All things considered, Ron DeSantis is going to be America’s first autocrat. He’s Trump without Trump and my Traditionalist relatives are waiting with baited breath to “vote for him three times.” DeSantis is the ideal person to consolidate autocratic power that will ultimately lead to a Constitutional Convention. We’ll wake up in 20 years and President DeSantis will be invading Canada for some autocratic reason.
But then there’s Trump.
He simply will not get out of the way. Trump’s a fighter and even if he’s indicted, he’s still going to run for president. Of course, there are things I can’t predict. But for the time being, it definitely seems as though Trump is running again in 2024.
And, as such, DeSantis finds himself in something of a pickle. He is so close to the brass ring of being America’s autocrat — amazing power and wealth — and yet dingus Trump is in his way. The question is, will he bend a knee to Trump to be his veep or will he charge him directly?
At the moment, I just don’t know. But there’s one thing to remember — if DeSantis somehow gets the nomination, there’s no reason to believe Trump won’t simply bolt and join, say, the Patriot Party. Then DeSantis would still have to compete direction against Trump in a three way race.
So. I don’t know. It could go either way. But we have to accept that the United States is far less stable than we might otherwise believe.
It’s really taking a lot, lot, lot longer than I imagined to write this first novel. A lot of the delay comes from how I’ve been drifting towards my goal, rather than setting any clear deadlines. I suppose I just am reluctant to make this a chore. Writing a novel is supposed to be fun, not something you dread.
But I’m just not getting any younger.
I have to at least try to be more organized, focused and driven with this project. My current goal is to start querying in the fall of 2023. But to do that, I’m going to have to write two drafts then have beta readers then get someone to edit the copy THEN querying it.
As such, I probably need to have my second draft done in early 2023. I’m well on my way to making that a reality, but I have to stop daydreaming so much. I have to focus. I really want to at least have a second draft done in early 2023 that I can be proud of.
Then I can try to figure out how to get some beta readers in the summer of 2023 and begin the process of querying in the autumn of 2023. I have no idea if the novel will be good enough to catch the interest of a literary agent, but at least I will have achieved my goal — go through the entire process of writing a novel and trying to get it published in the traditional manner.
And, what’s more, I will know how *I* develop and write a novel. And that will help me a great deal when it comes to writing my second novel. When you reach my age, you are forced to prioritize for no other reason than if you don’t get something, anything done, you’ll be in your 60s and it will be very comical that you’re STILL trying to “make it big.”
The existential change in what you can actually achieve in life once you reach a certain age is something I’m growing very unhappy with. Is this a mid-life crisis?
Anyway, I have to keep believing in myself. But I also have to realize that if I get what I want, I won’t get what I want. It’s not like I can “make it big,” move to NYC and act like I’ve live there all my life. Even if I stick the landing, and sell a pop novel that is huge — I’m still going to be an old man who can’t date 24 year old women. And if I tried, it would be really creepy.
I just need to stop deluding myself and start to think a bit more clear eyed about what my immediate future is.
Besides having an overarching abstract fear of being “canceled” by the “woke cancel culture mob” simply for being conservative, the other pressing issue for a lot of MAGA Republicans is the “border crisis.” This is, in a sense, the original sin of the MAGA Republican movement.
The problem with addressing the alarm that MAGA Republicans have about the border crisis is, well, people like me can’t address the pink MAGA elephant in the room. The reason why MAGA Republicans are so alarmed about the border crisis is, of course, that they’re bigots. But it’s nearly impossible to say that in the course of any debate with a MAGA Republican because they will get really mad and simply engage in debate nullifcation.
As such, there’s no much point in talking about it with them because they a very comfortable, well thought out media narrative that they can fall back upon. If you challenge it in anyway, they just say it’s “bogus” because the information you point them to is just, in their eyes, liberal propaganda. They want “secure borders” — to the point of building a very pointless wall (which isn’t even a wall, but rather a fence) — and there’s absolutely nothing you can say to them that is going to change their mind.
And now we have the added development of several border state Republicans shipping undocumented immigrants to various Blue State places in an effort to remind them of the “crisis” at the border. This is a dick move on their part, but the base loves, loves, loves it so there’s not much to be done about it. It helps these governors secure their fucking racist, bigoted base and that’s that.
