Book In Review
Episode six of the Banner & Backbone Anti Fascist Book Club continues the panel’s read of Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny, picking up at lesson two, Defend institutions, and moving into lesson three, Beware the one-party state. Nick Paro was joined by Tara Devlin, host of Tarabuster, and Kristofer Goldsmith, founder of Task Force Butler and Veterans Fighting Fascism. Kris explained the club’s origin: a video he posted after the election listing the books he considered essential to understanding tyranny, followed by a free instruction manual for running a local chapter. Nick opened by recapping the closing exercise from episode five — each participant names the institution they will personally defend — and reported the prior week’s answers: Melissa Corrigan chose the judicial branch, and Nick chose the media. Snyder’s argument that institutions do not defend themselves became the organizing question for the hour.
Tara identified media and communications as her institution and grounded the choice in structural consolidation. She cited the Telecommunications Act of 1996 as the mechanism that reduced platform ownership from more than fifty companies to five, and pointed to the Jimmy Kimmel episode as a demonstration of what that concentration permits: individual station owners declining to carry a program across whole regions despite public pushback. She referenced research finding that Fox News viewers are less informed than people who consume no news at all, and drew a historical parallel to Nazi Germany, where a wealthy benefactor purchased a struggling newspaper to distribute party messaging. On lesson three, Tara traced the one-party state to the doctrine of the unitary executive, which she said she had objected to publicly since the Bush and Cheney years, describing it as a framework with no checks and balances.
Kris named two institutions — the Department of Veterans Affairs and the press — and described a conflict between them that occurred the week of taping. He reported that the Washington Post published a two-part investigation into fraud in the veterans disability benefit system, co-reported by Lisa Rein, a reporter for whom he has previously been a source. His criticism was directed less at the reporting than at the VA’s posture: he stated that the department declines to respond to press inquiries while stories are in progress, leaving no mechanism to correct or contextualize claims. Kris outlined the VA’s less-visible missions — benefits for nine million veterans, the National Cemetery Administration, and its role as the largest trainer of healthcare professionals in the country — and stated that the first Trump administration failed to mobilize the VA as a national backstop during the initial COVID waves. Both Nick and Kris disclosed that they receive all of their healthcare through the VA; Nick added that his family is covered through CHAMPVA, which he relies on after losing his job. Nick framed the VA as a working proof of concept for socialized medicine being deliberately underfunded to demonstrate failure, and Kris connected the funding fight to personnel, describing Pete Hegseth as a paid critic who built a career on the VA while telling Sean Ryan he had never received care there.
On the one-party state, Nick observed that a single party currently controls the legislative, executive, and judicial branches alongside numerous state supermajorities, and noted that nine House Republicans joining Democrats would suffice to move against Speaker Mike Johnson. Kris recounted asking Senator Chris Coons about opposition tactics on the Find Out podcast and receiving the answer that Democrats could write strongly worded letters; Kris reads that as a norm-restoration assumption that no longer holds. He called instead for elected officials to accept personal risk — invoking John Lewis occupying the House floor — and argued that Senator Booker being arrested at an ICE facility would carry more weight than a twenty-five-hour floor speech. Kris also cited asymmetric funding: decades of billionaire-backed investment in right-wing school board candidates producing book bans, against a left philanthropic culture that waits for guaranteed success. On remedies, he pointed to the Emoluments Clause suits brought by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington during the first term, most of which failed, and proposed clawback provisions to give Hatch Act enforcement teeth. The episode leaves a working test for lessons two and three: name the institution you depend on, learn the procedural lever that governs it, and treat accountability as a legislative project rather than a norm.
Thank you Noble Blend, P. J. Schuster, Beth Cruz, ArleneMach, Peter Sukowski, and many others for tuning into my live video with Tara Devlin, Kristofer Goldsmith, and Nick Paro!
Join us next Friday, 10/2 at 12:30pm, for our next episode and a continued discussion into Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny.
Where to find resources
How to Access the material
We encourage you to read along with us, with get a copy of your own — we recommend these resources:
Go to your local library and checkout a copy, if available
Learn More about starting your own in-person AFBC
Banner & Backbone Authors’ Notes
You being here shows that you have already begun the process of unfurling new Banners and forging new Backbones for a more progressive America. Please, take the time to become a paid, or free, subscriber to the Network — supporting us all and ensuring everyone in America can hear these messages.
The America we strive for — it is one where we willingly remember the teachings of our past, humbly learn from our failings, proudly celebrate our successes, and boldly lead the way into a future for all people.
