by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have become frequent, and with good reason. These comparisons are strongest between Trump and Mussolini — stronger than with Hitler and N**i-ism. Detailed comparisons are difficult for at least two reasons: 1) the historical circumstances are quite different between the 20s and 30s and today, and 2) F*****m was never a coherent political theory or philosophy, but, instead, was a populist and nationalist development in Italy that Mussolini did not create but did take over.
A comparison between Trump and Mussolini in terms of character and style, however, is frighteningly strong — and does give some guidance concerning future concerns. This comparison is based primarily on quotes from a book about Mussolini by R.J.B. Bosworth (2010). In general, the quotes speak for themselves, though I will add some commentary along the way. It should be noted that this book was published years before similarities between Trump and Mussolini became politically relevant, and, thus, were not written with Trump in mind.
I begin with Trump’s arrogant ignorance and incoherence:
“Other more critical contemporaries noticed instead the fluctuations in Mussolini’s ideas and the way he preferred to avoid in-depth conversations, sometimes excusing himself by saying that the details should be left to the experts. Here, they discerned, was a leader more interested in imposing his will than in harmonizing his attitudes or policies. Here was a politician more interested in seeming to know than in knowing.”
“He understood that a totalitarian dictator had to be, or to seem to be, expert in everything.”
“Cowing the press was only one part of building a totalitarian dictatorship.”
Bosworth points to a later developing ambition for Mussolini that is not yet overt with Trump — but it has already been hinted at by some in his inner circle:
“The real novelty of his ambition lay in his pretensions to enter the hearts and minds of his subjects, and so install F*****m as a political religion.”
Again, Trump’s ambition combined with a lack of coherence:
“and so readjusting his own history with his usual aplomb”
“ ‘Reactionary dictators are men of no philosophy, no burning humanitarian ideal, nor even an economic program of any value to their nation or the world. [George Seldes]’ They were ‘gangsters’ more than anything else.”
One striking detailed similarity: Mussolini appointed his son-in-law as foreign minister.
Trump, of course, is infamous for his ultra-thin skin:
“… he would flick through the French press and grow enraged at any criticism of Italy and himself.”
“… there were few things which annoyed Mussolini more than overt criticism.”
“This emotion [anger] had always been a prominent part of the Duce’s reaction to life .…”
Trump and Mussolini share thin-skinned ignorance combined with arrogant contempt:
“The Duce’s version of permanent revolution, it was increasingly plain, was more a story of his own permanent sense that the rest of humankind was not made in this own image (an arrogance which only partially cloaked his own sense of inadequacy …).”
“… it was plain that he [Augusto Rosso] was another who feared that Ciano [son-in-law] was very young, and very inexperienced in the real world, and who knew that Mussolini did not take his professional diplomats seriously.”
“In his diary, Bottai depicted a war leader whose administration grew steadily more ‘approximate’, with the Duce, a ‘man of the banner headline’ at heart, now bored by detail or discussion and preferring to ‘let things run of their own accord’.”
“… the Duce’s reaction, Bottai complained, was, ‘if things go well, take the credit; and, if they go badly, to blame others’. This, Bottai concluded, had become the real meaning of the formula: ‘Mussolini is always right.’ ”
The following speaks for itself, and speaks volumes:
From A.J.P. Taylor, quoted in Bosworth: “F*****m never possessed the ruthless drive, let alone the material strength, of National Socialism. Morally it was just as corrupting — or perhaps more so from its very dishonesty. Everything about F*****m was a fraud. The social peril from which it saved Italy was a fraud; the revolution by which it seized power was a fraud; the ability and policy of Mussolini were fraudulent. F*****t rule was corrupt, incompetent, empty; Mussolini himself a vain, blundering boaster without either ideas or aims.”
Here from a different book, Mussolini and Italian F*****m (2008), by Giuseppe Finaldi:
“Thus F*****m, as it developed in 1920-2, was not a political party, with a program and an internal structure headed by Mussolini who sent proselytizing disciples into the provinces, but a catch-all movement that, loosely speaking, would have met with the approval of many who saw themselves as belonging to the very widespread political and social environment of the Vitterio Veneters [a nationalist movement]. The ingredient that was (almost) unique to f*****m and which gave it an edge over traditional patriotic parties was its willingness to employ violence for political ends. Its ability to give a semblance of political coherence and a plausible set of symbolic reference points to what was essentially reactionary vigilantism allowed the process of law and the functioning of democracy … to be sidestepped with panache.”
Just as Mussolini took over the F*****t movement, Trump is exploiting and taking over the ultra-nationalism/alt-right movements. These are the power bases for two dictatorial personalities.
Two additional comparisons —one with Hitler and one with Putin — are also relevant here. Hitler and N**i-ism have both similarities and differences with Trump and Trumpism, but both include the style of creating multiple competing power centers, to be adjudicated by the ultimate authority. This not only creates chaos, but also encourages striving to produce the positions, actions, and proposals that will most powerfully capture what the Leader will bestow favor upon. It nurtures what came to be called “Working toward the Fuhrer.” It is a formula for extremism.
Violence is central to the history of all of these movements, and both Hitler and Mussolini came to their dictatorial powers via a relatively singular act of violence: the Reichstag fire for Hitler and the F*****t march on Rome for Mussolini.
Putin, however, demonstrates a different path. Violence, even Putin-directed lethal violence, has been a central part of Putin’s creation of his dictatorship, but there has not been any single violent event that generated his power. Instead, Putin’s history has been one of constant undermining and destruction of competing institutions and individuals, to the point that there are no longer any checks on his power. We have already seen major attacks by Trump on the judiciary, the press, and moves to undermine and take over the institutions of public safety. The s*******s partisanship of the Republicans in Congress ensures that the legislative branch will not be a check — unless that blind support is somehow itself changed.
The attacks on central institutions of American democracy as “enemies of the people” has a horrible and horribly dangerous historical background. Trump may (or may not) be too ignorant to know of that background, but his inner circle most certainly knows of it, and intends it in full.
