Tag: Fuck MAGA Fuck Trump

Will Red States Win The Second American Civil War?


by Ender

Short Answer: No.

Long Answer
If you’re searching for some sort of easy answer as to if the Red States would win a theoretical Second American Civil War, I just don’t have it for you. You probably are out at the cabin, drinking Miller Lite with the guys and someone gets a little too worked up about Vaccine Passports or Cancel Culture or whatever the fuck it is that cocksucker MAGA New Right idiots are upset about at the moment.

You pull up your phone and ask Google, “Will Red States win the civil war?“

And so, here you are.

First and foremost, you’re going to have to make concrete your hazy, abstract thoughts about a “civil war” and give me some sort of war aims. Even more important, is the issue of why do Red States even need a civil war in the first place? What, specifically, would make Red State people think that they need to start killing their fellow Americans in an organized manner because of their political views?

As I tell my conservative relatives at every opportunity, all Red States have to do is be patient and they’ll get everything they ever wanted and then some. Blue State leadership — at the moment — is divided, tepid and weak-willed and, as such, Red States could very easily establish a MAGA New Right autocracy without firing a shot. It’s when you leave the realm of politics and start making things existential that Red States have a severe problem on their hands.

But, lulz, the MAGA New Right glorifies political violence and is itching for the opportunity to eliminate the “liberal problem,” so it’s something that is at the forefront of a lot of Red State people’s minds.

If you’re still eager for a Second American Civil War and want to know if Red States will win it, I need to know what your war aims would be. What’s the point of the civil war relative to you? With the First American Civil War, the war aims of the South were clear — independence in order to protect slavery. With any Second American Civil War, Red State war aims seem extremely abstract.

Red States so hate the way Blue State people think that they’re willing to risk everything for the opportunity to physically harm them en masse. But why? Why do that when you could simply be patient and have the country slide peacefully into autocracy. It appears that the glorification of political violence on the part of the MAGA New Right is nothing more than what you would expect as part of a Fourth Turning — it exists because it exists.

Back to war aims.

I’m having to do some political reverse engineering here, but here goes. The first problem that the MAGA New Right Red States face when gaming out a civil war is, at the core of their desire for a Second Civil War is a severe existential fear of the browning of America. So, after the initial political violence began, it would soon become clear that establishing some sort of white Christian ethno state would be the chief Red State war aim.

As such, Red State people, who to date have been getting everything they want via traditional politics will get a rude awaking — POC will freak the fuck out the moment the MAGA New Right makes it clear they want to “put them in their place.” Hence — a race war will begin. And part and parcel of that race war will be crimes against humanity on the part of Red State governments (collectively known as Trumplandia) who will begin to systematically kill POC in a frantic effort to maintain control.

So, right off the bat, Red States have a race war to deal with — they just don’t have a unified polity because of that.

Then, you have two other major issues: population and economics. If California stays in the Union at the onset of a Second American Civil War it, unto itself, would be enough to allow Blue States to dominate everything from the West Cost to Texas in the South to the Mississippi River in the center to Minnesota to the north.

Add to this, in general, the Blue States have far bigger economies and more dense populations geographically and things aren’t looking good for Red States.

But if you STILL want to have a Second American Civil War because you “just want to be left alone” then Red States have a few things going for them. First is, Blue States aren’t really taking seriously how deranged Red States are going into any Second American Civil War. So, it is possible that some sort of sucker punch could happen that would knock Blue States off their feet long enough for Red States to consolidate power — still a problem: race.

Additionally, it’s almost inevitable that WMD will be used by both sides, so you could sketch out a scenario whereby the MAGA New Right is simply so much more fanatical than the Blue States that when push comes to shove on the use of WMD, Red States win because they’re willing to vaporize more people.

The argument could also be made that if Trumplandia simply wants to leave the Union to form its own white Christian ethno state, then, yes, Red States would then probably come pretty close to achieving their war aim. There would be a massive migration of POC out of Trumplandia, but the MAGA New Right hates POC to begin with, so win-win, right?

