The New Normal


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Our absolute best case scenario at this point is Trump will be a one term president who has a political legacy equal to the Reagan Revolution. There will be a new normal where the Trump Deep State actively attempts to destroy the administration of any Democrat that doesn’t toe the MAGA line.

That’s the best case scenario.

I say that because the dead hand of history would suggest that Trump isn’t going anywhere for any reason. Trump is actively working to turn the United States into an autocrat state and it would make absolutely no sense for him to allow himself to “lose” for any reason.

Add to this how the Russians are very likely to hack directly into our election systems as part of a quid pro quo for Trump removing 1/3 of our troops from German and it will be the biggest shock of my adult life if Trump ever leaves office for any reason.

Even if the Russians for some reason allow a Biden landslide, the damage Trump has done to the administration of government is so horrific that I find it difficult to imagine that things are going to just snap back to “normal.” Trump is our political herpes.

Or, put another way, the only upside to Trump’s tyranny is a lot of macro pressure on our political system has been eased because craven Republicans go two things they lusted after — young hack MAGA judges and a gratuitous tax cut for plutocrats that punishes Blue States. Republicans still hate democracy because they hate the Browning of America and the rise of women as a cultural and economic force, but if the Russians don’t do what I expect and Trump loses, at least they got there two big goals.

As their base grows smaller and more angry, they will use their control of the Judiciary and Trump’s new Deep State to create the conditions for them to get back power as quickly as possible. Every time they get power, it will grow a quantum leap more difficult to get them out of power. In the end, it will become completely impossible and at some point the country implodes and it’s every man for himself.

That implosion may happen in 2020, or it may happen between now, and, say, 2028. But it is going to happen for no other reason than Republicans have learned a lot from Trump and they will re-calibrate according to his weaknesses. If the implosion doesn’t happen, it will be because the next time they get to put an autocrat in power, he will be far more focused and organized.

But I still think everything is moot. Trump is never leaving office. Most Americans aren’t willing to risk their “lives and scared honor” in the real world to do anything about it.

So, soon enough, the United States will leave NATO, form some sort of new alliance with a number of autocratic states across the world and begin snatching people off the street and pushing them out of windows. This is going to happen, it’s just a matter of how long it takes.

If it doesn’t happen, it will be because people get woke and there’s a national implosion. I’m not advocating that. I don’t want that. But the macro trends indicate that if we don’t get woke on a mass level that Republicans are hell bent on turning us into an autocratic, American version of apartheid South Africa.

The Only Way To Save The Republic Is A Biden Landslide


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There’s a very good chance that mysteriously Trump will win the electoral college in exactly the same way he did in 2016. We will all be in shock. We will write it off to all the boat parades or the “shy Trump voter” or whatever. At some point — maybe never — we will learn, however, that the Russians fucked with our election systems and threw election to Trump.

The darkest scenario, of course, is we will learn this happened before the Electors Vote, TrumpBarr lulz it and fight the issue in the courts and Trump STILL “wins” the election because of a 6-3 (5-4?) vote at SCOTUS. In fact, that definitely seems to be the failsafe for Republicans at this point. This are so rabid in their desire to win the election that they are completely oblivious to the political consequences of such behavior that it’s definitely the setup for The Big Ugly of civil war or revolution.

But, even without Russian help, if the election is anywhere close, we’re going to have not a Brooks Brothers Riot, but a Brooks Brothers War. There could be real, unprecedented political violence across the country as it becomes clear that TrumpBarr intends A Very American Coup. They already are suing everything that moves before the election, you can only assume that if they believe they have any — ANY — shot of stealing the election through extra-political means, they will pull that particular trigger.

So, really, the only way we keep the Republic is if somehow the Russians don’t do what I assume they’re going to do and Biden wins in such a massive landslide that it at least grows more difficult for TrumpBarr to pull of A Very American Coup — even though, obviously, they will try anyway.

I just don’t see how the post-election period isn’t one of unprecedented instability and even violence if Biden doesn’t win in a massive landslide. The Republican party simply doesn’t see democracy as valid if it isn’t helping them obtain or maintain power, so, lulz.

