fascism is not an opinion - fascism is a crime!

How Elon Musk set off two weeks of chaos across Washington – #fascism

Elon Musk and his allies have spent the last two weeks barreling full speed into multiple government agencies, causing confusion and chaos and raising questions about whether an unelected businessman can wield this kind of authority, seemingly running roughshod over laws and programs set up by Congress. Over the last several days, Musk-aligned personnel have gained full access to the Treasury’s payments system, threatened to shut down the US Agency for International Development, offered all federal employees a sort of “buyout” plan, and in several agencies, pushed aside career civil servants – in some cases locking them out of their offices or computers. Taken together, Musk’s moves represent an unprecedented effort to expand the power of the executive branch with little regard for laws or procedures – an effort Donald Trump foreshadowed during his successful 2024 campaign. Musk, the world’s richest man, has tens of billions of dollars in government contracts, and now, access to the innermost workings of the federal government. “I have a hard time thinking of anyone who has exerted the kind of power and control that he has exerted over government operations in the last week,” Kathleen Clark, a Washington University law professor who specializes in government ethics, told CNN. The question of whether Musk will comply with federal conflict-of-interest rules – and whether the Trump administration will enforce them – has drawn scrutiny from Democrats and watchdog groups.

via cnn: How Elon Musk set off two weeks of chaos across Washington

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‘Headed for technofascism’: the rightwing roots of Silicon Valley

The industry’s liberal reputation is misleading. Its reactionary tendencies – celebrating wealth, power and traditional masculinity – have been clear since the dotcom mania of the 1990s An influential Silicon Valley publication runs a cover story lamenting the “pussification” of tech. A major tech CEO lambasts a Black civil rights leader’s calls for diversifying the tech workforce. Technologists rage against the “PC police”. No, this isn’t Silicon Valley in the age of Maga. It’s the tech industry of the 1990s, when observers first raised concerns about the rightwing bend of Silicon Valley and the potential for “technofascism”. Despite the industry’s (often undeserved) reputation for liberalism, its reactionary foundations were baked in almost from the beginning. As Silicon Valley enters a second Trump administration, the gendered roots of its original reactionary movement offer insight into today’s rightward turn. At the height of the dotcom mania in the 1990s, many critics warned of a creeping reactionary fervor. “Forget digital utopia,” wrote the longtime technology journalist Michael Malone, “we could be headed for techno-fascism.” Elsewhere, the writer Paulina Borsook called the valley’s worship of male power “a little reminiscent of the early celebrants of Eurofascism from the 1930s”. Their voices were largely drowned out by the techno-enthusiasts of the time, but Malone and Borsook were pointing to a vision of Silicon Valley built around a reverence for unlimited male power – and a major pushback when that power was challenged. At the root of this reactionary thinking was a writer and public intellectual named George Gilder. Gilder was one of Silicon Valley’s most vocal evangelists, as well as a popular “futurist” who forecasted coming technological trends. In 1996, he started an investment newsletter that became so popular that it generated rushes on stocks from his readers, in a process that became known as the “Gilder effect”. Gilder was also a longtime social conservative who brought his politics to Silicon Valley. He had first made his name in the 1970s as an anti-feminist provocateur and a mentee of the conservative stalwart William F Buckley. At a time when women were entering the workforce in unprecedented numbers, he wrote books that argued that traditional gender roles needed to be restored, and he blamed social issues such as poverty on the breakdown of the nuclear family. (He also blamed federal welfare programs, especially those that funded single mothers, claiming they turned men into “cuckolds of the state”). In 1974, the National Organization for Women named him “Male Chauvinist Pig of the Year”; Gilder wore it as a badge of pride.

via guardian: ‘Headed for technofascism’: the rightwing roots of Silicon Valley

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FBI turns over details of 5,000 employees who worked on January 6 cases to Trump Justice Department, as agents sue

The demand has caused consternation among FBI employees who fear it is meant to amass a list of line-level personnel for possible termination by the Trump administration. Mark Wilson/Getty Images CNN  —  FBI officials have complied with demands to provide the Justice Department with details of thousands of employees who worked on investigations related to the January 6, 2021, US Capitol riot, according to people familiar with the situation. The demand has caused consternation among FBI employees who fear it is meant to amass a list of personnel for possible termination by the Trump administration. Acting Deputy Attorney General Emil Bove, in a Friday memo with the subject line “Terminations,” had given FBI officials a noon deadline Tuesday to submit the details of thousands of agents and analysts. Bove previously ordered the firing of eight senior FBI officials, including those who oversaw cyber, national security and criminal investigations. More than 5,000 employee details were submitted, including employee ID numbers, job titles and their role in the January 6 investigations, sources said, but not their names. There are more than 13,000 agents and 38,000 total FBI employees. Meanwhile, officials dispatched by Elon Musk have been seen at FBI headquarters. Musk has headed up efforts by President Donald Trump’s newly formed Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE.

