Reading
Snyder in The New Yorker Trump’s skills and talents go unrecognized when we see him as a conventional candidate—a person who seeks to explain policies that might improve lives, or who works to create the appearance of empathy. Yet this is our shortcoming more than his. Trump has always been a presence, not an absence: the presence of fascism. What does this mean? When the Soviets called their enemies “fascists,” they turned the word into a meaningless insult. Putinist Russia has preserved the habit: a “fascist” is anyone who opposes the wishes of a Russian dictator. So Ukrainians defending their country from Russian invaders are “fascists.” This is a trick that Trump has copied. He, like Vladimir Putin, refers to his enemies as “fascists,” with no ideological significance at all. It is simply a term of opprobrium. Putin and Trump are both, in fact, fascists. And their use of the word, though meant to confuse, reminds us of one of fascism’s essential characteristics. A fascist is unconcerned with the connection between words and meanings. He does not serve the language; the language serves him.
A statement from Prime Minister Albanese for Remembrance Day, 2024. An overview of Israeli action in Gaza over the last month and an overview of entering Gaza over the weekend. Protests in the Netherlands in support of Palestine after ugly scenes during and after the soccer. Chris Hedges describes the ‘corporate civil war’ in the Continue reading »
Trump has a real rapport with these guys. For obvious reasons: The Taliban has congratulated Donald Trump on winning the presidential race, saying they hoped it marked a “new chapter” in relations with the United States. The Afghan government, which has not been recognised by any state since they swept to power off the back of an offensive surge in the months and weeks leading up to the US withdrawal, appeared buoyed by the election result, which has seen Trump take 294 electoral college votes so far. On X, foreign ministry spokesman Abdul Qahar Balkhi expressed hope that a future Trump administration “will take realistic steps toward concrete progress in relations between the two countries and both nations will be able to open a new chapter of relations”. He underscored that during former president Trump’s first term in power he presided over a peace deal with the Taliban that paved the way for the US withdrawal in 2021 “after which the 20-year occupation ended”.
On the anniversary of Sesame Street, we wish to remind everyone that the series has always been an unofficial American spinoff of Doctor Who.
President Joe Biden has now joined the ranks of Jimmy Carter and George W. Bush as a president whose Middle East policy crashed and burned spectacularly. Unlike Carter, who was stymied by the Iranian hostage crisis, or Bush, who faced a popular Iraqi resistance movement, Biden’s woes weren’t inflicted by an enemy. Quite the opposite, it was this country’s putative partner, the Israeli government, that implicated the president in its still ongoing genocide in Gaza, as well as its disproportionate attacks on Lebanon and Iran, for which Biden steadfastly declined to impose the slightest penalties. Instead, he’s continued to arm the Israelis to the teeth. Israel’s total war on Palestinian civilians, in turn, significantly reduced enthusiasm for Biden among youth... Read more
Source: What Rough Beast? appeared first on TomDispatch.com.
He’s powerful but he’s not the superhero juggernaut they say he is: Trump cannot claim is a landslide victory, although that’s how he will describe it. As of Saturday, Trump is winning the popular vote with a little more than 74 million votes, although millions of votes have yet to be counted in California, Washington and Utah, among others. The final 2024 popular vote tally likely won’t be known until December. When he lost convincingly in 2020, Trump got a little more than 74 million votes. So while it’s true that much of the country moved to the right in this election, it’s also true that there was some voter apathy if, at the end of the day, turnout is down from 2020. […] In terms of the Electoral College, Trump is on track to win 312 electoral votes if his lead in Arizona holds. It’s a solid win, but in the lower half of US presidential elections. It would be a better showing than either his or Joe Biden’s 306 electoral votes in 2016 and 2020, respectively. It would also outperform both of George W. Bush’s electoral victories in 2000 and 2004.
