'Observe, Orient, Decide, and Act: Notes on Preserving the American Republic'
"We’re in the midst of an authoritarian takeover of the U.S. government. It’s been coming and coming, and not everybody is prepared to read it that way. The characters regarded as people to emulate, like Orban and Putin and so on, all indicate that the strategy is to create an illiberal democracy or an authoritarian democracy or a strongman democracy. That’s what we’re experiencing. Our problem in part is a failure of imagination. We cannot get ourselves to see how this is going to unfold in its most frightening versions. You neutralize the branches of government; you neutralize the media; you neutralize universities, and you’re on your way."
"That means that if we’re political people, if we care about the American Republic, if we care about this country, everything we do right now has to be guided toward defeating this takeover. These aren’t one and done things. It’s complicated. It’s often incremental, albeit sometimes unfolding very fast. Gains can be reversed. In the political realm it’s almost a zero sum game with the power of the Democratic Party, simply because that’s the one organized political force in the country that can contest the takeover in the political arena. You may say you’re done with the Democratic Party. And fine … but if you are you’re just going to have to reassemble the more or less identical coalition under a different label. So the difference doesn’t terribly concern me."
"I don’t want to re-litigate the events of last week in the Senate. That’s done and you know where I stood. What is still worth saying is that you should have made your decision (and all such future decisions) about the right course of action based on which one was more likely to slow, impede or defeat what Bollinger rightly calls 'an authoritarian takeover' of the US government."
"This is where we are. Observe, orient, decide, act. The side which acts faster and smarter wins."
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/observe-orient-decide-and-act-notes-on-preserving-the-american-republic
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