@tzimmer_history@mastodon.social
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tzimmer_history

@tzimmer_history@mastodon.social

Historian at Georgetown - Democracy and Its Discontents - Podcast: Is This Democracy https://anchor.fm/is-this-democracy - Newsletter: Democracy Americana https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/

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tzimmer_history, to random
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Vigilante Violence Is Part of the Right’s Plan

I wrote this exactly a year ago, and today – as Texas Gov. Abbott has pardoned convicted killer Daniel Perry – is, sadly, a good day to repost it: The open embrace of violence plays a key role in the broader rightwing mobilization against democracy.

Some thoughts: 1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/vigilante-violence-is-part-of-the

image/jpeg

tzimmer_history, to random
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Weekend reading: Student Revolt and the Curtailing of Critical Speech

The violent crackdown on campus protests reveals an alliance between the Right and mainstream elites who are driven by reactionary impulses and status anxieties.

A thread, based on this week’s piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/student-revolt-and-the-curtailing

tzimmer_history, to random
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📢 PODCAST

From Reagan to Trump

A Conversation about “Landslide” and the Transformation of American Politics since the 1970s – with @jbenbradford and @sethcotlar (Part II)

New Is This Democracy - a short thread on what we discuss:

🧵1/

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/36-from-reagan-to-trump-a-conversation-about/id1652741954?i=1000652564269

tzimmer_history, to random
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Weekend reading: I wrote about the disingenuous and dangerous folly of anti-anti-Trump conservatism.

How “respectable” conservatives normalize Trump, rage against a caricature of “the Left,” and accommodate rightwing extremism.

A thread, based on this week’s piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/anti-anti-trump-conservatives-are

tzimmer_history, to random
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📢 PODCAST

“Landslide”

How the Radical Right Took Over the Republican Party and Transformed American Politics in the 1970s – with @jbenbradford and @sethcotlar (Part I)

New episode of Is This Democracy:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/35-landslide-how-the-radical-right-took-over/id1652741954?i=1000652093152

tzimmer_history, to random
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Anti-Anti-Trump Conservatism Is a Disingenuous and Dangerous Game

A case study of how National Review normalizes Trump, rages against a bizarre caricature of “the Left,” and thereby accommodates rightwing extremism.

A thread, based on my new piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/anti-anti-trump-conservatives-are

tzimmer_history, to random
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There is also an element of Volkish ideology here - the assumption that rural white people with certain reactionary sensibilities do, in fact, represent “real America” and therefore command deference - while the groups that make up most of the pluralistic Democratic coalition constitute a deviation.

1/

tzimmer_history,
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A while back, I wrote about the dangerous myth of Trump’s special connection to “real America” - and how the mainstream political discourse is perpetuating ideas that form the bedrock of the extremist movement defined by ethno-religious nationalism that has galvanized behind Trump:

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/the-fascistic-myth-of-trumps-special

lolgop, to random
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The thing @tzimmer_history helped me understand about Project 2025 is the way it shows the entire right has embraced MAGA, AKA white fundamentalist authoritarianism.

They've learned from their mistakes.

They're ready to demolish any good government does.

https://www.patreon.com/posts/thank-you-2025-101712465

lolgop, to random
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Thank you, Project 2025!

New podcast episode with @tzimmer_history

https://www.patreon.com/posts/101712465

Let me know what you think!

tzimmer_history, to random
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ICYMI: What the Right Plans to Do With Power

All three parts of my series about “Project 2025” are out.

Almost 15,000 words on what these radical plans would do to America and how to explain the Right’s open embrace of state authoritarianism:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-makes-project-2025-so-dangerous

tzimmer_history, to random
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Weekend reading: I wrote about how conceptions of what it means to “defend democracy” have shifted in Joe Biden’s major speeches.

Is the liberal center embracing the idea of transforming America rather than just restoring pre-Trump “normalcy”?

A thread, based on this week’s piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-does-defend-democracy-actually

tzimmer_history,
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This is a painful process. But if the State of the Union is any indication (a big if!), liberal America might be moving away from exceptionalist myths and beyond limited visions of restoring “normalcy.” That would be progress.

