Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Camouflage. Trump has camouflaged his financial affairs, and the truth. His actions, and his desires. Himself in a blanket of lies. What better way to place his Trumpshirts undercover than to camouflage them in uniforms unrecognizable from the other without close examination of detail.

"about a book written 15 years ago...everybody commenting calls it a
2nd Civil War, I am more inclined to call it the 2nd Revolutionary War."

Ooi, why? i only ask because i see it as American v American, so as others tend more to see it. Though,
yep, it could be seen as a fight against the American constitution which could more be seen as revolution.

Still, can't see it as a battle against foreigners.

Esper and Milley may have slightly more precarious shelf lives today than they had earlier.

Seven steps by populists worldwide to undermine the democracies that elected them

By Kevin Douglas Grant | October 17, 2019|
@kevindgrant

WASHINGTON – The hallmarks of populist nationalism are gaining ground in many of the world’s largest democracies from Modi’s India to Bolsonaro’s Brazil and Trump’s America. In these, and many other countries, elected leaders are flirting with aspects of authoritarianism in an extreme era of digital disruption, mass migration and the mounting effects of climate change.

[...]

Key “plays” in The Playbook include:

Weaponize Fear – Embrace a language of violence, promote a more punitive culture, leverage military might at home. Give critics reason to believe they’ll be harmed if they oppose.

Target Outsiders — Stoke the fires of xenophobia by demonizing immigrants and foreigners. Blame domestic problems including economic woes on these scapegoats, and depict political opponents as sympathetic to these imagined enemies.

Undermine Institutions — Take over the courts, eliminate checks and balances, undo established treaties and legislation that limits executive power, weaken protections for free and fair elections.

Rewrite History — Exert control over schools and the media to indoctrinate the public with beliefs that reinforce autocratic power.

Exploit Religion — Appeal to the religious majority while targeting minorities. Conflate national identity with religious identity.

Divide and Conquer — Use hate speech and encourage violent actors to widen social rifts and use manufactured crises to seize more power.

Erode Truth — Attack the press as an “enemy of the people”; dismiss negative reports as “fake news,” counter legitimate information with disinformation, or “alternative facts.” Blast the media landscape with endless scandal and contradiction to overwhelm the traditional fail-safes.

One common thread in the global implementation of The Playbook? Steve Bannon, a U.S. Naval officer turned Goldman Sachs banker turned right-wing media executive, Trump advisor and Cambridge Analytica board member.

As part of what he calls “The Movement,” Bannon’s influence is evident in populist parties across Europe, South America and Asia. Cambridge Analytica alone played a major role in the recent elections of the U.S., Brazil, U.K., India and the Philippines, using targeted social media campaigns based on sophisticated user data to startle voters and push outcomes toward populist candidates and illiberal ideas. But sophisticated algorithms aren’t necessary to participate: Paid and unpaid propagandists of all stripes can spread misinformation both knowingly and unknowingly on Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and other platforms, shifting public opinion in a way once reserved for government agencies and major media outlets.

Another common thread? President Trump himself. He has pursued warm relationships the six leaders profiled in this project as well as with autocrats like Recep Erdogan in Turkey, King Salman in Saudi Arabia, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi in Egypt, Rodrigo Duterte in the Philippines, Kim Jong Un in North Korea, and of course, Vladimir Putin in Russia.

From holding hands with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at a “Howdy, Modi!” rally in Houston last month to offering quick congratulations to Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro after his election victory and offering a warm White House reception to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in May, Trump gravitates toward a certain kind of leader.

He’s spearheaded unprecedented collaboration with authoritarian leaders on foreign policy, including a Trump deal with Turkey to permit a military incursion into Northeast Syria, putting America’s longtime Kurdish allies in grave danger and providing the Russian and Syrian governments with more leverage there, along with a whitewashing of the Saudi government’s murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi while sending thousands of additional U.S. troops into the Kingdom.

Trump’s alliances and his actions at home fail what scholars Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt call “a litmus test for autocrats” in their 2018 book “How Democracies Die.”

The four criteria are:

Rejection of (or weak commitment to) democratic rules of the game

Denial of the legitimacy of political opponents

Toleration or encouragement of violence

Readiness to curtail civil liberties of opponents, including media

By Levitsky and Ziblatt’s analysis, Trump meets all four criteria, the first American president since Richard Nixon to fulfill even one of these conditions.

Links, and more - https://thegroundtruthproject.org/the-authoritarians-playbook-seven-steps-populists-worldwide-are-taking-to-undermine-the-democracies-that-elected-them/More -