The following is an opinion piece by the contributor T. Sinclair, and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of the Pine & Roses Editorial Board.

***

You know the trouble with the term “fascism”? There are just too many doggone types. That, and it’s lobbed around like a hot potato so much, to try and divine its actual definition these days is like trying to tell a heap from a pile. After all, we consider Mussolini’s and Hitler’s regimes to be fascist for sure, but where do we land on Hirohito’s Japan, Franco’s Spain, or Salazar’s Portugal? Were they fully fascist, or just authoritarian? If the AfD comes to power in Germany, is that suddenly a fascist state? How many hairs are left before a man is considered bald?

For these reasons of vagueness and the slow dilution of the term’s meaning, I suggest we take a “if it walks like a duck, and talks like a duck” attitude when comparing regimes to fascism, so walk with me while we run through that exercise with the current Trump administration. I’ve referenced Keene State College’s “Characteristics of Fascism” for this piece.

Populist nationalism centered on cult of a redemptive, “infallible” leader who never admits mistakes.

Yup, MAGA and Trump, done.

Political power derived from questioning reality.

Trump’s administration has claimed that it has a right to Greenland never before claimed by the US. He and his administration also still deny he ever lost the 2020 election. They said their administration was killing sailors in the Caribbean for being drug smugglers with no evidence ever presented. His Department of Homeland Security has recently openly contradicted video evidence that clearly shows its ICE agents committing murder by arguing without any material evidence that the victims were would-be assassins. Not to mention all the other times Trump has denied blatantly true shit.

Fixation with perceived national decline, humiliation, or victimhood.

“America’s decline is over. Thanks to President Trump, we are facing the world with dignity, power, and strength.” – US State Department, Jan. 20th 2026

“Rather than focusing solely on his own legal troubles or partisan opponents, Trump began portraying the United States itself as a victim of foreign aggression. In this version of events, other countries were villains responsible for plundering American industry, exploiting trade imbalances, and sending criminals across the border.” – ZME Science, referencing a study by Dr. Marianna Patrona of the Hellenic Army Academy.

“Replacement theory” used to show that democratic ideals of freedom and equality are a threat. Oppose any initiatives or institutions that are racially, ethnically, or religiously harmonious.

Trump’s administration has repeatedly gone after “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” rules within federal agencies and educational institutions, arguing that they’re inherently “racist” toward whites. During his first week in office, he signed Executive Orders banning the consideration of DEI within a number of institutions. 

He has also dog-whistled the far-right’s “great replacement” theory, according to which white Americans are being replaced by non-white Americans, with the stated goal of muting the political power of white Americans. “Our elections are bad, and a lot of these illegal immigrants coming in, they’re trying to get them to vote.” – Trump, Sept 2024 Presidential election. There is also the administration’s push to increase the birthrate and encourage traditional marriage among American citizens, increasing access to IVF and going so far as to consider a proposal for $5,000 bonuses for American women who give birth.

Disdain for human rights while seeking purity and cleansing for those they define as part of the nation.

ICE has consistently denied residents’ human rights, detaining people with legal residence in order to “reconsider” their status, caging children with legal status, deporting people in the middle of the night before their legal due process was completed, sending people to a high-security prison in El Salvador so they don’t have legal recourse. Moving detainees across state lines in order to make legal representation harder to attain in a timely fashion. All of these are denials of human and constitutional rights.

Identification of “enemies”/scapegoats as a unifying cause. Imprison and/or murder opposition and minority group leaders. 

The administration consistently has identified undocumented immigrants as “violent criminals,” and brings up the need to deport as many as possible. ICE being sent into areas with strong communities of black and brown folks, detaining both undocumented and legal residents alike in an attempt to ethnically cleanse urban centers of non-white, non-citizen residents. Note how ICE has not targeted undocumented residents from predominantly white nations, but instead has hammered down on immigrants and refugees from Latino and African nations. ICE has also murdered a handful of protestors, and detained hundreds more, who posed no physical threat to authorities, refusing to investigate those instances in an unbiased manner. This is all an attempt to create a unified “enemy.” 

