Skip to content

Details

This is going to be an online meetup using Zoom. If you've never used Zoom before, don't worry — it's easy to use and free to join.

Click on the link above at the scheduled date/time to log in...

***

***

IS AMERICA SLIDING INTO AUTHORITARIANISM, KAKISTOCRACY, A GREAT REALIGNMENT, OR A CONSERVATIVE COUNTER-REVOLUTION?

INTRODUCTION:

We're 9 months into Donald Trump's second presidential term, and although we've covered his administration's foreign policy, tariffs, tech & energy policies, we haven't really discussed the more controversial aspects of his domestic policy since our meetup on January 26th - just a few days after he took office and began issuing a flurry of executive orders. Since then, many left-leaning journalists, academics & pundits have argued that Trump 2.0 is even more dangerous, because he's not checked by the traditional Republican politicians (e.g. Mike Pence, Rex Tillerson, John Bolton) and senior military officials (e.g. John Kelly, James Mattis, Mark Milley, Mark Esper) he had in his first administration who reportedly dissuaded Trump from rash actions in some cases and occasionally refused to enact orders they saw as unconstitutional. This time, they argue, Trump has stocked his administration with under-qualified loyalists (e.g. Pete Hegseth, RFK Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, Sean Duffy, Kash Patel), he has a Republican majority in both houses of Congress and a conservative majority on the Supreme Court, and he's been gutting much of the federal bureaucracy, so he's virtually unchecked. As the months have worn on, Trump's critics have pointed to various signs of authoritarian sentiments and policies they regard as authoritarian & unconstitutional or at the very least highly corrupt & unethical, for example:

So what should we make of all this? If this United States actually sliding away from liberal democratic norms and towards an illiberal, authoritarian, corrupt form of government? And if so, is this primarily or exclusively due to Donald Trump and his followers, or were there signs of this "democratic decay" in earlier administrations of both parties (and in other democratic countries abroad) that might signal broader structural forces that can't merely be solved by getting Trump out of office and condemning his supporters as "fascists"?

And to what extent is a left-leaning political bias and "Trump Derangement Syndrome" among journalists, academics & civil servants distorting our view of what's happening? To what extent are we seeing a media circus like "Russiagate" in Trump's first term, where we'll eventually realize that much of the media fell prey to hype about unverified claims? And for those on the left complaining about Trump's actions now, why didn't they criticize Obama's deportations of 3.1 million people, expansion of domestic spying, IRS targeting of conservative groups, and prosecutions of whistleblowers? Why did they downplay the Biden administration's "jawboning" social media platforms into censoring content, attempts to inject partisan narratives about race & gender into our public & private institutions, evidence that Hunter Biden used his father's influence to enrich himself, and Biden's slew of last-minute pardons (many preemptive)? Are those who are tempted to dismiss the media's recent warnings about Trump succumbing to the "cry wolf effect" and "whataboutism" where the media's false alarms & hypocrisy in the past has caused people to ignore genuine warnings now?

In this discussion, we'll explore 4 various sets of arguments about Trump's aggressive actions that have aroused cries of authoritarianism & calls for resistance on the political left, some hand-wringing & calls for civility by centrists, and lots of cheers among the populist right... The first 3 scenarios are loosely inspired by John F. Harris's article in Politico back in Aug. 2020 entitled "What We Still Don’t Know About Trump: Tyrant, buffoon or a real voice for forgotten Americans? Five years after his escalator ride—and after two 2020 conventions—there’s still no consensus. That’s a problem for the party trying to take him down." The 4th scenario is essentially what the "anti-woke" conservative pundits who support Trump would argue.

In the 1st section, we'll look at some arguments for why Trump has overridden the federal government's checks & balances to the extent that he is causing a rapid slide towards a system of "competitive authoritarianism" (a.k.a. "illiberal democracy", "anocracy" or "hybrid regime") similar to Hungary under Orbán & Turkey under Erdoğan if not a full-blown autocracy like Nazi Germany or Russia under Putin. Under this theory, elections will continue but Democrats will be seriously hampered by factors like gerrymandering, voter suppression, malicious prosecutions of their candidates, and government attacks on their fundraising apparatus & activist organizations. Proponents of this scenario often see Trump sending ICE & the National Guard into blue cities as the initial steps to a "police state" and warn that it's intended to provoke left-wing activists into rioting, which will be used to justify even more draconian measures. This in turn could lead to a spiral of escalation that could thrust the U.S. into a period of extended civil conflict comparable to "The Troubles" in Northern Ireland or Italy's "Years of Lead" if not a full-blown civil war like we saw in the U.S. in the 1860s, Spain in the 1930s, or in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s.

