Is Trump an Incipient Fascist Dictator?

(No - I Don't Think So)

CONCERNING the heated rhetoric around Trump’s impending rule and where it comes from and my thoughts and what can be done

For a case study of what a minority-instigated military coup might look like in the U.S. I recommend reading about the Turkish coup attempt of 2016. It might prove reassuring… and that was a coup by a faction trying to gain power! Coup plotters generally don’t execute their plans when they’re already in office. I’m not worried about a coup and anyone with a deep understanding of the US military probably isn’t either.

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This election has hardly been ordinary (is any, really?). Trump has suffered the most extreme burst of political violence in decades, for one thing. The Democratic candidate (Kamala Harris) didn’t exactly attain her party nomination in the normal manner as well.

Remember, now and forevermore: you could be wrong. Your emotion and your feelings of certainty aren’t useful guides to reality. If anything they’re barriers.

We all exist in our own echo chambers these days. In the past week or two-as it has become apparent that Harris will probably not win-there has emerged a clamor about Trump’s fascist tendencies and dictatorial ambition on the Left. That is what I will address here, that rhetoric and its weaknesses and implications.

Except for very-online and fairly privileged (I think) Substack writers and journalists and wealthy donors and celebrities, most folks don’t think this is the case. This is not a popular idea in our streets and workplaces. Leftists seem to assume this equanimity is simple ignorance, or the product of trickery. I tend to think it’s just a different point of view. The Leftists I hear speculating about Republicans or the military do not seem very informed about either, for one thing. I would be careful about assuming YOUR opinion is the only valid and important one. People don’t really like that too much. Telling people they’re wrong and dumb is a poor way to begin a discussion, in my experience.

Here’s why I do not believe the predictions of dictatorship:

• Trump’s supporters are a varied bunch but he DOES have a zealous (and often extreme) base of support. People look at crazy talk about abortion or Trump’s willfully misinterpreted statements about using the National Guard against violent protests (which any president would be liable to do and many have done) and they treat ‘Trump Supporters’ as a monolith. This is silly. The election has proved (to the dismay of many folks on the Left) that American democracy is still a potent force. If Trump were to make moves against the Constitution he would IMMEDIATELY lose a huge share of support, probably most of it. There will always be a political opposition in this country and it will benefit from any extreme or extra-legal moves Trump makes, as it very much did after Jan. 6th.

• A military coup is one possibility I’ve heard over and over again. This is almost too silly to be believed. I don’t want to go into that right now but it betrays a profound ignorance about coups-and our military. Just talk to some army officers if you’re worried about this. If you can find a single field grade officer worried about this prospect please let me know-I’d love to talk to the guy. This is completely ridiculous. Trust me.

• The DNC and party leaders aren’t behaving as if this is a real possibility. Sure, some of them are using intemperate language now… because they’re trying to motivate voters. But if you examine their behavior and decisions during the past year or two do you see folks standing on the edge of the abyss? Did those speculative presidential hopefuls (Whitmer, Shapiro, Newsom) abstain from running this year because they were terrified there wouldn’t BE an election in 2028? Is any member of the DNC or the Senate sounding the alarm about this? How about our intelligence agencies? Do you think that a plot, which would require tens of thousands of participants, has escaped their watchful gaze? I don’t.

• An impressive and diverse group of political leaders have now endorsed Trump, and even joined the campaign. Could they all be wrong? Duped? Sure. The idea that Elon Musk and Tulsi Gabbard and RFK Jr. and the rest are all participating in some anti-democratic plot is not a serious idea, though. Power in our system comes, in some measure, from the consent of the governed and if Trump were to try some dictatorial moves he would LOSE their support. Public support is conditional in a democracy and Trump doesn’t have the dominant or unconditional base that alarmed Leftists seem to imagine he does.

  Could Trump knock these folks off one by one and put his opponents in camps and seize dictatorial powers? It’s a possibility-but it’s equally possible that Harris would-which is to say, it’s vanishingly unlikely. If you doubt me refer to the previous point. Powerful Democrats don’t seem to believe this either.

