John Ganz

Heresies; Stray Dog; Rachel Getting Married Reading, Watching 08.03.25

Weekly roundup.—
www.unpopularfront.news/p/heresies-s...

I am nomber one

Thank you!

Because he's using it as cover? It's called a twist. The other people are ronin, like Jean Reno.

He says "I never left" in the movie.

Eyeless in Gaza At the Mill with the Slaves

“The return of naked imperialism.... is a grave issue for all minority peoples like the Jews…. Zionists love to talk about the ‘lessons’ of Jewish history, but ignore its most potent one: They will use us today and toss us out tomorrow.” www.unpopularfront.news/p/eyeless-in...

Have you seen When the Clock Broke for sale at a train station in Europe? Please share a pic! It's my dream to have my book sold at a European train station.

This anecdote about David Duke’s 1991 run for Louisiana governor might as well just be lifted directly from the Simpsons

#FridayReads When the Clock Broke, by John Ganz. The only decent Trump book I’ve ever read (in large part because it has the sense to keep Trump in the background). Worth reading.

I would play Close Combat II: A Bridge Too Far

If I were to stream old video games I liked to play when I was younger, would people watch?

I may be crazy, but I do not think I'm crazy enough to have hallucinated all this

weirdly Schmittian argument: "under late capitalism, liberal capitalist rule relies on the state of exception which is basically the same of Trumpism, just applied to society as a whole"

Theodor Adorno and the Crises of Liberalism At the center of Adorno’s work was a reminder that fascist movements are not exceptional to liberal democracy but signs of its failure.

it's very baffling watching people argue like fascism was merely a product of interwar modernization pressures alone when adorno explicitly argued that fascism was a omnipresent danger towards civilization that liberal society could regress to

www.thenation.com/article/poli...

I think Ryan is picking up on the proximity to the old Comintern line when he calls it "tankie."

Theory to claim that liberalism was ever thus, while at the same time admitting this a new iteration. And so he's getting perilously close to applying the Third International's theories of fascism to Trump: "It's really nothing new, it's just an iteration of bourgeois rule." Well, yes and no.

I have a slightly more generous reading based on what I know of Tooze's books: since he situates the rise of fascism in the interwar period that was so very violent and unstable, to call this fascism appears like an exaggeration. But what he is essentially doing now is using the Frankfurt School's

Behemoth or Leviathan? State and Unstate

"Trump, who is the archetypal member of the rich rabble, the petty bourgeois, if you’ll permit the pun: vain, envious, litigious, greedy, etc., who recognizes no right except power and money." www.unpopularfront.news/p/behemoth-o...

ha haa

A Christian Nation Endless revelation

i thought this from @jackhanson.bsky.social was terrific substack.com/home/post/p-...

I also think Oberlin should be destroyd

The stabbed in the dick legend

The Fatal Embrace Reading, Watching 07.27.25

The previous owner of my copy of Arendt's "Antisemitism" wrote, "Jewish neoconservatives are the new court Jews" on the cover page.—

www.unpopularfront.news/p/the-fatal-...

Jesus Christ, this has got to be one of the worst public statements by a leader in history

Just finished When the Clock Broke and it really is fantastic. It does not focus on Trump directly, rather it captures all the disparate drivers, movements, and sentiments that foreshadow what we would one day come to call "Trumpism" sitting out there in the open all along.

Ross Perot Transformed Politics. It Will Be Harder for Elon Musk. Both tech billionaires tried to disrupt the two-party system. That’s where their paths diverge.

ANALYSIS: Ross Perot transformed politics. It will be harder for Elon Musk.

Both tech billionaires tried to disrupt the two-party system, but that’s where their paths diverge.

There's a ton of great stuff in @lioneltrolling.bsky.social 's 'When The Clock Broke' deserving of a fuller review

...but this tidbit about "new class theory" feels particularly relevant to how Trump uses populism to shield (favored) corporate elites from scrutiny.

Ross Perot Transformed Politics. It Will Be Harder for Elon Musk. Both tech billionaires tried to disrupt the two-party system. That’s where their paths diverge.

I’ve compared Ross Perot and Elon Musk, but I’m skeptical Musk will be able to copy Perot successfully. For politico:
www.politico.com/news/magazin...

Second Thoughts on Epstein; More on Aristotle and "the Tyrannical Soul" Reading, Watching 07.20.25

More on pleonexia, the "tyrant's vice"
www.unpopularfront.news/p/second-tho...

I don’t think he’s. Jewish