And, remember, none of this clusterfuck would happen in a vacuum. The DPRK could lop nuke our way to scramble things. WW3 would probably break out during the second civil war, the list goes on.

So, no, Red States wouldn’t win the Second American Civil War, or if they did, they would severely regret the whole thing by the time they “won.”

Twitter Liberals Are Looking At Unfrozen Caveman Governor DeSantis All De Wrong


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Sometimes, I grow very frustrated with Twitter liberals. They went to Harvard and shit and yet relative to what I, a mere hayseed rube Internet crank rando believe, they are completely clueless. A prime example of this is what’s going on with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

Ron DeSantis

All his thuggish behavior that is putting the lives of his own electorate in danger is exactly what not just the MAGA New Right base in Florida wants, but the NATIONAL MAGA New Right base wants in the abstract. The more thuggish he is, the better in their eyes.

They want autocracy. They want to “own the libs” no matter what the consequences are. And the more DeSantis’ political fortunes improve because of him being a demonstrable autocratic cocksucker, the more every elected Republican official who sees the next president when they look at themselves in the mirror in the morning will feel obliged to one up him.

Autocratic thuggery is now the sweet spot of modern Republican politics. Negative polarization is so absolute, so extreme now within Republican ranks that even the most overheated MAGA New Right fascist rhetoric could very well become policy once a Republican inevitable becomes president again. Then all my “doom shit” won’t look so hysterical.

Anyway, DeSantis knows what he’s doing. At this point, the only issue is if Trump co-ops him or the two of them have a political deathmatch to see who gets to be the first American autocrat.

Of course, 2025 is a long ways away. There are about a dozen other would-be autocrats who are going to fight like hell to get the chance to come to power in 2025 and….just never leave office for any reason. As such, DeSantis doesn’t have a complete lock on being our first true American Autocrat, but he’s definitely at the moment the chief contender.

We are so fucked. So very, very fucked.

I have no ready answers for you. I have no VOX Tik-Tok video spoken in formal Twitter liberal received English. I just have my two eyes and ears and simply “doom shit” logic to use.

We’re going to have to have some sort of United Front or hope we can get the type of radical moderate behavior that happened around the time Lincoln decided to free the slaves. Something gotta give. Something big has to happen, otherwise, DeSantis will become an American Augustus and establish a American Empire.

The ‘Doom Shit’ Between Now & 2025: Autocracy, Civil War or Military Junta


by Ender

When it came to predicting the ultimate effects of COVI19, I did a fairly good job of predicting things. Where I made the biggest mistake was on how severe I thought it would be. Given how the Chinese government freaked the fuck out when it was first reported, I assumed it was far more deadly than it ultimately turned out to be.

Anyway.

Let’s look at why, specifically, I think we have three options — autocracy, civil war or military junta — before us between now and January, 2025.

The United States is far less politically stable than we appear. The MAGA New Right talks openly about how liberals are “forcing” them to become radical fascists. They talk in sometimes not-so-vague terms about how soon enough they’re going to embrace fascism once and for all and it will be all liberals’ fault.

When you begin to accept that the Republican Party is now nothing more than a modern version of Slave Power that will stop at nothing to protect its interests, then, lulz, you have a recipe for disaster on your hands. The Republican Party has officially embraced autocracy and minority rule as its path to perpetual power from here on out.

What did you do to defend democracy, daddy?

What bothers me the most about Twitter liberals is they continue to frame the behavior of notable MAGA New Right elected as if we had a functioning liberal democracy. This, sadly, is not the case. The very thuggish, autocratic things that people like Ron DeSantis advocate are the very things that make them popular with the anti-democratic Trumplandia base.

Now, the ironic thing about all of this is Trump is such an idiot moron that he could very well, simply by existing be the thing that prevents us from peacefully transitioning into an autocracy in all but name. He’s so popular — and yet such a fucking idiot — that what should otherwise be a very easy political transition to autocracy on America’s part may turn into one of the other two options I keep thinking about: civil war or military junta.

