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<p>I was arguing with Russ on his blog:
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://russabbott.substack.com/p/why-inside-trumps-head">https://russabbott.substack.com/p/why-inside-trumps-head</a> and
because I'm impatient, decided to get Gemini to play my adversary.
It was the typical AI slop and I won't foist it on you. But a
couple of the tables she generated are interesting:</p>
<table
style="margin-bottom: 32px; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<thead
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><strong
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important; margin-bottom: 0px !important;">Aspect</strong></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><strong
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important; margin-bottom: 0px !important;">Constitutional
Unitary Executive</strong></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><strong
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important; margin-bottom: 0px !important;">Path
to Authoritarianism</strong></td>
</tr>
</thead><tbody
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">Removal
Power</b></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
President can fire a disloyal agency head to ensure policy
is executed.</td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
President fires all independent watchdogs (Inspectors
General, Special Counsels) to <b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">stop
investigations</b> or <b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">persecute
political opponents.</b></td>
</tr>
<tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">Independent
Agencies</b></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">Agencies
have less protection from presidential policy control.</td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
President co-opts key independent institutions like the
Justice Department, FBI, Federal Communications Commission
(FCC), or Electoral Commissions, and uses them for <b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">partisan
gain</b>.</td>
</tr>
<tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
Rule of Law</b></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
President must "take care that the laws be faithfully
executed."</td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
President claims the authority to <b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">depart
from the law</b> or <b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">ignore
court orders</b>, effectively placing presidential will
above the law. (An extreme view infamously summarized by
former President Richard Nixon: "When the president does it,
that means it is not illegal.")</td>
</tr>
<tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
Civil Service</b></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
President has the right to manage the executive branch.</td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">The
President attempts to replace the non-partisan, merit-based
civil service with <b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">politically
loyal personnel</b> to ensure no internal resistance to
the President's personal agenda.</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<table
style="margin-bottom: 32px; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<thead
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><strong
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important; margin-bottom: 0px !important;">Autocracy
Type</strong></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><strong
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important; margin-bottom: 0px !important;">Characteristics
Relevant to Succession</strong></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><strong
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important; margin-bottom: 0px !important;">Survival
upon Leader Departure</strong></td>
</tr>
</thead><tbody
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">Personalist
Autocracy</b></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">Power
is highly centralized in the individual leader. Institutions
(parties, military, bureaucracy) are weak or deliberately
hollowed out to serve the leader's will.</td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">More
vulnerable.</b> The leader's departure creates a chaotic
power vacuum, making the regime more susceptible to
collapse, coups, or mass protest. However, even if it
collapses, it is often replaced by another autocracy.</td>
</tr>
<tr
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">Institutionalized
Autocracy</b></td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">Power
is shared, to some extent, among a ruling elite (a party, a
ruling council, the military). These institutions provide a
framework for succession and power-sharing.</td>
<td
style="border: 1px solid; font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;"><b
style="font-family: Google Sans Text, sans-serif !important; line-height: 1.15 !important; margin-top: 0px !important;">More
resilient.</b> The institutions act as a "spare tire,"
allowing the regime to survive the loss of the leader by
smoothly replacing him with a new autocrat from within the
ruling elite.</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
<p>The gist seems pretty solid. A Good Faith UET believer would do
many of the things the Cheeto Jesus is doing, just not so "extra".
It seems to me that he's working for the "Personalist Autocracy".
And I don't see a successor. I still can't see anyone on the right
who I'd regard as Good Faith, though. Maybe we'll see a backlash
and get someone similar to Obama, who may exhibit some autocratic
tendencies, but at least he's not so extra. </p>
<p>
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<pre class="moz-signature" cols="0">--
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