#cronyism — Public Fediverse posts

@RHW @treleanor
The dreadful #cronyism of political appointees to senior public service roles (SES to Secretary) is a thin wedge killing our democratic institutions. We’ve been slipping to the right wing of politics for decades and the electorate has done sweet FA about it… is it too late?

#Antifa #AntiOligarchy #AntiPatriarchy #AusPol

@RHW @treleanor
The dreadful #cronyism of political appointees to senior public service roles (SES to Secretary) is a thin wedge killing our democratic institutions. We’ve been slipping to the right wing of politics for decades and the electorate has done sweet FA about it… is it too late?

#Antifa #AntiOligarchy #AntiPatriarchy #AusPol

@RHW @treleanor
The dreadful #cronyism of political appointees to senior public service roles (SES to Secretary) is a thin wedge killing our democratic institutions. We’ve been slipping to the right wing of politics for decades and the electorate has done sweet FA about it… is it too late?

#Antifa #AntiOligarchy #AntiPatriarchy #AusPol

@RHW @treleanor
The dreadful #cronyism of political appointees to senior public service roles (SES to Secretary) is a thin wedge killing our democratic institutions. We’ve been slipping to the right wing of politics for decades and the electorate has done sweet FA about it… is it too late?

#Antifa #AntiOligarchy #AntiPatriarchy #AusPol

@RHW @treleanor
The dreadful #cronyism of political appointees to senior public service roles (SES to Secretary) is a thin wedge killing our democratic institutions. We’ve been slipping to the right wing of politics for decades and the electorate has done sweet FA about it… is it too late?

#Antifa #AntiOligarchy #AntiPatriarchy #AusPol

A FOIA Update, Of Sorts

Last week, a Government Information Specialist at the State Department emailed to ask if I would still be interested in records I requested in 2021 under the Freedom of Information Act. “The Department is undertaking a comprehensive review of its backlog of FOIA requests,” she wrote, and if (after failing to respond to my request for five years) she did not hear from me within thirty days, “the Department will conclude you are no longer interested in pursuing this request, and your request will be administratively closed.”

The request itself concerned the Kalorama mansion purchased by Chilean billionaire Andronico Luksic Craig right after the 2016 election, where Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump lived during Trump’s first term. (I’ve written several posts about the situation over the years. This one is a pretty good primer.) When Jared and Ivanka decamped to Florida in 2021, the Kuwaiti foreign mission leased Luksic’s Washington, DC property; federal law required State Department approval. So I asked to see the Kuwaiti foreign mission’s written request and the State Department’s Notice of Approval.

I was casting a wide net in order to learn what I could about Luksic, his influence operations, and his international network of business relationships, which now extends to the very edge of the Boundary Waters, where Luksic-controlled Antofagasta plc plans to build the Twin Metals copper and nickel mine.

It was a longshot request to begin with. Is there anything to learn from these Foreign Mission Office records, five years later? Not likely, but who knows? So I replied that I am still interested. I feel obliged to see the thing through, or to see that the Department of State meets its obligation to the public. 

While I had the attention, or at least the email address, of someone involved in the comprehensive review, I thought I should ask about two other requests I’d filed with the Department of State back in October of 2018, and which I’ve been trying to chase down ever since. These requests concern the use of the US embassy in Santiago, Chile as a business backchannel for Antofagasta: one asks for records of a 2017 meeting between Antofagasta CEO Ivan Arriagada and Carol Perez, then US ambassador to Chile; the other asks for embassy communications regarding Trump’s nomination of Andrew Gellert to replace Perez. Over the years, the Department has set and missed several estimated dates of completion for these requests. I detailed some of the back and forth in a 2023 post. Since then, or at least for the past couple of years, the FOIA Office has failed to respond to my requests for more information about the status of these requests.

On Monday, this reply came:

These requests remain in process and has [sic] a new estimated date of completion (EDC) of January 31, 2028.  EDCs are estimates and subject to change. You will be notified of the results of the Department’s search and review efforts in response to these requests as soon as that information becomes available.

This is just boilerplate, of course; the subject-verb disagreement in the first sentence looks like a copy-paste accident. Still, a few observations. 

The requests are said to be “in process,” but in eight years no “search and review efforts” have been undertaken. The new estimated date of completion falls in the last year of Trump’s second term – a year and a half from now – and the FOIA office is not even committing to a response when the 2018 request hits the ten-year mark. I am sufficiently annoyed by this delay that I have to wonder aloud (but without evidence) if there is some directive at State to push FOIA matters, or certain FOIA matters, to the end of this administration. 

