Will the Trump presidency play out like Sinclair Lewis’ "It Can’t Happen Here?"

boing
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You’re welcome!

I agree, but I think we are in a very polarized era already. I think on the left it’s because a lot of people feel like their basic safety is under attack. You might be right that direct comparisions to the nazis isn’t helpful, but i think that’s because of the way that we think of the nazis in sort of public discourse, the way they’ve been built up by films and TVs, as this incomparable evil for what they did, rather than as part of a continuum of colonialism, imperialism, antisemitism, and political thought that came out of the 19th century and early 20th century. It makes us belief that it was a unique event, rather than something that could occur again. It lets the rest of the world off the hook. I sort of feel like Hannah Arendt’s book on Eichmann should be mandatory reading, as well as her On Totalitarianism book. I believe that a historical view that isn’t clouded by teleology or various sonderweg narratives is a more productive way of thinking about the past as it compares to current events. You’re correct that was then, this is now. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t gain some insight from the past and draw instructive parallels. There is some deep truth to Marx’s statement, “first as tragedy, then as farce.”

But I take your point that calling Trump a neo-fascist isn’t helpful, but I do think we need proper labels for some of his key backers. The alt-right are indeed white supremacists and neo-fascists, no matter how much they deny it. I also think that Trump has some deep corporatists, authoritarian tendencies, and we should be well wary of those.

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You’re likely right there. I do think we can course correct, though. [quote=“bobtato, post:57, topic:93633”]
I think the US probably isn’t capable of switching the way Germany did.
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You mean right after WW2? Germany was able to do it because they were utterly destroyed and we and the Soviets MADE them change. Both sides forced change on Germany and that became critical to our and to Soviet foreign policy because of the Cold War.[quote=“bobtato, post:57, topic:93633”]
but if the numbers are closer to 50/50 that’s a whole different proposition.
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Agreed. You end up in a civil war type situation if you have specific issues, with no easy answers and two sides unwilling to budge with a strong belief that god is on their side. [quote=“bobtato, post:57, topic:93633”]
There’s a memorable bit in Eichmann in Jerusalem about how the Holocaust largely didn’t happen in Denmark, simply because when the civil authorities were told to provide lists of names, their response was “OK, but we’ll need to see that in writing first”.
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Yeah, I think that’s an interesting part and what Arendt is attempting to get at… that resistance was possible and that people just went along. [quote=“bobtato, post:57, topic:93633”]
it’s a shame Arendt is mostly ignored on account of how she makes people a bit uncomfortable.
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YES! I keep meaning to see that film that came out about her a couple of years ago. She raised incredibly uncomfortable questions that people just didn’t want to think about - that many Germany WASN’T a weird abberation, but could be pointing to larger patterns in modern society which are inherently problematic. But in the glow of the postwar period, we just didn’t want to deal with these larger questions that bedeviled the modern era. Easier to just assume it was a weird throwback, attributable to some defect in the pre-war German character. That they one went along because Germans are all orderly people unwilling to think for themselves. It put the questions aside and allowed everyone to get on with economic growth and the Cold War.

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I’ve been playing “Frank Zappa For President” on and off for the last few months. I’d actually be very interested to hear the music he would have made to discuss the current situation (or indeed, the whole start of the millennium.)

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I think the colour of skeptical is the colour of the void until proven otherwise.

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So I heard this story on NPR this morning and thought it might be relevant to this discussion. It goes back to the separation of powers and the fact that the president is in charge of enforcing the laws on the books. The executive writes RULES under laws written and passed by congress that are used to enact the law, as the current administration sees fit:

http://www.npr.org/2017/01/26/511745408/how-a-law-is-implemented-depends-on-a-presidents-rules

I think this is important to think about when we’re talking about the separation of powers. Yes, the president doesn’t make laws, but he has some pretty wide lattitude in how laws actually function in the real world. It’s worth mulling over, I think.

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A lot of people think it’s like the 1930s again, but conditions are different. There really was no social safety net back then.
There were also a number of dictators intent on conquering and expanding into other countries. Trump, if anything is more isolationist and less hawkish than Hillary was.

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*reads post

“I should read Voltaire.”

