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Trump's Losing the Election — So He's Declaring War on Democracy
When a Head of State is Legitimizing Political Violence and Delegitimizing Democracy, You Should Be Very Worried
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By now, you've probably heard what Trump said during the debate: he told the Proud Boys to "stand by."
In other words, a head of state literally gave a fascist paramilitary hate group orders, in public, from the debate stage, to prepare themselves to cause unrest during an upcoming crucial election.
So. Should America expect political violence during the election? Just how unsettled should it expect the upcoming election to be? It's an ugly question. A disturbing one. But a necessary one.
What we survivors and scholars of authoritarianism can tell you is that when a head of state gives public orders to fascist paramilitaries just before an election, a society is in a very, very bad place. Democracy itself is under attack. Its rudiments are now under threat. The very last line — the line of organised political violence may be being crossed.
In case you think I exaggerate, let me give you a point of comparison. This is how the Islamic World melted down. Demagogues who were very much like Trump began to give public orders to fascist paramilitaries. They weren't called the "Proud Boys — they were called "The Army of the Pure" or "The League of the True" and so on. Only the names differ. the dynamic is precisely — precisely — the same. Authoritarian leaders form unofficial, extrajudicial alliances with fascist groups, who then attack democracy — by intimidating voters, bullying electoral officials, acting like vigilantes. That is precisely what is now beginning to happen in America.
Trump then "walked back" his comments, as American pundits say. What does it mean to "walk a thing back"? It means to have never said it. So Trump claimed that "he didn't even know who the Proud Boys are." How credible is that claim? They've appeared numerous times on Tucker Carlson's show, which is on Fox News, and we know that Trump watches both voraciously. Either Trump is the only person in America who doesn't know who the Proud Boys are, or he is lying. And given that lying is a pattern of behaviour, it's not exactly hard to conclude that Trump is doing another thing authoritarian leaders do.
The reason that authoritarians make alliances with fascist paramilitaries is very simple. They are not officially part of the government. So both can evade responsibility. The authoritarian can shrug and say "I had nothing to do with them," and the paramilitary can say, at the very same time, "we are only acting for the nation!" This game of double denial serves the purpose of insulating both. The authoritarian is not really held responsible for the violence he has caused, because it is done using unofficial actors, and the unofficial actors, at the same time, are not really held responsible, because the authoritarian is shielding them.
At the same time, something even more disturbing happened. It emerged that Kyle Rittenhouse, the young man who shot protestors in Kenosha — assassinated them for political reasons — was to be shielded by Homeland Security. Homeland Security was to say that he was merely acting to defend small business owners.
Wait, what? Why should Homeland Security intervene at all? Isn't that far beyond its remit? Especially to justify fascist violence? Is it saying that when far-right extremists do political violence, that it will act to help them?
Ask yourself how strange and ominous this is. Why would a nation's internal security agency protect a young man who shot people, out of all the criminals in the land? There can only be one explanation: it sympathizes, or has been directed to sympathize, with his political aims. Because he shot protesters that the head of state has described as "radical leftists" who are "the biggest threat to our society," he is protected from the law…by the law.
This is an even more troubling that's being crossed. In this case, a head of state is not just giving fascist paramilitaries orders in public to prepare to do violence. He is protecting them after they have done violence.
It's impossible, really, to overstate the danger of this line being crossed. It is a very, very slippery slope, and the very first step down it is too much. What happens next? A Proud Boy assassinates a political opponent — and he's shielded, too? A group of fascists massacre protesters — and they are protected? You can imagine how fast and dangerous this spiral is. It is a spiral of lethal and very real violence.
Let me reiterate it, so it's crystal clear. The head of state is now protecting fascists who do political violence. He is abusing the institutions of the state to shield them from the law. This is one of the gravest abuses of power there can be. It makes a mockery of justice, constitutionality, peace, equality, freedom.
Beyond that, there is just civil war and atrocity, really. If a President protecting a fascist who has shot people in cold blood doesn't ring your alarm bells, what could?