In the 2nd section, we'll look at some arguments for why Trump's cronyism & corruption, as well as his use of "lawfare" against his political opponents, has eroded democratic norms leading to what analysts have called "constitutional rot" and a Jacksonian-style "spoils system". Critics also point out that Trump has used his position to brazenly enrich himself but paid no virtually penalty in terms of public support, suggesting perceptions of corruption may no longer matter to voters. Altogether, analysts who focus on these sorts of actions tend to argue it places the U.S. in the realm of a "flawed democracy", sometimes described as a "kleptocracy" or "kakistocracy". However, they tend to think it is unlikely to lead to "competitive authoritarianism" since Trump's administration is too incompetent to hatch a plan to fully consolidate power, and cuts to the federal bureaucracy will hamper their ability to enact & enforce a totalitarian agenda. They also argue that Trump's administration also has too little public support (judging from falling approval ratings) and faces too much opposition from powerful elites both within and outside the government. This is especially the case after Elon Musk's departure in June signaled a rift opening between Trump and the "Tech Right", which makes the scenario where DOGE leads to "techno-fascism" less plausible. However, a reduction of civil liberties & rights violations are expected, although this falls short of dystopian scenarios like a "police state". In terms of political violence, they predict something analogous to the protests & riots we saw in the summer of 2020, which still fell short of the riots & domestic terrorism of the 1960s-70s which were scary but didn't lead to anything analogous to "The Troubles" in Northern Ireland. Rather than a protracted civil conflict, proponents of this scenario tend to predict various types of "soft secession" from red & blue states ignoring the federal government when it falls into the hands of the opposition. This in turn could lead to a loss of national unity, economic decline as bureaucratic incompetence reduces "state capacity", and the loss of America's status as a world leader.

In the 3rd section, we'll look at arguments for why right-wing populism is best thought of as a structural force almost incidental to Trump, and why it is part of a "Great Realignment" (a.k.a. "Seventh Party System") where the Republican Party slowly but almost inevitably transitions into a multiracial working class coalition rather than a white nationalist party as some had feared. Proponents of this theory point out the Republican Party gained more support from black & Hispanic voters under Trump despite much of his rhetoric. Under this theory, the transition will be incomplete & chaotic until the GOP finds capable leaders who will make a clear break with the Reaganite legacy of tax cuts & deregulation to enact social & economic policies that benefit the working & middle classes - what was once called "producerism" or more recently "national conservatism". Proponents of this "Great Realignment" often imagine the Democratic Party slowly absorbing the neocons & libertarians pushed out of the GOP and reverting to a business-friendly version of "Third Way" liberalism roughly analogous to the Democrats under Bill Clinton - perhaps via what's recently been called "abundance liberalism".

In the 4th section, we'll look at arguments for why Trump is merely enforcing existing immigrations laws, cracking down on crime, and trying to reverse the left's "long march through the institutions" (e.g. news media, entertainment, schools & universities, nonprofits, corporate HR departments, the federal bureaucracy). They argue that elite dominance of most major institutions makes any major conservative reforms impossible without drastic actions that breach ostensibly "neutral" democratic norms that implicitly favor the left - e.g. invoking the Insurrection Act to use the National Guard in sanctuary states or violating the 1st Amendment by cracking down on left-wing activists & academics at universities. However, they'll often argue these actions are still constitutional based on various historical precedents when prior administrations used similar strong-arm methods to enact their agenda, e.g. Eisenhower's "Operation Wetback" deportations, Eisenhower & JFK using federal troops to desegregate public schools & quell race riots at universities. In terms of Trump gutting the federal bureaucracy & staffing it with loyalists, this is often justified with the "unitary executive theory" of jurisprudence. Another major component of this scenario involves not so much ignoring or overturning civil rights laws but reinterpreting them to root out what conservatives perceive as "reverse racism" against whites, as well as discrimination against heterosexual men, trans-exclusionary women, conservative Christians, and pro-Israel Jews. Under this interpretation, journalists, academics, civil servants & other managerial elites are merely using claims of "authoritarianism" and "fascism" against Trump to whip up a moral panic and obscure their agenda which is tantamount to "soft totalitarianism" under the guise of diversity, equity & inclusion administered by the "managerial state".

Please keep in mind that several or all of the scenarios presented in each section may have some true claims without being entirely true, and that they're not necessarily all mutually exclusive. It's not uncommon for people on the left to go back & forth between Scenarios 1 & 2, centrists to draw upon aspects of both Scenarios 2 & 3, and conservatives to use arguments from Scenarios 3 & 4. However, these scenarios are not necessarily exhaustive of the entire range of possibilities. Rather, these scenarios are just some of the more common narratives I've heard from journalists, pundits & academics over the last year or so, and I'm hoping they can serve as the launching point for a more nuanced discussion.

WHO'S CAST AS THE HEROES & VILLAINS IN EACH SCENARIO?

