Trump v. United States - what an appropriate case name!

The US Supreme Court has just abrogated the Constitution of the United States, at the request of disgraced felon Donald Trump.

 If America can ever restore the principles of the Constitution, including the central principle that no one is above the law and the co-equality of the three branches of government, among many others, Trump v. United States will come to be viewed as the single worst decision ever rendered by this disgraceful Court. At last, Plessy v. Ferguson and the Dred Scott decision, not to omit the legally fanciful abuse of Bush v. Gore, will no longer occupy the bottom rung of American jurisprudence.

Wake up, America! The coup d'etat that started long ago is almost finished, almost without firing a shot. While its most visible manifestation was January 6, Trump's criminal attempt to overturn the clear result of the 2020 election, with the connivance of nearly all of the Republican Party, is part of their decades-long effort to put fascist reichwing rule beyond the remedy of democracy.

They're almost finished. Can we stop them? Don't count on it.

Why Trump is even close

 

I'd title this: Biden honors D-Day; Trump not invited

The mainstream media - the Washington Post in this example - is completely bending over backward to normalize the neo-fascist Trump. They did this in 2016, too, when it was all Trump outrages all the time. If Trump wins in November, the press will be bending over in a different direction.

There was a time that America bloodied up fascists, instead of coddling them. That day is gone. There are only a scant few 100-year-old D-Day veterans left to witness the horror that American politics has become.

The 27%

I was watching the History Channel the other night and learned that the Nazis only won 37% of the vote in the 1932 election. From that beachhead in the electorate, they used violence, suppression, and mass media to completely co-opt and dominate what had previously been a civilized nation.

American has its 27-percenters. My point is not that they're Nazis - they aren't - but that leverage on power, even in a democracy, frequently does not require a majority. Look at the Teapublican willingness to drive Congressional agendas, without regard for compromise, by abusing the filibuster. It was intended as a rare power; the GOP uses is now as a minimum required supermajority.

On this day 67 years ago, Adolf Hitler killed himself rather than face an accounting at Nuremberg for his brutal crimes against humanity. Coward.

But Hitler's death is still cause for celebration, even if I wish an American dogface had double-tapped him.

When Teapublicans say this is a republic, not a democracy

This is what they mean:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Yeah, for them, it's short for they get all the power.

None dare call it fascism

Except maybe me...



(h/t Balloon Juice)

Look no further for fascism

It's pretty clear that the local authorities in Louisiana are in bed with BP. The federal government should be there enforcing the U.S. Constitution. At gun point, if it's necessary to arrest some of the LEOs for civil rights violations.

Major Malcolm Wolfe of the sheriff's office [of Terrebonne Parish] says the deputy's pulling someone over in his official vehicle while working for a private company is standard and acceptable practice, because Wheelan was acting suspicious and could have been a terrorist.

Update (7/5): I can understand why the local authorities could be bought and paid for many times over by BP, but I don't understand how the Obama administration can find any reason whatsoever to be seen working fist in glove with BP.

Unrepentant criminal

You can't punish Dick Cheney just because he's an asshole. Everyone in America has the right to be one, although few of us achieve anything approaching the consistent assholery of Darth. But seeing such contemptible - and openly contemptuous - slime get his just desserts would certainly make any punishment of him for his proudly fascist crimes even more delightful.

Is it possible that the Dems might actually stand up to him once he's out of power? I doubt it.

Jonah Goldberg newspeaks

As seen in Salon (h/t John Scalzi), here are some of the assertions of the type that have gotten Jonah Goldberg the nickname the Doughy Pantload:

• fascism = socialism
• nationalism = communitarianism
  
• national socialist = socialist
• totalitarian = organic
• totalitarian = holistic
• subordination = inclusion
• It Takes a Village = state parenting
• real militarism = metaphorical efforts against crime, poverty, drugs
• regimentation = consensus
• socialism = state-run economics, regardless of who benefits
• nationalized = socialized (Eisenhower must have socialized the National Guard!)
• marxist = fascist (!?)
• liberal = free market
• classless = socialist (So America is - or thinks it is - socialist?)
• populist = liberal (Tell that to George Wallace.)
  

