Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

“A king is only a king if we bow down.” – Rev. William Barber

Trump’s cabinet: like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

The truth is, these are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand.

The fundamental promise of conservatism all over the world is a return to an idealized past that never existed.

Giving in to doom is how we fail to fight for ourselves & one another.

It’s pointless to bring up problems that can only be solved with a time machine.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Dear media: perhaps we ought to let Donald Trump speak for himself!

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

It’s the corruption, stupid.

Their shamelessness is their super power.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

There are some who say that there are too many strawmen arguments on this blog.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

We can’t confuse what’s necessary to win elections with the policies that we want to implement when we do.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

There are times when telling just part of the truth is effectively a lie.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

“I was told there would be no fact checking.”

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Open Thread: Could’ve Been An Email

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oh dear lol

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— First Wordle Problems (@fwordleproblems.bsky.social) September 30, 2025 at 10:46 AM

At last, Jeb Bush has his revenge! Per the company paper, in the town where the monopoly industry is national politics [gift link]:

Live updates: President Donald Trump on Tuesday defended the administration’s use of the military to police U.S. cities, decrying “the enemy within” and citing presidents early in the country’s history who “used the armed forces to keep domestic order and peace.” His comments came during an address to hundreds of senior U.S. military officers during an extraordinary meeting that has placed many of the Pentagon’s top generals and admirals in one room. Earlier, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth pledged to fix “decades of decay” in the military, which he blamed on “foolish and reckless politicians.” The gathering, at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia, was ordered by Hegseth last week and required some top military officers across the globe to fly thousands of miles on short notice to attend…

11:30am
Bannon says Trump looked tired during address to military leaders…

10:49am
The Pentagon’s top generals and admirals listened with little visible emotion as President Donald Trump spoke, keeping with military protocol as their commander in chief sought to elicit reaction, according to pool reports.

One naval officer took notes while others sat silently. Laughter occasionally followed a joke, but Trump’s attacks on former president Joe Biden were met with silence…

9:56am
President Donald Trump, who draws energy off of instantaneous feedback, seems quite affected by an audience that is largely silent. His remarks appear to be delivered in half-speed, in a monotone. And for a president who complained about a malfunctioning Teleprompter last week at the United Nations, there is little indication that he is following the one in the room as he leaps from disparate topics that have little relevance to the military brass there…

9:45am
Met by silence, Trump asks for applause
… “I’ve never walked into a room so silent before,” Trump said, appearing uncomfortable in the quiet room.

He continued: “If you want to applaud, you applaud.”

The military follows strict customs and courtesies, which includes showing deference and respect to the commander in chief and refraining from showing approval or disapproval of political statements.

“Just feel nice and loose, okay?” Trump said. “Because we’re all on the same team.”

“I was told that, ‘Sir, you won’t hear a murmur in the room,’” Trump continued. “I said we had to loosen these guys up a little bit.”

9:39am
Trump says he will fire military officials who aren’t ‘warriors’
President Donald Trump touted firings this year within the military — and vowed to continue to let officials go if he doesn’t “like” them.

“What we have now is the best,” Trump said to reporters outside the White House, before leaving to address military leaders in Quantico, Virginia. He described certain Defense leaders during his first term as “bad ones,” including former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley, and former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis. “And if I don’t like somebody, I’m going to fire them right on the spot.”

Trump described the generals gathered in Quantico as “our real warriors.”

“And when they’re not good, when we don’t think they’re our warriors, you know what happened? We say you’re fired. Get out.”…

"This could have been a Truth Social Post."

— MariedeGournay (@mariedegournay.bsky.social) September 30, 2025 at 10:27 AM

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Did anybody else catch the part where he told them they were free to leave, “but there goes your rank?” 🤬

— Be Jay, Do Crimes (@templinjay.bsky.social) September 30, 2025 at 10:03 AM

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But the generals look… very impressed, don’t they?

I'd be curious to know who much it cost the American taxpayers to flying generals in from all over the world so Pete Hegseth and Donald Trump would have a captive audience to witness their weird and dangerous witlessness live.

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— Mrs. Betty Bowers (@mrsbettybowers.bsky.social) September 30, 2025 at 3:39 PM

Open Thread: Could’ve Been An EmailPost + Comments (78)

The Dangerous Toddler Needs to be Reined In

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Apparently spell check doesn’t know when to use reigned in vs. reined in. It keeps telling me I have misspelled that word, which I don’t believe I have, unless everything I know is wrong.