More here – please consider subscribing:

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-does-defend-democracy-actually

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What Does “Defend Democracy” Actually Mean?

Biden’s State of the Union hinted at a key shift in the liberal imagination: From a merely restorative to a potentially more transformative vision for America.

A thread, based on my new piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-does-defend-democracy-actually

tzimmer_history,
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From insisting that the “soul of the nation” is incorruptible and indisputably democratic to emphasizing the defining conflict between two fundamentally incompatible visions for what “America” should be. If taken seriously, that shift really matters.

More here - please consider subscribing:

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-does-defend-democracy-actually

tzimmer_history, to random
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The best argument for applying “American fascism” as an analytical framework to Trump / Trumpism is the fact that it emphasized - rather than dismissed or sanitized - these fascistic elements from the start and rightfully diagnosed an acute threat to constitutional self-government.

🧵1/

tzimmer_history, to random
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Weekend reading: I wrote about what “Project 2025” wants to do to America.

“Project 2025” is designed as a grand battle plan for the Right’s open war against multiracial pluralism – and it will be on the ballot in November.

A thread, based on this week’s piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-project-2025-would-do-to-america

tzimmer_history, to random
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What “Project 2025” Would Do to America

The Right has developed concrete plans to make America into a much nastier place for anyone who dares to deviate from the white Christian patriarchal order. That’s what is on the ballot in November.

A thread, based on my new piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-project-2025-would-do-to-america

tzimmer_history, to random
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Weekend reading: I wrote about the worldview of the people behind “Project 2025”

They see themselves as noble defenders of “real America” against a totalitarian “woke,” “globalist” assault. “Project 2025” is their declaration of war on multiracial pluralism.

A thread, based on this week’s piece:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/project-2025-promises-revenge-oppression

tzimmer_history, to random
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Conservatives say “Project 2025” is their “Promise to America.” But from the perspective of multiracial, pluralistic democracy, it is more aptly described as an aggressive threat.

New piece:

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/project-2025-promises-revenge-oppression

tzimmer_history, to random
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What the “Biden Too Old” Discourse Is Really About

Let’s evaluate the arguments of those who describe Biden as manifestly unfit – and how they preemptively assign blame for Trump’s possible return to “the Liberals” they despise.

New piece:

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/what-the-biden-too-old-discourse

tzimmer_history, to random
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The biggest challenge in 2024 is to get enough people to actually listen to what Trump and those around him are openly, consistently, and explicitly promising to do once they get back to power.

It is utterly deranged, and discounting it as just rhetoric would be a disaster.

tzimmer_history, to random
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Weekend reading: I wrote about Republicans lusting for civil war or “national divorce.”

It’s a manifestation of the Right’s radical rejection of pluralism. They’ll have their “real America” - or none.

Short thread, based on the piece below:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/domination-or-dissolution-rule-or

tzimmer_history, to random
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📢 PODCAST

“Project 2025”: What the Right Plans to Do Once Trumpism Returns to Power

New Is This Democracy - a short thread on what we discuss in this episode:

🧵1/

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/is-this-democracy/id1652741954?i=1000643792888

tzimmer_history, to random
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Weekend Reading: Monday was MLK Day.

I wrote about MLK’s “divisiveness” in the 1960s, the history of white backlash politics, and how self-proclaimed moderates and “popularists” have been instrumental in preventing a serious racial reckoning:

🧵1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/mlks-legacy-and-the-quest-for-a-racial

xankarn,
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@tzimmer_history

Always considered this the perfect rejoinder.

https://youtu.be/UBFDdTIYZ6Q?si=AiMTxUoyPZlH-gZ5

tzimmer_history, to random
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“Faith and Family” vs Democracy

On the normalization of Mike Johnson, the media’s inclination to accommodate power, and the perpetuation of “real American” extremism.

A thread, based on my new Democracy Americana piece: 1/

https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/faith-and-family-vs-democracy

tzimmer_history, to random
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Good news, friends of “Is This Democracy”: After a loooong summer break (life intervened, we’re really sorry!), the podcast will finally be back later this week - and @LilyMasonPhD and I will be back to a regular schedule going forward. We have much to discuss!

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/is-this-democracy/id1652741954

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