A Cold Civil War


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m a huge fan of David Rothkopf — even though I fear he’s come to think I’m an Internet crank — but I have to disagree with him on what’s going on in the United States at the moment.

He wrote about the “cold civil war” going on in the United States at the moment, and, from what I could tell, he seems to think this is a potentially long-term solution. He just can’t come out and say what growing numbers of people — especially those few who read my writing know I believe — that the United States could very well be living in a modern day antebellum period.

It’s actually possible that the world’s first hyperpower is on the cusp of willingly bombing itself into oblivion. And if that doesn’t happen, then we’re going to slide peacefully into autocracy.

Or, to be more succinct — America is careening towards the two existential choices of civil war or autocracy. Either we play the high stakes game of who has the best military or we simply let an autocrat “make America great again.”

And there are no quick fixes to this problem. No “boom” is going to save us. No, “this is big” Twitter thread. And we just don’t have the political will to take down TrumpWorld using the legal system.

So, in essence, we’re fuuuuuucked.

Why am I so sure about this? Well, all the metrics point in one of those two directions. A huge swath of America no longer believes in democracy. While another group of MAGA is bloodthirsty enough that they could very well start a civil war just because they want the opportunity to hurt people like me on a physical level for my political beliefs.

Anyway. You have a few years. I would say, if we’re lucky, we’re living in 1857 right now. Slave Power will either take over the whole country or we start a civil war around 1860 – 1861. Good luck.

Weimar America: The Patriot Front Threat


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I was astonished to see the footage tonight of the fascist paramilitary group the Patriot Front swooping into D.C. then leaving as quickly as they came. This is very disturbing for a number of reason, among them being that usually when a democracy is in its death spiral, paramilitary groups like the Patriot Front begin to pop up.

So, my general belief that we’ll in the beginning stages of a very bumpy few years is beginning to hold water. If hundreds of far Right nut jobs can spirit themselves into the capital without anyone knowing about it, then this is a dry run for something far more nefarious.

Because it takes an extensive infrastructure and logistical command to pull of such a thing. You don’t just get that many people into a hostile center-Left Blue city in broad day light just for the lulz of taking some tourist pictures.

These guys are plotting long-term.

But, what?

There are any number of things that they could be up to. I think they’re going through their paces in the lead up to something Really Big at some point as we grow closer to the potentially very turbulent 2024 – 2025 timeframe. When they feel they can make a difference in the control of the government, they strike. But they know they have a few years where they can do dry run after dry run after run in preparation of that.

Or, put another way, this is another macro metric that is difficult for us to understand the context of. Is the Patriot Front doing shit like this a ping from a dark future, or is it value free? Or is it both? I honestly don’t know. But it doesn’t exactly make me feel any better.

Deep State — #Lyrics To A #Pop #Rock #R&B Song

Make of this what you will. Just letting off some steam.

Deep State
lyrics by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
please give credit if you produce or perform

deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust

see you with someone else
someone else at your side
I just want to let it slide
but I have to confront that
when you told me you loved me forever
you lied
you lied
you lied

now I’m living in a deep state
deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust

what am I going to do
when I have to admit we’re through
will you ever smile your special smile
the one that makes me feel so high
I fear that’s the past and all my lust
is now nothing but disgust

now I’m living in a deep state
deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust

(bridge)
all this lust I feel in my heart
still burns as hot as the sun
no need for disgust when
the person you love makes you sigh
then I awake as if from a dream
feel all my disgust again

now I’m living in a deep state
deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust
deep state
of disgust

Of NATO, Ukraine & Putin’s Metrics For Invasion


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

One theory floating around Twitter is Putin is about to engage in a massive, risky war against Ukraine because he wants to stop the country from joining NATO.

I struggle to imagine this being true, for a lot of reasons.

The biggest is — if all Putin wants to do is ensure that Ukraine doesn’t join NATO, all he has to do is a modest smash-and-grab operation connecting Donbass to Odessa. Have enough of a lingering “frozen conflict” endgame to it that NATO just doesn’t want to risk letting Ukraine join.

And all of the other metrics presented to me can be swatted away. Putin is old, they say. And I say, so what. Putin is an autocrat and all autocrats think they’re going to live forever. The list goes on.

You can’t escape some cold hard facts. It’s sexy to think of a big war between Ukraine and Russia, but you can’t escape how small Russia’s economy is. You can’t escape the stress such a huge, potentially long-term, war against Ukraine that has a fair sized population would have on Russia’s economy and overall stability.

