It’s a presidential criminal!
He didn't exactly slip into the Whtie House. He was enthusiastically placed there by people who admire his amoral thuggishness.
Yes and no. There is Trump the thuggish criminal, and there is Trump the straw man that FOX created. A good portion of his voters voted for Fox Trump, not Real Trump. These voters can also be characterized as the gullible and uninformed. The voters who enjoy and admire his cruelty are certainly there, but if you got rid of Fox News, you would get rid of many of the destructive, immoral, spineless Republicans now in office. I think that was front and center in Murdoch's mind when he created Fox. He could see that Republican values did not resonate with the majority of voters, so he created Fox to whitewash their candidates and make them look more user-friendly so he could get more pro-business politicians into government. I blame Murdoch for a lot of what is wrong with America today.
Yes, there’s a fundamental problem with who we are as a people I agree. But people plan careers and politics for 25 or 30 years so they could become president he just did the whole thing on a lark. And yeah, why is popularity? The two reasons that I believe our number 30 years of Fox News pumping propaganda and unopposed. Secondly income disparity/affordability incrementally, squeezing the middle class over the last 30 years (likely due to Republican deregulation policies). America was living through a slow motion, Weimar republic scenario.
I actually think Nixon helped him with some odd advice, and maybe dirt on some money MEN
Might be true. If you take all of the bad qualities of all of these people and then inject them into a James Bond level sociopathic narcissist well then you get Donald Trump.
You have a point. But regardless of Trump's venality, there are intelligent and motivated cabinet and administrative members who DO have an authoritarian agenda and they are the ones we need to be worried about. Stephen Miller has way too much power over the rest of Trump's goons. The only thing we can hope for is self-implosion as the thirst for influence and power causes a massive back-stabbing incident.
Agreed
Very true! Miller and P2025 crowd.
Mob bosses have ideologies, and being a mob boss (there's no 'wanna be' here for Trump, just 'is') is not at all mutually exclusive to being an authoritarian. But I absolutely agree that 'mob boss' is the best frame to understand many Trumpian actions.
Not all those actions, e.g. ICE which is straight up fascist, but that may be e.g. the sensibility of Steven Miller passing through Trump's endorsement. This is how the Administration addresses the masses of regular people.
Trump doesn't concern himself with regular people. He only cares about people or institutions of some means, that have something he wants.
So yes the foreign policy is ABSOLUTELY shaking down other countries like the mob shakes down a business. But the mob does not limit this to protection money, also forcing the business to aid in various aspects of the larger criminal enterprise. The owners of the businesses remain in place formally, but act under the watchful eye of an enforcer who insures they'll comply when called on 'to return a favor'.
This is not just a parallel of how Trump deals with other countries, but how he deals with media companies, law firms, universities... I suspect it's how he'll deal with the oil companies reluctant to go back into Venezuela.
The problem is that the pundits are applying other frames to the 'Donroe Doctrine' conquest agenda. MAGA is not going to 'run Venezuela' by replacing the regimes functionaries with Americans, or putting our military boots on the ground. Nor will we invade Greenland. Trump will simply make sure Maduro's gang, or the Danes, or whoever will 'do him a favor' when he asks by 'making them an offer they don't refuse'.
There’s a lot to respond to here. Please stand by….
I'd say Trump and the GOP could be easily compared to pre-ww2 fascist Italy.
I’m going to disagree. He’s just a sociopath narcissistic criminal who has only one objective to make himself more powerful to make himself richer. Hitler’s prime goal was to be the most powerful person in the world. I’m not sure that Trump puts that on the top of the list. Money is more important to him. And how he gets it is entirely criminal. Why does it matter? Because if you were covering a mafia kingpin like John Gotti, you wouldn’t be trying to figure out what his underlying political ideology was. Oh, this looks like a Neo conservative intervention in South America. Or that’s odd tariffs are a democratic thing not a free trade Republican thing. He’s a heterodox politician. All that is painfully naïve. Tariffs for instance are just an extortion racket. That’s all that’s been behind at the entire time. That’s why he’s lying about where the money comes from. He’s just using it to shake down other governments and industry for more power so he can get more money and maybe stay on.
