there is something quite dark here, Trump's idea basically that freedom belongs really only to a subset of the nation, and that everyone else should be deprived of it, or purged, or made to suffer.
I take comfort that he's an incompetent, but he must have learned something from last time about wielding power in office, and it can't be denied he inspires some kind of devotion, and that he means to do harm
I think, if he wins (and for some awful reason I think it likely), the UK will find itself turning again to Europe. and among the things we can agitate for in the coming years is ror, as you say, the EU to grow to its full height and perhaps rediscover its purpose.
At the moment, European EU countries are bent on repeating the trend of the 1920s: everybody moving to the right and populism.
I don't see a strong, credible, social democrat party in the big countries, even after decades, they haven't learned that following the conservatives on their path to the right means loosing. Because if even the nominal social democrat parties say the exact same racist stuff, enact the same punishments on poor people as the conservatives - then why should we vote for them?
Thanks for this pithy summary, Ian. The inertia of big, established systems of governance when attacks from outside the existing framework arrive - the charismatic, fascistic, race-baiting, wanna-be dictator, sidestepping norms accepted and followed by the current system - is nothing new. Sadly, nor is our current way of trying to deal with it.
The kind of radicalism that Trump embodies can only be countered with an equally radical approach by the liberal establishment, which is what it is most ill-equipped to provide. The right has become increasingly extreme over the course of my adult life, and it seems to be accelerating, but the left and the centre are unable to alter their normal behaviour to respond adequately. Change at that level is uncomfortable and requires both risk-taking and an acceptance of the seriousness of the situation. In itself, this acceptance will undermine our trust in the assumptions from which we’ve worked, making it a harder sell again and thus more likely to be fought against. So, instead, the radical right is met with all sorts of accommodations, excuses, and pointless negotiations from our own side. an endless series of “maybe this time ...“ that almost guarantees that when our counterattack finally comes it will be disordered, and we’ll be grabbing what we can and running from the house as the flames take hold.
Trump, Farage, Orban and the rest are nothing new, and our concerted response will be nothing new either. Unless we accept where we are, have the difficult conversations now, and allow our own radical pushback to be organised and empowered, the result is also sadly inevitable.
As Corona has shown, any crisis is a gift for the populists because it radicalizes another subset of the population into easy answers, conspiracy theories and distrust of the state.
And before Corona, there was the financial crisis, the refugee "crisis" of 2015 and and and.
Along with apparently a whole new generation of politicans (there were smart articles by people watching politics for decades, bemoaning this in the 1990s) who have no beliefs, morals or similar, and who only react by following polls.
Which is disastrous, because long-term building of infrastructure, reforming things going wrong, reacting to technological changes requires both a humanist belief and the willingness to do what's right even if some people call you names.
So right when we need a bunch of democrats to stand fast, we instead get a bunch of smug, polished clones who all say the same, never admit responsiblity, cave under pressure.
Couple of thoughts (from a Brit living in San Francisco):
From 1: > because he has taken one of the two main parties and turned it against democratic results
This is not new. GW Bush only "won" Florida, and therefore the presidency, in 2000 because the Republican controlled Supreme Court ordered a stop to a recount that was clearly going to result in Gore winning. They've also done as much as they can to dismantle the Voting Rights Act. Republicans have been drawing state legislative district lines to guarantee themselves majorities even when they get a minority of the vote - and when a Democrat wins the ungerrymanderable statewide races - for Governor, for example - they strip the incoming Democrat of power. I guess if you squint this could be called playing hardball, but the rules. I guess Trump just declaring that the results are fake is a major step further, but don't kid yourself that the GOP was a pro-democracy party before he came along.
From 5: > There is, of course, space to look at the economic struggles of many Americans, who will be having a rough time even though they did not experience the same degree of inflation or economic suffocation we've seen in the UK.
I think you are being way too kind here. By and large, lower income people vote Democratic, which makes sense to me as it is the party whose policies are most likely to help them. _Maybe_ in 2016 you could see an argument, similar in many ways to a pro-brexit argument, whereby people see the current system as broken and not working for them, and so voting to burn it all down. But when he was President, Trump's signature legislative acheivement was tax cuts for the rich, and one thing he wanted, but didn't get, was taking away poor and sick people's healthcare. The people voting for him now are White Evangelical Christian zealots and people who have bought into his cult of personality - that he (along with the right-wing propaganda networks masquerading as news channels) has managed to make that the great majority of the modern Republican Party is terrifying.
