Tag: fascism

America Needs to Break the Back of its Fascist Movement Now

Umair Haque has another great article in Medium this month.

America Needs to Break the Back of its Fascist Movement Now — Or Else

America needs to break the back of this fascist movement, now, severely — or it will pay an even more severe price in years and decades to come. A price in violence, rage, blood, and unrest. The highest of prices. No, I’m not kidding — and though you might feel a chill, I think you know it, too. It’s us or them.

Like us, Haque realized that Trump was dangerous before he won the electoral college in 2016, and he knows that Trumpism will remain dangerous long after he is gone. The whole article is great, but I’d like to put an emphasis on these 3 points that he makes:

  1. You can’t compromise with fascists because they are totalitarians to begin with. 
  2. You shouldn’t compromise with fascists and terrorists because it creates a norm with a very special name all its own: appeasement.
  3. You give terrorists no mercy because when you do, they have succeeded at terrorizing. 

Haque eludes to this, but let’s look at how the Biden administration is handling this.

Biden’s [inauguration] address will seek to bridge the nation’s deepening political divide by summoning support from people who didn’t vote for him as well as those who did, according to advisers and allies. To do that, he’ll have to move beyond his penchant for saying what’s on his mind — such as remarks Friday in which he told Republican lawmakers who refuse to wear masks to “grow up.”

“He believes that we have to bring this country together,” incoming White House communications director Kate Bedingfield said on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday. “You can expect that this will be a moment where President-elect Biden will really work to try to turn the page on the divisiveness and the hatred of the last four years.”

The wording is vague — probably intentionally — but the implication is exactly the opposite of what we should be doing: Breaking the back of this fascist movement, now, severely. That 40% of American adults who are fascists must either be reformed or neutralized. Appeasing them is not going to make that happen.

From a practical perspective, this would mean rooting out the fascists in our police and military, using existing laws to destroy fascism wherever it hides within our country, and providing accurate political education without coercion. We know this would work because the same strategy was used against the left and now there is no significant leftist movement in the US. Most Americans no longer even understand what “the left” is, erroneously thinking that the Democratic party is left of center (it’s actually near right). America has repeatedly chosen to support or appease fascism instead of destroying it.

The Biden administration is choosing the path of appeasement and compromise because they, their base, and their constituents are cowards that are not up to a protracted fight against fascism. They think — falsely — that if they throw a steak to the monster it won’t try to eat them. They are also more afraid of democracy than they are of fascism — this was true of liberals during the Weimar republic as well.

Biden is also — as we predicted — giving even greater power to law enforcement. This is either complete idiocy or a move toward totalitarianism on the part of Bidenists because we already know that more than half of the police are fascists, and we know that current laws are sufficient to put down a movement. My guess is that this is a move toward totalitarianism because even though Biden himself shows signs of cognitive impairment, his crew (unlike Trump’s) is extremely competent. It all makes sense once you accept that the DNC, the Democratic party base, and the majority of Democratic party voters are conservatives; the only reason that idea seems peculiar is because of the elaborate disinformation campaign driving wedges between Republican conservatives and Democratic conservatives, with the purpose of moving the whole country to the right.

This article by Akin Olla explains what’s at stake:

Following the fascist riot at the US Capitol, progressives and liberals have begun to mimic the calls for “law and order” of their conservative counterparts, even going as far as threatening to expand the “war on terror”. While this may be well-intentioned, it fits neatly within the trajectory of attacks against civil liberties over the last two decades. A Biden administration with a 50-50 Senate will seek unity and compromise wherever it can find it, and oppressing political dissidents will be the glue that holds together Biden’s ability to govern.

We are in a country where almost no one wants freedom. We few who do are caught in the middle of an epic struggle between two dystopian visions for the future. The trajectory of Bidenism is not one of progress, unless that means progress toward a different kind of fascism.

Related: You can’t fight fascism by expanding the police state by Evan Greer

We can’t believe your disbelief.