The point is — what metrics is Putin using that would cause him to believe a general war against Ukraine would be a good idea? What the hell is he thinking? Because it would make a lot more sense if this was all just a very expensive bit of saber rattling meant to get a face-to-face sit down IRL with Biden.

And he can do that because he’s an autocrat. So, for the time being, that’s what I think is happening. When something changes, I’ll revise my assessment.

TrumpRussia 2.0


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner


This is really bonkers. But it’s entertaining to mull this possibility, so here we go. We all know how much Trump loves to suck Putin’s cock, so it would make a lot of sense if those two guys continue to chat like school girls. And we know that Trump never met a quid pro quo that he didn’t like.

So, what if Putin told Trump — hey, it’s not the House flipping you have to slow walk January 6th things in the courts to, it’s a point this December.

Trump wouldn’t know when, exactly, but he would know that the eyes of the world would turn rather abruptly to Ukraine soon. So much so, that we would wake up in six months and look at each other, shocked that Congress’ January 6th investigation has mysteriously faded into nothingness.

Now, obviously, this kooky idea falls part after this because the Republican Party could very well collapse into two waring camps if Putin misjudges the willingness of Ukrainians to fight for their nation. The longer the war lasts, the more Putin-loving Trump will begin to tear away from the rest of the Republican Party.

But Trump, obviously, doesn’t have the mental ability to do that second and third level political thinking — he’s more of a grunt kind of guy –so, it’s possible this informal quid pro quo might happen.

Or not. I have no proof and it sounds kind of bonkers even to me.

I note that The Washington Post is reporting that evidence suggests that Russia may attack Ukraine early next year with 175,000 troops.

So, if there is any discussion between TrumpWorld and Putin that would mean the there are any number of other, less nefarious explanations for why they’re slow walking everything — that’s just Trump people do. The whole Russia thing could very well be happening totally independent of what’s going on in the States with Trump and January 6th.

But the war starts early, like, say between now and Dec. 16, then, that would be really spook, because December 16th is the date TrumpWorld lawyer Jeff Clark pushed his Congressional testimony to.

What The Fuck Is Putin’s Russia Up To Around Ukraine?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Putin is up to something curious around Ukraine. The one thing I’ve noticed lately is someone has blocked the troop movement Websites that a lot of armature observers of this developing situation have been using to date. Which definitely seems to suggest that Putin wants as much leeway to strike when and where of his own choosing.

At this point I would like to point out that Stalin was a paranoid motherfucker with a lot of foresight — almost all of the capitals of the Soviet Republics were originally placed in geographic locations that are very close to the border of a sister of republic. I’m assuming his thinking was by doing so, if one of the two was in rebellion, the other one could at least be near the capital of the rebellious Republic.

So, if you look at the map of Belarus, the only thing that separates its border to in the south to Ukraine’s capital of Kiev is a large, long lake. So, if there was some sort of crazy huge war between Russia and Belarus against Ukraine, it’s easy to imagine a one two punch pincer movement by Belarus and Russia to strike Kiev.

If Putin really is preparing a open, general war against Ukraine it’s going to come a huge fucking shock to Americans. And, it has to be noted that in some ways a major regional war in Europe would help Trump a great deal and in another way would hurt him.

It would help Trump for the basic reason that it would crowd out all other news in the domestic news echo chamber to the point that a lot of his defeats about the investigation into January 6th could be pushed off the front page. And, the argument could be made that in the minds of most Republicans the fact that Putin waited until AFTER Trump was president to attack Ukraine would “prove’ that the TrumpRussia imbroglio was a “hoax.”

And, yet, such a war could also fuck Trump over for two reasons. One reason would that for a lot of the smarter center-Left thought leaders like those at Crooked Media and Deep State Radio, the logic of Putin waiting until AFTER Trump was in office to invade would be obvious — why invade Ukraine while your stooge is in office and devastate him politically, when you can just be patient and wait until he’s out of office and do the same thing?

The other reason why a major war between Russia and Ukraine could seriously hurt Trump is if there was a long term regional war between Ukraine and Russia then there would come a point where Trump’s absolute fidelity to Putin would bump up against the Republican’s historical hostility to Russians. And, that, might be the setup for a massive civil war between MAGA and the Republican Establishment to the point that Trump’s Patriot Party eats the Republican Party or the center-Right is simply hobbled for a few presidential cycles until they get their shit together.

In fact, sad to say, that’s one of the ways we could both avoid autocracy and civil war in the United States because if the Republican Party is too busy strangling itself, it can’t very well kill American democracy or start a civil war, now can it?

