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One thing @anneapplebaum and I talk about towards the end of this podcast, and that I keep coming back to, is Trump wasn't even the hard test of our institutions.
He’s not an omnicompetent autocrat demanding we choose between effective governance and liberties. He’s not a strategic autocrat who hides his narcissism or nepotism. He’s not a beautiful speaker who cloaks his lust for power in glittering ideals.
And yet, the Republican Party fell so easily to him. So what happens when a more competent, capable, would-be autocrat tries this strategy, in a party where Trump already laid the groundwork? https://www.vox.com/21562116/anne-applebaum-twilight-of-democracy-gop-trump-election-fraud-2020-biden-the-ezra-klein-show
I think people get too caught up on the "can you have Trumpism without Trump" question. There are lots of strains of autocrats and demagogues. The next one may be quite different than Trump, and if we're just looking for Trump 2.0, that may make them hard to see in time.
Political parties are crucial. As Daniel Ziblatt and others have argued, it's political parties, and how they react to autocratic threats, that decide whether societies fall. And so it's the Republican Party as an institution that worries me, not the would-be autocrats.
