Republican National Convention(s)

[Dill]

(08-25-2020, 03:42 PM)PhilHos Wrote: We've had 4 years of Trump and he's nowhere near closer to being a fascist dictator now than he was 4 years ago, but, sure, keep comparing him to one because THAT doesn't further divide the country or anything.

I would not call Trump a fascist at this point. He does not purvey that ideology of sacrifice and subordination to a "spiritual" state over bourgeois money grubbing that we find in fascism*, and is not likely to. He doesn't strut around in uniforms. But he is certainly an authoritarian, and is striving to increase his powers following a path which past dictators have. 

To see that, though, you'd have to know what a path from democracy to dictatorship typically looks like, and looked like before Trump. Without some independent standard of judgment about what counts as a move towards dictatorship, and an independent framework for comparing apples to apples, there can't really be explanation or discussion, only recurring equivocation.

So I'd say he's SOMEWHAT closer to being an authoritarian dictator now than he was four years age. Sure, he was already undermining the free press four years ago, including unqualified family members as key advisors, displaying an authoritarian leadership style, and admiring that style in other authoritarian leaders. He has never evinced an understanding of rule of law or Constitutional separation of powers. He rode to power stoking grievance against an immigrant and Muslim "Other" in our midst, a defining feature of right-wing, authoritarian populism.

But four years ago he had not yet fired whistle blowers and other officials investigating his abuse of power. He was only beginning to undermine the CIA/FBI back then, and had not done so on an international stage. He had not yet used his power over foreign policy or over institutions like the post office for the partisan purpose of undermining US elections. He did not yet have the Republican Party as fully under his control as he did by the time of his impeachment for abuse of power and obstruction of justice. He had not yet called the US military into the streets against US citizens. The first time he ran, the Republican Party had a platform. This time they don't, just that reaffirmation of support for the dear leader.

Four years ago, people imaged there were more effective checks against presidential power than there actually are. It is Trump who has so eagerly demonstrated this for us.

I should add that the primary threat to democracy now isn't just from Trump's illiberal, anti-democratic leadership, but from the embrace of that illiberal, anti-democratic leadership by a mass of followers. There could be no Trump in power, no authoritarian threat to democracy, without their support of the man above party, platform, and rule of law. The millions who would look the other way if he shot someone on 5th Avenue. And the threat doesn't have to be that he actually becomes a full-fledged dictator. Bad enough if he breaks down democratic governance and divides the nation with an alternative and anti-democratic narrative of "hoaxes" and a lying press which cannot be trusted over his confused and contradictory pronouncements.

*One could even argue that Trump is exactly the image of what fascist leaders like Hitler and Mussolini defined themselves against, the money grubber par excellence with no transcendent SPIRITUAL goals worthy of sacrifice. Someone like that would be unfit to embody the will of the nation.