SAN FRANCISCO
Lee Heidhues 7.23.2024
I listened to the FRESH AIR interview with Anne Applebaum. An insightful political journalist whose no nonsense commentary and writing needs a wider audience.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anne_Applebaum
Anne is definitely well known amongst the political intelligentsia. Her work is respected.
In this time of coarse political discourse it’s a pleasure to realize there is someone out there whose knowledge is far above the American. norm.
The tape and transcript of the entire interview is attached.
While Donald Trump is discussed briefly I thought what Anne has to say about Trump, given her knowledge of authoritarian leaders, needs special mention. See the excerpt herein.
TONYA MOSLEY, HOST FRESH AIR:
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/nx-s1-5049021
TONYA MOSLEY: In the case of Donald Trump, he set the narrative by dominating the conversation on social media
ANNE APPLEBAUM: Yeah.
MOSLEY: In 2016.
APPLEBAUM: Yeah. And the constant stream of lies, even incredible, unbelievable ones – I mean, actually, Trump began his presidency with a lie about how many people had appeared on the National Mall for his inauguration. I don’t know if your memory stretches back that far.
MOSLEY: Yeah.
APPLEBAUM: It feels like so many things have happened since then. But it was a very stupid lie. I mean, who cares how many people were on the National Mall? But he wanted the U.S. Park Service to lie about it, and he wanted his press spokesman to lie about it. And again, that was partly to show – who’s in control here? – I’m in control, and I get to decide what the truth is. And it’s also to confuse people and alienate them from politics. I mean, during the Trump administration, we spent a lot of time arguing about what was true and what wasn’t.
And for some people, they hear that conversation and they say, right, this is – how do I know what’s true? I’m just checking out, you know? So constant lies also create this kind of cynicism and apathy. It’s a way of keeping people out of politics and preventing civic engagement.
I mean, a lot of these authoritarian states know that their biggest enemy, their biggest threat to their power, is their own people. And so their goal is to prevent people from ever organizing, from ever being engaged, from ever caring at all. And one of the ways they do that is through this constant stream of lies that make people feel like they’re simply unable to know any more what’s true and what’s not.
I’m Tonya Mosley. And my guest today is Anne Applebaum, who’s been writing for years about the rise in authoritarianism around the world and the erosion of democracy. Her latest book, “Autocracy, Inc.: The Dictators Who Want To Run The World,” is a potent read on how today’s autocracies are not just ruled by one powerful leader, but are instead a sophisticated interconnected network. She reveals how they collaborate and support each other through financial systems, technology, and propaganda that spans well beyond their borders. This loose network, which includes nations like Russia, China, and North Korea, isn’t an alliance. They don’t share an ideology, but they do have one thing in common. They don’t like us, and they’re growing more powerful in the fight against democracy. Applebaum says, in order to fight this threat, democracies like the U.S. have to fundamentally reorient their policies.
Anne Applebaum is the author of several books, including “Gulag: A History,” which won the Pulitzer Prize, “Iron Curtain: The Crushing Of Eastern Europe, 1944-1956,” and the best-selling “Twilight Of Democracy: The Seductive Lure Of Authoritarianism.” She’s a columnist for the Atlantic and a senior fellow at Johns Hopkins University. Anne Applebaum, welcome back to FRESH AIR.
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