The United States has been so stable for so long that it’s difficult to wrap one’s mind around the idea that there might be a civil war here. A lot of people simply can’t grok it as a possibly at all. And, yet, according to all the metrics I keep in my mind about such things a civil war is definitely among the three options we face.

And now, we come to the great irony of all of this — the very same macro trends that could lead us to civil war, autocracy or a military junta — could very well simply give the MAGA New Right everything it wants without destroying our democracy.

For the moment, the center-Left is divided, fractious and ineffectual. America has been drifting towards a more conservative political center for about 50 years now. There’s every reason to believe that the Republican Party — even with the browning of America — could dominate American politics within the context of American political tradition for at least another generation if not more.

But they’re fucking greedy and want an autocracy because they lost the culture wars and they want to “own” the libs once and for all.

And, yet, once the MAGA New Right make shit existential for Leftist soyboys, they could very well have a lot more kick in them than expected. It’s human nature. Let me repeat that: IT’S FUCKING HUMAN NATURE.

The MAGA New Right Red States could very well make the same mistake about the Blue States that the Axis Powers made about the United States in late 1941. Red States think Blue States are “degenerates” who will collapse the moment there’s any political violence.

Surprise! That’s not true!

And, yet, this all raises the issue — why am I so certain that one of three unthinkable options will happen between now and around January 2025.

Besides the glorification of political violence on the Right, the hardening of the political divide and the death of politics in general, I would point to the coordinated efforts on the part of the Republican Party at the state and local level to highjack any election result they don’t like.

Sorry for the shitty quality.

Why give the Republican dominated legislature the right to take over local election certification if you don’t intend to use it? Why make it so fucking hard to vote if you don’t intend to abuse your ability to dissuade people from voting in general. I’m simply taking Republican anti-democratic moves both seriously and literally and then extrapolating from that.

A lot of the people who poo-poo my “doom shit” about our political future either refuse to realize that we’re no longer a functioning democracy or they would be the people who tuned out entirely once we become an autocracy and it becomes clear that it’s pointless to vote.

I’m beginning to think that maybe — just maybe — when we finally face the options of civil war or autocracy the U.S. Military will step in and tell everyone to cool it. We may live under military rule for a few months — years? — but in the end all that will happen is there will be a Constitutional Convention that sorts out all our structural issues and then we move on without a lot of bloodshed.

Doom Shit

But, in general, the macro trends are definitely drifting towards Something Big happening no later than January 2025. At this point, in my mind, the biggest known unknown is if Trump will still be politically viable enough to fuck everything up so we start killing each other for political reasons.

The Political Implications of Global Climate Change


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It has been speculated that global climate change was responsible for the current COVID19 pandemic. If that is the case, then the argument could be made that Trump was the first political fatality of our new hotter-than-ever age.

Watch out for that last step.

If things continue the way they are currently going, there’s going to come a point when American politics is going to change in a rather dramatic fashion — potentially a lot sooner than you might think.

If a huge chunk of Florida and Louisiana simply sink into the sea, those people — voters — have to go somewhere. Imagine what happens when Miami sinks into the sea and all those voters have to find somewhere new to live. Where ever they go, they’re going to change the political dynamic once they get settled.

And, remember, a huge swath of the the Rust Belt has been depopulated over the last few decades. If things really get as hot as we fear, then, on an existential basis, it’s easy to imagine cities like Detroit, Buffalo, and other, similar places having a rush of new residents.

Given how badly we’re fucking things up, this could happen a lot sooner than you might think — it could be so soon that our apparent inevitable march into autocracy might, if not be stopped, at least slowed or the context changed a little bit.

Anyway, what do I know. All I know is, long term, we’re fucked.

The Ballad Of Barr & Pence: A MAGA Autogolpe That Wasn’t


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

When the history of Trumplandia is written, two people will stick out as having changed everything by what they did — or didn’t do: Bill Barr and Mike Pence.

What makes their actions so weird in hindsight is neither one of them was ever mentioned as the “guardrails” that were going to save us from Trump’s excesses. In fact, they were some of the biggest toadies for Trump — until they weren’t at very crucial moments in time.

