Category: The Gray Plague

What American Liberals Can Learn From Putin’s Russia


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I hate violence. I hate conflict. I am a man of ideas and peace. And, yet, it is growing ever more clear to me that if the United States picks the option of autocracy rather than civil war that we are all very, very fucked.

The path is clear for America’s first autocrat in the style of Russia’s Putin. Within a few years of taking power, Putin had totally dominated the Russian liberals and, lulz, that was it. And now here we are 20 years later with Putin still president and Russia firmly established as a legalistic autocratcy.

Really, it’s very possible that we’ll look back at the 2020 election as the last free and fair election in American history. And there is a chance that no matter what happens in 2022, one side or the other will get so angry that we have some sort of significant political violence.

But that’s probably not going to happen.

What’s more likely to happen is, lulz, Trump becomes president and his hand picked successor is our first autocrat. It could be anyone from Gen. Mike Flynn to goober Josh Hawley to fat fuck Mike Pompeo. Or, hell, Trump could really be an asshole and pick someone like JD Vance to be his veep and then well, there you go.

Anyway, the point is — if we don’t have a civil war we’re going to wake up in 20 years and be politically identical to Russia. Which brings me to a question that came up on Twitter recently — am I being “self righteous” to suggest if there is a mass exodus of Blue Check Liberals once we become an autocracy that they’re all “fucking cowards.”

I still think that they would be.

The person I was talking to Twitter gave the counter-example of how Einstein left Hitler’s Germany to “fight from outside.” I say — Einstein is the exception that proves the rule. He was a Jewish scientist who had to leave Nazi Germany. Also, the comparison between Nazi Germany and Autocratic America doesn’t hold up because it would take time for the newly autocratic American Federal government to crush Blue States.

It sure would help fight the transition to autocracy if Blue Check Liberals would stand and fight in the US rather than flee to the south of France to write long Substacks about how we’re SOOO CLOSE to bringing democracy in America back from the dead because, I don’t know, Mueller is going to save us at last?

So, if we chose autocracy, that’s it. The end. We’re fucked. We’re going to gradually become identical to Russia and twenty years from now we’re going to still have President DeSantis.

No One Has Done A Good Pandemic Scifi Novel Yet


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The long-feared deluge of pandemic inspired fiction has yet to come about. There have been a few pandemic themed novels written before the COVID19 pandemic that have gained traction, but nothing written during or after. Though, I guess, “Our Country Friends” is one — but that’s not scifi.

Anyway.

I have two pretty good pandemic related concepts that I keep toying with. One would be more just the part of a broader story while the other would be a full blown novel. And, really, the only reason why I have done anything with either one of these idea is 1) I’m busy working on something else 2) I have a universe but thinking up a plot is a huge amount of work.

But the concepts are really unique and interesting and it’s too bad I probably won’t ever get around to them.

What’s The Matter With Canada?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I honestly don’t know what’s going on with Canada at the moment, other than what I see passively — and occasionally — on Twitter. I’ve decided to bone up on this issue, however, because things are turning dark rather quickly. My fear is that the truckers who are now apparently camped out around the Canadian Capitol in the middle of winter will radicalize and stage a January 6-like attempted coup.

Given what I know about Canadian politics — that things can change there rather abruptly because of the small population size — my concern is that things might get out of hand a lot sooner than anyone might predict. The next thing you know, some sort of Right wing dictatorship, long predicted for the United States, will happen in Canada (of all places) first.

If something like that did happen, it would only destabilize the United States even more. And, let me be clear, if you’re reading this and getting off on the idea that the United States — or Canada for that matter — might have a Right wing dictatorship soon: please fuck off you piece of shit.

Anyway, the point is — the entire anglophone world is in crisis at the moment for various reasons. New Zealand is the only one that seems to be acting normal at the moment. All the others are veering from crisis to crisis of their own making.

Americans, Worry About Canada


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Let me begin by saying I’m not an expert on Canadian culture and or politics and this is just a gauzy reflection on what little I know about the place. But the key issue is — the current “Make Canada Great Again” anti-vaccine mandate trucker camp out in Ottawa is dangerous.

I say this because the entire anglophone world is in crisis. And, even more importantly, Canada has such a small population that the whole “5%” of the population rule to make a revolution is even more timely.

So, it’s at least possible to imagine a situation where the truckers spark something that is marketed as a “Right wing revolution” in Canada. This, in turn, would embolden the fucking insane Right wing nutjobs in the United States.

