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When it comes to Republicans spouting the belief that the United States is a republic, and not a democracy, it’s time to put them on mute.
That’s according to The New Abnormal co-host Andy Levy, who discusses the issue while delving into the RNC’s announcement last week that it, along with the Trump campaign, had filed suit against the Nevada Secretary of State for allowing mail-in ballots to be counted up to four days after the election.
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“They hate democracy, they do not want a democracy,” Levy says of the RNC. “You hear it all the time. One of their favorite things to say is, ‘America’s not a democracy, it’s a republic,’ which is ahistoric garbage.”
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In 2020, for example, Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) scored considerable attention for posting on Twitter: “We’re not a democracy.” In 2022, then-GOP candidate for the Arizona state legislature, Selina Bliss, said: “We are a constitutional republic. We are not a democracy.”
Levy explains: “We are a representative democracy. The founding fathers were quite clear on that they all believed that we were a democracy, but they [Republicans] love to say that because we don’t vote directly on every issue, that instead elective representatives do that, that we’re not a democracy. And it’s garbage. The minute you hear someone say that—and they’re always a Republican—the minute you hear someone say that, you can absolutely tune them out because they are lying to you.”
Then, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, author of the book, Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present, talks about the recent Time magazine interview with Donald Trump and the rise of fascism in America.
“It’s very sobering,” Ghait says of the Time piece. “It was an interview that allowed Trump the space to tell us exactly what the vision is and those who think that he’s just out of it or lazy or just a clown, should all read that piece because he has a very particular vision of what he wants.”
Plus! We’re joined by author Arthur Goldwag. He tells us all about his new book, The Politics of Fear: The Peculiar Persistence of American Paranoia, which documents America’s long history of susceptibility to conspiracy theories.
Listen to this full episode of The New Abnormal on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon and Stitcher.
