The term Christian nationalists brings together a number of radical religious sects seeking to overthrow the democratic republic of the United States and installing a strict theocracy, from dominionists to orthodox Catholics to Evangelicals and many more. They tend to believe in Strict Father Morality, and desire to establish some sort of Christian fascist theocratic […]
Ukraine Timeline
The war in Ukraine is less “surprising” to some who’ve seen it raging since 2014. Although it escalated greatly in 2022, the Ukraine timeline dates back all the way to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. To understand the backstory — which is now inextricably intertwined with our own presidential history given the […]
Wealth Cult: The oligarchs influencing American politics from the shadows
A network of exceedingly wealthy individuals and organizations have channeled their vast fortunes into influencing American politics, policy, and public opinion — they’ve formed a wealth cult. And they’ve leveraged that cult and its considerable fortune to influence and in many ways dramatically transform American politics. The term “dark money” refers to political spending meant […]
Science denialism
Science denialism has a complex and multifaceted history, notably marked by a significant event in 1953 that set a precedent for the tactics of disinformation widely observed in various spheres today, including politics. The 1953 meeting and the birth of the disinformation playbook The origins of modern science denial can be traced back to a […]
Hyper Partisanship: How to understand American politics today
- Politics
- 2016 Election
- 2020 Election
- Beliefs
- Cluster B
- Corruption
- Cults
- Culture
- Cybersecurity
- Democracy
- Economics
- Emotion
- Fascism
- Hacking
- History
- Internet
- Kleptocracy
- Media
- Morality
- Narcissism in Politics
- Philosophy
- Power
- Propaganda
- Psychological Warfare
- Psychology
- Religion
- Russia
- Science
- Sexism
- Surveillance
- Technology
Buckle up, we’re in for a wild ride. Many of the serious scholars of political history and authoritarian regimes are sounding the alarm bells that, although it is a very very good thing that we got the Trump crime family out of the Oval Office, it is still a very very bad thing for America […]
Authoritarianism Dictionary
We glibly believed it could never happen here even though we’ve been warned again and again. And in some sense, even though it’s been here all along — hiding in plain sight. It could happen here, and it did, because it’s happened here before. This dictionary of American authoritarianism collects definitions and charts the rise […]
Fascists became conservatives in the 1930s and 40s
Who were the early conservatives? They emerged out of the group of former fascists and Nazi sympathizers in the US. 1930s opposition to Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal 2 main right-wing factions then: After the Allies won World War II, a number of the early Hitler sympathizers “hid out” in anti-communist circles, allowing them to cloak […]
Trickle Down Economics
- Uncategorized
Trickle down economics is known by a number of names: supply side economics, Reaganomics, voodoo economics, deregulation, Libertarianism, Mudsill Theory, horse and sparrow theory, and the Trump tax cuts, to name a few. It has been espoused by everyone from Ayn Rand to Milton Friedman to Alan Greenspan to Gordon Gecko. Trickle down economics involves […]
Democracy vs. Autocracy Timeline
- Uncategorized
In America we tend to have a view of our politics as exceptional — and specifically, impervious to authoritarian takeover. We think of ourselves as the democratic shining city on a hill (even Reaganites!) that will act as a beacon to other nations, steadily rolling back despotism and dictatorship around the world. It hasn’t quite […]
Who really increases the national debt?
Mythology has it that “reckless Democratic spending” is to blame for the ballooning of the national debt — though the historical record shows otherwise. In fact, the conservatives‘ beloved demi-god Ronald Reagan was the first President to skyrocket the debt, thanks to some bunk ideas from an old cocktail napkin that linger to this day […]
Neoliberalism Explained: Why it must be dismantled
Or: How Milton Friedman destroyed Western civilization, the neolliberalism story. An economic ideology first theorized in the 40s and 50s by scholars, it was brought to popular attention in the 1970s by the works of economist Milton Friedman and novelist Ayn Rand among others. It grew in popularity and became widely adopted in U.S. economic […]
We went from The New Deal to the Raw Deal
In the 1930s and 40s we had the New Deal (thanks, FDR!). In 1938, Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act, setting legal limits on the maximum number of hours worked and the minimum wages allowed. Child labor was outlawed, and union laws allowed collective bargaining — resulting in much-needed wage growth and improved conditions […]
Turn Republican short-sightedness into financial upside: invest in solar
As members of the white male oligarchy fall all over themselves to mock the Green New Deal in their prostrate subservience to special interest lobbyists and Wall Street, there’s an opportunity hanging out in the wind (…but mostly in the sun) for Main Street. People who claim that solar power isn’t scalable are living like […]
Peter Thiel and Palmer Luckey: Welfare queens
Peter Thiel and Palmer Luckey are a particularly toxic breed of billionaire welfare queen, who outwardly revile government with every chance they get while having both sucked at its teat to make their fortunes, and currently making a luxe living on taxpayer largesse. Thiel’s Paypal and Facebook-induced riches rode the coattails of the DARPA-created internet, […]
Oligarchy and the Creep of Fascism
Some people like to argue that more economic inequality is a good thing, because it is a “natural” byproduct of capitalism in a world of “makers and takers,” “winners and losers,” “wolves and sheep,” [insert your favorite Manichaean metaphor here]. However, too much inequality is deleterious for both economics and politics — for with oligarchy […]