I’m a fan of Bill Maher and I thought last night’s show was one of his best. But it wasn’t the comedy that stood out, it was what I thought was a chilling warning from Yale professor Timothy Snyder.
I couldn’t find a very good quality video so the one below is the best I could find. Follow the link to find a better quality video.
Here are some quotes from the interview.
Maher asked Snyder to give the top three lessons from tyranny for which Americans should suit up.
“Don’t obey in advance,” was Snyder’s first instruction. He doesn’t necessarily mean obeying leaders or authority rather, “don’t follow what everyone else is doing… figure out what you stand for and be yourself.”
His second instruction was that Americans must defend institutions. Many anticipate that “the institution will save us” but Snyder said that this kind of thinking is wrong. “We have to save the institutions. They don’t do it on their own. This is the moment of ‘ask not what the institutions can do for you. Ask what you can do for the institutions.'”
His third was for Americans to believe in the truth. “Without truth, we don’t have trust. Without trust, we don’t have the rule of law. Without the rule of law, we don’t have democracy,” he continued.
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“It was the fascists who said, ‘everyday life doesn’t matter. Every detail doesn’t matter. Facts don’t matter. All that matters is the message, the leader, the myth, the totality,'” Snyder continued. “We should be thinking about the 1920s.”
These are difficult times in our nations history, but our victory yesterday should give us hope that we can turn the fascist attack on our democracy around, if we keep working and keep focused. Don’t think it’s over because we’ve saved Obamacare for now. We’ve already seen warnings that Nunes and Ryan will do almost anything to cover up the Trump connection to the brutal dictator Putin.
I truly believe that if we keep fighting, we will get through the tying times ahead and many Americans are going to wake up to the threat the GOP fascist cult actually is. The pendulum will swing back our way, and when it does, we’ll have a chance to change the world. Until then, keep fighting and never ever give up!
RESIST!