This article was posted shortly before the election but everything in there is still true and seeing his appointees perhaps worse than predicted.
Carl Sagan wrote in 1995:
I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time – when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness…
The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance
While there were always idiots, they often lacked the capacity to engage or equip themselves with such a sophisticated web of lies to prop up their beliefs. As such, Joe Schmoe from Bumfuck, Alabama had a limited platform and so could go on his blissfully ignorant way without much harm beyond his county line.
These days? They all communicate together and domestic and foreign operatives can reach them all the same to stoke division.
Crazy to watch.
I hope we can still correct course. The sad part is what many would consider a prediction is more that he was observing trends already happening even back then.
“Democratic collapse nowadays isn’t a matter of abolishing elections and declaring oneself dictator, but rather stealthily hollowing out a democratic system so it’s harder and harder for the opposition to win. This strategy requires full control over the state and the bureaucracy: That means having the right staff in the right places who can use their power to erode democracy’s core functions.”
The establishment Dems and Reps have been doing this for decades. Trump is just the last straw. He’s walking away with the monster they created and he’s probably going to let it off the leash.
The only question I have is whether the oligarchy wants him to do that. Imo they weren’t ready for it last time. They built the monster for someone controllable like Clinton or Jeb!, and I think they were actually surprised when Trump won the first time. This time they made him a nice little play book, and they’ve had some time to learn how to at least keep him pointed in the right direction, if not controlled. They might be ready to release the monster they created. Everyone will blame Trump too, instead of the oligarchy… Bonus.
The only question I have is whether the oligarchy wants him to do that.
Quite a few have explicitly said they do. That’s a big reason why Trump won with Silicon Valley conservatives this year.
He’s also much more senile this time. And they have plenty of experience with that from Reagan.
Reported as a duplicate from 3 weeks ago:
https://lemmy.world/post/21605389
Allowing this for now as the discussion following a Trump win has a different context than hypotheticals from before a Trump win.
For example:
Before the election Trump was still claiming he knew nothing of Project 2025.
AFTER the election, his nominee to run the FCC is the guy who WROTE the FCC chapter of Project 2025.
I’m very sorry, I tried to use the search function prior to posting to make sure it wasn’t already posted. I don’t know if it was because I made a mistake or if it was because I searched based on the URL instead of the title but for some reason I didn’t receive any results.
Generally, I’d just pick the most unusual word from the headline, search for that, and sort by “New”. In this case “Extinction”.
Nations rise and fall. Its fine. Eventually dictatorships fall. The climate, however…
Theres no time…
Maybe we’ll get lucky and the economy will collapse.
Seems likely
So we should stage an insurrection to prevent him from taking power right?
Right?!
Oh, no, we’re gonna just act like this isn’t an existential threat like you’re saying.
So why should I believe you when you say something is a threat?
Preach. If everyone who wrote about the end of democracy actually believed what they were saying, this wouldn’t be getting downvoted. If anyone who wrote articles like this actually believed it, these would be calls to action, not liberal hand wringing.
If people actually do believe this, and in response sit there doing nothing, they are cowards. Plain and simple. If you think this is the end of democracy, what are gonna do… vote democracy back? Ya’ll don’t, you know how I know ya’ll don’t? You aren’t doing anything about it, and you won’t.
Like fuck off with this ridiculous, inflammatory shit. It already lost the election and both houses, maybe focus on figuring out how to win a fucking election once everyone realizes these idiots can’t actually govern in 2 years, again!
Not even going to act like this isn’t a good idea.
Rationalizing it to be a BETTER insurrection than what he already tried won’t work. That would trigger another civil war and set the country back a hundred years.
Fair game though: he’s going to absolutely ruin the economy and the country anyway, so…🤷
All the organizing bullshit people are running hopium for won’t work for these people. We are LITERALLY living the same politics of the Nazi and fascist rise in Europe. You won’t turn it around until other people step in to start a world war and declare these people insane. Unfortunately the world powers right now that would step in are most interested in elimination of the US. Bad spot to be in.
Meh, it died long ago for marginalized people, it’s just catching up to white people now.
This is written as if the election were still in the future. We’re going in, and it’s going to be hell. This is the loadout selection screen before the match starts. We need to be thinking of ways we can bolster our communities and defend ourselves.
This is written as if the election were still in the future
Because it was at the time
If only there were a way the opposition party could have done something about this like, I don’t know, campaigning on a platform of better living conditions for the working class, more jobs and better pay instead of doubling down again and again and again on identity politics.
Like what, helping people buy houses to live in?
What kind of help - loans so housing gets more expensive?
That headline though. My inner pedant just cannot leave it alone. Democracy is like Nature. It does not care about you or me or Trump. It will continue to exist as an idea no matter what he does. Other countries will even continue to use it.
Same as anarchism.
Lots of people valuing self reliance and care for others without regard for our existing leaders and systems. There just happens to also be systems of governments around.
excuse my ignorance, but ive always wondered this about anarchism: Seems to me that people gather and organize themselves to reach common goals. How can these organizations not become governments? is that actually possible?
I think like any other political or philosophical view, this is one of those things where you will get one unique answer per each anarchist you ask.
Speaking personally, I think philosophies should be used as tools, and as the best tool for a job.
To me, anarchism means disregarding established authority and working together to achieve whatever a goal is. Ideally cooperatively. Some groups will perform well at this and some will not. Some will perform better under a more traditional organized structure.
I don’t want to subjugate people with anarchist dogma. I want to help people learn to trust themselves and to cooperate. And I want to get better at it myself.
I see, so you see it not an actual state we may achieve, but rather the negation of present authorities and systems.
That is my take.
The delusion of grandeur I might suffer would be something like people foster such a strong culture of cooperation and mutual aid that state government operations and programs become obsolete.
That’s a north star. Something to aim for as a concept. But of course we won’t ever land a rocket ship on the actual North Star.
By avoiding hierarchy. So it’s like how a poker game has a bunch of players, but nobody is the boss of poker. And if somebody starts cheating, you either expel them or form a new group.
The hard part is scaling this up to billions of people.
So as long as an organization is truly democratic, it can be considered anarchist?
For example, if one person likes to make coca cola but as a side effect he pollutes a river that the rest of the group wants to keep clean. The group may decide democratically to force him to not make coca cola. I would call this a goverment-like organization, even though it does not need to have a leader to fulfill its goal.
I would consider that anarchist iff it’s not hierarchical, yes.
A lot of what is commonly called anarchism isn’t a complete lack of government. It’s more like removing the capitalist system and wealthy elite. Then not having large governments, make stuff like the town council the highest form of government.
I’m not 100% sure how that translates to modern mass infrastructure and global trade but those are the basic ideas as best as I can see.
It’s an extension level threat.
that’s in four years when he tries to stay in office.
Oh ok cool, let’s get right on that then.
