420
A Trump dictatorship is increasingly inevitable. We should stop pretending.
(www.washingtonpost.com)
this post was submitted on 04 Dec 2023
420 points (83.1% liked)
politics
19089 readers
3865 users here now
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
I think the biggest factor isn't going to be Trump himself. If it was just him, he might trip over his own feet and keep himself from instituting a democracy. (Not that I'd bet our democracy on that happening.)
The bigger danger are the people who would be (and already are) working behind the scenes. I think they were caught by surprise in 2016 - both in Trump's win and in his willingness to go further towards dictatorship than they even hoped to achieve. They weren't prepared and we got the chaotic slip that did damage, but didn't result in President Trump For Life.
This time, they're prepared. If they get into power via a second Trump presidency, our best hope is that the institutions are sturdier than they seem to be and possibly that Trump is even more clumsy - to the point of sabotaging his own team's plans. That's not a very big hope, though. It's about the same level as saying "I'm completely broke so I'll spend my last few dollars on this lottery ticket to become rich." Could it happen? Sure, but it's much more likely that you/America lose.
And even if we somehow, miraculously, emerge from a trump presidency with our democracy intact, it would be on life support. As you said, you don't go from 0 to Dictatorship. Trump would have turned the dial enough that some future Trump figure would get into power and turn it the rest of the way.
The only way to ensure that our democracy is safe is to keep Trump - and everyone supporting him - as far from power as possible.