The fall of democracy and the rule of law fall to authoritarianism: An example

A number of things reassure some Americans that democracy and the rule of law will not fall to some form of authoritarianism or autocracy. They see little to modest cause for concern. Reassurances come from things like a long democratic history, ethics rules and laws, democratic norms and institutions, e.g., courts, a free press and a vigorous political opposition. 

However, recent poll data indicates that most Americans are now seriously concerned. NPR commented yesterday: “One year after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, Americans are deeply pessimistic about the future of democracy. A new NPR/Ipsos poll finds that 64% of Americans believe U.S. democracy is ‘in crisis and at risk of failing.’ Overall, 70% of poll respondents agree that the country is in crisis and at risk of failing.” 

A striking thing about those concerns is that they are mostly partisan. Republicans generally believe that Democrats are hell bent on establishing a brutal, atheist, socialist or communist tyranny. Democrats generally fear Republican authoritarianism and right wing autocracy. One question that raises, is the threat from each side about equal? Is there equivalence, more or less?

Some (most?) experts agree and are now warning of an imminent, serious threat to American democracy. At least one expert now sees the US as an anocracy, neither democracy nor autocracy. Most experts appear to see right wing autocratic tyranny as the main threat, not socialist or communist tyranny. 

The example of Hungary and the rise of radical right authoritarianism

The New York Times writes:

After years of complacency and wishful thinking, Brussels is finally trying to rein in the country’s pugnacious leader, Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

After long indulging him, leaders in the European Union now widely consider Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary an existential threat to a bloc that holds itself up as a model of human rights and the rule of law.

Mr. Orban has spent the past decade steadily building his “illiberal state,” as he proudly calls Hungary, with the help of lavish E.U. funding. Even as his project widened fissures in the bloc, which Hungary joined in 2004, his fellow national leaders mostly looked the other way, committed to staying out of one another’s affairs.

But now Mr. Orban’s defiance and intransigence has had an important, if unintended, effect: serving as a catalyst for an often-sluggish European Union system to act to safeguard the democratic principles that are the foundation of the bloc.

Early this year, the European Court of Justice will issue a landmark decision on whether the union has the authority to make its funds to member states conditional on meeting the bloc’s core values. Doing so would allow Brussels to deny billions of euros to countries that violate those values.

The bloc has consistently worked on political consensus among national leaders. But Mr. Orban has pushed Brussels toward a threshold it had long avoided: making membership subject to financial punishments, not merely political ones.

The new frontier could help solve an old problem — what to do about bad actors in its ranks — while creating new ones. Not least, it could invite the European Commission, the bloc’s executive branch, to exercise a new level of interference in the affairs of member states.

How Mr. Orban has forced the European Union to such a juncture, and why it seemed helpless to stop him for so long, says much about the bloc’s founding assumptions and why it has stumbled in the face of populist and nationalist challenges.  

Mr. Orban’s party adopted the new Constitution and a new media law that curbed press freedom. It overhauled the country’s justice system, removed the head of its Supreme Court and created an office to oversee the courts led by the wife of a prominent member of the governing party, Fidesz. Election laws were changed to favor the party. 

Does any of that sound familiar, e.g., changing election laws to favor the party?

The NYT article points out that EU leaders did not confront Orban about the rule of law, corruption or authoritarianism. EU leaders, being politicians, did not want to confront him because he won an election. That is what politicians respected. Their professed core democratic values were subjugated to their core political values. That gave Orban the political room he needed to usurp democracy in Hungary without significant EU opposition.

One can ask, in what way is this relevant to US politics? The NYT article comments that on Monday, the ex-president endorsed Orban for re-election. Trump even pledged his “complete support.” On the other hand, Orban was an early supporter of Trump. He endorsing him in the summer of 2016 and again in 2020. Tellingly, Orban commented about Trump: “probably, like me, a little bit controversial, but that’s OK.”

A little bit controversial? Maybe that is how right wing authoritarians see themselves. Just a little bit controversial, nothing more. Maybe that is how left wing extremists see themselves too.