We, like you, are watching the news coming out of the US capitol today, as Trump supporters execute the mob rule portion of the Half-assed Coup. But unlike most people, apparently, we’ve been expecting this kind of thing for 5 years. We’re all gobsmacked at the amount of disbelief we’re seeing from the news media and our liberal friends and families. Even Michael Morello says that in his position as both deputy director and acting director of the CIA, they never, ever thought that such a naughty thing would occur in the USA. (If the CIA would like to consult with us, we’d be happy to do that, but you will have to pay us. A lot.)

This is just another Trump rally. This has been going on for 5 years. This is just the first time the rally has happened at a place that white, moneyed America has cared about. The fact that you all are freaking out about this particular event just speaks to how little attention you’ve been paying, and how little you’ve thought about what’s going on. This isn’t even the first time these clowns have killed someone.

From our perspective, we are relieved about a couple of things.

First off, we are relieved that Trump’s posse is just as stupid as he is. They actually had some real leverage for a while there, but they pissed it away with their usual clowning around. I won’t get into more detail because I don’t want to give them any ideas, but this could have been so much worse.

Second, we’re pleased with the fact that the left has stayed out of it. There’s absolutely no reason for any leftist to try to defend the Biden government, but there are compelling moral reasons to show up to an event like this — especially since the police completely failed to act for hours. They let this go on for hours.

Politicos and newsies are both using the right word for this: Insurrection.

Had this been a BLM rally, for example, the police would have beaten and arrested hundreds of people — even if they didn’t enter the capitol building – but these Trump clowns are the cops’ buddies so they just let it keep going. We will be very interested to see if anyone faces charges for this event. Rudy Giuliani actually told the mob, “It’s time for trial by combat!” That is undoubtedly inciting insurrection.

The last time I looked, the penalty for insurrection in the USA is death. It doesn’t matter if the way you carried out the insurrection was stupid — the penalty remains the same. How many of these insurrectionist clowns will be executed? My bet is none.

2021

I know it’s fun to think of a bad year, like 2020, as special, unique and finite. I just watched “Death to 2020” and it was pretty darn funny. It would really be great if all the things that made a year bad would just magically end at midnight on December 31. However, we are all adults and we know that the difference between one year and the next is an arbitrary point, and that events and trends don’t really care what year it is.

I hope you’re ready to focus back on what’s going on in the world.

The Half-assed Coup

First off, the half-assed coup continues. It looked like Trump had gone to Florida for good, but on New Year’s Eve he flew back to DC, and fascist politicos are at least pretending that they’re going to really try to derail congressional approval of the electoral college vote. I’ve seen commentary from the political press saying that the situation is “shocking”. It isn’t. We could just let the people vote and then whoever won the vote would be the next President. The whole reason why we have an electoral college, and the whole reason why the electoral college vote has to be approved by Congress is specifically so the votes of the people can be ignored if political elites feel they should be.

I do think that Trump will ultimately be dethroned, but people — liberals in particular — absolutely do not appreciate how entirely possible it is for Trump Republicans to end American democracy.

COVID-19

COVID-19 will still be with us for a while, and although the vaccine development process was truly amazing, it may not have been fast enough — thanks to anti-mask conservatives and upper-class frequent flyers. There are now at least 2 variants in the world — thankfully, the current vaccines appear to work against both. If the protein key on any new variant of COVID-19 does not match the original version, that will mean an additional vaccine will have to be produced and distributed. The estimate for when COVID-19 will be under control globally is already at around 2023.

US Inequality

Inequality in the US remains dramatic — it is the highest among the G7 nations. It is closer to the levels found in what Trump calls “shithole countries” than what is found in whatever the opposite of that is.

Related: 6 facts about economic inequality in the U.S.

