The former president and his backers aim to strengthen the power of the White House and limit the independence of federal agencies.
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No system of government can withstand 50% of its participants being bad actors.
I honestly don’t know how we get out of this situation without aggressively litigating politicians that have committed crimes. That requires overwhelming political will, though, and it’s obvious now how important Fox News and Right Wing radio has been to creating an atmosphere where that will doesn’t exist.
I want to say maybe 20% to 30%.
It’s very scary. As an ethnic minority I am only as safe as my government lets me be.
You can go from democratic Weimar Republic to Nazi Germany in a space of a few years.
Of the population, sure. But I meant of the actual political actors in the system, Republicans make up about half as they are overrepresented when compared to the population.
The way to bring Republicans to heel is for them to keep losing until they give up and try something else.
Between 1860 and 1912 exactly one Democrat - Grover Cleveland - managed to be elected president; Woodrow Wilson ended that streak in 1912 in no small part by breaking with his party to embrace progressive reforms (though the intra-party GOP split between TR and Taft also helped), and while Wilson was one of the worst racists to ever inhabit the White House, that embrace of progressivism nevertheless set the stage for the era of Democratic dominance under/after FDR.
What dominance. I have seen 8 years of reagan, 4 of bush sr, 8 clinton, 8 bush jr., 9 obama, 4 trump, and getting to 4 biden. The majority for me has been unfortunately republican.
I honestly don’t know how we get out of this situation without aggressively litigating politicians that have committed crimes.
I think this would actually make the situation worse. Donald Trump has successfully made a mockery of our entire justice system, by convincing half the people in this country that the cases against him are a big conspiracy theory/witch hunt while also trumping up (no pun intended) charges against his own political enemies and getting the GOP to support him.
Now take the fact that the overwhelming majority of people accused of crimes in government right now are Republican – Trump and all of his lackeys, the multiple judges on the SC accepting bribes, George Santos being George Santos (or whoever the fuck he is), Gaetz sleeping with underage girls, etc. etc. etc., and there’s absolutely no way you’d be able to aggressively litigate politicians without adding metric fucktons of fuel to the belief of those on the right that such charges are little more than political witch hunts.
And while the obvious reply to that is “Their opinions don’t matter, we should be pursuing justice”, you are correct. But you’d also be ignoring the reality that there are a whole hell of a lot of them and they are willing to turn violent if they truly believe that an ongoing series of charges against GOP government officials are politically motivated.
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I have no idea. That’s well above my pay grade. All I’m saying is that Trump has spent the past 7 years telling every inbred redneck in 'Murica that the radical left was coming to take their guns and their rights and their religion and the entire system is rigged and they want to censor and jail you for your free speech. Now follow that up with seeing their almighty god-emperor doing a perp walk in an orange jump suit followed by an endless parade of his cronies. If you think that’s gonna end peacefully, I’ve got some bad news for you…
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The biggest lesson they learned from the Trump administration is that if you don’t act ashamed, you must not have done anything wrong. This has opened the floodgates on blatantly unethical and/or illegal behavior.
1984, just change the definition to what you want it to be
Fascists will do fascist things.
And it’s so blatant too.
Mr. Trump intends to bring independent agencies — like the Federal Communications Commission, which makes and enforces rules for television and internet companies, and the Federal Trade Commission, which enforces various antitrust and other consumer protection rules against businesses — under direct presidential control.
First thing listed in the article is control the message, which is done by controlling the media. Straight out of the fascist playbook.
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That’s really worrisome and a major backslide for American democracy.
Imagine if Trump fired Dr. Fauci and ended all pandemic restrictions in 2020 like he wanted.
Why does that sound like what Ceasar did as he aimed to create the Roman Empire.
Or Palpatine.
If he could just go ahead and have the heart attack he’s obviously overdue for, the world would be a better place.
Dictating. First stop on the World Dictator Tour.
Personally, I think presidents have more than enough power now, and I don’t want them to have more. Whether I support or oppose any particular president. Because I don’t want to live in a dictatorship.
Too much. There’s already a huge lack of oversight too, as seen by Trumps term. This is basically paving the road towards a dictatorship. Parliaments aren’t perfect, but I rather have a bunch of people vote on decision making stuff, instead of one dude saying how it goes. Especially when it is apparently that easy to become president of the biggest military apparatus of the world. As it stands, the US is a ticking time bomb.
I dunno, I sort of like how all 3 branches of government check each other.
one improvement I could see would be to make supermajorities and filibusters illegal - for all parties.
Are they really checking each other if they all want to place power in one political party (or more accurately, one person)?
I read the title and immediately thought of the time when President Xi if China had basically made himself president for life and during a rally, Trump said maybe we should try that some day and did that little shrug he does when he really means what he says but shrugs to make the crowd think he’s not really serious about it.
all 3 branches of government check each other if they feel like it
FTFY
Can we get an unlocked version of this news. Behind a paywall.
Who would have thought that he wants to do an illegal power grab? It’s always those who invoke the constitution, the founding fathers, and the bible who could actually not care less about them.
The same ones who have never read a word of any of those documents.
Remember in the frenzy after Kavanaugh was added, when that one guy drove out to his house with a weapon in a briefcase? But then he thought about life in prison, his family, and then caved and turned himself in?
Fast forward a bit through the many mangled Supreme Court rulings and the overturning of Roe v Wade.
Crazy to think what could be different in the world. When you think about it, the entire future of American politics and culture would shift dramatically overnight if just two Supreme Court justices were to suddenly cease to exist.
Wild stuff.
Ribbit
