I saw Billy Bragg post this on FB and wanted to share. The old Gadsden flag is tainted but I quite like what he did with it;

"Since Renee Good was shot dead by ICE in Minneapolis last week, there have been a slew of opinion pieces and posts declaring that this is a sure sign that the US has become a fascist state. The Tяump regime has done nothing to counter this notion, in fact they seem intent on encouraging it.

In a move that echoed the Nazi’s “Ein Reich, Ein Volk, Ein Fuhrer” slogan, the US Department of Labor recently tweeted the phrase “One Homeland, One People, One Heritage”; The Department of Homeland Security utilised the title of a white supremacist anthem “We’ll Have Our Home Again” in a post calling on people to join ICE. And DHS Secretary Kristi Noem spoke at a podium which displayed the words “One of Us - All of You”, which many took to be a reference to the Nazi’s response to the assassination of SS leader Reinhard Heydrich in 1942. As a reprisal, 340 people from the Czech village of Lidice were murdered.

On first glance this does seem evidence of a fascist regime. But I don’t buy it.

Fascism is first and foremost an ideology and it is difficult to discern a set of ideological beliefs that drive the Tяump regime. Yes, they deport people, but so did Obama, and to a greater extent than Tяump. Sure, they invade sovereign countries for their resources but so did Reagan in Grenada. And they lie about their intentions, as did GW Bush over the invasion of Iraq.

Even the use of lethal force against unarmed protesters in Minneapolis does not, in my reading, amount to evidence of fascism. The terrible killing of innocent civilians that we have witnessed in the past days on the streets of Iran is the reaction of despots through the ages, desperate to cling to power. Of course Tяump is unarguably a despot, ruling by decree, acting with impunity, more reckless a president than any that I listed. But that unpredictable nature is what undermines the notion of an ideologically-driven regime.

The mullahs in Tehran have their holy book to defend them from the growing forces of modernity and Christian nationalists in the US would similarly like to use their selective reading of the Bible to turn back the clock. However, the grievances of the MAGA movement are too incoherent to allow an ideological framework to form. The nearest thing it has to a unifying credo is one that echoes through American history in capital letters: DON’T F%CK WITH ME!

It’s the response that Tяump gives to anyone who challenges him, from the contractors he refused to pay when he was building his real estate empire to the European Union saying Greenland is not for sale. It’s the message that the Tяump regime seeks to send by posting the above mentioned tweets. And it’s the motivation for the deployment of ICE in the liberal stronghold of Minneapolis.

It’s becoming increasingly clear that Tяump’s supporters think America was great when women, Blacks, Latinos, gays and commies knew their place. Since the civil rights reforms of the 1960s, liberal democracy has levelled up the playing field, bringing the out-groups in, requiring those at the top of the hierarchy to show respect to those they once looked down on. If you have a zero-sum world view, respect shown to people who aren’t like you feels like a loss for you and your values and, as we’ve been told over and over, many of Tяump’s supporters say the voted for him because they don’t feel they get the respect they deserve.

But earning respect it hard. In order to get people to admire you for your qualities, you have to live up to them, especially in adversity. Much easier then to get respect by making people afraid of you. What ICE is doing in Minneapolis - raiding workplaces, stopping people on the streets to demand papers, harassing people of colour, displaying a bullish sense of immunity - is purely performative. If ICE really wanted to find illegal immigrants, they are more likely to be down at the southern border rather than the northern. The point of deploying ICE in Minneapolis is to strike fear into those who Tяump regime has demonised, forcing them to show respect to the white male heterosexual Christian status quo.

Tяump made this clear in his response to a reporter who asked him if it was necessary to use lethal force against Renee Good: "It was highly disrespectful of law enforcement. The woman and her friend were highly disrespectful of law enforcement…Law enforcement should not be in a position where they have to put up with this stuff.”

This from the guy who pardoned all of the Jan 6 insurrectionists.

Shocking though the storming of the Capitol was, it is another example of the failure of the MAGA movement to develop an ideological framework capable of articulating their goals. The mob used terrifying violence to break through police lines and smash their way into the building, yet when they got into the halls of government, they just wandered around taking selfies. There was no plan because the message of their protest was the inchoate roar of the MAGA movement: DON’T F%CK WITH ME!

The Gadsden flag was much on display on that day of infamy, with its image of the coiled snake ready to strike above the words ‘Don’t Tread On Me’. It’s a suitable symbol for that particularly American strain of right-wing libertarianism that defines liberty as the right to act in ones own interests without consequence or criticism. Yet freedom is a collective endeavour, one which requires us to not only respect the rights of others, but to stand up for them when they are under threat.

If those waving the Gadsden flag truly believed in liberty, they would be opposed to the use of lethal force by the state against unarmed protesters whether it be on the streets of Minneapolis or the streets of Tehran."