And, of course, all of this is in addition to the subversion of American democracy and of the Trump administration by Putin’s Russia.
We live in dangerous times.
slatten49 wrote:
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have become frequent, and with good reason. These comparisons are strongest between Trump and Mussolini — stronger than with Hitler and N**i-ism. Detailed comparisons are difficult for at least two reasons: 1) the historical circumstances are quite different between the 20s and 30s and today, and 2) F*****m was never a coherent political theory or philosophy, but, instead, was a populist and nationalist development in Italy that Mussolini did not create but did take over.
A comparison between Trump and Mussolini in terms of character and style, however, is frighteningly strong — and does give some guidance concerning future concerns. This comparison is based primarily on quotes from a book about Mussolini by R.J.B. Bosworth (2010). In general, the quotes speak for themselves, though I will add some commentary along the way. It should be noted that this book was published years before similarities between Trump and Mussolini became politically relevant, and, thus, were not written with Trump in mind.
I begin with Trump’s arrogant ignorance and incoherence:
“Other more critical contemporaries noticed instead the fluctuations in Mussolini’s ideas and the way he preferred to avoid in-depth conversations, sometimes excusing himself by saying that the details should be left to the experts. Here, they discerned, was a leader more interested in imposing his will than in harmonizing his attitudes or policies. Here was a politician more interested in seeming to know than in knowing.”
“He understood that a totalitarian dictator had to be, or to seem to be, expert in everything.”
“Cowing the press was only one part of building a totalitarian dictatorship.”
Bosworth points to a later developing ambition for Mussolini that is not yet overt with Trump — but it has already been hinted at by some in his inner circle:
“The real novelty of his ambition lay in his pretensions to enter the hearts and minds of his subjects, and so install F*****m as a political religion.”
Again, Trump’s ambition combined with a lack of coherence:
“and so readjusting his own history with his usual aplomb”
“ ‘Reactionary dictators are men of no philosophy, no burning humanitarian ideal, nor even an economic program of any value to their nation or the world. [George Seldes]’ They were ‘gangsters’ more than anything else.”
One striking detailed similarity: Mussolini appointed his son-in-law as foreign minister.
Trump, of course, is infamous for his ultra-thin skin:
“… he would flick through the French press and grow enraged at any criticism of Italy and himself.”
“… there were few things which annoyed Mussolini more than overt criticism.”
“This emotion [anger] had always been a prominent part of the Duce’s reaction to life .…”
Trump and Mussolini share thin-skinned ignorance combined with arrogant contempt:
“The Duce’s version of permanent revolution, it was increasingly plain, was more a story of his own permanent sense that the rest of humankind was not made in this own image (an arrogance which only partially cloaked his own sense of inadequacy …).”
“… it was plain that he [Augusto Rosso] was another who feared that Ciano [son-in-law] was very young, and very inexperienced in the real world, and who knew that Mussolini did not take his professional diplomats seriously.”
“In his diary, Bottai depicted a war leader whose administration grew steadily more ‘approximate’, with the Duce, a ‘man of the banner headline’ at heart, now bored by detail or discussion and preferring to ‘let things run of their own accord’.”
“… the Duce’s reaction, Bottai complained, was, ‘if things go well, take the credit; and, if they go badly, to blame others’. This, Bottai concluded, had become the real meaning of the formula: ‘Mussolini is always right.’ ”
The following speaks for itself, and speaks volumes:
From A.J.P. Taylor, quoted in Bosworth: “F*****m never possessed the ruthless drive, let alone the material strength, of National Socialism. Morally it was just as corrupting — or perhaps more so from its very dishonesty. Everything about F*****m was a fraud. The social peril from which it saved Italy was a fraud; the revolution by which it seized power was a fraud; the ability and policy of Mussolini were fraudulent. F*****t rule was corrupt, incompetent, empty; Mussolini himself a vain, blundering boaster without either ideas or aims.”
Here from a different book, Mussolini and Italian F*****m (2008), by Giuseppe Finaldi:
“Thus F*****m, as it developed in 1920-2, was not a political party, with a program and an internal structure headed by Mussolini who sent proselytizing disciples into the provinces, but a catch-all movement that, loosely speaking, would have met with the approval of many who saw themselves as belonging to the very widespread political and social environment of the Vitterio Veneters [a nationalist movement]. The ingredient that was (almost) unique to f*****m and which gave it an edge over traditional patriotic parties was its willingness to employ violence for political ends. Its ability to give a semblance of political coherence and a plausible set of symbolic reference points to what was essentially reactionary vigilantism allowed the process of law and the functioning of democracy … to be sidestepped with panache.”
Just as Mussolini took over the F*****t movement, Trump is exploiting and taking over the ultra-nationalism/alt-right movements. These are the power bases for two dictatorial personalities.
Two additional comparisons —one with Hitler and one with Putin — are also relevant here. Hitler and N**i-ism have both similarities and differences with Trump and Trumpism, but both include the style of creating multiple competing power centers, to be adjudicated by the ultimate authority. This not only creates chaos, but also encourages striving to produce the positions, actions, and proposals that will most powerfully capture what the Leader will bestow favor upon. It nurtures what came to be called “Working toward the Fuhrer.” It is a formula for extremism.
Violence is central to the history of all of these movements, and both Hitler and Mussolini came to their dictatorial powers via a relatively singular act of violence: the Reichstag fire for Hitler and the F*****t march on Rome for Mussolini.
Putin, however, demonstrates a different path. Violence, even Putin-directed lethal violence, has been a central part of Putin’s creation of his dictatorship, but there has not been any single violent event that generated his power. Instead, Putin’s history has been one of constant undermining and destruction of competing institutions and individuals, to the point that there are no longer any checks on his power. We have already seen major attacks by Trump on the judiciary, the press, and moves to undermine and take over the institutions of public safety. The s*******s partisanship of the Republicans in Congress ensures that the legislative branch will not be a check — unless that blind support is somehow itself changed.
