Daphne

“The story of Donald Trump’s rise to power is the story of a buried American history—buried because powerful people liked it that way. It was visible without being seen, influential without being named, ubiquitous without being overt.”
― Sarah Kendzior, Hiding in Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America

“anocracy.” Citizens receive some elements of democratic rule—perhaps full voting rights—but they also live under leaders with extensive authoritarian powers and few checks and balances.”
― Barbara F. Walter, How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them

“Democratic countries that veer into anocracy do so not because their leaders are untested and weak, like those who are scrambling to organize in the wake of a dictator, but rather because elected leaders—many of whom are quite popular—start to ignore the guardrails that protect their democracies. These include constraints on a president, checks and balances among government branches, a free press that demands accountability, and fair and open political competition. Would-be autocrats such as Orbán, Erdoğan”
― Barbara F. Walter, How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them

“Americans built a culture of speculation unique in its abandon,” writes the historian Joshua Rothman in his book Flush Times and Fever Dreams. That culture would drive cotton production up to the Civil War, and it has been a defining characteristic of American capitalism ever since. It is the culture of acquiring wealth without work, growing at all costs, and abusing the powerless. It is the culture that brought us catastrophic downturns, like the Panic of 1837, the stock market crash of 1929, and the recession of 2008.”
― Nikole Hannah-Jones, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story