via cnn: FBI turns over details of 5,000 employees who worked on January 6 cases to Trump Justice Department, as agents sue

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Nelson teen who shouted Nazi slogan at police found with knife, nunchucks and screwdriver

When police stopped a vehicle being driven without its headlights on, they found more than they expected. Sol Allen was seated in the back, wearing gloves, and a red bandana, barking like a dog and yelling the Sieg Heil slogan. The German phrase and salute adopted by the Nazi Party translates to “Hail Victory” and is widely regarded as indicative of fascist sympathies. Despite the weapons found in Allen’s possession and concerns he was planning to commit a crime, there was no evidence that was his intention, the Nelson District Court heard today. Police also said there was no evidence the 18-year-old was connected with any gang. The court heard that on the night of January 8 Allen was a back-seat passenger in a car police stopped in Nelson. They subsequently searched him and found him in possession of a large knife, nunchucks he said were part of a Japanese tribute wall he had at home and a screwdriver in his jersey.

via nzherald: Nelson teen who shouted Nazi slogan at police found with knife, nunchucks and screwdriver

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Trump’s nominee to lead counterterrorism efforts has white nationalist ties

Joe Kent, a former CIA officer, has engaged with white supremacists and neo-Nazis. President Donald Trump’s nominee to head the National Counterterrorism Center has ties to white nationalists and neo-Nazis who supported him during two unsuccessful runs for Congress. In his announcement on Monday, Trump praised Joe Kent, a retired Green Beret and former CIA officer, as a “great American hero” who will help the administration “keep America safe by eradicating all terrorism.” The Senate would have to confirm Kent to lead the Center, an agency within the office of the Director of National Intelligence responsible for coordinating national and international counterterrorism efforts. The White House didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Who is Joe Kent?  Kent, 44, has twice run unsuccessfully for a House seat to represent districts in the state of Washington. In 2022 during his first bid, Kent was interviewed by a neo-Nazi YouTuber who once called Adolf Hitler “a complicated historical figure which many people misunderstand.” He also engaged with a representative of another white nationalist group, during which he reportedly complained that America was anti-white. He also met with Nick Fuentes, an anti-Zionist white supremacist and Holocaust denier, to seek his support during a GOP primary. He later disavowed Fuentes’ “politics, especially in regards to our ally Israel.” During that campaign, Kent was endorsed by GOP Reps. Paul Gosar, a far-right Republican from Arizona who employed ardent followers of Fuentes and has repeatedly associated with white nationalists; and Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Trump loyalist who has been accused in the past of making antisemitic remarks — including her suggestion that a Jewish-funded space laser had sparked wildfires in California in 2018. Kent’s website also featured an endorsement from Arizona state Sen. Wendy Rogers, who was censured by the Arizona senate after she spoke at a white nationalist conference and invoked an antisemitic trope about Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who is Jewish. Kent also hired a member of the Proud Boys as a campaign consultant.

via forward: Trump’s nominee to lead counterterrorism efforts has white nationalist ties

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Jewish Leaders Call for Boycott After Elon Musk’s Nazi Salute, Holocaust Jokes

“Elon Musk is one of the leading purveyors of antisemitism in the world and presents an urgent danger to Jews and many other groups the world over.” After billionaire Elon Musk performed not one but two Nazi salutes at president Donald Trump’s inauguration, made appalling jokes about the Holocaust, and threw his weight behind Germany’s far-right political party, Jewish leaders are pushing advertisers to drop Musk’s in-shambles social network X-formerly-Twitter. As the Washington Post reports, more than 160 rabbis and activists have published a public letter calling the world’s richest man an “urgent danger to Jews” and “one of the leading purveyors of antisemitism in the world.” “When the world’s richest man combines political power with a platform that can mobilize hate, the danger becomes immediate and lethal,” the letter reads. “We face a stark choice: stand up now or watch as hate spreads unchecked.” The letter highlights Musk’s worrying embrace of white supremacist and antisemitic beliefs, which have seemingly been sharpened by his own social media platform. Musk has a track record of antisemitism and racial animus against other groups. In 2023, Jewish leaders wrote a strikingly similar letter to X advertisers after Musk outright called a deeply antisemitic tweet the “actual truth.” At the time, Musk claimed that he had “no choice but to file a defamation lawsuit against the Anti-Defamation League,” threats that the billionaire never made good on. He also claimed — without giving a shred of evidence — that the ADL was to blame for 60 percent of ad sales decline at X. Research has shown that his social media platform has succumbed to a tidal wave of hate speech and antisemitism under his leadership, which has proliferated in a near-total absence of content moderation. Advertisers, which have long represented Twitter’s main revenue stream, have had an extremely rocky relationship with Musk’s hate speech incubator. Many major brands returned to the platform last fall, despite their ads appearing next to posts celebrating Adolf Hitler and other instances of blatant hate speech. However, X-formerly-Twitter’s financials are stagnating, as Musk admitted himself in a recently leaked email.

