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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBEING HONEST ABOUT TRUMP By Adam Gopnik
As I have written before, to call him a fascist of some variety is simply to use a historical label that fits. The arguments about whether he meets every point in some static fascism matrix show a misunderstanding of what that ideology involves. It is the essence of fascism to have no single fixed forman attenuated form of nationalism in its basic nature, it naturally takes on the colors and practices of each nation it infects. In Italy, it is bombastic and neoclassical in form; in Spain, Catholic and religious; in Germany, violent and romantic. It took forms still crazier and more feverishly sinister, if one can imagine, in Romania, whereas under Oswald Mosley, in England, its manner was predictably paternalistic and aristocratic. It is no surprise that the American face of fascism would take on the forms of celebrity television and the casino greeters come-on, since that is as much our symbolic scene as nostalgic re-creations of Roman splendors once were Italys.
What all forms of fascism have in common is the glorification of the nation, and the exaggeration of its humiliations, with violence promised to its enemies, at home and abroad; the worship of power wherever it appears and whoever holds it; contempt for the rule of law and for reason; unashamed employment of repeated lies as a rhetorical strategy; and a promise of vengeance for those who feel themselves disempowered by history. It promises to turn back time and take no prisoners. That it can appeal to those who do not understand its consequences is doubtless true. But the first job of those who do understand is to state what those consequences invariably are. Those who think that the underlying institutions of American government are immunized against it fail to understand history. In every historical situation where a leader of Trumps kind comes to power, normal safeguards collapse. Ours are older and therefore stronger? Watching the rapid collapse of the Republican Party is not an encouraging rehearsal. Donald Trump has a chance to seize power.
Hillary Clinton is an ordinary liberal politician. She has her faults, easily described, often documentedthough, for the most part, the worst accusations against her have turned out to be fiction. No reasonable person, no matter how opposed to her politics, can believe for a second that Clintons accession to power would be a threat to the Constitution or the continuation of American democracy. No reasonable person can believe that Trumps accession to power would not be.
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Her Sister
(6,444 posts)EL34x4
(2,003 posts)From the opening sentence (excerpted), Gopnik's article drips with the smarmy liberal elitism that is driving voters to Donald Trump in the first place. Fortunately, nobody but those already solidly in Hillary Clinton's camp will ever read it.
so its "smarmy liberal elitism that is driving voters to Donald Trump"????
Are u lost?
EL34x4
(2,003 posts)...I can't help but think, "people just aren't getting the message."
When you open your article with: "The best show in New York right now may be the Guggenheims retrospective of the work of László Moholy-Nagy (pronounced nadge, not nadgy, a lesson hard learned)." and then proceed to blast Trump (and by association, his supporters) for being a fascist, you're just not fucking getting it.
Pardon my language but Gopnik is clueless and not helping at all. Maybe he needs to take a sabbatical until after the election.
muriel_volestrangler
(101,424 posts)What is wrong with someone making an argument that will resonate with his readership?
Here's an example of who this is aimed at: people in the media who think they can cover Trump as just another candidate. If they wake up and see Trump for the fascist he is, this will help defeat him.
EL34x4
(2,003 posts)It's just as soon as I read that first sentence, my immediate thought was, "This guy has never so much as spoken to a Trump voter."