An Historian of Authoritarianism Looks at the Fragile State of American Democracy

An historian of fascism and authoritarianism recently made a checklist of how democracies collapse; things in the US look very, very bad. Trump Preparing to Subvert Elections If you haven’t been paying attention — and believe me, I understand if you haven’t the spoons to do so — Trump is winding up the machinery to subvert, challenge, or discredit the fall mid-terms. Multiple news sources report [1] that Trump has fired all members of the bipartisan federal Election Assistance Commission. This is the poisonous fruit of the recent Supreme Court decision allotting him the power to fire anybody in the federal government (except the Federal Reserve), expertise or civil service or Congressional appointments be damned. [2] This is an absolutely unprecedented level of power, unseen in the US since the corrupt “spoils” system of the early 19th century. And now we immediately see why. In the words of EL Green at the New York Times: The move comes as President Trump seeks to cast doubt on the…