Recent searches
Search options
Administered by:
John Stoehr on why Trump is appointing monstrosities to his cabinet:
"Among liberals, the discussion seems to be limited to the absurdities each of these people brings to governance as well as the dangers they pose. 'Yes, shake your head at the seeming absurdity of these picks,' wrote MSNBC’s Jen Psaki. 'But don’t stop there.'"
https://www.editorialboard.com/trumps-cabinet-nominees-are-a-sign-of-totalitarian-drift/
@wdlindsy@toad.social"'These choices aren’t just controversial; they require us to stay vigilant about how each potential new Cabinet member could negatively affect our lives.'
But I think we’re missing the bigger picture. These nominations signal the totalitarian drift that’s coming to Washington and the country. Yes, that’s right. No, I’m not exaggerating. It’s time to start using that word."
Stoehr says totalitarian.
I say fascist.
@wdlindsy I think we also have to keep in mind that t loves to create chaos to wear us down. His final choices will be truly scary. But yes, fascism is the end game.
@lillyfinch That's right.
@wdlindsy I'm not sure about our terms here. Stalin was totalitarian and Stalin with today's technology would really put the "total" in totalitarian. Big Brother in 1984 is totalitarian. That means total control of the minds and bodies of the citizens. Umberto Eco says, "If by totalitarianism one means a regime that subordinates every act of the individual to the state and to its ideology, then both Nazism and Stalinism were true totalitarian regimes." He argues that Mussolini's fascism was not totalitarian, in part because it didn't have a coherent ideology. Eco has 14 points that define fascism, too much to outline here, but his essay on Ur-Fascism, published in the New York Review of Books in 1995, is certainly worth reading.
Anyway, it is possible to have a fascism that is not totalitarian, and while both are bad, totalitarianism is worse.
@jredlund I myself find the better-term or perfect-term game pretty ennervating right now. Totalitarianism works for me. Fascism works for me, too. In fact, it works even better, because in my view, that's exactly what we're seeing unfold in a new guise, as astute observers from Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Timothy Snyder, Jason Stanley, and others have warned us for some time now.
@wdlindsy Yes, whatever we call it, what is coming is bad. It does irk me when people (not you of course) throw political terms around like insults, often accusing someone who is slightly liberal to be simultaneously woke, fascist, AND communist. If the terms become meaningless, we have to invent new ones.
AOC discovered that some of her constituents had voted for her AND for Trump. She recently gave an interview talking about what she found out when she asked them why they did that. Some of them said that they hated politicians, but she seemed "real" and Trump also seemed "real." Maybe we do need new terms.
@wdlindsy
There will be the usual harrumphs from some Republicans, just enough so they can talk up their 'independence' sometime in the future.
Also pointing out how these people are destroying their agency won't matter. The destruction of our institutions is the entire agenda. Ruin government, then point to its failure as a reason to privatize or further cut spending, creating chaos and suffering makes people desperate. This is the goal.
@jredlund Good commentary. I agree.