Trump’s downfall
Fascist capitalism will do him in
Friends,
I’m old enough to remember when American politics was divided between those who wanted less government (they were called “conservatives,” or the Right) and those who wanted more social safety nets (called “progressives,” or the Left).
It’s hard to find Right or Left these days. Instead we have something no one has ever seen in America — a personal takeover of nearly all the institutions of government and, increasingly, the private sector, by a would-be dictator.
Trump is on the way to occupying Democratic-led cities with the Army, National Guard, and ICE — in what appears to be a dress rehearsal for the 2026 midterms.
He’s telling Republican states to super-gerrymander in order to squeeze out more Republican seats in Congress, to help retain Republican control of the House after the 2026 midterm elections.
He’s trying to silence criticism from universities, museums, law firms, and the media. And targeting critics for prosecution, such as Adam Schiff and John Bolton.
But that’s hardly all of it.
At the same time, Trump is taking personal control of the U.S. economy.
He’s trying to control the Federal Reserve Board, threatening Jerome Powell with unflattering stories about his expenditures on the Fed’s building. He has fired Fed governor Lisa Cook on dubious legal grounds.
He’s imposing his will on key industries, from semi-conductors to steel.
He’s given the chip giants Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices export licenses to sell their semiconductors to China on condition that they pay the U.S. government 15 percent of what they make on those sales. (Not incidentally, Trump has reported substantial personal holdings in Nvidia.)
He’s converting nearly $11 billion of grants that the government had given Intel (part of the Biden administration’s CHIPS and Science Act) into a 10 percent stake in the company, worth $8.9 billion, held by the government. Presumably, this would let Trump decide on its CEO.
His White House has even created a scorecard that rates American corporations on how loyal they are to Trump. Corporations with “strong” ratings (among them, Uber, DoorDash, United, Delta, AT&T, and Cisco) are to be rewarded with tax and regulatory benefits, while “low” rated corporations could face retribution ranging from lawsuits to damaging executive orders, harsh regulations, and unbridled scorn from Trump.
Before they poured money into Trump’s initiatives and PACs, many Big Tech corporations were facing federal investigations and enforcement actions. Those investigations and lawsuits are now being dropped.
Trump’s import taxes (tariffs) are the results of individual deals between Trump and particular countries, as well as between Trump and big American corporations. So far, America’s trading partners have agreed to invest over $1 trillion in the American economy. Who will oversee such investments? Trump.
In sum, an increasing part of our economy is no longer being determined by supply and demand but by the deals Trump is striking.
Authoritarian regimes rely on vast bureaucracies to control industry, as does China’s Xi Jinping.
But the new order being imposed on American industry doesn’t come from a vast authoritarian bureaucracy. It’s personal and arbitrary. A single so-called “strongman” is seeking to control everything.
I don’t know the proper term for this. State capitalism? Fascist capitalism?
Whatever we call it, it will be Trump’s downfall because his arbitrary and mercurial decisions are making the private sector nervous about investing in the U.S. economy, causing global lenders to demand a higher risk premium for lending to the U.S., and pushing the economy toward both inflation and recession — so-called “stagflation.”
If nothing else brings him down, his authoritarian control over the economy surely will.
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Just a reminder that my new memoir, Coming Up Short, can be found wherever you buy books. You can also support local bookstores nationally by ordering the book at bookshop.org.
My fellow Americans,
In this moment of profound national sorrow, I reach out to you not as a partisan, but as a daughter of a Korean War POW who endured unimaginable hardships for the freedoms we hold dear, and as the mother of a disabled Marine who sacrificed his well-being in service to this country. My heart is shattered—gutted—by the chaos unfolding before us, a chaos born from one man’s refusal to confront the darkness he has long evaded. President Trump’s decision to deploy the National Guard to 19 states, turning our brave troops against their own citizens amid the unrest he himself ignited, is an abomination that betrays the very soul of our democracy. Our soldiers are warriors trained for battlefields abroad, not enforcers quelling the righteous cries of a people demanding truth and justice at home. This is not protection; it is suppression, and it must end.
Let us set aside, for now, the burdens of tariffs that strain our families, the shadows of conflict in Russia and Ukraine, Iraq, Iran, and the Congo, the dismantling of USAID that abandons the vulnerable worldwide, and even the intrusion of Elon Musk—a South African outsider—into our sacred social programs, eroding the safety nets that sustain us. These are wounds enough, but the final, unbearable straw—the one that has broken the back of our fragile democracy—is Jeffrey Epstein. The refusal to release those damning files, shrouded in secrecy despite promises of transparency, has unleashed a torrent of anguish that no lie can contain. When Pam Bondi dismissed it all as “nothing there to see,” she didn’t just insult our intelligence; she ignited a firestorm, crashing Trump’s poll numbers as the American people awoke to the betrayal. We know better. We know the truth lingers in those shadows, implicating the powerful and protecting the guilty.
This is not merely about Epstein’s victims, though their pain is a scar on our collective conscience. It reverberates through every sexual assault survivor—myself included, haunted by memories that resurface in this denial of justice; my children included, inheriting a world where truth is traded for power. We are all diminished, all violated anew, by a system that shields predators while silencing the brave. This utter nonsense must cease. It is ridiculous, it is heartbreaking, and it is utterly undeniable: our nation deserves better than division sown by deceit.
I implore you, my fellow citizens, to stand united—not in anger alone, but in unwavering resolve. Demand the light of truth, the release of those files, and the withdrawal of our troops from our streets. For the sake of our heroes past and present, for our children, and for the democracy we cherish, let us heal this rift with courage and compassion. America is stronger than this storm—we must prove it now.
Fact, there is crime in our cities, the majority of which are committed by "our own" citizens, not the result of immigrants breaking the law. During the Biden administration some 12 million immigrants crossed over our Southern border. Looking at the illegal acts this hoard may have committed, the total number of serious criminal convictions among undocumented immigrants remains a tiny fraction of the estimated 12 million who crossed while Biden was President. That equates to a shocking 0.08% of the immigrants who Trump is so obsessed with deporting committed a high level crime in this country, yet he wants to deport them all. Trump is in love with "AI" so I went to his buddy and offered the following comparison: Looking at a study group consisting of 100,000 individuals from both sources, which group is more likely to commit a high level crime? Research consistently shows that immigrants—including undocumented individuals—are less likely to commit crimes than U.S.-born citizens. If Trump wants to reduce crime levels in our country the fool is looking in the wrong direction. It's our own people who are breaking the laws, not the immigrants who came here looking to build a better life. ICE is nothing more than Trump's version of the gestapo under Hitler. The birth of the 4th Reich is establishing a foothold in this country, and degenerates like the fools who attacked our capitol are in it up to their chins. Trump maintains the immigrants in this country who he intends to deport are the "very worst criminals." Donnie, after looking at your buddy's figures I have come to the conclusion that the real criminals in this country are members of the group you just recently pardoned for their disgraceful conduct on 1/6. You want to deport filth, let's begin with them.