As you can see, the first 2 sections present scenarios which differ in their severity but put the blame mostly or entirely on the forces of right-wing authoritarianism, Christian nationalism & white supremacy, as well as their grifters & useful idiots like "bro podcasters", "token minority" Trumpers, and "heterodox" pundits engaging in "both-sidesism".

In the 1st scenario, the radical left are often cast as the heroes who must wake up the public and galvanize the "Resistance 2.0" since the establishment left has failed to stop Trump, while the elements of the old establishment right (neocons & libertarians) are viewed as dangerous "entryists" if they propose an anti-Trump alliance with the center-left which would implicitly involve sacrificing the more radical proposals of the progressive left.

For most proponents of the 2nd scenario, the establishment left and anti-Trump elements of the old establishment right are often seen as the "adults in the room" who must somehow regain the public's trust & reign in Trump to restore order, while the radical left's willingness to use violence is potentially dangerous in terms of giving Trump a scapegoat.

The latter 2 sections present scenarios which are different in their outlooks but both put some or most of the blame on aspects of "liberalism" - economic liberalism (a.k.a. "neoliberalism" or "free-market fundamentalism") for Scenario 3 and social liberalism (a.k.a. "identity politics" or "cultural Marxism") for Scenario 4.

In the 3rd scenario, the establishment left & right are the chief villains for neglecting the plight of the working class, while the populist right & radical left are both viewed ambiguously - i.e. "class-first socialists" & "national conservatives" both see the nation's major problems somewhat accurately & their alliance could set the country on the right path to reform, but the racist elements on the radical right could sabotage this project, while the "woke left" are essentially "useful idiots" for the establishment left's use of identity politics to divide the working class.

In the 4th scenario, only the radical right sees the nation's problems correctly, while the old establishment right is dismissed as impotent "cuckservatives" who only half-heartedly opposed the left's agenda, and the establishment left is often seen as running interference for the radical left, ultimately forcing Trump into taking drastic actions.

DO WE KNOW WHICH SCENARIO IS CLOSEST TO THE EXPERT CONSENSUS? AND HOW RELIABLE OR BIASED ARE THE EXPERTS?

As far as I can tell, the closest proxy we have to an "expert consensus" would be the Bright Line Watch which is an organization created back in 2017 that regularly polls U.S. political scientists & the general public on issues related to the health of democracy and government actions that potentially breach democratic norms. I encourage you to read the key findings of their recent survey from Sept. 2025 of both 703 political scientists and a representative sample of 2,750 Americans - it's entitled: "Violence, redistricting, and democratic norms in Trump’s America". In general, it appears to best align with the 2nd scenario we'll look at, since it says "current expert ratings of U.S. democracy are closer to those of a mixed or illiberal democracy than a full democracy or countries often considered as relevant comparisons such as Great Britain and Canada." It also notes that "human forecasts from the Metaculus prediction platform and those from experts are broadly consistent after adjusting for experts’ prior tendency toward pessimism. AI forecasts from the startup Mantic, which has created the best-performing AI forecasting bot to date, rate the likelihood of most events lower than either human source."

If you'd like to understand the research being done at Bright Line Watch and how much we should trust the experts, I'd recommend listening to the Niskanen Center's interview with political scientist Brendan Nyhan back in January. The interviewer, Matt Grossman, prods Nyhan by pointing out that "you found that experts tend to overestimate or be too pessimistic about democratic threats.... [In Trump's first term,] there’s events that [scholars] thought were 65% likely to occur that 20% of them occurred or so. So we got pretty high, and I know at the highest levels, they did occur, but we got pretty far into a consensus that didn’t materialize. So what are the reasons for that? Is there liberal bias in academia? Is there just a negativity bias when you’re asking people about a bunch of threats? Is there something that went wrong in the reasoning that we can tell?"

Nyhan responds by saying: "We don’t have a lot of direct evidence on why this is taking place. It’s certainly possible that it’s political bias. I don’t think the totality of the evaluations offered by our experts across all their survey responses is consistent with that. I’ll say for instance, if you look at the overall evaluations of democracy during Trump’s term, the experts barely moved. They expressed concern. We asked people are these things threats to democracy? But they didn’t engage in the doomerism that we often saw online, and they consistently rated the US democracy as pretty stable, and while imperfect, significantly better than countries like Brazil and Russia and so forth. So I’m not convinced that the political bias story is the right one. I think negativity bias is an important idea to evaluate. And in our new future surveys, we hope to include negative events that aren’t related to democracy as well as events related to democracy that are neutral or positive to be able to better isolate how much that’s contributing. The final factor is, I think it may simply be these events are ones that seem especially intuitive. They coincide with narratives about Trump and potential vulnerabilities... And in selecting them in that way, we may be drawing out their beliefs on the kinds of events that they’re most likely to override their prevalence of."