Why is an administration protecting a fascist who has shot people in cold blood so dangerous? It creates a double standard — one set of rules for the fascists, and another for their opponents. The opponents — the ones on the side of democracy — take ever increasing risks. Their actions are criminalized, they are beaten and gassed and abducted by Trump's shock troops, and eventually they run the risk of being assassinated. Meanwhile, the fascists who do the violence are protected by the state — either they work for it, as the shock troops who abducted people in Portland, or they are shielded by it, like Kyle Rittenhouse.
This is serious, my friends. It is as serious as it can possibly get. What does all this, put together, tell us?
It tells us that this administration is committing to violence as a political tool during the upcoming election. I don't feel good saying that. But it's nonetheless true, so far as I can see. There is no doubt in my mind that all these disparate events together add up to one conclusion. The head of state has decided that using violence — by encouraging it, protecting it, and turning a blind eye to it — is a perfectly acceptable tool to help decide the election for him.
Let me repeat the dots, in case they're still not connected. One. The President gave a fascist paramilitary group orders in public, to "stand by." It's not credible in the least that he "doesn't know who they are" — we all do. Two, the fascist paramilitary responded to those orders, saying that it was indeed preparing itself. Three, America's internal security agency was ordered to create a pretext for a far-right wing extremist who just did horrific violence — a pretext to justify his actions, and shield him from justice.
None of those things should be taken lightly. They are not random events. Especially in the context they have: a President who has built camps, put kids in cages in them, separated families, created shock troops who beat and gas people in the streets for being on the side of hated minorities, has a system of gulags in which women's organs are being cut out (yes, really). All of this is a classical sequence: of authoritarian fascist implosion. It is a set of mounting political catastrophes that culminate in the largest one. That one tends to go like this.
An authoritarian head of state makes a certain set of alliances. Theocrats are chosen to capture the judiciary, because they create a pretext for abuses of power, legalising and normalizing it. Fascists are allied with on the ground, to do violence, and intimidate and bully a society into submission, especially during election time. Manipulating fascists and theocrats like chess pieces on a board, the authoritarian shatters what's left of a society's ability and capacity to resist and withstand abuses of power. He finishes seizing power, and retains it, often for life. Democracy comes to a sudden end, faster and more viciously than most thought possible.
All of that is what is happening in America now.
There is very little doubt that the President is now doing three things. One, he is counting on far right extremists to intimidate people with very real violence. He is sending two messages to them: "stand by," and we will protect you — so do your worst. Two, he is sending a message to people slightly less violent than that, mere fanatics. He is asking them to "watch" the polls — to essentially means to perform voter intimidation, which has already emerged in places like Fairfax, Virginia.
And three, he is sending a message to his base in delegitimising the vote. He is saying that we can seize power by any means necessary — if we want to. I will not accept the results if I lose — and I will rely on your violence to retain power. This society will be ours, if only we are fanatical and extreme enough, if we don't back down. He is saying to his base that democracy does not matter, and only their desire to rule as an extremist minority over a moderate majority does.
My friends, that is what authoritarianism is.
A society cannot be in a more dangerous place than America is now in. Short of civil war, short of atrocity, short of Holocaust — this is as bad as things can possibly get. The President has effectively declared war on American democracy. He has delegitimised the vote and the election — and legitimised violence and brutality, by calling for it, encouraging it, and worst of all, protecting it.
This in not a drill, my friends. There are 33 days left until the election. They might well be the last 33 days of America as we know it. There is no exaggeration or hyperbole there. Take it from those of us who have lived this before. This is how it happens — so precisely that it's eerie.
Those of us who've lived all this before know what happens next, too. Today's paramiliitaries become tomorrow's SS's. Today's political violence becomes tomorrow's law. Today's president becomes tomorrow's dictator. Today's opposition becomes tomorrow's enemies of the state. Today's freedoms become distant memories. And today's democracy becomes a future where a society is ruled by the most fanatical, extreme, brutal, and ignorant of all, who hold the power of life and death over the rest, and demand absolute fealty and totalitarian purity in thought and action.
If you doubt that, ask yourself: did you think America would be here maybe five years ago? I didn't think so. You won't like where it is five years from now, if the fascists and authoritarians have their way.
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This is not a drill. This is the real thing. It is happening here.
Do not let it happen to you.
Umair
September 2020
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