I think you nailed it with the following sentences:
"If you want to prevent a “Trump III” — or worse, a competent heir to his movement — you don’t just beat the candidate. You solve the conditions that make his pitch attractive in the first place."
Exactly.
Interesting observations about Youngkin as well. Far more palatable than Weirdo Couchbonker, but potentially even more dangerous if he embraces the authoritarian ethos--a "kinder, gentler" dictator is, after all, still a dictator. I see that his popularity, according to this site https://www.multistate.us/insider/2025/4/22/heres-what-america-thinks-of-its-governors is right in the middle (29th out of 50.) He's ineligible to run again for governor, and in an interview this past April, was cagey about the possibility of running in 2028, but he's definitely well worth keeping an eye on. Thanks for calling attention to him.
I loved a lot of this and plan to reread it with a highlighter in hand for the particularly useful guidelines and suggestions. However, a couple of observations: First (and this is the lesser of them) Youngkin is not all that popular in Virginia. His staunchest supporters seem to be folk in the southwest of the state, MAGA country, for sure. He convinced enough folk in NoVa to vote for him via dressing like them and being more or less a preppie in his bearing. But once he started spouting nonsense his appeal faded. And let's remember, please, that the Old Dominion in which I lived for many years, was once a Confederate state, and the profoundly undemocratic, racist and misogynistic views of the old South are still a strong undercurrent there, as elsewhere. Secondly, unlike any other failed democracy I can think of, we have widely distributed power, with strong state and municipal government, producing expert and experienced leaders in multiple places. I think of Turkey, with its history as seat of the Ottoman Empire, Russia, seat of the Tsars, Hungary, seat of the Otto-Hungarian Empire, anywhere in South America, only relatively recently liberated from European Colonial rule--and not very robustly, I might add. Or China, with its centuries of Imperial rule. We have a quite different history, I would say, and one which was FOUNDED on an anti-authoritarian set of beliefs. While the current order has revealed the cracks in our system of checks and balances (largely vis a supine Congress sucking at the teats of Dark Money), the structure is still there and still buttressed at the state and local level.
He’s unpopular with “NoVA,” not with “VA.” And given that Trumpers just gutted NoVA payrolls, I can picture Glenn strolling in with, “Oh no, I’ll get your jobs back!” — and suddenly, assuming they haven’t moved, pow.
To win Virginia as a Republican, you’ve got to pull off two things Democrats think are impossible:
Carry all those racist hicks in the rural counties.
(MAGA has that down cold.)
Clear at least 45% in NoVA.
Youngkin did that — not by accident, and not by being one thing to everyone. He spoke pure MAGA to the base, conservative-lite to the Beltway crowd, and something plausibly respectable for the cameras.
He doesn’t need to be beloved statewide; he already got the prize — governor. Now he’ll run the same play again:
To MAGA: “Of course we’ll go after the brown and black people — trust me.”
To the Beltway: “Of course we’ll govern responsibly.”
To the press: “Me? Nazi? Preposterous.”
The man is dangerous, deft, and disciplined. He’s the one I keep watching. Or someone just like him.
And as for the “we’re different” argument? I’m not seeing it. Americans seem fine with the glide path to full-blown Nazi. The reaction so far? Complaining about the sausage-making, not stopping the sausage factory. No general strikes. No resistance with teeth. No consequences for ICE or the goons. Just outrage theater while the dials quietly ratchet in one direction.
"Yeahbut": NoVA contains most of the population of the state, and as for Richmond and the suburbs, they're reliably blue. Tidewater might be up for grabs, but if Trump keeps appointing chodes like Hegseth to oversee military matters, and renaming our forts after undistinguished Confederate generals (of which my direct forbear was one), and you add those disgruntled white military to the brown and black and female military members, odds are fairly promising that Youngkin will lose Norfolk-Virginia Beach, too.
And William, don't you think it's a bit early to ring the death knell on the majority of Americans who don't support Trump&Co? Have you looked at the polls lately? It's early in the game for street protests, but they might swell as inflation makes itself felt. And if a real fighter with at least as many chops as Youngkin emerges (like, say Gavin Newsom) all those apathetic and angry young men might climb on the Dem bandwagon. Ordinary daydreaming is not the same as being asleep at the wheel. We have never accepted the boot of authoritarianism on our neck as an entire people, and I firmly believe we never will. Stupid pockets of us (poor whites in the antebellum South, for example) have been hoodwinked by racist fear-mongers, but not in numbers large enough to take the whole country down that rabbit hole with them.)