Or, put another way — keep an eye on Canada. It might grow a lot more unstable in the near future than any of us in North America — and beyond — may like.

Trump As America’s ‘Negative Yeltsin’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I continue to read a book about the rise of Hitler and Nazis and I have to admit that there are a lot of eerie parallels between Trump and Hitler. And, yet it’s the difference between them that I think are most telling.

While both men were underestimated by their opponents, the thing that is clear to me is that Trump is not the Great Man that Hitler was. Trump is nothing more than an avatar, a vassal for the rage of white Christians who are afraid of the browning of America. Trump is just himself. He doesn’t manage or direct the flow of history, he just rides it towards an unknown destination.

As such, it’s not Hitler I would compare Trump to, but rather a kind of negative Boris Yeltsin. Both men seek to destroy and they both cause a lot of chaos. Yeltsin brought about the peaceful destruction of the Soviet Union. So, too, could Trump ultimately do the same thing with the United States.

Trump, like Yeltsin, is paving the way for a successor who will ultimately be the real Man of History. So, if we manage not to buckle into civil war, it will be President Pompeo, or Cotton, or Cruz, or Flynn, or, Hawley or, or, or, or, or whoever ultimately becomes a very powerful, very long-lasting American autocrat. Whomever the autocrat ends up being, they will become fabulously wealthy and powerful.

The thing that has me on edge is I still can not game out which of the three possible outcomes the United States is going to take. Will we have a civil war, or turn into an autocracy or have some sort of military junta? I just don’t know. Logically, at the moment, we’re going to slip peacefully into autocracy because we’re already an autocracy without an autocrat.

And, in the end, when we do become an autocracy, at first things really won’t change. It will only be gradually that the autocrat will begin to abuse their now free reign to do whatever the fuck they want. And that’s when people like me will feel the direct effects of no longer living in a Western democracy, of living in an illiberal democracy.

I know this sounds like my usual “doom shit.” But something’s gotta give. There really are too many similarities between the Weimar Republic and modern America for us not to sit up and take notice. To realize how fucked we are. And we are really, really fucked.

Our political isn’t just collapsing — it’s collapsed. We’ve reached the point where two people who disagree politically can’t discuss matters of the day without screaming at each other. That’s just one step away from the two sides taking up arms and settling those issues on the field of blood.

So, while Trump definitely shares a lot of historical traits with Hitler, for the time being I don’t think he is our Hitler because I don’t think that’s the proper historical analogy. The proper comparison is the fall of the Soviet Union and the transition from Yeltsin to Putin. Someone is going to be an American Putin and THAT person is going to be the person that strangles American freedom and liberty once and for all.

Besides the whole autocracy or civil war question, the other question is — who will Trump pick to be his 2024 veep? He’s so dumb and always goes for the worst possible decision that I think it’s possible he’ll pick Mike Flynn. But I also think fucking cocksucker and fat fuck Mike Pompeo would definitely be someone that Trump would look hard at. Pompeo would quickly make life for loudmouth drunk cranks like me hell, especially when I won’t shut up about what a fat fuck he is.

But only time will tell, I guess.

What The Fuck Is Trump Up To, Changing His Tune On Vaccines?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Well, I’m stumped on this one. It make no sense what so ever for dingus Trump to suddenly embrace COVID19 vaccines. None. I honestly don’t understand what’s going on. It feels like some sort of surreal alternative universe. Which, I have to admit, is what everything since Trump coming down that goddamn escalator has felt like.

The only thing I can think of is Trump is subtly shifting his attention from a pure base play to a more Traditionalist play. He knows he’s weak right now and maybe he thinks if he embraces vaccines then those conservatives who are “MAGA adjacent” might like him more? I’m thinking of those conservatives who have taken the vaccine but because of negative polarization and an extensive permission structure would never, ever for any reason make common cause with liberals against MAGA.

I dunno.

And, yet, that is a way too complicated political consideration for someone demonstrably as stupid as Trump is. Whatever the most simplistic, stupidest political judgement might be for Trump doing the exact opposite of what you might expect from him is why he’s doing it.

Or, I guess, you could say he’s finally grown so senile that he’s lost touch with reality to the point that he has actually begun to do what he should have done when the pandemic started. This doesn’t eliminate the question of, like, why? Why the fuck is Trump doing…gulp...the right thing?

It remains a mystery to me. Either it will become very obvious soon enough what he’s up to, or Trump risks destroying himself for no apparent reason.

