The Problem With Jon Stewart - The Far Right Is Going Global: Anne Applebaum on the Decline of Democracy

Episode Date: January 18, 2023

Brazil’s insurrection is just the latest in a series of attacks on democracy around the world. So we’re talking to Anne Applebaum, a staff writer at The Atlantic and author of the book Twilight of Democracy, about why autocracy is making a comeback and how to stop it. We dive into democracy’s roots as an unstable form of government, the role of global elites on both sides, and why fascism is really just a money-laundering scheme. Plus, writers Henrik Blix and Maria Randazzo weigh in on George Santos’ litany of stupid lies and why you can always tell a future dictator by the absurdity of his facial hair. Season 2 is now streaming on Apple TV+.CREDITS
Hosted by: Jon Stewart Featuring, in order of appearance: Maria Randazzo, Henrik Blix, Anne Applebaum Executive Produced by Jon Stewart, Brinda Adhikari, James Dixon, Chris McShane, and Richard PleplerLead Producer: Sophie EricksonProducers: Zach Goldbaum, Caity GrayAssoc. Producer: Andrea Betanzos Sound Engineer: Miguel CarrascalSenior Digital Producer: Freddie MorganDigital Producer: Cassie MurdochDigital Coordinator: Norma HernandezSupervising Producer: Lorrie BaranekHead Writer: Kris AcimovicElements Producer: Kenneth HullClearances Producer: Daniella PhilipsonSenior Talent Producer: Brittany MehmedovicTalent Manager: Marjorie McCurryTalent Coordinator: Lukas ThimmSenior Research Producer: Susan Helvenston Theme Music by: Gary Clark Jr.The Problem With Jon Stewart podcast is an Apple TV+ podcast produced by Busboy Productionshttps://apple.co/-JonStewart

Mm-hmm. I just got some I got some in my teeth and here we go. Hold on a little product placement for big spinach Ah Welcome back It's the podcast the problem with me the actual problem John Stewart. Don't forget to watch our Apple TV plus show We got more of those coming for God's sakes. You just got away like a Month or two something like that. I don't know it take we we rely on elves unfortunately we rely on content elves and They are often the Caribbean right now, so we'll have to see but today's gonna be an exciting one

We are talking about the end of democracy Autocracy on the move Brazil had a little insurrection it looked a little bit like The January 6th insurrection, but with people which much nicer asses. That's how Brazil does things. It was it was a carnaval Insurrection we're gonna be talking to Atlantic writer and Applebaum who's Written an awful lot about these networks of far-right anti-democratic movements But first Maria Randazzo and Henrik Blitz you are the writers for our program on Apple TV plus called the problem Hello

Hey, John First of all may I just comment on Henrik? Please the beard is magnificent today. Thank you. This may be the luscious This may be the most Fully developed that I have seen. Thank you so much. I can ask you a question. Yeah, is that crocheted or is that grown? This yeah, my sister made this for She does amazing beard work John have you ever thought about going full

Wizard mode like really letting it because you got a pretty you got a pretty solid beard Yeah, if I could dumbledore this I would do it My only problem is with the judaic nature of my face any even anything longer than this and The only questions I will get are from people saying rabbi We all have watchouts where I'm like if I lean in too much people are gonna start being like hey, man We got a pretty fun militia if you want to join If I were to lean in too much it would become very clear to people that I'm a Sicilian American woman So there is even though you might not see it. There's a certain amount of upkeep. That's also happening behind the scenes here understood

But more importantly, I have been watching to have you guys seen George Santos since he's been sworn in I can't get enough. I I'm so excited to see What happens to the guy that I voted for No, that's good that you're voting in the place where you live, I think that's an important I Like to cast a legal vote now Maria. You're you're you're Ohio. So Santos is obviously not your Your guy either but pleasant to watch Pleasant to watch a real I mean just a sprawling

Cheesecake factory menu of of stories to choose from from this man as to which to follow It's it's astounding. What's what he's done what he's offering up to us I think there's something very funny that the reaction to me feels less outrage and more amusement and I think it's the nature of what he's doing is so funny because you know most like congressional or political scandals are mired in complexity or Interpretation of the law or like corruption. Yes, or is it is it is it coincidence that?

You know, they sold this stock right before this legislation passed and his scandals are like he said he invented a car And so it's just it's all these like Tom Sawyer ass Rumpel still skinny tricks right where he's truly like guess what my real name is I was a dentist No, and I was the best dentist until my hands fell off. I Really think that the reason why his scandal You know people shout about it that do things but nobody really cares is because of how he looks Sure, everything about him is screams of just mediocrity. He's not obese. He's not skinny He's just he's everything in the middle and I have to say

When I when I watch him now on the floor trying to interact with his new Republican brethren It looks like one of those movies like prison movies where they yell like fish like it's like fresh meat Hey, fresh meat like he's got that look on his face like I I'm going to have to join the Aryan gang because the Spanish gang is threatening me Yeah, can I hang out with you fellas like he doesn't ever look like he belongs? No, he's always on the outside He looks like he just had to give up a carton of smokes to get to keep his muffin Yeah, that's that's what it that's what he looks like to me Maybe he'll undergo like a makeover and come back with kind of like a leathery looking face and a crazy haircut. No

That guy's got baby's bottom written all over. He does He just seems like he would be a treat to wrestle. Let me let me just say this That took an unexpected time You know what I mean, you're just trying to feel strong. No, no, I don't know what you mean He'd be a treat to wrestle. I stand by it. I Think I think a little slippery and squishy, but oh He really to me it looks like his mom drops him off at Congress and like kisses him on the cheek He's like mom. Don't like

Me off a few blocks in front of it. Yeah. All right. Yeah, by the way, that's not my mom That's Princess Diana, right, you know, my real mom is Grace Kelly Yeah, he's like He's I mean the funniest one to me is like we were talking about some of them the funniest one to me is He claimed he played Division 3 volleyball at Baruch College and Both of his knees had to get replaced because he played too hard Yeah, and that to me is like playing a D3 sport. It's impressive, but it's not a thing that people are like. Oh