Hitler definitely was an ideologue.
Mussolini on the other hand was very flexible and the point was to get in power.
But Mussolini was basically a career politician that started a party. Trump was running for office to increase his profile so he could negotiate a better deal for the next season of apprentice. This is the accidental presidential criminal.
Trump created the current GOP. It's his image and the old one is not coming back.
And he attempted a coup in order to stay in power!
He attempted a coup to stay out of prison. He didn’t really create the current party. He just said all the quiet parts out loud. This was always Republicans. Or at least Republicans since LBJ. When the Dixiecrats ran over to the other side that was it.
when Bernie said something like he is a good politician, I thought no way, he could not
be more wrong, wonder why he said that. made me think he's going a little senile, it was an interview I think.
Bernie Sanders said Trump was a good politician? I don’t think he meant he was a good person, I don’t think he meant he supported his policies, I think what he said was that he’s able to get his message across and sway people. Trump is profoundly ignorant, but exceedingly clever. He’s not stupid. He’s just enormously ignorant. He also doesn’t buy into any world view that looks anything different than might is right and law of the jungle. He’s basically a street thug.
was fairly recent, not a good person, but some specific political skill
Putin has the Epstein files sitting on his desk. That’s what’s ultimately changed geopolitics. Well yeah, I agree, but the radical part is to look at this not through the lens of a political authoritarian, but through the lens of a criminal organization. Nobody would ever sit there and try to think of Al Capone‘s motivations. They’re pretty obvious. So if we ditch the authoritarian nonsense I just think of him as sociopathic narcissistic criminal. Everything else is really easy to figure out. Don’t you think?
Criminal organization is correct. I don't believe Putin has the Epstein files on his desk, I believe he has proof positive of Donald's money laundering operations for his Russian oligarch friends. Been going on for decades.
I don’t think that’s enough to scare Trump
y maybe putin has some tape of Donnie boy from long ago at one of those clubs over there, and showed it to him at Helsinki
diddling with some very young girl or worse, cameras everywhere I've heard and if he let loose in a club well, that could explain a lot. hard to say
Occam‘s razor says he has the Epstein file.
“So which is it to be? A stand for liberty in the spirit of Thomas Paine, or acquiescence to the depredations of our own mad King George? The rule of law or the rule of Trump?”
Is this a trick question? For two thirds of this country I would say the rule of law; however, the last third; not so much!
In 1941, Dorothy Thomson wrote an article in Harper’s Bizarre (JVL wrote about it in a past Triad): Who goes Nazi. I think it’s fair to say we know exactly who these people are in our society; starting with Miller and Hegseth; although in those cases, they were always Nazi’s; or at least fascists, playing the part! IMHO…:)
Let’s play!
https://harpers.org/archive/1941/08/who-goes-nazi/
Trump is a self-proclaimed king. He doesn't have centuries of traditional lore of benevolent kings to measure himself with. He has no sense of noblesse oblige. He has no honor.
The only part about nobility that Trump understands is the hierarchy: king, Duke, Marquesses , Earls, Viscounts, and Barons.
Trump is so ignorant, he thought. Baron’s were at the top of the pecking order and named his son accordingly.
Bottom line, dumb as a rock doesn’t begin to describe Trump; he’s a riddle, wrapped in an enigma of fascist lies!….:)
He doesn’t even know what the word means.
Making the West Wing the same height as the ballroom, which is the same height as the residence will do exactly nothing to make these changes in balance or aesthetic. The whole thing will be a monstrosity, much like Trump himself.
Thank goodness it will never get built. Trump will just keep wanting to make it bigger and bigger until it would be impossible to construct.
