Month: May 2022

Talk About A Vibe Shift: Imagining Pence As A #NeverTrumper


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I continue to believe that we should not sleep on the potential significance of the #NeverTrump movement. I say this because even though at the moment they’re a very, very small collection of Republicans, they are all usually really smart and articulate leaders.

And should things get as harry as I fear around 2024 – 2025 what Blue States are going to need is leaders.

As such, at the moment, the person who is most likely to be forced, by history, to rise to the occasion is Liz Cheney. It would be extremely ironic, but if Blue States got fed up and left the Union, Cheney is just the type of person who would step into the leadership void that currently exists with the center-Left. The center-Left is so divided and deluded for various reasons as to be useless.

But there is another person who could really shock us all if he would simply do the obvious and become a #NeverTrumper — Mike Pence.

Let me be clear — I absolutely fucking hate Mike Pence’s political beliefs. I despise them.

But I swear to God if that motherfucker confessed everything he knew about Trump and Trumplandia and I would be the first in line to vote for him in 2024. I’m so enraged by the impending return of fucking ding-dong Trump in 2024 that if the only way to save the Republic was to vote for motherfucking Mike Pence I would do it in a heart beat.

The thing about Pence is while he’s crazy conservative, he’s enough of a traditional American conservative that he would probably stay within the bounds of the Republic’s norms at a minimum. And he would definitely stay within the spirit of Constitutional law – he did do that, after all, when he was required to on Certification Day 2021.

If Pence was to become a #NeverTrumper it would throw the American political system for a loop. It would be most shocking political event of this new century, up there with the election of Obama the first time and the election of Trump — and the January 6th Insurrection.

Pence would completely, and totally, rewrite his political fate in an instant. He wouldn’t have to change a single political view other than his fidelity to Trump. And he would be within shouting distance of being the Democratic nominee as part of a 2024 Unity Ticket.

There would be, of course, a huge amount of risks to such a Hail Mary pass. If he got any traction, MAGA would want to kill him. But, come to think of it, they already want to do that, now don’t they. He would become the most hated person in America for about 38% of the electorate.

But since Blue Check liberals have proven that they’re all fools, they would love Pence with all their heart and he wouldn’t have to change a thing. Of course, I just don’t see Pence doing any such thing. He will never rise to the occasion and be a hero of the Republic by giving the center-Left the leadership it needs.

Oh well. I wonder if my re-education camp will have wi-fi and a shower.

Mike Pence As America’s (Potential) Great White Hope

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It’s beginning to dawn on me that Mike Pence has a rendezvous with history — if he so choses. There is no way that man is going to be POTUS if he stays safely within the MAGA family. If he leaves MAGA cold turkey and confesses everything and I mean EVERYTHING he knows about Trump and Trumplandia, then he has a pretty good chance of becoming extremely culturally and politically culturally again.

Now, obviously Pence is never, ever fucking going to do this.

But it’s beginning to eat away at me that he won’t and so I find myself needing to write about it.

One question is, of course, when would Pence turn on MAGA? My best guess would be just after the the results of the 2022 mid-terms are known and we find out if Trump is going to run again. If Trump does run again — which obviously he will — Pence might, just might decide that the only way he can possibly ever be president is as an Andrew Johnson type figure.

Andrew Johnson was a royal asshole, but for Lincoln at the time of the 1864 election, Johnson served an important purpose as a War Democrat. Or, put another way, Pence would instantly be seen as a liberal darling by easily seduced Blue Check liberals who have learned nothing from Bob Mueller and various other false hope conservative Republicans.

So, the moment Pence joined the “Resistance” in a very public manner, he would be fawned over by Blue Check liberals who would believe the he, at last, will be the one to save us all and allow them to continue to write long breathless Twitter threads instead of doing any of the hard work in the real world.

Anyway, I don’t know what to tell you. I don’t see any way out of our existential choice of autocracy or civil war around 2024 – 2025. But it’s extremely annoying that Pence won’t show any leadership at all.

Am I About To Be Deplatformed?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I got deplatformed (Zucked) by Facebook some time ago for a very, very dumb reason. And, as such, I’m a little skittish that it might happen again. So imagine my concern when I have begun to see people from my hosting service – DreamHost — begin to show up in my Webstats.

There are two possible explanations for this, given that I’m a nobody.

One, they love my work and find me very interesting.

Two, MAGA people keep reporting me for various reasons and they keep having to double check that I’m not, like, advocating violence or anything. (I’m not.) I will admit that I say “fuck” a lot. But I definitely go out of my way to not advocate violence or anything like that.

I suppose I should cool it with my rants for the time being. It would be so embarrassing if I got deplatformed AGAIN. But, no, fuck that. I’m riding this pony all the way to the bottom. If I get deplatformed, it will just give me more time to work on the novels.