You played volleyball Baruch. We have a table for you right here So like it's not it's not that crazy And it's so funny to hear him tell the lie because he's like we were playing we were playing some of the big dogs We were playing Harvard Princeton. He slayed them. Yeah, sure Listen when when you go up and when you're throwing down for Baruch and by the way shout out go go fighting hamantaschen Baruch They bring it and their volleyball team is renowned Amongst I can see why he chose that. Oh, they really do have an outstanding volleyball team. I have no fucking idea

Oh, my guess is no But that's the beauty of his lies is you wouldn't even think to check because it's just so stupid, right? I would crush him in volleyball. Do you think that's the chatbot? Like do you think George Santos? Typed in lies I could tell that people wouldn't check and and just an AI chatbot The originality is not the lies the originality is that he tried it and when I watch him like, you know he did that podcast with like Matt Gates and When I see it's sort of like what you talked about on the floor

Which is like, you know that phenomenon when a comedian that all other comedians think is a hack Makes it big and everyone's like fuck You can't just say whatever you want There's like a little bit of skill and nuance to this it feels like watching Gates talk to him Felt like that where he's like here's how you lie saying shit. Yeah One thing the thing we have to be careful of and and I always caution myself on this and I ran into this trouble with Trump Is we cannot mistake absurdity? For lack of danger. Yes, because it takes people with no shame to do shameful things

Yes, and so I always and the same thing is going on like there's that Brazilian Insurrection and you could say like oh, this is absurd But in absurdity is is where the real danger always is it's like with Gaddafi you would see Gaddafi and you'd be like Oh my god, he's dressed like Michael Jackson. What a ridiculous person. He's like and I'm developing a nuclear bomb You're like, oh fuck. It's absurdity always makes you think something is more benign than it is I had the same problem. I admit that misjudged Trump because he's so ridiculous And then you think about well the worst people in history Have been ridiculous the Hitler mustache, right?

Anybody who would walk out of his house and go like this is I think the best I can do That's a dangerous person right there's something behind these choices They're not just funny random, right, but I didn't think Bolsonaro would be like that I Bolsonaro struck me as like kind of a handsome dude like, you know tried to be the alpha male like he didn't have that so that I think Watching what happened in Brazil and and watching how he has attached himself to the MAGA world It feels beneath him to be quite on but isn't it isn't it? Necessary, you know what? I mean like if you it's like in for a penny in for a pound like Bolsonaro might have started on this earth But but eventually you have to get to the point of being like I'm the biggest strongest man in the world

And anyone who says they can beat me as a liar You have the Kim Jong-un's of the world who are like my best score in golf is 17 And like that's national doctrine so Bolsonaro being like I can't be killed and I will always be in charge Is like I think it's necessary at some point to do what they're doing I think it also at a certain point the more ridiculous the shit you try and pull the fewer people you have around you to do it like The the the semi it's it's how you end up with the pillow guy because The other folks even Home Depot guy at a certain point is like look

I think people don't work because of socialism, but even I won't be that fucking crazy Right like I think the further you go down the rabbit hole the fewer people the less Competence the more crazy and those are the only people that will still lie in the bed with you You get to a point where it's not all first-round draft picks anymore where it's like it's got to be Jason Miller and then he's like the The head of truth social I think yeah parlor. I can't remember which one grinder. I think he's with grinder Getter g e t t r is his Jason Miller's thing, but it's you know, I I want them to all go back to being nationalists and not Dangerous straight-up national. Yeah, I just want them to go back being pure Nationalists stop working together you want fascism classic exactly. I want the classic yeah

It's it's morphed into something, but I have to think that even back in the third You know, there is a certain like when you see the footage of Mussolini on the You know balcony standing with his hands crossed and giving the look you're like, oh, what a ridiculous human being. Yeah And then you see the damage that that this individual, you know And those stories don't always end with him hanging by his feet in a square Like you just don't know how this thing's gonna play out. My guess is she she knows all about this She's written books on creeping autocracy how democracy is on the back foot. So I'm gonna check in there See if she believes democracy this democracy could already be over. We just don't even know it

So she may she may have the answer, but and I get it. I'll come back. I'll tell you guys let us know Yeah, I definitely want to know because I want to know Who I should be aligning with and what kind of beards we should all start growing. Yeah. Oh, do you think there'll be a new fascist because? Ridiculous and absurd hair configurations are a hallmark It's never been normal. It's like it like Hitler is like I'm gonna dress like Charlie Chaplin and Mussolini is like I'm gonna dress like a Shriner general and Kim Jong-un is like I'm gonna dress like Hillary Clinton at a debate All right, I'm gonna go talk to Ann Applebaum, I'll talk to you guys in a second

All right, everybody it is time to get to our guests. We're very excited We're gonna welcome staff writer for the Atlantic author of Twilight of Democracy, which I'm sure sounds more depressing than it actually is Please welcome Ann Applebaum Ann. Thank you so much for for taking the time to join us Thank you so much for having me. It's great pleasure And I was so sorry to hear that Democracy is dying and that autocracy is now Ascendant, but you've written quite a bit about the perilous nature that we find Healthy liberal democracy in

Do you want to expand on that is that's not something that we just saw after January 6th? This is a in been an ongoing backslide No indeed my book predates January the 6th. Yes Also, I would put it a little differently. I would say there's an ongoing contest I'm not predicting the demise of democracy or that it will end because that's not how history works We're still in the game We're still in the game and nothing's over till it's over, right? So, you know one of the ways in which you can Shape events is by thinking positively about them or thinking about what's wrong analyzing the problem

And changing the situation and moving on that sounds like hope and prayers. That sounds like hope and prayer Maybe that's a little bit too optimistic, but you know, but but I I feel a kind of professional Responsibility to be optimistic, you know, I mean, how could I say to my kids or to my Students or to people younger than me that everything's over, you know, that seems unfair even when I do sometimes Feel it, but no, there's been a challenge to the mainstream of liberal democracy that's actually began percolating I think about a decade ago And it's got different sources There is an economic source, which is the one that's most famously talked about but I think

Really, it's more cultural There's a part of the western elite in America in Europe and in many other countries That became Discontented with its role and its influence and began trying to imagine something different Usually, I know it's talked about in a different way. We talk about, you know The masses being unhappy about this or that but I actually think this is something that began in a different place So you talk about global elites generally Global elites are seen as the liberal establishment