There is some reason for a bit of optimism that when he eventually leaves the stage this might drift away: Republicans have tended to do worse than expected when Trump personally is not on the ballot, Republican candidates who subscribe to Trump's election denialism have tended to lose winnable races, and, on a slightly different topic, everywhere that abortion rights have been on the ballot directly, the pro-choice side has won, even in the deepest red states.
The naked idolatry of him is both horrifying and fascinating. They seem to be hoping for a Nazi Germany-Iran blend of theocratic fascism, yet regard themselves as the deepest patriots. Make it make sense?
Because they are authoritarians, not democratic citizens. Since the whole white culture of US has a long authoritarian streak.
So to the MAGAs/ white Christians/ QAnons/ Incels etc. , winning means Our Guy Wins - that's why they said on Jan. 6th that the election was stolen. And Republicans have been doing that before Trump - Bush jr called up a friend of his father, and the counting in Florida was stopped. Because when you have power, you have the right and are not bound by the rules.
Which was the belief of Ronald Reagan before, or of Nixon before him.
Or the quote about the in-Groups:
There are In-Groups, who the law protects, but doesn't bind, and out-groups, who the law binds, but doesn't protect.
White / Men/ Christian (nominal)/ Rich/ Cis/ Hetero are the in-group, the others are the out-group, and you can see the red thread throughout US history.
It is also because these people are authoritarians, that every time someone explains how to not be an arsehole (for example when a gay friend points up heteronormative language), most of us learn and move on, but these people take every suggestion as being a command from On High, and when they don't like it they still see it as a command but are determined to resist it. Hence the War on Woke and every other War On.
I listened to Bob Woodwards interviews with Trump. Trump obviously is fascinated by Dictators and the power they have. He is really susceptible to flattery too. They will obviously flatter him as much as possible. His ego is huge too. I honestly think he’s not just ego-driven but a moron and he’s very sensitive to criticism. He will never see reason. I admit the thought of him winning terrifies me. I wish the news would stop trying to dampen down the weight of this.
Great piece! Ive seen a lot of well meaning ppl say that the rise of Trumpians is due to liberals ignoring the working class. Whether free market policies harmed them is a fair point, but we must grapple with the reality that they can’t be reasoned with. It is about their image of a white Christian America. That can’t be reasoned or appeased. Btw, are you going to be back on Origin Story?
Good point! Just read an article on how social democrats trying to win "back" their voters by repeating far-rightwing populists slogan are wrong, according to the latest study (dozens of similar studies have been done before with same results):
the actual working class mostly votes social democrat or left (as they did in the 1930s, Berlin's workers stayed red); middle class votes largely social democrat because they care about "liberal values" that is woke stuff like transgenders, feminism, acceptance of refugees and helping poor people.
The voters the SPD lost didn't switch to AfD or CDU (right wing populists or conservatives), they went to Greens and Left, or to non-Voters because they were dis-illusioned.
The real underclass, those who are unemployed, are mostly non-voters because they don't believe anybody will actually help them, after decades of frustration and bad treatment by public employees in welfare offices.
And looking at current slogans and actual proposals from the Traffic light coalition of SPD and Greens, when my mother asks me why we should still vote for these parties who are doing the same politics as conservatives, I have no believable answer.
I did switch from SPD to Greens, but Greens are now betraying refugees, democracy and climate crisis, too.
I don't see how - the Republican party leadership is the post-Jan. 6th coup party, that is ready to break all laws just to win. Especially because leadership doubled down after Jan. 6th, purging their members of anybody who had acted against Trump on that day, and continuing their campaign on state level to win elections regardless of what the voters decide.
And this shows that the Party members also don't care what Trump does. It was bad enough when he talked about shooting a man on the open street and not loosing voters, but now everybody knows that he's ready to grab power with some guns, and the voters want that.
That the 2 million registered voters didn't show up for the first round isn't comforting to me: anybody who's still a member after Jan. 6th agrees with authoritarianism "It doesn't matter how we get power, only that we have it".
Because people who actually value democracy would have quit the party after Jan. 6th. If that wasn't the line, there is no line left.
It could be a good sign if only 5% of people who vote Republican are willing to vote if Trump is on the ballot; if there are 10 Democrat voters for every Republican, and a turnout around 60%, that'd be a wipeout for Trump as "his" voters stay home.
But British politics isn't a fucking game though. It's deadly serious because it can destroy lives and has done so. The fact that most mainstream politicians and journalists treat it as a game is what turned me completely off them. And I bet I'm not alone.
Also how most of the population believes it's just a game the 1% plays, where they have no agency.
