4 ms·

There's no need to dissolve congress. You instead make sure that (1) a single party stays in power (through gerrymandering, voter suppression and more), (2) the

by paxys 11mo ago

There's no need to dissolve congress. You instead make sure that (1) a single party stays in power (through gerrymandering, voter suppression and more), (2) the courts are stacked with loyalists and (3) the legislature and courts rubber stamp all decisions of the executive regardless of legality or anything else.

lazide 11mo ago
Sure, but also why wouldn’t they? It’s historically unpopular as an institution, and clearly toothless.
- victorbjorklund 11mo ago
  For the same reason russia and north Korea has elections? It sounds better to pretend the dictator is chosen by the people
  - kazen44 11mo ago
    it is also a very easy pathway to create controlled opposition. When you are a totalitarian dictator without elections, opposition of any kind is hard to control. With faux elections you give people a "choice" which seems reasonable compared the usual extremes in an totalitarian state.
- Sevrene 11mo ago
  Democratic institutions only have as much power as they're given.
  - lazide 11mo ago
    Have you not been paying attention?
    - Sevrene 11mo ago
      Can you expand on this, what do you think I'm missing?
      - lazide 11mo ago
        the Weimar Republic (a democracy) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic] certainly never directly voted to make Hitler a dictator - they voted him in, and he used the mechanisms of the state against itself (and crisises, both real and imagined) to seize power completely and become the official Dictator (Fuhrer means ‘leader’ in German). Here is a write up [https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/germany-1933-democracy-dictatorship/ https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/germany-...]. Italy transitioned from a regency into democracy - which the fascists used to seize power and form a dictatorship [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_fascism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_fascism]. When the USSR collapsed, there was a temporary fledging democracy that started to form - that was then hijacked by Putin and twisted to support his now obvious Dictatorship. In the US, while one can certainly argue ‘they knew what they were voting for’, the Trump voters I knew vehemently denied what is now the obvious plan re: economic policies, starting new wars/crises, etc. that are now the norm. The current actual behavior of the US gov’t seems to align quite well with historical norms on this front, and continue to escalate. If ‘the people give them the power’ means ‘it’s legal’ (aka it is within a law the people’s agents have voted on and made official), or was voted on by the people, it’s clear the vast majority of high profile behavior of the gov’t lately doesn’t care about it. If anything, Democracies seem to be inherently ‘dumb’ when it comes to these types of situations.
        Sevrene 11mo ago
        The idea that democracy either created hitler or wasn't able to stop his rise via democratic action at all is often spruiked in anarchist communist circles, while it's true hitler wasn't voted in the literal sense, neither is Australia's Prime Minister. That doesn't make the PM undemocratic, it's just its own democractic institution inside the party. There's actually nothing in the Australian consitution about PMs. It doesn't mean you couldn't unelect the party democratically and thus the leader. The public can unelect them from power by voting out the Nazi party of which Hitler was leader (through again, a vote). So this is a case of what I'm saying actually being relevent – if people voted against the nazi party, hitler would not have risen to power. He only gained that power because the democratic institutions, the people let him. This is a case for more and better democracy, of valuing that institution. I've encountered Trump voters who were actually bernie bros and accelerationists - they voted for trump as a fu to the establishment. I think the have a moral responsibility to not vote on those urges and whims. I think this that's bad, even if I can feel the sentiment sometimes, and I think that sort of "democracy bad" is actually a harmful to discourse and simply not true. We need to bolster democracy for the people, not call it toothless while invoking communism and fascism. I don't ultimately blame Trump for his rise to power, I blame the people for being fickle and perfectionists. Democracy is precarious and precious, not a perfect ultimate catch all. The people need to foster it otherwise the rising tide of populism and fascism will drown it.
googlywoogly 11mo ago
There's no need to do any of things you mention considering that both parties are owned by the same people and are essentially two faces of the same party in practice. Also - almost all the powers that be - including courts and Congress are already for sale/at the service of big tech.
- leptons 11mo ago
  Both sides are not the same,not even close, and the voting record proves it.
  - jdmichal 11mo ago
    > the voting record proves it. Putting on my tin-foil, devils-advocate hat... AKA I don't necessarily believe this but I also have no counter-argument: Mostly performative. When it's decided that something actually needs to pass, then you'll get some sacrificial lambs that vote across the aisle. Typically they'll be close to retirement or from a state where they won't be heavily punished for that specific vote.
    - gusgus01 11mo ago
      I mean at some point arguments like this become more akin to Russell's Teapot. If you're making an almost unfalsifiable claim, then the burden of proof is on you to prove it and not others to disprove it. From a political standpoint, the statement "from a state where they won't be heavily punished for that specific vote" is a weird way to put it, since if you framed it in a positive light it would sound more similar to "the state population falls on both sides of the issue and thus either vote could make sense from their legislator depending on exigent circumstances and other factors" or any number of other explanations depending on the vote and populations.
    - leptons 11mo ago
      It's not performative when people are losing health insurance and other people are at risk of starving. I agree with holding out on the government shutdown to try to prevent Americans losing healthcare. But when Republicans are absolutely fine with poor people starving so that they can take away people's healthcare, with a bonus that they get to shut down the government and say "see, government doesn't work", it becomes clear that letting the government shut down (especially food program shutdowns) continue is going to hurt more people than the government shutdown is going to help. So, when you say "performative" it sounds like you support the "both sides are the same" meme, but the ideologies are vastly different - one side is fine with people starving indefinitely, and the other actually doesn't want that. I would think at least some of this should be obvious, but I guess not?
axus 11mo ago
Democracy with Chinese Characteristics
- kazen44 11mo ago
  atleast the people's republic of china never claims to be a democracy in the liberal western, sense of the word. Politically (on paper atleast) the chinese goverment is very much a marxist state, and it is very clear about that.
redhed 11mo ago
Yeah this is usually how it happens. Whether its ancient Rome, modern Russia, Venezuela, etc all the dressings of the old Republic stay but become subverted by an autocrat.
victorbjorklund 11mo ago
Yea, US is probably gonna end up as Russia if nothing changes. On paper a democracy with elections. In practice a dictatorship.
- whimsicalism 11mo ago
  utter nonsense, i truly don't see how people can live in the US and be left with this impression.
louthy 11mo ago
You also need a country name with 'Democratic' in it: Democratic People's Republic of America. That's how you know it's a fully totalitarian state.
stackedinserter 11mo ago
TBH these steps are not that easy and probably are not possible in a federated country like US.
- joshred 11mo ago
  Gerrymandering already exists. Voter suppression was huge in the past, and may become huge again. The supreme court made sure of that. And also... the supreme court keeps issuing partisan decisions. So... what is left? Number 3? I guess you're arguing that federalism protects people, but how does it do that in a way that isn't already being eroded?
  - stackedinserter 11mo ago
    There's no voter suppression in US, and it won't stand in courts even if somebody pushes it. Supreme court keeps using partisan decision in favour of Dems and GOP, so it remains balanced. What's left is everything you mentioned.