Bill Barr — at least in my opinion — had a specific purpose when he was originally hired: end the Mueller Investigation. He wrapped that up and did plenty of really shitty things. And then in the 2020 – 2021 timeframe he did something that saved American democracy for four more years: nothing.

He sat on his hands.

So, even though Barr intimately knew on a personal basis how badly Trump wanted DOJ to indict the Bidens, or Hillary or Obama or whomever, he was able to simply slow walk all of Trump’s would-be autocratic moves so they were moot. Without Barr doing that, it’s very possible that all the autocratic things I thought up in 2020 Trump would have done and he would still be president.

Then there’s Mike Pence.

Pence is the consummate Trump sycophant. Or, at least, he was until January 6th. After defending Trump at every turn for any and everything he did, no matter how horrible or autocratic, on January 6th Pence gave American democracy a second chance by simply doing his fucking job. (Which in the specific case of certification was simply to announce the certification, he didn’t really have to do anything other than not nullify the certification by going rouge.)

And, so because of the actions of two people everyone assumed would be Trump’s lapdogs, American democracy was spared for a few years. You honestly could not make such shit up.

What happens next is up to us. We aren’t going to be as lucky, next time.

Schlichter, Never Go Full Fascist


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So, this happened.

The guy above is one of a few MAGA New Right “thought leaders” who establish the talking points that will be watered down and disseminated throughout the Right wing bullshit echo chamber. These now far more palatable talking points will be parroted by your conservative relatives at, say, Thanksgiving Dinner.

That’s why such people like Kurt Schlichter are actually far more important than you might think. Even though some of what they rant about is nothing more than bad faith bullshit meant to “own the libs,” usually the general drift of rhetoric on their part does give you some sense of what they actually believe.

As such, it definitely seems as though the on-going fascist radicalization of the Republican Party continues. And, as I’ve mentioned before, it definitely seems as though should Republicans ever gain power again — they’re never going to peacefully give it up.

These days, I vacillate widely between thinking that when the MAGA New Right autocracy finally is established that things aren’t going to change the much for a while, to thinking there’s going to immediately be a civil war and or military junta established.

It’s possible that when the autocratic white Christian ethno state is finally established, the Republicans will drift towards a Russian style autocracy, but, at first things won’t change that much. There will be excesses — like the media will be purged — but for the time being people like me will be allowed to continue to rant about what fucking cocksuckers the MAGA New Right is.

Though, truth be told, if it’s Mike Pompeo who is our autocrat, that may not last very long –that guy is a real asshole who, once president, will be just as corrupt and autocratic as Putin has ever been.

Anyway, back to Schlichter. His Twitter thread definitely gives us a sense of what we’re up against. It’s not like they’re hiding their vision for America. All I can compare it to is how Hitler wrote a whole fucking book laying out exactly what he was going to do….and then he did it.

I can’t predict the future, but the macro trends definitely indicate that the conditions are there for at some point between now and January, 2025, there is going to be some sort of catalyst that forces us to make the existential choice of autocracy, civil war or military junta.

The Right, as exemplified by Schlichter are locked and loaded to strike Blue States on an ideological basis. They’ve established what they’re going to do and why they’re going to do it. But it hasn’t happened yet. Something would have to happen for me not to think we’re just going to peacefully transition into autocracy.

Who knows at this point. Definitely not me.

My Hot Take On The Specific Chronology Of Trump’s Attempted Autogolpe


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The key issue — the one that set up Pence to save American democracy for about four years — is “1/03: DOJ threatens mass resignation; Trump backs down.” It is a testament to how Trump has always been playing himself that he backed down at that point.

A true Great Man would have pushed ahead, despite mass resignation. The autocrat is willing to endure the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune — see, also, how Hitler handled the SA — while an idiot ding-dong like Trump goes through all the trouble of getting to that point then backs down.

By January 3, 2021, it was well established that on a political level, Trump was above the law. Nothing, in real terms, would have happened to him if there were mass DOJ resignations. He could have easily gotten what he wanted — to stay in power — and the mass resignations would have been seen as just a blip. This would especially been the case once he was in second term and he could simply purge the media to control the narrative of how he secured a second term.