The Tyranny Of Trump’s Instability


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The thing about Trump is talks big but often folds in a dramatic, unexpected fashion. He does this all the time. And, yet, faced with the very real possibility of criminal liability should he leave office, there’s a chance he’ll destroy the United States in order to prevent that from happening.

So, you just don’t know.

What makes Trump so difficult to predict is he’s such a combination of would-be autocrat combined with incompetence and malicious showmanship that you often assume the absolute worst from him. Then, he can’t follow through. Or, put another way — it’s similar to how voters assumed they were getting the guy from The Appearance when they were just getting an empty suit.

But there is the issue of Barr. Interior Minister Bill Barr, having successfully managed the media narrative of The Mueller Report, has every reason to believe he can do the same thing with the 2020 Election. And the more difficult doing so becomes, the more radical he and Trump are likely to become.

And, yet, as I said, Trump is both so incompetence and erratic that virtually anything is possible. It could be that Trump simply salts the earth on the way out. Or he quits and gets Pence to pardon him. Or he pardons himself. There is a huge spectrum of different worse case scenarios to choose from. And all of them, given the information available, would make sense as possibly happening.

All I know is, the next three or so months are going to be just like Trump — surreal and unpredictable.

Election 2020 Known Unknowns


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

How Tight Is It Going To Be?
On one hand, you have indications that we’re going to have a massive number of people voting, which would help Democrats in general. On the other hand, it’s possible that because of the Electoral College and the 48 – 48 split of the nation that even that won’t be enough to give us what we need: a massive blowout to such an extent that it makes it much more difficult for Trump to pull off A Very American Coup.

Russians Hacking Into Our Election Systems
I rant about this a lot, but I don’t, like, KNOW that this will happen. But Russia loves Trump so much that it makes sense that Trump removed 1/3 of our troops from Germany as a direct quid pro quo for the Russians hacking directly into our election systems. I could very well see Trump just barely winning Pennsylvania — and a few other states — and we’d just write it off to the 2016 effect of a split popular / Electoral College vote. We could simply never know what the Russians did. Maybe when AOC is let out of prison in 40 years we’d find out about it. But by that point, lulz.

Is Trump Too Incompetent & Lazy?
While Trump is an autocrat, he is a very lazy and incompetent autocrat. The thing that might cause him to overcome these basic aspects of his personality would be his abject fear of going to prison after leaving office. As such, it’s possible that using Barr he will stage A Very American Coup and never fucking leave office for any fucking reason. This is a very reason possibility — especially if there is any doubt on election night who won.

Are Americans Will To Risk Real World Things?
If TrumpBarr do stage A Very American Coup, is the average American willing to actually risk things that are important to them in the real world for the sake of the country? That’s probably the biggest known unknown. It could be that while there might be a bit of violence here and there, really all that would happen is a lot of angry Twitter threads.

October Surprises
Every day we get closer to the Election, the likelihood that something fucking bonkers is going to happen to upend the whole thing. I keep thinking it’s going to be a Hunter Biden Laptop Deepfake, but who knows. One thing is for sure — we’re already an autocratic managed democracy and for Trump to not think up some bullshit October Surprise would definitely not make any sense. So, it seems logical that things are going to turn on a dime and Trump is going to magically be in the lead again.

The Big Ugly
The weird thing about Trump is he literally keeps inciting violence and no one listens to him. The question is — is it possible that the moment it seems as though Trump is actually going to lose, will Right Wing nutjobs start to blow shit up in an effort to scare us into letting Trump stay in office? Or, put another way, it definitely seems as though an extra-political solution to Election 2020 is on the table if Trump loses by every other metric. It could be that the country convulses no matter who wins the election for any reason because we’re just too divided and it’s just our fate to have a revolution / civil war in 2020.

The Trump Deep State


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

First, if Trump somehow left office — even after a massive Biden landslide — it would be the biggest shock of my life. Trump is an autocrat — if a very incompetent one — and, as such, he will never “lose” in the sense that he will never fucking leave office for any fucking reason. He would rather destroy the country, bring it to its knees, than leave office and risk personal criminal liability.

