Is It Time to Flee the US?
1.
If only there were a website run on the same principle as isabevigodadead.com, that could tell us with a simple yes-or-no answer whether the US has finally lapsed into fascism. That question, unfortunately, however much we would like for it to present itself in binary form, has in the real world more the character of a Rorschach test, in which anyone can see anything. I myself believe that Trump and his boyars often say things that qualify as fascist, or that would, if we could attribute to them sufficient historical awareness of the import of the ideas they are channeling. But that’s asking a lot. These days people just say whatever, and that, as we’ll see below, is the true defining feature, and the true novelty, of our political moment.
I remain convinced of the essential stability of the claim, articulated already in the early days of Trump’s first term, that his reign is one of “malevolence tempered by incompetence”. The first 100 days of the second administration were indeed bold, and seemed to have something of the quality of a big-budget sequel to what had initially been an indie film unexpectedly elevated to the status of a hit. But even this earnest attempt by Trump 2 to be as scary as possible right out of the gates, seems, although it was surely the most sincere effort at instigating a fascoid cultural revolution in my lifetime, by now mostly to have fizzled. Markets, courts, and polls —the ultimate instruments for interpreting what passes for reality in our society— all prove, again, to have veto power over unviable initiatives.
For Trump himself it’s no big deal either way. He reverses course, declares victory no matter what ends up happening; his opponents hate him exactly as much as before, and his supporters fail to notice. Some genuine atrocities are committed — the abduction of Rümeysa Öztürk is, so far, for me the most horrifying of them. But neither Homeland Security nor any shadier agency is yet sending the intellectuals to labor camps, there is no particular hostility to people who wear eyeglasses, and US citizens who are holders of endowed chairs at Yale University, to all appearances, are still able, if they choose, to do their jobs, as they understand them, without significant fear of persecution.