via futurism: Jewish Leaders Call for Boycott After Elon Musk’s Nazi Salute, Holocaust Jokes

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Südtirol-Streit um AfD-Politiker: Hotel verbietet Gauland Italien-Urlaub – Diskussion folgt

Wer an das schöne Südtirol mit seinen Bergen, Seen und der Landschaft denkt, der hat bestimmt nicht gleich Alexander Gauland im Kopf. Der äußerst umstrittene AfD-Politiker aus Deutschland, der sich schon mehrere Entgleisungen geleistet hat, ist für viele ein rotes Tuch. Er verharmloste die Herrschaft der Nazis in Deutschland als „Vogelschiss in der Geschichte“, war einst kein Freund vom damals aktiven Nationalspieler Jerome Boateng und griff die Integrationsbeauftragte Aydan Özoguz an, die „in Anatolien entsorgt werden“ sollte. Natürlich wünschen sich viele Hoteliers so einen Gast nicht in ihrer Unterkunft, geschehen auch in Südtirol. Gauland darf nicht mehr ins Lieblings-Hotel in Südtirol – „Gast bringt Unruhe ins Haus“ Angefangen hatte alles im Oktober 2024, als der Politiker in einer Talkshow sagte: „Aus meinem Lieblingshotel in Südtirol – seit Jahrzehnten schon – ist mir gesagt worden, dass man mich nicht mehr als Gast haben möchte. Den Rest meiner Familie ja, aber mich nicht.“ Dieser Satz wurde Anfang Februar 2025 wieder aufgerollt. Es handelt sich hierbei ums Hotel Elephant in Brixen, der laut Besitzerin Elisabeth Heiss Unruhe ins Haus bringe. „Wir sind ein liberales Haus“, sagte Heiss Rai Südtirol, „aber Alexander Gauland passt nicht mehr zu uns.  Ich habe das Gespräch gesucht und ihm nahegelegt, nicht mehr zu uns zu kommen. Und zwar aus persönlichen, teils auch aus ideologischen Gründen. So ein Gast bringt Unruhe ins Haus, nicht bei uns, aber bei den Gästen.“ Zustimmung bekommt Gauland aus rechten Kreisen, die fragwürdige Meinungen vertreten. Der Südtiroler Politiker Jürgen Wirth-Anderlan (Liste JWA – die auf seinen Namen zurückgeht) kann das gar nicht nachvollziehen. Er war Landeskommandant des Südtiroler Schützenbundes, erreichte größere Bekanntheit, weil er sich rassistisch, sexistisch und homophob äußerte. Impfen und die Maßnahmen gegen Corona fand er nicht gut. Kein Wunder also, dass er Gauland in Schutz nimmt, dessen Partei sich während Corona mit ähnlichen Äußerungen oft ins Aus schoss. (…) Heiss wird für ihre Entscheidung gefeiert. „Das ist eine Frage der Haltung! Prima Entscheidung“, schreiben die User unter den Instagram-Post von Rai Südtirol, wo die Geschichte in kurzen Absätzen erzählt wird. „Respekt, prima Haltung“, meint jemand anderes. „Herr Anderlan, dass hat etwas mit Haltung und Werten außerhalb des Geldes zu tun. Glückwunsch an das Hotel. Kann man weiterempfehlen“, so ein anderer User. Und eine Frau wird das Hotel sogar nutzen: „Ich komme euch besuchen, wenn ich in Brixen bin.“ Haltung kann also nicht nur Kontroversen auslösen, sondern sich auch positiv auszahlen.

via merkur: Südtirol-Streit um AfD-Politiker: Hotel verbietet Gauland Italien-Urlaub – Diskussion folgt

siehe dazu auch: AfD: Südtiroler Hotel will Gauland nicht beherbergen – heftige Debatte entbrannt. Alexander Gauland geriet in der Vergangenheit des Öfteren in die Schlagzeilen. Die Liste der Kontroversen um ihn ist lang: Er hatte etwa die NS-Zeit als “Vogelschiss in über 1000 Jahren erfolgreicher deutscher Geschichte” bezeichnet und forderte einen “Schlussstrich” unter Deutschlands Nazi-Vergangenheit. Deutschland habe das Recht, stolz auf die Leistungen deutscher Soldaten in zwei Weltkriegen zu sein, sagte er. Zudem gab es Ermittlungen wegen Volksverhetzung gegen ihn, nachdem er gefordert hatte, die damalige Integrationsbeauftragte Aydan Özoguz “in Anatolien zu entsorgen”. In der norditalienischen Provinz Südtirol hat der AfD-Mitbegründer nun erneut für ein Politikum gesorgt: Ein Hotel in Brixen will Gauland nicht mehr als Gast. Sowohl die Eigentümerin als auch der Hoteliers- und Gastwirteverband Südtirol (HGV) sowie Spitzenpolitiker:innen der Provinz melden sich jetzt öffentlich zu Wort.

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