The attacks on central institutions of American democracy as “enemies of the people” has a horrible and horribly dangerous historical background. Trump may (or may not) be too ignorant to know of that background, but his inner circle most certainly knows of it, and intends it in full.
And, of course, all of this is in addition to the subversion of American democracy and of the Trump administration by Putin’s Russia.
We live in dangerous times.
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cogn... (
show quote)
And I'm sure we could take a long look at obama and biden and point out their similarities to C*******ts. Not worth the exercise.
LogicallyRight wrote:
And I'm sure we could take a long look at obama and biden and point out their similarities to C*******ts. Not worth the exercise.
I could write an article comparing Slatten to Stalin if I wanted to. Anyone can twist anything if they have a mind to.
slatten49 wrote:
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have become frequent, and with good reason. These comparisons are strongest between Trump and Mussolini — stronger than with Hitler and N**i-ism. Detailed comparisons are difficult for at least two reasons: 1) the historical circumstances are quite different between the 20s and 30s and today, and 2) F*****m was never a coherent political theory or philosophy, but, instead, was a populist and nationalist development in Italy that Mussolini did not create but did take over.
A comparison between Trump and Mussolini in terms of character and style, however, is frighteningly strong — and does give some guidance concerning future concerns. This comparison is based primarily on quotes from a book about Mussolini by R.J.B. Bosworth (2010). In general, the quotes speak for themselves, though I will add some commentary along the way. It should be noted that this book was published years before similarities between Trump and Mussolini became politically relevant, and, thus, were not written with Trump in mind.
I begin with Trump’s arrogant ignorance and incoherence:
“Other more critical contemporaries noticed instead the fluctuations in Mussolini’s ideas and the way he preferred to avoid in-depth conversations, sometimes excusing himself by saying that the details should be left to the experts. Here, they discerned, was a leader more interested in imposing his will than in harmonizing his attitudes or policies. Here was a politician more interested in seeming to know than in knowing.”
“He understood that a totalitarian dictator had to be, or to seem to be, expert in everything.”
“Cowing the press was only one part of building a totalitarian dictatorship.”
Bosworth points to a later developing ambition for Mussolini that is not yet overt with Trump — but it has already been hinted at by some in his inner circle:
“The real novelty of his ambition lay in his pretensions to enter the hearts and minds of his subjects, and so install F*****m as a political religion.”
Again, Trump’s ambition combined with a lack of coherence:
“and so readjusting his own history with his usual aplomb”
“ ‘Reactionary dictators are men of no philosophy, no burning humanitarian ideal, nor even an economic program of any value to their nation or the world. [George Seldes]’ They were ‘gangsters’ more than anything else.”
One striking detailed similarity: Mussolini appointed his son-in-law as foreign minister.
Trump, of course, is infamous for his ultra-thin skin:
“… he would flick through the French press and grow enraged at any criticism of Italy and himself.”
“… there were few things which annoyed Mussolini more than overt criticism.”
“This emotion [anger] had always been a prominent part of the Duce’s reaction to life .…”
Trump and Mussolini share thin-skinned ignorance combined with arrogant contempt:
“The Duce’s version of permanent revolution, it was increasingly plain, was more a story of his own permanent sense that the rest of humankind was not made in this own image (an arrogance which only partially cloaked his own sense of inadequacy …).”
“… it was plain that he [Augusto Rosso] was another who feared that Ciano [son-in-law] was very young, and very inexperienced in the real world, and who knew that Mussolini did not take his professional diplomats seriously.”
“In his diary, Bottai depicted a war leader whose administration grew steadily more ‘approximate’, with the Duce, a ‘man of the banner headline’ at heart, now bored by detail or discussion and preferring to ‘let things run of their own accord’.”
“… the Duce’s reaction, Bottai complained, was, ‘if things go well, take the credit; and, if they go badly, to blame others’. This, Bottai concluded, had become the real meaning of the formula: ‘Mussolini is always right.’ ”
The following speaks for itself, and speaks volumes:
From A.J.P. Taylor, quoted in Bosworth: “F*****m never possessed the ruthless drive, let alone the material strength, of National Socialism. Morally it was just as corrupting — or perhaps more so from its very dishonesty. Everything about F*****m was a fraud. The social peril from which it saved Italy was a fraud; the revolution by which it seized power was a fraud; the ability and policy of Mussolini were fraudulent. F*****t rule was corrupt, incompetent, empty; Mussolini himself a vain, blundering boaster without either ideas or aims.”
Here from a different book, Mussolini and Italian F*****m (2008), by Giuseppe Finaldi:
“Thus F*****m, as it developed in 1920-2, was not a political party, with a program and an internal structure headed by Mussolini who sent proselytizing disciples into the provinces, but a catch-all movement that, loosely speaking, would have met with the approval of many who saw themselves as belonging to the very widespread political and social environment of the Vitterio Veneters [a nationalist movement]. The ingredient that was (almost) unique to f*****m and which gave it an edge over traditional patriotic parties was its willingness to employ violence for political ends. Its ability to give a semblance of political coherence and a plausible set of symbolic reference points to what was essentially reactionary vigilantism allowed the process of law and the functioning of democracy … to be sidestepped with panache.”
Just as Mussolini took over the F*****t movement, Trump is exploiting and taking over the ultra-nationalism/alt-right movements. These are the power bases for two dictatorial personalities.
Two additional comparisons —one with Hitler and one with Putin — are also relevant here. Hitler and N**i-ism have both similarities and differences with Trump and Trumpism, but both include the style of creating multiple competing power centers, to be adjudicated by the ultimate authority. This not only creates chaos, but also encourages striving to produce the positions, actions, and proposals that will most powerfully capture what the Leader will bestow favor upon. It nurtures what came to be called “Working toward the Fuhrer.” It is a formula for extremism.
Violence is central to the history of all of these movements, and both Hitler and Mussolini came to their dictatorial powers via a relatively singular act of violence: the Reichstag fire for Hitler and the F*****t march on Rome for Mussolini.
