The federal government has immense capacity and control over trillions of dollars. That power was a co-creation of the American people. It belongs to them. The oligarchs around Trump are working now to take it for themselves.
Theirs is a logic of destruction. It is very hard to create a large, legitimate, functioning government. The oligarchs have no plan to govern. They will take what they can, and disable the rest. The destruction is the point. They don’t want to control the existing order. They want disorder in which their relative power will grow.
. . . The gap between the oligarchs’ wealth and everyone else’s will grow. Knowing what they themselves will do and when, they will have bet against the stock market in advance of Trump’s deliberately destructive tariffs, and will be ready to tell everyone to buy the crypto they already own. But that is just tomorrow and the day after.
In general, the economic collapse they plan is more like a reverse flood from the Book of Genesis, in which the righteous will all be submerged while the very worst ride Satan’s ark. The self-chosen few will ride out the forty days and forty night. When the waters subside, they will be alone to dominate.
. . . In [this] logic of destruction, there is no need to rebuild afterwards. In this chaos, the oligarchs will tell us that there is no choice but to have a strong man in charge. It can be a befuddled Trump signing ever larger pieces of paper for the cameras, or a conniving Vance who, unlike Trump, has always known the plot. Or someone else.
. . . [T]the men currently pillaging the federal government . . . see themselves as the servants of the freedom of the chosen few, but in fact they are possessed, like millennia of tyrants before them, of fantastic dreams: they will live forever, they will go to Mars. None of that will happen; they will die here on Earth, with the rest of us, their only legacy, if we let it happen, one of ruins. . . . The attempt by the oligarchs to destroy our government is illegal, unconstitutional, and more than a little mad. The people in charge, though, are very intelligent politically, and have a plan. I describe it not because it must succeed but because it must be described so that we can make it fail. This will require clarity, and speed, and coalitions.
. . . The logic of “move fast and break things,” like the logic of all coups, is to gain quick dramatic successes that deter and demoralize and create the impression of inevitability. Nothing is inevitable. Do not be alone and do not be dismayed. Find someone who is doing something you admire and join them.
What is a country? The way its people govern themselves. Sometimes self-government just means elections. And sometimes it means recognizing the deeper dignity and meaning of what it means to be a people. That means speaking up, standing out, and protesting. We can only be free together.
– Timothy Snyder
Excerpted from "The Logic of Destruction
. . . And How to Resist It
Thinking About
February 2, 2025
Excerpted from "The Logic of Destruction
. . . And How to Resist It
Thinking About
February 2, 2025
“This Is Essentially Viktor Orbán’s Playbook”
Related Off-site Links:
“It’s a Coup”: Musk’s DOGE Granted Access to Treasury System That Pays Out Social Security – Olivia Rosane (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
The Fu*king Nightmare – Robert Reich (RobertReich.com, February 2, 2025).
We Must Create a Broad Anti-Fascist Movement to Fight Back Against Trump 2.0 – C.J. Polychroniou (Common Dreams, February 2, 2025).
Fighting for Justice Doesn’t Have to Be a Big Dramatic Act. It Can Be Small – Rebecca Solnit (The Guardian, February 2, 2025).
Did You Hear About the Friday Coup? – Marisa Kabas (The Handbasket, February 1, 2025).
Call It by Its Name: A Coup – Robert B. Hubbell (Today’s Edition Newsletter, February 1, 2025).
Dictator Donald Thinks He’s Invincible; He’s Not – Ralph Nader (Common Dreams, February 1, 2025).
Top Treasury Official Out as Musk Cronies Demand Access to Payment System That Funnels Trillions in U.S. Funds – Julia Conley (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
“DOGE-Affiliated Goons” Accused of Locking Career Civil Servants Out of Key Databases – Brett Wilkins (Common Dreams, January 31, 2025).
Trump’s First Week: “Designed to Destroy the United States From Within" – Chauncey DeVega (Salon, January 30, 2025).
How to Organize Under Authoritarian Creep in a Closing Civil Society – Nadine Bloch (Waging Nonviolence, January 30, 2025).