None of the political class has yet to address a real solution to the economic distress happening in America — it was there before, but COVID made things a lot worse. They just keep sending out checks that will be paid for later by hiking up our taxes or cutting government services; they might even steal our Social Security to pay for it. A real solution would be for a national rent freeze to be accompanied by a national mortgage freeze, but for some reason, the banks are untouchable. The Biden tax plan is a nice idea (if it can make it into law) but it is still weaker than what is required. It seems pretty unlikely that they’d go after the real inequity problem — billionaire wealth. The upshot is that working class Americans are going to continue to struggle financially.

Climate

The climate-change-exacerbated disasters that we saw in 2020 are likely to be worse this year, and worse still the year after. A government controlled by the mega-rich donor class will not be capable of creating and enforcing laws that get us to negative emissions, which is what is required to save humanity.

Joe Biden

Joe Biden’s cognitive functioning is going to be problematic. At the very least, he’s going to be seen as a joke, much like Trump was. At the worst, he will indeed be a puppet for capital (much like how Trump often served as a puppet for fascists), which will only make things worse.

Fascists

America still has over 75 million fascists, many of whom are heavily armed. One of the interesting things that were brought to our attention over the last 4 years is that this includes most of our law enforcement officers. America’s cult of radical individualism has eaten away at our ethics to the point where most of us (yes, even Democratic voters) believe that any community good is secretly an evil plot by communists.

CONCLUSION

My conclusion is that 2021 could definitely be worse than 2020. Instead of having a “gee, I sure am glad that’s over LOL” kind of attitude about it, we need to commit to continuing to work hard. And I see you heading for the liquor cabinet, but we all need you coherent and awake for what’s coming next. We all need to pay attention and think.

To that end, let me suggest a couple of people to you.

The first is Heather Cox Richardson. Her “Letters from America” series of semi-daily updates is the best single summary of US news available, in my opinion. She is a Democrat, and so you have those familiar blind spots (like unwavering faith in our democratic institutions, despite their ongoing failures) and yet I haven’t seen anything better. You can find her on Facebook, or if you’ve been banned like me, you can subscribe to Letters from America in email form.

Second is Chris Hedges. If you’re familiar with him, you know his shtick is a bit tiring and you might have discovered (like I did) that he has quite a few stances you strongly disagree with. However, he also has amazing clarity in some areas that I have not seen anywhere else. For example: The Collective Suicide of the Liberal Class

Violence and Fascism

First, I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen’s Council-er or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to “order” than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says “I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can’t agree with your methods of direct action;” who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a “more convenient season.” Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

Dr. Martin Luther King

The Trump regime is still pursuing a coup via the Supreme Court and Trump has recently surrounded himself with psychotic clowns who are encouraging him to declare martial law. Members of Mid-Missouri JBGC still think the half-assed coup will fail, but the fact that they’re still at it requires us to revisit what is required to stop a fascist movement.

There are only 2 ways to stop a fascist movement:
1. Violence
2. A threat of violence that they (the fascists) perceive as sincere and substantial

There is a popular idea in US culture that says fascism can be stopped with nonviolent resistance, and one of the most influential sources for this idea is the book “Why Civil Resistance Works” by Chenoweth and Stephan (previous related post). I’ve read the book, and I can tell you that in 100% of cases in the book where civil resistance worked, the actual factor that resulted in success was either 1) violence or 2) a threat of violence that was perceived as sincere and substantial.

Nonviolent resistance can be a complete solution if the enemy you are dealing with has a conscience. An enemy like that isn’t so much an “enemy” as a group of people who just didn’t understand the impact of their actions. When you apply nonviolence resistance to a situation where this kind of adversary has power, that adversary considers the resistance, and then meets with you to work out a reasonable compromise.

In order for non-violence to work, your opponent must have a conscience.

Stokely Carmichael

Fascists don’t have a conscience.