by paxys 11mo ago

lazide 11mo ago

Sure, but also why wouldn’t they? It’s historically unpopular as an institution, and clearly toothless.

victorbjorklund 11mo ago
For the same reason russia and north Korea has elections? It sounds better to pretend the dictator is chosen by the people
- kazen44 11mo ago
  it is also a very easy pathway to create controlled opposition. When you are a totalitarian dictator without elections, opposition of any kind is hard to control. With faux elections you give people a "choice" which seems reasonable compared the usual extremes in an totalitarian state.
Sevrene 11mo ago
Democratic institutions only have as much power as they're given.
- lazide 11mo ago
  Have you not been paying attention?
  - Sevrene 11mo ago
    Can you expand on this, what do you think I'm missing?
    - lazide 11mo ago
      the Weimar Republic (a democracy) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weimar_Republic] certainly never directly voted to make Hitler a dictator - they voted him in, and he used the mechanisms of the state against itself (and crisises, both real and imagined) to seize power completely and become the official Dictator (Fuhrer means ‘leader’ in German). Here is a write up [https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/germany-1933-democracy-dictatorship/ https://www.annefrank.org/en/anne-frank/go-in-depth/germany-...]. Italy transitioned from a regency into democracy - which the fascists used to seize power and form a dictatorship [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_fascism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_fascism]. When the USSR collapsed, there was a temporary fledging democracy that started to form - that was then hijacked by Putin and twisted to support his now obvious Dictatorship. In the US, while one can certainly argue ‘they knew what they were voting for’, the Trump voters I knew vehemently denied what is now the obvious plan re: economic policies, starting new wars/crises, etc. that are now the norm. The current actual behavior of the US gov’t seems to align quite well with historical norms on this front, and continue to escalate. If ‘the people give them the power’ means ‘it’s legal’ (aka it is within a law the people’s agents have voted on and made official), or was voted on by the people, it’s clear the vast majority of high profile behavior of the gov’t lately doesn’t care about it. If anything, Democracies seem to be inherently ‘dumb’ when it comes to these types of situations.
      - Sevrene 11mo ago
        The idea that democracy either created hitler or wasn't able to stop his rise via democratic action at all is often spruiked in anarchist communist circles, while it's true hitler wasn't voted in the literal sense, neither is Australia's Prime Minister. That doesn't make the PM undemocratic, it's just its own democractic institution inside the party. There's actually nothing in the Australian consitution about PMs. It doesn't mean you couldn't unelect the party democratically and thus the leader. The public can unelect them from power by voting out the Nazi party of which Hitler was leader (through again, a vote). So this is a case of what I'm saying actually being relevent – if people voted against the nazi party, hitler would not have risen to power. He only gained that power because the democratic institutions, the people let him. This is a case for more and better democracy, of valuing that institution. I've encountered Trump voters who were actually bernie bros and accelerationists - they voted for trump as a fu to the establishment. I think the have a moral responsibility to not vote on those urges and whims. I think this that's bad, even if I can feel the sentiment sometimes, and I think that sort of "democracy bad" is actually a harmful to discourse and simply not true. We need to bolster democracy for the people, not call it toothless while invoking communism and fascism. I don't ultimately blame Trump for his rise to power, I blame the people for being fickle and perfectionists. Democracy is precarious and precious, not a perfect ultimate catch all. The people need to foster it otherwise the rising tide of populism and fascism will drown it.

