Neo Nazis and the Alt Right

Finding out seems…bad?

Seems pretty lenient to me.

Only 6 months shy of the Maximum, per the article:

Head’s prison sentence is six months shy of the statutory maximum in his case. It’s also the second-longest so far among hundreds of cases arising from the Capitol siege on Jan. 6, 2021, when a mob of Trump supporters stormed the building as Congress prepared to certify President Joe Biden’s electoral victory.

Very nice piece from John Ganz on why it is important to understand the fascism underlying the Trump / MAGA movement and the broader Republican accommodation with them.

Trumpism at its core is a movement fixated on restoring national greatness through the charismatic leadership of a single providential individual who “alone can fix it.” Trump’s campaign began with an assault on the presence of unclean ethnic minorities. The movement is obsessed with national decline and attacking the internal enemies, who it blames for the parlous condition of the country. Although more loosely organized and weaker than those of the classical Fascisms, MAGA also has paramilitary formations that have tried to carry out this project to the point of attempting the overthrow an elected government . He has openly menaced his opponents with the existence of this groups. From the very beginning of his political ascent, he attracted the interest and enthusiasm of the extreme right: he was the kind of thing they’d been looking for for a long time. Perhaps now a disappointment, perhaps now a failure, but certainly a step in the right direction as far as they were concerned and one they have kept faith so far.

To the issue of why it’s important to call it fascism or semi-fascism: The point is not to labeling as such, rather the point is to study these events so as to expand the capacity of one’s imagination so it can deal with the actual potentials of the situation. In other words, so one can form a proper judgment. As I’ve pointed out again and again, even the crudest version of the fascism thesis foresaw something like January 6th happening, some violent attempt on the democracy. The critics of the thesis said it was inconceivable and absurd to imagine such a thing. They were wrong. Like many people in the past few years, their imaginations failed. This is why I believe using fascism as one of a number of historical touchstones does not contribute to the deformation of political judgment of Trumpism, but rather its improvement: The notion that there is something fascist about the Trump phenomenon seems at this point to be the more robust theory of the case.

In one respect at least Hamid is correct. It is actually a big problem for American democracy that there is something resembling a fascist movement afoot in the United States. It is difficult to reconcile political rights with a group that takes advantage of them but also wants to undermine them. It’s again worth pointing out that the two big classical fascisms got into power through perfectly legal constitutional moves. It’s quite conceivable that Trump wins “fair and square,” but it’s also quite conceivable that he makes efforts to cook future elections in his favor or attempts to not leave office, BECAUSE HE’S DONE THAT ALREADY. I don’t quite know how to solve these problems either. But the solution is not to say, “Come now, don’t be silly, not possible.” It is possible. That’s the point: Without catastrophizing, without panicking, we need to cultivate a broader sense of the possible. Especially when it’s right in front of our face.

Please stop using mental illness as the be all of his problems. You can be severely mentally ill and not use Hitler for marketing and anti-semitism. This is not about mental illness. This is about a vile, horrible person, who’s ALWAYS been a selfish narcissistic jerk who thinks the world of himself and thinks everyone should fall at his feet. Sure he’s bipolar, but more than that, he’s just a terrible asshole and always has been outside of the mental illness.

Yeah, Kanye has always been a total piece of shit.

This doesn’t invalidate what you said, but it seems worth noting that narcissism is a clinical mental illness (and clearly also one of Kanye’s afflictions).

Aside from the dog-whistle antisemitism here, is there actually any mystery about where prosecutors get their funding from?

As much as I hate to extend even the most infinitesimal benefit of the doubt to someone like DeSantis, I would assume he’s talking about the funding for election campaigns (many DAs are elected).

Edit: or did you mean any mystery about the campaign contributions? I have no idea on that but I’d assume that they could have dark money super PACs like any other election.

Yes, could be.

Don’t give him the benefit of the doubt and create some logic and reasonableness on his behalf. He, and many in this country haven’t earned it.

As if there was any doubt, Trumpers have now openly embraced Nazism in all its previous forms.

At this point, I just expect that whatever these kind of people accuse others of, is something that they’re doing themselves. If you’re knowingly taking money from foreign autocrats and semi-hostile governments to manipulate and subvert democracy in your country, it is so much easier to justify to yourself if you can pretend to believe the other side is doing “the same”.

On the interesting side, it is fascinating how many of the would be fascists the GOP keeps embracing are incompetent blowhards.

Speaking of fascists, how did Brazil swing?

50.8 for Lula, 49.2 for Bolsonaro (98.8% counted)

I imagine the next step is a coup attempt.

Holy Molely, that’s pretty darned close for what I assumed was a fiat. Coup incoming indeed.

I’m so glad that the president here, whoever they may be, doesn’t have the control over the military that a Brazilian president seems to have.

Is the implication that the other two statements are fakes, then?