RELEVANT MATERIALS FROM PAST MEETUPS:

Way back in Dec. 2017, we had a meetup entitled "Trump & Post-Truth Politics." We discussed: (1) the "Goldwater rule" and rhetorical analysis of Trump's speeches, (2) applying Occam's razor & Hanlon's Razor to the Trump administration, (3) the debate over "Trump Derangement Syndrome", (4) political fact-checking websites & their reliability in the age of "alternative facts", and (5) Trump as a "bullsh*tter" and "master persuader".

Back in Feb. 2018 we had a meetup entitled "Are We In A Global 'Democratic Recession'?" We discussed: (1) the components of democracy (free & fair elections, civil liberties, civil society, rule of law); (2) correlations between rankings on "democracy indices" and economic growth, personal freedoms, social progress & happiness; (3) whether we're in a global "democratic recession" - and if so, why; (4) has the U.S. declined into a "flawed democracy" - and if so, why.

In Sept. 2018, we had a meetup entitled "Can We Predict Geopolitical Conflict?" where we discussed the principles for geopolitical forecasting that Philip Tetlock discovered in his research with the Good Judgment Project. In the 3rd section, we looked at what factors can predict civil unrest, military coups & popular revolts. In the 4th section, we looked at looked at what factors can predict civil wars & mass atrocities.

In Oct. 2020, we had a meetup entitled "Is Constitutional Conservatism Dying?" We looked at the social trajectory of the American conservatism movement from the resistance to FDR's New Deal, to the Reagan & Gingrich Revolutions in the 1980s-90s, to the way the "libertarian moment" fizzled amid the Tea Party populism of the 2010s, which in turn paved the way for rise of Donald Trump. We also discussed the East Coast vs West Coast Straussian split over Trump, and the debate among Christian conservatives about whether fidelity to classical liberal ideals should be retained or jettisoned.

Back in Jan. 2021, just after the storming of the Capitol on 1/6, the Skeptics had a meetup entitled "Bad History & Our Political Crisis". We looked at political turmoil & violence in Weimar Germany and the U.S. in the lead-up to the Civil War and compared & contrasted this with modern-day America.

In Nov. 2022, we had a meetup entitled "Understanding the Great Realignment" and the 4th section dealt with the possibility that Trumpism" and the "Great Awokening" are realigning the two major parties, leading to a GOP that's more driven by a working-class/middle class coalition in the rural, suburban & exurban areas and a Democratic Party that's based around an multiracial urban coalition composed of a college-educated elite and lower-wage service workers. We explored how the current party coalitions might fracture in a meetup in Jun. 2024 entitled "Which Party's Coalition Will Crack First?", focusing on Democrats' struggles with young people and black & Hispanic voters (particularly men), and Republicans' struggles with major corporations and suburban middle-class whites (particularly women).

Back in September of this year, shortly after the shooting of Charlie Kirk, we had a meetup entitled "Is Political Violence Increasing in America?" We discussed: (1) what we can learn from studies on who commits political violence & which portion of the public supports it, (2) what we can learn from studies on hate crimes & the public's underlying racial/ethnic animosities, (3) the political effects of peaceful protests vs riots and the "radical flank effect," and (4) conflict cycle theories and whether they indicate the U.S. is at risk of a civil war.

DIRECTIONS ON HOW TO PREPARE FOR OUR DISCUSSION:

The videos & articles you see linked below are intended to give you a basic overview of some of the major debates over democratic decline in the U.S. over the past decade. As usual, I certainly don't expect you to read all the articles prior to attending our discussion. The easiest way to prepare for our discussion is to just watch the numbered videos linked under each section - the videos come to about 60 minutes total. The articles marked with asterisks are just there to supply additional details. You can browse and look at whichever ones you want, but don't worry - we'll cover the stuff you missed in our discussion.

In terms of the discussion format, my general idea is that we'll address the topics in the order presented here. I've listed some questions under each section to stimulate discussion. We'll do our best to address most of them, as well as whatever other questions our members raise. I figure we'll spend about 40 minutes on each section.

***

I. ARGUMENTS FOR WHY TRUMP IS CAUSING A RAPID SLIDE TOWARDS A SYSTEM OF "COMPETITIVE AUTHORITARIANISM" & A "POLICE STATE" (IF NOT FULL-BLOWN AUTOCRACY) WHICH COULD PRECIPITATE AN EXTENDED CIVIL CONFLICT (IF NOT A CIVIL WAR):

1a) NYT w/ Marci Shore, Timothy Snyder & Jason Stanley, "We’re Experts in Fascism. We’re Leaving the U.S." (video - 6:53 min)
https://youtu.be/IXR9PByA9SY

1b) History Documentary Channel, "Expert [Barbara F. Walter] Reveals the Signs & Risks of Civil War 2.0" (video - 4:15 min)
https://youtu.be/Of3Up6qDoVU

Donald Trump
Immigration
Elections
Grassroots Democracy
Political Polarization

Members are also interested in