Pragmatic politics focused on the public interest for those uncomfortable with America's two-party system and its way of doing politics. Considering the interface of politics with psychology, cognitive science, social behavior, morality and history.
Etiquette
DP Etiquette
First rule: Don't be a jackass.
Other rules: Do not attack or insult people you disagree with. Engage with facts, logic and beliefs. Out of respect for others, please provide some sources for the facts and truths you rely on if you are asked for that. If emotion is getting out of hand, get it back in hand. To limit dehumanizing people, don't call people or whole groups of people disrespectful names, e.g., stupid, dumb or liar. Insulting people is counterproductive to rational discussion. Insult makes people angry and defensive. All points of view are welcome, right, center, left and elsewhere. Just disagree, but don't be belligerent or reject inconvenient facts, truths or defensible reasoning.
At a rally in Aurora, Colorado, on Friday, the Republican presidential nominee weaponized violent and dehumanizing language to describe immigrants, referring to them as the “enemy from within” while advocating for harsher criminal punishments for the vulnerable demographic, including promising the death penalty.
“But I protect you from outside enemies. But you know I always say, we have the outside enemies, so you can say China, you can say Russia, you can say Kim Jong Un … if you have a smart president it’s no problem,” Trump said. “It’s the enemy from within.
“All the scum we have to deal with that hate our country,” he continued. “That’s a bigger enemy than China and Russia.… Everyday Americans like Cindy are living in fear all because Kamala Harris decided to empty the slums and prison cells of Caracas, and many other places. Happening all over the world.”
“They took the criminals out of Caracas, and they put them along your border, and they said if you ever come back, we’re going to kill you,” Trump said.
“Think of that!” he continued. “We have to live with these animals. But we won’t live with them for long!”
At that, one person in the crowd shouted, “Kill them!”
Jesus Fucking Christ. This deranged lunatic is legitimately trying his damnedest to get something to pop off before Election Day, ain’t he? He wants chaos. He wants death. He wants bloodshed. At this point I don’t think he cares if he wins the election, because it doesn’t matter. This is not going to be a peaceful election. Fuck you MAGAs for promoting this level of domestic terrorism.
That got ~8,300 upvotes. Another peanut commented, but with only 146 upvotes:
I think he's so demented at this point he thinks he's pulling an actual Hitler. And he's stupid enough to have no comprehension of the actual nuances of the situations. Sadly he's going to get a lot of people hurt and killed proving it.
This peanut says, with ~1,100 upvotes:
Hitler used those exact words to help justify what he did. Trump is using the same words to justify what he'll do, and his supporters will also use those words to justify violence against the "enemy from within."
Last peanut:
Lemme guess, this isn't being covered by ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, NYT WSJ, or any other legacy media outlet. Fucking cowards need to remember "The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing"
My professional pulse check assessment: Some people are getting pissed off at DJT and MAGA.
Pastors for Trump founder says Antichrist will be a “homosexual of Jewish descent” — Trump called it a "great honor" to be endorsed by the founder's group (MAGA is anti-Semitic)
-- Democrats apparently have "huge" machines that "spit clouds," which they are using to stop the "black Nazi" from becoming governor. “Like the whole thing with North Carolina, I know though it’s a grab for the land — land grab and they want the lithium,” Kandiss Taylor, who ran for governor of Georgia in 2022, said on the October 5 edition of her podcast, Jesus. Guns. And Babies.
'Sleeper agent' bots on X fuel US election misinformation, study says -- American Sunlight Project analyzed nearly 1,200 accounts, a long-standing network that generated more than 100 million posts as of July, including pro-Kremlin propaganda, content favoring Republican nominee Donald Trump, and misinformation about Harris's campaign. The accounts, some of which have escaped detection and moderation on the site for as long as 15 years, retweeted such content within seconds of its posting, indicating bot activity, the group said in a report shared with AFP ahead of its public release.