If your adversaries are fascists, then how might nonviolent resistance result in success? In this case, the goal of your nonviolent action is to gain the favor of either 1) agents of violence or 2) people who control agents of violence. Typically, we see this framed as “gaining the support of the majority” or something like that, which means that you’re trying to get the majority of people in society (and voters, in particular) to support your cause. When that happens, the majority will either send in agents of violence (typically police or military) or threaten to do so if the fascists do not cease their activities.

Some nonviolent resistance movements facing fascists are able to succeed not by appealing to the majority of people but rather by appealing directly to the military or police. Others succeed by appealing to an overwhelming external force, like the US government, which then threatens violence or carries it out directly. If you look at a nominally peaceful organization like Amnesty International, for example, the punchline is that all those letters work because they are accompanied by an implied threat of force from the US military; it becomes much easier for the fascist government targeted by the letter-writing campaign to release a single prisoner than to risk becoming a target of US military or economic might.

Economic embargoes are a kind of violence. Economic power is a type of power, and slow starvation might just be more cruel than bombs. We could ask a number of nations that have experienced both which one they prefer.

If you are using nonviolent resistance against fascists, are you truly nonviolent? Or are you just outsourcing your violence to someone else? Since the violence has to happen for your action to succeed, aren’t you in a less morally-defensible place than you would have been if you’d just taken personal responsibility for the violence? Are you creating a performance of morality to absolve yourself of guilt?

If there are no agents of violence that can come to your rescue, though, nonviolent resistance becomes ineffective against fascists. Fascists enjoy punishing people for being weak, so if you won’t fight back, they interpret that as weakness and enjoy hurting or killing you even more. Your refusal to fight makes them feel more powerful, convinces them that you are getting what you deserve, and eliminates the risk that they themselves might be injured.

The big question, then, is whether or not the majority of Americans have a conscience. I don’t think anyone knows the answer for sure. However, it seems clear that the majority of US voters either are fascists (based on Trump’s approval ratings, this is close to 40%) or basically don’t care if fascists kill resisters. That second group (people who don’t care if the state uses violence against protesters) is harder to quantify, but I’m putting that number at over 25%. I’m assuming that people who self-identify as Democratic party voters and voted for Biden in the primary are the same as the Democrats who are scared of socialism and wish that antifa and BLM would stop being so gosh darn disruptive; they want to get back to brunch and for dissenters to work within a system specifically designed to resist change. They think Ocasio is an extremist.

I don’t know about that AOC. She makes me nervous. Something in her eyes.

my mother, a Bidenist

This is the group that agrees that it is sad so many Americans are suffering from having inadequate or expensive health insurance, but still insist that there is nothing that can be done. They agree that poverty is sad, too, but insist that there just isn’t anything that can be done. Police violence is very sad; nothing can be done, they say. Life is hard. Pass the strawberry jam.

Basically, in the US, fascists just have to associate you with socialism and point out how disruptive you are, and near-right Democrats might claim to be sad that you died, but they won’t do anything to stop it, and they’ll probably say that you share some of the blame for your untimely demise. You could have worked within the system, you could have been less disruptive — but cooperating within the system doesn’t create change. They are politely asking that you give up. It comes down to the fact that the world as it is works very well for them — they don’t want change.

Will this supposed revolution of yours affect my 401K?

a worried Bidenist

So, here you are. In America. Where perhaps two-thirds of the people would either enjoy watching you die or passively let you die. Of the remaining third, most don’t pay enough attention to the news to even know that anything happened to you. The agents of violence that might respond to your injury or death with decisive action (i.e., violence or the threat of it) to end the reign of fascism are they, themselves fascists.

I don’t have a solution. This is a predicament, so it has no solution. I just want to make sure everyone understands how nonviolence works — or doesn’t.

The Half-assed Coup

December 14 came and went, the electoral college voted as they should, and GOP politicians are backing down from supporting the coup. I feel safe in concluding that the coup has failed. Let’s review why it did.

