Fascists do not compromise, being uncompromising is their brand. Fascism, militaristic rule by state violence, backed by corporate power, is based on a relentless appeal to terror. Being terror-based, fascism never needs to articulate a rational set of beliefs based on observable reality — no argument is allowed in a fascist state. A terrified populace is ready for the protection of a “strongman,” a leader who will never yield or bend. That these strongmen are, in fact, the weakest and neediest (and generally the most insane) people in history, is obscured during their reigns by the irrationality they unleash among a public scared out of its collective wits. A fascist ruler never compromises, about anything, ever — hence “strongman”. An angry two-year old never compromises while raging either, but nobody confuses an enraged toddler with an all powerful being. Unless your critical faculties have been disabled by a crippling fear of death, in which case that infuriated toddler has every right to rule.

Fred Koch, wealthy father of the most influential fascist of the American rightwing, billionaire polluter/”philanthropist” Charles, was essentially a Nazi. The German nanny Fred hired for his four boys (as he built the fuel refineries that kept Hitler’s Luftwaffe in business throughout the war), a stern disciplinarian who required the young brothers to defecate on a strict schedule, ran back to Germany to be with her beloved Fuhrer, after his blitzkreig conquered France. Fred Koch inspired his boys to fight, to compete for dominance. The two history recalls as The Koch Brothers, Charles and David, ruthlessly fought their brothers in court for decades and essentially prevailed. You can read the sickening details of how this psychotic father replicated himself in his two “strongest” offspring in Jane Mayer’s masterful Dark Money. David, backed by Koch money, ran for vice president in 1980, on the Libertarian ticket. The Kochs got an appropriate 1% of the national vote for the millions they spent on the campaign. Charles, a brilliant and dogged engineer, got to work building, testing and constantly correcting a vast anti-democratic machine to influence public opinion, frame every public issue to suit his private passions, pass unpopular legislation, defeat regulations to protect air, water and biodiversity, gain control of the federal judiciary (he succeeded 100% with the 6-3 ideologically pure Federalist Society Supreme Court) and so on.

A step back into the America that MAGA wants to make great again, back to the days before “judicial activism” destroyed our great nation. 1954, a unanimous Supreme Court, after hearing the arguments, ruled that “separate but equal” in America’s racially segregated public schools was a crock of shit. They ordered “desegregation” of all American public schools be carried out “with all deliberate speed”. The speed was deliberate enough that racists went to work to make sure their children never had to sit in the same classroom as non-white children. The public school I attended was not integrated until 1964. That school, one of the top rated public schools in New York, was the elementary school Trump would likely have attended, he could have walked there from the house he grew up in less than ten minutes. His psychotic father had other plans for his sadistic young son.

American racists were outraged at the “judicial activism” of the unanimous Brown v. Board of Education ruling. It made no difference to them that the decision was based on a rational evaluation of the evidence presented, in fact, that made it 100 times worse. In response to this judicial act of “communist” sabotage, brought by Negroes and their race traitor allies against a school board 146 miles from his hometown of Wichita, Fred Koch and several wealthy industrialist fellow travelers founded The John Birch Society, a far right-wing fringe group still in operation today. You can visit their website. Once the lunatic fringe of the right wing, which Republican politicians and pundits were always careful to distance themselves from, JBS, as they brand themselves now, is mainstream MAGA, the quivering heart of the present day Republican Party. Check out this photo, the first thing you see when you open their homepage:

Something I learned from my personal life — there are people, dear loved ones sometimes, who, once in a conflict, reveal a rigidity and need to fight to the death that was unthinkable a moment earlier. Their unwillingness to compromise is actually an inability to compromise, based on a deep terror of loss of control. This type only feels safe when they are in charge and their will is not disputed. They refuse to negotiate because they can’t compromise, crippled by a fear as powerful as the terror of imminent, violent death. Feel sorry for these creatures if you are kind-hearted, but never underestimate the depths of their desperation when they are in a battle to the death (which they always are when compromise is proposed).

Speaking of psychopaths, it struck me last night — Trump was deeply jealous of his buddy Jeffrey, a guy who started with nothing but an amazing ability to lie and manipulate and an insatiable appetite for young girls, and wound up as a super-wealthy friend and confidant of the most powerful people in the world. Epstein got away with raping 14 year-old girls for decades, and his powerful buddies — including lying gay anti-icon Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent [1] — all stayed close to him anyway, even after his criminal proclivities became public. Wealthy, powerful men like Woody Allen, Larry Summers, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton, Scott Bessent, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, Trump, all stayed friends with Epstein, seemingly whether blackmailed by him or not. No wonder the perverted fucker was suicided in federal detention under Trump and Bagpiper Bill Barr. How infuriating his successful, unaccountable scumbag life must have been to the eternally covetous Donald John Trump!

[1] In the event the administration becomes aware of this on finance.senate.gov and takes it down, as they are wont to do, here is the first part of the post:

Washington, D.C. – Following new revelations about Jeffrey Epstein’s deep and long-running relationship with J.P Morgan, Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden, D-Ore., today introduced the Produce Epstein Treasury Records Act (PETRA) to compel Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to turn over Epstein-related Treasury records to Senate investigators. Finance Committee staff reviewed a large portion of those files in person at the Treasury Department in 2024. Senator Wyden has sought to obtain the complete set for further investigation, but Bessent has repeatedly refused to produce them to the committee and downplayed their significance. The files detail Epstein transactions totaling at least $1.5 billion dollars, and they include the names of women and girls he may have trafficked, as well as the identities of individuals whose involvement with Epstein may put them at risk of blackmail or other foreign corruption. They also reveal potential violations of federal anti-money laundering laws by J.P. Morgan and other banks–compliance failures that helped Epstein continue abusing and trafficking women and girls many years after law enforcement was first alerted to his activities.

“The basic question here is whether a bunch of rich pedophiles and Epstein accomplices are going to face any consequences for their crimes, and Scott Bessent is doing his best to make sure they won’t. My head just about exploded when I heard Bessent say it wasn’t his department’s job to investigate these Epstein bank records, because it’s simply impossible that somebody with his background in finance is unaware of FinCEN or any of the other investigative offices within the Treasury,” Senator Wyden said. “From the beginning, my view has been that following the money is the key to identifying Epstein’s clients as well as the henchmen and banks that enabled his sex trafficking network. It’s past time for Bessent to quit running interference for pedophiles and give us the Epstein files he’s sitting on.”