I was watching Chris Hayes’ show tonight when he said something that I had thought about, but had yet to articulate — the rise of “vide signaling” within the Republican ranks.
The idea that Republicans have decided to willfully become cocksuckers for attention is something I have thought a lot about. This has come to the fore with the tragic, accidental shooting of Halyna Hutchins by Hollywood star Alec Baldwin.
Both of these tweets are prime examples of what Hayes and I have noticed. I think some of this comes from the more self-aware members of the MAGA New Right knowing that there is, at this point, literally nothing they can say on social media that won’t be attacked.
So, they decide to fuck with people and say intentionally dumb, crass, asshole things, knowing that Twitter liberals will quote-share their content, amplifying their message.
The whole situation is fucked up and there is not ready answer as to how to fix it. “Vice signaling” is yet another sign of the bolts popping of American civil society. We’re careening towards a very dark future with no obvious endgame. At the moment, I think our best scenario is we have some sort of temporary military junta lead by someone like James Mattis who helps us figure out how to fix some deep seated structural problems in our Republic without either us turning into a long-term autocracy or having us have some sort of civil war.
All one can do, on a personal level, is to figure out what one believes in and what you’re willing to risk your life and sacred honor for in the real world. Getting mad on Twitter or Facebook is easy and low risk. Get back to me when you know what you’re willing to believe when you have a gun stuck in your face in the real world.
Whatever you still believe in at that point, is what you need to start to prepare to defend now, while you have time to plan. I’m trying to do that — I got a passport — but I know myself well enough to know that I’ll endup going towards, rather than away, from danger should the occasion arise.
Something is fucking wrong with Ohio Republicans. They have a big Republican Senate primary coming up next year and two of the guys running in it have fucking lost their minds. Take, for instance, this tweet:
The above is an example of how broken our democracy is. When you’re using crass trolling of the liberal media to get attention and, by extension, the negative-polarization attention of your MAGA base, something is fucking wrong not just with you — but the party you are a part of. Then there is this bit of malicious kookiness from the other guy running in the Ohio Republican primary:
It’s talk like this that I feel re-affirms my fears that Something Big is going to happen at some point between now and about January 2025. I still don’t have a handle on what it going to be — autocracy, civil war or military junta — but the current status quo simply can not stand.
The United States is running on political fumes at the moment and something’s gotta give. I can tell something is seriously wrong because of how the people like the two guys featured above see themselves. They have made the cognitive leap into seeing anyone who doesn’t agree with them not just as political rivals, but as “the other” they have a destroy – or be destroyed zero-sum relationship with.
And all of this is happening in Ohio of all places, which is, unto itself, pretty strange in my opinion. But the key take away is we’re careening towards a dark, unsettled future — the Fourth Turning, if you will. We can no longer simply assume that norms or even traditional liberal democracy politics itself will take care of our problems in a traditional fashion.
It definitely seems as though on an institutional level, the Republican Party is now radical, anti-democratic and bloodthirsty. In fact, I would go so far as to say they are their own worst enemy in the sense that if they would just be patient, they will give everything they want.
Here are some reasons why we won’t have a civil war:
It’s not in our nature to have a civil war. For all the hateful rhetoric on the part of the MAGA New Right, it’s possible that in the end, they manage to pull off a peaceful transition to autocracy. In fact, at first, at least, the chance from democracy to autocracy could be so subtle that only a few hysterical people like me even notice. For the average person, it will just be a replay of 2000, only worse: it will simply be accepted that the only way a Democrat can become POTUS is if that party also control Congress. People will say “the system worked” and move on.
Republicans have gamed the system. It could be that by 2024 – 2025 the actual administration of elections will be so corrupt that it will be a fact of life that people shrug and take for granted. It will be the first step towards Americans becoming Russians in that they will no longer feel as though the government expresses the will of the people. And that will be that.
Not Trump 2024 Another reason why we could slip peacefully into autocracy is it’s not Trump who is the Republican nominee, but someone other than Trump. If this is the case, when I honestly don’t see why we would have a civil war. Autocracy is so popular within the United States –and the opposition to it is so weak — that our transition to an actual autocracy will in the end be so easy to pull off that there will be no need to resort to violence. Blue States will get angry, but, lulz, they always get angry, right Mr. Eastman?
Autocracy is very popular in the United States A sizable portion of the United States’ electorate wants an autocracy. They want one so bad that they seem like a cult to people who aren’t all that thrilled at the prospect of one. So, it’s possible that they will wrap up the transition into autocracy without any violence at all. By the time people realize what they’ve lost, it will be way, way too late. The United States will be nothing more than a Russia clone with an identical political dynamic. There will be a MAGA-themed Constitutional Convention to “pass a balanced budget amendment” and we’ll still have President DeSantis (or whomever) 30 years from now.
Anti-MAGA forces are just too weak willed. Again, it could be that when push comes to shove, the whole thing will be over before it even starts. There will be a lot of angry tweets on Twitter, but in the end, because Twitter liberals aren’t willing to risk anything in the real world, we slip peacefully into autocracy and that, as they say, will be that.
We will sleep peacefully into autocracy, millions of center-Left people will flee the country gradually over a generation and the United States will become a shit hole country, hiding behind Fortress America. But Republicans are so fucking bonkers and bloodthirsty, that they could very well push us into a violent civil war where the metrics that success are measured by will be dramatically different.
One thing is for sure, however — if we do have a civil war, we’re going to bomb ourselves into the stone age and it will all be so bloody, so horrific that everyone involved will regret it ever happened.
