“Full-spectrum dominance”
Heather Cox Richardson’s newsletter this morning reminds readers that in March Trump 2.0 officials declared its intention to overwhelm any opposition to a Trump-is-king message with full-time, in-your-face offense (in both senses). She writes:
“We’re here. We’re in your face,” said Kaelan Dorr, a deputy assistant to the president who runs the digital team. “It’s irreverent. It’s unapologetic.” Trump spokesperson Steven Cheung said their goal was “FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE.”
They are engaged in a marketing campaign to establish Trump’s false version of reality as truth. The White House has also brought into the press pool right-wing influencers, who are asking questions that tee up opportunities for White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt to push administration talking points, which the influencers then amplify on social media.
In case the meaning is too subtle, “full-spectrum dominance” is a war-fighting strategy established by the Department of Defense in 2000.
In case Leavitt and Stephen Miller are too subtle, Trump plans a Red Square-style military parade costing tens of millions of dollars on his 79th birthday (June 14). It coincides (conveniently) with the “the 250th anniversary of the Second Continental Congress’s establishment of the Continental Army in 1775.”
The Associated Press reports that plans call for “about 6,600 soldiers, 150 vehicles and 50 helicopters to follow a route from Arlington, Virginia, to the National Mall.” There are no reports that the parade will include ballistic missile carriers or that Trump’s troops are practicing goose-stepping.
HCR continues:
The administration’s hunkering down in right-wing ideology showed as well in Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s public attack on U.S. ally Germany for declaring the German right-wing political party Alternative for Germany (AfD) as an extremist party that goes against Germany’s “free democratic order.” That designation is the result of a three-year investigation. It allows the government more leeway in monitoring the AfD.
Both Vice President J.D. Vance and billionaire White House advisor Elon Musk supported the AfD and backed it in a recent election. Rubio took AfD’s side today, writing on social media that that new designation was “tyranny in disguise.” He attacked the current government and urged Germany to “reverse course.”
The German Foreign Office responded publicly. “This is democracy. The decision is the result of a thorough & independent investigation to protect our Constitution & the rule of law. It is independent courts that will have the final say. We have learnt from our history that rightwing extremism needs to be stopped.”
It says something about the Trump administration that the German government is lecturing the U.S. government about the dangers of right-wing extremism.
Trump’s government has already abandoned our Constitution and the rule of law.
Don Moynihan at the University of Michigan responded, “Both Rubio’s tweet, and the response, are remarkable artifacts. You have a Secretary of State tweeting right wing talking points to defend Neo Nazis, and the country where Nazis originated telling him to sod off.”
Steve Vladeck of Georgetown Law quipped, “When you’re getting lectured by the German government on failing to account for the dangers posed by right-wing extremism, it might be time to take a seat.”
It also says something that Donald Trump intends to rename our Veterans Day and VE Day “Victory Days.” That brings American naming in line with the Russia’s celebration of Victory Day each year on May 9. Trump has an insatiable need to convince everyone (especially the world’s strongmen) that he’s a winner. One wonders how many security blankets (gold, of course) the felon-billionaire has squirreled away in the Residence.
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