Recently Fox News, the flagship propaganda arm of the Republican Party, broadcast from Hungary and lavished praise on Orban for doing such a good job. While in Hungary, the self-professed professional liar, Tucker Carlson, commented on the differences between Biden and Orban: 

“Because the lessons are so obvious, and such a clear refutation to the policies we currently have, and the people who instituted those policies, Hungary and its government have been ruthlessly attacked and unfairly attacked: 'It's authoritarian, they're fascists…' There are many lies being told right now, that may be the greatest of all. .... The elite [Democrats and Biden] has turned against its own people, and that's not healthy. Simply put, the leadership of the country hates the American people. .... He [Orban] is defending democracy against the unaccountable billionaires, the non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and certain western governments. He is fighting for democracy against those forces which would like to bury it.”

So there you have it. One of the top Republican Party propagandists calls Democrats and Biden authoritarian fascists who want to bury democracy. No wonder most Republicans see a deadly threat from Democrats. Carlson and most Republicans see Orban and themselves as fighting for democracy against billionaires and other bad groups and people. By analogy with Republican thinking, EU political leaders must also be authoritarian fascists for criticizing Orban.

Questions: 

1. Is the threat to American democracy and the rule of law about the same from Democrats and Republicans?

2. Is Hungary now authoritarian, or even fascist?

Fascism: a form of far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, and strong regimentation of society and the economy, often tinged with racial or ethnic bigotry and hostility to a free press

Human civilization: Is war unavoidable?

DISCLAIMER: Comments below that criticize this program and my interpretation of it have are convincing. I non longer stand by this blog post. I will not delete it so that what I wrote and the criticisms stay available online. I apologize. I want the combination ignorance and errors (on my part) and irresponsible reporting by PBS to stand intact so people can see for themselves how mistakes and misunderstandings can so easily arise.  

PBS is airing an excellent four-part series called First Civilizations. The first episode is War. The other three are Religion, Cities and Trade. They are behind a paywall, so I can't link to anything one can play online without a PBS membership. I've listened to War and Religion so far.

The history of war is relevant to modern civilization and politics. The experts argue that all of the evidence, technology and analysis available so far point to the following narrative as (i) a likely path to modern civilization, and (ii) a basis to predict future events:

Before civilizations started, groups of nomadic humans competed with each other. They were hunter-gatherers. They sometimes fought and killed each other for food and other resources. Civilization started when agriculture started about 12,000 years ago. People settled down and stay put as long as the land and climate could support agriculture. 

Evidence from early settlements that grew to significant size indicates that the most powerful tribes or clans took control of increasing areas of land. Those mini-civilizations (mini-civs) had their own customs and beliefs that tied them together. Sometimes terrain constrained a mini-civ, while others kept getting bigger. Eventually the bigger mini-civs attacked and either obliterated the smaller ones or subjugated them. These wars were to pro-actively protect what the mini-civ had and/or to expand the attacker's power and land mass.

Sometimes the winning mini-civ would adopt one or more of the customs, beliefs or technology of a defeated mini-civ. The War episode referred to this process of assimilating things from others as creative destruction on the path to modernity. The creative destruction was usually (always?) bloody and cruel. Assimilation was a necessary step. The experts then step back and look at archaeology and history from the time of mini-civs to today. They see the same pattern over and over. War leads to creative destruction and civilization often takes another step forward, or at least sideways. 

In this context civilization refers to both advances in technology, including (i) advances in weapons and tactics of war, and (ii) changes in cultural customs and norms. The changes in customs and norms included creation of and advances in social institutions, governance and religion. In essence, the customs and norms were the social glue necessary for civilization to advance. The Religion episode argues that religion was a necessary component for social glue and thus for civilization to advance.

Why bring this up?

Multiple reasons. One is that human history is riddled with war. War is now seen by at least some experts as possibly unavoidable for civilization to advance. The problem with that is that humans can now obliterate modern civilization with nuclear weapons and maybe also with unrestrained climate change and/or overpopulation. If nothing else, complacency about the possibility of humans obliterating modernity and having to do a restart should not be taken as a remote possibility if past human history is a guide.

