I need to start another of these link collection posts.
#Politics #Trump
America is facing an epistemic crisis: “an increasingly large chunk of Americans believes a whole bunch of crazy things, and it is warping our politics. […] what if Mueller proves the case and it’s not enough? What if there is no longer any evidentiary standard that could overcome the influence of right-wing media?”
America is facing an epistemic crisis
4chan: The Skeleton Key to the Rise of Trump. “Like the Hollywood heroes, right and left have been competing to become this new radical anti-/status quo/ party. And so far, in both Europe and America, the right has won, implying that, as Arendt predicted, the powerlessness created by bourgeoisie systems of capitalist exploitation might once again implode into far right totalitarianism.”
4chan: The Skeleton Key to the Rise of Trump
This Political Theorist Predicted the Rise of Trumpism. His Name Was Hunter S. Thompson. “As Thompson presciently wrote in the /Nation/ piece he later expanded on in /Hell’s Angels/, that kind of politics is ’nearly impossible to deal with’ using reason or empathy or awareness-raising or any of the other favorite tools of the left.”
This Political Theorist Predicted the Rise of Trumpism. His Name Was Hunter S. Thompson.
Authoritarianism and Post-Truth Politics. “[...] insisting on the difference between truth and lies is itself a part of the defense of freedom. Orwell, Arendt, and Havel teach us that the power to tell public lies and to have them repeated is evidence of, and a tool for the expansion of, a power that free people should resist and refuse.”
Authoritarianism and Post-Truth Politics
You Are Still Crying Wolf. A long piece debunking the myth that Trump is a racist. He’s terrible for different reasons.
It’s not elitism, but its absence. ���[...] Brexit and Trump come as terrible reminders that the comfortably well-off are too removed from the bases of their own comfort to see they need to preserve them rather than taking them for granted. [...] abandoning Western civilisation based on Enlightenment values is a ridiculous proposition when offered as remedy for our current problems. It would be better for people opposed to political nihilism in the West to act like a resistance rather than a bunch of genteel, mannered bourgeois namby-pambies talking tolerance of intolerance.”
It’s not elitism, but its absence
What So Many People Don’t Get About the U.S. Working Class. “{WWC white working class} men aren’t interested in working at McDonald’s for $15 per hour instead of $9.50. What they want is what my father-in-law had: steady, stable, full-time jobs that deliver a solid middle-class life to the 75% of Americans who don’t have a college degree. Trump promises that.”
What So Many People Don’t Get About the U.S. Working Class
Donald Trump Will Dramatically Realign America’s Political Parties. “More and more, the downscale Republican voters felt they were being betrayed by their party’s elites. Eventually, the only thing that united these factions was the story that America was engaged in a Manichaean struggle between good and evil in which Democrats were definitely on the side of evil.”
Donald Trump Will Dramatically Realign America’s Political Parties
Trump, the GOP, and the Fall. Hah, I think he’s right: Trump is not the problem. He is the symptom. The actual problem is that the Republicans made it possible with their fundamentalism, their anti-science stance, their fear of facts, their money worship, their callousness, their greed. You reap what you sow. Or as the case may be: Trump reaps what you sowed. But even if it had not been a lying, abusive, narcistic egomaniac candidate, it wouldn’t have been any better. With the kind of shit you sowed, with the Tea Party and your friends, you aren’t going to reap much better. Start over.
Autocracy: Rules for Survival. “I have lived in autocracies most of my life, and have spent much of my career writing about Vladimir Putin’s Russia. I have learned a few rules for surviving in an autocracy and salvaging your sanity and self-respect.”
A madman has been given the keys to the surveillance state.