Why 2020 (2) Is Probably Going To Suck


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I wouldn’t get too complacent about 2022 being anything more than yet another pretty shitty year. Here are my Christmas Day predictions for why this is:

Lots of Old Powerful People
It is inevitable that someone like the Queen is going to drop dead next year. And with it, there will be a lot of talk about What It All Means. And it’s not just the Queen. There are any number of very powerful American politicians who are old, old, old.

Potentially More Deadly COVID Variants
It’s at least possible that next year, a much more deadly version of COVID will pop out and everything will get thrown up into the air.

Republicans Are Probably Going To Win Congress
It’s very possible that a very damning January 6th Committee Report will come out in the summer and…nothing happens. Republicans win in the fall like they would anyway and then we have the setup to civil war / autocracy in 2024 – 2025.

Wars and Rumors of War
It’s also very possible that there will be at least one major regional war somewhere in the world in 2022, which could so destabilizing the global order that something akin to WW3 happens.

Future History: The Omega Variant


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

My fear at the moment is we’re not looking at the COVID19 pandemic in the right way. In fact, we need to readjust what we think the endgame may be. What if, in a sense, we’re all lulled into a false sense of security by COVID19 gradually being considered endemic.

And then, a year or two years from now, largely because of people refusing to vaccinated, it’s possible that really, really deadly version of COVID19 — the Omega Variant — might pop out. So, while everyone keeps taking about how “next time” will be a lot worse, it could be the Fire Next Time is nothing more than the Fire This Time rebooted.

So, not only could this be The New Normal, but it’s also possible that all of this is the set up for a far darker situation at some point in the future. And should the Omega Variant happen, it would happen with no notice. We would just wake up one day to news that the number of people dying from COVID has jumped from 2,000 a day to 10,000 (or more) a day.

And away we go.

If we were talking 10,000+ people dying a day in the United States of a COVID19 variant, it would freak everyone out and greatly change the political equation. Now, a lot of this would obviously depend on vaccines and therapeutics not working. If vaccines were really working and it was 10,000+ UNvaccinated people dying a day…oh boy.

Anyway, I suggest we reflect on what’s going on and COVID19 and maybe change our expectations some.

2022’s Coming Battle Royale Over COVID’s ‘Endemic’ Status


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Seems like the next major battle after Cancel Culture and CRT will be FOX “News” ranting at the top of its lungs that COVID is now “endemic” and fuck you. They will night after night lay out why they think around 2,000 people dying a day from COVID is just “a fact of life” and why is it we can’t get more tax cuts and young hack MAGA judges?

The reason why this is going to happen is, as I understand it, something being considered “endemic” is pretty much totally subjective. The issue is — how many people dying a day from something is a society willing to take? Red States are tired of the pandemic, so COVID is endemic, while Blue States are aghast at how many people are dying every day from COVID, so it continues to be a national health emergency.

And because of how subjective things are, this gives Fox “News” a huge opportunity to do what it always does — scare the shit out of white people about “evil libtards” who want to control them and divide the country between Red and Blue.

So, it’s easy to see the battle over COVID’s status being yet another bow in the FOX “News” quiver in their rapacious drive to flip Congress. They’ll play their audience like a xylophone, bouncing back and forth between CRT, Cancel Culture and COVID being endemic.

You already see FOX News doing this, they just don’t use the term “endemic,” probably because they don’t want to sound pretentious.

COVID In Blue & Red


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m the red headed step child of my family on a political basis. My family is made up of bed rock Traditionalists, while I’m the paste-eating libtard weirdo. I would note, however, that it’s only since the rise of MAGA that the lines have hardened. I’m not really that liberal, but I’ve been forced to pick a side and I fucking refuse to ignore that MAGA is run by a fucking moron who is thisclose to being an autocrat.

Slings and arrows, and all that.

Something I find myself talking to the Red people in my life a lot these days is COVID. It is very interesting how different the two sides see this particular macro event in our nation’s history. I see it as a national health crisis, while my Red family members are just tired of it and want to move on.

One issue that is a bone of contention is when does the pandemic become endemic? When do we just take COVID for granted and see it as just another risk associated with being human? Even under the best of conditions, talking about this with my Red family members can seem like going in circles. They want to compare 1,000 people dying a day to other forms of death. And I keep saying, “But is cancer contagious? Is heart disease contagious ? Is an accident contagious ?”

I totally get why people are so tired of the pandemic. I get it. I really do. And we’re so divided as a nation at the moment that there will likely come a point when 48% of the population shrugs and decides COVID is endemic, regardless of what libtards say while 48% will still see COVID as a national health emergency.

So, as always, we’re fucked.