As someone who has a lot of Traditionalists in my family, I feel Sydney Sweeney’s pain when it comes to having family members whose politics you disagree with. While no one in my family wears red MAGA caps, the situation is similar.
And, yet there is also the Germany expression about how if you have 12 people at a table — 11 Nazis and 1 non-Nazi — you have 12 Nazis at the table. Seeing all those MAGA people in Sweeney’s family and the public’s reaction to it definitely gives us a reminder of how polarized America is at the moment.
But I do think we should give her a pass. She can’t be held responsible for the political views of her relatives. That’s just life. We all have to deal with how we can be different than people we’re related to. That’s a universal problem and we just have to accept that it’s possible that while she loves her relatives, she can also totally disagree with their politics.
This particular controversy is definitely an indication of how America is, in general, spiraling towards a very dark future. If politics starts to tear families apart, we definitely are entering a new antebellum era. But, for the most part, I would just say, “Sydney Sweeney alone.”
The issue of the moment is if Trump will pay any — any — political price for stealing dozens of Top Secret documents. At the moment, I don’t think so. I think he’s going to get away with it. And if he doesn’t there is a real risk of unpreceded political violence.
Things are so fucked up right now with American politics that the most logical outcome is Trump potentially causing the death of CIA agents will be that the MAGA New Right not only shrugs it off, but clings ever tighter to Trump. I am growing seriously concerned that we’re going to reached something akin to a political Upside Down where Trump goes transactional and single handedly starts a civil war in the United States.
The only reason why NARAlago happened in the first place is Trump simply refused to do what he was asked to do when it was done politely. It’s just not in Trumps nature to abide by what any other normal person would do in a similar situation. So, because he’s a malignant idiot, he forced the Federal government to swoop in and take what they couldn’t otherwise get.
But, again, I think we’re mistaking that for any sort of likelihood that Trump will ultimately be held accountable in a court of law. In the end, NARAlago will simply increase the partisan divisions in the United States and be forgotten except for a few of the usual suspects on Twitter.
As I keep saying, there are a number of instances where Trump could single handedly start a civil war in the United States. If he is the 2024 Republican nominee instead of DeSantis, the risk of a civil war grows significantly because of how radical his second term agenda will be.
It definitely seems as though this is the nadir of the year. All the wealthy liberals are preparing for Burning Man where they hope to do anonymous butt stuff with some random Plebe. Meanwhile, this could be the calm before the storm for everyone else.
A lot of “thought leaders” are so tuned out at the moment that when they finally jack back into the world in early September that the various crisis we are dealing with at the moment will lurch forward. And that doesn’t even begin to address the issue of the 2022 midterms.
If Republicans gain power again, we are all very, very fucked. It’s going to get really dark really quick. Remember, there is always a chance that Trump might demand to be Speaker of the House, especially if you think about how there’s at least a chance that he might face an indictment. (I find this very dubious, however.)
What will become clear in January 2023 if Republicans gain control of the House is how quickly they will move to impeach both Biden and Harris just for existing. And, what’s more, as I’ve written before, they might get so excited that they impeach Biden accidently on purpose. At least the first time. There is a lot of bent up rage within the fascist MAGA Republicans to get revenge on Democrats about impeachment and, as such, Biden and Harris will be impeached simply out of momentum.
So, as I keep saying, I suggest you enjoy these last few days of living in a semi-functioning democracy (anocracy.) America remains a nation on edge and there’s a good chance that things will grow very, very bumpy a lot sooner than you might think.
I don’t know anything about anything. I’m often, if not usually, wrong. But here, nonetheless, is my hot take on the question of the moment — “Will Trump be indicted?”
No. I don’t think he will be. I think, in the end, this will be just another Bad Thing that is baked into the cake when it comes to Trump. I say this because it’s clear that Republicans have done a gut check and since the base is fired up about what happend — and not in a good way — they have decided to hunker down and cling to Trump even tighter.
