47 Comments

The problem now is how to successfully, albeit perhaps slowly, de-program those afflicted by the Big Lie are filtering down to local officials and races.

Expand full comment

Dubious of large percentage of converts from this cult, the miasma of MAGA morons is nearly as strong as Trumps filthy diaper! Excellent piece, thanks Ruth!!

Expand full comment

The solution probably is a devastating, humiliating loss by the Republican Party. Following such a loss, the Party may be able to reconstitute itself and become a Party of integrity, and honor, soundly based in a level-headed ideology. If the Republicans are unable to reconstitute themselves as a "loyal opposition" Party, I see no meaningful future for them.

Expand full comment

With all due respect It's frustrating for me these ideas that somehow they are going to come around. They've demonstrated, only about a million times, that they have any interest in anything other than minority rule. The rest of us need to operate with the concept that we will need to reform the opposition party. Old school Republicans and everybody else better join in with the Democrats or else we are in for a shocking domination by this so-called party that has no interest in democracy.

Expand full comment

I think they are doomed for life to live out their delusions. Without professional help, how does one get out of a cult?

Radicalized.

True Believers.

Expand full comment

The Backfire Effect will prevent most of them from changing their views, even with corrective information. This is very common in the conservative mind. It seems that their amygdala is different from that of liberals and tends to make them double down on their erroneous beliefs.

Expand full comment

Separate the followers from the cult leader usually works, so says leading psychiatrists who study sociopathic leaders and violence. -Dr Bandy Lee and scores of other psychiatrists.

https://open.substack.com/pub/bandyxlee/p/full-speeches-of-our-eminent-mental?r=44kjm&utm_medium=ios

Expand full comment

My real disgust is for the 45% of my fellow Americans who eagerly swallow the lies not because they really believe them, but because deep down in their bigoted and misogynistic hearts they desperately want the lies to be true.

Expand full comment

I truly believe that most of them believe that tRump is not a fascist and is sane. It defends their position of voting for him.

Expand full comment

Ruth Ben-Ghiat: Your writing is at the very top of my daily reading, especially your beautiful writing about the times of il Duce, where the deep-rooted beauty that is Italian culture showed through even in the worst of times, of oppression.

I can think of no worse propaganda job, that condemns Fox News, than the exposé of truth you set out here:

"A memo that formed part of the lawsuit's documentation showed that Rupert Murdoch floated the idea that Laura Ingraham, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and other top hosts trusted by the Fox audience should appear together on television in Nov. 2020 and state clearly that Biden had won the election. Murdoch wrote that presenting a united front "would go a long way to stop the Trump myth that the election [was] stolen."

"Instead, Murdoch & Company went in the opposite direction to preserve audience size and profit margins."

That exposé shows a stark contrast between a responsible, promising draft-plan, and a cynical, jaded, naye, naked greed for money, money, money.

A form of political, obscene prostitution.

Deliberate manipulation of good-faith viewers.

The irony is: The Murdochs hurt their own followers.

Most of us are NOT followers of Murdoch, and are unaffected by his disinformation.

It is totally wacky for a "news" agency to formulate a broadcast strategy that intentionally hurts its own paying audience and nobody else.

Strange, strange!

Obscene and greedy.

This obscene and intentional STRATEGY of disinformation constitutes at least two, maybe three of the seven deadly sins: Pride (Hybris), Greed, and maybe Lust (for Power?!).

Expand full comment

Murdoch should have received a long prison sentence for assisting a fascist movement.

Expand full comment

Steve Rasmussen: That would be only just!

Expand full comment

In a real sense, fascist, authoritarian movements go beyond lies and laws. For them there simply is no such thing as truth, laws, or values - only power and its applications. This is an old pattern outlined many centuries ago in the Melian Dialogues of Thucydides in the late 5th century B.C.E: "the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must..." Might makes "right..."

Expand full comment

“We do not see things as they are ; we see them as we are.”

Expand full comment

As the old saying goes,”The truth ain’t in them!” Never has, never will!

Expand full comment

Thank you for another insightful article .. it is not only about the orange man and his cronies .. your insights can also help the rest of us understand when we are faced with an individual in our lives that exhibits similar traits. All based on insecurities ..

Expand full comment

It is mind-boggling to think what a huge percentage of our population is insecure…

Expand full comment

You would like the book, "The Sociopath Nextdoor" by Martha Stout, PhD.

Expand full comment

Ruth, I think you've accomplished a miracle: you've made trump make sense to me. Thank you for that. I think in a way what you've said are things I've known, but never have been really able to put together. It still floors me, though, that so many people believe him. I'm guessing they must also be very weak people.

Expand full comment

Psycholo-social propaganda by those in power has been at work on this country’s population most overtly since the Reagan era. What you sow you reap and we are now bringing in the chaff of that disinformation and distortions of truth.that has been fed to us. The wheat of this propaganda is what has been stolen from us and now what do we have?