But let’s play pretend.

What I think will happen if we miraculously remove Trump physically from the Oval Office is he will salt the earth on the way out. He is going to install is own “deep state” in the Federal government that will do everything in its power to destroy the Biden Administration from within. In fact, I believe the Trump Deep State will be the biggest story of any putative “post-Trump” Era. That’s all we will talk about is how Trump appointees who are difficult — if not nearly impossible — to get rid of are doing everything in their power to hamper Biden.

We already see this with the head of American intelligence Ratcliffe. He’s an extreme MAGA partisan hack. There’s no reason to believe he won’t continue to be just that for as long as fucking possible. He’s going to actively fuck over Biden at every turn for as long as he’s in office. And Biden won’t be able to get rid of him, no matter what he does, because the entire Murdoch faux outrage machine will attack him for even thinking about it.

The point is — even if we get rid of Trump the person, his political herpes will continue to be a problem in American politics for years and years to come. And that’s the best case scenario — the worst case is the whole country goes tits up and we start killing each other. (I really hope I’m wrong on that last bit.)

Did Trump Really Get The Rona?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I hate conspiracy theories. I generally think they’re the last refuge of the intellectually dishonest. And, yet, when it comes to Trump’s case of COVID19 I’m beginning to be willing to entertain the idea that it was a hoax of some sort.

Let’s go through why.

How We Found Out
For a White House that is known for its raibid paranoia, we sure did find out about Trump having COVID19 in a rather casual way. A journalist from Bloomburg asked a question and they found out. (I think they found out about Hope Hicks having it, which led to Trump.) That is very curious. Why let such earth-shattering information just slip out without usual teeth-pulling, lies, stonewalling and general rat fucking. Just letting us find out without it being a state secret — especially with this White House — is very odd

Claudia Conway
It makes us feel all warm inside to think that 15-year-old Claudia Conway gave us the truth in a Tik-Tok video. And, relative to what she believed, I have no reason to doubt that she was telling us the truth. And, yet, it sure would make a lot more sense that instead of her mom “accidently” letting her daughter hear that Trump was near-death (or whatever) what if it was “accidently on purpose?” That sure does make a lot more sense than what we thought at the time.

Trump Is Fine Now
COVID19 usually takes weeks to recover from, not a few days. And given the side-effects of all the different drugs he was allegedly put on, you’d think he would be acting even more surreal and bonkers than he usually does. And, yet, it was pretty much just an exaggerated version of his usual fucktardness. It would make a lot more sense if he was out of commission for at least two weeks.

Now, let’s go through why this conspiracy doesn’t make any sense

The Superspreader Event Was Real
How it could be that Trump would fake a COVID19 infection after what was an actual, real superspreader event at the White House make no sense. So, that leads me to believe he really got it. Even though he was on steroids and experimental therapeutics that should have left him out of it for some time, he was able to pull through in a surprisingly short amount of time.

Trump’s White House Can’t Shoot Straight
Trump runs the White House like the Trump Org and, as such, it’s a complete shitshow. It’s so totally disorganized and leaky, that for them to successfully fake Trump getting COVID19 would require an amount of discipline that they, to date, have not shown.

So, I don’t know. I guess the only reason why I’m willing to entertain this idea at all is how much Trump lies and how much he got to “own the libs” by making them feel bad about him being sick.

The Crisis Of Anglo-America


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I love worst case scenarios because at least, then, I can prepare myself for the worst in some sort of concrete fashion. To me, the worst fear is an abstract fear because you don’t even know what you’re really afraid of.

Anyway, the conditions are there, at least for the two leading English speaking nations to completely implode this winter. The United States could implode if TrumpBarr attempts some sort of Very American Coup. The United Kingdom could implode if Hard Brexit happens on January 1st and it’s such a clusterfuck that Scotland bounces because it wants to remain a part of the EU.