Now, remember, Trump is a very complex historical figure because not only is he just an avatar, a vessel for white Christian rage, he also refuses to get out of the way to DeSantis can finish the job he started. What’s more, even if he did get out of the way, then, like I said, we’re doomed in a different way. DeSantis (or someone like him) will become America’s first autocrat and that will be that. We’ll wake up in 20 years and wonder why DeSantis is still president. We’ll also wonder why we have to use VPN to watch the BBC talk about how horrible things are in the United States.
The other alternative, obviously, is civil war. And if Trump is the 2024 Republican nominee then the likelihood of a National Divorce grows dramatically because he always says the “quiet part out loud.” He will cheat to win the 2024 election, even if he doesn’t have to. Trump is such a chaos agent that there are not one but three ways he could start a civil war.
If he got indicted, I could totally see him go transactional and demand Red states begin the process of leaving the Union. Texas’ autocratic state government already talks like it has one foot out the door as it is. Just by calling up a Secessionist Convention, Texas would spook the Federal government to the point that they would ultimately shy away from doing anything with Trump criminally.
Meanwhile, there remains the lingering possibility that Trump will demand to be the Speaker of the House should Republicans take Congress in the fall. Even though I’m notorious for overestimating Trump’s mental abilities, even with his political grunt tendencies, I could see him use the threat of Red States leaving the Union as a bludgeon against Blue Senators when the inevitable impeachment trials of Biden and Harris happen.
The third way Trump might personally start a Second American Civil War would be as part of the 2024 presidential cycle. Either he so brazenly steals the election that Blue States begin to leave the Union or his second term agenda is so radical that that, unto itself, is enough to push Blue states — starting with California — out of the Union.
So, no, I don’t think Trump will be held accountable in any way for stealing America’s top secrets. We’re careening towards a very, very dark fate of either civil war or autocracy and this particular severe crisis will be just among the top five or so worst things Trump has done since 2015.
I just don’t think the recent revelations regarding Trump and secret documents at Mar-a-Lago will break the MAGA fever dream. Two things are at work. One is, MAGA is a fascist movement that is the result of a number of deep seated, structural problem with the United States. There’s just no way to abate the rise of white Christian rage. That’s why we face — most likely in 2024 – 2025 — the existential choice of autocracy or civil war.
We may all be antifa soon enough.
Meanwhile, there is the issue of Trump himself. We’ve reached the point where virtually everyone in American politics is doing some wish-casting in regards to Trump potentially not running for office in 2024. Everyone from Ron DeSantis, who is salivating over the prospect of being America’s first autocrat to your rabid Leftist simply would prefer Trump to retire and stop being the political monster that he is.
But he’s just not going anywhere. If he’s indicted, then he announces his 2024 run earlier than he might otherwise. And if he’s not indicted, then he runs because he is above the law and he has a very radical National Socialist-like agenda to enact in his second term.
And one thing I would like to point out — we can’t mistake the Federal government finally getting fed up and raiding Mar-a-Lago for any indication that their going to do anything else. It could be that given the political implications of indicting someone like Trump they will choke and simply hope for the best.
I say this because there a very real chance that Trump could go transitional if he is indicted. Even though Trump is a lazy idiot and I wonder if he has enough abstract thought abilities to handle destroying the United States, maybe being indicted will focus his mind. My fear is that Trump will begin to rant that Red states need to leave the Union so he can live his life in peace. States like Texas would definitely take him up on such a suggestion because it’s a state with a very autocratic government.
The Federal government knows all of this and so I think in the end that Trump is going to escape — again. This is going to be just thing about Trump baked into the cake and that’s it. This will set up the 2024 battle royale between MAGA fascism and a bunch of still-clueless liberals. Which way things go — autocracy or civil war — I still can’t game out.
I do know, however, that if Trump is the 2024 Republican nominee we are in deep, deep trouble. The prospect of civil war, with Blues leaving the Union increases significantly. DeSantis is enough of a “normal” politician that he could hoodwink the people necessary to become POTUS and gradually strangle democracy.
