Pidesco

He is risen!

First both Houses are entirely toothless. Entirely. They will either endorse whatever comes out of this administration, or ah-hum their way to the apocalypse, with vague hand wringing about norms and civility. As for the courts, the system is slow, but the Supreme Court has already clearly shown who it stands with. Congress, lol.

It's very fortunate then that the GOP hasn't been ignoring the constitution with no consequences, so far. We really dodged a bullet here, thanks for the help.

Also don't forget Peter Thiel who names every company he has after evil things in Middle earth.

While my examples were more generic authoritarian than fascist, a significant portion of Eco's list already applies to a tee to current situation in the US. That said, at this point, differentiating between authoritarianism and fascism is at best an interesting rhetorical exercise, at worse a distraction. Also whether the situation now is better or worse than in the Lindberg days, is really not that important. More important is where American political institutions and discourse stand now compared to ten, twenty or forty years ago. I'd argue things are moving in the wrong direction and accelerated dramatically with Trump's accession this year. Regarding your disappointments, I wasn't really surprised myself with either media or tech companies capitulating to Trump. Tech companies especially weren't so much capitulating but rather going mask off in the name of profits. Not all of them are run by complete nutso Peter Thiel, but the Zuckerbergs and Bezos and Musks of the world are not that far removed from Thiel.

Descent into fascism is a process not an end state. Examples: using government regulatory authorities to silence speech the powerful don't like. Plain clothes security forces rounding up people without due process. The Supreme Court using the shadow docket to push through blatantly unconstitutional decisions in favor of the current administration The rule of law being repeatedly ignored with no consequences I'd say that for the midterms to change anything the dems would have to have crushing victories in both the House and the Senate. I'm not sure, but I think in the Senate that's utterly impossible, even with the assumption of entirely free and fair elections. Also that assumption is becoming less and less guaranteed. Additionally, even if the dems win overwhelmingly, if they keep behaving in the same way they did during the Biden mandate, they will, at best, be an hiatus. I don't think Trump is necessary anymore, at this point the GOP seems entirely captured by its far right faction. Still, what happens to the GOP with a dead Trump is a bit of an open question. I sometimes have conversations with a colleague of mine who thinks Vance would be worse than Trump. I think he'd be a lame duck.

The one thing I enjoy about the US's descent into fascism is how quickly the constitution went from holy, sacred immutable document that must be followed how the founding fathers intended, to a piece of paper written specifically to be ignored.

Healthcare paid by taxes perhaps.

What is radical left ideology?

This is from 2019, but seems topical.

He fundamentally believed in the grift and the money that accompanied it. I'm just suggesting that we should treat his death by the same standards he treated others. He also didn't believe in empathy, so the people who are now sad about his death are just betraying the values Kirk stood for.

If you want clarity on what to think of this, Charlie Kirk got you covered. https://www.mediamatters.org/charlie-kirk/charlie-kirk-its-worth-have-cost-unfortunately-some-gun-deaths-every-single-year-so-we

That's because you are being handled.