This 13 minute video asks ChatGPT to identify and summarize the most important policy goals laid out in Project 2025. I skimmed some of it and concluded the document is genuinely authoritarian and kleptocratic. Project 2025 directly supports and empowers all three strains of modern American radical right authoritarianism, i.e., kleptocratic dictatorship, kleptocratic, unregulated capitalist plutocracy and kleptocratic Christian nationalist theocracy. In my opinion, all three strains of American authoritarianism are kleptocratic by virtue of being anti-transparency in government, which the video briefly mentions. The video does not mention kleptocracy or corruption per se, which I consider to be a major weakness in this particular analysis. And, the narrator has an annoying voice but that is just me.
The AI assessment of Project 2025 identifies and discusses these five topics:
Thanks to Larry Motuz for bringing this video to my attention.
Q: Does Project 2025 inherently establish conditions in government that favor corruption, such as limiting transparency or controlling the independent media?
A: Project 2025 appears to propose several measures that could potentially increase the risk of corruption and reduce government accountability:
1. Firing independent Inspectors General: Project 2025 calls for firing 74 independent Inspectors General who oversee federal operations and detect fraud, waste, and misconduct. It proposes replacing them with politically loyal appointees, which could reduce independent oversight.
2. Replacing civil servants with political appointees: The plan includes creating a new "Schedule F" that would allow firing up to 50,000 civil service employees and replacing them with partisan political operatives. This could reduce the independence and expertise of government agencies.
3. Limiting prosecution of campaign finance violations: Project 2025 proposes directing the Department of Justice to defer decisions on prosecuting campaign finance law violations to the Federal Election Commission, potentially reducing enforcement.
4. Reducing donor transparency: The plan calls for allowing more money in politics while reducing transparency around political donations.
5. Weaponizing the Department of Justice: Project 2025 proposes using the DOJ to target local elected officials and election administrators for partisan reasons.
6. Controlling investigations: It suggests having political appointees review and potentially terminate FBI investigations deemed "contrary to the national interest," which could be used to protect allies and target opponents.
Those measures would seriously reduce government transparency by obliterating independent oversight. Project 2025 proposes a gigantic incentive for corruption by basically making corruption and bribery even more legal than the USSC has made recently done. The document proposes concentrating power in the hands of political appointees loyal to the administration instead of professional career bureaucrats loyal to the public interest and the rule of law. The plan appears designed to give a future administration more control over traditionally independent government functions and reduce checks on executive power. And, there is this follow-up Q&A:
Q: What, if anything, does Project 2025 specifically say about transparency in government operations?
A: Project 2025 does not appear to explicitly address government transparency as a key focus. However, several aspects of the plan could potentially reduce transparency and accountability in government operations:
1.Firing independent Inspectors General: Project 2025 proposes replacing 74 independent Inspectors General, who oversee federal operations and detect fraud and misconduct, with politically loyal appointees. This could reduce independent oversight and transparency of government agencies.
2. Etc.
Here, one sees the weakness in AI. AI treats Trump and MAGA elites like normal people. They are nowhere close to normal. They are ruthless, radical right authoritarian kleptocrats. In view of the reality of Trump and MAGA elites, Perplexity unreasonably softens its answer with milquetoast language like “the plan could potentially reduce transparency and accountability.” Could potentially reduce transparency and accountability?? Like hell. With people like Trump and his corrupt thugs in power, implementing Project 2025 absolutely will eliminate essentially all transparency and accountability.
That is the reasoning that leads me to usually including qualifiers like corrupt, deeply corrupt and especially kleptocratic to describe Trump, MAGA elites and what GOP elites generally stand for.
In my opinion, most of the GOP rank and file are different with their disinformed, manipulated and betrayed minds. They are being used and will be abused if they get what they want. Unfortunately, we are collateral damage that will get the same or worse treatment.
