101–110 of 536 posts
Terrifying. This anti-speech is anathema to all Americans. Let’s remember that. By recalling what all Americans have as a sacred self-belief (myth even), that America is anti-Nazi and anti-dictatorship and pro-freedom and pro-speech, we can effectively strengthen our ties.
What seems to drive Trump at his core is not ideology, but ego. On their path to power, both he and Musk could have been democrats, but they were rejected.
Together, they share the goal of creating the greatest presidency in American history. At some point, this may be a better scenario than the alternative.
The election is past: “winning” and defeating the opposition are less relevant now than creative strategies for generating positive outcomes from the current situation.
Outrage feeds the demons. There may be other, more effective (but less emotionally satisfying) paths to mutual-self-interest. In conflict with the very powerful, redirection often works better than direct opposition.
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The president is fascist because he's, checks notes... , relinquishing governmental power by shutting down agencies? I think the only thing people have been habituated to is the enormity of the government; go back to any other point in history, was the government this big in terms of independent agencies, employee/contractor count, budget/debt as percentage of gdp? Sure the spoils system was bad, but the current iter…
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What a way to utterly waste the likely last few generations of "civilized" humanity on Earth... :(
Nobody really remembers, hence, the same mistakes will be made.
President is unilaterally shutting down federal agencies. If this goes on there really isn't a constitution anymore, not in practice anyway.
The president is fascist because he's, checks notes... , relinquishing governmental power by shutting down agencies? I think the only thing people have been habituated to is the enormity of the government; go back to any other point in history, was the government this big in terms of independent agencies, employee/contractor count, budget/debt as percentage of gdp? Sure the spoils system was bad, but the current iter…
He's shutting them down to strengthen his own power.
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In France at least, Brexit made the idea of leaving the EU obsolete in political discourse, both on the left and far right. But at the same time French media just repeated the “it's a clumsy handwave from an autistic dude” narrative after Musk's Nazi salute so I'm not sure it will work this time.
Notice that this benevolence and protection by the media is granted to Musk (and Trump) by their complete subservience to Israel's demands and wants. Trump just proposed ethnic cleansing the Gaza Strip and cleaning up the rubble with American money and work so it can be handed over to Israel in a nice shape.
It's the new Riviera after all . . .
"The Germans" is an absolutely jaw dropping read, a series of interviews with average German citizens and low-level nazi party members, conducted a decade or so after the war, by an American Jewish journalist. It shows, in first hand accounts, the banality of evil and how easily it can prevail if people do nothing. It is an account of modern tyranny and everyday collaboration. The parallels in the feeling of what's h…
They looked so normal, having fun, teasing each other, drinking and playing instruments.
There is even a video where hitler is shying away from his love companion.
This was a shock to me as a kid: evil doesn't look like the caricature of "the very bad guy", it emerges in every day people.
I think we failed to communicate that. It was too tempting to have a universal vilain you could use in Hollywood movies and instantly recognize. That you can't identify to. Black and white is so easy to sell.
But what it means is a huge part of our society cannot make the link between what is happening in their own life and the past. Because they have a vision of the past that looks like a kid show, not what really happened.
Worse, on the other side, outraged people abused the term nazi to call out anybody that had a bad behavior. But there is a huge difference between being an asshole and being ready to commit genocide.
Eventually it means the word nazi lost all of its meaning. And all of its usefulness to defend ourselves.
In the last too decades, we surely spent a lot of time playing with words until they could not be useful anymore. But it made us feel good for a moment.
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There are protests planned for today (Wednesday) across the US
Honestly, what would these protests do? Serious question. Let say you manage to achieve the unthinkable and bring a huge amount of people on the street, heck let say you are so successful that you also get a full on national strike going, what then? Do you think it would affect those in charge right now? He would not care. He is already ruining the US economy and alliances. Why would he care if some people he does no…