Not the illiberal In fact, generally autocrats and the illiberal Crowd are fighting against global elites. So you're saying they themselves may in fact be global elites Well, that's of course their narrative That's the narrative that they use in order to claim that they're the underdogs I mean, do you think, you know, Donald Trump wasn't part of the global elite or You know, Boris Johnson wasn't part of the global elite, you know There is no autocratic movement whether of the far left or the far right whether in Venezuela or in Hungary

That doesn't have elites working for it. So whether it's journalists or propagandists or speechwriters or the political candidates themselves They are invariably people who come with connections and preparation and ideas and sometimes education Am I hearing this correctly? Are you telling me that populism is a scam? Is that what I'm hearing here? That that demagogues rule the day no matter what the political movement is? I'm afraid populism is a scam. I don't know. I don't know how to break it to you at this late day

Apple bomb It's you say ten years, you know I want to look back a little bit further as we as we trace this thing and and then we'll get up to sort of where it's at Stands now in Russia and Brazil and as you said Venezuela and Hungary I'm old enough to remember Francis Fukuyama telling us that history had ended and This was post the fall of the Soviet Union America's dominance liberal democracies dominance was unquestioned

we could close the book on Fascism communism socialism that that this was ascendant and it was over and that lasted I think a week and then there was an invasion in Iraq and Afghanistan and and the whole thing turned on its head Has this movement against democracy actually never ended that it really that this is A post-World War two kind of there was a grace period and then the battle just started all over again I'm afraid I think it's even older than that if you look at the American founders and what they were talking about at the time They wrote the Constitution what they were most afraid of was a demagogue coming to power

I mean they knew it from their reading of classics, right? They were reading the history of ancient Rome mostly and they were afraid of Caesar They were afraid of some Demagogue coming to power and changing the rules and some of the weirdest things about our Constitution were deliberately written in order to prevent that and so really from the beginning the idea that democracy might be overthrown by Autocrats or by anti-democrats has been You know part of the nature of democracy

I mean and and all the rule writing and all of the debating that's ever gone into creating a democracy wherever they've been created whether in America or in Africa or in Asia or or or in Europe That's been one of the central concerns and so this idea that somehow You know the first challenges to democracy happened Maybe in the 20th century is really a misreading and a and a forgetting of the older history So it's it's kind of inherent to the idea of democracy is an idea of instability that there will always be People who want to challenge it. There's always going to be an alternate elite who want power for themselves They're always going to be people who don't accept the rules who don't want to

You know make it possible for their political enemies to win the next election I mean, that's that's that's inherent to the to the nature of the thing so so Throughout history, you know, let's let's say Caesar to Trump. Let's call that both by the way casino owners oddly enough It's really the push and pull of Autocracy and mob rule. That's kind of the founder's game is to find that sweet spot checks and balances between Allowing tyranny or mob rule and the tyranny of the mob To to run things and and that's kind of the delicate balance that we're always trying to maintain. Would that be it?

Yeah, I think that's the right way to to describe it You know, you have to think of democracy as a system that's constantly being challenged really by human nature itself I mean, it is a it is a normal Desire of people who are in power to wish to keep power and to keep it indefinitely and to alter the Institutions of democracy in order to keep it and so you have to create rules in advance that doesn't let them do that And that and those rules are things like an independent court system rule of law You know a set of norms and and ideas built up around that a kind of education System attached to that and you have to teach people to accept the idea that when someone wins an election

It doesn't mean they get to destroy their enemies and lock them up and put them in jail And then rule indefinitely because that's you know, that's the natural instinct of people who seek power and democracies have to find a way of preventing that from happening and You know, historically, there aren't so many democracies. I mean, I think for most of human history They've been pretty rare. It's why when when the founders were designing our system what they were reading about was Greece and Rome So there hadn't been anything in between that impressed them all that much Little bit of a gap. There was a gap There's a little bit of a gap and so they started and you see that it's it's so interesting you mentioned it

But I want to ask about the role of you know power doesn't want to see it itself But it also in order to be empowered to do the anti-democratic things Kind of paradoxically it needs an angry mob and You see that now in the stirring up of of the angry mobs. You see it in Brazil. You saw it on January 6 You hear it on talk radio. There is that idea of It's not just the people who are the leaders wanting to punish their opponents It's their supporters that there is a real Vigilante vindictive I mean for God's sakes locker up was maybe

the single biggest bumper sticker issue, you know in the 2016 election how How important is it? That they have the angry mob behind them It's very important and they spend a lot of time thinking about how to create the angry mob What are that's the point? That's the point, right? What are the issues that can inspire it? What can keep it together and one of the things that's happened? You know, this is now a cliche of me even saying this in the last several years is that social media has made that easier It's easier to create

Links between people who wouldn't have known one another before it's easier to find the people who are dissatisfied with the current political system or the current, you know, national order And it's easier to link them together and to create the mob You know, it was it was actually a lot harder in the past when you had to do it in sort of in real life Right, you had to actually have people on streets, you know, hanging around street corners talking to one another now It can be done electronically well, it seems like the real advancement in mob rule was probably radio Was it not I mean that was really like in the 30s and again, this is a very

American-centric view of it because I think it's probably different in in different areas around the world But here in this country, you know, it went from radio to direct mail to AM radio to Social media, but why is it that these movements? Why do their communications? What why are they so? easily passed and whipped up Whereas the communication of moderation or of You know a more democratic way has such a difficult time lies spread faster than truth First of all, you're absolutely right about radio

The two people who best understood radio and who instantly saw the possibilities of it at the beginning of the 20th century were Hitler and Stalin I mean, they were both addicted to radio. They loved radio, you know, Hitler communicated by radio Stalin was obsessed with radio I thought you're gonna say Wolfman Jack. I thought you're gonna say the one who understood it best was Wolfman Jack and father Coglan in this country and father look often in this country and of course You know the responses to radio are also very interesting So the creation of the BBC was actually an attempt to find a way to use Radio for Democratic purposes to use radio to reach different parts of the population to unite Britain into a single

