Tag: Tyrant Trump

Trump Is Getting Worse

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Trump’s recent posting of a picture of himself as…Jesus?…seems to have struck a nerve in the zeitgeist that his posting an AI generated photo of himself as the Pope did not.

“Doctor” Trump

I don’t know what to tell you. Trump seems to be testing the waters of how far he can go before anyone notices. I think there continues to be a whole lot of slack in the system.

Trump has a knack for posting or doing or saying things that are bonkers and alarming, but he can spin ex post facto away out of existence. It just makes you wonder what he could possibly do that would be so bad that that usual dynamic would not happen.

I honestly, at the moment, can’t think of anything. It seems as though Trump will always be on the edge of crashing out and ultimately the issue will be if we can prevent him from running for a third term.

Contemplating Trump Using Nukes On Iran

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Trump’s power is you just never know what he’s going to do next, so you game out all these horrific scenarios only for most of the time nothing to happen. So, as Trump’s big deadline tonight at 8 p.m. approaches, we know one of two things will happen.

Either Trump TACOs in a big, beautiful way, or he actually does commit the war crimes of attacking bridges and powerplants.

But, as of right now, the afternoon leading up to that particular possibility, we just don’t know what is going to happen.

One issue that has started to bubble up into the forefront of my mind is the possibility that Trump might do something really nuts like order the use of, say, “baby” nukes on Iran in some way.

Makes you wonder what the reaction in the homeland would be to THAT. I don’t think Trump would do such a thing — would he? — but I am a little unnerved about the whole idea. I think if Trump used tactical nukes on Iran, it would be the closest possible time to Trump actually getting impeached by the Republicans.

But…that’s about it. He might, just MIGHT get impeached, but he still would never be convicted in the Senate.

So, to that extent, Trump is a king, an emperor, not a president and we’re no longer a republic. Oh well. Being a republic for about 250 years is about typical for such things.

The End Of Pax Americana

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It definitely seems as though the old post-WW2 liberal order is…dying. It definitely seems as though we in a new era where anything is possible. I keep expecting that Trump will drop a MOAB or tactical nuke on Iran sometime soon.

I watch the little cartoon history videos called “History Matters” and it definitely seems like this would be the part of the video that was a precursor to Something Big. I don’t know what that Something Big is going to be, but it’s probably going to happen this year.

My fear, of course, is that there’s a major terrorist attack in the USA, or Trump uses some combination of the SAVE Act and a forced “nationalization” of elections to attempt to turn the USA into a “managed democracy.” And THAT, in turn causes a civil war or revolution.

But hopefully that’s not what’s going to happen.

And, yet, I do think this year is going to be far more turbulent that any of us could possibly expect otherwise.

The SAVE Act Is Bad News

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There’s a reason why Trump is so hysterical about passing the SAVE Act: he knows that’s how he can finally consolidate power. The SAVE Act is some serious Jim Crow bullshit.

It would be the worst piece of voter suppression, maybe in forever.

And, yet, here we are. It definitely seems like there is momentum for it to pass. And, as such, the USA is posed to become a zombie “managed” democracy like they have in Hungary, Turkey and Russia.

But we voted in Trump a second time, I guess that is what we should expect. It will be interesting to see if Trump uses the passage of the SAVE Act as a sign he can run for a third term without people really getting as nearly upset as they should.

Only time will tell on that one, I guess.

Fuck Trump, fuck ICE and fuck the SAVE Act.

If Trump Cancels National Elections, There Will Be A Revolution Or Civil War

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I don’t care what Trump thinks, barring something truly extraordinary like a few nukes blowing up across the USA, Trump simply can not cancel elections. Remember, the USA had elections during the middle of a civil war.

So, if Trump used what may be WW3 as a pretext to “cancel” elections, there will b hell to pay. I would even go so far as to say if Trump fucked with elections so they were clearly no longer free and fair, then, that, too might be enough to cause some sort of mass revolt on the part of the American people.

AND, something similar would happen if Trump ran for an illegal third term.

Anyway, I’ve frequently been accused of “hysterical doom shit” so maybe all of this is a lulz.

I am, however, unnerved by the prospect of some sort major terrorist attack in the USA sooner rather than later because of the dumb war Trump has started with Iran for seemingly no damn reason.

Potentially Watching the Opening Act of World War 3

I want to be clear: I don’t think we’re in World War 3 yet. But I do think we’ve entered one of the most genuinely destabilized moments in modern geopolitical history — and the distance between “very dangerous” and “catastrophic” is shrinking.

The two flashpoints I keep coming back to are Taiwan and the Korean Peninsula.

China’s posture toward Taiwan has grown increasingly assertive, and the window for a forced reunification attempt — whether through blockade, gray-zone pressure, or outright invasion — is a real strategic consideration among analysts, not just speculation. Xi Jinping has tied his legacy to the Taiwan question in ways that make backing down politically costly. If that move comes, it almost certainly draws in the United States, Japan, and potentially Australia, triggering a conflict that would dwarf anything we’ve seen since 1945.

