Mark Lawrence Schrad writes that Republicans have abandoned policy to promote the public good, including assistance following natural disasters.

Timo

@wdlindsy @philip_cardella All this bossiness from the republicans being described reminds me of H. L. Mencken's snarky "Puritanism—the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy". Just switch out Puritanism for any of the autocratic descriptors. The conservative SCOTUS members have implied they don't care what the people want, they are the deciders. No happiness for the people! Which is contrary to the mission statement of the USA: 'Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness'

Peter Butler

@wdlindsy Fascism is based on impotence politics. The government cannot accomplish anything. "Everything is *their* fault" and the government's only purpose becomes mass deportation and border policing

Philip Cardella

@wdlindsy thanks for the discussion today, William. I have the utmost respect for your opinion and value the articles you share on here.

They're always worth a read, even if I disagree with something here and there in them.

I know it takes a lot of time to curate those and I appreciate it.

Steve Woods

@wdlindsy @philip_cardella Hey, Donald!

The 1930s just called. They want their politics back.

#MakeAmericaGrateAgain

Danny the Weary

@wdlindsy I been sayin'

Danny the Weary (@[email protected])

A movement hostile to the idea of public goods and socially valuable institutions of the democratic West. Is it the Kremlin or the GOP....? whynotboth.gif

Free Radical (freeradical.zone)

Possumantha

@wdlindsy @philip_cardella I think everyone who knows what the term fascism means already knows trumpism is horrible and is working against it or thinks they will benefit from it. People who don't know by now don't want to know so they can't be told.
It's not a problem of linking hitler and fascism. That's been going on loudly since '16.

William Lindsey :toad:

@kastope @philip_cardella This is how I see it, too.

William Lindsey :toad:

@pinsk Thank you for the link. Good comments.

William Lindsey :toad:

@wood5y @philip_cardella Touché. Who'd have thought we'd have to relive that grim period, when so many of us claimed we'd learned the lesson it taught us? But here we are.

William Lindsey :toad:

@philip_cardella Thank you for finding the piddling efforts I make to share what I'm reading worthwhile. I keep trying!

William Lindsey :toad:

@peterbutler Yes, and yet, ironically, it's all about asserting stongman, macho dominance and power in a very strutty performative way.

William Lindsey :toad:

@timo21 @philip_cardella Yes, Mencken captured something core to a formative strand of American culture — which remains active and alive in American culture down the centuries — with that observation.

William Lindsey :toad:

@philip_cardella Yes, of course. I think at least historians have in recent years sought to sketch the larger picture of the Holocaust. Millions of Jews were murdered and must absolutely not be forgotten. But political dissidents, those considered mentally and physically disabled, Slavs, LGBTQ people, Romani: others were targeted and killed, too. It all began with murdering children in facilities for the disabled.

William Lindsey :toad:

@philip_cardella "Trump is openly channeling Hitler. Repeatedly. The press needs to identify this AND why it's so dangerous *in headlines*."

I very much agree. And his choice to hold his big upcoming rally at Madison Square Gardens, where the big Nazi rally was held back when underscores what he's doing.

William Lindsey :toad:

@Phiend I agree.

Philip Cardella

@wdlindsy I wish there were something other than a "like" button that says, I see what you said and I appreciate it without any sense of "that's such a fun thing you said!" Lol.

Scary times.

It's seemed like Miller was driving the bus but I wasn't sure until HCRs post today.

There's just no way using MSG is a coincidence.

William Lindsey :toad:

@philip_cardella Yes, emojis provide a limited range of emotions! I'd like a more diverse language-emotive system built into them, too.

Steve Woods

@wdlindsy @philip_cardella The biggest lesson I've learned from history is that lessons are never learnt from history.

Take for instance the UK's involvement in Bush's Afghanistan war. In the 19th century the British fought 3 wars against the Afghans. Result: Afghans 3, British Empire 0.

William Lindsey :toad:

@wood5y @philip_cardella I fear you're exactly right. My spouse is German-American and has spent years reading everything he can get his hands on about the Holocaust, as he struggles to understand how his people, German Catholic people, could have been responsible for or have silently colluded in mass murder. He's concluded that the notion of progress as history unfolds is total bunk. He says that the same battles have to be fought over and over again against inhumanity.

Steve Woods

@wdlindsy @philip_cardella The fact that the plays of Aristophanes are still being performed after millennia is indicative of human nature's lack of changing despite the changing times.