That, at least, is what an actual autocrat would have done.

The question is, will it be Trump that attempts to shepard us into autocracy in the 2024 – 2025 timeframe, or will it be someone far more adept like Ron DeSantis? But as I keep saying, we have three options ahead of us as of the moment: autocracy, civil war or military junta.

Who organized the Pence Gallows in front of the Capitol?
Sometimes, the biggest tell about an event comes from something we simply take for granted. In this case, it took some planning to set up a gallows for Pence on January 6th. That thing didn’t just magically appear out of nowhere. It suggests that there was a specific point to the insurrection — scare the shit out of Mike Pence so he wouldn’t certify the vote.

Why did Trump give Jim Jordan the Medal of Freedom on January 11?
Again, it’s easy to dismiss this by saying Jordan was such a long-term toady of Trump’s that of course he would get the Medal of Freedom before Trump left office. And, yet, the case could be made that Jordan did something specific in that prompted Trump in his zero-sum-game mind to feel compelled to give Jordan a “gift” in exchange for…what? Silence? Actively fucking up any investigation into what happened January 6th?

Why did a Proud Boy leader visit Trump in the days before January 6th?
This is one of those things where what actually happened is kind of nebulous. Did a Proud Boy leader get a tet-a-tete with Trump in the White House? What did they talk about? There are a lot of conflicting stories about all of this, but someone needs to ask some questions to figure out what happened.

How much did Trump know about the plot for January 6th?
It is reasonable to believe that Trump was the driving force for what happened on January 6th….but just like with the Russia conspiracy stuff, it was probably very chaotic and haphazard. Trump probably would dip in to a meet every once in a while to give “his people” a general goal then wonder off. This gives him legal “plausible deniability” because all he had to do was incite the mob — he likely didn’t know exactly that was going to happen. He just knew there was a good chance they would attack to Capitol in such a way that it could scare the shit out of Pence so he didn’t do his job.

DeSantis Is Politically De Dangerous To De Trump


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Ron DeSantis

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is very, very popular with my conservative relatives. The origin of his popularity is he is perceived as a “fighter” who attacks “the libs” on every front for any reason.

This is probably the most destructive of Trump’s legacies and the thing that could ultimately be his political downfall. My theory is this — now that Trump has established the blueprint for being a successful Republican politician, he no longer serves much purpose for his many, many would-be autocratic successors.

Trump, unto himself, is a blockage in our now inevitable transition into autocracy. Trump is just a big old ding-dong who is way too lazy and idiotic to successfully shepherd us into autocracy. His would be younger, more focused — and potentially more bloodthirsty successors, however — don’t have those problems.

As such, it is within the realm of possibility that there will come a political tipping point where people like DeSantis support Trump’s political demise because he’s outlived his usefulness. He has shown the path to autocracy, but doesn’t have the good sense to get out of their way, so they’ll be there throwing punches when the end comes, if it ever does.

Or, put another way, DeSantis, specifically, is growing popular enough that either Trump tries to co-op him by naming him is 2024 veep or he’s able to destroy Trump should the two have at it at last.

At the moment, DeSantis appears popular because he holds out the promise of MAGA without Trump. A lot — A LOT — of people who support the craven, racist ideals of MAGA can’t defend Trump and DeSantis gives them an out. In their mind, if the debate over MAGA is strictly one over polices — and not the fascist and ethical implications of it all — it’s a win.

They point is — as I keep saying, America is an autocracy without an autocrat. Once the autocrat is in position, we’re probably just going to transition into an autocracy and that will be that. There is a chance, of course, that either the military steps in or we have a civil war or both.

I can’t predict the future, I don’t know.

But at the moment, DeSantis has it within his power to destroy Trump. It will be interesting to see if he uses it, or allows himself to be co-oped.

When Every Election Is Existential, Your Democracy Is Undead


By Ender

These are the times that try men’s souls, as Thomas Paine would say. The reason is, we now are confronted with the cold, hard fact that every election we have now is existential — if Republicans gain power again, they’re unlikely to ever peacefully give it up.

