Branko Marcetic noted in his coverage of the SVB collapse and bailout that “The spectacular collapse of Silicon Valley Bank was caused by corruption, financial recklessness, and poor decision-making. With its bailout echoing 2008’s eager bailouts for the rich, it begs the question: How much longer will Americans put up with this?… Behind it all, there’s a question: How much longer people will tolerate a system like this? One where vast amounts of wealth are misdirected to unproductive ends in the middle of world historical crises, then frittered away in speculative recklessness that nearly brings the entire structure down, only for those with the money to parachute to safety while everyone else remains condemned to austerity. The original bank bailouts set off a cascade of popular anger that’s irrevocably shaped the landscape of twenty-first-century politics, from Occupy Wall Street and the Bernie Sanders campaigns to the Tea Party movement and the Trump presidency. What will it look like if they keep on happening?”
That sounds ominous, but it doesn’t sound nearly as ominous as it should. Yesterday, Jonathan Chait noted how Democrats dick around with the applicability of the word “fascist” to the Republican Party and their fascist politicians. He wrote that he agrees that “on the narrow point of terminology,” he largely agrees that “fascist should not be used to describe figures like Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis. Historians and political theorists have innumerable definitions of fascism— some narrow, others extremely broad. But most people understand fascism to mean a single-party state in which effective political opposition is impossible— or at least extremely dangerous. Neither Trump nor DeSantis is trying to build a system like this.” He’s demonstrably and utterly wrong in both cases. But let’s go on with his point because he wrote that he does “believe is that it’s accurate to describe Trump and DeSantis as engaging in and advocating authoritarian measures that weaken democracy without eliminating it altogether as a fascist would.”
OK, but you don’t go from a [somewhat decrepit, corrupted] democracy to a fascist state in the blink of an eye. It takes work and time— and both Trump, DeSantis and the MAGAt movement— virtually the GOP electorate—are moving in that direction, something akin to what Chait calls “democratic backsliding.” He noted that “World War II discredited the fascist label completely without thoroughly eradicating its underlying ideas. It is therefore possible for fascist, or semi-fascist, ideas to exist in a context in which the term fascist is shunned. The residue of the World War II struggle against self-identified fascist powers made the term into a synonym for evil in both Russia and the West, yet the former is replicating its features rather closely. Vladimir Putin has criminalized dissent while mobilizing the country in a genocidal war of territorial conquest— all in the name of opposing fascism. Attaching a widespread opprobrium to the term fascist does not seem to provide a society much inoculation against the rise of murderous ultranationalist dictators.”
Chait got it right when he wrote that “many people who denounce the post-election events of 2000 believe that the Republican Party has grown more hostile to democracy since then. These early signs of weakening commitment to democratic norms are consistent with believing that the party is evolving toward authoritarianism. A perfectly healthy Republican Party would never have nominated Trump in the first place. The Brooks Brothers Riot was a sign of things to come… [T]he whole transformation from the 1990s to the Trump era is that far-right paramilitary organizations have gone from a position outside party politics to inside of them. Of course, having large numbers of armed kooks milling around is never a good thing, but it’s much worse when they have become the paramilitary wing of a major political party. Trump not only encouraged this opening up of the party’s rightward boundary, but his main rival, DeSantis, has done absolutely nothing to halt it. DeSantis, on the contrary, has openly courted numerous representatives of the far right (QAnon devotees, J6-ers) who would have been shunned by the pre-Trump party. Proud Boys can now work in paid jobs in the Republican Party.”
Ron DeSantis is about to make his third campaign trip to South Carolina and was just in Iowa campaigning. He’ll be campaigning in New Hamsphire next month, headlining the GOP’s annual Amos Tuck Dinner on April 14, a clearly political event and the state Republican Party’s largest annual fundraiser. If he does, shouldn’t he resign as governor? Not only is he neglecting his duties, he would also be breaking the law. Florida has a resign-to-run law, which is codified in Section 99.012 of the Florida Statutes. It requires most elected officials— first and foremost governors— to resign from their current office if they intend to run for another elected office that is not co-terminous with their current position. The purpose of the law, passed in 1951, is to prevent elected officials from using their current position to gain an unfair advantage in their campaign for another office. Texas has a similar law and Abbott has told people that that has held him back from doing too much exploring of a presidential run, unlike DeSantis who is doing every single thing a candidate does— including raising tens of millions of dollars— short of officially declaring. Would you say this kind of breaking the law is another indication that DeSantis is fascistic?
It sounds like Colorado Republican Tim Miller thinks his state’s party has gone down the fascist path. “The GOP’s most wild-eyed members are determined to run things even further into the ground,” he wrote, referring to how badly the party did in the 2022 midterms. “This weekend they handed the keys to the party to a tiny cloister of extremists more interested in owning the libs than fixing their losing brand.”
On Saturday, a group of around 400 Republican party leaders and grassroots activists met to choose their new chair.