Putin, however, demonstrates a different path. Violence, even Putin-directed lethal violence, has been a central part of Putin’s creation of his dictatorship, but there has not been any single violent event that generated his power. Instead, Putin’s history has been one of constant undermining and destruction of competing institutions and individuals, to the point that there are no longer any checks on his power. We have already seen major attacks by Trump on the judiciary, the press, and moves to undermine and take over the institutions of public safety. The s*******s partisanship of the Republicans in Congress ensures that the legislative branch will not be a check — unless that blind support is somehow itself changed.
The attacks on central institutions of American democracy as “enemies of the people” has a horrible and horribly dangerous historical background. Trump may (or may not) be too ignorant to know of that background, but his inner circle most certainly knows of it, and intends it in full.
And, of course, all of this is in addition to the subversion of American democracy and of the Trump administration by Putin’s Russia.
We live in dangerous times.
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cogn... (
show quote)
LOL
Soooo. We're all a bunch of N**i, f*****t, nationalist, violent Mussolinis.....eh Goober ?
And we're helping Herr Trump to undermine and destroy the justice system, the f**e news media and the institutions of public safety.
But wait a minute Goober, I don't recall Herr Trump attempting to defund the police.
I do believe that the police are an institution of public safety.
In fact, it was your fine upstanding members of the demoq***r party, that insisted on defunding the police.........right ?.........Goober ?
slatten49 wrote:
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have become frequent, and with good reason. These comparisons are strongest between Trump and Mussolini — stronger than with Hitler and N**i-ism. Detailed comparisons are difficult for at least two reasons: 1) the historical circumstances are quite different between the 20s and 30s and today, and 2) F*****m was never a coherent political theory or philosophy, but, instead, was a populist and nationalist development in Italy that Mussolini did not create but did take over.
A comparison between Trump and Mussolini in terms of character and style, however, is frighteningly strong — and does give some guidance concerning future concerns. This comparison is based primarily on quotes from a book about Mussolini by R.J.B. Bosworth (2010). In general, the quotes speak for themselves, though I will add some commentary along the way. It should be noted that this book was published years before similarities between Trump and Mussolini became politically relevant, and, thus, were not written with Trump in mind.
I begin with Trump’s arrogant ignorance and incoherence:
“Other more critical contemporaries noticed instead the fluctuations in Mussolini’s ideas and the way he preferred to avoid in-depth conversations, sometimes excusing himself by saying that the details should be left to the experts. Here, they discerned, was a leader more interested in imposing his will than in harmonizing his attitudes or policies. Here was a politician more interested in seeming to know than in knowing.”
“He understood that a totalitarian dictator had to be, or to seem to be, expert in everything.”
“Cowing the press was only one part of building a totalitarian dictatorship.”
Bosworth points to a later developing ambition for Mussolini that is not yet overt with Trump — but it has already been hinted at by some in his inner circle:
“The real novelty of his ambition lay in his pretensions to enter the hearts and minds of his subjects, and so install F*****m as a political religion.”
Again, Trump’s ambition combined with a lack of coherence:
“and so readjusting his own history with his usual aplomb”
“ ‘Reactionary dictators are men of no philosophy, no burning humanitarian ideal, nor even an economic program of any value to their nation or the world. [George Seldes]’ They were ‘gangsters’ more than anything else.”
One striking detailed similarity: Mussolini appointed his son-in-law as foreign minister.
Trump, of course, is infamous for his ultra-thin skin:
“… he would flick through the French press and grow enraged at any criticism of Italy and himself.”
“… there were few things which annoyed Mussolini more than overt criticism.”
“This emotion [anger] had always been a prominent part of the Duce’s reaction to life .…”
Trump and Mussolini share thin-skinned ignorance combined with arrogant contempt:
“The Duce’s version of permanent revolution, it was increasingly plain, was more a story of his own permanent sense that the rest of humankind was not made in this own image (an arrogance which only partially cloaked his own sense of inadequacy …).”
“… it was plain that he [Augusto Rosso] was another who feared that Ciano [son-in-law] was very young, and very inexperienced in the real world, and who knew that Mussolini did not take his professional diplomats seriously.”
“In his diary, Bottai depicted a war leader whose administration grew steadily more ‘approximate’, with the Duce, a ‘man of the banner headline’ at heart, now bored by detail or discussion and preferring to ‘let things run of their own accord’.”
“… the Duce’s reaction, Bottai complained, was, ‘if things go well, take the credit; and, if they go badly, to blame others’. This, Bottai concluded, had become the real meaning of the formula: ‘Mussolini is always right.’ ”
The following speaks for itself, and speaks volumes:
From A.J.P. Taylor, quoted in Bosworth: “F*****m never possessed the ruthless drive, let alone the material strength, of National Socialism. Morally it was just as corrupting — or perhaps more so from its very dishonesty. Everything about F*****m was a fraud. The social peril from which it saved Italy was a fraud; the revolution by which it seized power was a fraud; the ability and policy of Mussolini were fraudulent. F*****t rule was corrupt, incompetent, empty; Mussolini himself a vain, blundering boaster without either ideas or aims.”
Here from a different book, Mussolini and Italian F*****m (2008), by Giuseppe Finaldi:
“Thus F*****m, as it developed in 1920-2, was not a political party, with a program and an internal structure headed by Mussolini who sent proselytizing disciples into the provinces, but a catch-all movement that, loosely speaking, would have met with the approval of many who saw themselves as belonging to the very widespread political and social environment of the Vitterio Veneters [a nationalist movement]. The ingredient that was (almost) unique to f*****m and which gave it an edge over traditional patriotic parties was its willingness to employ violence for political ends. Its ability to give a semblance of political coherence and a plausible set of symbolic reference points to what was essentially reactionary vigilantism allowed the process of law and the functioning of democracy … to be sidestepped with panache.”
Just as Mussolini took over the F*****t movement, Trump is exploiting and taking over the ultra-nationalism/alt-right movements. These are the power bases for two dictatorial personalities.