National conversation. I mean, there were there was a lot of thinking that was done about this at that time I mean, I think the main problem is that these are the demagogues are looking at a different audience So they're looking at an audience that wants very clear simple slogans that's bothered by raucous debate and divisive argument that favors a kind of homogeneous Conversation that wants You know wants kind of to simplify the public sphere And and and they're aiming at that group of people and as you say the more nuanced conversation is aiming at a different

Sort of people. It's not that it doesn't work It's that it has a different impact and and a different audience. How important is nostalgia in the mix of Sort of this more populist radio and rabble rousing this idea that you had something that was better That was lost that is being taken from you that that idea of You are the victims of this new Movement. It's it's hugely important and always has been in these kinds of movements I mean going back to the 18th and 19th century. So the idea that You're losing that you're falling behind

That you're falling out of something and that it can be restored and and their idea of restoration is not just I mean, I have some nostalgia for the past to you know, I like old buildings and I like sure Like Charleston shoes the old candy. That's right. Delicious, you know, what was wrong with good and plenty? But but their idea is is to use an idea of the past to destroy the present We're gonna wipe away all the ugliness that we see around it and we're gonna substitute something better And it's it's absolutely central to almost all populist movements and also to some left-wing movements as well I think too that the for me the important thing to remember is and I think this is something that Sometimes gets overlooked is that these movements are not spontaneous in any way. They're designed

That they are there are meetings upon meetings in rooms where these strategies are discussed designed deployed and And and before we get to That moment in in present times talk a little bit about how these movements that they're never a spontaneous kind of A moment of inspiration leads to this movement. It's not how it appears in Hollywood narratives It's how it appears in Boardrooms that these are strategies laid out very meticulously Well, this is why I was talking about elites because yes, you're absolutely right. So there's there's a planning process, you know

You know, just behind January the 6th. There was a planning process. We're going to bring people together. There's an online conversation. There's There are people planning what will happen There are people who think about in that case the impact of that day I mean there was there was a goal to that particular right It wasn't just people spontaneously gathering at the Capitol. It was meant to block Mike Pence from certifying Joe Biden's election. So it had a kind of you know, if there was an explicitly explicitly so This is this was the design of not necessarily the whole group, but a portion within that group Absolutely, I mean portion within that group knew that's what it was for, right, you know, you can see it

You can read it in what they were saying, you know, this is why they were saying hang Mike Pence This was there. This was their idea They were there in order to in order to block this and the planning process included lawyers and constitutional scholars Right. Speller might not be the right word But people who are thinking very hard about the Constitution and what were the loopholes in the Constitution and right? How could we use our weird electoral college, you know, and it's strange regulations How could we use that to block the Biden presidency? So absolutely it involved a lot of educated People who are working behind the scenes in order to create that spectacle

And so you're right the idea that it's happened spontaneously is is wrong and actually a lot of what happens online isn't particularly spontaneous either I mean, you know, people create campaigns. They create hashtags They try to link people together and how can how can this particular community be brought into touch with that other particular community? And how can they be made to think the same things and actually, you know, this can be done for good or for evil This is just a neutral fact, right? How do you campaign? How do you how do you, you know, create single ideas? I mean, this is this is what advertisers do. It's what, you know, political groups of all kinds do But the idea that the idea that arrived is spontaneous is of course absurd But the interesting point there I thought especially is that idea of loopholes, you know

When you have a liberal democracy, there is space within it because one of its sort of main selling points is a certain freedom And within certain freedoms, which means there's going to be more spaces for activities that can undermine those freedoms That's what we all heard after 9-11, you know, they they used our freedom against us. They undermined us in that way These movements do the same things. They weaponize the modes of communication. They weaponize the loopholes in the systems To gain control and then once in control, then that's the real, you know, it's sort of like they plant themselves But then the roots have to grow out and they have to erode all those democratic systems and bulwarks, those guardrails And that seems like stage two. Would that be would that be correct? Yeah, I think I think that's right I mean one of the things that we learned from the Trump administration was that there was a lot more about American democracy that operated on the basis of

Kind of norms and assumptions and behavior That wasn't written into the law Right just for just a petty thing the fact that presidents reveal their tax forms Which has been true since Nixon first started or their visitor logs or their visitor logs I mean, not none. There's no law that says you have to do that But it was just a thing that people did and everybody got used to the idea, you know or ethics rules about Who gets paid in the White House and who? You know, what's the role of presidential children in an administration?

Right and there were a lot of norms around ethics norms, you know about what money you can take and what kind of deals you can be doing on the side Turned out to be easily viable Um, and the same was true with the electoral process. It turned out that This thing that happened on January the 6th that we all thought was a kind of ceremony without that much meaning It turned out that some people looked at the ceremony and said wait, there's no what if we stopped that ceremony? What if we made it not happen? You know, then we'd throw a wrench into the system And it and it no one had thought of doing it before because it was just outside the realm of imagination

And once you begin to imagine that then yes, you begin to imagine all kinds of other things, you know What are the other institutions that keep things on track? For example? inspectors general right and ethics advisors and people have been Stuck inside bureaucracies to keep them independent. Yes the deep state and the deep state It's incredible to me though the amount of and I think the january 6th commission for Ultimately, whatever accountability will be brought to bear in it. The most interesting thing to me is The amount of conversation the amount of the administration that it takes To undermine a healthy democracy the lawyers that have to come in and check things over, you know

Absentee military coup, which they also I think were laying the groundwork for It's amazing to me how many fucking meetings You know autocrats need to take over Oh, you need you need a lot of meetings. You need a lot of smoke filled rooms. You need a lot of dinners You need a lot of conversations around kitchen tables No, there's there's a you know the planning and thinking about how you undermine the institutions

Figuring out which ones are weak, you know, who are the people who can be replaced, you know Which are the jobs that if you put a loyalist into it, he could screw up, you know Screw up the most things and by the way, that was something that trump didn't understand very well when he first became president And he got better at with as time went on. I mean, so he sure he began to understand better How you could use for example the department of defense the department of defense exactly your defense secretary Right. Here's where it gets us to sort of now more of the present moment And I think you've written an awful lot about this which is

this kind of loose movement of autocrats that In some ways look like kind of independent Weather systems that are going on but it's a larger climate and it is connected from Hungary to brazil To russia to the united states uh, and oddly enough The the recipe for this autocracy was laid out in full view for everyone to see I mean you could almost