Amid Confusion, Panic and Backlash, Trump’s White House Rescinds Funding “Freeze” on Grants and Programs – Chris Walker (TruthOut, January 29, 2025).
Think Trump’s Tyranny Can’t Be Opposed or Stopped? Think Again – Jeremy Brecher (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
In High-Speed Power Grab, Trump Seeks to Remake the Federal Government – Don Kettl (The Bulwark, January 29, 2025).
The Hostile Takeover of the United States by Corporate Raiders Has Arrived in Full – Thom Hartmann (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
Trump Is Clearly Moving in an Authoritarian and Potentially Fascist Direction – John Ripton (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
What Trump’s Pardons and Retribution Say About His Fascist Threat – Chuck Idelson (Common Dreams, January 29, 2025).
“Trump Is Trying to Collapse Our Economy”: War on “Woke” Revealed as a War on All Americans – Amanda Marcotte (Salon, January 29, 2025).
“We Do Not Consent” Says Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Illegal “Power Grab” as Judge Halts Trump Order – Jessica Corbett (Common Dreams, January 28, 2025).
Trump Tries a January Coup – Again: The President Wages War on the Separation of Powers – The Ink (January 28, 2025).
Trump’s Most Lawless Action Yet – David Dayen (The American Prospect, January 28, 2025).
Trump’s First 7 Days: The Framework for Presidential Dictatorship – Socialist Equality Party (January 27, 2025).
Energized Neo-Nazis Feel Their Moment Has Come as Trump Changes Everything – Ben Makuch (The Guardian, January 26, 2025).
Donald Trump Is the Empire Unmasked – Caitlin Johnstone (CaitlinJohnstone.com, January 21, 2025).
Can Nonviolent Struggle Defeat a Dictator? This Database Emphatically Says Yes – George Lakey (Waging Nonviolence, January 8, 2025).
UPDATES: Is Elon Musk Staging a Coup? Unelected Billionaire Seizes Control at Treasury Department and Other Agencies – Democracy Now! (February 3, 2025).
Elon Musk Has Plunged America Into a Constitutional Crisis. He Must Be Stopped – Will Stancil (Zeteo, February 3, 2025).
Trump’s Trade War, Authoritarian Power, and the Oligarchs – Robert Reich (Common Dreams, February 3, 2025).
Unions Sue to Revoke Musk Cronies’ Access to Critical Payment System – Jake Johnson (Common Dreams, February 4, 2025).
Musk Intensifies Government Spending Attack with Push to Cut All Regulations – Robert Tait (The Guardian, February 4, 2025).
It’s a War. Do Democrats Get That? – David Corn (Mother Jones, February 4, 2025).
Marianne Williamson: “This Will Not Stand” – Piers Morgan Uncensored (February 4, 2025).
Elon Musk Stages Coup d’etat – Owen Jones (Owen Jones Talks, February 4, 2025).
Stating the Obvious: The Replacement of Our Constitutional System of Government With the Whims of an Unelected Private Citizen Is a Coup – Heather Cox Richardson (Letters From an American, February 4, 2025).
See also the previous Wild Reed posts:
• Marisa Kabas: “We’re Witnessing a Coup By an Unelected Billionaire Propped Up By a Felonious President”
• Inauguration Day Thoughts
• Democrat Talk on the Eve of Trump’s Return
• Signs of the Times: The 2025 People’s March
• How Empires Are Built and Rebellions Are Born
• Neoliberalism vs Neofascism: Cornel West on the State of U.S. Politics
• Progressive Perspectives on Where Democrats Went Wrong in the 2024 Election
• What the Republican Party Now Stands For
• Venice Williams on How We Get Through the Next Four Years
• Progressive Perspectives on Kamala Harris’ Faltering Presidential Campaign
• Marianne Williamson: “We’re Living in Very Serious Times and We Need to Be Very Serious People”
• Chris Hedges on the End of the American Empire
• History Matters
• Progressive Perspectives on the Crisis in U.S. Electoral Politics
• Will We Let Fascism Come to America?
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