The FOIA office blames a backlog of requests, and that backlog is real. “The State Department’s FOIA backlog spiked by 6,000 cases to a total of 27,619” this fiscal year, reports Justin Doubleday. Back in June, Minho Kim did some great data analysis for the New York Times showing that federal agencies “accumulated the highest-ever backlog of cases in fiscal year 2025, raising questions about compliance with the Freedom of Information Act.” Not surprisingly, “the problem appears to have worsened under President Trump.” And the backlog problem has been compounded by cuts to FOIA staff, leaving “several key FOIA leadership and staff positions vacant” at State. One administration official quoted by the Times says the Trump administration chose to “hire ICE officers instead of FOIA processors.” That snide remark alone speaks volumes about this administration’s misplaced priorities, its refusal of all accountability, and its contemptuous disregard for the public interest. 

To put it another way: the FOIA backlog is itself a symptom of bad government and corruption, a condition that is only exacerbated by the Trumpist dismantling and hijacking of public institutions and federal agencies.

In 2019, William J. Burns warned against Trump’s “diplomacy of narcissism, bent on advancing private interests at the expense of our national interests.” The events that prompted my FOIA requests in 2018 – the meeting of an Antofagasta executive with Ambassador Perez and the nomination of Gellert, a Kushner friend – fit the pattern. The cronyism and self-dealing of the first term have gotten much worse and much more blatant this go-round. Charles Kushner is ambassador to France! Jared and Steve Witkoff are the faces of US diplomacy. The ambassador to Chile is Brandon Judd, a longtime Trump campaign stalwart and former head of the Border Patrol union. Judd’s main qualification seems to be that he spent some time in Chile in the 1990s, proselytizing for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. José Miguel Insulza put it bluntly: “de diplomacia no sabe nada.”

AmbassadorJudd has not exactly covered himself in glory. He caused an uproar just a couple of weeks ago when he criticized Chilean cabinet ministers for expressing serious and legitimate concerns about the new 12.5 percent tariffs on Chilean exports, petulantly adding that there would be no agreement if they continued their criticisms. Judd went on to suggest that Chile’s business leaders should “complain to your authorities to prevent them from making declarations about the relationship with the United States.”

“The ambassador,” said Juan Gabriel Valdés, “does not seem to understand that he is not part of the Chilean political system…. he does not have a role to play in internal Chilean political debate.” And this was not an isolated incident, Valdés noted. It was “the third or fourth time” that Judd had acted more like a colonial viceroy than a diplomat.

For the moment, at least, Chile’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Francisco Pérez Mackenna and his team are handling Judd. Pérez Mackenna is a seasoned negotiator. Before joining the right-wing Kast government this past spring, he spent nearly three decades as CEO of Quiñenco, managing the global operations of the Luksic business empire. Make of that what you will.

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Ex-Tory Treasurer and major party donor handed lucrative government contract to advise the Post Office | The Independent
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tory-donor-post-office-contract-rishi-sunak-b2512826.html

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#Fascist much, #DonTheCon? Must be reading his copy of #MeinKampf again. Britt commentary refers to "14 Characteristics of Fascism" by #LawrenceBritt.

10 alarming things #Trump has promised to do in a second term

by Judd Legum
and Rebecca Crosby
Dec 12, 2023

1. Trump says he will "abuse power" and be a "dictator" on "day one."

2. Trump says #ElectionFraud in 2020 gives him the power to "terminate" the Constitution
[Britt: "Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by #SmearCampaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control #voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections."]

3. Trump says he will issue "full pardons" to #January6 #insurrectionists
[Britt: "Rampant #Cronyism and #Corruption"]

4. Trump says he will cut funding to schools that cover subjects he believes are "inappropriate"
[Britt: "Disdain for #Intellectuals and the #Arts"]

5. Trump says he will legally erase trans people and ban them from military service
[Britt: "The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional #gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to #abortion is high, as is #homophobia and anti-#gay legislation."]

6. Trump says he will end birthright citizenship by executive order
[Britt: Identification of #Enemies / #Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause"]

7. Trump says he will impose a new 10% tax on all imported goods
[Britt: "Powerful and Continuing #Nationalism"]

8. Trump says he will investigate NBC and MSNBC for treason and potentially remove the company from public airwaves
[Britt: "Controlled #MassMedia"]

9. Trump says he will demand anyone convicted of selling drugs get the death penalty
[Britt: "Obsession with #Crime and #Punishment"]

10. Trump says he will order the arrest of all urban homeless and relocate them to federally-run tent cities
[Britt: "Disdain for the Recognition of #HumanRights"]

Full article:
https://popular.info/p/10-alarming-things-trump-has-promised

#CharacteristicsOfFascism #MAGA #Fascism #History #RabidRight #ChristoFascism #Project2025

Lawrence W. Britt: 14 Characteristics of #Fascism

[Unattributed, but based on the writings of #UmbertoEco]

"#Historian #LawrenceBritt studied the fascist regimes of #Hitler (Germany), #Mussolini (Italy), #Franco (Spain), #Suharto (Indonesia), and #Pinochet (Chile) and found they had 14 elements in common. He calls these the identifying characteristics of fascism.