Did it fail because our democratic institutions were impervious to the attacks by MAGA fascists? No. In fact, it became clear that the Trump regime had many viable and even “technically legal” avenues to completing the coup. The “deep state” turned out to be easily bent to the destructive and evil whims of Trump’s co-conspirators.

Did it fail because liberals turned out with such bold actions of material resistance that implementation of fascism was literally not possible? It’s a laughable question, but the serious answer is no. Liberals were in fact constantly trying to convince people to be more compliant as if this would somehow create a sympathetic magic that would bewitch the MAGAs into following our nation’s rules and norms.

When leftists attempted to provide that material resistance, liberals scolded instead of supporting, even going so far as to pursue legal barriers to that kind of resistance which would then be implemented by the very MAGAs the liberals were supposed to be against. For our part in it, our club — having broken no laws — was turned in to law enforcement at least three times by liberals and was booted off of Facebook just for being vaguely scary (again having broken no rules).

Did the coup fail because GOP politicians were good people deep down and refused to go along with the Trump regime’s program of fascism. No, those politicians folded as soon as Trump won the nomination and continued to support him until it was clear he had lost power. Below: Mitch McConnell is the personification of the fictional Pale Man from Pan’s Labyrinth, a monster that represents institutional evil that preys on the helpless.

Here it is: The one and only reason why the Trump regime failed in completely subverting US democracy is because Trump failed as a leader. He is a coward, and because he is a coward, he failed to provide the leadership that would have resulted in the completion of MAGA’s dream of ending liberal democracy. Part of this cowardice was that when he would become frustrated, he would attack the competent co-conspirators surrounding him instead of attacking his real enemies (who might be able to fight back). There were many examples of this, but I’d point to the firing of Steve Bannon as the most significant example of his cowardly mismanagement. Bannon was the primary architect of Trump’s initial victory and had a coherent vision for how to complete the construction of a fascist state.

The cowardice is of course related to Trump’s obvious fragile narcissism. He’s not only afraid of a coup failing (because he could potentially end up at the end of a rope that’s too short) but he’s also afraid of failure at every turn because failure proves the thing he’s most afraid off — that he isn’t as superior as he thinks. He might even be a dumbass.

The fact that Trump himself was the reason for the coup’s failure should not be comforting to you. This just means that the next fascist — coming in 2023 — will be more competent. Just a little competence could easily be the difference between the failure of this fascist coup and the success of the next one. And let’s not kid ourselves — just because the ultimate goal of MAGA was not reached does not mean that the Trump regime was a total failure. They had many successes that will be difficult to correct and others — like the destruction of thousands of immigrant families — that can never be undone.

This Isn’t Over

There’s a lot of political insanity going on right now — no, I’m not talking about the 56 million people who think Joe Biden stole the 2020 election — I’m talking about Democrats who are now overwhelmingly saying, “Welp, that’s it! Fascism has been defeated forever!”

That’s neat. Apparently, Democrats didn’t learn anything when conservatives went completely insane after the election of Barack Obama; nor did they learn anything when conservatives went completely insane after the election of Bill Clinton. And, apparently, they forgot that fascism is the foundation of this nation — they forgot how creating this nation required a genocide that’s still going on today, and they forgot how this nation was built by enslaved people. They forgot how systemic racism still exists today, and isn’t going to go away in their lifetimes. They forgot how the Trump phenomenon is a process that has been building since November of 1979, rather than some quirky anomaly. They certainly forgot how Joe Biden actively participated in maintaining and building a right-wing government, and yet just wasn’t white and racist enough for roughly half of voters.

One of the primary characteristics of Democrats as a group seems to be not just a fascinating aptitude for ignoring reality, but a real thirst for believing that everything is A-OK. Democrats solve problems by saying out loud that there isn’t a problem. Which might explain why they hated Trump so much — he just kept saying the quiet part out loud.