The case can be made that if Biden frames the 2022 elections in as start as terms as possible — fascism versus democracy — that we might see an unexpected upset in November. I have extremely low expectations at the moment. And I’ve already begun to game out how dark the period between January 2023 and January 2025 will be in the United States.
We all may be anti-fascist soon enough.
But if we can somehow hold the line against the rising tide of MAGA tyranny, then we will definitely be in a little bit of a better position going into the massive clusterfuck that will be the 2024 election cycle. I can not impress upon you enough how potentially dramatic and violent the 2024 presidential cycle might be. I just don’t see it being a free and fair election because the entire point of the Republican Party at this point is to steal the 2024 election. That’s all they want. All they want is to establish an autocracy in the United States. And all they have to do is gain power once — once! — and that’s it.
The key issue to remember is we can’t punt the existential crisis America faces down the road anymore. Everything is coming to a head in late 2024, early 2025. By definition, if a Republican wins in 2024, we’re going to go down the path of autocracy. If we’re lucky, we settle somewhere around Hungary or Turkey. If we’re not so lucky, we endup somewhere between Russia and Nazi Germany.
Things are really that dire.
Barring a Unity Ticket for 2024, however, I do think that if Biden begins to articulate why the MAGA New Right is old school fascism, that that will really help to clarify in the minds of voters an general unease they probably are feeling already about the extremism of the Republican MAGA New Right.
Things are so volatile when it comes to the Republican Party, even if Democrats were able to miraculously win the 2024 election fair and square Republicans probably would either steal the election or grow extremely violent. What happen on January 6th would pale in comparison to the amount of violence we will see if Republicans lose — or aren’t able to successfully steal the 2024 eletion.
Those motherfuckers really are out for blood, I’m afraid.
I just don’t think we appreciate how unstable the United States is at the moment. We’re a powder keg. A nation on edge. And, really, to some extent what’s saved us is Trump is not a Great Historical Man. He’s just an idiot who does nothing but be himself. He is too stupid and too lazy to do the hard work necessary to bring down the country.
This is unlike Hitler, who while being notoriously lazy, was adept enough to bend history to his will once he was given the opportunity. Trump is like a spoiled brat. He thinks he can get what he wants just by ranting a lot and vaguely insinuating that his supporters should do this or that thing. Hitler at least had the gumption to go transactional as necessary to get what he wanted.
Now, obviously, what everyone within Republican ranks wants is for Trump to get out of the way so DeSantis cane become POTUS and become America’s Putin. But Trump is a political monster and he won’t do that. So, we find ourselves in something of a pickle. The issue is — Trump, unto himself, could start a civil war.
He is notorious for saying the quiet part out loud to the point that he could easily breeze to re-election in 2024 (even though he will still cheat, obviously) and his agenda for his second term will be so radical and fascist that Blue States, starting with California will begin to head for the doors. The we have a National Divorce which either sees the country break into two after a brief, violent war or something far darker happens. And that doesn’t even begin to address the possibility that instead of a National Divorce we have some sort of pitched battle — with WMD used — to figure out who gets the USA “brand.”
But I just don’t see that happening. We’re most likely to just slip into autocracy and that will be that.
There are brand name members of the Far Right who say some seriously dumb shit. But they say it because there is so much frothy excitement within the MAGA base that they know it plays well. Sometimes, what they say is so surreal as to be easily dismissed by “normal” people — while the MAGA New Right laps it up and wants more, more more. Take this, for instance:
The above is a classic frothy comment. The key issue is, this type of bullshit sentiment eventually drifts drown to your crazy MAGA uncle who says it over Thanksgiving dinner without even realizing where it came from.
I try to keep my cool with all this anti-democratic talk on the part of the MAGA New Right, but it can be pretty difficult. What gets me is Republicans make it absolutely clear what their vision for America is — autocracy — and yet way too many people, especially in the press, lulz it.