Here are some reasons why we will have a civil war.
Republicans have come to glorify political violence Something you see a lot these days within the bullshit echo chamber of the MAGA New Right is the belief that because “liberals won’t leave us alone” that they are being “driven” to extremism. There’s a lot of leading not-so-vague talk as to what all this would ultimately mean. But it’s clear that for a number of “thought leaders” within the MAGA New Right that they have accepted that at some point in the future, they’re going to have to resort to violence to get what they want.
Republicans no longer believe in democracy It is now clear that like any good fascists, Republicans no longer believe in democracy unless it’s for the specific purpose of gaining and keeping power. This view of the system they’re supposed to a part of leads them do extremely distablizing things that help push the country to the brink.
Trump 2024 Just Trump being the 2024 nominee would, in itself, be enough to cause a civil war at some point in late 2024 – early 2025. He just has a special knack for “owning the libs” in such a way that if he stole in 2024 election and said the “quiet part outloud” that Blue States would grow so enraged that it would be they, not Red States, that left the Union and caused a Second Civil War. But Ron DeSantis is polling exceptionally well at the moment, so either Trump politically shivs him at some point, or he co-ops him, making him his VP, opening the door to DeSantis becoming America’s Putin at some point down the road a little bit.
Steve K Bannon. Bannon and his toadies are actively working to destroy the framework that weuse to administer free and fair elections. So, it’s very easy to imagine a situation where this gambit works in ways that Trump himself is too idiotic to pull off personally and it will be so egregious that, again, Blue States leave the Union and we have a Second American Civil War.
Extreme negative polarization We’re in for a bump four or so years, no matter what, because negative polarization, on a systemic level, has reached a critical mass. When one of your political parties is fascist and would rather crash the global economy instead of even appear to work for the good of the nation — you got a problem.
A lack of shared values As the big blow up on Twitter in the last 24 hours about a Stephen Colbert song and dance gag about getting vaccinated proves — we can’t even agree on what’s funny. A combination of this and negative polarization is leading to the United States being two nations, one Red, one Blue and when we get around to attempting to elect the next president, the system simply won’t be prepared for the passions it will stir up.
A potentially historic miscalculation on the part of Republicans It’s possible that, much like European powers in the lead up to WW1, when the time comes and Republicans have a choice between peacefully transitioning us into autocracy or fucking with us all so we want to take up arms, they will choose the latter not because they have to, but because they want to. It’s possible that by the 2024 — 2025 period, Republicans will see a civil war as their only choice to consolidate power, even if it’s clear that they could get everything they ever wanted within the system they so obviously loath.
All we can hope for, I guess, is somehow Blue States win in the end.
Macro trends are not on America’s side. As I keep saying, 2024 is going to be it. It’s the year when either the United States turns into a Russian-style “managed democracy” or there’s a civil war. Now, this isn’t going to be a complete list of the 50 states, but I am going to highlight some of the states that may be more problematic should a Second American Civil War erupt.
Oregon The state is really two states and, as such, is probably going to be a major flashpoint in any Second Civil War. What’s likely to happen is Portland will buck any attempt at a putsch on the part of bonkers Right wing nutjobs in the rest of the state and, as such, either there’s a really blood struggle in the state or there are a massive amount of political refugees from the Portland area as the rest of the state sides with MAGA.
Virginia Again, this is really two states. There’s the NOVA-Richmond-Hampton Roads urban corridor and everything else. It’s very easy to imagine a situation — especially with Virginia’s historic ties to the first Civil War — where the state implodes as we grow closer and closer to a Second Civil War. Too many good old boys in the rural areas of Virginia might get wrapped up in the “Lost Cause” mythos and decide to seize places like Danville (the last capitol of the Confederacy) or Richmond (another Confederate capitol.) If nothing else, simply because of the larger population of the “Blue” parts of the state, there will be significant violence and political refugees as the Blues consolidate power.
Michigan I don’t know as much about this state, but it definitely seems as though once the pre-war process of coups and political consolation begins that there will be at least a coup attempt on the part of the Far Right. Again, don’t underestimate how once you actually start murdering people that the dynamics of things change significantly. It’s very possible that there would be a coup in the state, it would fail, and there would be significant political violence as the state’s Blue population fought back and put the state firmly on the Blue side.
New York Yet again, we have a situation where once politics fails us that the otherwise banal regional differences in a state tears it apart. New York City is far more progressive than the rest of New York State and, depending on how things work out, it’s possible that New York City could become a revolutionary hotbed to the point that is tears itself away from the rest of the state and proclaims itself a Free City. This almost happen during the first Civil War. If nothing else, there will be a serious jiggling of the relationship between NYC and the rest of the state to the point where it aligns itself in any Second Civil War with New Jersey and Connecticut in a way that update New York does not. Or, again, there could be significant political consolidation as Blues from all over the northeast flee to New York and the MAGA-friendly natives of the state flee elsewhere.
Maine I really don’t know that much about this state other than a vague belief that the northern part of the state is far different than the southern part. It’s very easy to imagine significant consolation in the state one way or another as people flee to it as the rest of the country buckles. The state is big — if sparsely populated — and it’s strategic location near the Canadian border might be enough for it to be the home to large refugee camps.
Texas Texas would be in an odd situation as the country fell into civil war because its long-term political trend is shifting Blue, but it’s part of the South and a lot of people consider themselves Southern and MAGA. So either it simply buckles into its own intra-civil war or the MAGA cocksucker fucktards push out all the Blues who flee to Blue States nearby. The end result would be a lot of pissed off former Texans who would be of great benefit to the Blue cause.