If such a fucking dick move isn’t a sign that we’re careening towards either autocracy or civil war between now and spring 2025, I don’t know what does. When states start to turn on each other like this, that’s a very, very bad sign on a macro level.
And, what’s more the “crisis on the border” is probably going to be one of several reasons why Biden will be impeached, should Republicans take the House. The will put the country through yet another extremely divisive impeachment because they want to hurt Biden politically and they want to draw as much attention as possible to their hysterical, bigoted fears about the browning of America.
I honestly don’t know what to tell you. It definitely seems like we’re fucking doomed. Prove me wrong, America.
One of the most grating things to appear in American political discourse these days is when someone says someone “destroyed” this or that person with some comment they made. This is so, so very dumb for a number of reasons.
But the biggest reason is this is very frothy 2017 rhetoric. It works on the assumption that anything one might say about a MAGA Republican might change any minds. No matter how much you may “destroy” someone with a comment it just doesn’t change anything.
The two sides believe what they believe to the point that they can’t even agree on what is real. The Left and the Right already have their individual media narratives and talking points and they talk pass each other whenever there is any sort of debate about issues of the day.
There is no middle ground and no one’s mind will be changed no matter how much they “destroy” someone. It’s just silly and misguided at this point. Better to say nothing. Better to accept that the country is rushing towards a seminal moment in its political history when either it has a civil war or turns into an autocracy.
While I suppose there’s a chance of a military junta as well, the most likely outcomes are autocracy or civil war. We need to manage our expectations and stop believing that any sort of making a point will change our fate. MAGA Republicans are so angry, racist and misogynistic that they’ve tuned out any argument they don’t agree with.
And if they do listen to someone who disagrees with them, they get really, really angry. Not that I’m not above getting really, really angry myself when dealing with MAGA people, but at least I feel bad about it afterwards.
Anyway — people need to cool it with the “destroys” trope. Move on. Time to prepare.
I continue to see where the conventional wisdom by Respected Authors when it comes to a possible Second American Civil War is something like this — if happens, it will be rolling political violence from the MAGA Right who thinks they’re defending “real” America.
I call bullshit. This makes no sense. It seems, in a strange way, to be a certain amount of wishcasting on their part. These Respected Authors just aren’t willing to game out a scenario where the Second American Civil War looks a lot like the first. I still believe that if a 2ACW happens — which I don’t think it will — it will happen in late 2024, early 2025 when Blue States refuse to “bend a knee” to the autocratic fascism of MAGA Republicans who are in the process of stealing the 2024 election.
If it happens, it would happen spontaneously, probably starting with California, and may only be stopped with the swift and severe intervention of the U.S. Military in the guise of a military junta. There is, of course, the possibility that it will be Trump who demands that Red States leave the Union earlier than this scenario in an effort to save his sorry ass.
I guess the point of all of this is — I just don’t see any civil war happening in the way that the alleged experts say it will. It just doesn’t make any sense. They’re working on the assumption that MAGA Republicans will decide, spontaneously, to start blowing shit up.
But that just doesn’t make any sense unless Trump on a personal basis, goes transactional. MAGA Republicans are politically ascendant and, in the end, all they have to do is win ONE election and that’s all she wrote — we’re an autocracy.
If you think about who has something to lose in our current political climate, it’s not Reds, but Blues. And, as such, if we’re going to have another civil war — which I don’t think we will –but if we do, it’s going to be when Blue States decide to leave the Union as part of some sort of Certification Crisis in late 2024, early 2025.
I’m always wrong, however. So, who knows. I still think the most logical endgame is we simply become an autocracy and in about 20 years one a political basis the United States and Russia will be clones.
From my occasional political discussions with my Traditionalist relatives — whom I love dearly — it seems clear to me that the conditions already exist for a Second American Civil War. One of my relatives believe that to be a Democrat is, by definition, to be essentially a Godless Satan worshiper while the other one throws around the blood libel of “groomer” against the center-Left in a very cavalier fashion. So, in my little corner of the political world, people in my immediate family are ready to — in an abstract manner — support political violence against liberals.
Now, on a practical basis, I doubt they would actually support political violence. In fact, that might even be one of the few “red lines” they actually have — they will be Good Germans until there is actual blood in the streets. But if you have to wait until there is actual political violence before you object to the the policy agenda of MAGA, well, the whole country has a serious problem.