Two additional comparisons —one with Hitler and one with Putin — are also relevant here. Hitler and N**i-ism have both similarities and differences with Trump and Trumpism, but both include the style of creating multiple competing power centers, to be adjudicated by the ultimate authority. This not only creates chaos, but also encourages striving to produce the positions, actions, and proposals that will most powerfully capture what the Leader will bestow favor upon. It nurtures what came to be called “Working toward the Fuhrer.” It is a formula for extremism.
Violence is central to the history of all of these movements, and both Hitler and Mussolini came to their dictatorial powers via a relatively singular act of violence: the Reichstag fire for Hitler and the F*****t march on Rome for Mussolini.
Putin, however, demonstrates a different path. Violence, even Putin-directed lethal violence, has been a central part of Putin’s creation of his dictatorship, but there has not been any single violent event that generated his power. Instead, Putin’s history has been one of constant undermining and destruction of competing institutions and individuals, to the point that there are no longer any checks on his power. We have already seen major attacks by Trump on the judiciary, the press, and moves to undermine and take over the institutions of public safety. The s*******s partisanship of the Republicans in Congress ensures that the legislative branch will not be a check — unless that blind support is somehow itself changed.
The attacks on central institutions of American democracy as “enemies of the people” has a horrible and horribly dangerous historical background. Trump may (or may not) be too ignorant to know of that background, but his inner circle most certainly knows of it, and intends it in full.
And, of course, all of this is in addition to the subversion of American democracy and of the Trump administration by Putin’s Russia.
We live in dangerous times.
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cogn... (
show quote)
Parallels between Brandon and sling blade
slatten49 wrote:
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have become frequent, and with good reason. These comparisons are strongest between Trump and Mussolini — stronger than with Hitler and N**i-ism. Detailed comparisons are difficult for at least two reasons: 1) the historical circumstances are quite different between the 20s and 30s and today, and 2) F*****m was never a coherent political theory or philosophy, but, instead, was a populist and nationalist development in Italy that Mussolini did not create but did take over.
A comparison between Trump and Mussolini in terms of character and style, however, is frighteningly strong — and does give some guidance concerning future concerns. This comparison is based primarily on quotes from a book about Mussolini by R.J.B. Bosworth (2010). In general, the quotes speak for themselves, though I will add some commentary along the way. It should be noted that this book was published years before similarities between Trump and Mussolini became politically relevant, and, thus, were not written with Trump in mind.
I begin with Trump’s arrogant ignorance and incoherence:
“Other more critical contemporaries noticed instead the fluctuations in Mussolini’s ideas and the way he preferred to avoid in-depth conversations, sometimes excusing himself by saying that the details should be left to the experts. Here, they discerned, was a leader more interested in imposing his will than in harmonizing his attitudes or policies. Here was a politician more interested in seeming to know than in knowing.”
“He understood that a totalitarian dictator had to be, or to seem to be, expert in everything.”
“Cowing the press was only one part of building a totalitarian dictatorship.”
Bosworth points to a later developing ambition for Mussolini that is not yet overt with Trump — but it has already been hinted at by some in his inner circle:
“The real novelty of his ambition lay in his pretensions to enter the hearts and minds of his subjects, and so install F*****m as a political religion.”
Again, Trump’s ambition combined with a lack of coherence:
“and so readjusting his own history with his usual aplomb”
“ ‘Reactionary dictators are men of no philosophy, no burning humanitarian ideal, nor even an economic program of any value to their nation or the world. [George Seldes]’ They were ‘gangsters’ more than anything else.”
One striking detailed similarity: Mussolini appointed his son-in-law as foreign minister.
Trump, of course, is infamous for his ultra-thin skin:
“… he would flick through the French press and grow enraged at any criticism of Italy and himself.”
“… there were few things which annoyed Mussolini more than overt criticism.”
“This emotion [anger] had always been a prominent part of the Duce’s reaction to life .…”
Trump and Mussolini share thin-skinned ignorance combined with arrogant contempt:
“The Duce’s version of permanent revolution, it was increasingly plain, was more a story of his own permanent sense that the rest of humankind was not made in this own image (an arrogance which only partially cloaked his own sense of inadequacy …).”
“… it was plain that he [Augusto Rosso] was another who feared that Ciano [son-in-law] was very young, and very inexperienced in the real world, and who knew that Mussolini did not take his professional diplomats seriously.”
“In his diary, Bottai depicted a war leader whose administration grew steadily more ‘approximate’, with the Duce, a ‘man of the banner headline’ at heart, now bored by detail or discussion and preferring to ‘let things run of their own accord’.”
“… the Duce’s reaction, Bottai complained, was, ‘if things go well, take the credit; and, if they go badly, to blame others’. This, Bottai concluded, had become the real meaning of the formula: ‘Mussolini is always right.’ ”
The following speaks for itself, and speaks volumes:
From A.J.P. Taylor, quoted in Bosworth: “F*****m never possessed the ruthless drive, let alone the material strength, of National Socialism. Morally it was just as corrupting — or perhaps more so from its very dishonesty. Everything about F*****m was a fraud. The social peril from which it saved Italy was a fraud; the revolution by which it seized power was a fraud; the ability and policy of Mussolini were fraudulent. F*****t rule was corrupt, incompetent, empty; Mussolini himself a vain, blundering boaster without either ideas or aims.”
Here from a different book, Mussolini and Italian F*****m (2008), by Giuseppe Finaldi:
“Thus F*****m, as it developed in 1920-2, was not a political party, with a program and an internal structure headed by Mussolini who sent proselytizing disciples into the provinces, but a catch-all movement that, loosely speaking, would have met with the approval of many who saw themselves as belonging to the very widespread political and social environment of the Vitterio Veneters [a nationalist movement]. The ingredient that was (almost) unique to f*****m and which gave it an edge over traditional patriotic parties was its willingness to employ violence for political ends. Its ability to give a semblance of political coherence and a plausible set of symbolic reference points to what was essentially reactionary vigilantism allowed the process of law and the functioning of democracy … to be sidestepped with panache.”
