James B. Greenberg, Professor Emeritus

The Gospel of the Hidden Hand: Conspiracy Theories in Authoritarian Politics How conspiracy theories migrate from fringe beliefs to political weapons of authoritarian power

What once seemed like fringe entertainment now fuels authoritarian politics. Conspiracy theories aren’t sideshows—they’re working technologies of power. #ConspiracyTheories #Authoritarianism #Democracy #Disinformation #Trust

When Culture Becomes a Weapon How culture wars and scapegoating divide Americans and pave the way for authoritarian rule

Once it came from Radio Moscow. Today it comes from within: divide, scapegoat, inflame. The “culture war” isn’t about culture—it’s an authoritarian playbook. Let’s not fall for it. #CultureWars #Authoritarianism #Democracy #Scapegoating #USPolitics

Mourning America: Quantico and the Drift Toward Military Rule How Trump and Hegseth’s Quantico speeches blurred the line between politics and war, recasting dissent as insurgency and democracy as a battlefield

I am in mourning for America. At Quantico, Trump and Hegseth didn’t announce a dictatorship — they performed it. Words reclassified dissent as insurgency, turning citizens into enemies. #MourningAmerica #Quantico #Authoritarianism #Democracy

The Criminalization of Language How Trump is Turning Words Into Evidence and Speech Into Dissent

When a government starts treating words as crimes, democracy falters. Trump’s reclassification of language isn’t policy—it’s preparation for repression. #FreeSpeech #Authoritarianism #Trump #Democracy

Prelude to Military Dictatorship The “enemy within” and the militarization of American politics

Trump’s “enemy within” rhetoric isn’t bluster — it’s cultural work. Words recast dissent as treason, cities as battlegrounds, and neighbors as expendable. Preparations for military dictatorship are already underway.

#EnemyWithin #Authoritarianism #DemocracyAtRisk #NoDictatorship

The Grammar of Dissent Executive power, surveillance, and the slow suffocation of democratic life

Trump’s new executive order doesn’t just police actions—it criminalizes belief. By redefining dissent as extremism, it turns suspicion into law and civic life into compliance.

#FirstAmendment #FreeSpeech #SurveillanceState #Authoritarianism #Democracy

Engineering Exclusion: How U.S. Immigration Sustains Instability Exploitation is not a failure of the system—it is its foundation.

The U.S. immigration system isn’t broken—it’s designed. Winners profit from cheap labor, detention contracts, and political spectacle. Losers live in precarity, stripped of rights and trust.

#Immigration #BorderPolitics #Labor #Democracy

Fortress Logic: How Climate Threats Became Border Spectacle At the crossroads of climate stress, migration, and militarization

When climate stress drives migration, we face a choice: treat it as a warning of collapse—or as an invasion to repel. Trump chose theater over strategy, walls over resilience.

#ClimateCrisis #Migration #PoliticalEcology #Authoritarianism

Sabotage Disguised as Strength How weakening one pillar makes the whole nation fragile

Trump calls it strength. In reality, it’s sabotage disguised as sovereignty—cuts and dismantlings that leave the whole nation fragile.

#Trump47 #Authoritarianism #Fragility #Resilience #ClimateCrisis #PublicHealth #NationalSecurity #PoliticalEcology

Justice on Trial Trump’s attack on the courts and the unraveling of American democracy

Trump’s push to indict James Comey isn’t just retribution. It’s part of a larger assault on the courts—where law becomes performance, precedent is broken, and trust collapses. Justice itself is on trial.

#JusticeOnTrial #RuleOfLaw #Democracy #Authoritarianism #Comey

When Categories Define Lives The peril of a world where classification rules over humanity.

When categories define lives, safety is no longer a right but a fragile illusion. Labels decide who belongs—and who can be taken in an instant. #Democracy #HumanRights #Family #America

The Cult of Trump How ritual, spectacle, and devotion turned politics into worship

Trump doesn’t just seek power—he demands worship. His rallies function as ritual theater, his lies as tests of faith. This is not politics as usual, but the making of a cult. #Trump #Authoritarianism #CultPolitics #Democracy

When Words Become Crimes How political labeling turns debate into danger and inquiry into subversion

Labels don’t just categorize— they brand. From McCarthy to Trump, accusations of “communist,” “invader,” and “terrorist” turn debate into danger and inquiry into subversion.

#Authoritarianism #Democracy #Trump #WitchHunt #McCarthyism #PoliticalEconomy #FearPolitics #KnowledgeUnderAttack

How Safe Should We Feel? Conditional security and the slow undoing of democracy

When leaders promise “retribution,” they aren’t just talking. They are reshaping who feels safe, who doesn’t, and what democracy even means. Once Safety shrinks from a right to a privilege—the republic itself is at risk.

#Democracy #Authoritarianism #Retribution #CivilRights #Safety

The Method in the Madness Why Trump’s chaos isn’t accidental—and how it corrodes democracy’s foundations

I once saw Trump as a clown or a puppet, but I’ve come to recognize the method in his chaos. His performance corrodes institutions, and the spectacle itself functions as policy. The danger isn’t sudden collapse—it’s the steady drift.