• Kamala Harris might not have said the same kinds of strange and heated things that Trump has… because she hasn’t said anything. People say ‘when people tell you who they are believe them’ and that’s pretty good advice. In Trump’s case, though, he’s been saying wild things for years as a way to delight his supporters and discredit a brittle and decaying media apparatus. It has worked marvelously. When someone is intentionally trolling you then don’t believe what they tell you, about anything. Is this dishonest and risky and impolite? Yes, but it’s also not a good indication of despotic ambition, and that’s what we’re talking about.

  The Democrats have used the political system to intimidate civilian opponents and attack Trump and have floated the idea of suppressing free expression online. Political considerations have informed criminal indictments and regulatory decisions. Even if these things haven’t happened, the Right believes they have and they consider THOSE a bigger threat to American liberty. They have a point. If Trump gained control of every main privileged area of American society (universities, film studios, board rooms, federal agencies) and had a pliant media and a radical and proven track record of prosecuting the innocent and questioning free speech then he would be in exactly the position Harris is in right now. These are the attitudes of Trump supporters. It’s not that they’re sanguine about his tendencies so much as they’re suspicious of yours. Have any of you stood up to defend Jan. 6th protestors who are spending years in federal prison for very little criminality (and no intent)? Did you bristle when federal agents began to look into PTA members for having suspicious political commitments? Someone truly concerned about freedom would do those things. Everyone knows the Pastor Niemöller quote:

  First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.

  Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.

  Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.

  Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

  People always think it’s about organized labor or Jews. It’s a commandment to defend the liberty and rights, even of folks different from you, even of folks who disagree with you. A consistent democrat (small d) defends a person’s right to speak even as they disagree with what they’re saying. Do these statements describe you?

  The Right looks at you and suspects that you’re not defending liberty (which includes rights to protest abortion and post hate speech and mock AOC)-rather you’re defending your agenda. Liberty is value neutral. If you only support it when it coincides with your biases and values then you’re not supporting it at all. You’re merely supporting your biases and values.

• Trump already held the office

When I speak to regular folks the last point comes up again and again. This time (it appears) that Trump will have a much bigger base of support than he did in 2016. The Left should worry not about Trump ‘seizing’ power (he will already have it) or trying to illegally cling to it (which would ruin his party’s prospects and reputation for a generation and would be deeply unpopular among his supporters); they should worry about his personal popularity growing and them losing the next free election. Staying on their message boards and wailing about the death of democracy ain’t going to do much to defend against that possibility, though. I promise you that.

Every day I see dismayed progressives and never-Trumpers writing “I can’t believe people still support Trump!” For what it’s worth, I believe them. They are confused and horrified… because they never talk to Trump supporters and rarely to independents. Clustering in their custom-made media bubbles is obviously a reflex and it can be non-fatal to your political agenda when you control the major institutions of society (especially the media). That’s no longer the case though. To resist Trump you will have to convince Trump supporters. THAT is democracy, at its purest. I suspect that many of you have lost the ability to have tough conversations with folks who disagree with you about fundamental issues. Trump has managed to convince millions of black and Latino voters and skeptical Michigan immigrants. If you engage with these people your reach and influence will grow and you’ll filter out some of the crazy shit I’ve heard y’all saying to each other. Win-win…

It’s not directly related but it bears keeping in mind that the worst spasm of American political violence since 9/11 originated on the Left. I only say this by way of observing that BOTH sides have intemperate rhetoric and extremists and some violent ambitions. Just as I would never say that DEMOCRATS supported the burning of buildings and shooting of children in 2020, I would push back on the idea that Republicans want to topple our constitutional order. In my experience Republicans mostly honor and cherish the Constitution. They want a single-term Trump presidency… not a despotism. If Trump moved in that direction he would IMMEDIATELY lose most of his support.