There's that speech that steve bannon gave at the vatican where he just sort of lays out You know Putin is a defender of western civilization western civilization is under attack and we must all band together against liberalism And and just sort of laid out the game plan Oh, it's not a secret the game plan. Um, I I was I was at a Um Kind of strange event in room. It was right before the pandemic Organized by this kind of national conservative movement where victor orban was one of the guest speakers

And there were some americans there and other europeans and so on and and orban was interviewed on the stage And he was asked a series of sycophantic questions and you know, why why are you so wonderful? And how how is it that you've remained in power so long? Mr. Orban did tucker do the interview was that tucker? And tucker was sadly not there, but you know, how how is it that you've remained in power so long? He said well, it really helps to have no opposition So if you can eliminate your opposition And make sure they don't have any power that helps and the other thing that really helps is to have no journalists who disagree with you

So if you can eliminate the journalists Then you can stay in power longer and he said it I was sitting in the back with the other journalists, you know And we all laughed but you know Wasn't that funny was there even like See that's the kind of thing that you think when a leader says it you'd get at least an audible gasp Like the audience realizing that democracy was you know Backsliding gasped as they saw the creeping face of fascism coming across like you always think it's going to be more Dramatic than it is. No, the audience lapped it up

You know, these were sort of italians and you know spaniards and and and poles and others and they lapped it up And they said wow, wow, you know if we could eliminate our journalists if we didn't have this constant criticism If we didn't have an opposition think what we could do we could dismantle You know the entire state we could we could change Change everything about our society and make it the way we want it to be But what is the ideology is is the ideology that connects them? I just don't want to be bothered by journalists and the uh checks and balances of a democratic system What or is the ideology?

more about liberalism itself Is it more about we we are going to protect? the conservative view of christian western civilization Is there something that connects these sort of disparate autocrats that's larger than a a billionaire power dictators club

So they're they're different people in that group and they have different motivations. Sorry to be over nuanced No, no, no, no, please some of them do believe that you know the world has been taken over by a kind of left-wing communist gay Ideology and we need to bring the world back to some traditional way of being and we need to restore The hierarchy between men and women and some of them believe we need to store the hierarchy of race And some of them say, you know, it's all this immigration has diluted our societies And we need to bring it back to some as we've discussed some previous world that was that was better and stronger We need to be like that Some people are very interested in money

And one of the other things that happens when you eliminate your journalists and your political opposition and your inspector generals and your ethics councils Is that it's a lot easier to steal And you can steal a lot. And so, you know, for example in victor or bonds hungry They steal like crazy, you know, because they can, you know, there's no nobody watching them and nobody nobody preventing them Some of them are interested in power, you know, they just want to be in charge indefinitely And they don't want to have any opposition in the future So they want to just take power and then keep it Because it's a more comfortable way to live

So so there is so they're different they're different versions of it. Let's break these groups down Let's let's talk a little bit about okay. So who's let's call it fascism classic Uh, they're against in hierarchy of race and immigration Which of these sort of modern autocrats is is more ideologically aligned with the political aims of these kinds of fascist ideologies or autocrat ideologies And who is using it more cynically? I'll give you an example Putin recently gave a speech. It must have been two months ago Where he almost mirrored he talked about there's two wests There's a liberal west and a liberal west and we i'm on the side of the west

We just want to get uh back to patriotism great culture. Uh, he wanted to uh eliminate Gaze and wokeness and it struck me as boy He could have delivered that at cpaq in florida and been followed by matt gates and nobody would have been the wiser It was that unremarkable a speech So that is an example of extraordinary cynicism. So russia is a country where almost nobody goes to church um, where um Something like five percent of the people have ever read a bible

Um, it's also a country which is I think officially 11 or 12 percent muslim, but might even be higher than that Um, it's a it's actually a multi ethnic society with lots of little these little muslim republics In central asia and chechnya and so on Right um one one part of russia, which is chechnya is actually run by sharia law So the idea that russia is you know, some kind of defender of western christian civilization is absurd I mean absurd it's a senate right now for him It's a cynical reach to try and shore up this populism stream that he thinks will help Basically, it's all there to undermine europe and undermine the united states

Yeah, his goal is to undermine the european union make it fall apart make nato fall apart Get americans to leave europe um get americans out of the world and make the world safe for russian corruption And he sees that he can by talking about this whatever traditional values He sees that he can win some allies onto his side Some political leaders and in the west total cynicism. Do you feel the same way about orban? Is is that cynicism as well? Is he trying to be put in light? Or is there uh more of a belief system behind this? I think in his case, it's cynicism as well. I mean orban discovered christianity very late Um, he realized that it was good for him. Yes. Um, he's Trump as well. I uh from what I understand

I wasn't aware that trump had discovered christianity. Oh, I think he's got his favorite book Besides art of the deal. I think the bible might be his second favorite book And then you've got the link there from those guys into south america through bolscanero I mean guys from maga world. It's it's this incredibly weird confluence of uh You know maga world and putin and orban and bolscanero and they're all Texting each other. Yes, they are so one of the interesting things about nationalism

Is that nationalists didn't use to be able to work together almost by definition because if you're a nationalist then You know, you hate everybody who's not you, right? And so, you know, italian and austrian nationalists couldn't talk to one another because they had border conflicts what happened in the last several years was that um, the sort of international Sort of autocracy international found a set of issues That they could share and the issues were in in europe It's mostly to do with immigration but in this in this sort of south america america southern europe link it is often to do with

feminism gaze um, you know these kind of fake, you know traditional Right that they don't really care about It to a large extent some people might care about them and some of their followers probably care about them But some people see them purely as ways of manipulating an audience It's a means to an end But they're also kind of they've you know, it's in a way. It's like the weird flip side of globalization So they're also they also are a way to connect

You know, I mean, what if brazilian politics and american politics have to do with each other historically? I mean nothing in the sense of what do we have in common? We don't have any history in common. We don't have traditions in common um, but now they're you know, there are these You know, you can you can take slogans. I mean literally, you know the stop the steal slogan or the um, you know, the you can you can take english language slogans and you can You can try and pump them up on the brazilian internet and you can get they have signs that were like Hashtag stop the steal, right? Yes, they had social media savvy signs

