These are posts on Donald Trump and Trumpism from the blog Base and Superstructure. Trump took American politics by surprise. This provides us with a number of topics for further discussion. Some posts discuss whether Trump’s movement is fascist. Others critique the movement. Still others provide us with ways to combat against Trumpism and replace it with a class politics grounded in solidarity and the advancement of material interests. Even after Trump has left office, his movement is likely to continue as a component of American politics for years to come. These issues will be relevant for some time to come.
The question is simple enough. Should the Democrats impeach Trump? And yet it’s not a simple question. It’s really two questions. The first one is: has Trump done anything impeachable? And the second one is: if so, is impeachment the best strategy for handling this?
So that’s the background. To impeach is not the solution to all impeachable offenses in all situations, just as to convict is not the solution in all cases where a person has committed a crime. In the latter case, it’s a question of whether conviction is the best way to address the crime. Is it not?
Source: Roman Harak (https://www.flickr.com/photos/roman-harak/5015832858)
We know Trump eats up most of the news cycle these days. Not much foreign policy gets through unless it’s about Russia. But there have been a lot of developments in relations between the US and Asian countries, particularly North Korea.
It’s all over the map. No pun intended.
I also think much of the US left still needs basic orientation around foreign policy issues. A few well known analysts (e.g., Noam Chomsky) talk a good game, but even Noam focuses on details that might not be helpful for beginners.
I’m writing about North Korea in this post. But at a broader level, I’m going to write a series of 101 level posts on foreign policy in the coming months. I’ll write in a way that doesn’t require the reader to have much prior background.
In these posts, I won’t hash out every minor detail. Nor will I solve every problem. It’s more about getting down the basics about what’s happening and how to reason through issues regarding the US’s relationship with the world.
My leading questions are: what are these conflicts really about? What are the underlying issues and interests at stake?
As I said in my previous post, I’ve been sitting for awhile on the question of whether Trumpism is a fascist movement. But to answer this question, I needed to first sketch out what fascism is. A lot of people use ‘fascist’ to mean something like ‘very bad.’ Even historians and social scientists use the word without thinking about the economic and political contexts in which fascism grows.
So I offered five historical conditions where fascism grows. And a starting point for defining it. That starting point was: Fascism is the emergency management mode of capitalism. It arises during times of serious crises and left-wing threats in order to save capitalism from itself.
Here we are, then. Is Trumpism a fascist movement?
I’ve been sitting for awhile on the question of whether Trumpism is a fascist movement. Are we moving toward fascism in the United States?
It’s a big question, and it’s gotten lots of passionate responses. But I find a lot of the responses ill-informed or otherwise misguided. I also find that it’s a complicated question. Generally, I try to keep these posts to around 1500-2000 words. And to a focused topic. On the issue of fascism, however, I found this to be a burden.
So this is the first post I’ll write on the topic. I’ll add a second, and possibly a third, later. I’ll start by clearing some ground.
Photo by Pete Linforth. https://pixabay.com/en/users/TheDigitalArtist-202249/
There’s a certain pattern to how Trump and his interlocutors engage one another. A certain pattern of rhetoric, if you like.
It works something like this. Trump makes a wild claim. Usually it’s false. An opponent, or the news media, points out how and why it’s false. Trump doesn’t blink, and Trump’s supporters don’t blink. Trump wins, or, at the very least, doesn’t lose. Trump’s opponents look very confused as they fail to gain traction.
Note: The photograph at the top of this site's home page is used under a Creative Commons license. The photograph on the About page is the work of Francisco Anzola. This blog uses affiliate marketing links in some posts.