Really looking into the core of our being we are no better off than the Medieval serfs of ages past. The slave knows everything about the master and the master knows nothing of the slave. Why? Because we ( the people) have been filled with repetitive lies broken promises and dis or misinformation for years. A great example of what I’m saying is Trump throwing paper towels to the hurricane stricken hungry people of Porto Rico. Clueless master ( except for his lust for power)leaving us with the dredges of the harvest for this great country.

Expand full comment

I'm certain that not all of us have allowed ourselves to be filled with those lies. Some of us can see through the "masters". What's sad is the number of people who can't or won't. They are what keep us at the level of serfs.

Expand full comment

Susan…. So very true! Here’s an example: My niece( sane Republican ) just had an encounter with her hairdresser of 30 years and was shocked at how she- the hairdresser was spewing the Trumpian rhetoric at her! Quote by hairdresser: “I’ve researched everything he says and I know it’s the truth!

Chris ( my niece) asked her where she got all her “Research” info and she replied Twitter(X). My niece is an advid Republican for Harris person - but that’s how Trumpian rhetoric has eaten into good people’s souls and distorted their thinking. So glad for Ruth and my fellow Lucid followers of the truth!

Expand full comment

You know, Liz, I've never been near X (Twitter), and as a matter of fact I quit all social media several years ago. I never got any of the stuff that people seem to get now, but I'm appalled at how little people understand about doing research, or their unwillingness to look beyond their usual sources. When I do research (it's usually on medical subjects), I start immediately to evaluate what I'm reading, and move on if it sounds at all strange. I don't accept information as truth unless there is proof, either from what someone is saying, or from my prior education (I mean formal, university or work education). For political stuff, how hard is it to look for other points of view?

Expand full comment

Susan, me too! For a change of venue from my stressful job I’ll occasionally watch Reddit. I am very selective and only watch the apps on cooking and dogs. I started years ago with social media- the basics some Facebook, some Twitter -but soon got disillusioned and quit after a year. It’s been 10 yrs now and I couldn’t be happier!

Unfortunately, so many of my parishioners are on everything from Tik Tok to how they get their daily news.

I try to get them to widen their horizons by reading ….novels, current events etc. I suggested Ruth’s

“Strongman” not one out of close to 100 would read it!

The favorite comment was “ I’m

not interested in history, sounds boring!” Very few average ppl read in today’s society.

BUT I get to preach weekly and believe me they hear about history and how the past influences the future whether they recognize what I’m doing or not. Perhaps some tune me out- at least I know I’m reaching a few.

Expand full comment

Liz, good on you for preaching what needs to be said instead of what people think they want to hear. Hopefully you'll reach more than a few people. It's sad that people don't read any more. I've been reading good nonfiction like The 1619 Project and Caste. Right now I am reading "The Nation That Never Was" by Kermit Roosevelt III, another one well worth reading. I'm glad to be an old-fashioned person who really likes books.

Expand full comment

Republican for Harris is interesting because the Republican party is no longer accessible to these folks. As I've been saying in the comments repetitively, these Republicans for Harris need to join the Democrats or else we are going to be dominated by minority rule and medieval authoritarianism aka project 2025. This is going to be our societal Bible that will be crammed down our throats.

Expand full comment

Exactly my feelings. Ruth has in a very short essay explained what the rest of us millions pull our hair out trying to understand. If you are not a cheating authoritarian, or fearful rube, you can't understand what's going on.

Expand full comment

And I'll bet that you, like me, are fine being the way you are. IMO that's far preferable.

Expand full comment

It is quite an amazing thing - and one I’m a tad jealous of - that Trump lies incessantly … BUT the lies are so plentiful (and his character so predictable) that he doesn’t even bother to remember his latest lies! Astounding.

Expand full comment

Thanks Ruth! We need to know how authoritarians shred truth in their quest for power. But also we must pay attention to the cardinal lie of America - White Supremacy. Read more about that lie here - and please consider following me on Substack. I’ve got more coming soon. Thanks all. This is a great community.

MOSF 19.15: TrumpVance and their Proposed Advance of the Plantation of Lies and Weirdness https://eastwindezine.com/mosf-19-15-trumpvance-and-their-proposed-advance-of-the-plantation-of-lies-and-weirdness/

To paraphrase Walt Whitman, “If you stop this day and night with me, shall we possess the origin of all lies?” The foundational lie of America is White Supremacy. It is asserting itself with violent psychological force now. A thoughtful meander, ending with a new creation myth, the origin of stories themselves, and an urgent call for us to forge a new, inclusive story for a better future for all.

Expand full comment

Also this one about his force on our minds -

MOSF 19.11: The People and Harris v. An Increasingly Unhinged Trump (the Rising Culture of Democracy and the Beloved Community v. the Culture of King and Cult) https://eastwindezine.com/mosf-19-11-the-people-and-harris-v-an-increasingly-unhinged-trump/

Expand full comment

Democracy , the Enlightenment, emerged from

the struggle between science and dogma.

The revolution in 1776 challenged the Devine

Right of Kings.

Trump is essentially declaring himself a King.

Facts and science no longer prevail.

Trump is telling us if you oppose him you will

be crushed.