Combine this with Republicans’ growing glorification of political violence as a means to an end and their blaming of liberals for “forcing” them to radicalize and you have a recipe for disaster.

In the end, we either have a civil war with the specific objective of destroying the Republican Party or we slip into autocracy peacefully. At the moment, that’s what I think is going to happen. It will become political conventional wisdom that that Republicans — one way or another — always win the presidency, people stop voting and ta-da autocracy.

The only reason why I’m willing to entertain then notion of a civil war in even abstract terms is the MAGA New Right’s alarming, and growing, glorification of political violence. They keep ranting on Twitter that their fascist radicalization is the fault of liberals who “just won’t leave them alone.” Jesus, what a bunch of fucking cocksuckers.

We have to begin to gird our loins for the very real possibly that the otherwise peaceful transition into autocracy will somehow be bungled and we do, in fact, have a civil war. The North’s, er, I mean, Blue States‘ war aims should be: destruction of the Republican Party, a just and equable Reconstruction of the former Red States then a Constitutional Convention.

In short, we would need to renew the American Covent that has we last forged in 1865.

But, again, because the method that the MAGA New Right intends to use to initially turn us into an autocracy — the whole throwing things into Congress — is actually in the Constitution, that’s enough hook for the press to shrug and tell everyone to calm down.

The way the MAGA New Right might bungle things is if they are so aggressive and ham-handed in their efforts to win that people see it for what it is, then, well, the country is going to buckle and a civil war will start.

I find myself these days thinking a lot about what the U.S. Military will do should our transition to an autocracy somehow be bungled and it’s clear we’re going to have a civil war. I’m beginning to think rather than a civil war, the U.S. Military would step in — acting President Jim Mattis, anyone? — and that would be the way, ultimately, things would be sorted out.

The U.S. Military is the one remaining institution with the means, motive an opportunity to save us from ourselves.

So, I guess there are three, not two, choices facing us: autocracy, civil war or military junta.

A Rough Chronology Of Trump’s January 6th Autogolpe Plot


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m too lazy to hunt down the details of what I’m about to write — I’m not writing for VOX, after all — but here is a rough outline of what I know about the events leading up to Trump’s January 6th attempted autogolpe. I’ve added relevant text from another post I’ve written to flesh out this post.

Background
When the history of Trumplandia is written, two people will stick out as having changed everything by what they did — or didn’t do: Bill Barr and Mike Pence. What makes their actions so weird in hindsight is neither one of them was ever mentioned as the “guardrails” that were going to save us from Trump’s excesses. In fact, they were some of the biggest toadies for Trump — until they weren’t at very crucial moments in time.

First, Bill Barr. Bill Barr — at least in my opinion — had a specific purpose when he was originally hired: end the Mueller Investigation. He wrapped that up and did plenty of really shitty things. And then in the 2020 – 2021 timeframe he did something that saved American democracy for four more years: nothing. He sat on his hands.

So, even though Barr intimately knew on a personal basis how badly Trump wanted DOJ to indict the Bidens, or Hillary or Obama or whomever, he was able to simply slow walk all of Trump’s would-be autocratic moves so they were moot. Without Barr doing that, it’s very possible that all the autocratic things I thought up in 2020 Trump would have done and he would still be president.

It is a testament to what a lazy ding-dong Trump is that in the summer and early fall of 2020 he was not far more aggressive against Biden. Anyone else in Trump’s position would have leaned into the fact that he was now politically above the law and, as such, could do anything to stay in power and it work. If Bill Barr wouldn’t indict the Bidens, then a true autocrat in Trump’s position would have fired him in the middle of 2020 and found someone who would. Trump talked a lot about indicting Hunter Biden or Joe Biden…but it was all talk. He didn’t even simply fire anyone necessary to have something akin to the Second Comey Letter released.

We can only conclude from this that Trump is a historical and political avatar. He’s not a great man, he just kind of drifts through history reflecting the rot of our undead liberal democracy back at us. As such, it didn’t really sink into Trump he might be forced out of office until the moment it was too late to use politics — the moment the election was called for Biden. It was at this moment Trump both freaked out and, on a political level, all of Trump’s options ended.

