America slides into totalitarianism -- and it won't be easy to reverse

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America slides into totalitarianism — and it won't be easy to reverse
"Authoritarianism" is so 2018 — Donald Trump and his minions want to conquer all of civil society

By Mike Lofgren
Contributing Writer
Published June 22, 2025 6:00AM (EDT)


(Salon) We’ve seen a spike over the last few years in the use of the word “authoritarianism.” This is the predictable result of the recent rise of authoritarian regimes which, to a greater or lesser extent, work to subvert and dismantle the institutions and practices of democracy and the rule of law.

A survey of more than 500 political scientists found that they believe the United States is headed towards authoritarian rule. A majority of Americans, according to a PRRI poll, now believes Donald Trump is “a dangerous dictator.” (It remains an enduring mystery why this majority didn’t stumble onto this conclusion before the November election).

Authoritarianism and totalitarianism

There is, of course, another term for modern dictatorial regimes, one that gained considerable currency during the Cold War after the 1951 publication of “The Origins of Totalitarianism” by Hannah Arendt, but which has somewhat fallen out of favor.

How does authoritarianism differ from totalitarianism? There is no precise description of either; like other political terms, they are subject to questionable definitions that often depend on the viewpoint of whoever is using them. Marxist writers shunned the word “totalitarian”; Nazi Germany was invariably referred to as “fascist,” while the Soviet Union was a “people’s democracy.” But “totalitarian” was a favorite term of anti-Communists throughout the Cold War.

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The U.S. is now distinctly moving toward the principal goal of the totalitarian project: erasing the distinction between civil society and the state. The Trump regime is eagerly working to insert itself into every facet of American life, from effectively taking over private universities and dictating their curricula to banning books from the Naval Academy, dictating prices to retail businesses, attempting to change cartographic nomenclature (like “Gulf of America”) and vetting exhibits at the Smithsonian Institution, which is not formally a part of government and has had an independent policy on exhibits for the last 178 years. ...............(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/06/22/america-slides-into-totalitarianism--and-it-wont-be-easy-to-reverse/