It's dying in the open, Nobel laureate Paul Krugman suggests in his Substack column today, picking up on the ironic and pompous Washington Post motto.
"The newspaper that broke the story of Watergate and brought down Richard Nixon has been Bezosified, its editorial independence destroyed and its newsroom increasingly eviscerated. Many other institutions, from other media organizations to some universities to law firms, have also become enablers of the regime. Big business has caved almost completely.
But it turns out that predictions of creeping authoritarianism both underestimated and overestimated MAGA. Almost everyone, myself included, underestimated how far MAGA would go in engaging in open violence and abuse of power against those it considers enemies. On the other hand, we overestimated the movement’s impulse control, its ability to mask its tyrannical goals until its power was fully consolidated. [snip]
Everything points to a blue wave in November. Yet many people in MAGA simply can’t accept losing power — among other things, their actions over the past year mean that if they lose power, many of them will go to jail.
Trump is now calling for 'nationalizing' the midterms, meaning to put voting and the counting of votes under his administration’s control. He can’t do that, but his demand is a clear sign that he will not accept the public’ s verdict in November.
So it’s just being realistic to say that MAGA will try, somehow, to prevent voters from having their say. Will ICE try to prevent blue districts from voting? If that fails, will they reject the results, in a midterm version of Jan. 6? Call me alarmist, but remember: The alarmists have been right, and the people telling us to calm down have been wrong, every step of the way." (our emphasis)
It's not alarmist to see the un-American, anti-democracy actions of the demagogic Malignant Fascist and his minions out in broad daylight. It's just a matter of putting two and two together. The MF won't stand for another impeachment, a justified humiliation and attempt to bridle him in his first term. Nor will he stand for a Dem majority in Congress to undo his growing fascistic, militarized, and crony capitalist state. It will take everything to stop his attempts to corrupt the mid-term elections. The fight is on and we have to win it.
(photo: Scott Olson / Getty Images)