We are in so much trouble as nation. We’re far more unstable than we’re prepared to admit to ourselves. And all this frothy, anti-democratic and sometimes violent rhetoric that the MAGA New Right spews out on a regular basis is all a part of that.
I don’t have any ready answers. We’re fucked. If I could get out of the country, I would. But I can’t because I’m so poor. So, I guess I’ll have to figure out some way to survive in either civil war America or autocratic America.
When talking about the idea of a Second American Civil War, you first need to define what you mean by “civil war.” It’s my impression from my Webstats that what most of the people who come to this obscure Website are looking for is an answer to the question, “When do I get to murder liberals for political reasons without having to worry about going to prison?”
Unlike civil war scholar Barbara F. Walter, I believe that it’s highly unlikely that the United States will have a civil war that’s like the Troubles of Northern Ireland. Such an idea suggests that there would come a point when MAGA would, in a spasm of hate, just start to randomly blow shit up out of spite. While I suppose that’s possible if Trump specifically told MAGA to do that — or if, say, Trump shuffled off this mortal coil for some reason — it makes a lot more sense to me that if there is a Second American Civil War, it will happen because of a National Divorce.
So, let’s say there is a National Divorce. So what? What would that be like?
Well, it would suck. A lot.
Probably what would happen if there was a 2ACW would be the extensive use of WMD by both sides. Our best bet is that there is a short, but violent National Divorce that lasts months, not years. The two sides finally won’t have to deal with each other and Blue States get a lot Bluer and Red states get a lot Redder. There would Blue USA and Trumplandia USA and they would absolute hate each other just as much as they currently do, only they would live under different government systems and have different passports.
The worst case scenario is, of course, that the two sides have a fight to the death to see who gets the USA “brand.” If a civil war becomes a zero-sum game then well, we would have a catastrophe on our hands. It would suck very, very bad. The United States, the most powerful nation in the world, would bomb itself into oblivion.
And, what’s worse, is because of EMP from a-bombs being used, large parts of what was once the United States would have no electricity and no use of any electronics at all. It would definitely have a very End of the World vibe to it.
But that’s the absolute worst case scenario. Though, I have to admit that if there is any sort of 2ACW, then WW3 is going to happen.
In short, if there is a 2ACW, it would be so catastrophic not just for America but the world that it would probably cause the death of more people than WW2. But I think if there’s going to be a civil war, it’s going to happen in 2024 – 2025 and it’s going to be because Blues decide to leave the Union. It will be Blue States, not Red States, who demand a “National Divorce.”
If what happened in 2020 is any indication, the first sign that we would have that something was amiss in 2024 would be on the local level. Instead of people who simply do their job as Americans and do the rather perfunctory duty of certifying the win of A Democrat, this doesn’t happen. In crucial voting districts all across swing states, Bannon’s “spiritual shock troops” either refuse to certify the win of A Democrat, or they go so far as to YOLO things and switch the win to Trump.
As this happens, the tension in United States escalates day by day. The very rallying cry of MAGA in 2020 — “Stop The Steal” will be adopted by the center-Left when it becomes clear that the MAGA New Right is hell bent on brazenly stealing the 2024 election in broad daylight.
But remember, the center-Left has a very different personality than the MAGA New Right. The center-Left, for all it’s problems with “cancel culture” and being “woke” is still actually connected to reality. So, there would be a struggle between the natural inclination of centrist Liberals to let the “process work” and Leftists who would want to burn everything to the ground given how corrupted everything had become.
All of this turmoil on the local level would find elections in crucial states thrown into the political realm where MAGA state legislatures and Secretary’s of State would begin to actively ensure that A Democrat is prevented from winning. Every day between Election Day 2024 and Certification Day 2025 things would grow more and more unstable in the United States as it became clear that Bannon’s long-planned “administrative coup” was actually going to work.
There would be mass confusion. Lots of lawsuits
And, remember, if Trump is involved, as all of this is going on, he would do everything in his personal power to rile up both sides. If his ongoing, progressive cognitive decline has gotten bad enough, he might even go transactional.