A madman has been given the keys to the surveillance state
Unnecessariat. “Here’s the thing: from where I live, the world has drifted away. We aren’t precarious, we’re unnecessary. The money has gone to the top. The wages have gone to the top. The /recovery/ has gone to the top. And what’s worst of all, /everybody who matters seems basically pretty okay with that/.” The best explanation for the rise of Trump. The Unnecessariat is not like the Proletariat of old, the people who worked hard, nor the Precariat, the people who feared for their jobs but worked. The Unnecessariat are the rest of us. No job, no hope, no future. I remember seeing the first glimpse of that as I watched the movie Winter’s Bones (2010). White trash and Meth. I also like the long arc the story takes. Gay men dying of AIDS. The economy is not coming back. You can practically hear Bruce Springsteen singing about the post-industrial landscape. Politics for the rich. New tech gadgets for the rich. Tesla! Mars! iPad! For the rich… The rest are simply – unnecessary. No matter who they vote for. But if they vote Trump, at least we’ll all go down in flames. Hello, Hofer, Petry, Le Pen, Orbán. Blocher.
Goodbye, Cold War. “Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump marked the return of the repressed: the reemergence of two varieties of popular politics that were common until the 1940s but were eventually crushed under the pressure of the long cold war. [...] Often, instead of finding working agreements through shared policy goals, the inclination has been to resolve conflicts in advance through debate over the philosophical status of race or class—an impossible task. The result has been sectarianism that has only worsened a long-standing weakness of the left in this country: the lack of cohesive coalitional politics.”
When It’s Too Late to Stop Fascism, According to Stefan Zweig. “I wonder how far along the scale of moral degeneration Zweig would judge America to be in its current state. We have a magnetic leader, one who lies continually and remorselessly—not pathologically but strategically, to placate his opponents, to inflame the furies of his core constituency, and to foment chaos. The American people are confused and benumbed by a flood of fake news and misinformation. [...] I thought of one other crucial technique that Zweig identified in Hitler and his ministers: they introduced their most extreme measures gradually—strategically—in order to gauge how each new outrage was received.”
When It’s Too Late to Stop Fascism, According to Stefan Zweig
The Prophecies of Q: “QAnon is emblematic of modern America’s susceptibility to conspiracy theories, and its enthusiasm for them. But it is also already much more than a loose collection of conspiracy-minded chat-room inhabitants. It is a movement united in mass rejection of reason, objectivity, and other Enlightenment values. And we are likely closer to the beginning of its story than the end. The group harnesses paranoia to fervent hope and a deep sense of belonging. The way it breathes life into an ancient preoccupation with end-times is also radically new. To look at QAnon is to see not just a conspiracy theory but the birth of a new religion.”
What if Facebook Is the Real ‘Silent Majority’? «The conservative commentator Ben Shapiro has gotten 56 million total interactions on his Facebook page in the last 30 days. That’s more than the main pages of ABC News, NBC News, The New York Times, The Washington Post and NPR *combined*.»
What if Facebook Is the Real ‘Silent Majority’?
Dear news media, stop covering the US as if it’s a democracy: «Liberties aren’t eliminated, they are restricted and violated – until they erode. Rights aren’t abolished, they are undermined and trampled – until they become privileges. Truths aren’t buried, they are mocked and twisted – until everyone has their own.»
Dear news media, stop covering the US as if it’s a democracy
The Scalzi Endorsement: Joe Biden: «We get to decide whether we will get four more years of corruption, of white supremacy, of self-dealing and of, literally, plague… or at least four years of not all of that. Four years of probably decent, probably unremarkable governance, by and from people who mostly know what they’re doing and mostly want to be useful when they do it, headed up by Joe Biden.»
The Scalzi Endorsement: Joe Biden
So What About That (Self)-Coup?: «This clearly wasn’t just politics as usual, and not because of the mob that took over the Capitol. This was a trial run for a self-coup that could very well be tried in the future. **An overwhelming majority of the GOP representatives in the house spent the day in lock-down and came back and promptly voted to overturn the election.** In a future scenario where the election had come down to PA—for example if Joe Biden hadn’t very very narrowly won Georgia and Arizona by a total of about 23,127 votes out of total of about hundred-and-fifty million cast, or if Trump hadn’t just contributed to the loss of two senate seats in Georgia for the GOP, and thus the loss of the control of the Senate. It’s absolutely plausible to me that even more Republicans would have joined this blatant attempt to overturn the election and that their base would mostly have been fine with that. The (self)-coup train wasn’t something that was just for show; it just wasn’t close enough to work *this time*.»