Breaking: President declares war on his own country.

Things are getting dangerous out here. Day by day, Gov. Pritzker sounds the alarm a little more loudly and a little more clearly.

Maybe for the cheap seats, I guess, who don’t understand how dangerous these times are for democracy?

To Donald Trump:

Stop using military troops and ICE to invade and disrupt American cities.

Stop calling your political opponents “enemies” of the US.

Stop attacking the 1st Amendment.

Our troops and our nation deserve better than you acting as a petty tyrant.

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— Governor JB Pritzker (@govpritzker.illinois.gov) September 30, 2025 at 10:01 AM


.

People of Illinois, we need your help.

Get your cell phones out – record what you see. Put it on social media. Peacefully ask for badge numbers and identification. Speak up for your neighbors.

We need to let the world know this is happening – and that we won’t stand for it.

— Governor JB Pritzker (@govpritzker.illinois.gov) September 29, 2025 at 9:47 PM


.

As for reports from the White House LIES from the White House that the Dems put something in writing that Jeffries said is outright illegal, may I suggest something clarifying in writing, at the next meeting, if there ever is another one?

Fuck you.  Strong letter to follow.

(Yeah, there’s a reason I would never make it in politics. Probably a hundred of them)

*****

Rick Wilson has a good, short take.

It really was that entirely insane. Trump is not well mentally or physically, and the speech posed a moral challenge to America’s military leadership.

Would you turn the key for a man with these obvious mental infirmities?

The Bulwark coined the phrase:

Fat, disoriented Elvis

Which I have added as a category named simply “Disoriented Elvis”.

Personally, I am particularly interested in hearing thoughts related to the speech posing a moral challenge to America’s military leadership.

Open thread.

Updated to say that I have temporarily changed the tag to Disoriented Orange Satan until we can come up with the correct words to follow “Disoriented”.

The Dangerous Toddler Needs to be Reined InPost + Comments (175)

Truth or Consequences (Open Thread)

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Same channel, minutes apart:

Mike Johnson on CNBC claims that Democrats "put it in writing" during their meeting yesterday that they want health insurance for undocumented migrants as a demand for averting a shutdown

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) September 30, 2025 at 8:13 AM

Johnson claims there’s written evidence to support his assertion.

CNBC: Is it true that you want to restore American taxpayer benefits to illegal immigrants.

JEFFRIES: This is also an outright lie. Federal law prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars to provide medical coverage to undocumented individuals. That's the law.

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) September 30, 2025 at 9:30 AM

Jeffries says Johnson’s claim is an “outright lie.”

If only there were some group of professionals whose job it is to look at the evidence and tell folks who’s lying and who’s telling the truth.

Open thread.

Truth or Consequences (Open Thread)Post + Comments (226)

Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Looming

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More than 100,000 federal workers are going to formally resign tomorrow, the largest such mass event in US history.
This is part of a Trump program to dramatically gut the federal workforce.
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025…

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— More Perfect Union (@moreperfectunion.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 11:38 AM

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Schumer after his meeting with Trump: "We have very large differences on healthcare and on their ability to undo whatever budget we agree to through rescissions and through impoundment."

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— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar.com) September 29, 2025 at 4:39 PM

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Republicans are on vacation, democrats are here working seems like an important message

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— @NewsJennifer (Jennifer Schulze) (@newsjennifer.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 9:44 PM

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If there’s one thing that is fairly well creased into American politics, it’s that the Democrats are the people who want the government open and working.

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— Clean Observer (@hammbear2024.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 10:14 PM


 
Recap, per the Washington Post [gift link]: “Government shutdown set to begin overnight as Congress hits impasse”

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Tuesday Morning Open Thread: LoomingPost + Comments (253)

Late Night Open Thread: Pete Hegseth, WARFIGHTER!

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They said Hegseth is becoming increasingly “obsessed” with his own security and exhibits frenzied behavior, such as fidgeting and pacing during meetings.
“Dude is crawling out of his skin,” another source said.

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— Jason "Red5" Lyall (@jaylyall.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 4:56 PM

War with his personal demons, it sounds like. Wonder if he’ll bring his ball bearings to fondle at the meeting?