Let's hope. The plan went before a planning commission filled with Trump cronies. No approval or public comments as yet.
I’m less optimistic.
RE: "The rule of law was central to the American experiment. Is it still?"
The rule of law (not men) IS the American experiment.
Without it - and the "liberal" in liberal democracy - America will simply be not an "experiment" but a 21st century version of rehashed royal and aristocratic authoritarianism, with oligarchs forming the court of a dimwitted, ego-driven monarch wearing a stupid trucker hat instead of a crown.
This raises an old question: Are we 'evolved' enough to hold a democracy together? Can we rule ourselves with reason and equanimity? Or, are we too brutish and naive to expect something like democracy to work?
Well, the way I look at it is that democracy has worked for us a for a quarter of a millennium... nowhere near perfectly, and we completely "broke it" once, creating a civil war, but then managed to put it back together again.
So, I think the answer is Yes, we *are* actually evolved "enough" to hold a democracy together. And even to fix it if it becomes damaged or breaks. The larger and more pertinent question might be: Are there enough of us who *want* either of those things "enough" to make them happen, with the challenges of the 21st century being different than those of the 19th?
Yes. I gave that some thought. We almost lost it in the 1860s and Europe has tried and struggled with democracy in the 20th century. South American countries go back and forth with it.
I currently see it as an aspirational goal for those who can envision society whose vision is not obscured by the need for immediate gratification.
In societies where complexity and variety aren't valued, democracy has an uphill climb. Or so it appears.
I think that last is the key about the value(s) that makes a democracy of any stripe possible, but particularly and especially a 'liberal' democracy with decentralized power and serious and effective checks and balances on that power to prevent exactly what we are now experiencing.
We obviously now need something "more" in that regard that doesn't depend so much on the good faith and conscience of those in power to respect not only rules and traditions but the very law itself, though I have no idea what, exactly, that "more" would be. Somehow making the pardon power of the president not exclusively his alone would be a start, perhaps involving the co-approval of a completely independent body of some sort. NOT the Congress, obviously. Nor the Supremes.
Would probably get better decisions from a kindergarten class than either of those two. Seriously.
I also think the climb is *always* uphill for democracy, liberty and freedom. History paints democracy and democratic liberty and freedom as the exception and not the rule for the world writ-large for most of its existence. The U.S. is actually an aberration in the history of men's desires to rule over their fellow men.
BTW... What's your theory of the development of morality, if you can do sort of a summary to give me some idea of it. Having discussed a few things with you in the past, I'd be interested in hearing about it.
We were ‘evolved’ enough to start the experiment. But we seem to be ‘devolving’ into brutish stupidity.
Thomas Paine and his cohort were highly educated men passing on concepts of governance to people who were intelligent enough (even if not formally educated) to engage with those concepts and make an informed decision about what they wanted for themselves and their neighbors.
That is no longer descriptive of half the population in this country.
Too many of us are loathe to call Trump supporters stupid, ignorant, uneducated, uninformed, etc. because it is offensive, it is unknowable, it is unkind, yada, yada, yada, but I think until there is an accounting for how many of our citizens were duped by a con man and continue to ride that ride rather than face reality, we will never move beyond this horror show.
I agree, Mary. We were endlessly lectured by legacy media (NYT, WaPo) to try harder to understand Trump voters. Interesting that such advice never was applied to them.
Amen! How many fucking diners were visited over the last decade??
How many are willing to back authoritarianism if it will benefit them? How many want some sort of white male strongman? How many of these people like that "blue" (so "enemy" in their minds) cities are being occupied like conquered land? We don't want to admit how many people there are who think like this, but it clearly is quite a few.
Mary, Thomas Paine was a singular individual. At times his views meshed with his cohort and he was very inspirational. He also was very radical in ways that put him outside the mainstream and he ended his life alone and mostly forgotten. His story is worth thinking about.
