Fiascoism

An Ideology of Incompetence for an Age of Idiocy

When, in 1784, the German philosopher (and author of many unreadable texts) Immanuel Kant famously asked “Do we presently live in an enlightened age,” his answered was succinct: no. However, Kant was no Debbie Downer. As he saw things, although people were still mired in irrational superstition, ignorance, and backwardness, there were nonetheless clear indications that “the obstacles to general enlightenment – and to people’s release from their self-imposed immaturity – are gradually diminishing.” Kant concluded that, although we cannot say we live in an enlightened age, “we do live in an age of enlightenment.”

As global financial markets convulse, as the multilateralism of the post-War era is collapsing, as the standard of law is debased, I think Kant might have appreciated our current global predicament: unleashed, unbridled, straight up stupidity causing havoc. This is because, after writing those words, he would go on to live another two decades. He witnessed the insanity of the French Revolution and the first phase of the Napoleonic wars, which brought mayhem, destruction and instability to his homeland. I suspect his worldview had changed somewhat by the time he died in 1804, uttering, it is said, “it is good.” What “it” refers to is unclear. Perhaps he was still clinging to his bit that “obstacles to general enlightenment are gradually diminishing,” but if so, the emphasis had presumably sharpened considerably on that word “gradually.” The point being that the events of his later life put paid to the idea that human reason was clearly blossoming to bring about a better world. So while 1784 Kant would probably be pretty appalled at what is happening right now, 1804 Kant would be shaking a knowing head and offering up hugs. Although by all accounts, Kant was not a hugger. But you get the point.

The irony – and frustration – of the current imbroglio is that it is at once the product of an Age of Idiocy, where truly-committed, Olympic-calibre folly and unreason has somehow moved to the centre stage of global politics, all while yet unfolding in an Age of Enlightenment (or something akin to it). The US administration continues stubbornly with its gobsmackingly idiotic plans to refashion the world into a vision of what it thinks it wants, opting for conflict with its friends, appeasement of its enemies, and the dismantlement of the rule of law, administrative institutions, and a system of order both internal and external. As it does all this, only the most committed cultic ideologue, or maybe just the reality-blithe, could possibly look on and nod approvingly – which is, it seems, currently close to half of the US population. But – and here’s the point – basically nobody else.

The rest of us (mostly) exist within a general rule-bound system of logic, reason, cause-and-effect, and knowledge and can judge actions by a standard of reasonableness to evaluate their worth or shortcomings. We see, not a US administration reclaiming its sovereign authority and economic prowess by using its geopolitical heft to reorder the world according to some underlying rational political vision, no we see a five-year old throwing a massive temper tantrum in his room. It’s just that this five-year old happens to inhabit a room that is responsible for 25% of the global economy. It’s going to be quite the cleanup.

There are many who, dismayed at this colossal act of destruction, worry that the US is veering into fascism. They worry about the integrity, not just of the government (I mean that ship sailed out of port on election day), not just of the US electoral system, but of the basic American commitment to act even vaguely within established norms that, ironically, the Americans were instrumental in establishing in the first place. It is true that, if one inclines to this view, the signs are undoubtedly there. Empowering armed ideological militias by suspending the consequences for illegal action? – that sounds a bit fascist. Holding a big military parade for the leader’s birthday? Oh yes. Fever dreams of twenty-first century Anschluss of your friends and neighbours? Definitely.

But I am here to say that when I look at the US, I do not see fascism. Fascism, to quote the Big Lebowski, at least is an ethos. And I don’t see much ethos. In fact, I doubt most members of the current US administration could define ethos, let alone structure their thinking with anything like the degree of analytical rigour needed to construct one. Instead, I see government by shitposting and tweets. When the US decided to eradicate one of its most effective tools of soft power, the US Agency for International Development (which I venture had one of the best cost-benefit ratios of any US overseas initiative), it was despatched not as a consequence of policy via a white paper on American power abroad, but by deleting the spreadsheets of its budget and then commemorating this via a tweet, which noted it had been “put through the wood-chipper,” recalling that scene from Fargo. (And my quota of Cohn brothers references is now used up for this post!) The same wood-chipper mindset holds true for any number of other aspects of the US administrative state (such as the US Department of Education) which the current administration is seeking to dismantle with similar deftness and forethought.

Now, I acknowledge that there is an underlying architecture to these plans, or maybe better put, a plan of controlled demolition. The authors of the infamous Project 2025 definitely had an ethos, premised on the basic idea that the (liberal) enemies of the state were everywhere, had spent decades building up nation-destroying (liberal) institutions to consolidate their (liberal) control, and so had to be rooted out using aggressive policy measures. That sounds both Stalinist in administrative terms (rootless, cosmopolitan, anti-revolutionary wreckers and saboteurs who defeat the state from the inside), and pretty fascist in more general cultural terms (the wrong type of people are allowed to thrive within the state and must be dealt with). And clearly, once you start seeing the world in terms of enemies who have to be rooted out, while you may not be in Fascistland yet, you certainly have your bags packed and your car tanked up. (I have discussed this aspect of political reckoning in a post last year.)