California In a sense, the whole fate of the United States rests on what California does. If it simply bolts from the Union, then that significantly hobbles the Blue cause on the ground. California sitting on its hands and become its own nation in the event of a Second Civil War makes it far more likely that either Red states win or there is some sort of half-ass balkanization of the United States. But if California stays and fights, then they could provide not only the necessary economy and population for a Blue state victory — after many, many dead — but also something of a vision for what America would look like after we’re finished bombing ourselves into oblivion.
The Deep South It’s very easy to imagine at the onset of a Second American Civil War most of the old Confederacy on a political level getting extremely excited and having a massive amount of momentum to either leave the Union outright or support the Republican controlled Congress’ attempt to brazenly steal the election. Then reality would sink in — all of the Southern states have significant African American populations and once politics is no longer a viable method of solving problems then the far more brutal dynamics of realpolitik would kick in. I just can’t imagine millions of African Americans lulzing a return to the Confederacy, no matter how badly the white political establishment of those states may want it. So, even though the South has a lot of people and a big economy, it would be, on a regional basis, too busy fighting a race war to really help the Red cause all that much. If things really grew as radical as I fear they will — probably because WMD are stolen and cities start to get vaporized — it’s the Deep South where you’re most likely to see some WW2 level atrocities as radicalized whites begin to murder blacks en mass.
As for the rest of the states, their ability to pick one side or the other is probably far easier and their biggest problem would be dealing with political refugees.
It definitely seems as though the United States is going to slip peacefully into autocracy in broad daylight. If it’s not the complete corruption of the administration of elections by Steve Bannon’s “spiritual shock troops” involved in his “administrative coup,” then it will be the nullification of any election of a Democrat by Congressional Republicans for the rest of our lives.
Now, this raises the question of what the reaction of the average person will be when this happens. Will they just shrug and roll over as the fucking fascist MAGA New Right cocksuckers consolidate power, or will I be surprised and we won’t transition peacefully into autocracy at all? Will the throttling of our 240 year old democracy simply be too brazen for that to happen?
At the moment, I just don’t know.
But let’s assume that Bannon’s plot works and we simply shrug. Then what?
Well, form follows function and once the connection between the governed and the government no longer exists, it’s only a matter of time before the media is purged, ICE is weaponized and people like me start to mysteriously die because I just won’t shut the fuck up about what a fucking cocksucker President Mike Pompeo is.
But there would be consequences to this consolidation of power. Center Left would soon begin to simply vote with their feet, leaving the United States behind. This “brain drain” would happen until it got so bad that America’s autocrat would move to make it nearly impossible for anyone to get a passport and to leave the country. Form follows function.
Before that happened, however, enough upper middle class liberals would leave the country to make a huge difference in nations across the globe. It’s easy to imagine Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Great Britain and any number of European nations taking in millions of disillusioned Americans and reaping huge economic and social rewards.
One nation that might see a huge economic and societal change as wealthy center-Left Americans scramble to leave the United States is the Philippines. It’s got great climate, has a historical connection to the United States, cheap living and the room to accommodate a few million Americans. They would all telecommute to the States and might, just might, single handedly bootstrap the nation out of its current third-world status.
I often wonder where Hollywood would re-locate under this scenario. I think it would be somewhere like Perth. From my personal experience, people from Perth are really creative and interesting and even though it’s in the middle of nowhere, it seems within the realm of possibility that the Hollywood community might re-locate to that city once the United States finally drifts into autocracy.
But all of that is very speculative. At the moment, it’s possible it could go either way, that we either have a civil war or we slip peacefully into autocracy. Only time will tell.
Politically, I’m the red headed step child of my otherwise very conservative family. My family — other than me — is a bedrock traditional Southern conservative family. One thing that really makes me feel a sense of doom is the total unwillingness of my non-MAGA family to make a united front against the rise of MAGA New Right fascism.
In the end, I fear my family may be torn apart like a family might have been during the First American Civil War. The two sides have simply so hardened their positions that things are going to grow really, really existential. Negative polarization is such that I can’t even talk about politics with my family anymore — period.
This, even though generally in the past when we talked about politics we actually agreed more than we disagreed on some pretty basic elements of the national discourse.
But now, that’s over. The two sides have established what they believe and there’s no room for debate or compromise.
I have to prepare myself for some dramatic events happening to me one way or another. Either at some point after we turn into an autocracy around January 2025 I get murdered by an ICE agent, or I have to flee to as a political refugee to a Blue part of the country at the onset of a civil war.
No one is going to help me. No one is going to save me.
Holy shit are things going to get a lot worse soon. It is a testament to how we’ve crossed the Event Horizon of a potential “Fourth Turning” that we have to take seriously the possibility that Trump will become Speaker when the House flips as part of the 2022 mid-terms.
If that very real possibility becomes a reality, then all my dystopian hellscape predictions for 2024 – 2025 may happen a few years earlier. The country is running on political fumes at the moment. Just the added pressure of Speaker Trump ranting about how Biden and Harris absolutely have to be removed from office might be enough to tip us into significant political violence.