Or maybe I’ll work on my podcast dreams while I work on 5 novels. I have no reason to change what I write here because I’ve done nothing wrong. I just don’t like the unnerving feeling that I’m being watched for some reason.

The Unity Ticket Of 2024

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There’s a really good book called “How Democracies Die” that I read some time ago that has, in theory, some solutions to America’s fucked up political problems. As I recall, they said those times that democracies managed to save themselves there was a coordinated effort across party lines to stave off the rise of fascism.

Let me be clear — this is never going to happen in the United States. The country is just too big, too unfocused and too divided for us to ever have the gumption to save our Republic in any comprehensive way. And, yet, one could make the case that if Mike Pence switched sides and confessed his MAGA sins that the you could have the unity ticket of Pence / AOC 2024.

Everyone would be extremely upset about this situation, but it would at a minimum punt the rise of fascism in the United States down the road a few more presidential cycles.

I say “punt” because the existential choice of civil war or autocracy in the United States is caused by macro forces within our political system that aren’t going anywhere.

So, we’re fucked.

We’re doomed. Either we become MAGA themed autocracy of blood and soil or we have a civil war. But a unity ticket would at least give us a few more years to enjoy our freedom, I suppose.

Mike Pence’s Only Option Is To Become MAGA’s John Dean


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It is comical how dumb Mike Pence is from a political standpoint. He has the means, motive and opportunity to become, overnight, a liberal political hero and, yet, he’s so beholden to Trump he can’t bring himself to do what he has to do — become MAGA’s John Dean.

Let me explain.

Despite their protests to the contrary, modern Blue Check liberals like the “Mueller, She Wrote” Twitter account really do still believe in the system and really do believe that somehow, magically, Trump and his ilk will be, at last, held accountable. They write breathless Twitter threads about the latest MAGA scandal, leaving their audience with a warm fuzzy feeling of justice just on the cusp of being served.

Now, this is the point where Mueller, She Wrote calls me “a terribly negative person” who “mischaracterized” her work. Uh huh. But why is the account itself named after the delusional belief on the part of Blue Check liberals that life-long Republican Bob Mueller was going to somehow — you guessed it — save us from ourselves?

What’s more, people like Liz Cheney have proven that liberals are willing to fall all over themselves with support for you — even they otherwise disagree with you on everything else — if you just are willing to stand up to the MAGA New Right.

So, as such, the case could be made that if Pence became a MAGA apostate that he could potentially throw himself into the ring as — gulp — the Democratic nominee in 2024. Or something. Something like that. At a minimum, he would be in a far better political position that he is now.

Rather than run away from the fact that the MAGA base hates him and wants to “hang Mike Pence” he would be far better off politically to reverse polarity and embrace the #NeverTrump movement.

Why doesn’t he do such an obvious thing?

I dunno. It’s one of the biggest political mysteries of our time. The brass ring of political relevancy is right there in front of him. And, in real terms, he wouldn’t even have to change anything he believes other than stop being a Trump sycophant.

I mean, Liz Cheney is till a tough as nails conservative I don’t agree with on anything, but if she ran for president, I would seriously think about voting for her out of desperation for the fate of the Republic, if nothing else.

Pence switching sides would be not only the biggest political event of the decade, it would breath a huge amount of air into our failing Republic. All he would have to do is totally, completely disavow Trump, confess everything he knew about that malignant idiot.

He could keep all is horrible political views, otherwise. People — especially Blue Check liberals — would be overjoyed at what had happened, that they would ignore the rest of his brutish policy beliefs. The fact that the MAGA base actively wanted to murder him has not been enough to dislodge him from MAGA is, well, it’s something else.

The Republican Trump Problem


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There’s a memorable Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episode where we learn that Bart Simpson had a “bad twin” that the family kept up in the attic. At the end of the episode, we learn that the wrong twin was put in the attic, so they switch them. At the very end, we learn that living up in the attic has driven the “good twin” bonkers.

I often think about this when it comes to how desperate the Republican Establishment is to move the fuck past Trump. They love, love, love Ron DeSantis. They know, on a basic level, that DeSantis is Trump without Trump and if they can only squeeze that motherfucker past ding-dong Trump that he can become America’s Putin.

Then Republicans can transform the US into an autocratic white Christian ethno state of blood and soil run by minority whites.

We’ll wake up 20 years from now and there will be talk by the BBC about “Generation DeSantis” and America will be poor, inward looking and politically identical to Putin’s Russia of 2022.

But Republicans have to get past Trump first to make this nightmare a reality.

There are plenty — PLENTY — of reasons to believe Trump will somehow not be the Republican nominee in 2024. He is old and growing more and more deranged each and every day.