So What About That (Self)-Coup?
The age of Trump comes to an end but the a new age of disinformation has only just begun. Like the mysticism invading the Roman Empire in Russel’s view of the History of Western Philosophy, or Gibson’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, but also like the stirring revolutions kicked into action by the pamphlet printing during the reformation, and boots and guns of the third Reich spurred by Göbbels on the radio, we have our own disinformation to fight.
educators must be explicit about the ethical frameworks and daily practices of truth-seeking institutions such as science, scholarship, and journalism. Social-media platforms enact values that are firmly grounded in beliefs about individualism, capitalism, and consumerism. Educators must make clear how those values differ from the pursuit of truth through other means. – The Librarian War Against QAnon, by Barbara Fister, for The Atlantic, adapted from her essay, Lizard People in the Library
The Librarian War Against QAnon
Radicalisation everywhere.
What the American left needs now is allegiance, not allyship. It must abandon any imagined fantasies about the sanctity of governmental institutions that long ago gave up any claim to legitimacy. Stack the supreme court, end the filibuster, make Washington DC a state, and let the dogs howl, and now, before it is too late. The moment the right takes control of institutions, they will use them to overthrow democracy in its most basic forms; they are already rushing to dissolve whatever norms stand in the way of their full empowerment. – The next US civil war is already here – we just refuse to see it, by Stephen Marche, The Guardian
The next US civil war is already here – we just refuse to see it, by Stephen Marche, The Guardian
Reap what you sow in the Supreme Court:
In the last four years, a reliably Republican majority on the high court, led by Chief Justice John Roberts, has embarked on a remarkable spree against history and reality itself, ignoring or eliding facts in decisions involving school prayer, public health, homophobia, race, climate change, abortion and clean water, not to mention the laughing gas case. The crescendo to this assault on expertise landed in June, when the majority’s *Chevron* decision arrogated to the courts regulatory calls that have been made by civil servant scientists, physicians and lawyers for the last 40 years. … The decision enthrones the high court—an unelected majority—as a group of technically incompetent, in some cases corrupt, politicos in robes with power over matters that hinge on vital facts about pollution, medicine, employment and much else. – The Supreme Court’s Contempt for Facts Is a Betrayal of Justice, by the editors of Scientific American
The Supreme Court’s Contempt for Facts Is a Betrayal of Justice
Say it: Racism.
The simple truth is that Trump is a racist, and it is his shamelessness about his racism that appeals to white people. He says what they wish they could get away with saying. They forgive his criminal behavior, his lies, his egomaniacal behavior, and his other flaws because of his racism, not in spite of it. They don’t care that his economic policies will benefit billionaires and not them, just so long as he makes sure minorities have it worse than them. – Racism Is Why Trump Is So Popular
Racism Is Why Trump Is So Popular
Billionaires.
All these donations and machinations by the ultrarich make clear that billionaires are a danger to our democracy, our environment, and efforts to create a fairer economy. We desperately need to rein in their power, but that will be far harder than it should be because the Supreme Court has repeatedly shot down rules that seek to limit the ultrawealthy’s influence in politics. But we can at least tax billionaires more. – If Trump Wins, Blame the Billionaires
If Trump Wins, Blame the Billionaires
Is Trump a fascist?