We'll just have to agree to disagree then. And let's not either one of us pretend to know it all. It's early in the game. And it's infamously true that two people can often look at the same set of facts and come to dissimilar conclusions.
You made excellent points. I've been saying that we're living in 1930s Germany and you just reinforced that. I had never given much thought to Youngkin, but you're correct that he could well be the more successful authoritarian that Trump could never be. Although in my opinion trump is mainly a puppet run by Stephen Miller, Russell Vought and the Heritage Foundation. While he's out front creating outrage and spectacle they are quietly dismantling our system of government. And when he becomes a problem such as being publicly named in the Epstein files he will be dealt with and JD Prance will take over as puppet in chief.
100%. Well good luck whoever you are trying to take over a bunch of different kinds of people in a country 28 times bigger than Germany. There are more guns than people here like everyone already knows by heart. And some of those guys in the flea market cop ensembles looked pretty uneasy walking just the quiet streets of D.C. this week. One shabby cop impersonator in a clip called POTUS “Donald Trump” NOT president when they advised some people on a stoop to not smoke or drink outside. I will never forget where I learned the term “dry gulchers.” It was Missouri Breaks. A Western. Trump and his bloodless revolution nuts may be underestimating the geography and the actual population with all of that thinking in theory. I know we have a lot of states with many questionable groups in every state on the Southern Poverty Law Center website but most folks do not need or want to join any violent groups and actually do something violent that I have ever heard of. And I live in Killers of the Flower Moon and burn down Black Wall Street country with the “Sooners” who illegally entered during the land run, here where everybody regularly says to hell with the law. Oilies will do anything for money and land. Come what may I personally think the resistance to the bypassing of the Constitution are the smart ones and bet many are trained in many ways for any fight that may come up. In the meantime, after ten years of watching this stupid low class interloper rally and talk on and on (with the help of everybody and their dog in power for ten years) and say the same thing every single time, to me it looks like Trump and company are not the force of nature that they think they are. He sounds bad and looks bad and has for a long time. Bet the end is near. Bet people are starting to pay attention now. Bet folks counting on doing damage to other people will be disappointed. Seven months in and everyone hates Trump and company all over the world. All I am saying is I personally am not going without a big fight. I don’t care what Trump tries. He is not an inevitability. p.s. they are so dumb they think Don Junior could be president one day…and I remember when Lady G stated (like he actually knows what is up) that Lara Trump is the future of the republican party…makes me bust a gut while I cry my ass off…many thanks for the excellent education you provide and the opportunity to speak personally. I read everything you write and have learned a lot. All the best.
Not Germany, and not Italy either. The better comparison for a form of ethnic-nationalist Christian fascism is Franco’s Spain; and if you see what the neocons did to Chile in the 1980s - which they’re starting to repeat on us now - then that point is reinforced. Chile and Spain give hope, too: just as democracy was restored after Pinochet’s referendum defeat, and Franco’s death, do there is basis for hope in the USA. But it took a hell of a long time, tragically.
From a European perspective, I'd raise the score: ICE is already equivalent to the Italian Camice Nere ; there are extermination camps and threats of invasion to obtain Lebensraum.
No. Obviously : you can critics the president With NO consequences (at maximum a rant on social (nice achievement!)) , when in Russia or China it means to die.
But some steps are very bad, very dangerous and hard to be repaired.
Excellent article. I have shared it with several people and will be upgrading to paid. Question for you - is there a red line that has yet to be crossed that would be especially troubling, or move the dials substantially in the wrong direction?
Thank you for this comprehensive explanation, Mr. Finnegan. I am not an expert, but I feel our situation may have a higher Mallen Baker score than your estimate because: 1) many components are set to trend rapidly worse, and 2) there are more clever, less insane people likely positioned to take over. That's one way to say I am more pessimistic than you.