Just as Mussolini took over the F*****t movement, Trump is exploiting and taking over the ultra-nationalism/alt-right movements. These are the power bases for two dictatorial personalities.
Two additional comparisons —one with Hitler and one with Putin — are also relevant here. Hitler and N**i-ism have both similarities and differences with Trump and Trumpism, but both include the style of creating multiple competing power centers, to be adjudicated by the ultimate authority. This not only creates chaos, but also encourages striving to produce the positions, actions, and proposals that will most powerfully capture what the Leader will bestow favor upon. It nurtures what came to be called “Working toward the Fuhrer.” It is a formula for extremism.
Violence is central to the history of all of these movements, and both Hitler and Mussolini came to their dictatorial powers via a relatively singular act of violence: the Reichstag fire for Hitler and the F*****t march on Rome for Mussolini.
Putin, however, demonstrates a different path. Violence, even Putin-directed lethal violence, has been a central part of Putin’s creation of his dictatorship, but there has not been any single violent event that generated his power. Instead, Putin’s history has been one of constant undermining and destruction of competing institutions and individuals, to the point that there are no longer any checks on his power. We have already seen major attacks by Trump on the judiciary, the press, and moves to undermine and take over the institutions of public safety. The s*******s partisanship of the Republicans in Congress ensures that the legislative branch will not be a check — unless that blind support is somehow itself changed.
The attacks on central institutions of American democracy as “enemies of the people” has a horrible and horribly dangerous historical background. Trump may (or may not) be too ignorant to know of that background, but his inner circle most certainly knows of it, and intends it in full.
And, of course, all of this is in addition to the subversion of American democracy and of the Trump administration by Putin’s Russia.
We live in dangerous times.
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cogn... (
show quote)
Trump is an animal all his own . This country has never seen any president any where near like him .--
slatten49 wrote:
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have become frequent, and with good reason. These comparisons are strongest between Trump and Mussolini — stronger than with Hitler and N**i-ism. Detailed comparisons are difficult for at least two reasons: 1) the historical circumstances are quite different between the 20s and 30s and today, and 2) F*****m was never a coherent political theory or philosophy, but, instead, was a populist and nationalist development in Italy that Mussolini did not create but did take over.
A comparison between Trump and Mussolini in terms of character and style, however, is frighteningly strong — and does give some guidance concerning future concerns. This comparison is based primarily on quotes from a book about Mussolini by R.J.B. Bosworth (2010). In general, the quotes speak for themselves, though I will add some commentary along the way. It should be noted that this book was published years before similarities between Trump and Mussolini became politically relevant, and, thus, were not written with Trump in mind.
I begin with Trump’s arrogant ignorance and incoherence:
“Other more critical contemporaries noticed instead the fluctuations in Mussolini’s ideas and the way he preferred to avoid in-depth conversations, sometimes excusing himself by saying that the details should be left to the experts. Here, they discerned, was a leader more interested in imposing his will than in harmonizing his attitudes or policies. Here was a politician more interested in seeming to know than in knowing.”
“He understood that a totalitarian dictator had to be, or to seem to be, expert in everything.”
“Cowing the press was only one part of building a totalitarian dictatorship.”
Bosworth points to a later developing ambition for Mussolini that is not yet overt with Trump — but it has already been hinted at by some in his inner circle:
“The real novelty of his ambition lay in his pretensions to enter the hearts and minds of his subjects, and so install F*****m as a political religion.”
Again, Trump’s ambition combined with a lack of coherence:
“and so readjusting his own history with his usual aplomb”
“ ‘Reactionary dictators are men of no philosophy, no burning humanitarian ideal, nor even an economic program of any value to their nation or the world. [George Seldes]’ They were ‘gangsters’ more than anything else.”
One striking detailed similarity: Mussolini appointed his son-in-law as foreign minister.
Trump, of course, is infamous for his ultra-thin skin:
“… he would flick through the French press and grow enraged at any criticism of Italy and himself.”
“… there were few things which annoyed Mussolini more than overt criticism.”
“This emotion [anger] had always been a prominent part of the Duce’s reaction to life .…”
Trump and Mussolini share thin-skinned ignorance combined with arrogant contempt:
“The Duce’s version of permanent revolution, it was increasingly plain, was more a story of his own permanent sense that the rest of humankind was not made in this own image (an arrogance which only partially cloaked his own sense of inadequacy …).”
“… it was plain that he [Augusto Rosso] was another who feared that Ciano [son-in-law] was very young, and very inexperienced in the real world, and who knew that Mussolini did not take his professional diplomats seriously.”
“In his diary, Bottai depicted a war leader whose administration grew steadily more ‘approximate’, with the Duce, a ‘man of the banner headline’ at heart, now bored by detail or discussion and preferring to ‘let things run of their own accord’.”
“… the Duce’s reaction, Bottai complained, was, ‘if things go well, take the credit; and, if they go badly, to blame others’. This, Bottai concluded, had become the real meaning of the formula: ‘Mussolini is always right.’ ”
The following speaks for itself, and speaks volumes:
From A.J.P. Taylor, quoted in Bosworth: “F*****m never possessed the ruthless drive, let alone the material strength, of National Socialism. Morally it was just as corrupting — or perhaps more so from its very dishonesty. Everything about F*****m was a fraud. The social peril from which it saved Italy was a fraud; the revolution by which it seized power was a fraud; the ability and policy of Mussolini were fraudulent. F*****t rule was corrupt, incompetent, empty; Mussolini himself a vain, blundering boaster without either ideas or aims.”
