Religious Fundamentalism and Fascism: Ideologies dependent on enemies and fears.
The President of the United States delivered a July 4 speech yesterday. As always, Donald J Trump made the holiday and all the 250th Birthday celebrations about himself. What else is a narcissistic demented aged sociopath supposed to do? What else could we expect from an entitled, insecure, incompetent, illiterate, imbecilic old fool? Who else but a life-long sexual predator, liar, grifter, thief, and fraudster would steal the nation’s celebration, undo and ruin decade-long preparations that he inherited when he stepped into a second term in office? If we wanted a shyster who would destroy everything like a spoiled four-year old child, we picked the right man.
But Trump’s tantrums, bad behaviors, illegal and unethical antics were no surprise to any Americans who’ve paid attention to MAGA politics, the True Believers, and their leader. He’s the ugliest boor America has ever put into the Oval Office. He never hid who he truly is.
The surprise is that the Republican party continues to watch the child destroy everything. Though I keep going back to Donald being the party’s Useful Idiot, something tugs at me and says, But they are watching total destruction. Like Winston Churchill’s policy of Germany’s total destruction before its surrender, the Republican party -- successful as they’ve been in enacting Project 2025 – seems willing to destroy the country and party they love before they surrender to voters who want better. They seem powerless to save themselves from the evil child’s whims.
So, which is it? 1) Donald J Trump is their Useful Idiot and they let him do as he pleases while they control most policy levers in local and national governments or 2) The Useful Idiot and his billionaire friends like Musk et al now control the Republican party and are as willing to destroy the Republican party as they are willing to destroy the Constitution, our democracy, the Democratic party, dissent, resistance movements, socialism and progress. The answer lies in yesterday’s speech.
In a speech that should have praised the nation for its 250 years of progress, innovation, liberty, justice, and democracy, the POTUS railed against “the Communist threat” and promised to “exterminate” the vermin. Instead of raising Americans’ beliefs in freedom, equality, justice, and prosperity for all, the POTUS raised a new enemy and new threats to the work the Republican party intends to complete. Instead of promising to stand by all Americans in their pursuit of happiness and liberty and justice, the POTUS promised to eradicate the communist threat that intends to destroy the American way of life.
Instead of uniting Americans, he pitted one against the others. Instead of praising the valor of all Americans who already help each other and demand that governments do more for all Americans, he rebuked and condemned Americans for committing to government policies (per recent votes and elected offices) that would raise Americans from poverty and hunger, empower workers and unions, make home ownership a reality again, help farmers, reshape and renew urban areas, provide free and affordable healthcare and education…everything the Republican party despises. His speech was about hatred, divide, revenge, retaliation, and war.
To whom was yesterday’s speech directed? To Americans who believe so innately in white Christian entitlement that they’d willingly destroy others to advance themselves. To Americans who believe so strongly in their fundamentalist interpretation of the Bible that they’d willingly give up ‘separation of church and state’ to destroy the influence of other religious beliefs and practices. To American billionaires and millionaires who so adamantly believe in their wealth and status that they’d willingly oppress the poor and lower classes and thereby prevent having to share their wealth. To America’s uneducated and willingly ignorant masses who need someone else to blame for their insecurities, poverty, failures, and resentments. To Independent voters and apathetic non-voters who need more reason to stay away from politics…because what is the purpose…are not all fascists, socialists, communists, and American politicians jumping into bed with one another?
To all the White Male Christian Supremacists, White Evangelical Fundamentalists, White Survivalists, Republican Oligarchs, and Far Right Influencers out there, Your new enemy is a communist. Your enemy is anyone who opposes the work the Republican party is doing now. Your enemy is an immigrant, a liberal woman, a Democrat, a Black man. Your enemy is anyone outside the Republican party who demands accountability and causes dissent. Your enemy is vermin because they are beneath us.
Once we understand who the audience is, we can bombard everyone else with Truth. Once we understand who the audience is, we can bombard that audience with ridicule, shame, facts, and resistance.
Certain groups cannot be reached with truth and facts. Religious fundamentalists believe they are chosen by God and for God. All others are The Enemy. White supremacists believe in their natural entitlement to all power and wealth. They are afraid that everyone else intends to steal their stuff and kill them. The wealthiest people believe that they earned all their wealth and privilege and hence, that all the poor and struggling folks also deserve what they have and don’t have. People with great power in the Republican party believe that the nation can only endure when they use their power to enrich themselves and oppress others.
The Christian Nationalists, Proud Boys, wealthy white evangelicals, KKK, Federalist Society, and other toxic far-right cultist thinkers of our country will not trade their power for policies that benefit all people.
During the three decades of the post WWII era, the Republican party expended great effort and resources to “eradicate the communist threat.” They failed repeatedly to convince all Americans that communists are the supreme enemy. Republicans continued to lose elections and power over those three decades. President Nixon was the acme of the party’s era of shame. Then along came a Trojan Horse in the shape of White Christianity.
Following a national backlash from white supremacists to the Civil Rights and Voting Rights laws of the 1960s and 70s, white fundamentalists finally began to organize. They left the Democratic party throughout the Southern and Middle states and joined with the Republican party to eradicate the feminist-liberal-Black-atheist-Democratic-nonconformist-communist-Nothern elitist-hippie Californian-Hollywood-nontraditionalist threats to the American way of life. Americans bought into it. The enemy was no longer simply a communist sympathizer. The enemy was someone you already disliked and distrusted.
This strategy worked. It worked so well since the 1980s that the Democratic party seemed oblivious to the growing strength, boldness, and resourcefulness of white supremacy among voters, institutions, both political parties, and the wealthy class. Project 2025 was a written culmination of that strategy. The Republican party used the Idiot but, the Idiot is both a result of the Republican strategy and its most beloved leader. Donald J Trump did not write his speech; Republicans wrote it. Republican leaders are not returning to the triteness of the Communist Threat as political strategy. They are throwing shit at the wall to see what sticks.
Fascism cannot exist without enemies. It is a system sans truthful or reasonable substance. Therefore, the Republican party sees Democratic Socialists winning recent elections, sees the internal struggle in the Democratic party, sees the usefulness of giant emotional distractions from the Republican party’s failures and trump’s fiascoes, and decides to grab the moment.
Will this new strategy work? I’m not losing sleep, but I am losing purposeful energy and aging too quickly. I don’t trust my fellow Americans. But I know there is no one else to trust or help us. We cannot rely on Democratic party leaders, the judiciary, religious leaders, institutions, elections, or Americans are exceptional people stories. So we must save ourselves or die trying to.
Let us determine to make their strategies utterly useless and ignoble.