Here are some reasons why we won’t have a civil war:
It’s not in our nature to have a civil war. For all the hateful rhetoric on the part of the MAGA New Right, it’s possible that in the end, they manage to pull off a peaceful transition to autocracy. In fact, at first, at least, the chance from democracy to autocracy could be so subtle that only a few hysterical people like me even notice. For the average person, it will just be a replay of 2000, only worse: it will simply be accepted that the only way a Democrat can become POTUS is if that party also control Congress. People will say “the system worked” and move on.
Republicans have gamed the system. It could be that by 2024 – 2025 the actual administration of elections will be so corrupt that it will be a fact of life that people shrug and take for granted. It will be the first step towards Americans becoming Russians in that they will no longer feel as though the government expresses the will of the people. And that will be that.
Not Trump 2024 Another reason why we could slip peacefully into autocracy is it’s not Trump who is the Republican nominee, but someone other than Trump. If this is the case, when I honestly don’t see why we would have a civil war. Autocracy is so popular within the United States –and the opposition to it is so weak — that our transition to an actual autocracy will in the end be so easy to pull off that there will be no need to resort to violence. Blue States will get angry, but, lulz, they always get angry, right Mr. Eastman?
Autocracy is very popular in the United States A sizable portion of the United States’ electorate wants an autocracy. They want one so bad that they seem like a cult to people who aren’t all that thrilled at the prospect of one. So, it’s possible that they will wrap up the transition into autocracy without any violence at all. By the time people realize what they’ve lost, it will be way, way too late. The United States will be nothing more than a Russia clone with an identical political dynamic. There will be a MAGA-themed Constitutional Convention to “pass a balanced budget amendment” and we’ll still have President DeSantis (or whomever) 30 years from now.
Anti-MAGA forces are just too weak willed. Again, it could be that when push comes to shove, the whole thing will be over before it even starts. There will be a lot of angry tweets on Twitter, but in the end, because Twitter liberals aren’t willing to risk anything in the real world, we slip peacefully into autocracy and that, as they say, will be that.
But one thing is clear — there is a 100% chance that both Biden and Harris will be impeached for something, anything if the Republicans win the House. Speaker Trump would just be the autocratic cherry on top. That I have to take the prospect of a Speaker Trump this seriously is sign enough that we’re very, very, very fucked.
This next year is literally potentially the last year the United States will be anything akin to a functioning democracy. This will especially be the case if Speaker Trump actively incites political violence as a ploy to force Senate Democrats to convict Biden and Harris.
Here are some reasons why we will have a civil war.
Republicans have come to glorify political violence Something you see a lot these days within the bullshit echo chamber of the MAGA New Right is the belief that because “liberals won’t leave us alone” that they are being “driven” to extremism. There’s a lot of leading not-so-vague talk as to what all this would ultimately mean. But it’s clear that for a number of “thought leaders” within the MAGA New Right that they have accepted that at some point in the future, they’re going to have to resort to violence to get what they want.
Republicans no longer believe in democracy It is now clear that like any good fascists, Republicans no longer believe in democracy unless it’s for the specific purpose of gaining and keeping power. This view of the system they’re supposed to a part of leads them do extremely distablizing things that help push the country to the brink.
Trump 2024 Just Trump being the 2024 nominee would, in itself, be enough to cause a civil war at some point in late 2024 – early 2025. He just has a special knack for “owning the libs” in such a way that if he stole in 2024 election and said the “quiet part outloud” that Blue States would grow so enraged that it would be they, not Red States, that left the Union and caused a Second Civil War. But Ron DeSantis is polling exceptionally well at the moment, so either Trump politically shivs him at some point, or he co-ops him, making him his VP, opening the door to DeSantis becoming America’s Putin at some point down the road a little bit.
Steve K Bannon. Bannon and his toadies are actively working to destroy the framework that weuse to administer free and fair elections. So, it’s very easy to imagine a situation where this gambit works in ways that Trump himself is too idiotic to pull off personally and it will be so egregious that, again, Blue States leave the Union and we have a Second American Civil War.
Extreme negative polarization We’re in for a bump four or so years, no matter what, because negative polarization, on a systemic level, has reached a critical mass. When one of your political parties is fascist and would rather crash the global economy instead of even appear to work for the good of the nation — you got a problem.
A lack of shared values As the big blow up on Twitter in the last 24 hours about a Stephen Colbert song and dance gag about getting vaccinated proves — we can’t even agree on what’s funny. A combination of this and negative polarization is leading to the United States being two nations, one Red, one Blue and when we get around to attempting to elect the next president, the system simply won’t be prepared for the passions it will stir up.
A potentially historic miscalculation on the part of Republicans It’s possible that, much like European powers in the lead up to WW1, when the time comes and Republicans have a choice between peacefully transitioning us into autocracy or fucking with us all so we want to take up arms, they will choose the latter not because they have to, but because they want to. It’s possible that by the 2024 — 2025 period, Republicans will see a civil war as their only choice to consolidate power, even if it’s clear that they could get everything they ever wanted within the system they so obviously loath.
Even if that doesn’t happen, 2022 will be the testing grounds for Steve Bannon’s administrative coup on the local level and if it becomes extremely obvious that it has succeeded, we will face the choice of either confronting this death of democracy, or simply slipping peacefully into autocracy.
Steve K. Bannon
At the moment, I think we’re going to avoid a civil war and slip peacefully into autocracy. The only unknowns are if the MAGA New Right is so bloodthirsty that they force the issue and if Trump is so stupid by saying the quiet part out loud that that, too, forces the issue.