Goldberg couldn't make a distinction between his ass and a hole in the ground. Hey, they're topologically similar; they must be the same thing.

Then there's this quote:

[T]he only reason [Mussolini] got dubbed a fascist and therefore a right-winger is because he supported World War I.

See Scalzi for the definitive smack-down of this ahistorical claptrap. Goldberg is essentially a fascism denier. This is his logic: Those Indians tried to sully our good name by having the nerve to catch smallpox from the blankets we Europeans gave them for that express purpose. Those Guantánamo terrorists are continuing their asymmetrical warfare against all right-thinking Murkins by trying to commit suicide. That Mussolini may have founded fascism and called it a right-wing movement, but he was really just an old lefty.

There is no worthwhile way to engage this sort of incoherent "argument" other than ridicule. Goldberg's rhetoric can't even fig leaf his obvious intent to propagandize. It's intellectually bankrupt in all aspects, a logorrhea-covered exercise in self-service colonoscopy.

Goldberg is using words that are in the dictionary, but he's making up their meanings as he goes along. Even worse, at whim or necessity, he can switch meanings within the confines of a single paragraph.

He says he's not making the argumentum ad hitlerum, but in nearly every paragraph that's exactly what he's doing. X breathed and was bad. Y breathes. Therefore, Y is bad. He is breathtakingly, uneducably, irredeemably stupid. With a big, albeit uncomprehended, vocabulary.

The completeness of his turgid, ridiculous unclarity is visible here to those of us who aren't wearing his bullshit-colored glasses:

You don't have conservative groups talking about what kind of condoms you should use or what positions you can be in.

Earth to Jonah! Talked to the Christian right lately? Oral o.k.? Anal? Gay? How's the Pope's tolerance of any use of condoms coming along? Masturbation? Fantasy?

In the end, Goldberg's words about Mussolini apply better to himself:

He was sort of a buffoon in that sense; he was constantly changing his definitions of fascism and talking out of one side of the mouth, then out of the other side of his mouth, largely because of the sort of pragmatic idea he had about politics.

I haven't read his book, and I won't. His own words in this interview irrefutably expose him as an ass, unworthy of even an hour wasted reading his prose.

What he wants to say - but which wouldn't get for him all this undeserved attention - is that liberals are not like him. Thanks be to god! Instead of defending that clear and unarguable thesis, he muddles all the meanings he touches.

Future GOP ticket?

Smiling faces of future fascists. Rudy promised anti-abortion judges. Did he also offer the Vice Presidency to Rev. Pat Robertson, certifiable lunatic? They sure look like running mates.

I think this wins the nomination for Giuliani. But let the cross-dressing ads begin. C'mon, Mitt, you have no principles.

Bushist heir

Rudy Giuliani, the obvious Bushist heir to the unitary executive, that is, to the realization of fascism, isn't conservative enough for the righteous wing, so much so that they are willing to threaten the Republicans with a holier than thou Nader (but then that's redundant).

Of course, given Dobson's history of proteges like Ted Haggard, they'd better be very careful not to nominate a closeted, self-hating gay man! That would really blunt one of their obvious lines of attack. Maybe that's one reason Dobson is against a third-party effort.

I'm really looking forward to the ads featuring Rudy in a dress!

No more GOP

No one should ever again vote for a Republican.

The Republican Party has proven over the last forty years to be a party of fascist criminals. It should be subject to a RICO indictment and stipped of all assets.

Whoa! Isn't that too extreme for Americans! (Nope, just too unstintingly accurate and unpleasant for television.)

Here's the evidence: Four of the last five Republican Presidents engaged in banana republic subversion of the Constitution. Gerald Ford, the sole exception, was appointed by dint of negotiation between a Democratic Congress and the first of the criminals, Dick Nixon. And even he participated in the no Republicans held accountable plan.

Let's review!

Nixon, who left Washington one step ahead of impeachment and conviction, cast himself above any law, used the power of the IRS and the FBI against his political opposition, tampered with evidence (oh, please, you believed that Rosemary Woods cock and bull story?), egged goons to assault citizens, and was deeply involved in a criminal conspiracy to select and destroy his reelection opponent.