There is also the Trump administration’s weaponization of the Justice Department to go after perceived political enemies, like James Comey who investigated Trump in 2016, former New York Attorney General Letitia James, who successfully prosecuted Trump on fraud charges before his return to power, and most recently the arrests of journalists like Don Lemon, who are often critical of Trump and his administration in their reporting.

Supremacy of the military and embrace of paramilitarism in an uneasy, but effective collaboration with traditional elites. Fascists arm people and justify and glorify violence as “redemptive”.

Just look at our recent venture into Venezuela, a successful military operation that had Trump praising the might of our military, as well as the true reasons for the incursion. He said as much, “I am pleased to announce that the Interim Authorities in Venezuela will be turning over between 30 and 50 MILLION Barrels of High Quality, Sanctioned Oil, to the United States of America. This Oil will be sold at its Market Price, and that money will be controlled by me, as President of the United States of America, to ensure it is used to benefit the people of Venezuela and the United States!” Praising the might of the US military in order to take over a sovereign nation and fill the pockets of America’s elites.

Then there is the arming of thugs to join ICE, modern day Brown Shirts masked, wearing plain clothes and driving unmarked cars. I hate to hammer the point, but these guys are nothing more than civilians deputized and armed in order to chase down black and brown folks who don’t have citizenship, tear them from their families and communities, and whisk them off in the middle of the night to some other country. The government tries to valorize the violence they commit, but so far there has been great pushback against that narrative. Let’s hope it can hold.

Rampant sexism.

Not only is Trump’s administration sexist, supporting anti-choice laws across the country, he’s also attacked the LGBTQ+ community by ordering federal agencies to recognize only two genders on his first day, they’ve made a big deal of being anti-transgender students in school, and restricting gender-affirming care to trans minors. 

Control of mass media and undermining “truth”.

The administration’s refusal to admit some major news agencies into official press briefings, and its continual denial of facts as “fake news” is a blatant example of this. Most recently, the doubling down by the DHS and Trump on the two murder victims in Minneapolis as “agitators” and “suspects”, as well as withholding evidence from the state before investigations are begun, let alone completed, is a great example of how they feel the need to control the narrative. Someone call Orwell.

Often seeking to expand territory through armed conflict.

Venezuela, Greenland, and with the recent posturing among the U.S. Treasury and Alberta separatists, maybe even an attempt at parts of Canada. Lebenstraum, we need more lebenstraum! I mean, c’mon folks. 

The fact is, it doesn’t matter if you use the “F” word to describe the Trump administration or not. What matters is looking at facts on the ground as they are. Call it a paleo-conservative reordering of the American system. Call it the rise of western authoritarianism, or the inevitable outcome of American hegemony after 70 years. Whether you think the current administration is proto-fascist, quasi-fascist, or something similar but not quite the same, I would encourage you to at least consider: if it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, don’t be afraid to use the word. 

The post If it Walks Like a Duck and Talks Like a Duck … appeared first on Pine & Roses.

Monthly Newsletter of the Rochester Chapter of Democratic Socialists of America

Welcome to the February issue of Rochester Red Star. In this issue, read remarks on ICE violence, protest, and our chapter’s recent 2025 Convention. You’ll also find details on upcoming events, and coverage of chapter activities over the past month.

Interested in contributing? Send submissions to bit.ly/SubmitRedStar, or get involved with our Communications Committee. Reach out to steering@rocdsa.org and join DSA today!

The post Rochester Red Star | February 2026 | (Issue 22) first appeared on Rochester Red Star.

By: Kurt Stand

This was originally published by Portside on December 18, 2025.

“Here’s what’s wrong in this yard. Two white welders get fired and blackmailed into silence for their jobs. A third one, black, with an unblemished record, is fired for the same supposed offense and the company refuses to budge.”

“Ain’t right!” someone called.

“But not one of the three welders should have lost a minute of pay, much less their jobs. And why? Because you can’t breathe carbon monoxide! They are all victims of this company’s core value: Production over safety!”