This 6:34 video of Roger Stone supporting open attacks on the election makes it explicit that MAGA plans to steal the the 2024 election if DJT loses. This is the reality of American radical right authoritarianism. Its scope and depth has grown far, far beyond just Trump. The elites running the MAGA wealth and power movement are fueled mostly by lies, slanders, bullshit, crackpottery, rage, hate and what appears to be non-trivial, actual belief in some of their own lies, slanders, bullshit and crackpottery. American authoritarianism has deep roots and a lot of infrastructure in place. The Trump cadre of authoritarian elites** are planning to make their run at kleptocratic dictatorship with Trump as a callous, kleptocratic, above-the-law dictator for life.
** The Trump cadre of elites are the kleptocratic autocrats among MAGA elites. The kleptocratic plutocrats and kleptocratic Christian nationalist theocrats are also in play. A lot of elite authoritarians appear to be sympathetic two or all three strains. The extent of coordination between the three strains of American radical right authoritarianism is unclear to me, but significant coordination exists. Perplexity:
While the extent of explicit coordination is difficult to quantify, there are clear overlapping interests and mutually reinforcing actions between these groups that pose a threat to American democracy and civil liberties.
but this is about an election. We gotta fight it out on a state-to-state basis.”
☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️☠️
The Authoritarian Playbook
A nonpartisan, anti-authoritarianism group, Protect Democracy has posted the Authoritarian Playbook as a guide for journalists to spot and understand the tactics authoritarians use to gain power against a democracy.
Protect Democracy describes itself as “a cross-ideological nonprofit group dedicated to defeating the authoritarian threat, building more resilient democratic institutions, and protecting our freedom and liberal democracy.” The group relies on experts, advocates, litigation, legislative and communications strategies, technology, research, and analysis in its work. The point is to make a stand in defense of free and fair elections, the rule of law, fact-based debate, and a better democracy.
Authoritarian takeovers rarely happen overnight. Today’s authoritarian playbook is a process that happens piecemeal and is hard to distinguish from normal political jockeying.
Before the 1990s, authoritarian leaders bent on upending democracy typically came to power forcefully and swiftly, often by means of a military coup d’etat. The moment democracy ceased to exist could be time-stamped and reported on with a block headline.
Yet for at least the last 30 years, the threats to democracy have evolved. Today, democracy more often dies gradually, as the institutional, legal, and political constraints on authoritarian leaders are chipped away, one by one. This has happened, or is happening, in countries including Russia, Venezuela, Hungary, the Philippines, Poland, Nicaragua, India, Turkey — and the United States.
By using “salami tactics,” slicing away at democracy a sliver at a time, modern authoritarians still cement themselves in power, but they do so incrementally and gradually. Sometimes their actions are deliberate and calculated, but sometimes they are opportunistic, myopic, or even bumbling. There is no longer a singular bright line that countries cross between democracy and authoritarianism. But the outcome is still the same.
This presents a unique challenge for journalists, who are committed to providing the public much-needed information and context about important news. Contemporary democratic breakdowns are far more difficult to identify because — in snapshots — they can mimic the typical acts of political jockeying to gain advantage that are routine even in healthy democracies. But especially as these acts accumulate and intensify, hard-nosed politics can cross a line into authoritarian threats. Unfortunately, there is no simple bright-line answer or mechanical test to distinguish between the two.
At the same time, because authoritarianism worldwide tends to follow clear and consistent patterns, we can use these patterns to separate the signal from the noise. This basic framework — the authoritarian playbook — can help isolate clear and immediate dangers to democracy from partisan outrage, political hyperbole, and sensational spin.
The press has a foundational role to play in how democratic systems hold leaders accountable, and doing so requires clarity about the gravity and implications of their actions. Understanding and recognizing the authoritarian playbook as a whole can help journalists not only decide what to cover as threats to democracy, but can also help enrich and contextualize coverage about how the individual components of the playbook fit together. Americans suspect that their democracy is at risk. But by identifying and connecting individual threats to democracy to the global whole, reporting can help inform voters about more than just what is happening — it can tell them what the news means.