Because in the British system, the power of state does not start with the people (Alle Staatsgewalt geht vom Volke aus) as it does in democracies: the power went from Monarch to Parliament, and then stopped.
So normal people have no guaranteed rights, and no actual agency in the system, either.
A tiny grain of comfort in Iowa was that turnout was pretty low by historical standards. This may well have been largely due to the awful weather, but there's also the possibility that, at the General, Trump fails to enthuse people beyond his base. Probably still a toss up between him and Biden at that point, however.
It's also worth keeping in mind that Trump is not the leader of the movement. They're just the most successful figurehead. A battering ram. They'll find another if Trump goes away.
I find this an interesting question. I'm not so sure that "MAGA-ism" is an effective political force without Trump (and let's not forget Trump has quite the record of losing politically, but for the one exception of 2016). Yes, there will be other appalling people who come along and try to take up the mantle, but Trump is such a unique blend of peculiar elements that I think it's quite difficult for anyone else to assume it. DeSantis has tried "MAGA without Trump" and has abjectly failed, albeit he's just an all-round terrible candidate. Perhaps if Trump formally passes his crown on to a successor after a second term (god forbid), then that person might have more success.
ElevenLabs is the tool I use, I "read" better with my ears, so I've started converting quite a lot of my reading material to audio now that tech makes it sound almost natural.
Sorry, no idea what you've linked to, as it just takes me to the comments and I can't immediately see one that's relevant. If you've got Ian's permission, then perhaps say so when you post a link to AI using his voice, because it's not like people are going to just know. And permission for this sort of thing is really very important – the creative industries are very busy trying strip right away from authors, actors, singers, voice over artists and everyone else so they can replace them with cheap AI, so there are good reasons to be worried about it.
there is something quite dark here, Trump's idea basically that freedom belongs really only to a subset of the nation, and that everyone else should be deprived of it, or purged, or made to suffer.
I take comfort that he's an incompetent, but he must have learned something from last time about wielding power in office, and it can't be denied he inspires some kind of devotion, and that he means to do harm
I think, if he wins (and for some awful reason I think it likely), the UK will find itself turning again to Europe. and among the things we can agitate for in the coming years is ror, as you say, the EU to grow to its full height and perhaps rediscover its purpose.
great summary, cheers
At the moment, European EU countries are bent on repeating the trend of the 1920s: everybody moving to the right and populism.
I don't see a strong, credible, social democrat party in the big countries, even after decades, they haven't learned that following the conservatives on their path to the right means loosing. Because if even the nominal social democrat parties say the exact same racist stuff, enact the same punishments on poor people as the conservatives - then why should we vote for them?
Thanks for this pithy summary, Ian. The inertia of big, established systems of governance when attacks from outside the existing framework arrive - the charismatic, fascistic, race-baiting, wanna-be dictator, sidestepping norms accepted and followed by the current system - is nothing new. Sadly, nor is our current way of trying to deal with it.
The kind of radicalism that Trump embodies can only be countered with an equally radical approach by the liberal establishment, which is what it is most ill-equipped to provide. The right has become increasingly extreme over the course of my adult life, and it seems to be accelerating, but the left and the centre are unable to alter their normal behaviour to respond adequately. Change at that level is uncomfortable and requires both risk-taking and an acceptance of the seriousness of the situation. In itself, this acceptance will undermine our trust in the assumptions from which we’ve worked, making it a harder sell again and thus more likely to be fought against. So, instead, the radical right is met with all sorts of accommodations, excuses, and pointless negotiations from our own side. an endless series of “maybe this time ...“ that almost guarantees that when our counterattack finally comes it will be disordered, and we’ll be grabbing what we can and running from the house as the flames take hold.
Trump, Farage, Orban and the rest are nothing new, and our concerted response will be nothing new either. Unless we accept where we are, have the difficult conversations now, and allow our own radical pushback to be organised and empowered, the result is also sadly inevitable.
As Corona has shown, any crisis is a gift for the populists because it radicalizes another subset of the population into easy answers, conspiracy theories and distrust of the state.
And before Corona, there was the financial crisis, the refugee "crisis" of 2015 and and and.
Along with apparently a whole new generation of politicans (there were smart articles by people watching politics for decades, bemoaning this in the 1990s) who have no beliefs, morals or similar, and who only react by following polls.
Which is disastrous, because long-term building of infrastructure, reforming things going wrong, reacting to technological changes requires both a humanist belief and the willingness to do what's right even if some people call you names.
So right when we need a bunch of democrats to stand fast, we instead get a bunch of smug, polished clones who all say the same, never admit responsiblity, cave under pressure.
