What Trump wants to do is cram the US government with MAGA whack jobs to the point that even if somehow amazingly enough there is one day a Blue Administration, it won’t matter — the MAGA Deep State will ignore his or her orders. But he has to get rid of existing civil servants first, hence the need for Citizen Musk and all his bullshit going on at the moment.
Now, I just don’t believe we’re ever going to have free and fair Federal elections again. I know we’ve had some special elections since January, but I’m talking the midterms in a general way — they will happen, but they will be corrupt. The same goes for the 2028 presidential election.
Anyway, so unless something really big happens, this is it — the US government will be corrupt and full of crazy MAGA people who want to hurt as many people as possible, in as craven a way as possible to line not just their own pockets, but the pockets of plutocrats.
There is pride before the fall and I’m beginning to worry that Trump is going to really do something crazy with the FBI to the point that people might…begin to care?
If Trump actually makes good on his desires for a police state then, at least in some of the Blue States, this is going to cause some problems. I’m a man of peace, a man of ideas, but the idea of some sort of Blue revolution does seem in the greater-than-zero range right now.
I hope, I really hope, that doesn’t happen, but if Trump uses the FBI to literally snatch people — like me! — off the street then, well, we got a problem. But hopefully that won’t happen. Hopefully.
But it definitely, at least, SEEMS that we are headed in that direction. What will be interesting to see is the reaction on the part of the population to such thuggish shenanigans.
I suppose what Trump might do is purge the FBI to the point that he has to find whack jobs in police departments in Red States to fill all those high paying positions and then he uses them to do is bidding in Blue States. That causes mass protests, he calls in Red State National Guards and, tah-dah, we’re a military police state under martial law for the foreseeable future.
The United States is now an autocracy. Everything I kept ranting about for years has or is happening. The only big miscalculation I made was about protests. I thought if Trump went full tyrant from the beginning that there would be a General Strike or mass protests.
But, fun fact, no.
I know we’re still early in Trump’s administration, but it is clear to me that even if there were massive protests, there’s a good chance that the mass media is so beholden to Trump that they wouldn’t even cover any of it. I do think a prolonged General Strike with very strong leadership and a clear agenda could probably bring Trump and his regime down…but that’s just not going to happen.
People on the center-Left are just too busy being keyboard warriors to do something as dramatic as actually risk their “lives and sacred honors” in the real world. So, here we are, an autocracy.
The only lingering question is who gets to be the guy or woman who is president for 40 odd years once Trump shuffles off this mortal coil. I honestly don’t know at the moment. Maybe it’s going to be Musk, his legal inability to have the job be damned? Who knows?
I suspect the person is going to be a Trump, one way or another. And given Trump’s fascination with being a king, I wonder what would happen if he styled himself an emperor. Would anything happen? Anything at all?
There’s a pretty good chance that there will be a political Fourth Turning at the same time we have something akin to a Petite Singularity. Nothing is for certain, but there is a pretty good chance that just as the USA buckles we will see AI take off in an unexpected way.
I have been messing with AI a lot of late and I’ve been stunned at how good an unexpected it is at times. It’s *possible* that the first use of LLMs in androids will be in some sort of dystopian American Civil War / Revolution that happens in conjunction with a global WW3.
Oh boy!
Or not. What do I know.
I do know that the CONDITIONS are there for some pretty fucked up shit to happen starting in a few months. I just don’t see how we make it through the 2024 election in any form of peaceful existance.
As of late 2023, it definitely FEELS like we’re fucked here in the United States in regards to some sort of MAGA counter-revolution. There is an air of inevitability to the return of Trump to the point that anything that prevents it from happening will be jaw dropping — by definition.
Maybe Blues should become Blue Meanies.
Should Trump return to power, it will market the official end to the post-WW2 liberal order. The US will probably leave NATO, South Korea and Japan. We will probably align ourselves with Russia, Hungary and Turkey. All this will happen just as the wealthiest, most powerful nation in human history suddenly becomes very, very, very unstable.
Trump will try to rule Blue portions of America as King Trump I, while ruling Red parts of the country as more of a traditional autocrat. At least 1 million smug liberal Blues will leave the country, dramatically transforming global culture. Just imagine how a steady flow of well educated, well trained Americans being pumped into nations like Canada, New Zealand, Australia, The Philippines and a lot of Latin American nations could change the global order.
I don’t know how much Mexico will benefit from the collapse of the United States, but I could see Argentina, Chile and Brazil seeing so many Americans flood them that their general standard of living improves rather dramatically and abruptly within a few years.
And that doesn’t even begin to account for how Europe will change when many, many Americans flood to cheap places in the Balkans — it’s already happening.
This is where there are people on the MAGA Right who will roll their eyes and say none of this will ever possibly happen. Trump won’t be a king, he will bring peace and prosperity to all Americans through a combination of being an “alpha male” and rainbow unicorn farts.
I dunno. I guess we won’t know for sure one way or another until, well, they call the 2024 election. Good luck.
