"Just getting started": We have yet to see the worst of Trump's "spectocracy"

[marmar]

"Just getting started”: We have yet to see the worst of Trump's "spectocracy"
During his address to Congress, Trump bragged and threatened that his administration “is just getting started”

By Chauncey DeVega
Senior Writer
Published March 10, 2025 6:15AM (EDT)


(Salon) Are you not entertained?

America’s state of the union is horrible and rapidly becoming much worse. President Trump is the ringmaster, master of ceremonies and star of this horrible spectacle.

In her newsletter, historian Ruth Ben-Ghiat highlights the central role that the spectacle plays for the autocrat-authoritarian: “Anyone who studies authoritarianism, a political system that depends on propaganda, corruption, machismo, and violence, is well acquainted with the parade of sociopaths, sycophants, petty and grand criminals, and zealots who flourish in lawless environments where the performance of power is everything and the leader is elevated to a semi-divinity. In authoritarian states, ridiculousness often competes with brutality for center stage.”

....(snip)....

The grossly surreal nature of Trump’s speech (and this era) was encapsulated by his triumphant return to the Capitol and Congress. Four years earlier, Trump’s MAGA followers attacked the Capitol as part of his coup attempt, running amok, battling the police, smearing feces on the walls of that historic building and the heart of American democracy, waving a Confederate flag, carrying a huge White Christian cross like they were Crusaders from the European Middle Ages and erecting a gallows to execute Vice President Pence and the other “traitors.” On Tuesday night, many of the same Republican members of Congress who were literally hiding for their lives on Jan. 6 applauded Trump as a conquering hero and their champion.

....(snip)....

Donald Trump has only been president for seven weeks. His shock and awe campaign has been devastatingly effective in inflicting trauma and uncertainty on the American people, pushing the country closer to economic disaster, undermining the country’s democratic norms and institutions, making a mockery of the rule of law, destabilizing the international order and empowering Putin and Russia and other malign actors and enemies of democracy and freedom, and in total pushing the United States much closer to a state of competitive authoritarianism or outright fascism. .........................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/03/10/just-getting-started-we-have-yet-to-see-the-worst-of-spectocracy/

[hlthe2b]

1. Whew... Tough to read, but prescient...