She looked directly at it, like an idiot?
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Damn autocorrect.
Is there still any valid argument that Trump is not a fascist? His rhetoric was explicitly fascist during the campaign. Is it just willful ignorance from traditional Republicans? I’m not sure what their take is. I’ve seen plenty of his supporters enthusiastically embracing his fascist tendencies and it’s disheartening.
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That would certainly be a huge help, pipedream that it is
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Objectively, to answer that question, you have to first define what, exactly, fascism is. I’ve seen varying definitions of fascism.
You also have to specify whether you’re focusing on Trump’s words, his political principles, or his actions.
Trump’s rhetoric certainly reeks of authoritarianism. However, I can imagine someone plausibly arguing that it isn’t really fascism because it fails on certain criteria on one of the several definitions out there.
Trump isn’t Hitler. I am, however, struck by some similarities to Mussolini.
It usually starts this way.
Its easy to be part of the winning team when its only about rhetoric (no matter how crude or bombastic it may be)
But when Trump starts doing nasty things (not just to political opponents but to others), thats when the more reasonable will take a step back.
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however few that projects to
“The few. The reasonable. The Actuaries.”
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Let’s see here. Again, for one, his former Chief of Staff called him a fascist. And one person saying it doesn’t make it true, but he probably knows more about Trump than most.
Exalts nation and race: MAGA! And while Trump hasn’t made super-explicit comments about race, he’s made plenty about immigrants (shithole countries, vermin, poisoning the blood… where have I heard this before?).
Autocratic government: SCOTUS has put a foot in the door for this, if anyone thinks Trump doesn’t want more power, lmk.
Soft fascism: Trump said CBS should have its license revoked, all the fake news comments (also sounds familiar from history)
So I dunno, I’d argue that Trump is at least pointed in this general direction.
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To be honest at this point we can only judge his intentions. Why we shouldn’t take him at his word is to me the big question here.
This seems to be a mistake that people still make.
They still think Trump will not follow through with his threats.
The only thing that held him back last time was the Ds and the US Govts checks and balances.
All of that is gone now.
Senate? Check
Congress? Check
Federal Judges? Check
Supreme Court? Check
And now he wants to get rid of the military that is not completely loyal to him, as well as any civil servant as well (via schedule F).
Society will polarise even further as Trump thinks in binary terms: either you are completely loyal to him or you are an enemy. The whole country will become infected by that mentality because he will keep spreading it every single day via the media and his actions.
Next two years will be really bad as the Chief of Staff knows that they are vulnerable to losing the trifecta in the mid-terms, so executive orders will come thick and fast as soon as he is sworn in.
They have been planning this political and social Blitzkrieg for a very long time now. They are absolutely going to follow through on it no matter how many things they break.
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I struggle with this discussion because, as you point out, Trump has clearly indicated what he wants to do through things like you point out or project 2025 etc.
I understand if people say they prefer that they get more money in their pockets but I don’t understand it when people make it seem as both sides have issues.
Vance once called Trump America’s Hitler. Maybe we’re just confusing VPs here.
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I think it comes down to:
“YOUR side can’t call people names, you dumbass!”
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One opinion piece on Trump and fascism:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/oct/29/trump-rally-fascism-politics
Trump is putting Stephen Miller in charge of policy. Kinda pointless to try and compare Trump to Hitler or Stalin when he may as well just go out with his own brand of shit.
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One thing I’ve noticed around where I live is that there are a small but significant number of houses in the area that never took down their presidential campaign signs (but took down the local signs). That’s both those for Trump and those for Harris. It’ll be interesting to see how long they last.
My wife randomly turned to me last night and said she thought Trump hats and Trump signs are hate-symbols. The reasoning is simple-- Trump himself is such an absolute shit of a person, that you have to believe that his ardent followers must be as well. On top of that, we all know some people who are afraid right now-- lgbtq, feminists, daca, etc. and we feel like they need our protection, or anger, or something.
I am trying to do the opposite. I am trying to be amicable with the one or two Trump supporters in my tiny network. I get the sense that so much of this is due to simple distance. We don’t communicate enough, and it becomes easy to scapegoat the other. That is, I agree with you, I think everyone needs to get along, and I want to contribute to that.
But I’m not surprised that others do not want to befriend the enemy. If we had elected any other Conservative, there might been some healing. Not 100% since DeSantis is part of the same Culture Wars, but not as bad as we are now. But we didn’t do that, we picked the bad guy. So most people I know have “TDS” again, so to speak. They are wounded, anxious, and enraged. And it will be another 4 years before any healing can occur.
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I respect your position. As I have grown older I have grown moderate. I prefer understanding the other person to trying to win an argument now.
This attack shocked me.
Georgia election chief doused in paint after divisive parliamentary vote