talked about, the twilight of democracy, where loyalty replaces competence. whether you re talking about it in the media sphere, where you intimidate and get rid of media opponents. what about, again, the fcc, donald trump having the sole power to decide whether this network or other networks he doesn t like actually are on the air or not? that s what we re talking about here. talk about the danger, the level of danger to american democracy. well, if you love mussolini, you will love what donald trump is talking about for 2025. mussolini followed the unitarian executive theory, too, which meant total power to the dictator, no constraints. this is about as un-american, i think you will all agree, as anything i ve ever heard. i mean, the reason why this country was founded was as a rebuke to the british king. we wanted to develop a system where you could not have a king,
you could not have a dictator. power was under constraint. when you were in tuscaloosa, joe, i m sure you talked about, as i have ever since, the fact that there are checks and balances, three branches of government. that s all james madison who used to be a conservative hero. now comes along donald trump, the first major candidate in american history to say outright, i want a presidential dictatorship. i can t think of anything that s more out of the american tradition. and it really is, willie. it s from madison, who was a conservative hero for generations. from madison to mussolini, all the power and the executive branch, the power to shut down tv stations, the power to prefer certain businesses to other businesses. it is exactly what fascists do. yeah, this is pure strongman stuff, and they re saying it out loud. they re saying, this is what we re going to do. you watched us in the first term. it is going to be even worse in