Consider how far we've already gone:
-- Trump said that he'll pardon the traitors who tried to overthrow our government, throwing down the gauntlet by openly embracing a treasonous attempt to assassinate the Vice President and overturn the Constitution.
DeSantis was thus forced to quickly echo the sentiment, adding that he'd even consider pardoning Trump himself if he's convicted of violating the espionage act by selling America's secrets to the Saudis or Putin.
-- Trump wanted to create his own private police force answerable only to himself, much like Hitler's SS or Mussolini's Blackshirts, and for a while nearly did it, illegally sending out-of-uniform Border Patrol officers to Portland to kidnap and harass antifascist demonstrators.
DeSantis, however, actually did the job in Florida, creating a militia answerable exclusively to him, along with his own personal police force that was specifically designed to harass and arrest Black people who try to vote.
-- Trump wanted to shut down the "fake news" reporters who kept pointing out his lies; he argued we should gut the First Amendment so news outlets and op-ed writers who offended him could be fired or vulnerable to lawsuits.
DeSantis one-upped him; he now blocks reporters from even covering many of his activities and supported a bill in the Florida legislature that would have given him and other Republicans the power to sue reporters who offended them. Killing the Florida media was too extreme even for his own legislature, but he tried, and promises as president he'll succeed where Trump failed.
-- Trump tore families apart at the southern border and almost a thousand children are still missing, having been trafficked into a shady "Christian" network of foster and adoption homes.
DeSantis outplayed him by imitating the White Citizens' Council trick from the 1960s, when they offered Black families in the south free bus fare north with the phony promise of jobs and housing.
This is increasingly happening among Republicans running for the House and Senate, and in the states, too, as other Red state governors imitate DeSantis.
At the same time, members of state and federal legislatures and rightwing media are calling for everything from the "eradication" of queer people to using state money to fund all-white "Christian" academies and destroy public education.
There was a time in America when we would have said, "It can't happen here." It was a time we believed our country would never fall to cynical authoritarian hucksters.
When opponents of fascism were heralded as heroes, as the "greatest generation" winners of World War II, as role models for young people, instead of being vilified by fascist-leaning Republican-affiliated media as "Antifa."
When, as historian Heather Cox Richardson brilliantly pointed out, the US government made movies and published pamphlets explaining what fascism was and how dangerous it would be if it ever infested our politics.
That time is gone. Now, it can happen here. And there's a whole army of billionaires willing -- enthusiastic, eager even! -- to finance it.
They're joined in this by a nationwide network of churches, organized during the Reagan administration and openly defying IRS rules, using your and my tax subsidies to encourage hate, bigotry, and intolerance across the country.
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