Here’s what’s going to happen: The Trump regime is going to continue to stumble forward with their half-assed coup — not because they believe in the rule of law or have something resembling integrity — because they are afraid to cross that Rubicon. They’re afraid they’ll fail and end up in jail forever, or executed as insurgents. They also can’t drop it completely because of the rage that would induce in Republican voters.

They’re going to wait for Biden to be a disappointment — which he will be. I realize Democrats are all high on success right now, but Biden is truly a disaster area. Not only that, but a dyed-in-the-wool neoliberal like Biden (and his crew) does not have any tools at his disposal to solve the most serious problems facing this country or the world. The most he can do is tread water while those 56 million right-wing extremists seethe and plot. And, you know, he can share charming anecdotes about Cornpop or whatever.

It is literally impossible for Biden to satisfy right-wing voters.

When the 2024 election comes around, the Democratic left (who are centrists according to any sane political compass) will again attempt to win the Democratic party nomination. They’ll present America with a person who is extremely competent, moral, factually correct — and popular. The DNC and the American media will again sabotage that person (at the behest of their billionaire overlords), and convince Democratic voters that their near-right darling is the “practical” choice — i.e., the person that will allow them to go back to sleep. And then, that Democratic candidate will lose and the next President after Biden will be another fascist — except this time the fascist will be competent.

When faced with a competent fascist, what will Democrats do? Everything indicates that they will not do anything effective. They might march (with a permit). They might make an angry Facebook post. They might even change their Facebook icon temporarily as a sign of resistance, or wear a resistance-themed hat. In short, they will fail.

Trump lost the election, but it’s not like he was destroyed — and certainly Trumpism is a thing that exists completely independently from Trump the man. It’s not like this is a superhero movie, and the villain is dead — requiring the writers for the next movie in the franchise to manufacture a new villain. No, the villain — or, rather, villains — are still standing right there. They are right there. Plotting and waiting.

Please enjoy this related video from 2019:

Trump Refuses to Denounce White Supremacy

At the first Presidential debate of the 2020 election, Donald Trump again refused to denounce white supremacy. Instead, he took the opportunity to denounce “the radical left” (again) and give a shout-out to the Proud Boys, an organization of fascist thugs, who have become Trump’s de facto brownshirts. You’d think that would be the end of him, but it won’t be. At least 38% of voters are happy to have an open white supremacist in the White House.

Trump’s entire debate strategy was based around fascist principles — basically, attempting to bully Biden to make himself look strong without any interest in substantive issues.

“When asked what he will do about racial injustice in America, Trump reverted to boasting about the extremist and law enforcement groups that support his campaign. Moreover, when presented with the simple task of condemning white supremacy and white militia groups, he couldn’t – a stark insult to the millions of Black Americans and people of color facing police brutality, the overwhelming brunt of the coronavirus pandemic, and systemic racism in our schools, prisons, and workplaces every day in this country, and their allies who believe in justice and want to move the nation forward. In fact, he issued a rallying cry to one violent white nationalist group, telling them to “stand back and stand by,” Byrd said Tuesday night in an email. “His callousness toward millions of Americans and complete disregard for the systemic injustices our communities face is more than enough proof for why we must come together to vote him out of office. Another four years of Trump means another four years of shameless white nationalism and fascism. Our democracy cannot survive that.”

Jessica Byrd, of the Frontline, an election initiative from the Movement for Black Lives’ Electoral Justice Project and the Working Families Party

Trump himself is not what we need to focus on, however. We already knew Trump was a white supremacist before he was elected; in fact, he was clearly a white supremacist years ago, when he considered himself a Democrat. Instead, we need to consider those Americans who think fascism is a good idea and address the conditions that led them to that horrible opinion.

‘Stand By’: Trump Refuses To Denounce White Supremacy As Debate vs. Biden Spirals Out Of Control
From refusing to denounce white supremacy to shouting out the Proud Boys, the president dug deep into his shameless bag of racist tricks during the first debate against Joe Biden.
by Bruce C. T. Wright