And Corbyn as relic of the 1970s/ 1919.
Couple of thoughts (from a Brit living in San Francisco):
From 1: > because he has taken one of the two main parties and turned it against democratic results
This is not new. GW Bush only "won" Florida, and therefore the presidency, in 2000 because the Republican controlled Supreme Court ordered a stop to a recount that was clearly going to result in Gore winning. They've also done as much as they can to dismantle the Voting Rights Act. Republicans have been drawing state legislative district lines to guarantee themselves majorities even when they get a minority of the vote - and when a Democrat wins the ungerrymanderable statewide races - for Governor, for example - they strip the incoming Democrat of power. I guess if you squint this could be called playing hardball, but the rules. I guess Trump just declaring that the results are fake is a major step further, but don't kid yourself that the GOP was a pro-democracy party before he came along.
From 5: > There is, of course, space to look at the economic struggles of many Americans, who will be having a rough time even though they did not experience the same degree of inflation or economic suffocation we've seen in the UK.
I think you are being way too kind here. By and large, lower income people vote Democratic, which makes sense to me as it is the party whose policies are most likely to help them. _Maybe_ in 2016 you could see an argument, similar in many ways to a pro-brexit argument, whereby people see the current system as broken and not working for them, and so voting to burn it all down. But when he was President, Trump's signature legislative acheivement was tax cuts for the rich, and one thing he wanted, but didn't get, was taking away poor and sick people's healthcare. The people voting for him now are White Evangelical Christian zealots and people who have bought into his cult of personality - that he (along with the right-wing propaganda networks masquerading as news channels) has managed to make that the great majority of the modern Republican Party is terrifying.
There is some reason for a bit of optimism that when he eventually leaves the stage this might drift away: Republicans have tended to do worse than expected when Trump personally is not on the ballot, Republican candidates who subscribe to Trump's election denialism have tended to lose winnable races, and, on a slightly different topic, everywhere that abortion rights have been on the ballot directly, the pro-choice side has won, even in the deepest red states.
The naked idolatry of him is both horrifying and fascinating. They seem to be hoping for a Nazi Germany-Iran blend of theocratic fascism, yet regard themselves as the deepest patriots. Make it make sense?
Because they are authoritarians, not democratic citizens. Since the whole white culture of US has a long authoritarian streak.
So to the MAGAs/ white Christians/ QAnons/ Incels etc. , winning means Our Guy Wins - that's why they said on Jan. 6th that the election was stolen. And Republicans have been doing that before Trump - Bush jr called up a friend of his father, and the counting in Florida was stopped. Because when you have power, you have the right and are not bound by the rules.
Which was the belief of Ronald Reagan before, or of Nixon before him.
Or the quote about the in-Groups:
There are In-Groups, who the law protects, but doesn't bind, and out-groups, who the law binds, but doesn't protect.
White / Men/ Christian (nominal)/ Rich/ Cis/ Hetero are the in-group, the others are the out-group, and you can see the red thread throughout US history.
It is also because these people are authoritarians, that every time someone explains how to not be an arsehole (for example when a gay friend points up heteronormative language), most of us learn and move on, but these people take every suggestion as being a command from On High, and when they don't like it they still see it as a command but are determined to resist it. Hence the War on Woke and every other War On.
I listened to Bob Woodwards interviews with Trump. Trump obviously is fascinated by Dictators and the power they have. He is really susceptible to flattery too. They will obviously flatter him as much as possible. His ego is huge too. I honestly think he’s not just ego-driven but a moron and he’s very sensitive to criticism. He will never see reason. I admit the thought of him winning terrifies me. I wish the news would stop trying to dampen down the weight of this.
Great piece! Ive seen a lot of well meaning ppl say that the rise of Trumpians is due to liberals ignoring the working class. Whether free market policies harmed them is a fair point, but we must grapple with the reality that they can’t be reasoned with. It is about their image of a white Christian America. That can’t be reasoned or appeased. Btw, are you going to be back on Origin Story?
Good point! Just read an article on how social democrats trying to win "back" their voters by repeating far-rightwing populists slogan are wrong, according to the latest study (dozens of similar studies have been done before with same results):
the actual working class mostly votes social democrat or left (as they did in the 1930s, Berlin's workers stayed red); middle class votes largely social democrat because they care about "liberal values" that is woke stuff like transgenders, feminism, acceptance of refugees and helping poor people.
The voters the SPD lost didn't switch to AfD or CDU (right wing populists or conservatives), they went to Greens and Left, or to non-Voters because they were dis-illusioned.