Trump Loses — gives up It’s a real possibility that all the wet dreams of earnest, well meaning liberals like Mueller, She Wrote will come true and lulz, not only does Trump lose, but he just gives up. The “Good Guys” win and that’s it. We punt our structural problems down the road another four years.
Trump Loses — demands a National Divorce In this scenario, Trump loses, but instead of just slinking away, he frantically demands a National Divorce. A lot — A LOT — would depend on, say, Texas in this scenario. There is a greater-than-zero chance that Texas could very well call up a Secessionist Convention if Trump demanded a National Divorce. This would, in turn, cause a civil war.
Too Close to call (1876 / 2000 endgame) If this happens, then, holy shit are we in trouble. The country would collapse into civil war and revolution. If we just didn’t know who the next president was going to be…whoa buddy. Chaos. Violence. Collapse. Fourth Turning.
Biden Loses — It’s a Lulz If Biden loses and 1 million smug Twitter liberals leave the country ASAP, then, lulz, we turn into an autocracy and that’s that. We wake up in a few years and President-for-Life Trump is invading Canada for some dumb reason.
Biden Loses — Glorious Revolution In this scenario, Trump wins but goes full Tyrant in such a way that Blues stand their ground and organize things like a General Strike and or a Women’s Strike. The U.S. Military, rather than being Trump’s SA goons, stands down and maybe uses the guise of the 14th Amendment to overthrow Trump and we have President James Mattis for a few months until a Constitutional Convention can be called up.
The 1872 Election Endgame Look it up. It’s bad
Here’s how malignant ding-dong Trump plans to rule starting in late January 2025 if he wins re-election.
On a basic level, his animal brain knows he can rely upon Red States to give him free reign to be a more traditional autocrat. As such, he realizes he has two things standing his way — Blue States and the “Deep State” found lurking within the Federal government.
So, what he believes he can do is purge the Federal government of anyone who opposes him, knowing that he can rely upon the MAGA hacks of SCOTUS to back him up. He will also use his pardon power in a gratuitous manner to allow his fascist toadies to do any number of otherwise illegal things.
Then what he does is “crush” opposition in Blue States using the U.S. Military using the Insurrection Act. So, in Blue parts of the country Trump plans to rule not as an autocrat, but as a military dictator. Meanwhile, he will browbeat the national press so no one will know how bad things have gotten in Blue States. Remember — in an autocracy, communication can be a weapon. I could even see domestic social media being regulated to an unprecended extent as 2025 progresses.
Ok. There are some weaknesses to this plot. The key one being the United States is pretty porous to the point that if the U.S. Military was killing thousands of people in Blue States, it would inevitably be discovered in Red and Purple States. ALSO, I’m not 100% sure that the U.S. Military is totally prepared to be Trump’s MAGA SA-like goons.
But I have to give Trump credit, he’s a lot closer to being the type of autocrat he admires. But there are at least two issues he simply can not avoid — the whole setup will be EXTREMELY UNSTABLE and he’s fucking old.
I feel better now, though. I have figured out what we’re up against should Trump win in 2024.
Trump Loses — gives up It’s a real possibility that all the wet dreams of earnest, well meaning liberals like Mueller, She Wrote will come true and lulz, not only does Trump lose, but he just gives up. The “Good Guys” win and that’s it. We punt our structural problems down the road another four years.
Trump Loses — demands a National Divorce In this scenario, Trump loses, but instead of just slinking away, he frantically demands a National Divorce. A lot — A LOT — would depend on, say, Texas in this scenario. There is a greater-than-zero chance that Texas could very well call up a Secessionist Convention if Trump demanded a National Divorce. This would, in turn, cause a civil war.
Too Close to call (1876 / 2000 endgame) If this happens, then, holy shit are we in trouble. The country would collapse into civil war and revolution. If we just didn’t know who the next president was going to be…whoa buddy. Chaos. Violence. Collapse. Fourth Turning.
Biden Loses — It’s a Lulz If Biden loses and 1 million smug Twitter liberals leave the country ASAP, then, lulz, we turn into an autocracy and that’s that. We wake up in a few years and President-for-Life Trump is invading Canada for some dumb reason.
Biden Loses — Glorious Revolution In this scenario, Trump wins but goes full Tyrant in such a way that Blues stand their ground and organize things like a General Strike and or a Women’s Strike. The U.S. Military, rather than being Trump’s SA goons, stands down and maybe uses the guise of the 14th Amendment to overthrow Trump and we have President James Mattis for a few months until a Constitutional Convention can be called up.
The 1872 Election Endgame Look it up. It’s bad
Oh boy. Now that it is clear to me that Trump is so fucking stupid that he wants he thinks he can get away with imposing an actual military dictatorship on the United States…yikes.
It would take a next level amount of stupidity on his part to try to do such a thing. But here we are, with the idea that that is exactly what Trump might try to do. Any other Republican and I would tell you to prepare for a garden variety autocracy.