Is it enough to stigmatise the only opposition party -- rooted in the rule of law, committed to progressive policies for improving the lives of all Americans, and with a tradition of constructive international alliances -- for not being somehow good enough to beat a roiling slew of deplorables headed by a self-aggrandising former bankrupt and convicted criminal?
have you read @jamesgreenberg latest post "The Quiet Path to a New Constitution" ? If we were to include both pieces in our thinking we are past 'solving the conditions' and at the point, perhaps, that someone said 'it will be peaceful, if they allow it' .....
I am neither a Republican or Democrat and never voted for Biden or Trump. But I see Congress as the biggest obstacle to America's future. You cannot have a Republic without a functioning legislature. And America has not had one for most of my lifetime (I am 77). So no matter which of the parties wins the next election, if the President is still governing by executive orders (Royal Decrees), the Republic WILL fall. For instance, Congress hasn't passed a declaration of war since the 1940's, yet America has been at war continually by Presidential decree. Both Biden and Trump governed by royal decree, so parties really don't matter. And as the US sinks further into economic chaos which Congress refuses to address, people are going to look for a savior. I agree with you that Trump probably won't be it, might be someone entirely new, might be Vance, might be Harris. But whoever it is, Congress (and so Democracy) will be irrelevant and the nation will become a Republic in Name Only, as Rome did under the Caesars.
“Most of your lifetime” is probably right. But you also lived through an era when Congress was supremely powerful. They named the buildings on Capitol Hill after men who dominated Washington in your youth—Dirksen, Hart, Russell, Rayburn.
Not all saints. Richard Russell was a gigantic racist who would have strangled the Civil Rights movement in the crib if he could. But they were giants who slapped around presidents of both parties. Russell sank Kennedy’s civil rights approach and nearly sank Johnson’s. Dirksen, Hart, Rayburn, Russell—they wielded Congressional power as both cudgel and scalpel.
Even setting the legends aside—can you imagine Tip O’Neill dealing with Trump? Or Joe Martin, a Republican, bending over like “MAGA Mike”? Jim Wright and Tom Foley fought Reagan all day, every day. Hakeem Jeffries? I see a commission chaired by Jamie Raskin and a sternly worded letter—when what’s called for is defunding everything and dragging the Ochre Ogre out by his heels.
Your civics teacher (back when we had those) told you a lie: that the U.S. had three equal branches of government. It never did. It was built as a hierarchy—Congress supreme, the Executive as a powerful intermediary to keep the Confederacy from imploding, and the Court as an afterthought.
Newt Gingrich started strong, but ended as a punchline. We used to say when I was a Republican: “Newt’s got a lot of ideas; unfortunately, nearly all of them suck.” After Gingrich and the shutdowns against Clinton, Congress slid downhill. Hastert was a twat. Pelosi was skilled but a faint echo of Foley or Rayburn. Boehner mostly cried. Paul Ryan was a techno-putz whose lone accomplishment was servicing Trump on the tax cut. McCarthy? A gigantic putz. And Mike Johnson? Hard to imagine how he talks with Trump’s tiny weener lodged in his mouth.
After Gingrich, Congress lost the budget, lost the Republic, and stopped checking the Executive. The Federalist Papers describe January 6, 2021, as the precise event that should trigger impeachment, removal, and—ideally—worse (their words, not mine). Instead, they did nothing. And Glitch McDouchecanoe blamed us.
So yes—fuck Congress. Truly. We send the dumbest clowns from every state, then act surprised it’s a circus.
"But you also lived through an era when Congress was supremely powerful. " Most of them just blocked things. Few actually DID anything. The attitude of people in my youth reflected an old Russian saying "God's in his heaven, and Washington is far away." For that matter, the State of NY was far away. The State police would usually not come when you called, but told you to handle it yourself. Nowadays both Federal and State governments are interfering with your business every day.
I think you nailed it with the following sentences:
"If you want to prevent a “Trump III” — or worse, a competent heir to his movement — you don’t just beat the candidate. You solve the conditions that make his pitch attractive in the first place."
Exactly.
Interesting observations about Youngkin as well. Far more palatable than Weirdo Couchbonker, but potentially even more dangerous if he embraces the authoritarian ethos--a "kinder, gentler" dictator is, after all, still a dictator. I see that his popularity, according to this site https://www.multistate.us/insider/2025/4/22/heres-what-america-thinks-of-its-governors is right in the middle (29th out of 50.) He's ineligible to run again for governor, and in an interview this past April, was cagey about the possibility of running in 2028, but he's definitely well worth keeping an eye on. Thanks for calling attention to him.