Covering the authoritarian danger requires that the press do two things: understand the interlocking components of the playbook itself, and distinguish between normal political jockeying and genuine authoritarian moves. This briefing is designed to help journalists do just that.
The analytic framework for authoritarianism is this:
Weaponizing Fear: Authoritarian leaders embrace a language of violence, promote a punitive culture, and leverage military might domestically. They aim to make critics believe they'll face harm for opposing the regime.
Targeting Outsiders: They stoke xenophobia by demonizing immigrants and foreigners, blaming domestic problems on these scapegoats, and portraying political opponents as sympathetic to these perceived enemies.
Undermining Institutions: This involves taking over courts, eliminating checks and balances, undoing established treaties and legislation that limit executive power, and weakening protections for free and fair elections.
Rewriting History: Authoritarian leaders exert control over schools and media to indoctrinate the public with beliefs that reinforce their power.
Exploiting Religion: They appeal to the religious majority while targeting minorities, often conflating national identity with religious identity.
Dividing and Conquering: Using hate speech and encouraging violent actors to widen social rifts, they manufacture crises to seize more power.
Eroding Truth: They attack the press as an "enemy of the people," dismiss negative reports as "fake news," counter legitimate information with disinformation, and overwhelm the media landscape with endless scandals and contradictions.
Additional Tactics
Politicizing Independent Institutions: Authoritarians attack and seek to capture institutions that typically operate independently from partisan politics, such as law enforcement and central banking.
Aggrandizing Executive Power: They work to weaken legislatures, courts, and other institutions designed to provide checks and balances, often justifying this expansion of power through cults of personality.
Corrupting Elections: While maintaining the facade of elections, they tilt rules against opponents, suppress votes, and may even overturn results.
Stoking Violence: Many authoritarians deliberately inflame violence to create fear, division, and feelings of insecurity.
By employing these tactics, authoritarian leaders aim to consolidate their power, suppress opposition, and erode democratic norms and institutions. These tactics are often employed gradually and in combination, making them difficult to distinguish from normal political maneuvering. The playbook emphasizes that modern authoritarians frequently come to power through seemingly democratic means before slowly eroding democratic norms and institutions
The MSM talks very little about the OW (Overton Window). But in my opinion that is a serious mistake. Understanding the OW concept helps to understand the current ideological divide. It helps explain the false perception by tens of millions of Americans that DJT, the Republican Party and MAGA generally are not radical, authoritarian, kleptocratic or bigoted. A WaPo article directly discusses this (not paywalled):
More Americans see Harris than Trump as very ideological
It’s presumably in part because Trump’s already shifted conservative ideology so far to the right
There are those who dislike the metaphor of the frog in the slowly boiling water, but it’s hard to deny its utility. Perhaps frogs aren’t as complacent as the morality tale would suggest, but the idea of a critter becoming acclimated to increasingly dangerous environs deserves some sort of short hand. Particularly at the moment.
Republicans see a citizenry unaware that the nation is facing a crisis of the economy and public safety, mirroring the (pun intended) overheated presentation of their nominee, former president Donald Trump. Democrats see a country unconcerned about the risk of tipping into authoritarianism, a concern amplified by Vice President Kamala Harris (and that’s also driven by Trump’s past actions and rhetoric).
Partisans tend to see the other party’s candidate as an embodiment of the problem, an extreme manifestation of a political ideology they oppose. Unsurprisingly, then, polling conducted by YouGov for the Economist found that significant portions of the country view Trump and Harris not just as conservative and liberal, respectively, but very liberal or conservative. Perhaps unexpectedly, more Americans say Harris is very liberal (37 percent) than say Trump is very conservative (28 percent).
That’s in part because Democrats are less likely to say that Trump is very conservative (40 percent do) than Republicans are to say that Harris is very liberal (71 percent do).
