by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls
First, let’s get something out of the way — MAGA is, at its core, an illiberal movement. It’s really simply Putinism with an American accent. The whole point of MAGA is to use its control of the Executive and Legislative (Senate) branches of government to destroy liberal democracy in America long-term via young hack conservative judges who care more about their partisan agenda than the good of the country. Conservatives since at least Watergate have felt like victims of evil liberals. The MAGA attack on basic American democratic norms is a strategic and well-planned agenda that was set in motion decades ago.
My current analogy is this: if this was 9/11, Trump’s election was the two airplanes striking the towers. Liberals are firefighters in the lobby, trying to figure out what they’re going to do, not fully realizing they’re going to be in rubble in a few minutes. In other words, America is already a Russian-style managed-democracy, only the details have to be worked out. That, and Trump is criminally incompetent. So it may be one of his successors who finishes the job.
Having said all that, the reason why Kavanaugh is so significant is he took the positions staked out after the Access Hollywood tape to their next logical extreme. MAGA is upset because they see the efforts to “cancel” Kavanaugh for things he did as a young man as just another overreach by liberals who want to destroy traditional masculinity.
Liberal-progressives, meanwhile, are at a loss. They feel they have Kavanaugh caught red handed and yet they can’t seem to get any traction. This pretty much sums up how disorganized and ineffective the modern center-Left is in the United States in general. They can be so wrapped up in the finer points of who is more oppressed that they lose sight of the importances of messaging. Which, of course, what Donald Trump lives and breaths. (Another term for messaging would be, of course, branding.)
And so we’re at something of an impasse. But not really. MAGA will continue to plunder the treasury and destroy democratic norms at will. They will never be held accountable for anything they do. But they demand anyone they oppose be destroyed for the smallest slight.
Really, it seems that our absolute best-case scenario long-term is some sort of moderate, centrist military junta steps in at some point to keep the country together. But far more likely is Trump will go after individual Electors on a personal basis and “win’ the 2020 race on strict Constitutional grounds. Then Blue States revolt and Trump uses that as an excuse to abolish Blue State governments, turning them into military districts.
And that, as they say, will be that.
ICE will be weaponized. The camp infrastructure already in existence will be used for anyone not wise enough to shut up — like me! — and, then…well…I guess that’s it.