It would be around this point that I could see Blue governors begin to make serious plans to leave the Union. A lot would depend on what California was willing to do. But it would definitely make sense that California would be the first state to call a Secessionist Convention in preparation of leaving the Union if the 2024 election is, in fact, stolen.
But by some point between Thanksgiving and Christmas, you could see some sort of summit of Blue Governors where they debate their plans to leave the Union if the very thing that the MAGA New Right wants — to turn the United States into an autocracy — actually happens.
And as we approached Certification Day in January 2025, the last step in the crisis would happen. If you thought Certification Day 2021 was bad, just wait until Republicans are actively going over and above what they did then when it rolls around in 2025. So, the system will have been corrupted at both the local and state level. And then if that doesn’t work, Republicans will again try to throw the election into the House and Senate to buy time, if nothing else.
So, let me be clear — anyone who thinks we’re going to have some sort of MAGA New Right revolution a la The Turner Diaries — is a fool. Any Second American Civil War we have is probably going to be started by Blue States leaving the Union out of disgust that the fix is in.
Therefore, by the time Certification Day 2025 rolls around, it could very well be a foregone conclusion that we’re going to have a pretty organized civil war. Republicans have no shame and don’t apparently care about the consequences of their actions, so, lulz, we could find ourselves in the absolute worst of worlds because not only are states actively thinking about leaving the Union around this time, but the whole process of figuring out who is POTUS will be languishing in Congress. Republicans, because they are politically blood thirsty and will cheat, will win the power struggle, but there’s a chance states will begin leaving the Union.
It won’t be deranged, individual MAGA New Right blowing stuff up in some sort of rearguard action. It’s going to be a Blue Nation verses a Red Nation. A lot of the same things that happened in the First American Civil War will happen in the second. The U.S. Military will implode as people from Blue States leave it to establish a new Blue State military.
But one thing we have to expect in late 2024 to early 2025 is a mass migration of people across the country as people no longer feel safe living in an area of the country that doesn’t fit their politics. It could be rather frightening.
If it were, God forbid, to happen, I would guess that a Second American Civil War will begin between Certification Day 2025 and Inauguration Day 2025. In other words, as Trump is being sworn in, mass chaos will have erupted across the United States.
Once the hollowed out American military turns it attention to the Blue rebellion at the behest of Trump, it won’t be too long before WMD are sized and used by both sides. Not only would America bomb itself into oblivion with its eyes wide open, but it will be done in the context of WW3 definitely breaking out across the globe because the US will be too busy imploding to ensure the continuation of the post WW2 global order.
How’s that for a New World Order.
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.
Or, put another way, we’re fucked. We’re totally, completely fucked one way or another. Either we turn into an autocracy or Red and Blue begin to murder each other in cold political blood. The usual outcome of all this bullshit that we have come to expect — simply muddling along until we come to some solution one way or another — is not longer a valid option.
I only write this because I’m aware of how many private mercenaries and thrill seekers there are in the Lone Star State. Anyway, if there was a civil war like I fear might happen in the United States between now and January 2025, what happens to Texas?
Texas is very complicated because what should be happening — the state gradually becoming a safe Blue state — is being stymied by its autocratic state government. As such, there is already a real disconnect between the will of the people and how the state is actually governed.
But the key thing we have to remember is if there was a 2ACW that was started by Red States, rather than Blue States, then Texas might even be the first state to call a Secessionist Convention.
Two other things to consider. First, Texas would likely implode into intra-state civil war. There would be a pitched battle to for control of the state and I could see future school children learning all about The Battle of Austin as Reds try to take that dollop of Blue.
Also, the state would be the front line if Blue forces from California swooped across the country in an effort to re-unite the nation. I have my doubts that this latter thing would happen. I say this because the war aims of Blues might be simply to have a clean national divorce.
But Texas is so big and so Purple that I think if there was a civil war — no matter which side started it — it would be a complete shitshow. A catastrophe. Let’s not have one, shall we?
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