Tag: Trump

2022: The Year Of Peak Trump: We’re In For An “Extreme” Iran-Contra Endgame

by Shelton bumgarner
@bumgarls

It seems to me that we’re in for an “extreme” version of Iran-contra. What’s going to happen is everyone will know Trump should be impeached and convicted for this or that scandal, but nothing will happen because the base of the Republican Party loves him so much.

I fear that about 2022, Trump will do something so extreme, so insane that he will force all of us as Americans to debate what exactly it all means. The only way I could see maybe this not being the case is if the economy were to start to have trouble. Otherwise, though, Trump is going to be fine no matter what he does.

And that’s just sad.

V-log: A Liberal Ponders Trump Maybe Actually Spooking The DPRK

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

For once, at least, it seems that Trump has managed to if not do something “right,” managed to cause something beneficial to happen. It’s too bad that in this case the “madman theory” is in play and we happen to have an actual madman in the White House.

Anyway. Watch the below video, it’s fairly interesting.

Trump Is Probably Going To Survive & Prosper, Sad To Say

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I don’t have any secret knowledge that would lead me to believe this, but I do have a general sense of what’s going on. I have a feeling that in the fall of 2020, all the characters associated with the Trump Administration’s many scandals will still be on TV, still talking about how it seems Trump is going to leave office sooner rather than later.

I’m not buying. I think Trump is going to not only survive, but thrive for eight long, long years. There just doesn’t seem to be anything on the horizon that is going to get rid of the man politically. In fact, we aren’t anywhere near “peak Trump.”

If Trump should start a war with either Iran or the DPRK in the coming months and years, well, he’s only going to get even ore power. So I would suggest we use our power and energy for being politically engaged.

Oh, Come On, People, Why Aren’t We Talking About Barbara Moore & Trump?

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Now, I am the first to admit that The Daily Mail is a trash publication, but is Trump a trash person so why can’t we at least get people a little bit interested in this story about Trump having an affair in the 1990s with a Playboy bunny named Barbara Moore.

Nothing illegal happened, of course, but Trump is the president and so by definition anything as salacious as this that he’s done in his life is news. I just think we should at least be talking a little bit about it between all the commotion about Sean Hannity.

Why Trump Was Inevitable

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Let me state from the beginning that I don’t have all the political, psychological, sociological and even historical insight that I need to properly tell all of this, but I am a more than casual observer of American presidential political history and so I’m going to give it a go.

Having said that, it is clear to me that Trump — or someone like Trump — was inevitable at this moment in our nation’s history. It is obvious to me that what caused Trump was that while we were all enjoying Obama’s pleasant, scandal-free administration the Right was going completely insane. Tribal politics and its associated hatred of Obama for being the nation’s first black president made it so it was inevitable that we were going to have a completely bonkers Republican president at some point.

Add to this the headwinds of historic weakness of Hillary Clinton as a candidate and the election meddling of the Russians really the only way Trump would not have won was if he hadn’t run in the first place. But, really, if you looked at who was likely to get through the primary system at the time, it is highly unlikely that Jeb Bush was going to be the nominee. He was completely detached from the national Republican Party and everyone else who might have won was in some ways worse than Trump because no only were they insanely conservative, they were competent and had an ideology they were willing to defend to boot.

But Trump has his own unique set of bonkers qualities than make him extremely dangerous to the Republic. While he may be too lazy, unfocused and incompetent to be a true authoritarian, his complete lack of adherence to political norms may cause lasting damage to the American political landscape.

So, the issue is, there were and are structural problems with the Republican Party that the average person simply was unaware of unless they happened to catch FOX News one night. When about half the political electorate lives in an insane bubble of surreal conspiracy theories and race-induced rage, it’s inevitable that once they get their opportunity to run the country we’re in for a whole lot of trouble.

The truly tragic thing about all of this is there is no easy fix. The tectonic political, economic and demographic forces that led to the creation of the cancer that is the modern Republican Party aren’t going anywhere. It could be 20 to 30 years before things work themselves out and by the time they do the Republican Party will have turn our once independent judiciary into a bastion of Right wing nutjob hacks whose entire reason for being on the bench is to give old, wealthy white people as much power as possible.

What’s more, there’s a real chance of a civil war. There’s a real risk that we’ve gone beyond the point of no return and we’re going to have an actual civil war in the United States within the next 20 years. I have no idea if it will actually happen or not, but it’s something to worry about.

It will definitely be interesting to see what happens.

#TrumpRussia, Cambridge Analytica, Stormy Daniels & Fall Of The House Of Trump

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Something has shifted subtly. I can’t put my finger on it, but it seems as though we’ve finally, finally, begun to enter the second act of the TrumpRussia imbroglio. And it’s coming from an unexpected place — Great Britain. I have often said that it’s not like the Dutch can march in and save the United States from Trump, but maybe the Brits via their investigation of Cambridge Analytica might be about to do it.

Add to this what’s going on with the Stormy Daniels scandal and it seems as though as of right this second, we’re lurching towards a perfect storm when it comes to Trump.

This is not to say that there aren’t any number of ways Trump could weasel his way out of this. He could start a war with Iran or the DPRK. He could be successful in muddying the waters of public opinion so much that we can never pin him down. All of those are very possible.

