VEEP
Seriously. “Today the secretary of defense with a drinking problem reveals military secrets to a reporter due to a texting error.”
this post was submitted on 05 May 2025
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Game of Thrones.
I find the last days of the Qing dynasty China to be somewhat analogous. Institutional rot, rampant corruption, a complete failure to adapt to crises and open hostility to anyone proposing workable solutions or trying to learn from foreign examples. Basically the two voices in government were, "Learn how guns work while completely refusing to understand the scientific principles that allowed them to be developed" and "Learn absolutely nothing." The "lesser evil" was woefully inadequate, and once the government finally collapsed, both factions that emerged (communists and nationalist) were far more influenced by Western ideas than even the most radical in the Qing government were.
The historical precedent is the rise of Nazi Germany during the 1920s and 1930s. You should now be somewhere in the early 1930s.
To get spoilers, watch Downfall.
And Canada and Greenland are Poland.
or Poland and Austria
The wave of fascism going throughput Europe in the 19th and 20th century of course.
But the state of the American people is also portrayed well in The Hunger Games (books and movies).
Babylon Berlin
There’s a satirical (well, don’t know how long it will be considered that) movie about it… it’s called Idiocracy
I would much rather have Camacho as president than Cheeto Benito.
Terry Crews 2028!
That applies as far as the dumbing down of the population, but even they didn't go for fascists as leaders. That's right, the population of Idiocracy was smarter than what we have now.
I used to think this movie was funny but now it's just kind of painful because it's largely true.
Except Camacho was a caring president, in his own way.
He is the most unrealistic part of the film, he had a problem, found the most qualified person to fix it, listened to them (eventually), and then didnt take credit for it.
The Plot Against America by Philip Roth. Great book and a TV miniseries. An alternative history that has Lindbergh winning the presidency in the 30s and the US government enacting fascism domestically. The book does a great job of portraying the chaos that ensues. The series is also very good.
Idiocracy
They found the smartest person in the world and listened to them to fix their problems... Not at all accurate.
We're in the time he was frozen. We have 40 years or so before that part happens.
Once zoomers can vote and Mr Beast gets elected, things will change.
Over half of Zoomers can already vote. Gen Z is roughly 1997-2012.
Unfortunately the younger they are the more likely they are to be conservative it seems. More poisoned by the algorithms.
I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.
We’re only 20 years after Joe got frozen and he hasn’t been thawed yet. We still have 480 years before things get that bad.
Pretty sure we're speed running that part.
Who knows. We need a movie set in between the time frames we see to tell us.
we're in the "what if they didn't" timeline....
They also tried to publicly execute him.
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Andor
Just started watching that show recently and it's so amazing I'm surprised Disney allowed it to be made. The parallels to the current state of society are so apparent. In one of the episodes of Season 2 a character says "Why can't they just leave us alone" and that resonated with me so much
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The Man in the High Castle.
The Twilight Zone (2019), "The Wunderkind"
Synopsis: A down-on-his-luck campaign manager (John Cho) is determined to get a kid (Jacob Tremblay) elected as the next President of the United States.
1984 by George Orwell
Not TV (at least not that I am aware of), but it was the first thing to come to my mind. They made a movie if you prefer but, as always, you'll get more from the book.
The Prequel to Schindler's List
A lot of what he talks about prior to previous insurrections are pretty similar to what's happening now.
Oh hey, it's the same host as Behind the Bastards. Thanks for the recommendation!
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Literally the first novel ever written "Sinuhe" speaks of a very similar crisis in ancient Egypt.
The bobiverse series (about a guy who is hit by a car right after signing up for a cryogenics thing and then wakes in the future to find out he's basically been legislated to have no rights and is stuck into a self-replicating drone for space exploration, it's pretty good) kind of starts off setting the backstory like it. The christofascism just started a bit later.
Obviously it's not one to one but given Trump's performative Christianity it was all I could think about around the failed coup on Jan 6.
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Any sci-fi by Ray Bradbury, Aldous Huxley Phillip K.Dick, some by Robert Heinlein iirc.
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The Ultra podcast has two seasons and goes in-depth into previous attempts by fascists at taking over the US government.
Sitting members of Congress aiding and abetting a plot to overthrow the government. Insurrectionists criminally charged with plotting to end American democracy for good. Justice Department prosecutors under crushing political pressure. Rachel Maddow Presents: Ultra is the all-but-forgotten true story of good, old-fashioned American extremism getting supercharged by proximity to power.
When extremist elected officials get caught plotting against America with the violent ultra right, this is the story of the lengths they will go to… to cover their tracks.
Thanks for the recommendation. Giving it a listen currently.
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Take a serious look at the collapse of the Soviet Union, the gutting of the Commonwealth, and the rise of Russia under Yeltsin, then Putin. I'm not sure of any fictionalized works that examine this in any detail, but the aftermath and the new reality is well-described in Nothing is True and Everything is Possible by Peter Pomerantsev. Link is a 10 year old review in the Guardian.
The falls of other empires would also be instructive. There is an excellent podcast/YouTube channel, the Fall of Civilizations(YouTube Link)(Spotify Link). In listening, I found several parallels to the first Trump presidency. I haven't listened in years.
A paper-thin skinned hegemon leads a dying empire against his staunch allies. I fed this prompt to ChatGPT and it handed me back Dune by Frank Herbert and Foundation by Isaac Asimov.
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