I loved a lot of this and plan to reread it with a highlighter in hand for the particularly useful guidelines and suggestions. However, a couple of observations: First (and this is the lesser of them) Youngkin is not all that popular in Virginia. His staunchest supporters seem to be folk in the southwest of the state, MAGA country, for sure. He convinced enough folk in NoVa to vote for him via dressing like them and being more or less a preppie in his bearing. But once he started spouting nonsense his appeal faded. And let's remember, please, that the Old Dominion in which I lived for many years, was once a Confederate state, and the profoundly undemocratic, racist and misogynistic views of the old South are still a strong undercurrent there, as elsewhere. Secondly, unlike any other failed democracy I can think of, we have widely distributed power, with strong state and municipal government, producing expert and experienced leaders in multiple places. I think of Turkey, with its history as seat of the Ottoman Empire, Russia, seat of the Tsars, Hungary, seat of the Otto-Hungarian Empire, anywhere in South America, only relatively recently liberated from European Colonial rule--and not very robustly, I might add. Or China, with its centuries of Imperial rule. We have a quite different history, I would say, and one which was FOUNDED on an anti-authoritarian set of beliefs. While the current order has revealed the cracks in our system of checks and balances (largely vis a supine Congress sucking at the teats of Dark Money), the structure is still there and still buttressed at the state and local level.
I spent a decade in the “Old Dominion.”
I would not underestimate Youngkin.
He’s unpopular with “NoVA,” not with “VA.” And given that Trumpers just gutted NoVA payrolls, I can picture Glenn strolling in with, “Oh no, I’ll get your jobs back!” — and suddenly, assuming they haven’t moved, pow.
To win Virginia as a Republican, you’ve got to pull off two things Democrats think are impossible:
Carry all those racist hicks in the rural counties.
(MAGA has that down cold.)
Clear at least 45% in NoVA.
Youngkin did that — not by accident, and not by being one thing to everyone. He spoke pure MAGA to the base, conservative-lite to the Beltway crowd, and something plausibly respectable for the cameras.
He doesn’t need to be beloved statewide; he already got the prize — governor. Now he’ll run the same play again:
To MAGA: “Of course we’ll go after the brown and black people — trust me.”
To the Beltway: “Of course we’ll govern responsibly.”
To the press: “Me? Nazi? Preposterous.”
The man is dangerous, deft, and disciplined. He’s the one I keep watching. Or someone just like him.
And as for the “we’re different” argument? I’m not seeing it. Americans seem fine with the glide path to full-blown Nazi. The reaction so far? Complaining about the sausage-making, not stopping the sausage factory. No general strikes. No resistance with teeth. No consequences for ICE or the goons. Just outrage theater while the dials quietly ratchet in one direction.
"Yeahbut": NoVA contains most of the population of the state, and as for Richmond and the suburbs, they're reliably blue. Tidewater might be up for grabs, but if Trump keeps appointing chodes like Hegseth to oversee military matters, and renaming our forts after undistinguished Confederate generals (of which my direct forbear was one), and you add those disgruntled white military to the brown and black and female military members, odds are fairly promising that Youngkin will lose Norfolk-Virginia Beach, too.
And William, don't you think it's a bit early to ring the death knell on the majority of Americans who don't support Trump&Co? Have you looked at the polls lately? It's early in the game for street protests, but they might swell as inflation makes itself felt. And if a real fighter with at least as many chops as Youngkin emerges (like, say Gavin Newsom) all those apathetic and angry young men might climb on the Dem bandwagon. Ordinary daydreaming is not the same as being asleep at the wheel. We have never accepted the boot of authoritarianism on our neck as an entire people, and I firmly believe we never will. Stupid pockets of us (poor whites in the antebellum South, for example) have been hoodwinked by racist fear-mongers, but not in numbers large enough to take the whole country down that rabbit hole with them.)
I have looked at the polls.
My money hasn't changed off the "Don't Pass" line.
We'll just have to agree to disagree then. And let's not either one of us pretend to know it all. It's early in the game. And it's infamously true that two people can often look at the same set of facts and come to dissimilar conclusions.