I’m only dealing in conditions. It’s very possible that in the United States either Biden wins in a landslide or if Trump does win all that happens is there are a lot of angry Twitter threads and Tik-Tok videos from Claudia Conway. Otherwise, it’s a lulz. With the UK, it could be as an American I have no idea what I’m talking about and you should just, as always, ignore me with extreme prejudice.

The only reason why I think this worse case scenario is even possible is the United States and the United Kingdom have a tendency to follow each other politically on a macro level. This has happened to an eerie extent from when Margaret Thatcher won in the UK which was a prelude to the Reagan Revolution to the modern day. Who is Boris Johnson but just would-be British Donald Trump? In fact, the rise of Trump and the whole Brexit clusterfuck happened at just about the same time for similar reasons.

So, it would make sense that both those shit shows would wrap up at just about the same time, as well. Though, in the United States, if what I call “The Big Ugly” happens this fall-winter, it would be just the beginning of our problems, not the end of it.

No matter what, the Winter of 2020 is going to be a massive crisis for both the United States and the United Kingdom with no obvious endgame. We could possibly see a civil war / revolution in the United States and the simple dissolution of Europe’s last multi-ethnic state within days of each other. It could really get that deep.

One thing we all need to remember is in times of great upheaval things really don’t go in a straight line. There will be battles won and lost. Mistakes will be made for dumb reasons. And it may repeatedly look as though the forces of tyranny will win.

But in the United States, at least, I’m of the opinion that should the fucking fucktard MAGA-Qanon shitheads get their “civil war” they’re so eager to have, that the Blue States just might make them regret that wish. Or not. There’s no obvious endgame.

All I know is things are going to be lit.

The Curious State of The 2020 Campaign


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

We have two weeks before Election Day and there’s a lot — a LOT — going on. The interesting thing is on the face of it, it seems as though Trump has lost the Mandate of Heaven and we’re headed towards a historic blowout for Biden. I say this because of how tortured shows like Morning Joe are to make it seem as though the race is still up in the air and could go either way.

While that is true, if you read between the lines, it definitely seems as though they don’t want to come off as too cocky. And, yet, if you listen carefully, it definitely seems as though the conditions are there for Trump to get shellacked on Election Night.

But as I keep saying — autocrats never lose.

As such, two weeks is an eternity. So, I guess what I’m saying is at this particular moment, Trump is losing big time. But we’re always just one breaking news story away from all of that changing. Any moment now, I expect a Russian-produced Hunter Biden deep fake to pop out that will throw the whole race up in the air, leading to a Trump victory.

What makes it all so difficult for me to figure out what’s going to happen is how awful Trump is — in real terms — as an actual politician. The only reason why Trump has survived is a very specific set of macro trends that have prompted him up. In real terms, he’s a shit politician who is a massive self-own artist. Trump is just an avatar for white fears about the Browning of America and white, blue color male fears about the growing economic and culture power of women. Trump, as a person, is a lazy piece of shit who takes all of that for granted.

So, as such, at this particular moment, Trump is establishing the conditions for a pretty astonishing landslide against him. But, as I just said, those same conditions make it more likely that the Russians will hack directly into our election systems to throw the election for him and that some sort of Hunter Biden deep fake is going to appear very, very soon — like potentially within hours of now.

Too many powerful people — foreign and domestic — have a massive self-interest in Trump staying in power. So much so, that they could grow far more brazen than any of us could otherwise possibly imagine.

It’s all very difficult to figure out. We have a long fortnight ahead of us.

The Metrics Of The Hunter Biden Deep Fake October Surprise


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Let’s go through why it seems as though very, very soon a purported video (or whatever) of Hunter Biden engaged in some sort of illicit activity is probably going to pop out.