Expand full comment

I appreciate such granular explanations of what we are living through. It is vital that we who are not within the movement, remain firmly grounded in truth. So far this election season, I’ve been encouraged by the lack of yard signs for DT in my area, compared to 2020. But yesterday on the street behind my house I was bombasted by a massive banner strewn across the balcony of a very upscale and huge new home. The mere size difference between that banner and my typical Harris yard sign, hit me hard. I know we have the strength to get through this, but I’m more uneasy than ever before. As to how so many landed in this cult, also the big frustration for me, we must be more circumspect in making policies. Unions were not protected well enough, our public schools were not protected well enough, and electeds who had power, failed us mightily by not stopping the momentum of Limbaugh, Gingrich, McConnell, and Norquist. But right now, WE GET TO VOTE!!! “The most powerful person in the world is an American with a ballot.”- Anon.

Expand full comment

“The most powerful person in the world is an American with a ballot.”--unless they live in a gerrymandered area.

Expand full comment

"This situation has transformed the GOP into an autocratic entity dependent on institutionalized lying, so that maintaining party falsehoods about elections, immigration, crime, and other topics becomes a political duty and a test of loyalty for political elites and their media allies."

"[M]aintaining party falsehoods about elections, immigration, crime, and other topics" including the federal government is practically frictionless because the institutions and officeholders who have the power of the law at their disposal and are supposed to protect us view those falsehoods as constitutionally protected speech. Presumably that approach advances a social good that has greater value than preventing authoritarians from erecting their fortresses of lies. That philosophical calculus is going to seem naive if Trump recaptures the presidency. Should Trump's loss win us a reprieve, however, it's unlikely we'll take advantage of the opportunity to reassess our apparently limitless permissiveness toward politically motivated lies. We're free speech masochists.

Expand full comment

Fascists use free speech as a means to gain power. We have been foolish for allowing that. Our news media, in their attempt to be fair and balanced, allowed fascist speech. Now we're seeing the consequences of that mistake.

Expand full comment

Perhaps if social media was regulated as news is, truth, honesty, that could take some heat off of Fox as a "news entertainment". I don't see how cable "news" survives if people get majority of their news from social media nowadays. That Rupert Murdoch made a business decison based on losing his audience or telling the real truth, wont he chose his business everytime? Yes, I think its reasonalbe that he will continue that path. Its really a lot like the history of yellow journalism. As the telegram beat out the print news to the punch with lies and outrageousness, and then radio, then tv, now the social media. If the zone is filled with yellow journalism and lies...how can something like Fox compete with lies, outragious click bate prostituted as real news? New regulation and laws are necessary and vital to Democracy, when $1 billion defamation lawsuits don't really work anymore. The nonsesical goes on and on and on. Trump and down ballot R's are going to lose huge. But a new BIG LIE will be regurgatated after the election. Lawsuits will fly again. Red states will refuse to send their results in on time. Delay. Delay. Delay. All their fruad claims will be shot down, but that wont change the minds of the red state elction officals in time. We can not let this election get to the House of Representatives, full of extremeist zealots. I am not anxious anymore about Harris Walz winning, I am anxious about the chasos DT, the red state Republican election workers, supported by the House of Representatives and corrupt Scotus will unleash after the votes are counted. I think we need a concerted effort of protest to support democracy at every level, everywhere, should the unthinkable happen. We need to out organize protest now.

Expand full comment

Canetti also has Netanyahu down pat with that quote.

Expand full comment

If the Christofascists succeed and steal this election and tRump is sworn in on January 20, the US we know and love is over. (Watching DWH and Nicolle Wallace has Mark Elias, Ruth Ben-Ghiat and Basil Smikle on at the beginning of her second hour: Rising Fears of Political Violence Around Election.)

I'm going to be optimistic by making a prediction based on HCR's latest Letter from an American: Dubai! That’s where 🍊Jesus will go when he’s convinced he can’t steal the election!

<https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/october-9-2024?triedRedirect=true>:

Not all of Trump’s supporters appear eager to stick around to see if Trump will win another term. Today news broke that Patrick M. Byrne, the former chief executive officer of OverStock, who became a fervent advocate of the idea that Trump was the true winner of the 2020 presidential election, has left the country, apparently permanently, to live in Dubai. Dominion Voting Systems is suing Byrne, as is President Biden’s son Hunter. The younger Biden sued Byrne for defamation last November after Byrne claimed Hunter Biden sought a bribe from Iran. 

In September, Biden’s lawyers were trying to schedule a date for Byrne’s deposition when his lawyer abruptly “claimed for the first time that Defendant has moved his residence to Dubai and if Plaintiff wanted to take his in-person deposition counsel would have to fly to Dubai to do so, to which Plaintiff responded with various related inquiries to try to resolve this matter and defense counsel stated Defendant would not be returning to the United States for the foreseeable future.” 

Byrne claimed to have fled the U.S. because the Venezuelan government has put a bounty on him, but as Biden’s lawyers note, “the Defendant’s truthfulness is directly at issue.”

Expand full comment