googlywoogly 11mo ago

There's no need to do any of things you mention considering that both parties are owned by the same people and are essentially two faces of the same party in practice. Also - almost all the powers that be - including courts and Congress are already for sale/at the service of big tech.

leptons 11mo ago
Both sides are not the same,not even close, and the voting record proves it.
- jdmichal 11mo ago
  > the voting record proves it. Putting on my tin-foil, devils-advocate hat... AKA I don't necessarily believe this but I also have no counter-argument: Mostly performative. When it's decided that something actually needs to pass, then you'll get some sacrificial lambs that vote across the aisle. Typically they'll be close to retirement or from a state where they won't be heavily punished for that specific vote.
  - gusgus01 11mo ago
    I mean at some point arguments like this become more akin to Russell's Teapot. If you're making an almost unfalsifiable claim, then the burden of proof is on you to prove it and not others to disprove it. From a political standpoint, the statement "from a state where they won't be heavily punished for that specific vote" is a weird way to put it, since if you framed it in a positive light it would sound more similar to "the state population falls on both sides of the issue and thus either vote could make sense from their legislator depending on exigent circumstances and other factors" or any number of other explanations depending on the vote and populations.
  - leptons 11mo ago
    It's not performative when people are losing health insurance and other people are at risk of starving. I agree with holding out on the government shutdown to try to prevent Americans losing healthcare. But when Republicans are absolutely fine with poor people starving so that they can take away people's healthcare, with a bonus that they get to shut down the government and say "see, government doesn't work", it becomes clear that letting the government shut down (especially food program shutdowns) continue is going to hurt more people than the government shutdown is going to help. So, when you say "performative" it sounds like you support the "both sides are the same" meme, but the ideologies are vastly different - one side is fine with people starving indefinitely, and the other actually doesn't want that. I would think at least some of this should be obvious, but I guess not?

axus 11mo ago

Democracy with Chinese Characteristics

kazen44 11mo ago
atleast the people's republic of china never claims to be a democracy in the liberal western, sense of the word. Politically (on paper atleast) the chinese goverment is very much a marxist state, and it is very clear about that.

redhed 11mo ago

Yeah this is usually how it happens. Whether its ancient Rome, modern Russia, Venezuela, etc all the dressings of the old Republic stay but become subverted by an autocrat.

victorbjorklund 11mo ago

Yea, US is probably gonna end up as Russia if nothing changes. On paper a democracy with elections. In practice a dictatorship.

whimsicalism 11mo ago
utter nonsense, i truly don't see how people can live in the US and be left with this impression.

louthy 11mo ago

You also need a country name with 'Democratic' in it: Democratic People's Republic of America. That's how you know it's a fully totalitarian state.

stackedinserter 11mo ago

TBH these steps are not that easy and probably are not possible in a federated country like US.

joshred 11mo ago
Gerrymandering already exists. Voter suppression was huge in the past, and may become huge again. The supreme court made sure of that. And also... the supreme court keeps issuing partisan decisions. So... what is left? Number 3? I guess you're arguing that federalism protects people, but how does it do that in a way that isn't already being eroded?
- stackedinserter 11mo ago
  There's no voter suppression in US, and it won't stand in courts even if somebody pushes it. Supreme court keeps using partisan decision in favour of Dems and GOP, so it remains balanced. What's left is everything you mentioned.