Right from the start we’ve struggled to define the Trump Administration’s particular brand of populism. Chaos. Authoritarianism. A con. A cult. An alternate reality. White nationalism. Fascism.

Finally we just called it Trumpism.

On January 6 we saw it for what it really is. Mob rule.

It took the brutalization of one of our most sacred democratic shrines to understand that. But look back over the past four years. Trump’s populist rhetoric has always been a thin veneer over something that operated more on the level of the barbarians sacking Rome.

Now the veneer is off. The lies spread by the president and his party have come home to roost. The Trumpists have stormed the gates. We’re left with the painful image of invaders standing in the chambers of the House and Senate. Some actually wearing horns and animal hides. …

You would think that after reading Malcolm Nance’s books and listening to him over the last four years, I would have learned to trust his predictions. He warned of the coming MAGA terrorist attack about two weeks ago on “The Stephanie Miller Show.” Nance, a retired intelligence officer, was one of the first to sound the alarm about Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s ties to President Donald Trump. He also warned of the Russian-led influence campaign which had “hacked Americans’ minds” and convinced them to associate Hillary Clinton with emails and corruption, and overlook Trump’s checkered past. …

So, it finally happened. The president of the United States launched a terrorist attack against his own country. And the U.S. confirmed it’s status as a third world country to the entire world. Of course, many experts and writers have warned of this for years. I knew Trump was a Russian agent five years ago and that’s why I was devastated when he won the presidency.

I also saw the signs of Trump's dictatorial tendencies. I called him a wannabe dictator and said he reminded me of African despots in a 2018 column. I’ve interviewed experts, such as Yale psychiatrist Dr. Brandy Lee, who said Trump was similar to criminal patients she’d worked with. She compared him to a mentally-ill person with a cache of weapons. I interviewed Dr. Ruth Ben-Ghiat, an expert in fascism who predicted Trump wouldn’t leave willingly. And I also talked to Steve Hassan, a cult deprogrammer, who said Trump had brainwashed the MAGA cult. Wednesday was the end product of five years of willful ignorance and enabling. We witnessed a mob of deranged cultists, conspiracy theorists and white supremacists invade the Capitol in an attempt to overthrow the government. …

You would think that after years of monitoring right-wing media, it would be impossible to shock me. But I’m always surprised. I know the right-wing entertainment machine isn’t journalism. It’s well-packaged propaganda designed to keep people in a conservative bubble, but still …

On Monday, I saw an article from Newsmax that contained all the previously mentioned issues. The article was clearly not journalism. It was anti-journalism, designed to keep people ignorant. After The Washington Post released a recording that placed President Donald Trump’s criminality above President Richard Nixon’s, a Newsmax story claimed it was no big deal.

Another ‘Perfect Call’

“If you listened to it, it’s totally fine,” said host Greg Kelly. “Remember, he said the phone call with the Ukraine president was perfect? It was, and so is this. They are so bad, so bad and trying to make this an issue.” …

#1: There’s no such thing as a good Republican.

On January 6th, 2021, as Congress was in the process of certifying Republican President Donald Trump’s defeat, thousands of Republicans attacked the capital resulting in a lockdown, delay, and four deaths.

For months prior to this, Republican politicians openly supported the idea of contesting the election results to prevent Trump from leaving office, while dozens of Republican attorneys, legislators, and donors actively campaigned to change the outcome of the election.

For decades prior to this, Republicans have courted white supremacy, adopted fascist foreign policy programs, and worked to undermine democracy. In 2000, Republican President Bush came to power on a wave of fascist riots seeking to prevent a full and fair vote count and used his term in office to grow the movement of white conservative evangelicals who attempted a coup on January 6th. …

Earlier this week, U.K. judge Vanessa Bararitser blocked the extradition of Julian Assange to the U.S., citing “extreme risk of suicide.” The judge said that extradition to the U.S. “would be unjust and oppressive by reason of Mr. Assange’s mental condition,” due to the conditions he would likely face if imprisoned here. While this was indeed good news, it was a brief and bittersweet victory.

To begin with, as Jonathan Cook pointed out in an article on Popular Resistance, the judge’s rejection of the extradition was based on “what was effectively a technicality.” It almost appears as though this may have simply been a delaying tactic, as the judge seems to have not had any problem with the U.S. prosecution’s request itself. …

I took a break from writing on Medium over the Holiday season. And over the weekend, I was searching for ideas for a column. I should have known better. Even in the waning days of Donald Trump’s idiocracy, there’s always an hourly scandal. And on Sunday, The Washington Post’s recording of Trump’s phone call with Georgia election officials dropped.

Alex Jones on crack

The recording, which was deliberately leaked, is vintage Trump. I listened to the full recording, and it’s one hour of Trump gaslighting, threatening Georgia election officials and spouting conspiracy theories that sound like Alex Jones on crack. He sounded like your crazy uncle before he gets carted off to the nursing home. …

One of the country’s longstanding negative sociocultural traits could be hindering its ability to recover from the pandemic

In early January 2021, Brazil ranks second in global deaths caused by COVID-19 (196 thousand) and third in terms of confirmed infections by the Sars-CoV-2 virus (7.7 million) among all countries. This is obviously not good news. Besides the current sanitary crisis imposed to virtually all nations of the world, Brazil has been particularly affected by an economic recession (2014–2016), persistent unemployment ever since, a track record of major corruption scandals leading to a significant ethical crisis, and a notable trend of increasing polarization and divisiveness within the society, which culminated in the election of right-wing and denialist president Jair Bolsonaro in 2018. All this could be interpreted as causes for the situation in which the country finds itself today. …