#Trump #Authoritarianism #Democracy #Spectacle #Power

Crashing the Economy How Trump’s policies of looting, deportation, and data manipulation are driving the U.S. toward economic fragility

Trump governs like a grifter, bending tariffs, tax cuts, and deportations into tools of looting. The damage is already visible: slowed job growth, rising prices, and a government that no longer trusts its own numbers. #CrashingTheEconomy

The American DNA of MAGA Why Trump’s movement is less fascist import than homegrown insurgency

MAGA isn’t fascism borrowed from Europe. Its DNA is American: white supremacy, rebellion, and spectacle repackaged in red hats.

#MAGA #AmericanHistory #Democracy #WhiteSupremacy #Authoritarianism #ChristianNationalism

MAGA and the Politics of Identity Why identity politics thrives in collapse—and how MAGA turned it upside down

MAGA didn’t reject identity politics — it inverted it. What began as protection for the excluded has become grievance for the powerful.

#MAGA #IdentityPolitics #Democracy #Authoritarianism #PoliticalEcology

Beyond Facts: The Identity Politics of MAGA How ritual, grievance, and survival bind Trump’s movement together

MAGA isn’t just politics—it’s a system of belief. Ritual, grievance, and identity fuse into a fortress where facts can’t penetrate. Breaking it won’t come from evidence, but from new stories of belonging.

#MAGA #Trump #Democracy #Belief #Authoritarianism

The Cost of Survival How U.S. Healthcare Policy Triages the Aging and Poor

Healthcare in America isn’t collapsing by accident — it’s being redesigned to decide who survives. From debt traps to actuarial governance, survival itself is being triaged by policy. The logic is brutal, but it can be undone.
#Healthcare #Necropolitics #PublicHealth #Democracy #SocialJustice

I get it. The term is misleading. Neoliberalism doesn’t mean liberal in the democratic, pluralist sense—it came out of Europe in the 1930s to describe a “new” market liberalism: privatization, deregulation, and shrinking the state. Over time it became shorthand for policies that let markets rule.

The Price of Exposure Healthcare Inflation, Structural Abandonment, and the Quiet Reconfiguration of Risk

The U.S. healthcare system is collapsing under the weight of profit, politics, and neglect. What’s at stake isn’t just affordability—it’s survival. #HealthcareCrisis #Neoliberalism #Democracy #PublicGoods

The Elastic State: Trump’s Domestic Campaign Against Civic Opposition How Trump bends language, law, and force to turn dissent into conspiracy and opposition into crime

Trump’s assault on civic life doesn’t come as a coup. It comes in stretched words, bent laws, and deployments that make protest feel like crime.
#Authoritarianism #Democracy #CivicLife

Free Speech in the Age of Fear How intimidation, platforms, and politics are reshaping the boundaries of speech

Free speech isn’t dying in courtrooms—it’s eroding in conversations, platforms, and fear. Silencing has become a strategy of power. #FreeSpeech #Democracy #Authoritarianism #FearPolitics #CivicLife

Against the Murder of Charlie Kirk: Political Violence and the Architecture of Division How assassination, intimidation, and division threaten the fragile practice of civic life in America.

The murder of Charlie Kirk is more than rupture—it’s a warning. Violence doesn’t erupt from nowhere; it’s cultivated through division, intimidation, and speed. Can democracy survive when hostility becomes infrastructure?
#Democracy #PoliticalViolence #Authoritarianism #CivicLife

Trump’s Gamble: Power, Risk, and the Architecture of Abandonment How Trump turns neoliberal erosion into authoritarian acceleration—and why time itself has become his most dangerous weapon.

Trump’s second term isn’t improvisation—it’s acceleration. Institutions hollowed by decades of neoliberalism are now being gutted at speed. The gamble is his, but the consequences are ours. #Trump47 #Authoritarianism #Democracy #Neoliberalism

Collateral Damage: Deregulation, Profit, and the Quiet Collapse of Civic Protection How state capture turns corporate logic into public abandonment

When government adopts the corporate gaze, it divides lives into the profitable and the expendable. Deregulation isn’t red tape—it’s abandonment disguised as efficiency. #Deregulation #StateCapture #Commons #Accountability

The Cost of Coping: How Everyday Choices Shape a Fragile Economy Why the economy’s real story is written in the everyday choices families make under strain

A carton of milk put back on the shelf tells more about today’s economy than the stock market does. Households are rewriting the system through coping—and fragility is the result.

#TrumpEconomy #FragileSystems #CopingCosts

The War Trump Wants How Venezuela became a stage for distraction, power, and spectacle

Trump didn’t stumble into Venezuela. He chose it. War offers him distraction from fragility, a stage for spectacle, and a way to consolidate power. The cost is real, and it won’t be his to bear.

#Trump #Venezuela #War #Authoritarianism #USPolitics

The Trump Economy: Designed to Fail How tariffs, deportations, and attacks on institutions unravel trust and coherence in American life

Reagan asked: “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” Under Trump, the answer is harsher. The economy isn’t resilient—it’s decohering. What looks like strength is fragility by design.
#TrumpEconomy #Decoherence #Precarity #Authoritarianism