But and what i'm wondering is again when we get back to sort of fascism classic versus what we see today Today feels more like a caper a it almost feels like a heist movie an international heist between fat cat businessmen Right wing media ideologues right wing media cynics and this sort of movement to capture these resources for

The oligarchy now the flip side of it on the liberal side, you have everybody going to davos which immediately presents itself as an incredible target for these right wing autocrats like the the the liberal world is not doing itself any favors by having these bananas gatherings of elites in Sleepy swiss town, you know, it's not helping itself No, I mean one of the main sources of Of power certainly of the modern the real modern autocracies by which i mean russia and china

And you know iran The one of their main sources of power is that i mean they they literally come to power using our financial system. So international kleptocracy the thing that the The the the systems that allow people in autocratic states to steal from their people to take the money into the west to recycle it on You know in in caribbean islands Or sometimes in american states and to bring it back again. We created that system. So the money laundering scheme

It's a money laundering scheme So so the western financial system is complicit in helping to create this world of modern autocracy in that sense You're absolutely right. I mean, you know, we we allowed this to happen We cynically allowed autocrats to use our financial system in a way that enabled them to stay in power and now they've you know flipped it around and they're using our Um open social media space and our public conversation to undermine us So when you talk about fighting autocracies and you know, again going back to sort of fascism classic The mindset and maybe this is you know, misremembering and nostalgia in and of itself is that the free world has to gather all its resources

And fight this battle as church would say, you know in the streets and they're on the sit, you know, never give up never give in But the reality of it is We're fighting it in all the wrong ways and in some ways fueling it So so we're getting to that, you know, the traditional ideas of fighting fascism is you know, we sort of think about these It's the two armies coming together in the bloodiest conflagration that you could possibly imagine in a And and it's really about the forces of good versus the forces of evil and we must try them the reality of it is much trickier because Even liberal democracies are are faced with a crisis of corruption a crisis of the

The corrupt financial systems that are exploiting the very people that are then put vulnerable to these more autocratic messages We're by not Dealing with the corruption in our own liberal democracies Are we not making the soil more fertile? for these autocrats to take hold and exploit those same financial loopholes

That liberal democracies and capitalism have been exploiting Aren't we sowing the seeds aren't we doing the autocrats work for them? Aren't we aren't by exploiting our population? Financially aren't we setting the stage for these autocrats? so the best thing that we could do to fight modern autocracy whether it's in the form of russia and china or whether it's in the form of Of autocratic movements inside our own country. The best thing we could do is clean up our own financial system so fixing Wow

Fixing money laundering changing the dark money funnels that lead All kinds of people to be contributing to our political system in ways that we don't know This is absolutely the best thing we do if we change our internal behavior if we stop enabling autocracy and we stop enabling kleptocracy Um, we would we would benefit from it domestically at home as well That's I think that's something that can't can't be said enough and in some ways you almost look back and you think My god can could citizens united have been the decision that allows You know democracy to be eroded throughout not just this country, but europe and the world

Could it have been as as as easy as that I don't know if I would point at that alone, but it's certainly part of the problem Um, you know once once you have systems whereby people can try to use money to corrupt the political system Um, once that money can be coming from almost anywhere in the world and from almost anyone in the world Um, then you you know, you have the effect You have a you have a corrupted political system that isn't able to that doesn't reflect You know the real interests of people

And it's so interesting because if you were to look for the boogeymen of these autocrats, it's it's always the global elites globalization, you know, uh all those institutions That are charged with international Economics and finance and by the way not saying those institutions function well or don't create all kinds of opportunities for corruption, but it really is

So much of of fascism is really just a money laundering scheme Well, and as I said so many people see these issues cynically and they see you know, they use this kind of populist you know Authoritarian rhetoric in order to enact policies that will continue to be good for the financial elite. I mean, there's a You know, they in other words, they're they're preventing You know real people from from having a voice in politics because they're they're so overwhelmed by the amount of money that comes from

The influence of kleptocracy both in the world and in the united states is one of the great underwritten stories of the last couple of decades I mean, and if you think about it and the lack of accountability and I can't remember which bank this was it might have been hsbc It might have been wells fargo. I think we might have been hsbc That they were found to be laundering money for drug cartels As part of their, you know, business model They were taking money from drug cartels laundering it and putting it back in the system and I think they were fined I think, you know, they're basically they were HSBC was was found to be laundering money for drug cartels and international

Terrorism and and when they got caught it was like, hey man, just give us like five percent of that And and everything should be okay. Right actually the reaction should be What do we have to do to make this never happen again? How do we make this impossible, you know, how many of you have to go to jail? And how many people should go to jail and and how do we change the rules so that it's not possible anymore? How do you separate the sort of kleptocracy from again fascism classic stolons and hitlers who have

world domination as their goal not necessarily Just a more tin pot dictator Going to get as much money out of this as I can. How do you draw the distinction? Well, I think there is something now like I wrote an article a few months ago in which I use this expression autocracy ink Autocracy incorporated in which there is a system by which, you know, and this is not this is russia, china, iran, venezuela you know zimbabwe And a network of other countries do now seek to keep one another in power they You know, they they help one another get around sanctions. They lend one another surveillance equipment

The chinese are now constantly teaching other nations how to Use their, um, you know, their forms of social media control Um, you know, the russians have the vogner group, which is this group of mercenaries who they now send around africa and around the world in order to Help keep dictators in power. I mean, this is a somewhat separate story from the conversation We were having earlier about autocracy in our own country except that there is a link, which is that um, some of these same systems that you know fund the vogner group or fund the Um fund the surveillance systems are also looking at how they they're also spending a lot of time thinking about how to undermine democracy in america or in europe, so Um, so they they're not unrelated

But I do I do think they have a if not a you know an idea of world dominance, you know If not a central ideology they have a kind of Set of shared practices, you know in a way, so it's not like there's a secret room You know like in a james bond movie where all the bad guys get together and they say right now We're going to run the world. It's not really like that But they but they do have a kind of Um, you know shared practices they learn from one another they lend one another ideas You know the the corrupt state controlled companies of one

