by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
The United States is now an autocracy. And, yet, some of the last vestiges of the Before Times continue to linger. While Trump continues to do everything in his power to end free speech, Americans — at the moment at least — still have the ability to speak as they like and to peacefully protest.
It is only a matter of time, of course, before Trump and his MAGA Nazi toadies come after our basic rights in a full boar effort to finish the job they’ve started. I suppose we’re kind of in a liminal political space at the moment where it’s dusk, but nightfall as yet to officially arrive.
But arrive it will.
And that’s when the real test of the American populace will arrive. Trump is going to push us to the breaking point to see if we just give up or if we fight back in some way.
And, right now, I honestly doubt anyone will notice that we’ve become a legalistic autocratic state like Russia when it happens. I think the whole process will gradually happen in fits and starts to the point that in about 20 years we’ll be a Russian-style autocracy and a whole generation will assume that’s the way it’s always been.
I just don’t see Americans doing what would be needed to end this nightmare — we need a General Strike organized with the clear objective of ending MAGA tyranny once and for all. If that means we have a Second Revolution, so be it. (Not that I want that, because if it was successful, a Second Civil War would happen immediately.)
So, I continue to hope I sell a breakout hit novel so I can get the fuck out of this country and never come back. It’s inevitable that me ranting about Trump and the MAGA Nazis will come back to bite me.