But the Establishment has a vested interest in avoiding a civil war outside of those two factors mentioned above, I think we’re going to wake up 20 years from now and the United States and Russia will be identical on a political level. President DeSantis (or Flynn, or whomever) will have been president for a generation. There will be the occasional big protest across the country that we’ll hear about through the BBC and a lot of talk about how this or that thing might bring down the American autocrat…but jack shit will actually happen.
This is not an abstract for me. I’m just the type of loud mouth anti-MAGA person who would likely die at the hands of an ICE agent. The time for using the term “hope” as a talking point is long over. The time to think existentially on a personal basis is here.
The future is dark, and growing darker by the moment.
Macro trends are not on America’s side. As I keep saying, 2024 is going to be it. It’s the year when either the United States turns into a Russian-style “managed democracy” or there’s a civil war. Now, this isn’t going to be a complete list of the 50 states, but I am going to highlight some of the states that may be more problematic should a Second American Civil War erupt.
Oregon The state is really two states and, as such, is probably going to be a major flashpoint in any Second Civil War. What’s likely to happen is Portland will buck any attempt at a putsch on the part of bonkers Right wing nutjobs in the rest of the state and, as such, either there’s a really blood struggle in the state or there are a massive amount of political refugees from the Portland area as the rest of the state sides with MAGA.
Virginia Again, this is really two states. There’s the NOVA-Richmond-Hampton Roads urban corridor and everything else. It’s very easy to imagine a situation — especially with Virginia’s historic ties to the first Civil War — where the state implodes as we grow closer and closer to a Second Civil War. Too many good old boys in the rural areas of Virginia might get wrapped up in the “Lost Cause” mythos and decide to seize places like Danville (the last capitol of the Confederacy) or Richmond (another Confederate capitol.) If nothing else, simply because of the larger population of the “Blue” parts of the state, there will be significant violence and political refugees as the Blues consolidate power.
Michigan I don’t know as much about this state, but it definitely seems as though once the pre-war process of coups and political consolation begins that there will be at least a coup attempt on the part of the Far Right. Again, don’t underestimate how once you actually start murdering people that the dynamics of things change significantly. It’s very possible that there would be a coup in the state, it would fail, and there would be significant political violence as the state’s Blue population fought back and put the state firmly on the Blue side.
New York Yet again, we have a situation where once politics fails us that the otherwise banal regional differences in a state tears it apart. New York City is far more progressive than the rest of New York State and, depending on how things work out, it’s possible that New York City could become a revolutionary hotbed to the point that is tears itself away from the rest of the state and proclaims itself a Free City. This almost happen during the first Civil War. If nothing else, there will be a serious jiggling of the relationship between NYC and the rest of the state to the point where it aligns itself in any Second Civil War with New Jersey and Connecticut in a way that update New York does not. Or, again, there could be significant political consolidation as Blues from all over the northeast flee to New York and the MAGA-friendly natives of the state flee elsewhere.
Maine I really don’t know that much about this state other than a vague belief that the northern part of the state is far different than the southern part. It’s very easy to imagine significant consolation in the state one way or another as people flee to it as the rest of the country buckles. The state is big — if sparsely populated — and it’s strategic location near the Canadian border might be enough for it to be the home to large refugee camps.
Texas Texas would be in an odd situation as the country fell into civil war because its long-term political trend is shifting Blue, but it’s part of the South and a lot of people consider themselves Southern and MAGA. So either it simply buckles into its own intra-civil war or the MAGA cocksucker fucktards push out all the Blues who flee to Blue States nearby. The end result would be a lot of pissed off former Texans who would be of great benefit to the Blue cause.
California In a sense, the whole fate of the United States rests on what California does. If it simply bolts from the Union, then that significantly hobbles the Blue cause on the ground. California sitting on its hands and become its own nation in the event of a Second Civil War makes it far more likely that either Red states win or there is some sort of half-ass balkanization of the United States. But if California stays and fights, then they could provide not only the necessary economy and population for a Blue state victory — after many, many dead — but also something of a vision for what America would look like after we’re finished bombing ourselves into oblivion.
The Deep South It’s very easy to imagine at the onset of a Second American Civil War most of the old Confederacy on a political level getting extremely excited and having a massive amount of momentum to either leave the Union outright or support the Republican controlled Congress’ attempt to brazenly steal the election. Then reality would sink in — all of the Southern states have significant African American populations and once politics is no longer a viable method of solving problems then the far more brutal dynamics of realpolitik would kick in. I just can’t imagine millions of African Americans lulzing a return to the Confederacy, no matter how badly the white political establishment of those states may want it. So, even though the South has a lot of people and a big economy, it would be, on a regional basis, too busy fighting a race war to really help the Red cause all that much. If things really grew as radical as I fear they will — probably because WMD are stolen and cities start to get vaporized — it’s the Deep South where you’re most likely to see some WW2 level atrocities as radicalized whites begin to murder blacks en mass.
As for the rest of the states, their ability to pick one side or the other is probably far easier and their biggest problem would be dealing with political refugees.
It’s comical how Twitter liberals continue to struggle with — or are completely obviously to — the cold, hard reality that we’re on our own when it comes to our dark, dark future.
Who knows which future we’ll pick.
There will be no reform. There will be no “boom” that changes everything. We can no long simply “hope” that somehow, someway, the entire MAGA New Right edifice is going to magically come crashing down.
We have to admit that in the end, we may be forced into a corner by MAGA. Things are going to grow existential, especially if Steve Bannon’s administrative coup plan works. As early as 2022, we may be faced with the very real world of us either admitting that we’re going to be an autocracy or we have some sort of civil war.