Autocracy invest in the corrupt state controlled autocracies of another country Um, they learn, you know, they use the same social media ideas and symbols We've already talked about this kind of you know neotraditionalism Right, um that they that they share and they they they copycat from one another So they have a set of shared practices and they have a set of common enemies and the common enemy is us I mean, what you know, what really bothers them is liberal democracy partly because their own opponents inside their countries Continue to say things like we want free speech and they continue to

Um protest and some you know go to jail and organize opposition and they you know They see us as somehow connected to that So they see us and they see liberal democracy as a kind of Common enemy even if we don't see it that way I mean, we don't we don't think of ourselves as being you know at war with this network in any way But they see us, you know, they see us as the main opposition to their form of total control

I mean, let me let me present it in a less charitable light, which I think is you know The charitable light is we are a beacon of freedom and democracy and they can't stand Uh the idea that their people uh would have a role in self-determination and all that Is there also something to this that says, you know, we're the largest competitor they have for cheap exploitation of Minerals materials oils is is this just another form of colonialism? Where powers are competing to see who can extract the most? Out of the less developed countries and aren't we playing that game as well?

I suppose you you know, you'd have to again you'd have to look country by country I mean actually the chinese are now so far ahead of us in africa in terms of their influence and their control over minerals and And resources that i'm not sure we're even competing there anymore to the extent that we you know that we might once have been So yeah, i'm sure there's there's an economic element to it But there is there is an ideological element as well if only because as I say the russian opposition Um, you know the hong kong protest movement the iranian woman life freedom movement I mean all of those movements which are which are the thing that autocrats fear the most Are still inspired by the ideals of

Liberalism or the ideals of democracy even if they're not directly inspired by us You know, even if they're all rather disgusted by us and tired of us and you know, not impressed by us They are the germ of the idea which is very very old Remains inspiring to a lot of people around the world And so difficult to in many ways pull off. I mean, I think you know if if the arab spring had Had more success and less chaos and and led to less Autocracy, I mean you saw it in egypt kind of play out writ large, you know, they they get rid of the autocrat They have a democratic election, but they don't really have any

Civil institutions that can help so the only people organized enough To succeed there is the muslim brotherhood and then when that gets to chaotic Another autocrat steps in you know, they they go between these autocrats and military coups Is the way to make liberal democracy more contagious to make sure that it's less chaotic Well, you know, we don't have the power to make egypt less chaotic, but um, yeah, I mean I In terms of support, you know, you're right in that the the effort to support Independent groups and organizations the effort to support independent media some of which we do actually in mostly pretty small ways But we we do do it

The effort to provide people with good or at least better information You know, those are all things that we could do to help eventually make the world more civilized And as I said the in different bits of the u.s. Government and non-government organizations as well Do some of that but you know finding a way to Make the democratic alternatives real and to give people the feeling that they have a real voice or a real stake in their societies Is you know, it's god's work. I mean it's it's again Our ability to influence other countries is limited But to the extent that we can help we should be doing it and so in your mind, you know, when you look at

Kind of the state of play right now, uh, it certainly feels like uh, liberal democracy is a little bit on the back foot autocracies and and in some ways look, there's no question destabilizing the Middle East did not help our case in in Generally for liberal democracy Uh, we went in there with those high-minded ideals supposedly and by not having it come to fruition. I think set back the cause

quite terribly but Where do you see it sort of holding firm? You know, there's threats to it in now france. Italy went with meloni Uh, germany just had a coup attempt. You know, who is safe now? and and where do you see kind of, uh What's going to be the bulwark the german coup attempt was it let's admit it was pretty funny. Um, it was Was it really I I didn't I didn't know german coup and funny could be in the same No, it was a bunch of old reactionary aristocrats. I mean, I'm not even sure it was a coup attempt. It was oh, okay No, no rike's talk fire. They just had a week. There was no rike's talk fire at like, uh, a manse and that was the end

No, it was it was the history as trans starts as tragedy and second times as far as kind of thing I see. Okay. That's comforting. Look. I mean, you know in some ways some of the most optimistic and impressive people I meet now Are the democrats who come from the autocratic world? I mean, let me introduce you sometime to the venezuelan opposition You know or the hong kong opposition Right, you know, or let me introduce you to the taiwanese, you know, who are in a way kind of on the front line You know, they're trying to maintain their little island democracy in the face of this overwhelming Autocratic monolith that wants to destroy them, you know, or you know, let me introduce you to the ukrainians

who have a very idealistic and but also very pragmatic Vision of how their version of democracy will eventually triumph not only over the russians but over their own past traumas and their own They have their own ultra nationalist problem. No, don't they? They they do although most of those problems now kind of dim by comparison to the big problem Which is the war, um, you know People have really unified around the cause of fighting the war and they're they're fighting fewer differences between one another but

But you know, when you when you talk to ukrainians who are who very much believe that what they're fighting for is their Right to sovereignty into democracy into some kind of liberal space By comparison to an increasingly autocratic and almost utilitarian russia you will be inspired I mean, they're they're the ones who talk in idealistic terms who think about Big ideas and who hope that they can, you know, bring them You know to victory and in that case, it's a real victory. It's it is a military victory and it is a military conflict So, I mean, there are there are surprising numbers of people even in the most hopeless circumstances Who continue to fight for or believe in

Free speech and free or freedom of movement and the importance of choosing your own governments and the importance of civic involvement In politics and continue to try and create systems even at great risk to their own lives And they're the ones who really give me a lot of hope right now Well, that certainly is more optimistic than some of the other things that i've heard and it seems as though the west and the liberal west has to get more realistic about Just how allied and organized the forces against it are throughout the world and I don't mean militarily I mean in terms of, you know, the old message of hearts and minds the old idea of, you know

These folks are weaponizing media and financial instruments and all kinds of other things and it's something that has to be fought You know, not in the the Hamlets of Zurich, but you know, people have to get smarter About the ways in which they're trying to erode democratic institutions So russia and china combined spend Hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars on propaganda every year directed at us directed at africa directed at asia directed all over the world What we spend by comparison is a tiny fraction of that We don't even it's not even really on our radar that we should be doing that

That's because we're spending it all on radars We're we're we're just all we're doing is making more planes and bombs and you know, we we've somehow taken The idea that that the military is the only way to go with all this and I feel like there has to be a rethink There has to be a rethink and a recalibration of you know, rethinking about what's important and as you say an understanding of the the multiple ways in which the civilization that we still want to believe in and still want to be

