Flattery inflation

Last night I went to the Ringwald Theatre, housed in the Affirmations LGBTQ center in Ferndale to see the play Silver Foxes. The show is about three senior gay men coming to terms with their advancing age. Charlie was discharged from the Army when being gay was automatic grounds for dismissal. He used to be lovers with Ben, who lives in Charlie’s house in Palm Springs and is HIV positive and amazed he’s still alive. There is also their friend Cedric who lives in a senior home but has to be closeted there. Also a frequent visitor in the house is a young man about a third their ages who is the lover of another senior man. Charlie and the rest can’t remember his name and refer to him as the Twink. The seniors talk about their lives, the advances in gay rights, and their refusal to give up those rights. A comment about Anita Bryant getting a cake in the face goes right over the Twink’s head (that actor said working on the show was quite an education in gay history). Cedric had worked as a hairdresser in Hollywood and was able to dish. There is talk about how much time they may have left and what they want to do with it. The play was written by James Berg and Stan Zimmerman. The latter was in the theater and talked to the audience a while afterward. He had been a writer on shows such as the Golden Girls and Gilmore Girls. He said that some of the incidents related in the play come from gay men he knew. I quite enjoyed and recommend the play. It is funny and has many touching moments. The show will be presented twice more, Sunday afternoon and Monday evening. Zimmerman said a sequel is about to start rehearsal (somewhere else) and a sequel to that is being discussed. I finished the book On Tyranny, Twenty Lessons From the Twentieth Century by Timothy Snyder. The lessons are about how to act when a tyrannical state is arising around you. It’s a small book and a quick read. I’d like to mention all twenty lessons with their short explanations, but that could easily reproduce the book. So I’ll mention only a few. 1. Do not obey in advance. Many people adapt to the demands of tyranny with little prompting or thought. 7. If you must carry a weapon as part of your job be ready to say no. Most of those who did the killing in the Holocaust did it not out of conviction, but it avoid drawing attention. 8. Stand out. When you do others will follow your example. 10. Believe in truth. Truth dies through lying; endless repetition of lies; an embrace of contradictions; and misplaced faith (“I alone can solve it”). 11. Investigate. Figure out things for yourself. Read long-form articles rather than ones offering quick takes. Support sites that investigate. 12. Greet those around you to maintain community. 18. Tyrants create crises and use them to justify taking away rights. Don’t offer your freedom in hopes of getting security. 19. Know the difference between a nationalist and a patriot. A nationalist wants power. A patriot wants what is best for all. I highly recommend this small book. In Tuesday’s pundit roundup for Daily Kos Chitown Kev quoted Paul Krugman who explained flattery inflation discussed by scientist Xavier Marquez and Henry Farrell:

Here’s how it works. The ruler’s lackeys and courtiers believe that they must praise him to the skies, proving their loyalty by offering paeans to his wisdom, character, and golf game. And they must continually up the ante… [...] ...a similar process of self-reinforcement applies to telling lies that serve the autocrat’s ego. Call it “mendacity inflation.” Trump insists that he’s overwhelmingly popular and that only a lunatic fringe disapproves of his presidency. Well, to show loyalty his hangers-on must go further, declaring that grandmothers and parents pushing prams down 7th Avenue are illegal aliens and violent criminals. The humiliating absurdity is a feature, not a bug. Simply lying about demonstrators isn’t enough; to prove their MAGA mettle people in Trump’s orbit must tell lies that are grotesque and ridiculous.

Michael Goldberg of the New York Times discussed the video the nasty guy posted that shows him dumping poop on protesters.

What’s curious, then, is not Trump’s eagerness to degrade us, but his uncontrollable urge to defile himself and his office. Most national leaders, after all, do not willingly associate themselves with diarrhea. Scatological attacks are usually the province of outsiders trying to cut the powerful down to size... Perhaps the most puzzling thing about the second Trump administration has been its attacks on pillars of American strength that pose no challenge to its ideology. It was predictable that the White House would gut support for the humanities, but not that it would defund pediatric cancer research. I expected it to try to eliminate the Department of Education, but not to deliberately wreck the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which helps communities in both red and blue states when they’re beset by disasters.

That puzzle isn’t so puzzling to me. Those high in the social hierarchy, especially one like that nasty guy whose ego is so wounded, will use every means available to oppress those below them. And wrecking FEMA so that it can’t help people after devastation oppresses people quite nicely. In Wednesday’s roundup Greg Dworkin quoted the Wall Street Journal that reported the Treasury Department, across from the now demolished East Wing of the White House has told its employees not to share photos of the demolition because they could “potentially reveal sensitive items, including security features or confidential structural details.” They’re worried about confidential structural details of a building being demolished? Sure. John Stoehr of The Editorial Board discussing the No Kings rallies.