But Trump’s fascination with the Insurrection Act is very, very troubling. If he actually tries to establish a military dictatorship because his abstract thinking ability is too weak to think of the power plays of an autocrat, we are all in A LOT of trouble.
And, yet, as I keep saying, I can’t fucking predict the future. There are plenty — plenty — of known unknowns that might allow us to punt all of our structural problems down the road. But if Trump goes full tyrant not as an autocrat, but as a would-be military dictator…you got me.
There just would be no viable endgame.
We would be going beyond just “bad optics” to the type of tyrannical behavior that might even make Traditionalists who just want brown children in cages again….to sit up and take notice.
Radical Moderates are found in William Safire’s novel “Freedom.” If that were to happen, then a group of people not seen since the American Civil War might appear in American politics — Radical Moderates. These are people who are usually Traditionalists, but, for a very brief amount of time are willing to adopt otherwise radical measures because of tectonic forces of political history.
But maybe I’m overthinking things. Maybe Trump will lose. Or something. We still have a year of stewing in our political juices to find out one way or another.
So. What are we going to do if ding-dong Trump goes full tyrant and starts to shut down the free press? The issue is *ANY* Republican who becomes president would do all the same shit that Trump wants to do, but they would be a lot more sly about it and stagger the throttling of our American birthright — democracy — over the course of a few years.
But Trump is sooooo dumb and lazy that he is going to thrash around in the first few days of his Second Term and scare the shit out of a lot of Traditionalists who are more than willing to give a huge amount of slack as long as brown children would put back in cages.
It’s because drunk cranks like me who are harmless might get thrown into a camp that Trump might, at last, lose some of the not-so-tacit support that he has with Traditionalists. But for how dumb and lazy Trump is, these Traditionalists would be more than willing to be “Good Americans” as life for every day Americans grew more and more autocratic.
It’s because of what a shocking, jarring — and conspicuous — counter revolution the first few days of a Trump second term would be that we’re potentially going to see some pretty fucking astonishing things happen. And, remember, of course, that it’s very possible that none of this will happen.
It’s POSSIBLE that either Trump loses and doesn’t manage to start a civil war through demands for a National Divorce, or he wins and because 1 million smug Twitter liberals flee the country the whole thing is a fucking luzl.
If Tyrant Trump fucks up, we may ALL be antifa starting in early 2025. Who knows. We’re still a year out from when things will probably go haywire, so maybe….we’ll just punt our problems down the road another four years like we did in 2020?
Who knows. I’m not advocating anything! I’m a man of peace, a man of ideas. I hate guns. I hate violence. I just am growing more and more alarmed at what MIGHT happen starting Election Day 2024.
It’s clear we’ve given up on liberal democracy in the United States. At the moment, at least, it seems as though Trump will win a second term and I will end up in a camp — if I’m lucky. I dare not think what would happen to my sorry broke ass if I’m not lucky.
All of this is happening in broad daylight. Trump has made it clear that he wants to be an autocrat — specifically a military dictator. And yet the mainstream press can’t even trouble itself to frame the debate around Trump’s pending re-election in the right way.
Meanwhile, I find myself having arguments with conservative relatives about over how it’s a “free speech” issue when it comes to trying to not give Nazis a platform online.
It definitely seems as though our only shot is to hope enough chaos erupts in starting in 2025 that the country becomes so unstable that the military stands down and maybe even deposes Trump. (I AM NOT ADVOCATING ANYTHING.) If that happens, then maybe we could refound the republic and have a Third Republic take the place of the failed Second Republic.
Something, something like that.
But I have my doubts. I think this is it. It’s over. The US is just going to slide peacefully into a Russian-style autocracy and that’s it.
Oh boy. Are we in trouble. As I often do, I used my far, far more conservative relative as something of a one person focus group. And, yet again, what I learned startled me. They key take away is that there is way too much slack in what Tyrant Trump could get away with before this relative — whom I love dearly — would sit up and take notice.
This is not the first time that I’ve realized this, but as we lurch closer and closer to the end of the Second Republic, my alarm grows more severe. To recap — the First American Republic was founded by George Washington, the second, Abraham Lincoln.
Now, we’re at a crossroads. Either we somehow found a Third Republic or we collapse, at last, into autocracy. Either we have a moment of crisis and then national renewal….or we’re very fucked. I just don’t know which option we’re going to pick at the moment.
It could be that this is it. We’re just going to slide peacefully into autocracy and won’t look back. The Era of Democracy will be over once and for all and I will never again live in a “liberal democracy.” Ugh. Or, of course, I may somehow escape the country and finish my six novel project in some other nation.
I just don’t think we’re prepared for how many smug Twitter liberals are going to flee the country the moment it becomes clear Trump is going full tyrant. It’s going to be quite jarring. All us Poors are going to have to fend for ourselves. Also, I still struggle with what group will serve the purpose of the Nazi SA in our transition into autocracy.
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