Big Lie, Big Tech, and the Big Grift goes on… and the emoluments never got examined.
Even stranger is Trump’s ‘op-ed’ in the Wall Street Journal that uses some inverted Citizen’s United logic to claim his First Amendment rights are being violated because he can’t get back on YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook to violate their terms of service by fomenting lies and violence.
Guarding Mess: previous guy still gouging taxpayers on cost of Secret Service protection
Former president Donald Trump’s golf club in Bedminster, N.J., charged the Secret Service nearly $10,200 for guest rooms used by his protective detail during Trump’s first month at the club this summer, newly released spending records show.
Since Trump left office in January, U.S. taxpayers have paid Trump’s businesses more than $50,000 for rooms used by Secret Service agents, records show.
The Washington Post reported previously that Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club — where he lived from January, when he left the White House, to early May — charged the Secret Service more than $40,000 so that agents could use a room near Trump.
www.washingtonpost.com/…
"One of the gravest threats to our democracy today is a powerful group of Big Tech corporations that have teamed up with government to censor the free speech of the American people," the op-ed begins. "This is not only wrong—it is unconstitutional. To restore free speech for myself and for every American, I am suing Big Tech to stop it..."
"This coercion and coordination is unconstitutional," Trump continues. "The Supreme Court has held that Congress can't use private actors to achieve what the Constitution prohibits it from doing itself. In effect, Big Tech has been illegally deputized as the censorship arm of the U.S. government. This should alarm you no matter your political persuasion. It is unacceptable, unlawful and un-American."
www.rawstory.com/...
"Trump seems always willing to attack anyone who disagrees with him, or whom he does not see as sufficiently supportive of him. His attacks in very direct, personal, immature ways (name-calling/childish nicknames; stating overtly that opponents are horrible people, etc.), as well as Trump's using occasions that are typically at least superficially non-partisan (holidays, tragedies, etc.) to almost always include an attack on some person or persons, is far outside of what is normal."
Even worse, Trump's actions "gave permission to many people to treat other people and groups the same way. As a result, it had a ripple effect, where targeted groups (due to immigration status, race, religion, sexuality, gender, socioeconomic status, etc.) were being treated badly through being shamed, threatened with violence, and threatened with loss (money, inclusion, a home to live in, shunning from their society, etc.)."
When Trump wasn't abusing people with his juvenile insults, he was altering their sense of reality to meet his own political purposes. This occurred most infamously, of course, with his refusal to accept the science behind COVID-19 or the objective reality that he lost the 2020 election.
www.salon.com/…
Trump's populism means danger of fascism because
A key difference between populism and fascism is that, for populists, actual electoral results matter. In contrast, fascism implies permanent power, irrespective of the ballot box. Populism affirms the authoritarian idea that one person can fully personify “the people” and the nation — but it must be confirmed via electoral procedures.
Whereas fascism has reveled in lies, populism has respected the truth of the ballot box. This doesn’t mean it always advances democracy — indeed it frequently manipulates it. But it still derives power and depends on the integrity of the electoral system. That is why populist leaders have long recognized the value of respecting electoral results, even if they came out on the losing end of the democratic process.
But this distinction is beginning to fade. In this sense, President Donald Trump has been a trailblazer for global autocrats. Especially in his denial of the election’s results and embrace the "big lie” about voter fraud, Trump represents a historical turning point in populist politics, enabling and inspiring others — just like fascist dictators before him.
www.washingtonpost.com/…