Set at a shipyard in Quincy, Massachusetts where Brandow worked for 9 years, he uses his experiences as a welder and a union officer to give Goliath an authenticity that is too often lacking in fictional depictions of labor. This is evident in his awareness of the complexity of the characters in the novel, in the picture he presents of union meetings, grievance handling, rank-and-file organizing.                  

Set in the late 70s — early 80s. at the time of the Iran hostage crisis and the racist violence that followed attempts to desegregate Boston’s public school, Brandow places his work in a wider context of events shaping the time without ever losing his focus on the shipyard.  The novel centers on the life of Michael Shea, a Vietnam vet whose personal experiences lead to awareness of class injustice (fueled in part by his mother’s picket line assault that results in her death), and, unusual in the community in which he was raised, awareness of racial injustice and a rejection of the racial hatreds that surround him. Shea’s status as a veteran at a time when jobs were plentiful, enables him to find work as a welder.  The hazards of shipyard work, the union’s unwillingness to fight back, lead him to become an engaged unionist and eventually, a shop steward.  This is shown against the backdrop of personal challenges and difficulties that make this path anything but a linear march of progress. 

 At the center of the novel is a conflict over the role of shop stewards. Do they serve the union leadership, doling out favors to the skilled, the “loyal,” those who are white; do they defend workers by compromising their rights; or do they fight management through unity, creativity, militancy, by organizing rank and file participation – and reaching out for support outside the workplace.  

 Behind those choices lies a difference as to how to relate to a changing workforce.  A shipyard that in living memory had been almost all white men now includes Black Americans, West Indians, Cape Verdeans, Puerto Ricans, a small but growing number of women, all of whom the old leadership fears and resents.  And many of the younger white workers don’t have the commitment to the job or union that older ones had.  Thus a weakened union, a union that has become parochial, a union that still tries to represent the workforce but does so through compromises with management that allows for small victories at the expense of loss of rights.  The price of doing so is at a cost that will come due.

The battle over the quality of the work stewards perform is merged with the battle to have enough stewards.  That conflict is central to all that follows as Brandow makes clear early on.

[Shea] checked his contract … it permitted one steward for each two hundred hardhats in a department.  Despite that, the union by-laws capped the number at a single steward [per department]. He couldn’t let that go.  How could it be possible that the union – not the company – limited the number of stewards, the front-line protections guys had on the job?  Shea realized it really was a black and white issue. The only truly affected department, the only one that qualified under the contract for additional stewards, was welding—the only department with a significant number of black votes.

That sparks a union meeting where the rank-and-file gets defeated by leadership afraid that opening doors might loosen their own authority.  Subsequent battles – over racist graffiti in bathrooms, the lay-off of a pregnant worker, speed-up, safety & health concerns, company disciplinary policies, the conduct of a strike – show the shifting sentiment of workers, how prejudiced attitudes can be broken down and how they can resurface. In all of this, the fights and arguments that take place within the union are always presented in the context of the real problem, management policy that devalues the life of all workers. 

Brandow’s description of how a rank-and-file movement organizes demonstrates that understanding, its goal is to strengthen the union as a whole, not to attack or undermine it. Here too, his writing reflects what he lived, the meetings, arguments, tensions, celebrations, camaraderie, disappointments, harsh language flung back and forth even between friends, all contain the ring of truth. 

Those complications are also those of the characters who people the novel, all with lives outside the job, all facing the pressures of working-class life in which opportunities are few and (even in a more “stable” era) precarious. The violence in the air post-Vietnam, when reaction was raising its ugly head trying to push down progress toward social justice, the uncertainties as those changes were reflected in personal relationships, are very much part of novel’s depiction of workplace life.  The multi-racial character of the shipyard and of Boston and its environs as much a part of the story as the reaction to it, just as is the assertiveness of women pushing back against silences that had prevailed.

