One of the great antidotes to hysteria is memory. And so, for the creed of political hysteria, “whataboutism” — daring to remember what was said and done before — is a heresy.
In light of the indictment of Donald Trump, it’s perhaps worth returning to Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt’s 2018 blockbuster How Democracies Die. Acclaimed by Trump critics, this book warned that the United States faced a grave period of crisis. Donald Trump was, of course, the face of this crisis, though (also of course) the Republican Party more broadly was partly responsible.
Near the outset, Levitsky and Ziblatt outline some of the “indicators of authoritarian behavior.” One of them is described as: “Have they threatened to take legal or other punitive action against critics in rival parties, civil society, or the media?” In saying he would appoint “a special prosecutor to investigate Hillary Clinton” and claiming that “Clinton should be imprisoned,” Donald Trump met this criterion of authoritarianism, according to Levitsky and Ziblatt. Yet, by this standard, so might have any elected official who has expressed support for a legal investigation of Donald Trump (or any other politician). Remember that one of the central issues in the 2018 Democratic primary race for New York attorney general was investigating Trump.
Another question to test for authoritarianism, according to How Democracies Die: “Have they supported laws or policies that restrict civil liberties, such as expanded libel or defamation laws, or laws restricting protest, criticism of the government, or certain civic or political organizations?” The metastasizing “disinformation” regime on the left, which often relies upon coordination between government actors and private corporations, has often worked to restrict criticism of certain favored policies.
Consider yet another test. “Do they baselessly suggest that their rivals are foreign agents, in that they are secretly working in alliance with (or the employ of) a foreign government — usually an enemy one?” “Baseless” is a key qualifier here; members of the “resistance” would no doubt assert that they had plenty of evidence for accusing the GOP of being a Putinist plaything. Still, it’s depressing that the act of accusing your opponent of being a lackey for a foreign regime remains a rhetorical habit in the Beltway. (Of course, the tradition of American polemicists’ accusing each other of being foreign assets long precedes the Beltway. They didn’t pull punches in the 1790s.)
Other sorts of attacks on the legitimacy of one’s opponents are also marks of authoritarianism: “Do they describe their rivals as subversive, or opposed to the existing constitutional order? Do they claim that their rivals constitute an existential threat, either to national security or to the prevailing way of life?” In his blood-dimmed-tide denunciation of his political opponents in Philadelphia last fall, President Biden argued that “Donald Trump and the MAGA Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.” He also argued that the GOP as a whole is “dominated” and “driven” by this faction — the dots of delegitimization aren’t very hard to connect. The other day, Gavin Newsom, governor of the largest state in the Union, took to Twitter to argue that “extremist Republicans are systematically attacking the very foundations of our free society.” The video accompanying this tweet includes images of Newsom’s red-state counterparts Ron DeSantis, Greg Abbott, and Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
One needn’t agree with Levitsky and Ziblatt’s criteria for diagnosing authoritarianism, or even their very framing of “authoritarianism,” in order to find some of these trends concerning. Passions over Trump have a tendency to provoke an existential turn in American political thought and rhetoric, which is why conspiracy theories about both the 2016 and 2020 elections have proliferated. But the friends of republican liberty might also remember that the politics of emergency often exert a grave cost — both to the institutions of self-government and to our personal well-being. A thirst for Rubicon-crossing (always necessary, always urgent) may be one of the appetites most at odds with democratic sustainability.