I really, really don’t violence and I definitely don’t want a civil war. But the MAGA New Right is so full if itself, so bloodthirsty that they could very well force the issue, over and above the successful implementation of Bannon’s administrative coup.
The MAGA New Right could be on the cusp of peacefully getting everything they want, only to blow it because first, Trump always says the quiet part out loud and two, their own bloodlust gets the best of them.
I don’t think enough people appreciate how dire our striates are at the moment. We really are careening towards the existential decision of civil war or autocracy (or maybe military junta) and there will be no improvements to our lot. We pretty much have — on a political level — everything we’re going to have in the 2022 – 2024 timeframe.
We are so, totally fucked.
There are no easy answers. No easy solutions. And victory is the MAGA New Right’s to lose.
Given that they’re led by deranged lunatic Donald Trump, anything is possible.
Doing just a back of the envelope scenario about a Second American Civil War leads me to one dark conclusion: the states of the American “Heartland,” the Old Midwest, would be where the heaviest fighting — and most bloodshed — would occur.
I say this because these states have high population and, in a sense, the greatest disconnect between the will of the people and government. So, it’s very easy to imagine states like Indiana and Ohio running red with blood as the two sides vie for control.
Let’s not fight!
Of course, we have to remember that at the beginning of any ACW2, huge numbers of people in the states of Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio would bounce around, looking for a state that better fit their personal politics. As such, I could see Indiana and Ohio becoming deep, deep red to the point that they would see the most severe fighting should Blue States begin to get the upper hand. Or, alternatively, they would be where WMD would be used a lot by Blue States if things got that bad.
It would be in the Heartland where an ACW2 would look the most like WW2. It would be horrific. Many, many people would die and there would be a massive number of political refugees once things got as bad as I fear. And where they would go would depend on their politics and the ebb and flow of the war itself.
Another state that is somewhat up in the air for me is Michigan. It’s a state that traditionally Blue, and, yet, has a small and deranged Red element to its electorate. If we stop using politics to solve our problems and start murdering each other for political reasons, it’s possible that Michigan would also be the site of a lot of bloody struggle.
The point of all of this is, let’s not have a second civil war, shall we?
Occasionally, the hot takes within my center-Left, anti-MAGA New Right echo chamber are so bad, so ill conceived that I get really angry. A prime example of this recently is all the laugher about Trump telling the MAGA New Right faithful “not to vote” if the Republican Establishment doesn’t “address” his Big Lie about the 2020 election.
Two reasons exist for this being very, very dangerous.
The first reason is, well, Trump is giving the Republican Establishment its marching orders for 2022 and 2024. If they don’t toe the line, he’s threatening them with destruction. Hence, how quiet they are about his threats on the matter. And, really, the case could be made that this is part of Steve Bannon’s broader efforts at an administrative coup going forward.
Steve K. Bannon
Here are some reasons why we won’t have a civil war:
It’s not in our nature to have a civil war. For all the hateful rhetoric on the part of the MAGA New Right, it’s possible that in the end, they manage to pull off a peaceful transition to autocracy. In fact, at first, at least, the chance from democracy to autocracy could be so subtle that only a few hysterical people like me even notice. For the average person, it will just be a replay of 2000, only worse: it will simply be accepted that the only way a Democrat can become POTUS is if that party also control Congress. People will say “the system worked” and move on.
Republicans have gamed the system. It could be that by 2024 – 2025 the actual administration of elections will be so corrupt that it will be a fact of life that people shrug and take for granted. It will be the first step towards Americans becoming Russians in that they will no longer feel as though the government expresses the will of the people. And that will be that.
Not Trump 2024 Another reason why we could slip peacefully into autocracy is it’s not Trump who is the Republican nominee, but someone other than Trump. If this is the case, when I honestly don’t see why we would have a civil war. Autocracy is so popular within the United States –and the opposition to it is so weak — that our transition to an actual autocracy will in the end be so easy to pull off that there will be no need to resort to violence. Blue States will get angry, but, lulz, they always get angry, right Mr. Eastman?
Autocracy is very popular in the United States A sizable portion of the United States’ electorate wants an autocracy. They want one so bad that they seem like a cult to people who aren’t all that thrilled at the prospect of one. So, it’s possible that they will wrap up the transition into autocracy without any violence at all. By the time people realize what they’ve lost, it will be way, way too late. The United States will be nothing more than a Russia clone with an identical political dynamic. There will be a MAGA-themed Constitutional Convention to “pass a balanced budget amendment” and we’ll still have President DeSantis (or whomever) 30 years from now.
Anti-MAGA forces are just too weak willed. Again, it could be that when push comes to shove, the whole thing will be over before it even starts. There will be a lot of angry tweets on Twitter, but in the end, because Twitter liberals aren’t willing to risk anything in the real world, we slip peacefully into autocracy and that, as they say, will be that.
But the second, darker reason is Trump is dangling the prospect of the MAGA New Right no longer participating in the democratic process en mass. If they don’t feel as though they have a vested interest in democracy — if they just stop voting — then all the glad handing and backslapping that people like Rachel Maddow will do when Democrats start to win will be interrupted rather dramatically.
Here are some reasons why we will have a civil war.
Republicans have come to glorify political violence Something you see a lot these days within the bullshit echo chamber of the MAGA New Right is the belief that because “liberals won’t leave us alone” that they are being “driven” to extremism. There’s a lot of leading not-so-vague talk as to what all this would ultimately mean. But it’s clear that for a number of “thought leaders” within the MAGA New Right that they have accepted that at some point in the future, they’re going to have to resort to violence to get what they want.