The Peter Dutton led Coalition, spurred on by Donald Trump’s US election win, have started their Australian election campaign early by employing focus groups to help them decide which minority group it should accuse of eating cats and dogs. ”Donald... Read More ›
As long as they win
Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – November 10, 2024
by Tony Wikrent
Global power shift
Biden ‘rushing’ billions in aid to Ukraine as Trump win fuels uncertainty
[Al Jazeera, via Naked Capitalism 11-07-2024]
India
From historian Nicole Lee Schroeder It is a really jarring moment to be a historian. To know what might be coming is alarming. To realize that no one around you sees it or acknowledges it is a weird place to be in. Its like time traveling without time traveling. I study the 19th century and the 2020s look a lot like 1820s. Frequent epidemics? Check. Inflation? Check. Xenophobia and deportation schemes? Check. Womens rights losses? Check. Rampant backlash against womens economic freedoms and jobs outside the home? Check. Growth of carceral facilities? Check. Legislation to forcibly institutionalize disabled people? Check. Targeted attacks on Indigenous peoples? Check. Extreme religious fervor? Check. Efforts to shape public school curriculum with religious rhetoric? Check. Tariffs? Check. The antebellum era was a time of progress, but it was also a time fuelled by hate. Slavery fuelled the economy, and antislavery efforts were not very radical on the whole. Hatred against immigrants was widespread and poverty was extensive. Everything we are seeing right now happened in the early 1800s.
Sadly, I suspect most Trump voters agree with this, even the women: Elon Musk has used his large platform on X to promote a theory that a free-thinking “Republic” could only exist under the decision-making of “high status males” – and women or “low T men” would not be welcome in it. On Sunday, Musk re-posted a screenshot of the theory – which appears to have been conceived on 4chan in 2021– on the social media site. The theory, written by an anonymous user, suggests that the only people able to think freely are “high [testostrone] alpha males” and “aneurotypical people”, and that these “high status males” should run a “Republic” that is “only for those who are free to think.” “People who can’t defend themselves physically (women and low T men) parse information through a consensus filter as a safety mechanism,” the post reads. “Only high T alpha males and aneurotypical people (hey autists!) are actually free to parse new information with an objective ‘is this true?’ filter,” it adds.
He’s not alone Had dinner out with friends last night. There was a lot of half-serious “where can we move” banter. A gay couple in our party (men) are worried what could happen to them under an even uglier Trump 2.0 administration. They’re not alone in their concern by any means. ICYMI (reaction in Scotland): Patrick Harvie has condemned First Minister John Swinney’s decision to congratulate Donald Trump on winning the US presidential election. The co-leader of the Scottish Greens described the president-elect as a “misogynist, a climate denier, a fraudster, a conspiracy monger, a racist and a far-right politician”. Mr Harvie said Scotland must stand in solidarity with the communities he said are threatened by the incoming Trump administration in America. Speaking during First Minister’s Questions at Holyrood on Thursday, Mr Harvie said: “Yesterday the First Minister offered his congratulations to the convicted felon Donald Trump on his re-election.
“The spectacle of cruel laughter” It’s likely most of the Monday-morning quarterbacking on why Trump won last week is little more than speculation based on pundits’ existing biases. What novelist Joseph O’Neill offers The New York Time Review of Books is as good as any. Maybe better for being skeptical of conventional wisdom: The current prevailing theory about Trump’s victory is that most Americans, irked by an unpleasant encounter with inflation, cast an anti-incumbent vote without giving much thought to the consequences of that vote for US democracy. I don’t totally buy this whoops! theory. My sense is that, in this era of the Internet, there are millions more fascists in this country than people think, young men in particular. And I believe that many more millions are fascinated by Trump not for his supposed business prowess but for his transparent wish to hurt others. He is an evil guy, a villain—and many Americans are excited by it. Harris and the Democrats, by contrast, are boring, boring, boring.
The House is set to vote Tuesday on a bill that would let the administration destroy nonprofits it claims support terrorism.
The post Congress Is About to Gift Trump Sweeping Powers to Crush His Political Enemies appeared first on The Intercept.
I am re-posting this piece in observance of Veteran’s Day. -DH (Originally posted on Digby’s Hullabaloo on November 11, 2021) Dress me up for battleWhen all I want is peaceThose of us who pay the priceCome home with the least –from “Harvest for the World”, by the Isley Brothers Earlier today, my brother posted this on Facebook: While going through my father’s stuff after his passing we found a large stack of envelopes. They turned out to be letters from junior high students thanking him for the talk he gave the students on Veteran’s Day. It turned out there were over 14 packed envelopes. One for every Veteran’s Day he spoke with the students. My brothers and I were very close to throwing these out with many of the other miscellaneous papers in my Dad’s cabinets but, without even looking at the contents I decided to keep them. I finally opened them up today and started going through them. I used to kid my late father about being a pack rat but I am grateful that he was.
The National Theatre play starring Michael Sheen depicting how Nye Bevan introduced The National Health Service has many ties to Doctor Who.