… The defense secretary—who prefers the moniker “Secretary of War”—is being described by staffers as “manic,” erupting into fits of rage and tumultuous tirades, the Daily Mail reported on Monday.

While he has reportedly always been temperamental, two staffers claim the former Fox News star’s mental state has reached new, frenzied heights after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk earlier this month…

Also under scrutiny are Hegseth’s extensive personal security demands, which, according to the paper, are now straining the Army agency responsible for protecting him. The Army’s Criminal Investigation Division (CID) has reportedly pulled agents away from criminal probes in order to safeguard Hegseth’s residences in Minnesota, Tennessee, and Washington, D.C.

Sources told the Mail that those security measures have, in part, been driven by Hegseth’s [third] wife, former Fox News producer Jennifer Rauchet Hegseth, whose requests for protection go “far beyond” what’s been granted to other Trump administration officials…

 

More importantly, if your objective is regime consolidation over the military, then bringing together 800 irritated top officers is the worst possible idea. They wouldn’t normally conspire electronically, but stranding them together during a govt shutdown gives them time to talk & compare notes.??

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— Sanho Tree (@sanho.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 5:58 PM

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Breaking WaPo:
Military leaders have raised serious concerns with the Trump admin's new defense strategy — exposing a divide between the Pentagon's political and uniformed leadership.
?The critiques from multiple top officers, including the chairman of the Joint Chiefs.

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— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 7:55 PM

Great photo choice, yes? Gift link:

… The critiques from multiple top officers, including Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, come as Hegseth reorders U.S. military priorities — centering the Pentagon on perceived threats to the homeland, narrowing U.S. competition with China, and downplaying America’s role in Europe and Africa.

President Donald Trump will attend the abrupt gathering of generals and admirals at Marine Corps Base Quantico, where Hegseth is expected to deliver remarks on military standards and the “warrior ethos,” even as uniformed leaders fear mass firings or a drastic reorganization of the combatant command structure and the military hierarchy.

The debate over the National Defense Strategy — the Pentagon’s primary guide for how it prioritizes resources and positions U.S. forces around the world — is the latest challenge for top military officials navigating the Trump administration’s unorthodox approach to the armed forces.

People familiar with the editing process, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe sensitive deliberations, described a growing sense of frustration with a plan they consider myopic and potentially irrelevant, given the president’s highly personal and sometimes contradictory approach to foreign policy…

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War for Ukraine Day 1,313: Z’chor Babyn Yar!

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Picture of the ravine at Babin Yar, Ukraine

(The ravine at Babyn Yar)

Today is the 84th anniversary of the Babyn Yar massacre.

Today, Ukraine commemorates the Babyn Yar massacre – one of WWII’s darkest chapters.

In Sept 1941, Nazis executed tens of thousands, mainly Kyiv’s Jews, along with Roma, POWs, and civilians.

Babyn Yar stands as a symbol of Holocaust horrors. We remember to prevent history from repeating.

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— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 12:07 PM

Here is the press release I was sent by email from the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center:

Amid War in Ukraine, Historic Discovery at Babyn Yar

Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center Finds Over 1,000 Previously Unidentified Babyn Yar Victims

Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center Finds Over 1,000 Previously Unidentified Babyn Yar Victims

On 84th anniversary of the massacre, names read aloud at the massacre site for the first time; new discoveries made possible through unprecedented archival access and digitization during wartime

KYIV, Ukraine – September 29, 2025 – On the 84th anniversary of the Babyn Yar massacre, the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center (BYHMC) revealed today the names of more than 1,000 newly identified victims, read aloud for the first time in a ceremony at the massacre site that included the Jewish Kaddish memorial prayer. Despite the ongoing war in Ukraine and the difficult security conditions, researchers have restored the names of 1,031 individuals whose fate was previously unknown.

The discovery is part of a wider progress report presented by BYHMC. As of today, the museum’s database contains 29,671 names of victims, enriched with details such as ages, addresses, relatives, professions, and circumstances of death. Among the more than 1,000 newly identified names are victims as young as nine months old and as old as 102, underscoring the indiscriminate nature of the massacre. Since the war began, more than 2,000 existing records have also been updated and corrected.

