"Demagogues are willing to do or say anything to gain office or to consolidate their power. Unconstrained by ideology, they have no concern for the consequences of their actions. Anything that serves to make them more powerful is good enough for them — even if the political system that facilitated their rise should be destroyed in the process.
This, rather than some deep similarity to fascism, also explains the affinity between demagogues and political violence. True fascists venerate violence but also want to make it serve a purpose larger than themselves, like territorial conquest. Demagogues, on the other hand, tap into the most violent currents in a population simply to bolster their own popularity.
In the process, they often unleash lethal damage. They wreck the informal rules of civility that democracies require to survive. Once voters are activated along violent lines and fervently believe the myths propagated by the demagogue, the dam is broken; the ordinary rules of democratic politics no longer apply, and there is no telling what might come next."
Daniel Ziblatt
"The inability to identify with others was unquestionably the most important psychological condition for the fact that something like Auschwitz could have occurred in the midst of more or less civilized and innocent people. What is called 'fellow traveling' [collaboration] was primarily business interest: one pursues one’s own advantage before all else and, simply not to endanger oneself, does not talk too much. That is a general law of the status quo."
Theodor Adorno
"I will not bow, and God grant that we will never bow, before the gods of evil."
Martin Luther King, But If Not
Here are the charts for today.
There will be a fairly important stock options expiration on Friday.
This is driving much of the short term action in a lightly traded, pre-holiday week.
That, and the billions and billions in cheap money that the Fed is giving in bundles to the Wall Street Banks.
Sociopaths like to imagine themselves as powerful, inspiring fear in others. They practice outrageous behaviour, to intimidate and shame others. They often seek power in the world of money, for example, having a taste for crime which makes them feel special and privileged, but not for actual violence of the hardened criminal.
They may offer quite a show on the surface, effecting the loud and effusive manner of the rough and tough. But inside are half-formed and emotionally stunted people who lash out at others for the emptiness and pain that they feel life has given to them. They may become increasingly paranoid and prone to uncontrollable acting out as their tall tales and grand visions of themselves unravel.
And these are the people who too drive the management and shape the formation of our public principles. This is why the rule of law is paramount, and why no one can be allowed to rise above it.
This is the Achilles heel of unrestrainged free market capitalism which assumes that everyone is rational and virtuous. What a fatal error! Especially in a system that appeals to atomizing motives such as selfishness and greed, and seeks to reward and empower the worst in us.
Have a pleasant evening.
