AnarchoNinaAnalyzes<p>I write a lot about the reality that fascism itself, is a legalist, top-down political formulation that is very much about seizing control of the law, and then using that to install and maintain a fascist order. This runs entirely contrary to popular conceptions of fascism, which often portray the rise of a fascist movement or dictatorship, as a sort of "popular madness," where a majority of people support a fascist doctrine because of ignorance, or being deceived into doing so; or worse, the result of a "chud rush" where a bunch of "guys with guns" physically seize the halls of power and declare "it's fascism now." The reality that actually the best weapons to subvert democratic will that a fascist order has at its disposal are judges, lawyers and lawmakers, not an army of street nazis, was true in pre-war Germany, and it's true today.</p><p>Finally, it would appear that some folks are starting to notice:</p><p><a href="https://talkingpointsmemo.com/feature/intro-chesebro-docs" rel="nofollow noopener" translate="no" target="_blank"><span class="invisible">https://</span><span class="ellipsis">talkingpointsmemo.com/feature/</span><span class="invisible">intro-chesebro-docs</span></a></p><p>A lot of this article by Josh Marshall, over at Talking Points Memo (a Dem-aligned blog run by Josh Marshall) is about the particulars of Trump's Jan 6th, 2021 attempted autogolpe and how it was planned. It's a worthwhile read, but I'd just like to highlight the section that demonstrates exactly what I'm talking about in terms of the legalist nature of a fascist takeover, and how that sort of thing actually happens in reality, rather than popular imagination:</p><p>"The trove provides a definitive account of how a small group of attorneys, dedicated to Trump, designed and tried to implement the portion of the coup attempt which unfolded via legal arguments. They burnished the former president’s efforts with a veneer of respectability that at times masked their radicalism: This portion of the effort to reverse Trump’s loss did not proceed via loud claims of voter fraud or through Sidney Powell’s promise of a “Kraken” lawsuit that would wipe her enemies away, nor did it move forward through the actions of mobs and street thugs primed to seize the Capitol on Jan. 6.</p><p>Rather, the attorneys involved all had extensive experience in the practice of law. Chesebro is a Harvard Law graduate who spent much of his early career working on appellate cases with liberal commentator and Harvard Law professor Larry Tribe. John Eastman was a longtime conservative movement attorney who had been dean of Chapman University Law School. Others, like Pennsylvania attorney Bruce Marks, had built careers out of an extensive civil practice."</p><p>And I mean, yeah, yeah "not all lawyers" but that isn't the point here. The point is that when fascism comes to your door, it's going to be there because a bunch of guys with law degrees have twisted the rules to make fascism not only legal, but the only law of the land. That's how it always works. That's why Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. himself said "we should never forget that everything Adolph Hitler did in Germany was "legal"... What you saw on January 6th, was merely the public facing of a plot to abuse the law, for the purposes of overturning an election; and it's a pretty good preview of just how Trump, his cronies, and the folks behind Project 2025, mean to bring overt fascist rule to America after this next election.</p><p><a href="https://social.treehouse.systems/tags/Fascism" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Fascism</span></a> <a href="https://social.treehouse.systems/tags/Legalism" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Legalism</span></a> <a href="https://social.treehouse.systems/tags/ItCanHappenHere" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>ItCanHappenHere</span></a> <a href="https://social.treehouse.systems/tags/Chesebro" class="mention hashtag" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">#<span>Chesebro</span></a></p>