"Total domination does not allow for free initiative in any field of life [...] that is not entirely predictable." For decades, R voters have made themselves predictable by their repetition of ready made phrases. The impoverishment of language necessarily leads to the impoverishment of thinking.
The current US very much reminds me the communist Estern Block, where talents for a position were completely irrelevant, the only important feature was your loyalty to the right party (well, the only party…)
(f) Whoever…entrusted with…lawful possession or control of any…writing…relating to the national defense, (1) through *gross negligence* permits the same to be…delivered to anyone in violation of his trust…Shall be fined…or imprisoned not more than ten years...
"Nothing which was being done, no matter how stupid, no matter how many people knew and foretold the consequences, could be undone or prevented. Every event had the finality of a last judgment, ... rather like the expression of some unredeemably stupid fatality." --also Arendt, ch 9, p 267
My country's dictator had the cheek of saying it openly on TV, proud that his stooges were all "90% loyalty, 10% skill"... the very definition of an olligarchy (including our current "president").
During the Argentine Junta's dictatorship the joke was that an army general was found who was so stupid and incompetent that even his own colleagues noticed it.
In that passage, Arendt was talking about Carl Schmitt and how the Nazis had no use for him. Many authors agree that Schmitt’s ideas are more relevant to the regimes that exist today.
You know what I think? I think this may lead to something similar to the fall of the Russian Czar - soon after America falls for good, the term of "president" in this country may no longer exist. As much as I shit talk this country, I don't know if I'm prepared to live in a world like that yet.
„Anatomy of Fascism“ - still one of the authoritative works on the topic. When reading it the first time years ago, I didn’t think that it would be the US to provide an example of how a country can descend into a fascist state.
It’s very important to remember the difference: Germany’s military, executive and judicial branches after WW I were dominated by 80 % of people with deep rooted anti democratic and antisemitic ideology, nostalgia of the lost “Empire” included. Hitler’s grip on power was easy …
This is correct. You should, however, also look at Italian fascism which had entirely different roots and closer resemblance to what we currently see than Germany‘s Nazism. This is also an important point in Paxton‘s or Eco‘s treatises on fascism.
I think the main question everyone got wrong was how quickly and how far the US could radicalize. And racial animus, a hands-off leader, and a decentralized organization is very close to Germany and far from Italy.
The ideology of today’s far rightists is just klepto-plagiarism of the most bizarre types ranging from Nietzsche, Aleister Crowley, Carl Schmitt, Evola, Hitler, Iljin to Dugin and Karaganov, just to name a few which influence Putin, Orban and the Trumpers. (Not to forget SF-writers like Moorlock🤯)
And how German Lutheran churches supported Hitler as the wellspring of Germany's national renewal. Which makes for an ominous comparison with America's evangelical movement.
hannah arendt was a virulent anti-communist—there are better people to quote about fascism than someone who disparaged marxism as the "most pernicious doctrine of the modern age"
Michael Parenti's "Blackshirts and Reds" is essential. Trosky's "On Fascism" is excellent, and Gramsci also has a lot of important insight into the ideology in the Italian context
I’m particularly concerned about the totalitarian use of transcendence and grandiosity to justify terror especially by choosing an enemy of the State (trans people? Immigrants) and making them into an existential threat against the nation and the world. Would you know of authors thinking about that?
I know Pete Hegseth, et. al., live up to this observation; but, for my money, Mike Johnson is the dumbest and saddest of them all. Mean and dumb and sad.
And while she's usually a good source to quote from, this one is really bad. It's ableist, it's saneist, it's classist, there's basically everything wrong with it, which is especially weird since it seems she was trying to say something entirely correct.
Dear US citizens!You are allowed to start petitions and to contact your politicians,e.g. via phone and mail. With enough power you can bring up new elections, legal and without violence.Your voice is stronger than you think. Build groups, be united! You are stronger! https://www.senate.gov/senators/senators-contact.htm?OrderBy=state&Sort=ASC
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B/c I would feel better to hear maybe the Trump administration is too fucking stupid to pull off their own reich
Homo Sapiens re the most easily trainable animals, on the planet. Once they are trained not to think or question ... well, here we are.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/793
It's like she was foretelling this exact current situation.
"Umm, I Hegsethed our secrets in a busy coffee shop, soz"
"The bill presented was completely RFK"
"Is anyone listening to me? Am I 'Rubio non Grata' or something?"
“We need the best doctors!”
“They’re all dead”
It starts with robbing the government and giving control to the oligarchs.
30,000 Ukranian kids kidnapped, House Republicans unbothered
But you're exempted of course if you
Come join us
Independent, self-contented, revolutionary
Intellectual, brave, strong and scholarly
If you're NOT one of them, you're us already so
Come join us”
https://youtu.be/GSN6plRg9UQ?si=gANfFiM1tFWnqwwe
Viktor Orbán is coaching the turnips who follow Hitler's advice: "Close your hearts to pity."