steepholm: (Default)
[personal profile] steepholm
It's been almost two months since my last post. In some ways that's not so very long - but still long enough for the USA to turn from a functioning democracy into a Fascist-adjacent authoritarian state.

These lines have been going through my head on repeat since January:

Though justice against fate complain,
And plead the ancient rights in vain;
But those do hold or break
As men are strong or weak.

Marvell knew what he was talking about. Checks and balances can be toppled if there's no one to provide a counterweight. If a judge countermands an executive order in middle of the forest, but no one acts as if they heard it, did it really happen?

I do feel that this will be a temporary phenomenon, because Trump, Musk and Co. will fall on the sword of their own hubris and incompetence, and because forces of resistance will inevitably grow, if far too slowly. At the current rate of change, though, I think that those counselling "hanging on till the midterms" sound awfully naive. What midterms? We can't hold midterms in a National Emergency! (There is no National Emergency, you may object - but then, there is no war with Venezuala, and Trump still successfully invoked the Alien Enemies Act.) Laws, customs and institutions don't exist except in so far as people agree to act as if they do; to behave as if they had real force in their own right is magical thinking. Or, in the language of J.L. Austin, it's to ignore the contexts that give statements their performative power, or rob them of it.

A well known example is the sentence, "The constitution is suspended", the performative power of which is very different depending on whether it appears in a government proclamation or merely as the title of a blog post. For the moment it's the latter. In another two months, who knows?

(no subject)

Date: 2025-03-27 02:43 pm (UTC)
calimac: (Default)
From: [personal profile] calimac
I think there will still be elections on schedule. Orban and Erdogan still hold elections; they just control the available candidacies and the voting rolls, and that is the plot that seems to be being followed here. Most importantly, elections in the US are run by the states, and the federal government, while it can interfere as above, can't dictate the schedule. They might try, but I'm inclined to guess they won't think it necessary to get their way.

Here is where parliamentary democracies, whose election schedules are under the control of parliament, differ very much from the US.

(no subject)

Date: 2025-03-27 07:12 pm (UTC)
calimac: (Default)
From: [personal profile] calimac
On that last point I agree with you. Not only are the voting rolls and the monetary influence likely to be biased against them (what Larry says below is in congruence with mine, and is pretty much what I meant by "available candidacies"), but the Democrats have still not come to terms with how disliked their brand is, which is why DT won at all.

(no subject)

Date: 2025-03-27 04:43 pm (UTC)
heleninwales: (Default)
From: [personal profile] heleninwales
It's the speed of the coup that has astonished me. There seems to be no way of enforcing judicial decrees and Trump et al are just carrying on as though they didn't happen.

(no subject)

Date: 2025-04-01 04:57 am (UTC)
zasu: (Default)
From: [personal profile] zasu
Agreed. It’s all a shock 😮

(no subject)

Date: 2025-03-27 04:45 pm (UTC)
larryhammer: floral print origami penguin, facing left (Default)
From: [personal profile] larryhammer
I'm pretty sure that the next Congressional elections will happen on schedule, but there will be hella interference from the federal level, starting with ways to disenfranchise the Wrong Sort Of Voters ie those who are likely to vote against TPTB. Not to mention hella money being thrown into pots by oligarchs -- I fully expect restrictions on how much can be donated to campaigns to get loosened even further.

What will happen in 2028 is more murky to me.

(no subject)

Date: 2025-03-27 05:41 pm (UTC)
larryhammer: floral print origami penguin, facing left (Default)
From: [personal profile] larryhammer

Nope -- nothing reassuring about any of this.

(no subject)

Date: 2025-03-28 02:03 am (UTC)
jadelennox: Senora Sabasa Garcia, by Goya (Default)
From: [personal profile] jadelennox

it's not good, C. It's so, so bad rn. PhD student snatched in broad daylight down the street from me.

It's temporary but I do not want to be experiencing this median moment.

(no subject)

Date: 2025-03-29 02:30 pm (UTC)
calimac: (Default)
From: [personal profile] calimac
Here's an interview which illustrates my point about how DT is trying to control elections rather than cancel them. Final quote: "There’s a lot of concern about how Trump might try to manipulate the electoral process in advance of the midterms if it looks like Democrats are going to do well, and I kind of think this is the first salvo in that battle."

(no subject)

Date: 2025-04-01 05:15 am (UTC)
zasu: (Default)
From: [personal profile] zasu
Interesting interview. Thanks for the link

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