The inexorable logic underlying fascist regimes
PM Carpenter
“What country can preserve its liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms…. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants.”
—Thomas Jefferson, 1787 letter to future U.S. Congressman William Smith
“There is a plausible argument that it is morally permissible, and even morally necessary, to use political violence against the Trump Administration and its agents and supporters under the current circumstances in America.”
—Ken White, former federal prosecutor, at “Popehat.com”
“If agents of the state may kill people in public without being investigated.…”
—Jonathan Last, The Bulwark. In the comment section, I wrote an alternative continuation of his words: “… then people may kill agents of the state in public without qualms.”
I added, “Such is the inexorable logic underlying a fascist regime.”
As is this:
“On Friday, Jan. 9, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, ordered the Supreme National Security Council to crush the protests by any means necessary…. By Monday, Jan. 12, the protests had largely been crushed.” (NYT)
The Ayatollah’s security forces interpreted “any necessary means” as the killing of more than 5,000 Iranians.
Does anyone doubt that Trump — an Ayatollah in all but name — would order a similar “necessity”?
Americans are beginning to grasp the logic of this fascist regime. Next they must choose the logic employed toward this fascist regime — that of a Founding Father, a former federal prosecutor, and this political writer, or the post-logic of repressed Iranians.
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