Babyn Yar is the largest killing site outside the Nazi camps – the blood-soaked ravine in Kyiv where, on September 29–30, 1941, on the eve of Yom Kippur, 33,771 Jews were murdered in just two days. Over the two years of German occupation, about 100,000 people, including Jewish families, Roma, and Ukrainian political prisoners, were murdered there by the Germans and their local collaborators. Babyn Yar became the largest mass grave in Europe and a symbol of the “Holocaust by Bullets.” The massacre is regarded as the beginning of the “Final Solution” in the Soviet Union, carried out not with gas chambers but through direct gunfire and extraordinary brutality. During the Soviet era, memory of the massacre was suppressed, and Jewish victims were not mentioned by name.

The new discoveries were made possible in part thanks to the opening of archival sources in Ukraine that had been closed for 75 years. During the war, the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center scanned about 7 million documents, creating a digital archive of 8 million items – the largest in Eastern Europe.

Among the newly discovered materials are applications to adopt children orphaned after their parents were murdered at Babyn Yar, petitions by citizens seeking legal recognition of relatives’ deaths for inheritance, remarriage, or financial support, and birth certificates from the 1920s and 1930s that helped identify children murdered alongside their parents. One striking case is a 1946 legal file detailing the plea of Zindel Kravetsky, who sought recognition of the deaths of his wife and three children – 8-year-old Aron, 6-year-old Zoya, and 4-year-old Vova – all murdered at Babyn Yar. Another record documents Rakhil Meirovna Kravets, born in 1863, who fled Korosten to Kyiv at the outbreak of the war, only to be murdered in the killing ravine.

Since the war began, 300,000 people, including international leaders and Ukrainian citizens, have visited the Babyn Yar memorial site. Approximately 600 educational tours have been conducted, underscoring the growing commitment to remembrance even during wartime.

Natan Sharansky, Chairman of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center, said: “Memory is a moral weapon against denial, oblivion, and distortion. The war in Ukraine is an ideological war no less than a war over territory. There is a blatant attempt to undermine history and even erase it. Every name we succeed in restoring to existence contributes to Holocaust commemoration and advances justice and dignity for its victims. I salute the work of our researchers, who continue tirelessly under fire. Precisely in times of war, the obligation to defend the truth is doubled.”

Today, September 29, 2025, the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center and the International March of the Living held a memorial event at the National Library in Jerusalem marking the anniversary of the massacre. At the event, the newly uncovered names of victims were revealed, followed by a discussion titled “Memory Under Attack,” focusing on the challenges and importance of Holocaust research and commemoration.

Speakers at the event will include Minister Zeev Elkin, Ukraine’s Ambassador to Israel Yevgen Korniychuk, Natan Sharansky, Chairman of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center, Sallai Meridor, Chairman of the National Library, Dani Dayan, Chairman of Yad Vashem, Yigal Cohen, CEO of the Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum, Prof. Dina Porat, Chief Historian of Yad Vashem, Revital Yakin Krakowsky, CEO of March of the Living Israel, and Dr. Yohai Ben Gedalia, CEO of the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People at the National Library. The event was opened with an exhibition featuring items from Ukraine’s Jewish community before the war.

Revital Yakin Krakowsky, CEO of March of the Living Israel, added: “Babyn Yar, the symbol of the ‘Holocaust by Bullets,’ tells the story of more than 2 million Jews who were shot and thrown into mass graves across Eastern Europe. On this day, we bring their story, honor their memory, and pray for an end to the war in Ukraine. We hope to march in Kyiv at the Babyn Yar memorial site next year, which will mark 85 years since the massacre.”

This is not an endorsement of either the March of the Living program overall, it’s Israeli portion, nor Israel. Nor is it a commentary on what Israel is doing in Gaza or the West Bank, which is unacceptable from both a human and a Jewish perspective.

Last night Carlo Graziano was considering the Ukrainian strike on the Russian manufacturing plant:

The HIMARS strike hypothesis on Belgorod power infrastructure makes sense to me. The range seems right, and almost all Ukrainian drone strikes seem focused on oil/gas targets at the moment.

Except for that strike at the electro-technical manufacturing plant in Karachev. That seems new. It’s an economic target rather than a strictly military target, so it seems in line with the theory animating the Oil Plan attacks, but it is a departure from those attacks. I wonder whether the Ukrainians are generating target lists working from some economic model of the Russian supply chains that is broader than just oil supply. If so, we may see more such attacks on Russian industrial infrastructure in the weeks ahead

ETA: On reflection, the Ukrainian long-range drone campaign really got going in early August, but their development and manufacturing schedules must have been in place for at least a year before that. So they have had a lot of time to ponder and plan the best use of those offensive resources as they come on-line. It is entirely possible the the Oil Plan is only the first phase of an economic offensive that is scheduled to develop and grow with increasing Ukrainian drone capabilities and production rates.