  1. Trump is a traitor
    Trump’s head is so far up Putin’s rectum that it seems logical that the Russians would do anything — anything — to keep that fucker in power. Trump is actively destroying the country and the Russians see Trump as sort of the anti-Gorbachev. Trump would rather destroy the United States than risk any personal criminal liability by not being president anymore. So the idea of him working hand-in-glove with the Russians to facilitate a deep fake Hunter Biden seems logical.
  2. Rudy
    Why go to the trouble of coming up with some bullshit “laptop” disinformation campaign if you’re not going to unlock its sinister second stage. House Trump is about as hysterical as you can get at this point in the political silly season and Rudy has been bouncing back and forth between the United States and the former Soviet Union playing spy. So, seems pretty obvious Something Bad is about to pop out and a deep fake of Hunter Biden is going to be it.
  3. Qanon
    This is just rebranded Protocols of the Elders of Zion which is an OG Russian active measure to (as I understand it) validate pogroms in the Russian Empire, so it seem as though the plan is something like this: Qanon –> Hunter Biden laptop –> Hunter Biden deep fake.

Add to this my continued belief that Trump will mysteriously win just like he did in 2016 by barely winning in some crucial swing states because the Russians hacked directly into our elections systems as part of a quid pro quo for Trump removing 1/3 of our troops from Germany and, well, lulz.

The fix is in.

At this point, the question is will Trump’s innate incompetence and tendency to self-own be enough to save the near-death Republic?

And, don’t forget, I’m of the opinion that even under the best of circumstances, we’re in for a surreal few months. We could see unprecedented political violence on the part of MAGA-Qanon. We could see A Very American Coup (and counter coup.) Nothing is off the table.

Good luck.

The Big Ugly: What I Might Be Getting Wrong About Trump’s Coming ‘Very American Coup’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner


My hysterical, dystopian predictions are almost always wrong. And, yet, given that Trump is fucking bonkers and a caged rat at this point, I have a feeling I’m not going to be too far off — Trump is never leaving office for any reason because autocrats never “lose.”

But, for the sake of argument, let’s think about what I might be getting wrong. Is it possible Trump might actually be a normal human being and leave office should he lose the 2020 election?

First — no. This is never happening.

But, again, I’m not perfect. I keep getting things wrong. So, what could possibly happen that might cause Trump to actually not do A Very American Coup with the help his hatchet man Barr?

Well, I think one thing that would have to happen is the result be massive. Trump would really have to fucking lose in such a massive landslide that it was obvious he had lost the Mandate of Heaven. I just don’t see this happening because the Russians are going to hack directly into our election systems as part of a quid pro quo for Trump removing 1/3 of our troops from Germany.

And, yet, I don’t know that that is going to happen — even though all evidence suggests it will.

So, let’s assume for some weird reason Trump actually does, in fact, lose the election. Then what? I think TrumpBarr will do exactly what they would do, anyway — sue. They will sue any obstacle to them staying in power, even to the point of causing the country to implode (The Big Ugly.) The more difficult it is for them to stay in power, the more radical they will become. The only difference might be the context — if it’s a real blowout, it might be a teeny-tiny bit more difficult for SCOTUS to rule in his favor or Republicans to suck his cock. Lulz, who am I kidding. Of course, even if the country is about to fucking implode, SCOTUS will rule in Trump’s favor and Republicans will cling as tight to House Trump as they absolutely can. I wish I was wrong on that one. But I’m note. The Big Ugly would happen in that case, no matter what.

But am I being too dystopian? I don’t think so, but maybe? I guess if Trump actually does lose — and admits it — what he’ll do is go completely bonkers for three months. He will fire anyone he doesn’t like just out of spite. The lame duck Senate will approve any number of surreal nominations. Trump will pardon Jared’s dad, Flynn, and who knows, maybe himself.

The thing about Trump is he’s so unstable and unpredictable that I have a tendency to assume the absolute worst. It could be that Trump will just continue to be his usual bonkers self and any “salting the earth” will be in his usual half-assed incompetent fashion. That really is our best case scenario at this point.

Also of note is it’s not like Trump won’t still have a Twitter account and a golden Rolodex to flip through whenever he wants to cause mischief. He knows all our secrets and he’s going to be desperate for cash.

Or, put another way, even under the best of scenarios, we’re absolutely fucked as long as Trump is alive and in debt. Good luck, folks.