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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDavid Frum: How to build an Autocracy - the preconditions are present in the U.S. today
Last edited Tue Jan 31, 2017, 08:21 AM - Edit history (1)
(long read, but essential)
Fortunately for him, he did not need to campaign hard for reelection. His has been a popular presidency: Big tax cuts, big spending, and big deficits have worked their familiar expansive magic. Wages have grown strongly in the Trump years, especially for men without a college degree, even if rising inflation is beginning to bite into the gains. The presidents supporters credit his restrictive immigration policies and his TrumpWorks infrastructure program.
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On the eve of the 2018 congressional elections, WikiLeaks released years of investment statements by prominent congressional Democrats indicating that they had long earned above-market returns. As the air filled with allegations of insider trading and crony capitalism, the public subsided into weary cynicism. The Republicans held both houses of Congress that November, and Trump loyalists shouldered aside the pre-Trump leadership.
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Trump will try hard during his presidency to create an atmosphere of personal munificence, in which graft does not matter, because rules and institutions do not matter. He will want to associate economic benefit with personal favor. He will create personal constituencies, and implicate other people in his corruption. That, over time, is what truly subverts the institutions of democracy and the rule of law. If the public cannot be induced to care, the power of the investigators serving at Trumps pleasure will be diminished all the more.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/03/how-to-build-an-autocracy/513872/?utm_source=fbb
Cosmocat
(14,543 posts)Trump knows GD well it would be a useless pile of garbage.
But, being the sell BIG lies because the bigger they are the more the masses will gobble them up type he is, this is what he DOES know.
It is the expansive, debt based economic stimulus republicans denied BHO when this country actually needed a massive infrastructure investment instead of the modest one they passed.
It is simple - borrowing 20 billion plus to pour it into the economy. So what if it is worthless, so what that it will be money WE will have pay back double over time between interest on the debt and if these morons actually imposes trade fees with Mexicao. it will be a short term sugar high that he can run around taking credit for a more robust "economy."
Freddie
(9,232 posts)It's the best and most frightening thing I've read yet. Frum minces no words about where this country is headed if we can't stop this. He's also an "intellectual conservative" - I know, an oxymoron, but coming from his side this is even more powerful.
Cicada
(4,533 posts)I can't think of a political column more important than this one. Ever.
BSdetect
(8,989 posts)Despite claiming to fear twitler.
If he is a smart repugnant what hope is there that the idiots will see twitler for what he is?
emulatorloo
(43,982 posts)Rec to get it to the greatest page.
GliderGuider
(21,088 posts)David Frum doesn't have the first clue about what is actually being done to your country. He is still applying yesterday's perceptions to today's problem. That causes him to mistake this catastrophic fiasco for politics gone wrong.
As I've spent the last few days saying, This is not politics, this is a war. Political rules are as relevant to what's happening today as the Marquess of Queensberry rules are to an Afghanistan fire-fight.
It may look like politics because you just had an election and this is all happening in DC, but it.is.not.