Originally a comment by Bjarte Foshaug on Drag them and burn them he says.
As Timothy Snyder put it, they are clearly (from memory) preparing the ground for worse things to come. I don’t know to what degree it’s a conscious strategy (as opposed to instinctual, trial and error etc.), but anyway it’s a prime example of the weaponization of cognitive dissonance: Signal your illiberal and authoritarian agenda in advance while making sure there is just enough plausible deniability to give you an alibi (”it’s just trolling”, ”not to be taken literally” etc.). Get your followers into the habit of going along with, excusing or explaining away, even actively applauding increasingly dehumanizing and violent rhetoric, unambiguous, shameless lies, blatant … Read the rest