You made excellent points. I've been saying that we're living in 1930s Germany and you just reinforced that. I had never given much thought to Youngkin, but you're correct that he could well be the more successful authoritarian that Trump could never be. Although in my opinion trump is mainly a puppet run by Stephen Miller, Russell Vought and the Heritage Foundation. While he's out front creating outrage and spectacle they are quietly dismantling our system of government. And when he becomes a problem such as being publicly named in the Epstein files he will be dealt with and JD Prance will take over as puppet in chief.
100%. Well good luck whoever you are trying to take over a bunch of different kinds of people in a country 28 times bigger than Germany. There are more guns than people here like everyone already knows by heart. And some of those guys in the flea market cop ensembles looked pretty uneasy walking just the quiet streets of D.C. this week. One shabby cop impersonator in a clip called POTUS “Donald Trump” NOT president when they advised some people on a stoop to not smoke or drink outside. I will never forget where I learned the term “dry gulchers.” It was Missouri Breaks. A Western. Trump and his bloodless revolution nuts may be underestimating the geography and the actual population with all of that thinking in theory. I know we have a lot of states with many questionable groups in every state on the Southern Poverty Law Center website but most folks do not need or want to join any violent groups and actually do something violent that I have ever heard of. And I live in Killers of the Flower Moon and burn down Black Wall Street country with the “Sooners” who illegally entered during the land run, here where everybody regularly says to hell with the law. Oilies will do anything for money and land. Come what may I personally think the resistance to the bypassing of the Constitution are the smart ones and bet many are trained in many ways for any fight that may come up. In the meantime, after ten years of watching this stupid low class interloper rally and talk on and on (with the help of everybody and their dog in power for ten years) and say the same thing every single time, to me it looks like Trump and company are not the force of nature that they think they are. He sounds bad and looks bad and has for a long time. Bet the end is near. Bet people are starting to pay attention now. Bet folks counting on doing damage to other people will be disappointed. Seven months in and everyone hates Trump and company all over the world. All I am saying is I personally am not going without a big fight. I don’t care what Trump tries. He is not an inevitability. p.s. they are so dumb they think Don Junior could be president one day…and I remember when Lady G stated (like he actually knows what is up) that Lara Trump is the future of the republican party…makes me bust a gut while I cry my ass off…many thanks for the excellent education you provide and the opportunity to speak personally. I read everything you write and have learned a lot. All the best.
Not Germany, and not Italy either. The better comparison for a form of ethnic-nationalist Christian fascism is Franco’s Spain; and if you see what the neocons did to Chile in the 1980s - which they’re starting to repeat on us now - then that point is reinforced. Chile and Spain give hope, too: just as democracy was restored after Pinochet’s referendum defeat, and Franco’s death, do there is basis for hope in the USA. But it took a hell of a long time, tragically.
I agree that either you or Federico may be closer to the truth.
A truly useful piece. Thanks for the historical context.
I think that a 13th indicator might be destruction of science.
My money's on Tom Cotton.
Cotton is definitely someone to watch. I don’t think he’ll be the top guy… but he’ll be someone next go around.
I agree that the destruction of science, education, and medicine are indicators of a rising autocracy.
From a European perspective, I'd raise the score: ICE is already equivalent to the Italian Camice Nere ; there are extermination camps and threats of invasion to obtain Lebensraum.
Well the point of the taxonomy isn't to debate degree...
Do you think America is where Russia and China are?
I don't... not yet anyways.
No. Obviously : you can critics the president With NO consequences (at maximum a rant on social (nice achievement!)) , when in Russia or China it means to die.
But some steps are very bad, very dangerous and hard to be repaired.
Even those who know history are doomed to repeat it. That's what makes it so hard.
Thanks for this piece and the comments it generated. FWIW, here's a ChatGPT generated code for a radar chart of the indicators - https://chatgpt.com/share/68a4f950-e710-8010-acb5-af1a894f338d
Excellent article. I have shared it with several people and will be upgrading to paid. Question for you - is there a red line that has yet to be crossed that would be especially troubling, or move the dials substantially in the wrong direction?
https://open.substack.com/pub/notgoodenoughtospeak/p/midterms-what-midterms?r=3zzc32&utm_medium=ios
Thank you for this comprehensive explanation, Mr. Finnegan. I am not an expert, but I feel our situation may have a higher Mallen Baker score than your estimate because: 1) many components are set to trend rapidly worse, and 2) there are more clever, less insane people likely positioned to take over. That's one way to say I am more pessimistic than you.