A New Era: Let’s Rock


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Ugh. Why is everything so dumb.

Nothing I write here will make any difference. But tonight I’ve been watching a a Netflix documentary about Studio 54. It has gotten me thinking about the macro trends that prompted the popularity of Studio 54.

The key issue at hand is getting COVID19 behind us. But success requires risk and a willingness to get ahead of the curve. Yet let me be clear — this is just me mentally masturbating. Or, put another way, this is the tycoon version of me in late 2006 – early 2007 in Seoul who was both DJing at the best expat dive bar in Seoul while publishing a monthly magazine for expats.

I’m hungry.

And I’m not suggesting that any of this means anything — it doesn’t. I would have to win the lottery to make any of these dreams come true anytime soon, but I just wanted to note that once we finally get over COVID19 that people are going to want to party.

But all I’m saying is there’s a good chance that we’re just about to enter A New Era of some sort. It’s risky to make any assumptions on just your gut, but how else are you supposed to “disrupt” anything?

This, only in New York City.

I think back on Nori in Seoul, the little dive bar I used to DJ at and think about how much fun that was. What if you could transfer that dive bar’s great vibe to a bigger venue in New York City somewhere? Say, maybe the East Village. You get basement space that’s Studio 54-big, but design in such a way that it feels really intimate and the dance floor would be so tight that people would get all hot and sweaty and exited when just the right song was played.

Meanwhile, where’s our Spy Magazine? We have the undead Gawker, but it just doesn’t have the snarky spite of the old Gawker. And music, why is it so hard for rock music to come back as popular form of entertainment?

I think what I’m feeling is nothing more than nostalgia. That’s it. For what I want to have happen, happen, I would have to have access to several million dollars — at least — and connections, a shit ton of connections.

Anyway, I just had to get that out of my system.

Could A Second American Civil War Really Happen?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

This blog exists in oblivion. Outside of the odd, seemingly random scraping of it by the Internet Archive and some site in Iowa using Microsoft Azure, the only traffic I really get is people who are worried about a Second American Civil War.

I’ve kind of said my peace for the time being on the matter, but given the steady flow of people interested in a 2ACW, I thought I’d pontificate some more.

The key thing to remember when talking about a 2ACW is it’s at one end of a wide spectrum of possible outcomes in the next three to four years. At the moment, all signs point to the United States slipping peacefully into some sort of ever-tightening autocracy. A 2ACW is just potentially too far away in time for me to be able to say for sure one might happen or not.

Or, put another way — all the conditions are there for the United States to transition peacefully into autocracy no later than January 2025. I think MAGA is popular enough that they won’t even have to cheat. They will cheat anyway, but by January 2025, the United States will be on the path to becoming a political clone of Russia.

And that would be that but for one thing — Trump.

Or, to put it another way, the combination of Trump being a chaos agent and the bloodthirsty nature of the MAGA New Right could very well be a set up to the Right self-owning in a pretty astonishing fashion by starting a 2ACW that they could very well lose.

It is telling that so many people are low-grade freaking out about the potential for a 2ACW that they’re goosing my website’s traffic. But, again, at the moment I don’t think we have anything to worry about. Autocracy is just too popular.

One metric that I’m keeping an eye on is how insane Republicans when they regain the House and Senate. If they put bonkers people in their caucus in positions of power, then, well, that’s a pretty good indication that in the 2024 – 2025 time frame Republicans are going to push us to the political limit.

There are plenty of reasons to think that our political system will ultimately bend, not break, but, lulz, we still have time to fuck things up.

So, do I REALLY think we are going to have a 2ACW? Maybe. Ask me again in a few years.

Omicron: Sometimes, They Come Back


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

We all have been working on the assumption that COVID19 would come and go and later at some point we would face The Big One. This new pandemic would be separate from COVID and be so bad that we would look back at the years 2020 – 2021 and realize we really didn’t know how good we had it.

Yes, but.

It’s beginning to dawn on me that there is a real chance that The Big One may be nothing more of a continuation of the original COVID19 outbreak. Or, to put it another way, what if 2020 – 2021 is seen by future historians as analogous to WW1?

We could face a new, highly contagious and deadly COVID19 variant that is not something independent of COVID19, but rather a variant of it. It’s easy to game out a situation where we go through off of this again with the same virus, but we end up with far, far, far more people dead.

How likely is that to happen? I honestly have no idea.

But it is a hyper modern Modern Problem for us all to mull. It’s very possible that sooner rather than later our entire world could be upended by the same virus that’s been doing it since late 2019.