One of the indications that I have that the conditions exist for a civil war is how my Traditionalist relatives are enraged by the soft power of the center-Left. They are willing to burn the whole country to the ground using the *hard power* of MAGA to crush the *soft power* of the “woke cancel culture mob.” In essence, they’re willing to give up their birth right of American democracy because they think liberals are annoying.
But this is just one of a number of different conditions that exist that indicate we’re very ripe for a civil war at some point between now and, say, spring 2025. The two sides can no longer agree on the facts of any subject. If I point out this or that thing that Trump did that hurts the conservative movement, then it’s “bogus” because it comes from a media outlet that is liberal. My Traditionalist relatives suggest that “maybe we need a unbiased fact checker we can all agree on.”
We have that, it’s called Snopes and all MAGA conservatives do is spend all their time working the refs, saying Snopes is wrong for this or that reason. The facts simply are not on the side of MAGA Republicans, but because they’re so enraged by the browning of America, the growing economic independence of women and a growing support for gay rights….well, they willfully ignore the facts.
Or, put another way, the United States is more and more two nations, one Red one Blue who simply do not agree on not only what it means to be American but what basic fucking facts are. And if you’re so polarized that you can’t even agree on facts then my fears about autocracy or civil war in the United States starting around 2025 become very real.
The remaining question is, of course, is there going to be a civil war? While the conditions exist for one, I just don’t think one is going to happen. I say this because the people who would probably agitate the most for a National Divorce in late 2024, early 2025 — Twitter liberals — are all going to leave the country should the time come.
So, yes, MAGA Republicans will finally end the terror of the “woke cancel culture mob” when they turn the United States into a Russian-style autocracy. I’m poor, so I won’t be able to get out of the country when ICE is weaponized and people like me are put into camps. Then, of course, the OTHER red line for my Traditionalist relatives — the personal — will be crossed and they’re going to have to figure out how to get me out of said camp.
I know that sounds very hysterical at the moment, but form follows function. Once we’re no longer a democracy — or even an anocracy — it’s only going to be a matter of time before MAGA Republicans come after basic freedoms like freedom of speech. And because I will never shut up about how much I fucking hate MAGA — no matter how much my Traditionalist relatives may beg me to do so — they’re going have to get me out of a concentration camp.
One of the biggest differences between MAGA Republicans and the center-Left is the former has a very simple argument. MAGA Republicans know what they’re for and they are very passionate in articulating it. Of course, there is some murkiness with MAGA New Right rhetoric, but they have no shame and don’t care if they look like hypocritical fools, so lulz.
But, in general, there is a very clear MAGA Republican orthodoxy and, as such, it’s much more simple to articulate and propagate.
As such, I think the center-Left would be wise to boil down what they’re for into something that is far shorter than a long, rambling Substack post. Far too often, the center-Left gets into the weeds of how many different genders their are and the more nuanced elements of feminism.
The United States is now entering a very dangerous political period in its history and we have reached a point where anti fascists need to be clear as to what they believe. While I don’t believe in violence, I do think there should be something akin to “popular Antifa” that would be present the case for anti-fascism and democracy in a far more clear, blunt way than we currently have available.
We may all be Antifa eventually.
But, of course, Antifa is such a loaded term now, that it’s impossible to use. I don’t know what to call it. And no one listens to me, so luz. I just had to get this off my chest because I’m feeling a little annoyed.
We need to realize how dire the situation is and if we want to save American democracy, we need hone our political rhetoric down to something that the average person who isn’t all that interested in which pronouns to use can understand.
I have Traditionalist relatives — whom I love dearly — who were all-in with the MAGA Republican talking points about the initial stages of the fishing expedition known as the Durham Investigation. They really believed that Durham found some sort of wide spread Deep State conspiracy against the Trump Administration guided by Hillary Clinton. Or something equally annoying.
John Durham
Anyway, now that it seems as though the Durham Investigation is wrapping up pretty much having found nothing and having wasted a lot of money, I think the whole shitshow is a window into how much trouble the United States is in. People who should otherwise know better — educated, angry white men — have succumb to the siren call of the MAGA New Right. If you lose your Traditionalists to fascism, your democracy is on its last legs.
But here we are, that’s exactly what’s happened.
So, as I keep saying, as part of the 2024 presidential election cycle the United States faces the existential choice of autocracy or civil war. There is no middle ground other, than, say, a military junta maybe. I say this because, by definition, a Republican president means autocracy. It doesn’t matter if it’s Trump, DeSantis or Youngkin.
