Olson's Rules for Autocrats Part VII :: The Stalin Rule
We Don't Have to Agree on Everything. We Have to Agree on One Thing
The times we’re facing are unparalleled and unprecedented. I hope you’ll consider supporting the work of outlets like The Home Front as we work toward a better, freer tomorrow.
Olson’s 7th Rule for Dealing with Autocrats: Stand together with anyone who will join you to disturb, disrupt, and diminish the illiberal power structures. Even if you share nothing in common beyond a love of democracy or you loathe their politics in normal times, you must fight side-by-side.
President Franklin Roosevelt knew the only way to keep Russia in the war against Germany was to ship as many tanks, jeeps, trucks, boots, tins of food, bullets, and bombs as the Arsenal of Democracy could churn out. Roosevelt, always the realist, understood that if Russia fell, Hitler would have free reign over the European continent and beyond.
During the course of the war, the US sent:
400,000 jeeps and trucks
14,000 aircraft
13,000 tanks
4.5 million tons of food
1.5 million blankets
15 million pairs of boots
Roosevelt didn’t love Soviet communism, though he did form a bond with Josef Stalin during the war. He sent all that material because at war’s end, the Soviet Union had lost 27 million soldiers and citizens. The US by comparison, lost fewer than 500,000.
He fought alongside Stalin, Chiang Kai-Shek, and Charles DeGaulle not because he liked them, but because in times of great crisis, allies must put aside their differences, large and small, for the greater good.
Today, as difficult as it is, we must abide by Roosevelt’s ethos. So far, we’re failing as an opposition to Donald Trump’s rising autocracy. Badly beaten political parties often experience a loss of identity, internal turmoil, and external flailing. The Democratic Party is no different.
The party is caught between an aging generation refusing to step aside and a cohort of young upstarts refusing to be ignored. There are too many leaders focused either on their niche positions or on the 2028 presidential campaign (that no one should simply assume will happen as we’ve long known it.)
If it’s not age or ambition splitting the left, it’s the battle of the progressives and the moderates (or establishment.) Both blame the other for holding views that damage the country with swing voters, base voters, or both. Neither is yet willing to focus on developing a path forward that is anything other than “Trump is bad.”
We all know Trump is bad. Even Republican voters are starting to see he’s bad. The question for all of us in the pro-democracy coalition, is what are we offering as an alternative to the man who is single-handedly reducing the United States to a pariah state.
That word - coalition - is key right now. Between all registered Democrats, left-leaning independents and disaffected non-Trump Republicans, we have more than enough voters to win federal, state, and local elections. This alliance, like all heterdox blocs, is unwieldy. Many people believe they know the best path forward yet no one wants to be told what to do.
The voices that have long controlled levers of power, in this case money and access, are loathe to share their resources with anyone, even close allies. The donor class is being bombarded by dozens of different ideas leading to an institutional paralysis at the worst possible moment.
American politics has always been a bare-knuckle affair and remains so today. However, those willing to throw the hardest punches, the apostate Republicans, are the group held in least regard by those unwilling to take a swing, the Democratic establishment. We must combine the willingness to fight with the resources to do so.
During a recent conversation with a Democratic donor, they referred to me as someone who came from the Dark Side. A bit incredulous, I asked what more they would like me and my Never Trump allies to do. Have we not given up our careers, friendships, and more for what we considered the greater good?
I, too, am not immune, as I demonstrated in a recent post about a certain newspaper columnist.
In my latest podcast, guest
describes the frustration and futility he’s experienced all over the world with opposition groups that simply could not get along with one another. I share Genia’s frustration, but also believe this is a natural progression: A difficult, unhelpful, and necessary step to streamlining a true pro-democracy movement that is capable of taking on Donald Trump, sharing a common vision in this moment, and learning to work together, not for bespoke aims, but for those on whose behalf we claim to fight: The American People.News and Notes:
Listen to my conversation with Genia below. Please listen and rate 5 stars! You can help spread the good word!
Please take a few minutes to read the latest from
about the loathesome creature roaming the halls of Foggy Bottom (and no I’m not talking about Marco Rubio.)
Lastly, check out the latest reporting from
on how MAGA goon Matt Schlapp’s scandals resulted in a former CPAC employee’s indictment on imbezzlement charges.
Forming an opposition that agrees on one thing. Not as easy as I thought this might be. I remember years ago when we were told "to think outside the box." So--once outside the box, what then? Difficult. Need to think of what is needed, but not to burn down the box or throw the baby out with the bath water, as Yevgeny Simkin suggested. Finding the Statement that we can all agree on to stop the chaos and march to autocracy. Autocracy which never works according to Simkin. Thanks again Reed. Good discussion.