1. Powerful and Continuing #Nationalism
Fascist regimes tend to make constant use of #patriotic mottos, slogans, symbols, songs, and other paraphernalia. #Flags are seen everywhere, as are flag symbols on clothing and in public displays.

2. Disdain for the Recognition of #HumanRights
Because of fear of enemies and the need for security, the people in fascist regimes are persuaded that human rights can be ignored in certain cases because of “need.” The people tend to look the other way or even approve of torture, summary executions, assassinations, and long incarcerations of prisoners.

3. Identification of #Enemies / #Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause
The people are rallied into a unifying patriotic frenzy over the need to eliminate a perceived common threat or foe: #racial, #ethnic or #religious #minorities; #liberals; #communists; #socialists, #terrorists…

4. Supremacy of the #Military
Even when there are widespread #domestic problems, the military is given a disproportionate amount of government funding, and the domestic agenda is neglected. Soldiers and military service are glamorized.

5. Rampant #Sexism
The governments of fascist nations tend to be almost exclusively male-dominated. Under fascist regimes, traditional #gender roles are made more rigid. Opposition to #abortion is high, as is #homophobia and anti-#gay legislation.

6. Controlled #MassMedia
Sometimes the media is directly controlled by the government, but in other cases, the media is indirectly controlled by government regulation or by sympathetic media spokespeople and executives. Government #censorship and #secrecy especially in war time, are very common.

7. Obsession with #NationalSecurity
Fear of hostile foreign powers is used as a motivational tool by the government over the masses.

8. #Religion and Government are Intertwined
Governments in fascist nations tend to use the most common religion in the nation as a tool to manipulate public opinion. Religious rhetoric and terminology is common from government leaders, even when the major tenets of the religion are diametrically opposed to the government’s policies or actions.

9. Protection of #Corporate Power
The #industrial and business #aristocracy of a fascist nation often are the ones who put the government leaders into power, creating a mutually beneficial business/government relationship and power elite.

10. Suppression of #Labor Power
Because the organizing power of labor is the only real threat to a fascist government, labor #unions are either eliminated entirely, or are severely suppressed.

11. Disdain for #Intellectuals and the #Arts
Fascist nations tend to promote and tolerate open hostility to #HigherEducation and academia. It is not uncommon for professors and other #academics to be censored or even arrested. Free expression in the arts is openly attacked, and governments often refuse to fund the arts.

12. Obsession with #Crime and #Punishment
Under fascist regimes, the #police are given almost limitless power to enforce laws. The people are often willing to overlook police abuses and even forego #CivilLiberties in the name of patriotism. There is often a national police force with virtually unlimited power in fascist nations.

13. Rampant #Cronyism and #Corruption
Fascist regimes almost always are governed by groups of friends and associates who appoint each other to government positions and use governmental power and authority to protect their friends from accountability. It is not uncommon in fascist regimes for national resources and even treasures to be appropriated or even outright stolen by government leaders.

14. #FraudulentElections
Sometimes elections in fascist nations are a complete sham. Other times elections are manipulated by #SmearCampaigns against or even assassination of opposition candidates, use of legislation to control #voting numbers or political district boundaries, and manipulation of the media. Fascist nations also typically use their judiciaries to manipulate or control elections.

This post is a summary of Fascism, Anyone? by Lawrence W. Britt published in 2003 by Free Inquiry magazine."

https://voxpopulisphere.com/2017/08/23/lawrence-britt-14-characteristics-of-fascism/

#History #Histodon #RabidRight #Antifa #Antifascism #FarRight #Trump #Putin #Russia #MAGA #Project2025 #CharacteristicsOfFascism #DetentionCenters #VoterDisenfranchisement #VoterIDLaws #SilencingDissent #CriminalizingDissent

#MalAdjusted — Its a word they use.

Well, there are some things, many things in fact, in this system that we can say we are proud to be maladjusted to.

Paraphrasing from Dr #MartinLutherKing.

#warCrimes #micimatt #militaryIndustrialComplex #intelligencia #forcedMedia #forcedNews #keynesian #moneyPrinter #corporatism #cronyism #jeffreyEpsteinClass #thinkTanks #freeAssange