The spectrum whereby Republicans operate on a policy basis has shifted so far to the Right and is so natively undemocratic that it’s just not possible for American democracy to survive if we have a Republican president. This is just a more extreme version of how George W. Bush ran as a “compassionate conservative,” but, in general, on a practical basis far more conservative than that.
Of course, if someone as bland and vacuous as Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin becomes POTUS, the transition to autocracy will probably be a lot more gradual — but it will happen. The Republican Party, on an institutional basis has grown so radical and hates democracy so much that, lulz, even someone as ostensibly moderate and mediocre as Youngkin would ultimately become America’s first autocrat given any power.
But let me be clear — in the end, America’s fate rests in Trump’s tiny, tiny little hands. He could, unto himself, on a personal basis cause a civil war in a number of different ways. Yet I still wonder if I’m over estimating him — again. He’s just so stupid and so lazy that anything is possible.
I used to be active in a four way video conferencing service called Blab that no longer exists. It was a vanity project by some wealthy plutocrat and, as such, the plug was pulled on it soon enough. The interesting thing about Blab was because it was live video, a lot of people — especially women — simply did not want to use the video aspect of it. They were worried about their appearance, shy and so forth.
So, it’s striking how women totally dominate Tik-Tok. And sometimes they’re pretty raunchy in a feminine sort of way, which is rather amusing to me. Why, then, were women reluctant to use Blab’s video feature and yet women love, love, love Tik-Tok?
I think some of it comes from the controlled nature of Tik-Tok. It’s usually not live, so they can make sure they feel comfortable before they make a video. But once they feel ok, then they are able to lean into the native popularity of, well, hot chicks on video. And given how popular Tik-Tok is and how you can really blow up, getting views in the millions, there is a lot of inducement for women to let their hair down and be a bit more edgy than they might otherwise be.
In it’s own way, Tik-Tok is a “safe space” for women to talk about the female experience in ways they haven’t before so publicly. There are lots of videos about sex from a female point of view, periods, and various other things that generally men don’t see in other media. Of course, I don’t know how much of this is Tik-Tok thinks I’m a woman and how much is what is really going on with the service.
Anyway, Keep at it ladies. I find your content very entertaining and sometimes informative. The more dudes are forced to be empathetic to women, the better.
I have given this a lot of thought and the central issue when weighing the possibility of a Second American Civil War is how serious we should take all this talk of political violence that we now seem surrounded by. There is a lot of abstract fear about a civil war that is generated more from the absolute partisan divide in the country as opposed to any real risk of a war between Blue and Red actually breaking out.
How much of the chatter about having a 2ACW is simply MAGA Republicans have murdering liberals on the brain and how much is something we should be worried about? Is there a real risk that the most stable democracy in the world could actually implode into civil war?
That is a question I just can’t game out for a number of reasons. One reason is I believe that if there is a real risk of a civil war it’s going to be because Blue States refuse to “bend a knee” fascist MAGA Republicans when they either steal the 2024 election or come in with a presidential policy agenda that is so radical that they can’t bear to stay in the Union anymore.
Logically, there won’t be a civil war because millions of Twitter liberals will vote with their feet and flee the country as it becomes clear that the United States is finally transitioning into an autocracy. As such, the very people would might agitate for a “National Divorce” won’t be around to do it. The United States will simply drift into fascism and 20 years from now we’ll all be wondering why President DeSantis is invading Canada.
And, yet, any discussion of the potential for a 2ACW has to address the cold hard fact that Trump, unto himself, could single handedly start a civil war for a variety of reasons. I — and a lot of other people — are notorious for overestimating Trump’s political acumen, but there is a greater-than-zero-sum chance that Trump could start a civil war to save his sorry ass. Or he could say “the quiet part out loud” in 2024 to such an extent that some Blue States simply can not bend a knee and we have a civil war.
So, I don’t know. I just don’t know if we’re going to have a civil war or not. It’s very possible we might have one, but just not very probable. And in the end I think it’s pretty much up to Trump if we have one or not. He’s such a singular figure in American politics and history that he, himself, could be the additional pressure on the system that causes the whole thing to collapse.
But I think for the time being we would be better worrying about who his veep pick will be because whomever he picks will be America’s first autocrat.
You must be logged in to post a comment.