News from within the empire - From a leftist perspective
The way "democracy dies in darkness" is displayed at the top makes it sound more like a tagline.
a promise
If this happens, the best way to see it is as an act of fate. The stars have aligned around Trump. After Jan 6 the GOP could've ended his political career, but instead focused on avoiding blame, which served to further normalize him. The mainstream media viewed him as being good for ratings, which allowed for his rise to office in 2016. Lastly there's the economy, which may go into a recession some time this year. If this were to happen, Biden, who is already incredibly unpopular, will have no means to maintain his position as president. Americans are hustlers at heart, and Trump is the most famous and prolific conman alive today.
Whether or not Trump is actually into full-on fascism is dependent on whether we enter a recession, and how deep the recession hits. I'm going to be so pissed if the only "opposition" on TV ends up being scripted debates with people like Alex Jones, Nick Fuentes, Donald Trump, and reactionaries talking about how they ditched the Libertarian Party.....
Them choosing Julius Caesar as the dictator is oddly on the nose if you've read Parenti's book. "Oh no we're trading our wealthy senatorial unpopular oligarchy for a wealthy senatorial emperor who's at least popular!"
Julius Caesar at least has a trillion times more charisma and actual results than Trump does.
First name that comes to mind after reading your post is not Caesar, but Didius Julianus.