Thus, Trump would have to use extra-political means to stay in office.

The Modern Republican Party

Autogolpe
When, on a political basis, all of Trump’s options faded away, he began to freak out and think up ways to stay in office through an autogolpe — self-coup. His first idea was to berate and lean on the people who certified the election results in an effort to get them to nullify Biden’s win that way. He was calling up election officials from all over the country — and even inviting to the White House –in a panicked, desperate attempt to nullify Biden’s win at one of its weakest links.

When that didn’t work, Trump continued to panic. He began to lean on the Justice Department, hoping that they would simply say “the election was corrupt.” That’s all he wanted, just like with Ukraine. He just wanted people with authority to announce an investigation into the “corrupt” 2020 election and then he and Rudy would use the same agitprop techniques of the last five odd years to, through sheer ego and bullshit — force the election into the House and Senate.

Here’s something to mull — it’s very possible that our autocracy will come “legally’ when Republicans starting in 2024 always push POTUS elections into the House and Senate. Because Republicans have a majority of House delegations, they will always win. Let me repeat that: They. Will Always. Win. Because this up-to-now obscure element of the Constitution is their ultimate failsafe for winning elections, Republicans will use it to establish white Christian minority rule.

In fact, if America slips peacefully into autocracy, it will be because of that specific provision of the Constitution. It will be “Constitutional” so it will give the liberal media a hook to explain to the average person why they should cool it with talk of a civil war. This development will be framed just like the Bush V. Gore decision and, gradually, it will be such conventional wisdom that Republicans always win presidential elections that Republicans will finally get what they want: people will stop voting.

Of course, Republicans, once they know they can do whatever the fuck they want, will inevitably abuse their power to the point where we’re indistinguishable from autocratic Russia or there’s a civil war. I think we’re probably just going to become an autocracy and that’s it. At the moment, I just don’t see us breaking the seal on civil war.

If civil war happens, it will probably happen directly because of Trump’s personal incompetence at some critical moment in history. If history picks anyone else to shepherd us into autocracy, then it’s a done deal.

Let’s go back to the autogolpe. In the end, what spelled the demise of Trump’s autogolpe plot was how fucking lazy and stupid he was. He came up with all these ideas for how to throw the election into the House and Senate…and he just couldn’t bring himself to pull the trigger. He just was too deranged to simply fire anyone necessary to get that accomplished.

All the conditions were there, but, in the end, it was Trump, specifically, who fucked up and gave American democracy a few years of breathing room.

Because Trump could not pull the trigger, the last ditched effort of the autogolpe was something like this — gather a bunch of die hard MAGA fuckers near the Capitol, incite them in a speech, and then see what happened. At moment, there is no evidence that Trump knew how successful the insurrection would be, but he and his toadies knew, in general, what was likely to happen. In this respect, Trump gave himself some “plausible deniability” should the insurrection actually be a success.

So, from what I can tell, what Trump wanted was to get the mob to browbeat Pence into not certifying the vote. Why else were they chanting, “Hang Mike Pence?” This would throw everything up in the air and then Congress would get involved and that’s where Trump thought he would win because in the House each state delegation would get one vote and Republicans have a majority of delegations

The specific uses of the Electoral Count Act elude me, but it might have bene the middle step that Trump and Rudy could have fucked with to get a win. But the point remains — weirdly enough, we all owe Pence a lot of gratitude for destroying his political career by doing his fucking job.

Pence is the consummate Trump sycophant. Or, at least, he was until January 6th. After defending Trump at every turn for any and everything he did, no matter how horrible or autocratic, on January 6th Pence gave American democracy a second chance by simply doing his fucking job. (Which in the specific case of certification was simply to announce the certification, he didn’t really have to do anything other than not nullify the certification by going rouge.)

And, so because of the actions of two people everyone assumed would be Trump’s lapdogs, American democracy was spared for a few years. You honestly could not make such shit up.

Anyway, once Pence certified the vote, Trump lost.