But let’s not lose sight of what has been accomplished. On the one hand, Trump is confessing to the allegations of illegitimacy against him. Protesters said he is not a king. Then he said, in effect, Oh yeah? Watch me. That alone is worth celebrating, as it affects people who have doubts about Trump, but don’t yet trust the opposition. No Kings drew about 5 million people in June. This time, it added a couple million more. Next time, perhaps, a couple million more than that. On the other hand, however, is something deeper and more powerful. The president and his party want the American people to believe that the Republicans – and the Republicans alone – are the real arbiters of reality. Critics do not have the liberty to interpret facts independently. They do not have the right to express beliefs according to guaranteed liberties. Only Republicans have the true authority to define America. With one voice, more than 7 million Americans said no.

Way down in the comments paulpro posted a cartoon by Naish showing a young person in a cafeteria line with a tray with a steaming bowl on it. The person says, “Yuck! How long are you gonna serve us slop?!” The servers are revealed to be Google, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and X and one says, “How long will you keep taking it?” In the comments of Friday’s roundup is a meme posted by exlrrp. It shows a MAGA guy saying, “Illegal immigrants don’t deserve due process! Send them all to El Salvador prisons!” A scholar responds, “How do you know they are illegal without due process?” The MAGA man thinks about that then turns into a sheep, saying, “Because the government said they are.” In the comments of today’s roundup is a meme posted by exlrrp showing a skeleton sitting by a window and saying, “Me waiting to finally get one of those checks from George Soros that MAGA has been talking about for years.” Below the cartoons The Geogre discussed an article by Igor Volsky at The New Republic titled “If Dems Won’t Tax Billionaires After This, What Are They Even Doing?” From Volsky:

The sequence of events over the past few months reads like a case study in how oligarchy actually works in America. First, billionaires passed legislation to enrich themselves. Then they shut down the government to avoid helping working Americans afford health care—a system those same billionaires profit from. And now, they’re trying to leverage the shutdown to fire thousands of workers who protect vulnerable Americans while gutting programs millions of families depend on. This is a moment that demands a response. If Democrats can’t run on a unified platform that centralizes and prioritizes taxing the ultrawealthy in order to dismantle their stranglehold on our government, then they need to get out of the way for people who will. ... Let’s start with the “One Big Beautiful Bill”—a piece of legislation that delivers more than 70 percent of its benefits to the richest fifth of Americans in 2026. The richest 1 percent will receive an average net tax cut of $66,000—at a cost of $1 trillion. Meanwhile, the bill would result in 14 million more Americans becoming uninsured by 2034, with more than $1 trillion in cuts coming from Medicaid alone—the largest cuts in the program’s history, and a stunning transfer of wealth, almost dollar for dollar, from the poorest Americans to the richest. ... Billionaires have used the power that comes with their extreme wealth to capture our government and bend it toward a single purpose, enriching themselves at everyone else’s expense. And if Democrats won’t confront that reality now, when will they?

The Geogre added that 73% support raising taxes on billionaires. The Geogre doesn’t agree with everything Volsky wrote. Volsky commented that nasty guy says he is cutting programs and personnel of programs that Democrats want, which would deepen the pain of the left. The Geogre says that’s a misdirection.

To the degree that the Republicans can hide their attacks on the poor and “minorities” (an absurd idea by itself, “minorities”) by calling them attacks on “Democrats,” they can hoodwink the victims of their attacks into cheering for their own suffering. Like the poor white southerners who applauded right-to-work laws because “they’ll hurt the Blacks,” the labeling of cuts in infrastructure, education, environment, and services for food, entitlements, and the safety net as “Democrat programs” is a lie that will work. It’s false consciousness.

Kos community member revrick2 mentioned a few items from a Facebook post by Andrew Kerr, an architect with more than 20 years experience. From the stated square feet of 90,000 and budget of $300 million the cost per square foot would be $3,333. But even a price of $1,000 per square foot is astronomically high. A ballroom usually allows for 20 square feet per person. Stated occupancy is 999 people, or 20K square feet. Add in 10K for support functions and 10K for lobby, both generous, that’s only 40K square feet. What’s the other 50K square feet for? The renderings of the interior show that 20K square feet. The renderings of the exterior are 90K square feet. They don’t match. James Tate tweeted a cartoon drawn in 1906 by William Balfour Ker. It shows a ballroom filled with gowns and tuxes. Below are people oppressed by the ballroom floor. There is a fist that has punched up through the floor to the consternation of those in the ballroom.