That is in part because Republicans are more fervent in their ideology than are Democrats. That’s reflected in how partisans view their own candidates. About half of Republicans say Trump is “conservative” with another quarter saying he’s “very conservative.” Among Democrats, a bit under half say Harris is “liberal” — with nearly a third describing her as “moderate.” What it means to be “conservative” has shifted — perhaps not among purists but certainly among a lot of Americans. Donald Trump has been the Republican nominee for three straight cycles and, as the head of the ticket, has helped reshape the party and redefine right-wing politics.
So by the standard of national politics in 2014, Trump is unquestionably more ideological than Republicans overall. We might not have used “conservative” to describe his politics at the time, since “conservative” was a signifier for Republican spending and social positions. Now it’s a signifier for Trump’s far-right mix of populism, isolationism and xenophobia. And by the standard of the new Trump “conservatism,” Trump is in fact not extreme at all. The water got warmer.
Democrats identify themselves as liberal and moderate and see their candidate as liberal or moderate. Republicans identify themselves as conservative and see their candidate as conservative. But presumably in part because Trump has already shifted “conservatism” to the right, his ideology is seen as less fervent than his opponent’s overall.
An important concept that is absent here is authoritarianism. DJT's ideology is not "conservative." It is authoritarian, and kleptocratic. The same applies to Republican Party elites and most rank and file MAGA people/DJT supporters.
Note that the WaPo article referred to DJT's politics as Trump’s far-right mix of populism, isolationism and xenophobia.A Perplexity search about authoritarianism in that kind of politics gave this response:
Q: Can a far-right mix of populism, isolationism and xenophobia be considered inherently authoritarian or authoritarian-leaning, for example as in the case of Trump and MAGA?
A: Trump has shown a tendency to aggrandize executive power and resist checks and balances. This includes: Asserting broad emergency powers, issuing controversial [corrupt, actually] pardons, making extensive use of acting appointments, resisting congressional oversight, and claiming immunity from judicial accountability. These actions align with authoritarian efforts to consolidate power in the executive branch.
The MAGA movement has engaged in tactics that threaten core democratic processes: Spreading disinformation about election integrity by (i) attempting to overturn legitimate election results, (ii) passing laws that may enable partisan interference in elections, and (iii) supporting the January 6th attack on the Capitol. Such efforts to subvert democratic norms and institutions are hallmarks of authoritarian movements.
The movement revolves heavily around Trump as a strongman figure, with supporters often displaying intense, unquestioning loyalty. This cult of personality is a common feature of authoritarian regimes.
There are indications of hostility toward critics and opposition, including attacks on media as "enemies of the people", attempts to silence or discredit political opponents, and combative rhetoric toward those who disagree. This intolerance of dissent reflects authoritarian impulses to suppress opposing views.
While not every aspect of the movement is inherently authoritarian, the combination of these factors - executive overreach, undermining of democratic norms, nativism, cult of personality, and intolerance of opposition - creates a political ideology with strong authoritarian leanings. However, it's important to note that supporters may not view these elements as authoritarian, often seeing them instead as necessary measures to "make America great again."
That last sentence speaks truth. As far as I can tell, nearly all of the MAGA rank and file claim they are fighting to make American great again. Supporting DJT and MAGA is how they do that. That is solid evidence that the OW has shifted far toward authoritarianism, not necessarily far toward conservatism. There is a huge problem with limiting the OW spectrum to a left vs right scale. The most important OW scale here is democracy vs authoritarianism, not liberal vs conservative.
We talk of this thing called “afterlife.” If it exists, and since we have no direct access to it, we can
only imagine it, or if you are the religious type, maybe/probably you believe
in it.
But…
What if what we are experiencing now is an/the “afterlife”
of some existence we had before the current one?Is that impossible?
Like dreaming is an altered state of existence from what we
experience in our waking hours, maybe life as we experience it is just an
altered state of our “real” existence.
Take these thoughts and run with them (i.e., speculate).