And, yet, only the good die young. He could very well politically cockblock DeSantis (or the dozen other would-be autocrats, for that matter) simply by refusing to walk into that dark political night. As such, there are two options for Establishment Republicans.

Either there is something of a political death match between Trump and DeSantis or Trump names DeSantis his veep and DeSantis gets to (eventually) play America’s Putin that way.

But if Trump is the nominee around 2024 – 2025 and Bannon’s “administrative coup” works…oh boy. Trump loves to say “the quiet part out loud” so much that he could, single handedly, unto himself, cause a civil war in the United States. He could rile up the base of the Democratic Party so much in Blue States that there is real, significant political violence in the US which leads to ding-dong Trump striking back, which leads to a secession crisis which leads to civil war.

And then you have people like DeSantis having to make a regular Sophie’s Choice of which side they finally, at last, are going to be on. Though, come to think of it, if it’s Blue States that leave, lulz, DeSantis will be right there, comping at the bit for his chance to wreak vengeance on the prodigal Blue States.

MAGA Is Ascendant & Yet They Still Crave A Civil War


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m obsessed with my Webstats and have been for 20 years or more. Something about knowing (in general) a little bit about who is interested in me and my writing is very, very addictive. I keep writing about the possibility of a Second American Civil War and, weirdly enough, most of the interest in my speculation comes from people in Red States.

I say curious because the MAGA New Right is ascendant. They are well on their way to getting everything they want — a more — via political means and all they have to do is sit on their hands and be patient and soon enough the US will be an autocratic white Christian ethno state run by minority whites.

That’s what they want and that’s what they’re going to get — without firing a shot.

And, yet, here we are.

There is obviously a lot of interest in severe political violence on the part of the MAGA New Right. They are, in short, craven, greedy and impatient. They are completely oblivious to how they risk getting ahead of their skis and causing Blue States to leave the Union because they’re being forced to “bend a knee” to Red State orthodoxy.

As such, Red States might be giddy at the opportunity to “crush” Blue States that they open up a can of worms they had no need to open. You would think Red State “though leaders” might at least TRY to calm down some of the frothy civil war rhetoric on their side, but, no.

All the usual suspects of the Right want to burn the country to the ground, even though they’re politically ascendant. You can’t make this shit up.

Apparently, Tik-Tok Thinks I’m A Lesbian


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have spent a lot of time speculating that Tik-Tok might have some not-so-limited ability to like, read our minds and stuff. And then it does something like this — it keeps pushing me videos that seem to imply I’m a lesbian.

It’s all very odd.

I don’t understand how this is happening, given that 80% of FYP is nearly-naked women running around, jiggling their bodies to the latest dance trend. But out of the last 20%, a good 5% is of very, very female-oriented information that makes my eyes pop out.

I mean, how many times can one man see an up close, graphic and personal diagram of the female reproductive system before you start to think Tik-Tok has you all wrong?

Anyway, no harm no foul. I can only assume something about what I like on Tik-Tok makes the “algorithm” go haywire.

Thinking Outside The Box When Replacing SNL’s Lorne Michaels: Lin-Manuel Miranda

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I was a long-term fan of Larry King and so it was quite unexpected when he was abruptly retired and replaced with British dingus Piers Morgan. Now, as part of our overall vibe shift, we find ourselves contemplating who will one day replace Lorne Michaels at the helm of Saturday Night Live.

Seth Meyers is his logical successor at this point. And, yet, as Piers Morgan proves, sometimes network execs can do weird things out of the blue. As such, it seems as though someone like Lin-Manuel Miranda might be someone they would approach to run SNL at some point in the future.

But Miranda now has a successful Hollywood career, so, lulz. But maybe NBCUniversal could lock him down for a season or two while they figure out what they’re going to do long-term?

Who knows.

Is Stephen Colbert Ok?



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

At the moment, Late Night TV is in flux. James Corden is leaving The Late Late Show. Mike Birbiglia had a star making turn replacing Jimmy Kimmel while he had COVID…and Stephen Colbert is out from COVID “until further notice?”

My fear, of course, is that Colbert has long COVID and he may be knocked out of commission long-term. If that happened, there would likely be a lot of chatter about him retiring and who his replacement might be.

The logical replacement for Colbert, should it come to that, would be his mentor Jon Stewart. But other names that might be thrown about would be Birbiglia and maybe even Trevor Noah.

Which brings up something interesting — Late Night TV is the one place at the moment where the traditional “center” has held. It’s a bunch of interchangeable white men doing their interchangeable white man thing. It definitely seems as though the average American wants a Johnny Carson clone on their TV when they’re just about to go to sleep.

Anyway. Everything is out of whack right now. Talk about a vibe shift!