One option, of course, would be to simply look at what the former President’s closest advisors think. John Kelly, Donald Trump’s longest serving Chief of Staff (and a retired USMC general), a man who worked from 2017 to 2019 to see Trump’s policies enacted and who presumably agrees with many of them, says that Donald Trump is a fascist and “certainly prefers the dictator approach to government,” a position echoed by other former Trump aides and endorsed by Donald Trump’s own former National Security Advisor, John Bolton, though Bolton has added he thinks Trump is too stupid to be truly a fascist (the same was said by cleverer men about Mussolini and Hitler). James Mattis (also a retired USMC general) who served as Trump’s handpicked Secretary of Defense from 2017 to 2019, described him as “mak[ing] a mockery of our Constitution.” His next Secretary of Defense, Mark Esper, agrees, saying that if one looked up the definition of a fascist, “it’s hard to say he [Trump] doesn’t” fit that definition. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under Trump described him as, “fascist to the core.” Trump’s handpicked former Vice President refuses to endorse him, in part due to “differences on our constitutional duties that I exercises on Jan. 6” which is a polite way of saying Trump demanded Pence steal an election and Pence refused. – New Acquisitions: 1933 and the Definition of Fascism
New Acquisitions: 1933 and the Definition of Fascism
Externalizing costs:
Trump is king of the extrinsics. … People at the extrinsic end of the spectrum are … attracted to prestige, status, image, fame, power and wealth. They are strongly motivated by the prospect of individual reward and praise. They are more likely to objectify and exploit other people, to behave rudely and aggressively and to dismiss social and environmental impacts. They have little interest in cooperation or community. People with a strong set of extrinsic values are more likely to suffer from frustration, dissatisfaction, stress, anxiety, anger and compulsive behaviour. Trump exemplifies extrinsic values. – To beat Trump, we need to know why Americans keep voting for him. Psychologists may have the answer, by George Monbiot, for The Guardian
To beat Trump, we need to know why Americans keep voting for him. Psychologists may have the answer
Hope?
The next four years will be exhausting. An ageing, angry, erratic president branded a fascist by decorated generals will relentlessly spew falsehoods and hate, threaten violence against citizens and mass deportation of immigrants. But amid this onslaught, one need not feel powerless. Positive change will continue to be possible. – Trump’s victory is not the end of the world, by Aaron Glantz, for The Guardian
Trump’s victory is not the end of the world
America wants fascism:
. We know what he would do as President, and we know all the things he'd promised to do as President a second time, and millions of Americans took all that into consideration and said, *Yes, I want that*. … He is a liar and a criminal and openly corrupt and none of it mattered. Everything we've always been told voters reject, they ignored, even embraced. Voters wanted Trump, in all his malice. – This Place Is All Fucked Up, by Barry Petchesky, for Defector
Voters want fascism:
Trump is symptom, not cause, of the “crisis of democracy.” Trump did not turn the nation in a hard-right direction, and if the liberal political establishment doesn’t ask what wind he caught in his sails, it will remain clueless about the wellsprings and fuel of contemporary antidemocratic thinking and practices. It will ignore the cratered prospects and anxiety of the working and middle classes wrought by neoliberalism and financialization; the unconscionable alignment of the Democratic Party with those forces for decades; a scandalously unaccountable and largely bought mainstream media and the challenges of siloed social media; neoliberalism’s direct and indirect assault on democratic principles and practices; degraded and denigrated public education; and mounting anxiety about constitutional democracy’s seeming inability to meet the greatest challenges of our time, especially but not only the climate catastrophe and the devastating global deformations and inequalities emanating from two centuries of Euro-Atlantic empire. Without facing these things, we will not develop democratic prospects for the coming century. – The Violent Exhaustion of Liberal Democracy, where Wendy Brown interviews Francis Wade, for the Boston Review
The Violent Exhaustion of Liberal Democracy
Trying to convince voters:
It has been an extraordinary week for US politics – and a very depressing couple of days for those such as me who spent hours on the phone to people, trying to persuade them to vote for Kamala Harris and not Donald Trump. This is what voters told me time and again, and why so many did vote for Trump. … everyone they knew was doing badly, even if they were just fine themselves. … the Trump campaign successfully branded Harris as both a communist – lax on law and order – and simultaneously too tough on crime … voters, very often women themselves, told me that they just didn’t think that “America is ready for a female president” … I can only think of one occasion when someone mentioned stricter taxes on billionaires … The atrocities being committed by Israel in Gaza only came up six times in more than 1,000 calls. The idea that Harris was not leftwing enough seems false: the majority of the country just voted for the complete opposite. – I spent hours trying to persuade US voters to choose Harris not Trump. I know why she lost, by Oliver Hall, for The Guardian
I spent hours trying to persuade US voters to choose Harris not Trump. I know why she lost