Republicans no longer believe in democracy It is now clear that like any good fascists, Republicans no longer believe in democracy unless it’s for the specific purpose of gaining and keeping power. This view of the system they’re supposed to a part of leads them do extremely distablizing things that help push the country to the brink.
Trump 2024 Just Trump being the 2024 nominee would, in itself, be enough to cause a civil war at some point in late 2024 – early 2025. He just has a special knack for “owning the libs” in such a way that if he stole in 2024 election and said the “quiet part outloud” that Blue States would grow so enraged that it would be they, not Red States, that left the Union and caused a Second Civil War. But Ron DeSantis is polling exceptionally well at the moment, so either Trump politically shivs him at some point, or he co-ops him, making him his VP, opening the door to DeSantis becoming America’s Putin at some point down the road a little bit.
Steve K Bannon. Bannon and his toadies are actively working to destroy the framework that weuse to administer free and fair elections. So, it’s very easy to imagine a situation where this gambit works in ways that Trump himself is too idiotic to pull off personally and it will be so egregious that, again, Blue States leave the Union and we have a Second American Civil War.
Extreme negative polarization We’re in for a bump four or so years, no matter what, because negative polarization, on a systemic level, has reached a critical mass. When one of your political parties is fascist and would rather crash the global economy instead of even appear to work for the good of the nation — you got a problem.
A lack of shared values As the big blow up on Twitter in the last 24 hours about a Stephen Colbert song and dance gag about getting vaccinated proves — we can’t even agree on what’s funny. A combination of this and negative polarization is leading to the United States being two nations, one Red, one Blue and when we get around to attempting to elect the next president, the system simply won’t be prepared for the passions it will stir up.
A potentially historic miscalculation on the part of Republicans It’s possible that, much like European powers in the lead up to WW1, when the time comes and Republicans have a choice between peacefully transitioning us into autocracy or fucking with us all so we want to take up arms, they will choose the latter not because they have to, but because they want to. It’s possible that by the 2024 — 2025 period, Republicans will see a civil war as their only choice to consolidate power, even if it’s clear that they could get everything they ever wanted within the system they so obviously loath.
You think we have it bad now, just wait until a huge swath of deranged MAGA New Right cocksuckers grow radicalized and see violence as their only option to get what they want in the country. That would not be cool.
I just don’t think a lot of liberal “thinkers” are taking the very dangerous future we face seriously enough. Something’s gotta give. We either turn into an autocracy, have a civil war or the military steps in and we have some sort of military junta.
But the current situation is just not stable. It can only last so long. The United States is running on fumes.
Macro trends are not on America’s side. As I keep saying, 2024 is going to be it. It’s the year when either the United States turns into a Russian-style “managed democracy” or there’s a civil war. Now, this isn’t going to be a complete list of the 50 states, but I am going to highlight some of the states that may be more problematic should a Second American Civil War erupt.
Oregon The state is really two states and, as such, is probably going to be a major flashpoint in any Second Civil War. What’s likely to happen is Portland will buck any attempt at a putsch on the part of bonkers Right wing nutjobs in the rest of the state and, as such, either there’s a really blood struggle in the state or there are a massive amount of political refugees from the Portland area as the rest of the state sides with MAGA.
Virginia Again, this is really two states. There’s the NOVA-Richmond-Hampton Roads urban corridor and everything else. It’s very easy to imagine a situation — especially with Virginia’s historic ties to the first Civil War — where the state implodes as we grow closer and closer to a Second Civil War. Too many good old boys in the rural areas of Virginia might get wrapped up in the “Lost Cause” mythos and decide to seize places like Danville (the last capitol of the Confederacy) or Richmond (another Confederate capitol.) If nothing else, simply because of the larger population of the “Blue” parts of the state, there will be significant violence and political refugees as the Blues consolidate power.
Michigan I don’t know as much about this state, but it definitely seems as though once the pre-war process of coups and political consolation begins that there will be at least a coup attempt on the part of the Far Right. Again, don’t underestimate how once you actually start murdering people that the dynamics of things change significantly. It’s very possible that there would be a coup in the state, it would fail, and there would be significant political violence as the state’s Blue population fought back and put the state firmly on the Blue side.
New York Yet again, we have a situation where once politics fails us that the otherwise banal regional differences in a state tears it apart. New York City is far more progressive than the rest of New York State and, depending on how things work out, it’s possible that New York City could become a revolutionary hotbed to the point that is tears itself away from the rest of the state and proclaims itself a Free City. This almost happen during the first Civil War. If nothing else, there will be a serious jiggling of the relationship between NYC and the rest of the state to the point where it aligns itself in any Second Civil War with New Jersey and Connecticut in a way that update New York does not. Or, again, there could be significant political consolidation as Blues from all over the northeast flee to New York and the MAGA-friendly natives of the state flee elsewhere.
Maine I really don’t know that much about this state other than a vague belief that the northern part of the state is far different than the southern part. It’s very easy to imagine significant consolation in the state one way or another as people flee to it as the rest of the country buckles. The state is big — if sparsely populated — and it’s strategic location near the Canadian border might be enough for it to be the home to large refugee camps.