Another is that some comments here in the last week or two strenuously argued that the founding of America and its history was a tale of an evil, blood soaked death machine that inflicted vast death and misery on far too much of humanity. There is enough evidence to reasonably argue that. From that point of view, the Funding Fathers actually were Founding Genocidists or Founding Terrorists, none of whom should be venerated or respected. According to that line of reasoning, all US presidents were murdering war mongers or, at least in the case of indigenous American Indians, all were argued to literally be genocidists. In the context of the advance of civilization, it is arguable that whatever American was and did, it was an inevitable aspect of humans and just what they do. 

In a post here yesterday, I mentioned Thomas Paine's argument for a democratic Republic in his 1776 Common Sense essay. There, he advocated for war against England to throw off the tyranny of monarchy and the British Crown. To a significant extent, his writings were seminal in the vision and articulation of what American eventually turned out to be. But once again, war led to an advance in governance and society, but this time there seemed to be less assimilation by a winning, less powerful civ and more spontaneous creation. Regardless, war probably was a necessary component. But in some ways America arguably was an anomaly.

A question all this raises is whether humans can progress without war. After listening to the War and Religion episodes, it just isn't clear. Are we destined to self-annihilate and restart if we don't go extinct, or can we do it without most or all of the blood and misery? Are what we seeing in increasingly bitter US politics two mini-civs, left and right, at an intractable impasse that will lead to either civil war or the dissolution of the Union as increasing numbers of conservatives say they want? 

Signs that the media is awakening to the authoritarian threat

It feels like the dam has broken. Expressions of deep concern for the fate of democracy and the rule of law seem to be flooding out now. The Washington Post reports on calls for the media to give the radical right Republican Party threat more focus and urgency. The WaPo writes: 

Much of this work [on reporting the threat] has been impressive. And yet, something crucial is missing. For the most part, news organizations are not making democracy-under-siege a central focus of the work they present to the public.

“We are losing our democracy day by day, and journalists are individually aware of this, but media outlets are not centering this as the story it should be,” said Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a scholar of autocracy and the author of “Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present.”

That American democracy is teetering is unquestionable. Jan. 6 is every day now, in the words of a recent New York Times editorial that noted the growing evidence: election officials harassed by conspiracy theory addicts, death threats issued to politicians who vote their conscience, GOP lawmakers pushing measures to make it harder for citizens to vote and easier for partisans to overturn legitimate voting results.

“The reactionary counter-mobilization against democracy has accelerated,” wrote historian Thomas Zimmer, a visiting professor at Georgetown. “It’s happening on so many fronts simultaneously that it’s easy to lose sight of how things are connected.”  

To be sure, even some of the most studiously neutral of news organizations are doing important journalism on this subject.

“ ‘Slow-motion insurrection’: How GOP seizes election power,” read the headline of an Associated Press news story last week. It detailed the ways in which Republicans aligned with former president Donald Trump, after the near-miss of last year’s coup attempt, “have worked to clear the path for next time.”  

Similarly, NPR recently ran a seven-minute segment on what it called “the clear and present danger of Trump’s enduring ‘Big Lie.’ ” As NYU’s Jay Rosen noted, the piece was admirably direct in its language: “No dilution via 'both sides,” no ‘critics say,’ Just a straight-up warning.” And on NBC’s “Meet the Press” this weekend, moderator Chuck Todd — who has deservedly drawn criticism in recent months for too often allowing GOP talking points to go unchallenged — stepped up in a significant way to detail the “big lie” spread by Trump allies this past year to evoke the specter of a supposedly stolen presidential election.  

But, in general, this pro-democracy coverage is not being “centered” by the media writ large. It’s occasional, not regular; it doesn’t appear to be part of an overall editorial plan that fully recognizes just how much trouble we’re in.

That must change. It’s not merely that there needs to be more of this work. It also needs to be different. For example, it should include a new emphasis on those who are fighting to preserve voting rights and defend democratic norms.

