Ineptocracy can be defined as a system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of (thinking deeply and broadly) and producing goods and services.
Have a good day, though, I recognize those days are few and inbetween if you paying attention. @ruthbenghiat#Strongmen#Poor&Irationals
US politics are dispiriting, but since the GOP's frontrunner is currently #TFG, depravity is a daily occurrence:
At his NH rally, TFG compared himself to pedophiles in church, & that's why he needs immunity.
"As I discuss in #Strongmen, protecting abusers & rapists, starting w/the leader, is a pillar of authoritarianism. Mussolini & Gaddafi were serial rapists & used state resources to procure women. TFG's bus' (modeling, beauty pageants) provided a pool of women to exploit."
-R Ben-Ghiat
"The essence of authoritarianism is getting away with crime, and corruption must be at the center of any analysis of how dictatorships operate. A large percentage of actions authoritarians take are about covering up corruption:"
"demonizing and jailing journalists, judges, prosecutors and investigators, inventing narratives about their selflessness and purity, and establishing 'inner sanctums' composed of cronies, sycophants, and family members who will keep their secrets, dispose of their enemies, and share in the profits from illicit activities."
Ben-Ghiat focuses on hos authoritarian strongmen often rely on their sons-in-law to assist them in their corrupt schemes.
Charlie Sykes reminds us of history many Americans choose to forget:
Lots of Americans once loved Mussolini — that swagger! That machismo! That decisiveness! Those movie-star looks! He's making Italy stronger!
Mussolini had large numbers of fanboys in business, labor, Hollywood, and the media. Because a solid proportion of Americans have long been fatally attracted to authoritarianism….
I'm currently reading Strongmen.
In the early chapters still.
I find my mind drifting thru current events as I read, especially events 2016-present if you know what I mean.
We are in danger. I mean our democracy by "we" which inherently means our very lifestyle, culture, and...us, the people.
There is a lot of coordination in this current authoritarian push, just as has happened and been modeled in the past. #USPol #ProDemocracy #Strongmen
Thomas Zimmer's valuable commentary is always dense and rich, and that makes it difficult to choose excerpts to feature in social media snippets. I'd encourage readers to read the entire Zimmer essay I'm linking here.
He maintains that the American Values Survey whose results PRRI released at the end of October provides an important window into the current cultural-political mood in the US — an ominous mood.
The nation is in trouble, in short, because too many of us are willing to bend the rules of our democratic system to enshrine white Christian nationalism — and themselves as white Christians — as the law of the land. As PRRI subtitles its survey:
“State of the country: Pessimism, political violence, paranoia.”
"Actually, those on the Right, very much including people who vote for Trump, are at least as concerned about what may happen to democracy in the next election as those in the anti-MAGA camp are. In fact, about as many Americans believe Biden winning reelection would 'threaten American democracy and way of life' as there are people thinking Trump coming back to power would endanger democratic self-government."
"The people who vote for Trump clearly don’t share the vision of egalitarian multiracial pluralism. What they worry about is losing their democracy: A restricted version of democracy that leaves entrenched hierarchies of race, gender, and religion largely intact. They are committed to defending their white Christian patriarchal democracy – and determined to prevent multiracial pluralism."
"Women and LGBTQ individuals have always been as much the strongman's enemies as the political opposition, prosecutors, and the press. For a century, the gender politics of authoritarianism has relied on the toxic triad of hypermasculinity, misogyny, and homophobia, which have worked together to devastating effect."
"MAGA Republicans bring violence, disorder, chaos & gridlock. The #MAGA wing of the #Republican Party, after all, broke the tradition of a peaceful transfer of power. It actively rooted for a default & then a government shutdown. It brooks #violence against law enforcement, peddles #conspiracy theories...
"Contrary to what critics of #democracy claim, democracies are far more stable, nimbler & more functional than govts dominated by extreme ideologues or those in the thrall of a narcissistic cult leader.
#Strongmen who promise order often are disruptive once in power....
Ruth Ben-Ghiat: The aim of this part of the spectacle is to look "presidential" and generate as much dramatic build-up as possible to the moment when he takes a hit on behalf of his people. Maximize the glamour, then milk the outrage to keep the $ coming in. #TrumpMotorcade#TrumpArrest#FultonCountyJail#FaniWillis#Strongmen
"It’s no surprise that Donald Trump, the leading GOP presidential contender, has declined to participate in tomorrow’s GOP presidential primary debate. That’s how demagogues behave. …
Russian President Vladimir Putin understands this well."
"Authoritarians are happy to engineer the intellectual, social, and financial impoverishment of the educational sector to get rid of anyone who stands in the way of their dreams of national and ideological purity."
"Watch for higher education professionals to be increasingly targeted as agents of the destruction of family, decency, and nation as GOP politicians compete to seem more extremist and authoritarian —which will bring them even further into line with autocrats such as Orbán.
Far from being 'ivory towers' closed off from society, higher education institutions are often front-line targets of those who seek to destroy democracy."
"This smackdown between two White male extremist brutes [DeSantis and Trump] may seem entertaining to some. Yet as a scholar of strongmen and the destruction they cause to societies, I see this macho posturing about who can be more commanding and violent as dangerous in myriad ways."