Both of them compare Trump to a dictator. Paul Graham compared him to Stalin. Both Altman and Graham believe, like I do, that Trump is an existential threat to

Both of them compare Trump to a dictator. Paul Graham compared him to Stalin. Both Altman and Graham believe, like I do, that Trump is an existential threat to our democracy. If they truly believe Trump is "Literally Hitler" (as has been said about every Republican candidate since it could be said (Dewey), modulo I assume Eisenhower since it would be so ludicrous, and of course Stalin was far worse), then their behavior is indeed hard to explain. Which suggests to me that they don't actually believe he's "an existential threat to our democracy" (cue Adam Smith's "There's a great deal of ruin in a nation" upon news of the defeat at Saratoga). Or they're trimming their sails so they can still play a role in the possible coming Neo-Fourth Reich, i.e. they're cowards, doubly so since they're wealthy enough to relocate to some other 1st World country like Switzerland (last time I checked, which was long ago, some French cantons would allow you to sign a private tax treaty for 50,000 Swiss francs a year). Although I suppose a counter to that accusation is that they're not about to abandon "their people" to the tender mercies of Stalin Mark II. My advice, as a designated deplorable "irredeemable", if you're truly worried about this? Buy yourself a fricking rifle of military utility (a turn of the previous century clip fed bolt action rifle and modest supply of ammo is cheap, a few hundred bucks, and allowed pretty much everywhere except NYC) and learn how to shoot it well, don't bow your head as you're herded to the camps, follow this bit from Alexander Solzhenitsyn in The GULAG Archipelago (remember, we are, per Graham, talking "Literally Stalin", who was at the top when this happened): And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say good-bye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand? After all, you knew ahead of time that those bluecaps were out at night for no good purpose. And you could be sure ahead of time that you’d be cracking the skull of a cutthroat. Or what about the Black Maria [Government limo] sitting out there on the street with one lonely chauffeur — what if it had been driven off or its tires spiked. The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! "They", whichever you think is the they, can't take on a mass of people without using artillery or worse (see "Hama Rules"), and if things get that bad, well, you're already at war, you might as well be useful to your side.