The real underclass, those who are unemployed, are mostly non-voters because they don't believe anybody will actually help them, after decades of frustration and bad treatment by public employees in welfare offices.
And looking at current slogans and actual proposals from the Traffic light coalition of SPD and Greens, when my mother asks me why we should still vote for these parties who are doing the same politics as conservatives, I have no believable answer.
I did switch from SPD to Greens, but Greens are now betraying refugees, democracy and climate crisis, too.
There are 2 million registered GOP voters in Iowa, only 102,000 voted and only half of those voted for Trump. That might be a good sign?
I don't see how - the Republican party leadership is the post-Jan. 6th coup party, that is ready to break all laws just to win. Especially because leadership doubled down after Jan. 6th, purging their members of anybody who had acted against Trump on that day, and continuing their campaign on state level to win elections regardless of what the voters decide.
And this shows that the Party members also don't care what Trump does. It was bad enough when he talked about shooting a man on the open street and not loosing voters, but now everybody knows that he's ready to grab power with some guns, and the voters want that.
That the 2 million registered voters didn't show up for the first round isn't comforting to me: anybody who's still a member after Jan. 6th agrees with authoritarianism "It doesn't matter how we get power, only that we have it".
Because people who actually value democracy would have quit the party after Jan. 6th. If that wasn't the line, there is no line left.
It could be a good sign if only 5% of people who vote Republican are willing to vote if Trump is on the ballot; if there are 10 Democrat voters for every Republican, and a turnout around 60%, that'd be a wipeout for Trump as "his" voters stay home.
But British politics isn't a fucking game though. It's deadly serious because it can destroy lives and has done so. The fact that most mainstream politicians and journalists treat it as a game is what turned me completely off them. And I bet I'm not alone.
Also how most of the population believes it's just a game the 1% plays, where they have no agency.
Because in the British system, the power of state does not start with the people (Alle Staatsgewalt geht vom Volke aus) as it does in democracies: the power went from Monarch to Parliament, and then stopped.
So normal people have no guaranteed rights, and no actual agency in the system, either.
A tiny grain of comfort in Iowa was that turnout was pretty low by historical standards. This may well have been largely due to the awful weather, but there's also the possibility that, at the General, Trump fails to enthuse people beyond his base. Probably still a toss up between him and Biden at that point, however.
https://x.com/aynrandorg/status/1746608120833445924?s=46&t=x0LgUwbqp1aaBDIvAOFhzA
It's also worth keeping in mind that Trump is not the leader of the movement. They're just the most successful figurehead. A battering ram. They'll find another if Trump goes away.
I find this an interesting question. I'm not so sure that "MAGA-ism" is an effective political force without Trump (and let's not forget Trump has quite the record of losing politically, but for the one exception of 2016). Yes, there will be other appalling people who come along and try to take up the mantle, but Trump is such a unique blend of peculiar elements that I think it's quite difficult for anyone else to assume it. DeSantis has tried "MAGA without Trump" and has abjectly failed, albeit he's just an all-round terrible candidate. Perhaps if Trump formally passes his crown on to a successor after a second term (god forbid), then that person might have more success.
AI Reading of this in Ian's voice:
https://soundcloud.com/thomas-askwho-askew/some-quick-thoughts-on-trump
Pretty accurate! Although a bit more gravitas and downward inflection than Ian's real voice ;-)
Well this is astonishing and scary at the same time. How do you do this? :O
ElevenLabs is the tool I use, I "read" better with my ears, so I've started converting quite a lot of my reading material to audio now that tech makes it sound almost natural.
Isn't it a bit rude, not to say unethical, to use someone else's voice without their permission?
I'm kind of hurt that you immediately assumed that's what I did.
https://open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/p/rwanda-nothing-makes-sense?utm_source=direct&r=67y1h&utm_campaign=comment-list-share-cta&utm_medium=web&comments=true
Sorry, no idea what you've linked to, as it just takes me to the comments and I can't immediately see one that's relevant. If you've got Ian's permission, then perhaps say so when you post a link to AI using his voice, because it's not like people are going to just know. And permission for this sort of thing is really very important – the creative industries are very busy trying strip right away from authors, actors, singers, voice over artists and everyone else so they can replace them with cheap AI, so there are good reasons to be worried about it.
Really appreciated the concern but just to be clear, I gave permission for this a while back and for it to be done freely.
Thanks for clarifying that, Ian. And apologies for jumping down your throat, Tom.
“the biggest win for a race of its kind in American history”
Iowa is 1% of US pop., with 719k registered Republicans, of whom 56k voted for Trump.
Lets keep this in perspective.