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Obama also had no problem with the 600 plus drone strikes which killed many civilians. Making enemies faster than we can kill them. Not sure if he had the power to, but Obama did very little about the increased surveillance state. For that matter nothing about Wall St. he even had Rubin and Summers working for the administration within months.

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That’s not quite true. It was not as well developed as what we have now (and it was never well developed here and very piecemeal), but Weimar Germany had some progressive policies as did other European nations. The interwar period saw the general legalization of unions, the codification of a limited work week (under 50 hours) and weekends, as well as the first attempts to create various welfare programs. I think it’s more accurate to say that there were experiments with different programs in Europe and the US and some of the debates between the left and the right came down to issues like this. [quote=“petr, post:87, topic:93633”]
Trump, if anything is more isolationist and less hawkish than Hillary was.
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Except for China, who he wants to go to war with. And pretty much anywhere Daesh might be. And anywhere he wants to build a hotel… except China.[quote=“petr, post:89, topic:93633”]
Obama also had no problem with the 600 plus drone strikes which killed many civilians.
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And you think Trump is going to stop that program? He’ll let the CIA continue it as an olive branch and probably ramp it up. He’s also denying entry to the very refugees our policies helped create.

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The problem is that Trumpism is a worldwide phenomenon. It is not just in the US there are equivalents in Europe and some on the left. There is a mini culture war going on right now about how much of it is about the rise of racism.
Sure there is some of that, either overt or dog-whistle but there are economic causes too and the blame it on racism argument gives the center left an out. In reality the left is partly to blame, for thirty years they have told everyone globalism is good for you and you can re-train and become computer programmers or whatever (but we won’t bother really because we’re cutting taxes) Remember welfare was overhauled and Nafta was signed under Bill Clinton.

And by the way we’re going to move to the centre because that’s where the money is and over time the centre left abandoned its core constituents the working class. This is where people like Thomas Frank Donald Trump is moving into the White House and Liberals put him there.

The left really has to shift its focus and get back to representing its base and not cozying up to Wall St.

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Also, Hitler and Windrip came from the left.

Not this tired old bullshit again. Lemme guess, hyperinflation comin’?

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Where was the social safety net when Weimar collapsed in 32? What did the US have at the time?

The China thing is mostly talk, a trade war probably but even that would hurt US businesses. But in recent years there were at least 22 million hacks from China targeting not just government or military but regular businesses (for instance stealing the formula for white paint - to get a competitive advantage. That’s not something to be ignored.

Whether Trump continues the drone killings is less relevant than the fact that they were done under Obama with very little protest. And to point out that Obama wasn’t the saint he was made out to be as he left office.

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I can’t begin to say how much on the Left I am. I just don’t want the Left’s criticisms to be easily dismissable as the lunatic ravings of a bunch of crazy people who make hyperbolic comments about everything. At least you’ve disabused me of some of my own ravings, which I now won’t repeat in public company. This is what workshopping is all about.

That is a fair reply. Sorting out the false Bircher/Larouche talking points from one’s general sense of history is an early step in resisting 'Murican-style authoritarianism.

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In the toilet, like everywhere else. The safety net was based on a healthy economy, which literally no one had at the time.

It was on the way in 32… literally. Hoover got voted out of office because he refused to do anything. 1933 saw a flurry of activities aimed at creating a more robust social safety net, which the postwar order built on.

Again, what safety net existed was not what we have today (here or in Europe), but the ground work was there and the left and right BOTH talked about it, in slightly different terms. Many states had implemented various programs that we’d recognize as such. And that doesn’t even get into the programs in the Soviet Union (when they weren’t working people to death or putting them in gulags to further their 5 year plans). [quote=“petr, post:93, topic:93633”]
The China thing is mostly talk
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I don’t think he understands consequences and might well set off a trade war. [quote=“petr, post:93, topic:93633”]
That’s not something to be ignored.
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I never said it was. But Trump seems willing to overlook Russian hacking pretty easily. Hacking is not something to get into a shooting war over, it’s an issue that can be worked out in other ways. [quote=“petr, post:93, topic:93633”]
they were done under Obama with very little protest.
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There was dissent on that issue. From the Democrats, no, but from the antiwar movement, yes there was. [quote=“petr, post:93, topic:93633”]
And to point out that Obama wasn’t the saint he was made out to be as he left office.
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That’s a fair enough point, but he wasn’t the monster some made him out to be either. Most presidents are mixed bags, especially when it comes to American empire and the very real world destruction it causes around the world. We ignore that at our peril, but we do ourselves a serious disservice trying to pin it on one party or the other only. American empire is one policy position where the parties both walk in lockstep and always has been.