The race kicked off last December with an event that is already legendary in local political lore: a Shooters shoutfest outside Boot Barn Total Landscaping in Greenwood Village, a suburban enclave home to family-friendly neighborhood parks, chain restaurants, and the Denver Tech Center—not exactly a hotbed of nationalist extremism.
In a parking lot outside the downmarket cowboy boot retailer, a group of radicalized grayhairs dubbing themselves the “Save Colorado Project” held a press conference declaring they would overthrow the current GOP leadership in the state because they are a “bunch of whores” and “asswipes” and were not enthusiastic enough about chasing down their hallucinations about the stolen election and the deep state.
Among the group’s demands was further cloistering the party by ensuring only Republicans can participate in primary elections and opposing mail-in balloting—as well as any “electronic voting” (modern!).
This weekend, the Boot Barn Mafia got their first scalp, successfully replacing the old (Trump-friendly) leadership with a new chair so ensconced in the MAGA cult that he went to court to have “Let’s Go Brandon” formally added to his name.
State Rep. Dave “LGB” Williams won on the third ballot over a buffet of other election-denying freaks, most notably Tina Peters, whose collaboration with QAnon leaders to tamper with voting machines in order to “prove” the Democrats did the fraud (brilliant!) I reported on back in 2021.
Peters went on to a failed bid for the secretary of state nomination and ran her chair’s race while simultaneously being a defendant in an ongoing criminal trial. She was charged with six election-related felonies, and found guilty on the count of “obstruction of government operations.” She is set to be sentenced on April 10.
For a sense of who wields the power in the Colorado GOP, it was this felonious conspiracy theorist’s decision to buck party bylaws and give a pro-Williams endorsement speech between the second and third ballot that gave the new chair the votes he needed to win.
For his part, Williams might not have the criminal rap sheet of Peters, but he is no less whacked out. His court-rejected attempt to formally don a moniker calling for the sitting president to get fucked was part of a failed primary campaign against sitting far-right congressman Doug Lamborn last summer. This faceplant wasn’t Williams’s first foray into the realm of epic failure. As student body president at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs, Williams was impeached for a series of actions targeting gay students, including a McCarthyite campaign to out college Republicans and block funds for national coming-out day. In the state legislature, his most notable “accomplishment” is sponsoring a slate of anti-LGBTQ legislation that had no chance of passing.
He is also an anti-vaxxer. Of course.
In his speech accepting the new role Williams said, “We are the party that elected Donald J. Trump, and we are not going to apologize for that anymore.” (Minor fact check: Donald Trump lost Colorado twice, most recently by 13 points).
Pro-Trump, anti-gay, anti-vax. Determined to change the party rules to prevent independents from participating. This doesn’t seem like a path to success in a blue state. But maybe Mr. Let’s Go Brandon sees something I don’t.
Does this send up any alarm signals? Marjorie Traitor Greene “is working with House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-KY) to schedule a trip for members of Congress to visit the Washington, D.C., jail where Jan. 6 defendants are being held. Greene, who has previously toured the jail where those charged with crimes relating to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack are held, is leading the effort… ‘We’re going to be addressing the human rights abuse, such as the fact that they’ve been held in solitary confinement up to 23 hours a day, denied the ability to see their families,’ Greene said, also alleging ‘non-working toilets’ and issues receiving medical treatment… Greene visited what she called the ‘patriot wing’ of the D.C. Department of Corrections in November 2021, taking a tour and speaking directly with Jan. 6 defendants. Her office at the time said she was granted access to the location following ‘months of requesting access with letter and letter and call after call.’ She said she has tried to return to the jail ‘many times’ since her initial visit— sending a number of letters to the mayor’s office— but was unable to secure access.” Heil!
And, while we’re at it, is Leonard Leo— armed with a billion dollar contribution from a wealthy far right Chicago business owner— a fascist?
"...in a context in which the term fascist is shunned." What context is that? I can't recall a single instance of a person being called a fascist who showed any indication of feeling shunned. Except perhaps in the most academic of circles, "fascist" is a label that generates much more heat than light. It doesn't open the mind of the labelee to reconsider his / her actions, nor does it open the mind of the labelee's followers. It has the opposite effect, it inures the individual and their followers from criticism because they write off your criticism as invalid: you're obviously an extremist using pejoratives to make a lazy ad ad hominem attack because you can't make a legitimate criticism…
For purposes of argument, I'll accept the premise that DeSantis is a mere authoritarian and that he is not a fascist. Under no set of circumstances should ANY of us want an authoritarian like him as president. He has pushed the envelope with the (relatively limited) power of a governor to dangerous extremes. I shudder to think about what he could do with the power of the FBI, the CIA, and the DoD under his control.
I further think that DeSantis is being dangerously underestimated. Today, Charles Pierce, whom I greatly admire, wrote:
[H]e was once considered one of the bigger bags of hammers in the House of Representatives.
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a43307824/desantis-ukraine-fox-news/?src=socialflowTW
Were one to say that the likes of MTG or…