How extreme? So extreme that in late May, Anton set aside nearly two hours on his Claremont Institute podcast (“The Stakes”) for an erudite, wide-ranging discussion with self-described monarchist Curtis Yarvin about why the United States needs an “American Caesar” to seize control of the federal government, and precisely how such a would-be dictator could accomplish the task.
With this conversation, Anton seems eager to shift the Overton window far beyond anything resembling liberal democracy. In its place, he would substitute an elaborate, historically and philosophically sophisticated justification for tyranny…
The podcast concludes with Anton quoting another Claremont writer (Anthony Codevilla) on how Trump dropped “the leadership of the deplorables,” which is waiting to be picked up by someone “who will make Trump seem moderate.” Yarvin responds approvingly with a quote by Serbian dictator and indicted genocidal war criminal Slobodan Milošević, who said the goal should be that “no one will dare to beat you anymore.”…
Which means that on the starboard side of American politics, the Overton window has now shifted far beyond the boundaries of democratic self-government to a place broadly coterminous with fascism.
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