Here from a different book, Mussolini and Italian F*****m (2008), by Giuseppe Finaldi:
“Thus F*****m, as it developed in 1920-2, was not a political party, with a program and an internal structure headed by Mussolini who sent proselytizing disciples into the provinces, but a catch-all movement that, loosely speaking, would have met with the approval of many who saw themselves as belonging to the very widespread political and social environment of the Vitterio Veneters [a nationalist movement]. The ingredient that was (almost) unique to f*****m and which gave it an edge over traditional patriotic parties was its willingness to employ violence for political ends. Its ability to give a semblance of political coherence and a plausible set of symbolic reference points to what was essentially reactionary vigilantism allowed the process of law and the functioning of democracy … to be sidestepped with panache.”
Just as Mussolini took over the F*****t movement, Trump is exploiting and taking over the ultra-nationalism/alt-right movements. These are the power bases for two dictatorial personalities.
Two additional comparisons —one with Hitler and one with Putin — are also relevant here. Hitler and N**i-ism have both similarities and differences with Trump and Trumpism, but both include the style of creating multiple competing power centers, to be adjudicated by the ultimate authority. This not only creates chaos, but also encourages striving to produce the positions, actions, and proposals that will most powerfully capture what the Leader will bestow favor upon. It nurtures what came to be called “Working toward the Fuhrer.” It is a formula for extremism.
Violence is central to the history of all of these movements, and both Hitler and Mussolini came to their dictatorial powers via a relatively singular act of violence: the Reichstag fire for Hitler and the F*****t march on Rome for Mussolini.
Putin, however, demonstrates a different path. Violence, even Putin-directed lethal violence, has been a central part of Putin’s creation of his dictatorship, but there has not been any single violent event that generated his power. Instead, Putin’s history has been one of constant undermining and destruction of competing institutions and individuals, to the point that there are no longer any checks on his power. We have already seen major attacks by Trump on the judiciary, the press, and moves to undermine and take over the institutions of public safety. The s*******s partisanship of the Republicans in Congress ensures that the legislative branch will not be a check — unless that blind support is somehow itself changed.
The attacks on central institutions of American democracy as “enemies of the people” has a horrible and horribly dangerous historical background. Trump may (or may not) be too ignorant to know of that background, but his inner circle most certainly knows of it, and intends it in full.
And, of course, all of this is in addition to the subversion of American democracy and of the Trump administration by Putin’s Russia.
We live in dangerous times.
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cogn... (
show quote)
=================
Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have
==================================
There you go again Slat. you don't fool me with the mind of this crazy man, you called professor. These people are well known for liberal brain. They are either ignorant, or don't know what a F*****T is about. Who are the F*****TS right now? The Biden-Obama administration, ruling without the Constitution, but dictated by their own Marxist-Totalitarian brain. These are the F*****TS. THEY'VE TWISTED THE MESSAGE!
I pity any student of this most ignorant and stupid teacher, learning his kind of crap coming out of his psychotic brain.
This man is mentally incapacitated. He belongs to the far left, and all his statements are the opposite of the facts. I pity any student who belong to this guy's classroom.
He is either a LIAR, and dumb radical l*****ts whose masterpiece of is about "race". Fact: Currently race, is the subject matter, the prime issue being taught and discussed in all PUBLIC SCHOOLS at present, paid by taxpayers.
"RACE" What is happening now in Public Schools, or in Liberal Colleges.
All students focus on race. Students are dumb, they could not do math, could not read, and could not write. They h**e other races such as White, Jews, and Asian.
They use CRT to dumb them so that they, the darky" could earn equity. These stupid students of the Liberal professors of teachers are dumb. But they are experts on subject about SEX. The L**T, and the TRAN. How a man could become a woman and a woman to become a man. These are now taught in schools.
The brain of Luce sounds like this. They go to the doctor to t***sform them, and demand taxpayers to pay for their surgical body for it is about their healthcare.
The messages of this man named Henry Luce, are all TWISTED, and DUMB! You called him professor? What school? In Pennsylvania, one of the most violent liberal places in the country. Professor of dumb people, and his brain is twisted to the LEFT due to ignorance, but a masterpiece in immorality. What a waste of Public fund.
All statement he wrote were TWISTED proving SOP of the LEFT.
Check Joe Biden and his team are doing right now. At the expense of our taxes, Biden uses the DOJ, FBI, and all the Liberal Judges all over blue states, to attack the Republicans. Most especially Donald Trump, and his team. They rule above the law. They've ignored the Constitution. The DOJ of America has two tiers of Justice System. All the criminal Democrats are free of their massive crimes and abuses. Joe Biden, drug addict son H****r, and the Biden's entire family ae crooks. Check records: they are in Congress right now.
Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton's crimes are all free. Anybody they fear of, like the GOP, they destroy; or knows about their hidden crimes, just disappear. E.g. Seth Rich, etc.
This Biden administration rule like a Marxist -Totalitarian system. They've bypassed the Constitution. We are no longer a Republic, but a Marxist system. And the so-called Luce who teaches psychology TWISTED his message, is equally dumb, or a L*****t LIAR!
Your next article Slat could probably from the brain of George Soros.
Coos Bay Tom wrote:
Trump is an animal all his own . This country has never seen any president any where near like him .--
No it hasn’t but then we haven’t and the current White House occupant is the weakest man we’ve ever had in that position. We’ve never had a president like him either.
This country’s breakdown started before Trump came on the scene.
Americans had better wake up and soon.
Coos Bay Tom wrote:
Trump is an animal all his own . This country has never seen any president any where near like him .--
God works in mysterious ways
BIRDMAN wrote:
God works in mysterious ways
Yes indeed -- He created me .
Weirdos of America --Unite !!
slatten49 wrote:
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cognitive Robotics and the Philosophy of Knowledge in the Department of Psychology at Lehigh University (Bethlehem, PA).
Comparisons between Trump(ism) and F*****m have become frequent, and with good reason. These comparisons are strongest between Trump and Mussolini — stronger than with Hitler and N**i-ism. Detailed comparisons are difficult for at least two reasons: 1) the historical circumstances are quite different between the 20s and 30s and today, and 2) F*****m was never a coherent political theory or philosophy, but, instead, was a populist and nationalist development in Italy that Mussolini did not create but did take over.