Is it enough to stigmatise the only opposition party -- rooted in the rule of law, committed to progressive policies for improving the lives of all Americans, and with a tradition of constructive international alliances -- for not being somehow good enough to beat a roiling slew of deplorables headed by a self-aggrandising former bankrupt and convicted criminal?
have you read @jamesgreenberg latest post "The Quiet Path to a New Constitution" ? If we were to include both pieces in our thinking we are past 'solving the conditions' and at the point, perhaps, that someone said 'it will be peaceful, if they allow it' .....
I needed a clear-eyed perspective, thank you.
I am neither a Republican or Democrat and never voted for Biden or Trump. But I see Congress as the biggest obstacle to America's future. You cannot have a Republic without a functioning legislature. And America has not had one for most of my lifetime (I am 77). So no matter which of the parties wins the next election, if the President is still governing by executive orders (Royal Decrees), the Republic WILL fall. For instance, Congress hasn't passed a declaration of war since the 1940's, yet America has been at war continually by Presidential decree. Both Biden and Trump governed by royal decree, so parties really don't matter. And as the US sinks further into economic chaos which Congress refuses to address, people are going to look for a savior. I agree with you that Trump probably won't be it, might be someone entirely new, might be Vance, might be Harris. But whoever it is, Congress (and so Democracy) will be irrelevant and the nation will become a Republic in Name Only, as Rome did under the Caesars.
“Most of your lifetime” is probably right. But you also lived through an era when Congress was supremely powerful. They named the buildings on Capitol Hill after men who dominated Washington in your youth—Dirksen, Hart, Russell, Rayburn.
Not all saints. Richard Russell was a gigantic racist who would have strangled the Civil Rights movement in the crib if he could. But they were giants who slapped around presidents of both parties. Russell sank Kennedy’s civil rights approach and nearly sank Johnson’s. Dirksen, Hart, Rayburn, Russell—they wielded Congressional power as both cudgel and scalpel.
Even setting the legends aside—can you imagine Tip O’Neill dealing with Trump? Or Joe Martin, a Republican, bending over like “MAGA Mike”? Jim Wright and Tom Foley fought Reagan all day, every day. Hakeem Jeffries? I see a commission chaired by Jamie Raskin and a sternly worded letter—when what’s called for is defunding everything and dragging the Ochre Ogre out by his heels.
Your civics teacher (back when we had those) told you a lie: that the U.S. had three equal branches of government. It never did. It was built as a hierarchy—Congress supreme, the Executive as a powerful intermediary to keep the Confederacy from imploding, and the Court as an afterthought.
Newt Gingrich started strong, but ended as a punchline. We used to say when I was a Republican: “Newt’s got a lot of ideas; unfortunately, nearly all of them suck.” After Gingrich and the shutdowns against Clinton, Congress slid downhill. Hastert was a twat. Pelosi was skilled but a faint echo of Foley or Rayburn. Boehner mostly cried. Paul Ryan was a techno-putz whose lone accomplishment was servicing Trump on the tax cut. McCarthy? A gigantic putz. And Mike Johnson? Hard to imagine how he talks with Trump’s tiny weener lodged in his mouth.
After Gingrich, Congress lost the budget, lost the Republic, and stopped checking the Executive. The Federalist Papers describe January 6, 2021, as the precise event that should trigger impeachment, removal, and—ideally—worse (their words, not mine). Instead, they did nothing. And Glitch McDouchecanoe blamed us.
So yes—fuck Congress. Truly. We send the dumbest clowns from every state, then act surprised it’s a circus.
"But you also lived through an era when Congress was supremely powerful. " Most of them just blocked things. Few actually DID anything. The attitude of people in my youth reflected an old Russian saying "God's in his heaven, and Washington is far away." For that matter, the State of NY was far away. The State police would usually not come when you called, but told you to handle it yourself. Nowadays both Federal and State governments are interfering with your business every day.