Then there’s North Korea, which has gone conspicuously quiet. That’s not necessarily reassuring. The DPRK has spent the last several years dramatically advancing its nuclear and missile capabilities, and silence from Pyongyang sometimes precedes provocation rather than signaling restraint. A miscalculation on the Korean Peninsula — or a deliberate escalation — could ignite a second front almost simultaneously.

What would it mean if several of these regional conflicts metastasized at once? At some point, the international community would have to reckon with the label: World War 3.

And here’s the domestic question that keeps nagging at me. If that label became unavoidable — if the U.S. were actively drawn into multiple simultaneous conflicts — would it create the political conditions for something unthinkable at home? Emergency powers have been expanded and abused before, even in democracies. The scenario where a president uses wartime crisis as justification to delay or suspend elections is not fantasy; it’s a documented playbook from history, and one that American institutions have never actually been stress-tested against at this scale.

I’m hopeful we don’t get there. I genuinely am. But hope isn’t a strategy, and the architecture of the current moment deserves to be taken seriously.

Only time will tell — and lately, time hasn’t been especially reassuring.

Our A.I.-Caused Recession Is Here

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It definitely seems as though This Is It.

It seems as though we’ve finally reached the long-feared moment, tipping point, when A.I. productivity gains begin to influence the job market. And for it happen in the context of a war and the inflation caused by an uptick in oil prices is kind of a lose-lose situation.

I don’t know what to tell you.

It’s been a good run, I guess.

Now, on the political front, we have to wonder if the economy tanking would make Trump more or less a tyrant. That one is really up in the air. I just don’t know.

I really don’t.

He could go either way. He could see a souring economy as an excuse to get worse. Or, if his poll numbers get really bad he might just calm the shit down a tiny bit.

It really could go either way.

Only time will tell, I suppose.

Stop The Steal 2026: Blue Insurrection(?)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I will be absolutely stunned if there the 2026 midterms are free and fair. I just don’t see it happening. Now, the issue of course is what the consequences of that will be.

Do the Blues have it in them to actually, like respond to the theft of the 2026 midterms? Could they possibly do something along the lines of a Insurrection like we saw in 2021?

No. They just don’t have in them. The center-Left is in the odd situation of being the protectors of law-and-order, “the Establishment” of rules and norms and, lulz, they just don’t have it in them to protest the brazen theft of the midterms.

So, as such, the US will become a zombie, “managed democracy” like they have in Hungary and Russia. Good luck. You’ll need it.

‘Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.’ — JFK

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Politically, the USA is in a luminal space. We have a nasty fascist staph infection that is only getting worse by the day. And, as such, I just don’t see us having free-and-fair elections ever again.

And, with that in mind, I do think there is a greater-than-zero chance of a revolution / civil war in the USA between late 2026 and early 2029.

I have said such things repeatedly in the past and nothing happened. And I can’t promise you I’ll get it right this time — I sure hope I don’t. The American population is just too blasé, too copacetic. I would be stunned if they did anything untoward like a revolution or civil war.

What’s more likely to happen is we’ll implode politically into a “zombie” democracy like they have in Hungary or Russia and probably Trump will divide the world up between the US, China and Russia.

And that, as they say, will be that.

Good luck, folks. Get out if you can.

We Have Got To Stop Appeasing Trump

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The thing about Trump that a lot of people seem to forget is he’s not a Great Man of History. He’s a symptom, not a cause. Hitler, while very similar to Trump in the beginning, was definitely a Great Man. He bent history to his will, especially during the war specifically.

Meanwhile, Trump is too lazy and too big of a wussy to do what he was initially elected to do: turn the US into an autocracy. While he’s gotten far, far worse in his second term, he still just doesn’t — to date — have the backbone necessary to truly transform the US into a white Christian ethnostate.

That’s why, I think, if we really collectively stood up to Trump in some demonstrative manner that we could at least maintain some of our basic rights. And, yet I’ve learned, at last, that people are just too distracted playing video games or making money to give a shit about Trump’s tyranny.

Now, there is one specific issue that might change that: the economy.

In a paradoxical way, because the economy has been doing so well (in a K-shaped kind of way) Trump has been given free reign to do whatever the fuck he wants. But if that should change, then, maybe, just maybe, some people who otherwise wouldn’t care might sit up and take notice.

Remember, Watergate only really started to get worse because the economy sucked. There’s a decent chance that had Nixon had Trump’s economy (and Fox News) that lulz, he would have never had any problems, no matter how tyrannical he got.

Anyway, I have no hope anymore. I just need to finish my novel, sell it and hope that’s it a big enough success that I can flee the country.