Wanted to be real the ways in which it's under attack both internally and externally and we need to begin Reorganizing our political system and our maybe our foreign policy in order along those lines. I agree with you and step one financial Cleaning up the corruption in the world step one is financial step one is cleaning up the The the money laundering systems ending kleptocracy Making it impossible for people to have secret bank accounts or own property secretly or own company secretly There's really no reason why that has to even be possible You know and yet it is and it's how so many people both Americans and non Americans hide their money and even in places like South Dakota and Delaware

Um, it's not just Caribbean islands and it's not just foreign countries where where these things are possible Right and that's and that listen. We can't even get uh, our representatives to stop insider trading We can't we can't even get people to not walk out of committee meetings and call their broker and have to make a quick deal So that's that's going to be a tall test, but I think you're absolutely right. I think that's job one That is job one. All right, uh, an apple bomb writer for the Atlantic I can't thank you enough for the conversation truly appreciate it. Oh, it was a real pleasure talking to you. Thank you very much Thank you so much And apple bound

I don't know if I feel better or worse. That's my takeaway. She she seems concerned I feel this I feel the same way and it was concerning when she was like Um, look, I can't say we're losing because that would be too hard on my students And I was like give it to me straight and she was like she was like I I I can't say that we're gonna lose What kind of mother would I be too sad? Yeah, I did like that. It's it's it the idea that her students wouldn't be able to handle it Like there's just too much going on right now for them to also deal with the fact that Uh, democracy is a dying political form. I I do think the idea though

I like that she said it's an ongoing struggle because I think You know you reference all the time that there's that book the end of history and then like a week later history started back up again Right and I think because we're so incredibly privileged to have been born in the 100 years of human history Where democracy was a prevailing power structure We forget that the default system of government is like the dothraki Which it's like the guy who's the best at killing makes all the decisions and he tells us who else we have to kill And that that's gonna be no the default an ongoing struggle the default Governmental system is the king gets to have sex with your wife on your wedding night

God says he has to have prima nocta And you're like it would be an honor for the king To share my bed. I would hate for myself to bring on seven years of drought By not allowing the king to make passionate love to my wife. Yeah, so that's that I think is the um Is what the inert is the gravitational pull is toward that and I think being real about the fact that like This is never going to be locked up and just done for you know She talked about like the the the democracies that we reference like Rome Eventually had a Caesar and so I think it's healthy for us to be like we're always going to be kind of

In a push and pull. Yeah, and we take it for granted. I mean we really do we take democracy for granted and you know, I I love when she talked about how nostalgia is a really important part of authoritarian messaging and I'm like, how do we get You know, how do we get messaging across to make democracy? Sexy and interesting and like what is the nostalgia we can bring into that like Remember when we didn't have to see neckbeards charging the capital remember those days

Like how do we remember when we didn't have fences around the the national mall that kind of a thing? Yes, yes, yes Yeah, nostalgia is a It's a huge part of it. But I also think that people who believe in liberalism or progressive values tend to think that they are immune from the pull of authoritarianism And and I think that is a huge mistake There are very few people who would not give leeway to the dictator as long as it was their dictator

and and as a matter of course Who is probably considered the greatest progressive president Democrat of all time and that would be franklin delano roosevelt. And by the way Wanted to stack the supreme court interned the japanese americans

In prison camps Did not serve two terms decided to go for four Uh, you know, he is the one who blew past all the the democratic norms and and all the uh, so-called liberal values To get the things done that progressive thought was necessary and and would consider important But god bless nobody would be like Roosevelt was like hitler But with food stamps to be fair

I had a religion teacher in high school who did say that roosevelt was like hitler No, so that that's not a out of this world take But I I think you're right because like when I look at these, you know, the bolson arrow or Um, the other the other fascists that are rising orban. I'm like, I don't agree with authoritarianism But I get it Because it's so simple and there's there's a speed and efficiency to that type of government Like I think we've talked on this podcast before about um

China and how they're able to switch gears so quickly because there's no resistance And that's the advantage to it. But the disadvantage is if you're in their way, you're going to get completely Steamrolled I've always said this and I and I'll say it again and this has been taken up by many scholars China is the razzles Of uh economic systems. Is it a candy? Is it a gum? We don't really know but they shift back and forth and there's a lot of are they are they I've never had a razzles Maria is that tell me about the razzles Sounds like something I should dear lord sounds like something my family made did I just step into the did I just step into the old man cave?

It's okay. I I and I wander out so razzles are uh, there have not been a lot of Innovations in the candy world in a long time generally the innovation at this point is like what if we put dark chocolate on it? Yeah, or like m&m's are like, what if we put rocks in the middle of the m&m? Uh a razzle comes in the back. I don't even know if they still make them and it was like uh, look like a tablet Okay, and you would put uh, let's say 10 of them in your mouth And you would start to chew them and you would think oh these are like sweet tarts and as The longer you eat them the more you realize. Oh these motherfuckers aren't going away They're not going away

They're they are somehow managing to defy the laws of saliva and chewing and they are staying in my mouth And quite frankly they seem to be forming what appears to be What I normally recognize as gum gum now Maria did you not did you not know uh the the razzles that is that does it ring a bell as I described? I've never heard of a razzle. I think my closest thing to a razzle would be a blow pop, but you know what's coming You're you're in for it. They're pretty they're wait a minute. They tell you wait a minute. Wait a minute. Wait a minute All I want to see

Is the commercial for blowpops? Where two people are eating them and the one says the other you know what's coming That's the kind of government I want to You know what's about to happen, right? So you don't want a razzle's government. You want a blow pop government Yeah, and that's the appeal of authoritarianism. That's what I'm trying to uh express here Uh, thank you guys very much. Thanks to Ann Applebaum for a fantastic conversation on uh autocracy and liberal governments and How we have to remain vigilant Maria rendazo, henrik blitz as always a pleasure and check out the problem. It's airing on apple tv plus

You can get the episodes in the descriptions there of our little program. Thanks so much guys, and we will see you Next week. See ya. Bye The Private john stewart podcast is an apple tv plus podcast and a joint busboy production