That is some solid good news for a change. It is unfortunate that this is prompted by something sinister and immoral, evil IMO. We will see how the Republican Party assault on democracy, the rule of law and civil liberties will play out. The 2022 and 2024 elections are likely to shed some light on whether the US will go from the anocracy it is now to a fascist autocracy or whether it will move toward democracy.

The stunning power of propaganda

A new poll indicates that a majority of Americans now believe that American democracy is in serious danger of falling. But as the poll indicates, the two sides see each other as the threat. NPR writes:

One year after the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, Americans are deeply pessimistic about the future of democracy. 

A new NPR/Ipsos poll finds that 64% of Americans believe U.S. democracy is "in crisis and at risk of failing." That sentiment is felt most acutely by Republicans: Two-thirds of GOP respondents agree with the verifiably false claim that "voter fraud helped Joe Biden win the 2020 election" — a key pillar of the "Big Lie" that the election was stolen from former President Donald Trump.

Fewer than half of Republicans say they are willing to accept the results of the 2020 election — a number that has remained virtually unchanged since we asked the same question last January.

"There is really a sort of dual reality through which partisans are approaching not only what happened a year ago on Jan. 6, but also generally with our presidential election and our democracy," said Mallory Newall, a vice president at Ipsos, which conducted the poll.

"It is Republicans that are driving this belief that there was major fraudulent voting and it changed the results in the election," Newall said.

Nearly two-thirds of poll respondents agree that U.S. democracy is "more at risk" now than it was a year ago. Among Republicans, that number climbs to 4 in 5.

Overall, 70% of poll respondents agree that the country is in crisis and at risk of failing.

The country can't even decide what to call the assault on the Capitol. Only 6% of poll respondents say it was "a reasonable protest" — but there is little agreement on a better description. More than half of Democrats say the Jan. 6 assault was an "attempted coup or insurrection," while Republicans are more likely to describe it as a "riot that got out of control."

Americans are bitterly divided over the events that led to Jan. 6, as well.

"I think the Democrats rigged the election," said Stephen Weber, a Republican from Woonsocket, R.I. "And who the hell would vote for Biden?"

More than 81 million people voted for Biden, compared with more than 74 million for Trump. Biden won with 306 electoral votes to 232 for Trump.

But Weber is skeptical. In a follow-up interview, Weber said he doesn't trust mail-in voting and doesn't believe that Democratic lawmakers have the country's best interests at heart.

"They want to change it to something else. We don't want it changed," he said.

Democrats also expressed dismay about the state of democracy — but for very different reasons. In follow-up interviews, they voiced concern about voting restrictions passed by Republican-controlled state legislatures in the wake of the 2020 election. And they struggled to make sense of the persistent belief in the fiction that Trump won.

"When Trump first came out with his 'big lie,' it just never occurred to me that so many Republicans would jump on board," said Susan Leonard of Lyme, N.H.

"It's like a group mental illness has hit these people," said Leonard. "I cannot believe this is happening in our country. I'm scared, I really am."  

The poll found that support for false claims about election fraud and the Jan. 6 attack have been remarkably stable over time.

For example, one-third of Trump voters say the attack on the Capitol was actually carried out by "opponents of Donald Trump, including antifa and government agents" — a baseless conspiracy theory that has been promoted by conservative media since the attack, even though it has been debunked.

If that isn't evidence of how powerful and persuasive even debunked, crackpot propaganda and lies can be and is, then what is it evidence of? 

For Republicans, it is compelling evidence that the Democrats rigged the election so they can change the country. Changing it from what to what is never made very clear. Neither is the Republican vision of what it is. Some republicans say they don't want what American is now and want something from the past, but how that past would differ from what there is now isn't specified. 

One reassuring point is that a majority of Republicans and Democrats still reject political violence according to the poll. At least we still have that.

Question: On a scale of 1-7, 1 = no danger, 7 = grave danger, how much danger is the US in regarding losing democracy and civil liberties to (i) the Republicans and their supporters, and (ii) the Democrats and their supporters?