Yes, Trump is a fascist

 So....there apparently is some hullabaloo over on TYT over whether Trump is a fascist. Cenk thinks he is, and Ana did this weird "well ackshully fascism requires like a state of military mobilization" or something. And uh...yeah. The left is up in arms over Ana saying this, and while I try to be charitable to Ana, she's wrong on this.

Like, I dont use the term lightly. And I know where she's coming from. People debated whether Bush was a fascist too, and guess what, he wasn't. I dont like to call conservative opponents fascists. under normal circumstances it's in bad faith and it's the left wing equivalent of the right calling all liberal politicians communists. Honestly, it's tacky and in bad faith to make those kinds of comparisons without having valid standing in doing so. 

But Trump, he's different. He's a literal threat to democracy, and there have been many parallels to the third reich and mussolini's italy made against him that are disturbingly valid. And you know what? I decided to consult the dictionary to decide, whether he fits the definition of a fascist.

So according to Merriam Webster's dictionary, fascism is:

a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime (such as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation and by forcible suppression of opposition

 So let's go over this line by line.

 a populist political philosophy, movement, or regime

Trump is definitely an economic populist.

  that exalts nation and often race above the individual

 This part is a little iffy. Trump is a nationalist and a racist, and promises to do large scale deportations of illegal immigrants (sometimes assumed to be code for ethnic minorities in general), but I wouldnt say that nation or race is placed above the individual. There is some jingoism in the GOP, and a lot of faux patriotism, but I'm not sure if it's above the individual. 

As far as race, while Trump isn't necessarily like, so racist he started going on exactly like hitler does about like you know the white race blah blah blah, he definitely has his contingent of supporters who do. And he has kinda played footsie with the to a disturbing degree, having people like Steve Bannon or Stephen Miller. None of this is a smoking gun in and of itself, but he's flirted with this stuff to a disturbing degree, more than most republicans have. 

It should also be noted that if you play with technical academic definitions definitions of the term fascist, then you may be missing the big picture. The nazis didnt start out with the concentration camps. They started with demonizing minorities, deportations, and allowing systemic harassment akin to Kristalnacht and stuff. And as the minority report points out, maybe we shouldnt say someone isnt a bank robber unless they get out of the bank with the money or someone isnt a murderer because they didnt actually succeed in killing someone. We should go according to intention, not their success.

So...the fact is, the fact we can make as much of a comparison to Trump as we can to EARLY mid 1930s nazi germany is disturbing in and of itself. And maybe we shouldn't fool around with waiting for him to meet the technical definition because by then it's too late and we're screwed.

, that is associated with a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader

 Trump WANTS to be a dictator, and he wants to centralize power as per project 2025. 

and that is characterized by severe economic and social regimentation

 I'm guessing they mean like....minorities treated differently from whites here? While our institutions held against trump in his first term, it's very well possible in his second, we will see a rolling back of stuff, especially if the GOP controls the entirety of the government and goes along with him. 

Again, i'd rather not wait to find out.

by forcible suppression of opposition

 If he could forcibly suppress his opposition, he would. he has used repressive force against protesters, i think he would suppress the media if he could, and he certainly has called for locking up political opponents like clinton in 2016 before. And let's not forget january 6th.

Final prognosis

I don't think Trump fits the COMPLETE definition of fascism and he lacks some of the finer points, like an outright racist ideology that goes beyond just being a bloviating jack### who is prejudiced against people who doesnt like and wanting to deport illegal immigrants. if anything trump has, despite his very obvious racist rhetoric and racism associated with his campaign, tried to court minority groups like latinos. 

But that's the thing. He's an unsophisticated racist, meaning he has no outright fascist, white supremacist ideology. He's too boorish in some ways to meet the definition of fascism. Fascists are more "sophisticated racists", meaning they have this grand theory of everything about why white people are better and everyone else is trash. I think Trump lacks that, although some of his supporters sure don't, nor do some people he's employed in his administration before. So are there fascist influences in his administration despite him not being an outright "fascist" himself? Sure. 

But beyond that, yeah, he's a populist. Yeah, he has nationalist and racist qualities. A lot of his policies seem out of the early stages of nazi germany's playbook. And he IS authoritarian, he DOES wanna be a dictator, and while i dont think he has a sophisticated ideology, and he's basically out for himself, that doesnt fully disqualify him. it just means that he's too stupid to pull it off.

And thankfully, that's the best thing about Trump. He's a complete and utter idiot. He was an incompetent moron who despite having these clearly dictatorial and authoritarian tendencies, he was too stupid and unsophisticated to pull it off. Not that he didn't try.

And the fact that he DID try to subvert american democracy and clearly does say the unhinged things he says and does clearly want to install himself in power and suppress other peoples rights should concern people.

Quite frankly, Trump fits about 60-70% of a fascist. Mainly because he's too stupid and unsophisticated to match the other 30-40%. but at the same time, the trump administration isnt just about trump. He has people behind the scenes like the project 2025 people and even a lot of outright fascist people who are feeding him policies and will use him to get what they want. And a lot of what his second term looks like really does look like it's straight out of the hitler playbook. 

Honestly, electing Trump is like playing with fire. You get him in, he undermines and threatens liberal democracy and our institutions and starts doing these mass deportations and taking away peoples rights and liberties, and yeah, we will backslide into an overtly fascist direction. Let's not kid ourselves. Trump is close enough to a fascist to be a fascist. And even if we can disagree on some finer points on the definition because he's too unsophisticated and boorish to fit the definition to a T, he's still fronting a full on fascist agenda going into his second term.

Election day on Tuesday people. Vote like your lives depend on it. Because they do. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. 

Keep in mind, was i freaked out about trump in 2016? Not really. I just saw him as a boorish populist and figured him winning was a fluke. I was more concerned with the democrats forcing centrism on us and crushing the chance of the left to actually have a candidate worth a darn. In 2020, even then I wasnt TOO concerned. I still thought "gee if you like the guy something's wrong with you", and i thought Biden would win by a landslide. 

But then he only barely won and trump's coalition was viable. Then january 6th happened and after letting that stew in my head a couple years, I've decided, yeah, this guy is full stop dangerous. And he actually has a coalition that could win. And he's going full mask off on the authoritarianism. And he is literally fronting fascists.

So there's been a lot of escalation from 2016, this isn't fun and games any more. He isnt just an idiot who won by dumb luck. This is a guy who is dangerous and has a coalition of illiberal authoritarians with fascist tendencies that they wanna force on the people. And our best chance of beating him, is doing so at the ballot box.

So...let's get to it. PA is ground zero. As you can tell by my predictions, it all comes down to PA. So to my fellow Pennsylvanians, get out there and VOTE. And yes, vote for Kamala Harris, she's the only one who can beat trump. And this election is kind of important as the stakes are higher. This is literally possibly the most important election of our lives. It's the crossroads between remaining free and putting the hands of the country into the hands of a possible fascist with no checks and balances, given they'll also probably control congress, the courts, and trump will be purging the administrative state and filling it with those loyal to him. So this is a defcon 1, bona fide threat to democracy. Our institutions contained him last time. But if he wins again, they may fail. I'm not kidding. We're literally at the part of the angst music videos where voting for trump is like shooting the tvs. 

So...yeah. That's my closing argument against Donald Trump. Don't vote for him.