| THE CONSPIRACY TO END AMERICA Five Ways My Old Party Is Driving Our Democracy To Autocracy Stuart Stevens Twelve, October 2023 |
Rating: 5.0 High |
|||
| ISBN-13 978-1-5387-6540-1 | ||||
| ISBN 1-5387-6540-3 | 225pp. | HC | $30.00 | |
Coming off a successful thirty-year career as a Republican political consultant, Stuart Stevens laid out in his previous book1 how Donald Trump coopted the Republican Party, turning it into a tool he could use to advance his personal, anti-democratic goals. Trump lost his bid for a second term in 2020. Stuart Stevens played a part in that loss. Trump also failed to achieve his goal of remaining in power despite losing the 2020 election to Joe Biden But, in talking to Republican politicians, Stevens found Trump had not given up the hope of returning to power, and neither had the Party he coopted; Republicans — now effectively Trumpublicans — would, eagerly or reluctantly, assist him in his quest.
Stevens was soon joined in his disappointment by almost everyone concerned for the future of democracy. As the months went by, reasons for concern multiplied. Even the candidates running against Trump (initially eight, now down to four at this writing), with the notable exception of Chris Christy, refused to attack Trump directly. And six of them pledged to support him even if he is convicted in one of the four trials he will soon face.
Stuart Stevens has a different view of how dangerous a cult can be:
It's often said that Donald Trump has a cultlike following. But that's far too benign. The film Star Wars has a cultlike following. Taylor Swift has her cult of "Swifties." A political organization that has no platform other than loyalty to the leader is not a cult, it's an autocratic movement. As Hannah Arendt wrote in The Origins of Totalitarianism: Total loyalty is possible only when fidelity is emptied of all concrete content, from which changes of mind might naturally arise. The totalitarian movements, each in its own way, have done their utmost to get rid of the party programs which specified concrete content and which they inherited from earlier, non-totalitarian stages of development. – Pages 56-57 |
Jim Jones and David Koresh showed us how dangerous cults can be.
But Stevens notes, troublingly, that right-wing extremists are different now: older, more affluent, often employed, and more widespread. They will not be so easily mollified as yesterday's extremists.
"Whenever a democracy slides into autocracy, there are five critical elements at work. All of these are active today in American politics. The tendency is to examine each as if it is an isolated phenomenon, troubling perhaps but manageable by the American system. This illusion is the hope of the autocrats and a potentially fatal mistake. Each of these is part of a greater whole that together threatens the existence of the American experiment. This book is an urgent warning to examine collectively the power of the forces working together to end American democracy as we know it." – Page 5 |
Those five elements are:
With the insights only a veteran political insider can provide, Stevens Examines each of these elements in a separate chapter. He names names, cites books and articles that bear on each subject, and quotes revelatory statements. For example, on pages 81-82 he quotes seven prominent Republican politicians condemning the insurrection — then shows them reversing their stances to fall in line behind Trump. The financers include Peter Thiel and Mark Zuckerberg, and in addition to providing oodles of money to candidates through PACs, they flooded the zone with misinformation. On pages 101-102, Stevens describes a meeting that took place on 18 May 2016 at Facebook headquarters.
"Responding to attacks from the right that Facebook was censoring conservative voices, Thiel facilitated a meeting of sixteen prominent right-wing figures, Zuckerberg, and himself. The gathering included Fox News's Tucker Carlson and the loony Glenn Beck, the presidents of the Tea Party Patriots, the American Enterprise Institute, and the Heritage Foundation. Max Chafkin describes the outcome: Facebook intended to allow supporters of Donald Trump, who was by then the de facto Republican nominee, to say more or less whatever they wanted on its platform. Over the next several months, misinformation on Facebook—much of it in Trump's favor—outperformed real news. The most popular election headline on Facebook during that period, according to one study, was "Pope Francis shocks the World, Endorses Donald Trump for President," which, of course, never happened. Another claimed falsely that Wikileaks emails revealed that Hillary Clinton had sold weapons to Islamic State terrorists.
– Page 102 |
The toxic brew of propaganda (as in The Big Lie), dark money, misinformation, intimidation and threats, allied with cowed politicians and compliant media, adds up to a major challenge to America's democracy.2 As hard to imagine as it may be, it has a chance of succeeding.
The difficulty with imagining the unimaginable is that it's truly difficult to imagine. A phrase like "the end of democracy in America" easily calls to mind some violent confrontation with tanks rolling down Pennsylvania Avenue. At a QAnon conference in 2021, Michael Flynn, the former general Trump chose to be his first national security advisor, and who later pled guilty to felony charges of lying to the FBI and was pardoned by Trump, was asked, "I want to know why what happened in Myanmar can't happen here." The crowd cheered, and Flynn answered, "No reason. I mean, it should happen here." – Page 143 |
Republican politicians and Trump's voter base are increasingly saying the quiet part out loud. Stevens's final chapter, "Driving Toward Autocracy," wraps up our current situation and prospects.
For thirty years, I pointed out flaws in the Democratic Party. I'm sure if I looked back, some of that criticism would stand as valid and some as partisan bullshit, but there is always a lot of partisan bullshit in campaigns. None of that matters now. The inescapable truth is that there is now only one pro-democratic party in American politics, and that's the Democratic Party. The Republican Party has proven there is no line that can be crossed, no principle shattered, that will force the party to return to decency. If you are unwilling to hold the man accountable who sent a mob to kill you and your colleagues, what other possible transgression could merit a response? *
* * This means that the only way to move forward with two sane parties in America is to vote for Democratic candidates. Not voting or casting a protest vote is a vote for Trumpism. I have friends who tell me quite smugly that they refused to vote for Trump but voted for Mike Pence. How does that work? It's childish at a moment when our nation is crying out for honest adults. There is no national solution to this national crisis. It is up to each of us individually to do what it takes to save the America we love. We are our own last best hope. No one is coming to save us. We are our own destiny. – Pages 223-225 |
The book is well written and is a quick read. Grammatical errors are few. It lacks an index, so I don't rate it a keeper. But it is for sure a must-read; it makes a compelling case for American democracy being in dire straits. Peruse it and pass it on so as many people as possible can benefit from its urgent clarity. And when election times come 'round again, vote Blue as if our lives and livelihoods depend on that — because they do.
To contact Chris Winter, send email to this address.