However, to be effective, an ethos must have people who both understand it and are competent to carry out its vision. In this regard, we have, as the kids used to say, an epic fail. Looking at the current roster of boobs and charlatans who man the administrative corridors and are the ones who actually have to enact the project 2025 vision of .. well whatever the fuck their vision actually is, I conclude: this group is so extraordinarily incompetent that they would almost warrant Stalin-like levels of paranoia that the counter-revolution has seeded the state with saboteurs to undermine the revolution itself.

The decision to blow up some Yemenis via online chat that mostly consists of gradeschool-playground-clique whining about “the Europeans” like they’re mean girls, I mean what better image could one conjure up to capture the overall level of brilliant statecraft that has currently been assembled to carry out the Project 2025 plans to transform America? Churchill had his War Room with maps, battle plans and plenty of scotch, while these guys have Signal chats, emojis and Pabst Blue Ribbon. Times change I guess.

But really let us look no further than the unadulterated charlatanry of the US declaration of a global trade war via its tariff scheme. As is by now well known, the methodology behind the tariff was to grab some unreliable statistics on the US trade imbalance with basically every nation on earth (with a few exceptions, including, notably, Russia), divide it by total imports and then, in act of breathtaking dishonesty, label that ratio a tariff. Like a sixth grader caught cheating on his homework, when this chicanery was uncovered, the Administration released some reverse-engineered pseudo-math, using Greek letters as faked up constants (which, deliciously, cancelled out), as if thinking “look here’s a formula, a’right, satisfied? Can I go now?”

Now listen, I know times are hard and uncertain, portfolios are reeling and anxiety increasing. Yes, we may be heading for global depression (although I think that unlikely), and yes, for my American readers, I appreciate that what is happening to your country is simply despicable. But, still, take a moment to appreciate the truly top-level, sublime absurdity of the current aesthetic; the US government, having decided to topple the existing world order in one swoop, does so by releasing this:

And you lived to see it. So take a breath and enjoy it as you would any fine piece of Absurdist art.

The thing is, the directions of the project 2025 road map may have called for the Trump Administration to take the off-ramp into Fascism. But the people actually driving the clown car clearly cannot read (a map, he adds charitably). Instead, they drove right past the Fascist exit and straight to the Fiasco offramp. “Close enough!” they cried, “both begin with F.” And so here we are, experiencing Fiascoism.

There are moments in Thucydides’ account of the Peloponnesian War where you can feel him shaking his head in disbelief as leaders of various Greek poleis draw up misguided plans that are pretty much guaranteed to fail, and will only result in their cities being reduced to poverty, ruination, and despair. As ancient Fiascoism, so its modern iteration. The collective incompetence of those currently seeking to bring about some great national triumph by throwing American weight around without bothering to do any of the math is such that I feel confident the only thing they will eventually achieve is disgrace and ignominy. It will be an unpleasant, unstable, infuriating four years, no question. But as the writer Jack Hitt pointed out decades ago in a memorable radio piece, there’s a point where, when things descend to the level of fiasco, you simply have to go with the flow.

This is the Age of Idiocy, and the curtain has lifted. The actors are assembled, and they’re busy botching their lines, missing their blocks and flubbing their cues. Painful to watch? Sure. But not serious. Can these folks do a lot of harm? Absolutely. But the lack of forethought and planning, the lack of knowledge and expertise, the complete absence of any meaningful sense of how to get where they want to go (if they even know), means that whatever shambles they make of things now, they are very unlikely to hold the line and commit to their intentions.

So that said, we should acknowledge that the Age of Enlightenment has not degenerated into an Age of Idiocy. They coexist. They have always co-existed. If you are on the rational side of things – and you can pretty much self-assign if you think that gussying up some sham math to justify a global trade war, and thereby tanking your economy, is not ideology but simply incompetence – then take at least a little solace in the fact that fiascoism, unlike fascism, is not an ethos. It is simply chaos. Therefore, it is unlikely to result in the systematic degeneration into autocracy, lawlessness, or the invasion of Greenland.

I don’t want to minimize the serious consequences of all this stuff. But I do want to suggest that this fiascoist approach will collapse under the weight of the very chaos that it is producing. As I will explore in a follow-up post, it strikes me that we have good reason, despite it all, to hold on to that Kantian valediction: es ist gut.