Texas Texas would be in an odd situation as the country fell into civil war because its long-term political trend is shifting Blue, but it’s part of the South and a lot of people consider themselves Southern and MAGA. So either it simply buckles into its own intra-civil war or the MAGA cocksucker fucktards push out all the Blues who flee to Blue States nearby. The end result would be a lot of pissed off former Texans who would be of great benefit to the Blue cause.
California In a sense, the whole fate of the United States rests on what California does. If it simply bolts from the Union, then that significantly hobbles the Blue cause on the ground. California sitting on its hands and become its own nation in the event of a Second Civil War makes it far more likely that either Red states win or there is some sort of half-ass balkanization of the United States. But if California stays and fights, then they could provide not only the necessary economy and population for a Blue state victory — after many, many dead — but also something of a vision for what America would look like after we’re finished bombing ourselves into oblivion.
The Deep South It’s very easy to imagine at the onset of a Second American Civil War most of the old Confederacy on a political level getting extremely excited and having a massive amount of momentum to either leave the Union outright or support the Republican controlled Congress’ attempt to brazenly steal the election. Then reality would sink in — all of the Southern states have significant African American populations and once politics is no longer a viable method of solving problems then the far more brutal dynamics of realpolitik would kick in. I just can’t imagine millions of African Americans lulzing a return to the Confederacy, no matter how badly the white political establishment of those states may want it. So, even though the South has a lot of people and a big economy, it would be, on a regional basis, too busy fighting a race war to really help the Red cause all that much. If things really grew as radical as I fear they will — probably because WMD are stolen and cities start to get vaporized — it’s the Deep South where you’re most likely to see some WW2 level atrocities as radicalized whites begin to murder blacks en mass.
As for the rest of the states, their ability to pick one side or the other is probably far easier and their biggest problem would be dealing with political refugees.
It is very, very unlikely that our worst fears about what’s going on at La Palma will be realized and there will be some sort of “megatsunami.” It’s so unlikely as to not be something any of us should be worried about.
But I love me a scenario, so let’s run it. Let’s think about what would happen to the United States on a political basis, if a huge fucking wave crossed the Atlantic and destroyed a huge chunk of the American Eastern Seaboard.
My initial reaction is given how divided the country is at the moment, that the country would decend into chaos and something akin to the “Red October” that the MAGA New Right keeps babbling about would happen. The political and economic implications for the United States would, on paper, be enough to destroy the country unto itself.
But let’s think about this more deeply.
It could be that some of the assumptions I’m making aren’t right, that I’m jumping to conclusions. The country would be in shock for the first few days after the event and there would be a massive power vacuum across a huge swath of the country. It could be that the first reaction to the event would be for the country to unite. A lot would depend on how much of the Federal government was still functioning after the possible destruction of D.C.
It seems logical to conclude that it would be the massive economic depression that would strike the globe that would be the thing to cause some sort of MAGA New Right-themed “revolution” in the United States. If Trump survived the event, he would likely somehow be ranting about how now was the chance that MAGA had been looking for — it would be their time to strike. Or, more specifically, Steve Bannon would be saying that.
So, it’s very possible to imagine after the initial shock wore off and the economic implications of the event began to sink in that the usual finger-pointing would begin to happen and be taken to the next level as a huge, populous portion of the country struggled to get the lights on and to figure out what happens next.
I could easily see 20 or more small MAGA states descend into some sort of MAGA New Right themed revolution, which would, in turn, strain the already gobsmacked Federal government.
But, again, I may be assuming the absolute worst a little bit too much this time. Or not. If there was going to be a Second American Revolution, this time with the intent of “making America great again,” something like a huge fucking wave destroying a huge chunk of the country is probably the best bet for it to happen sooner rather than later.
I have to take a moment to ponder how otherwise deluded the MAGA New Right is for thinking that they could pull off a “Red October” without a massive wave striking the US Eastcoast. Revolutions usually, by definition, are Leftist and for all their talk of how much they fucking want to fuck their guns, MAGA cocksuckers have — if the January 6th Insurrectionists are any indication — proven to be massive wussies.
Anyway, hopefully this will stay just a idle daydream.
I totally validate the anger on the part of the transgender community when it comes to Dave Chappelle’s recent Netflix special. It get it. I understand the anger. At the same time, I’m not very much of a Leftist and it seems to me that the rise of the illiberal Left is not doing the cause of American democracy any favors.
I’m, by nature, a moderate, and there must be some way we can get angry over Chappelle comments without getting so angry that we attempt to end his right to say what he said. There is thing called the marketplace of ideas and, as such, Chappelle was simply exercising his freedom of speech and it’s up to the marketplace to determine how popular that speech will be.
The United States is careening towards a very, very dark future. And, the case could be made that what’s really going on with the debate over “cancel culture” is we’re seeing, in real time, the two sides are hardening their views to the point that if we don’t end up murdering each other for political reasons, we’re going to be lucky.
What’s more important, it’s very easy for the MAGA New Right to use the rise of illiberal Left as a bludgeon against the minds of the average person who is more interested in the latest winner of The Masked Singer than the endless political debate we otherwise live in.
We see this all the time now. This very thing. The Right latches on the most extreme examples of the illiberal Left and tries to paint the entire anti-MAGA movement as being that thing and that thing only.
But, I think in the end, there’s nothing that can be done. Ultimately, either we slip into a MAGA New Right autocracy and all the “woke” concerns of the illiberal Left will be moot. Or, we have a Second Civil War and suddenly some — but not all — of the concerns of the illiberal Left will “burn off” because things will grow so existential for everyone involved that we’ll have more, pressing issues, to address.
You must be logged in to post a comment.