Thread by @dcpetterson

I wrote this a year ago today. Still true:

Republicans have worked for 40 years to demolish the federal government. In Trump, they found a wrecking ball to accomplish their dreams.

The lack of any sane response to the pandemic is one inevitable and entirely foreseeable result.

Trump is an acute symptom of the disease of Reaganite Fascism. America became infected with this plague the day Ronald Reagan declared, "The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, 'I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'"

Since that day, the GOP has existed for one purpose only: to dismantle "the government".

All Republican propaganda is geared toward that goal:

from maligning "big government" to denying the conclusions of federal scientists;

from tax cuts designed to starve domestic programs to doctoring intelligence and thus triggering Middle-eastern wars;

from repealing regulations to attacking "activists judges" (and then packing the courts with criminally unqualified ideologues).

Republicans support Trump, because Trump carries out their goal of destroying governance.

Why do Reaganite Fascists hate government? Because the government of the United States of America exists for one purpose only: to limit the power of feudal overlords.

Back in the eighteenth century, the only form of "government" that existed in modern nations was dictatorial monarchy (though some nations, like England, tried to limit monarchical rule through a parliament, which still was dominated by the House of Feudal Lords).

The American nation founded itself on a different principle: that government should be run by The People, consist of The People, and should govern for The People.

The People, in this view, should no longer be considered the property of feudal lords.

Decisions should not be made for the benefit of The Lords. Decisions should be made by and for The People.

Yes, the execution of this idea was startlingly flawed. Some people--particularly women and African slaves--were still considered property.

But in theory and in design, even such flaws as that could be corrected when The People chose to do so. See, for instance, the Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Nineteenth Amendments.

The point is, the =entire reason= for America was to limit the power of feudal lords, and to put governance into the hands of The People.

Reaganite Fascists are the modern equivalent of feudal lords.

This means American government exists for the =sole purpose= of limiting the power of men like Reaganite Fascists.

This is why they lie to you about what "government" means. It's why they tell you "government" is your enemy. Because it's =their= enemy.

They lie and tell you the Constitution is designed to "limit the power of the federal government."

No.

The Constitution is designed to limit the power of feudal lords, by making the federal government into an arm of We the People, and giving it =absolute= power.

American government exists to do whateverthefuk We The People want, need, desire, and command.

In the present case, the federal government should be doing whateverthefuk is needed to combat the worst pandemic in more than a century.

But Reaganite Fascists have spent forty years demolishing American government, in order to allow them to do whatever they want TO YOU.

The result is that the mechanism to respond to a crisis in a way that serves The People no longer exists.

This is the world Republicans have been building. This is the America Republicans want. This is what they have been pursuing with all their might since fascist feudal monarchists seized control of their party with the election of Ronald Reagan.

This is the war we, as Americans, must fight.

It's not going to be enough to defeat Trump and replace him with Joe Biden, though that is an absolute moral necessity.

We must defeat Republicans on all levels with such force as to decimate their ability to recover.

We must drive these fascist monarchists back into their slimeholes, and then must remain ever vigilant, every election thereafter, and on every form of social media from Twitter to the corner soapbox, to never again let their anti-Americanism become acceptable discourse.

This is the task for the Twenty-First Century: to realize the dream of our Founders in the late Eighteenth, to make America truly into a nation run by We The People, rescued from the clutches of hereditary fascist lordships.

America has no King. America needs no King.