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There is one fact which should be noted: regardless of his ambitions or tendencies, if Trump wins the election he will be the president. At that point his critics will have one of two options to pursue:

1. Resist and to undermine his leadership. I don’t think this is a good strategy regardless of your political goals as I will explain below.

2. Assent to his legitimate rule and resume ‘politics as normal’, acting through law-abiding activism and fund-raising and cordial debate and the votes of your elected representatives

The Costs of Intransigence

People always focus on the OTHER side when it comes to extremism (when was the last time you read about a ‘far-Left organization in the media, for example?). But the fact is that extremism feeds extremism, in a vicious cycle. If communists in the 1930’s had not been fighting pitched battles with brownshirts in the streets the people wouldn’t have been so desperate for a strong leader. Antifa ‘activists’ (knowing little of policy and less of history) conclude that pitched battles in the streets is the way to go. The same principle applies in the United States. If you support Leftist protests which turn violent then you are gathering the kindling for the Rightwing riot in 2 years. That’s the risk, and a reason to be careful in your political sympathies. If you want to fight extremism the answer isn’t opposite extremism-it’s calm and moderation. If you want to oppose political violence you must oppose ALL political violence… and most political violence during the past half decade has come from the Left-at least some of it.

Confusion and Dismay

I don’t think most of the folks who are expressing alarm about Trump’s Hitlerian turn fully believe what they’re saying. For one thing, I offered MANY of them a bet ($100, 10-1 odds, there will be an election in and a Constitution in 2028). Also, as I observed (on the other side, in 2020) being in partisan echo chambers can purify your ideas and make them more foreboding and shrill, a kind of Darwinian process of ideological extremism. This can partially dissipate when you return to reality though. It’s like LARPing-it’s part fantasy.

I have said, again and again:

TALK TO THE OTHER SIDE

If you’re worried about evangelicals or Trump voters or Republicans the least you can do is talk to some. Epistemological rigor demands it. Is a group going to admit their pending coup? No, but it’s better than inferring the ideas and intentions of groups comprising millions of people based purely upon some highly biased news articles and a dozen public statements and some commonly-known facts. Just try it! You can’t lose information and I think intellectual honesty demands it. People on the Right have been saying that the Left is importing immigrants to undermine democracy or that Biden was trying to destroy the US economy, in service of his globalist elite paymasters. (ALTHOUGH, the influx of immigrants is politically suspicious in my opinion. The idea that millions of new voters isn’t something that either party would want is ridiculous, and talking about the incentives for party leadership isn’t ‘racist’ or xenophobic. You can love immigrants, as I do, and still recognize that a strategy to add 3 million asylum seekers to the voting rolls would greatly benefit the DNC.) However, most Democrat voters support open(er) borders because they think it’s a compassionate or even beneficial policy. It’s not a conspiracy. It almost never is. There is also no conspiracy of millions of Trump voters desperately and secretly longing for a dictatorship (but just never talking about it). I’ve spoken to hundreds and I detect nothing like that. Perhaps you disagree but don’t disagree on the basis of the three you’ve argued with on a message board. That won’t cut it.

It would be as if I read that: Muslims support Sharia law (in some sense) - TRUE. Sharia law dictates a Muslim theocracy, ruled by Muslims - TRUE. Iran is such a theocracy - TRUE!

Therefore Muslim immigrants in Dearborn, MI are potential fifth columnists in a war with Iran. False.

I could go through and tease out the assumptions and errors in your reasoning… or you could just go talk to some Muslims in Dearborn! You will immediately and intuitively see how silly your theory is. I would say the same to frightened Leftists game-planning the Handmaid’s Tale-style Republican dictatorship which will shortly be imposed, with legions of fanatical evangelical Sardaukar legions behind it.

Remember, now and forevermore: you could be wrong. Your emotion and your feelings of certainty aren’t useful guides to reality. If anything they’re barriers.

I see this shit and I think, “Do you know any evangelicals? Any REPUBLICANS!?”

I suspect not. Which means they probably don’t know any small town folks or carpenters or truckers or firefighters. How sad.

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