St. Ronnie, who left with dementia setting in, had only implausible deniability (and our fundamental dismissive assumption that he was a mere figurehead) between him and Iran-Contra. Even Ollie North, whose only respect for brown Latinos stems from their affection for juntas made up of colonels, didn't believe Reagan's daft denials. Democracy? Law? Who needed 'em!

Duhbya's father, Bush I, said he was "out of the loop" on Iran-Contra, meaning of course that he was definitely not in Chicago at the time. Well, not downtown anyway. HW carried his water in the ongoing criminal conspiracy by pardoning Caspar Weinberger's substantive perjury. People like them (including Scooter) aren't criminals; you can't send them to jail just because they broke a few eentsy-weentsy Democratic laws.

Duhbya, the worst, the apotheosis of the criminal Republican, has a rap sheet unrivaled since at least Grant, maybe ever:

stole the 2000 election - set out to do it and succeeded using the resources his father had pre-positioned

neglected his duty to protect the country

chose to invade Iraq on the basis of lies in order to implement the PNAC plan for empire

effectively ended judicial oversight of surveillance of American citizens

made torture the policy of America

drove a truck through habeas corpus

used the "Justice" Department to install cronies who would trump up politically motivated charges against Democrats

robbed the Treasury for the benefit of the most wealthy Americans

sat by while domestic energy cartels almost openly manipulated prices for vast profits

brought partisan politics deep into law enforcement

reinfected the military with propaganda

subverted intelligence gathering

exposed secrets and a covert agent for short-run political gain

refused the just oversight and jurisdiction of the other branches

asserted the kingly power of the "unitary executive" to control the access Americans have to information

Could the Republicans in Congress be salvageable? Consider:

the trumped up show trials of Bill Clinton

the complete abdication of oversight and separation of powers

the constant willingness to side with the rich against the rest of us, all while pigging out on their slops

the end of any concern for environmental impact of any kind

steady defense of Bushist lies on every topic, large or small

By all means, America will have a conservative party. The sleepwalkers, sheep, and mouth-breathers need representation, too. I recommend that conscientious former Republicans, who are similar to former Iraqi Baathists in this, start with the Democratic Leadership Council. Joe Lieberman has been pretty lonely. You could make his day; give him something to do besides moping around Baghdad in a flak jacket.

Better late than never

Justice Denied ($) indeed:

In the 1960s, Chief Justice Earl Warren presided over a Supreme Court that interpreted the Constitution in ways that protected the powerless — racial and religious minorities, consumers, students and criminal defendants. At the end of its first full term, Chief Justice John Roberts’s court is emerging as the Warren court’s mirror image. Time and again the court has ruled, almost always 5-4, in favor of corporations and powerful interests while slamming the courthouse door on individuals and ideals that truly need the court’s shelter.

Yep. Not a single wrong thing. These people want to return to the 1920s or even the 1880s. They’re bad people, willfully ignorant of those they feel are lesser than they, even if the Bushists do have good manners and nice, toothy upperclass smiles. They will rule in favor of the unitary executive, and then pissing around with legal arguments won’t get us anywhere for 40 years. I always thought big brother would come here in America from fascism long before communism.

Who you calling a mob, punk?

(Responding to this.)

You need to check your definitions. Citizen journalism could conceivably lead to mob rule or could be exploited by fascism, but the real danger of fascism is in the corporate-compromised so-called mainstream media. This is the media that beat the drums for war in Iraq (including the Washington Post and the New York Times, mind you). This is the media that still, after the Democrats have won Congress, overrepresents Republican and conservative points of view, especially on television. This is the media that until very recently rolled over and asked the Bush White House to scratch its belly in exchange for childishly credulous access to the latest Rovian spin - and was willing to type up that spin as if it were true even when the reporter *knew* it was a lie. This is the media that stridently dumps on the earth tones and the haircuts of prominent Democrats, while fawning over Duhbya playing dress-up as a fighter pilot, a rancher, or even a man in control.

So, while I still read widely in the daily press, no one who wants to be informed can omit the citizen journalism of the Internet, particularly the blogs. The virtue of the Internet, at least, is that there is more than one mob. The mainstream media practices much more "journamalism" than real journalism anyway. When the mob comes, if it does, the mainstream media won't protect us from fascism.