As we saw with Operation Spider Web, Ukraine appears to have a named operation with different phases to strike relevant Russian targets using a variety of means. I expect that what we’ve been seeing with the petroleum industry strikes are lines of effort within that phase of the overall named operation. As for the manufacturing plant in Karachev, it may not be part of a different phase within the named operation. Rather, since it is a legitimate dual use target, it may simply be high up on the Ukrainian Joint Integrated Prioritized Target List (JIPTL pronounced jiptil, though I once heard a Navy captain call it the jipitil), was nominated, the Ukrainian commander decided that it could be hit cleanly, and approved the strike. We’ll have to wait and see if more targets like this start being hit before we will have a better idea if there is a phase of the named operation to strike these types of targets.

“There will be no safe place for Russia — Ukrainian weapons can reach any military targets on its territory, said Ukraine’s Deputy Foreign Minister.” – Sybiha, during his speech at the Warsaw Security Forum.

— WarTranslated (Dmitri) (@wartranslated.bsky.social) September 29, 2025 at 10:42 AM

President Zelenskyy participated in the Warsaw Security Forum today.

Here’s the video with English closed captioning turned on.

And here is his address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump.

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Interesting Read: Are We Witnessing the Fall of the American Empire?

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"The high-water mark of America’s influence over the world has come and gone. All empires are transitory, right? If you rise, you’re inevitably going to stagnate and fall," says American political history author and podcaster @mikeduncan.bsky.social.
Interview: www.rollingstone.com/culture/cult…

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— Rolling Stone (@rollingstone.com) September 22, 2025 at 9:48 AM

Well, maybe the Empire will last out our time…

Mike Duncan knows how empires fall. He’s covered history’s most defining collapses, upheavals, and regime changes through the Revolutions and History of Rome podcasts — the latter being a 179 episode, 73 hour long behemoth exploring the trajectory of the Roman Republic and Empire from conception to collapse. He knows what it looks like when things go wrong.

In 2025, it’s clear to Duncan that the American empire, which has dominated global geopolitics for the last century, has passed its zenith. Under the Trump administration, the devolution of the American ideal has accelerated in some ways that could only exist in the unique context of the current moment, and others that mirror the predictable, centuries old ouroboros of political power and decline…

So how does the slow unraveling of the American experiment compare to the great declines and revolutionary periods of global history? No one is better positioned to read the room than Duncan.

Let’s start with Rome. We can’t talk about all 179 episodes but let’s do a quick recap of the fall of the Republic and then the Empire.
The fall of the Republic feels more like what we’re dealing with right now. It really has to do with the Roman Republic, emerging, for the first time, as the dominant power in the Mediterranean. And that kicks off like the cycle of economic inequality starts to grow between the very richest Romans and the poorest Romans, and that leads to all kinds of social conflict.

There is a civil war on the peninsula of Italy, between Italians who just want citizenship in order to participate in the society they’re a part of, and the Roman old guard who are trying to resist it. As these conflicts are starting to get heated up, the politicians themselves lose track of any kind of propriety or bounds about what can and should be done in order to pursue your own political agenda.

If you lose a vote or you lose an election, how do you respond? There used to be a very stable consensus that you basically accepted defeat. In the Roman world, the political leaders and the military leaders are identical. So now you have political leaders who are in charge of entire armies, and they are now going to start throwing those armies at each other, and that’s really what leads to the breakdown of the Roman Republic.

In the 21st century, in America, we have huge disparities of wealth and income inequality, and we have fights over citizenship and who gets to participate in our polity right now, and how that’s sort of tearing us apart. And we have politicians who were like, “Oh, did I lose an election? Let’s stage an armed insurrection inside the Capitol on January the sixth.”

And after the Republic collapses, the empire continues to exist for another 500 years.
When the Republic became the Empire, it’s not like Augustus said, “I am the Emperor now, and this is an empire.” There were still elections every year, there was still jockeying among the senatorial classes to get these offices and win these elections. The entire apparatus of the Republic was maintained in place as a facade. It was just that all power was ultimately absorbed into this person…

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