I am aware. I am also willing to say that “radicals” are often seen as dangerous. I guess I would argue that taking a stance because you want to be remembered is not really what we should be aiming for. The status quo is a powerful force that allows most people to simply put their heads down and remain uninformed.
I am thinking of millions of Germans (and others) in the 1930’s…..
Bound only by his 'own morality'...
'I am the only one who can fix it'
These are essentially identical statements together with being quintessentially un-American.
‘Bound only by his own morality’ - which is to say, not bound at all.
At least not one recognizable to the casual, or even highly trained, observer.
Marlin Perkins might recognize it though. It does seem to have parallels to the 'Wild Kingdom'.
Good catch.🥂
It seems to me that the ultimate answer to all of the rulings SCOTUS has to make is whether they understand that what THEY believe the Unitary Presidency to be, the Felon has his own idea and they do not mesh. They believe that a Unitary President combines Executive and Legislative powers, to hell with the Constitution. He believes that, even further into Hell with that abominal limitation on him, it encorporates all three branches into one, his and his alone. Ipso facto, this also means he is free to ignore what the other two want if it contradicts his own idea of what his "morality" (man, it is an abomination to use that word with him, the most immoral President we have ever had) says he should do, as he said in his interview with the New York Times.
yes but the justices clearly believe in the unitary executive powers of presidents they like, not so much if the president is black, female or in any way liberal and Trump believes in Trump’s executive powers not in anybody else’s the same way he believes in the power of his justices to make decisions in his favour
"The only limits he acknowledges are 'My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.'”
God help us.
"...It's the only thing that can stop me."
McDonald's says "hold my beer."
The Roberts Court decided to endow the presidency with broadly defined immunity for illegal acts. One can’t help but wonder if SCOTUS would have reached this decision if it seemed unlikely that Donald Trump would regain the presidency. We do know that Robert, Alito and apparently others on court were adherents to the unitary executive theory (textualists, try to find that in the Constitution). Do they also believe in the divine right of Donald?
What they believe in is the "natural right" of the wealthy property owners to govern the masses. All the rest is in service of that goal.
They believe in their particular strain of Christianity holding sway in America and themselves remaining in their seats until they're ready to leave, and their pension.
At this point they're probably afraid of Trump.
Whatever they might think about the "divine right" of Donald, they think that's better than letting the left have power if they can possibly prevent it and not end up with pitchforks and scythes not only on the steps of their court but the steps of their own homes.
Another reason to be angry at Biden. He had the same executive immunity, and he never even touched it. He could have put Trump under house arrest, as a possible test of the theory.
He did not have the same immunity. Remember student loan relief?
Whenever I read about Trump becoming a monarch, I am always reminded of Trumpkins' comments when, in 2017, NPR did their annual reading of the Declaration of Independence. Trump voters were angry that NPR would denigrate Trump with this reading. Boy, were they onto something. I would bet examples of Trump's usurpations could be found for almost each one listed.
“Cheap shots: I agree with Andrew; “when Kirk was shot, these people considered us complicit in the violence.”
That said, this is why I always said that holding our tongues will play right into their hands. They even used Kirk’s memorial to demonize democrats further. And Trump, always the showmen, uses his pulley pulpit to demonize democrats and critics alike, as well as to further his own selfish ambitions.
Now with Trump signing NSPM-7, we’re all domestic terrorists; if we even have the audacity to look at an ICE agents cross eyed! This national security memorandum is illegal. We need to sue, because this is the Trump card Trump will use to hold all of us to account.; no pun intended!
They can deem anyone who criticizes Ice as a domestic threat. They can put you on the no fly list and run investigations to silence us all. So stay vigilant and get out the vote!
Lastly, does anyone still think ICE is a legitimate agency, and not a bunch of stormtroopers under the president’s control, without any congressional oversight? Today we stand on perilous grounds; the midterms may be our last hope! IMHO…:)