A comparison between Trump and Mussolini in terms of character and style, however, is frighteningly strong — and does give some guidance concerning future concerns. This comparison is based primarily on quotes from a book about Mussolini by R.J.B. Bosworth (2010). In general, the quotes speak for themselves, though I will add some commentary along the way. It should be noted that this book was published years before similarities between Trump and Mussolini became politically relevant, and, thus, were not written with Trump in mind.
I begin with Trump’s arrogant ignorance and incoherence:
“Other more critical contemporaries noticed instead the fluctuations in Mussolini’s ideas and the way he preferred to avoid in-depth conversations, sometimes excusing himself by saying that the details should be left to the experts. Here, they discerned, was a leader more interested in imposing his will than in harmonizing his attitudes or policies. Here was a politician more interested in seeming to know than in knowing.”
“He understood that a totalitarian dictator had to be, or to seem to be, expert in everything.”
“Cowing the press was only one part of building a totalitarian dictatorship.”
Bosworth points to a later developing ambition for Mussolini that is not yet overt with Trump — but it has already been hinted at by some in his inner circle:
“The real novelty of his ambition lay in his pretensions to enter the hearts and minds of his subjects, and so install F*****m as a political religion.”
Again, Trump’s ambition combined with a lack of coherence:
“and so readjusting his own history with his usual aplomb”
“ ‘Reactionary dictators are men of no philosophy, no burning humanitarian ideal, nor even an economic program of any value to their nation or the world. [George Seldes]’ They were ‘gangsters’ more than anything else.”
One striking detailed similarity: Mussolini appointed his son-in-law as foreign minister.
Trump, of course, is infamous for his ultra-thin skin:
“… he would flick through the French press and grow enraged at any criticism of Italy and himself.”
“… there were few things which annoyed Mussolini more than overt criticism.”
“This emotion [anger] had always been a prominent part of the Duce’s reaction to life .…”
Trump and Mussolini share thin-skinned ignorance combined with arrogant contempt:
“The Duce’s version of permanent revolution, it was increasingly plain, was more a story of his own permanent sense that the rest of humankind was not made in this own image (an arrogance which only partially cloaked his own sense of inadequacy …).”
“… it was plain that he [Augusto Rosso] was another who feared that Ciano [son-in-law] was very young, and very inexperienced in the real world, and who knew that Mussolini did not take his professional diplomats seriously.”
“In his diary, Bottai depicted a war leader whose administration grew steadily more ‘approximate’, with the Duce, a ‘man of the banner headline’ at heart, now bored by detail or discussion and preferring to ‘let things run of their own accord’.”
“… the Duce’s reaction, Bottai complained, was, ‘if things go well, take the credit; and, if they go badly, to blame others’. This, Bottai concluded, had become the real meaning of the formula: ‘Mussolini is always right.’ ”
The following speaks for itself, and speaks volumes:
From A.J.P. Taylor, quoted in Bosworth: “F*****m never possessed the ruthless drive, let alone the material strength, of National Socialism. Morally it was just as corrupting — or perhaps more so from its very dishonesty. Everything about F*****m was a fraud. The social peril from which it saved Italy was a fraud; the revolution by which it seized power was a fraud; the ability and policy of Mussolini were fraudulent. F*****t rule was corrupt, incompetent, empty; Mussolini himself a vain, blundering boaster without either ideas or aims.”
Here from a different book, Mussolini and Italian F*****m (2008), by Giuseppe Finaldi:
“Thus F*****m, as it developed in 1920-2, was not a political party, with a program and an internal structure headed by Mussolini who sent proselytizing disciples into the provinces, but a catch-all movement that, loosely speaking, would have met with the approval of many who saw themselves as belonging to the very widespread political and social environment of the Vitterio Veneters [a nationalist movement]. The ingredient that was (almost) unique to f*****m and which gave it an edge over traditional patriotic parties was its willingness to employ violence for political ends. Its ability to give a semblance of political coherence and a plausible set of symbolic reference points to what was essentially reactionary vigilantism allowed the process of law and the functioning of democracy … to be sidestepped with panache.”
Just as Mussolini took over the F*****t movement, Trump is exploiting and taking over the ultra-nationalism/alt-right movements. These are the power bases for two dictatorial personalities.
Two additional comparisons —one with Hitler and one with Putin — are also relevant here. Hitler and N**i-ism have both similarities and differences with Trump and Trumpism, but both include the style of creating multiple competing power centers, to be adjudicated by the ultimate authority. This not only creates chaos, but also encourages striving to produce the positions, actions, and proposals that will most powerfully capture what the Leader will bestow favor upon. It nurtures what came to be called “Working toward the Fuhrer.” It is a formula for extremism.
Violence is central to the history of all of these movements, and both Hitler and Mussolini came to their dictatorial powers via a relatively singular act of violence: the Reichstag fire for Hitler and the F*****t march on Rome for Mussolini.
Putin, however, demonstrates a different path. Violence, even Putin-directed lethal violence, has been a central part of Putin’s creation of his dictatorship, but there has not been any single violent event that generated his power. Instead, Putin’s history has been one of constant undermining and destruction of competing institutions and individuals, to the point that there are no longer any checks on his power. We have already seen major attacks by Trump on the judiciary, the press, and moves to undermine and take over the institutions of public safety. The s*******s partisanship of the Republicans in Congress ensures that the legislative branch will not be a check — unless that blind support is somehow itself changed.
The attacks on central institutions of American democracy as “enemies of the people” has a horrible and horribly dangerous historical background. Trump may (or may not) be too ignorant to know of that background, but his inner circle most certainly knows of it, and intends it in full.
And, of course, all of this is in addition to the subversion of American democracy and of the Trump administration by Putin’s Russia.
We live in dangerous times.
by Mark Bickhard - Henry R. Luce Professor in Cogn... (
show quote)
Interesting article. Thanks for posting.
If you want to reply, then
register here. Registration is free and your account is created instantly, so you can post right away.