That reflects itself in the character of the “sell-out” union president, who remembers with nostalgia, the militancy, the willingness to fight, that built the union.  He respects the new militancy of Shea and the others pushing for change, as much as he does all in his power to undermine them.  He rationalizes the compromises with management he makes every day, for all he sees is a losing battle.  His weakness is part of the problem, no doubt, but nonetheless, he is right – management holds the cards. For those who lived through those times, reading Goliath is a reminder of what happened when layoffs swept industry, fear of job loss leading those who had resisted to accept the unacceptable as safety regulations went out the window.  The end result is a feeling Brandow well describes as he records Shea’s thoughts toward the end of the novel as the combination of permanent layoffs, unrelenting speed-up, breakdown of shifts and jobs assignments, leave workers demoralized, the old union leadership out in the cold, younger union activists with a sense of defeat. 

He knew they thought of their homes, fishing trips in New Hampshire, mythic fiberglass boats skimming over the water, the week, maybe two in a year that they prized as their own. They thought of their own little girls and their sons in their yards. All gone. They knew they would go to their graves with a rage they could never concede. They stood by the basin and yearned for a bright, free beginning. For a start they knew they would never be given.

That describes a reality that those newer to labor activism also need to know for no gain should ever be taken for granted, unity needs to be fought for again and again, struggles for justice at the workplace need to be joined to those taking place in the communities where people live and the broader forces pushing society in one direction or another have to be engaged. Perhaps the greatest strength of the novel lies in making clear that what matters is not just the outcome of a particular battle – for win or lose, it is transitory.  Rather what matters is what we take away from each dispute, each organizing effort, how to integrate that in one’s own life.  Shea reflects that challenge in himself, his personal weaknesses as much a part of the story as his strengths.  The novel’s conclusion providing a good starting point for thinking about how to accept loss, which way to look for new beginnings, a search that – almost by definition, is never easy. 

Cotty and Lonny [two of the rank-and-file leaders] watched them go. They looked around, searching for Shea before they went in. He was the last to join the line. Cotty said, “You did what you could.” Shea nodded without hearing.  “For real, man,” Lonny added, poking Shea in the chest. “I mean, we had men and women, black and white, every shift pulling together. That’s real. That’s something they can’t take from us.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he said as he followed them into the ship and headed for his worksite. Shea’s legs ached to skip down the stairs, to churn past the gates, to breathe in the freedom outside. Instead, he stumbled his way past slaggy mounds of main deck debris toward his gear.  The last whistle blew.

Goliath at Sunset was published by Hard Ball Press on December 15, 2025.

Kurt Stand was active in the labor movement for over 20 years including as the elected North American Regional Secretary of the International Union of Food and Allied Workers until 1997.  He is a member of the Prince George’s County Branch of Metro DC DSA, and periodically writes for the Washington Socialist, Socialist Forum, and other left publications. He serves as a Portside Labor Moderator, and is active within the reentry community of formerly incarcerated people. Kurt Stand lives in Greenbelt, MD.

The post Shipyard Unionism: A Novel of Triumphs and Defeats – A Review of Goliath at Sunset by Jonathan Brandow appeared first on Working Mass.

A response to our article on Lotta Communista in Italy.

The post Response Letter from the Italian Internationalists appeared first on Democratic Left.

Date: Thursday, February 12, 2026 at 6pm PST

Online Only. RSVP for Zoom Link.

Monthly Steering Committee Meetings are open to members to observe but, generally, only Steering Committee members may vote and participate.

Wednesday, February 11 at 6 pm PST (Online)

Wednesday, February 4 · 6:00 – 7:00pm (Online)

Monthly Working Session Meeting

RSVP HERE

The Political Education Working Group is the place to bring your ideas for workshops, educational material, agitprop, and more. Our goal is to bring socialist ideas, DSA messaging and campaigns, and class consciousness to the people of Ventura County. All levels of organizing experience welcome.

Date: Sunday, February 1, 2026 from 9:30 am til 11:30 am

Location: Ragamuffin Coffee Roasters• 550 Collection Blvd, Oxnard, CA 93036

Come join like-minded comrades for a cup of your favorite morning beverage. These gatherings offer a relaxed space to meet members and find out how to get involved, decompress, talk about the issues we face, and stay connected as we close out the year.

No RSVP needed!

What can a stoplight in Syracuse teach us about collective action at work?

The post The myth of “Unions can’t change anything” appeared first on EWOC.