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The safety net (or beginnings of it) were not comparable to what we have now. Which is why 2008 wasn’t a repeat of the great depression.

The safety net (whatever there was) may have been in the toilet, and that’s why the US brought in the closest thing to a benevolent dictator they’ve had and Germany brought in Hitler. And the unfortunate example of that is Hitler’s Germany was booming while the rest of the world was still trying to get out of the depression. By the way, ironically, one of the most common visitors to FDR’s government was Mussolini’s son because the US was trying to protect its industry the same way that Mussolini did by cartelizing Italian industry.

I agree on the last point that both parties walk in lockstep but not just on American empire in fact a lot of policy since the Democratic party (and other left parties around the world) have shifted to the centre and abandoned the working class. Going back 30 years they embraced globalism and free trade and told everyone it’s good for them but then shifted to the centre because that’s where the money is. Even Obama appointed Summers and Rubin and the Treasury Secretary was the guy from Citibank. The left by abandoning its traditional base has made Trump and other Trumpets around the world. Those people know he’s a bullshitter but he resonated with them.

This is a global phenomenon and is a backlash against the past 30 years of the Market Revolution Regime of Reagan and Thatcher which itself was a backlash against the Keynes influenced Bretton Woods focus on full employment from 45-75. To characterize this as fascism misses the point. Mark Blyth who predicted both Brexit and Trump does a good job trying to explain what’s going on. Global Trumpism

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I in fact have no great problem calling Trump himself a neo-fascist. Most of the qualities a true neo-fascist has can be found with him. However, calling all or even most his supporters Nazis is something I would not do.

I know you disagree on this, but the Nazis were a product of their time and in their totalitarian control they were unique. The anniversary of the Wannseekonferenz and the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz are just two of the reminders of that to me during the last week.

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Start with Candide.

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I’ve used the term as a generic insult but yeah, I agree that calling someone a Nazi as an accusation that they’re actually a Nazi sympathizer is counterproductive. Not just because it unnecessarily escalates the conversation but also because its use promotes a certain kind of confirmation bias where our vigilance is constrained only to those signs of authoritarianism history has warned us about. As a result, we pay less attention and give less weight to signs that have yet to be written into history.

Say the U.S. government under Trump descends into an authoritarian regime for the next eight years, claiming the lives of thousands and the freedom of millions. I guarantee you, should ‘trumpism’ become part of the English lexicon, that an associated shortlist of warning signs will be cited as such for decades afterwards.

Authoritarianism is a political family in the biological sense of the word and its genome is always adapting, yielding new genera and species.

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Just for the sake of completeness: calling out neo-nazis as neo-nazis, as recently happened in Germany with the Thuringian MP Höcke after a public speech in which he claimed that Germany needed a ‘180-Grad Kehrtwende der Gedenkkultur’ (i.e. 180° turn in culture of remembrance of the shoa) is important. The same is true for KKK-defending white supremacists and holocaust deniers in the US. Fuck this Nazi shit, it is not worth to discuss with those. People who actually vote for candidates embracing such inhumane populists, however, might be won back for reason. I have, however, to admit that I don’t have any one strategy for this, but to try and discuss with them what alternative to throwing away 300+ years of lived representative democracy there is.

On a sidenote: your comparison of a socio-political movement to a biological taxon (here: of family rank) is, from a scientists perspective, not really fitting. It might even be dangerous, and prone to be turned against you. Cultural processes might be described in evolutionary terms, but the units and processes are very different, I would venture.
But I clearly understood what you ment, so that’s that. =)

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It was a shoehorned analogy. I wanted to delete it when I re-read it an hour later but sometimes leaving stupid things said is healthier for everyone so long as someone’s willing to call it out. Good on ya for that.

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