Experts in Authoritarian Regimes Warn the System Has Been Captured

[B.See]

Experts in Authoritarian Regimes Warn the System Has been captured - Alternet

Trump’s team shows all the signs, including trying to eliminate structural checks on their power, intimidating opposition parties, threatening potential dissenters within their own ranks and defying the courts. Similarly, autocrats punish and bully the news media and “protect allies from legal prosecution while targeting political opponents, and purge senior military and government ranks of career staff in favor of loyalists.”

That, and a whole lot more...
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part one

[BoRaGard]

1. .

[Bernardo de La Paz]

2. The judges are pushing back, but change is likely down to mass action

1) Mass action in the streets, especially June 14, which is shaping up to be huge. tRump's birthday celebration include a military parade he created with an excuse but thinks is going to honour him. Protest everywhere except DC: that weekend it will be swarming with maga and goons commanded by Noem and Patel.

Don't shop for anything June 14 except for emergencies. Plan ahead. Gas up ahead. Buy groceries & medication ahead. March. Marchers aren't shopping.

2) Mass action include general strikes and boycotts. The latter can be initiated and self-initiated any time but organization helps. The former requires organization, which is built by mass action in the streets.

[muriel_volestrangler]

3. Notice that the experts saying this include a guy from the conservative Hoover Institution

Would-be autocrats often move to eliminate structural checks on their power. They intimidate opposition parties, threaten potential dissenters within their own ranks, and defy the courts. Autocrats punish and bully the news media, protect allies from legal prosecution while targeting political opponents, and purge senior military and government ranks of career staff in favor of loyalists.

President Trump has checked all of those boxes, says Larry Diamond, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution who has spent four decades studying how and why democracies fail.

“If we were slipping into an authoritarian situation, step by step, it would pretty much look like what’s happening right now,” he says.
...
“It’s very important to keep an intense focus on the rule of law,” says Dr. Diamond of the Hoover Institution. “The more that [Mr. Trump] defies and disrespects the federal courts along the way, the more we have indicators of a gathering constitutional crisis. And the more that he seeks to abuse his authority by trying to weaponize the power of the federal government against his enemies, the more people should be concerned about the future of our democracy.”

https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2025/0509/donald-trump-authoritarian-playbook-democracy

Democracy Matrix ranking:

...
30 Slovakia 0.836 Working Democracy
31 Greece 0.834 Working Democracy
32 Czech Republic 0.834 Working Democracy
33 Latvia 0.83 Working Democracy
34 Barbados 0.83 Working Democracy
35 Israel 0.821 Working Democracy
36 United States of America 0.811 Deficient Democracy
37 Cape Verde 0.792 Deficient Democracy
38 Jamaica 0.787 Deficient Democracy
39 Trinidad and Tobago 0.784 Deficient Democracy
...
https://www.democracymatrix.com/ranking

Freedom House ranks the USA at 57th, below Argentina and equal with Mongolia.

[B.See]

4. Yep.

[littlemissmartypants]

5. Regarding: The Administration That Pardoned Jan. 6 Rioters Is Trying to Jail a Guy Over a Protest Banner

The good news is...
"Martin, who is serving in an interim capacity, must be confirmed by the Senate before May 20. His prospects have suddenly become iffy, with Democrats demanding a hearing in order to ask about an array of controversies that have dogged the prosecutor’s brief tenure. Though Trump on Monday made a lengthy Truth Social post lobbying for Martin, North Carolina Republican Sen. Thom Tillis on Tuesday announced that he would not vote to confirm the nominee, citing Jan 6."

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/05/08/ed-martin-jan-6-trump-pardon-protester-00334168

❤️ RESIST!! ✊️

[Hornedfrog2000]

6. People waited too long

Time to start looking for ways out before they seize all of our money. That or I am seriously considering changing to an independent and laying low, not voting for a while. Yeah, I sound nuts, but we are to that critical juncture and I don't want to go to prison, have my assets seized etc.

Keep bringing those strongly worded essays to the senate floor though!

[GiqueCee]

7. WTFU*...

... The destruction of America is happening RIGHT NOW; it is being disemboweled right under our noses, and the nation is most definitely NOT greater for it. And what do we hear in outraged response from our leaders? Crickets...
Trump is a traitor, and so is anyone that continues to support him. Those who swore an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of The United States are silent, but for a courageous few. Silence is complicity. I'm lookin' at YOU, M$M, and at those who are more concerned with preserving their seats in Congress than they are about saving democracy. But especially those who betrayed their Oath of Office by pledging allegiance to a depraved monster, instead of doing what they are legally required to do. But then, they're Republicans, so whaddya expect?
This constant state of simmering rage is exhausting, but turning away from this evil is not an option.

*WTFU = Wake The Fuck Up

[Baitball Blogger]

8. Bookmarked.

[B.See]

9. Thank you. For every one of these

I've posted (in two threads) there are easily 3-4 more I've yet to post. That's how fast this guy and his goons are unraveling our democracy.

[DavidDvorkin]

10. It's not a capture but a gift

A gift from the Idiotic, stupefied American electorate.