And, yet, something really significant seems to be brewing with both Cambridge Analytica and Stormy Daniels, enough so that I feel as though we may get out of this alive just yet. As I have mentioned before, it’s almost impossible to get rid of a president and as long as Trump is power we are at risk. So, it’s almost an all or nothing kind of thing. As long as Trump is president, we face a real risk of becoming a “managed democracy” like they have in Russia.

But since everything Trump touches dies, it seems as though maybe, just maybe, it’s possible Trump will actually be brought down. But it won’t happen until after the 2018 mid-terms. And that’s where we face a pretty enormous Constitutional Crisis. If Bob Mueller finally gives Congress a report that lays out any number of reasons why Trump should be removed from office…and nothing happens…then, well, we’re all pretty well fucked.

The next few days will be pretty telling I suspect. The next few days we will get some sense of how likely it is any of this will matter. It seems as though the Stormy Daniels interview, should it be aired, could be one for the history books. It could be quite memorable.

No matter what happens, I still have hope. I still have hope that when all is said and done, Trump will be removed from office by Congress sooner rather than later. There is the odd chance that if Mueller says Trump should be charged and nothing happens that the country will get so angry that we will really be in historic times. Some pretty unprecedented things could happen.

Regardless, we’ll just have to wait and see. I have a little bit of hope, but not too much. I say keep an eye on the DPRK and Iran. Trump could, in a final act of desperation, start a war with one or both of those countries and we’ll wake up in 2025 to President Tom Cotton.

Some Scenarios Of The Near Trump Future

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I love to run scenarios in my head, so let’s sketch out various possible outcomes to what’s going on with Trump and see how close we get to what really happens.

1. The Wag The Dog
In this scenario, we’re at war with the DPRK by August and along the way Trump fires who he needs to fire and pardon’s who he needs to pardon and the whole Stormy Daniels problem vanishes down the memory hole. The war is dirty, but brief and about 1 million die. Of course, there are some curve balls that could happen during the course of the war including North Korean sleeper cells being activated and there being a real death toll of American civilians in the heartland. Or any number of other weird outcomes could occur that would not result in the things being as tidy as Trump would hope. War is hell and strange things happen all the time once you actually start them.

2. The Iran-Contra
In this one, the United States is just too divided, and the issue is just too muddied and we don’t finally pin Trump down. All we get, at best, is a televised speech where Trump wanly says he’s “sorry” and we all move on and Trump wins reelection.

3. Blue Wave: All Hell Breaks Loose
In this one, Trump fires Mueller, the Stormy Daniels scandal reaches a tipping point there’s an actual Blue Wave in November. Trump is impeached by the House and convicted by the Senate, but Trump refuses to accept the outcome and there’s a shoot out on the lawn of the White House between the Secret Service and the FBI. The United States is on the brink of civil war until Pence pardon’s Trump and actively tries to calm the situation down. Pence is worse than Trump in some ways because he has an ideology and there’s a lot of resentment against him by a large segment of the population. Also, there is the possibility that by the time all this happens we will reach such anger in the populace that even Pence is removed and we endup with a Democratic president in a round about way. Or it’s possible that if it Trump sees its obvious that he’s going to be impeached, the Vichy Republicans Congress may negotiate a deal whereby someone like Ivanka Trump may replace Pence during a lame duck session after the Blue Wave.

I honestly have no idea which one of these will happen. It’s likely it will be some muddled mixture of the three. Only time will tell.

If We See Pictures Of Trump’s Dick From Stormy Daniels’ Sexts, Will It Matter?

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

These are the times that try men’s souls.

It’s possible that Stormy Daniels has, uh, “pictures” she got during her affair with Donald Trump. I am jumping to conclusions, but if those pictures are of Trump’s junk….lulz, nothing matters? I mean, would it really matter? Trump seems to have a God-like hold on his supporters, so the whole seeing Trump’s junk probably wouldn’t phase them.

I would like to think, however, that that might be rock bottom. That once we all get to see Trump’s junk that that would be it. Trump would still be president, still have the power to ruin everything, but psychologically, we would have reached the total be-all-end-all of how bad it could possibly get with Trump as president.

But nothing matters. That 35% of the electorate who would drink Trump’s Jim Jones Kool-Aide seem to control the country now, so we’re fucked. We all so very fucked.

The Cult Of Trump #Resist

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I am winning myself no friends amongst the people I went to high school with when I call the people who still support Trump cult members. But as every day brings with it new scandals and revelations, there doesn’t seem to be any other answer but that.

Trump’s base is a cult.

What gets me is otherwise normal well-informed, educated people have succumb to this cult in such a way that they rationalize anything Trump does out of existence. In the end, it’s all rather chilling because it’s the people with logical explanations for why they can continue defend Trump that really bother me.

I was on a vacation of sorts and off the grid when it broke, but this whole Rob Porter debacle is a prime example of what I’m talking about. There is a lot going on with all of this. Something about Trump, in essence, poo-pooing domestic assault, added to his usual grab bag of misogyny, racism and bigotry is something of the last straw. I simply can’t brook such bizarre illogical behavior. How someone could possibly support a public figure who attempts to mitigate viable claims of domestic abuse is really beyond me. It is staggering that anyone could, at this point, continue to support Trump. I take violence towards women very seriously and the at best tepid response on the part of Trump to this fetid imbroglio leave much to be desired, to say the least. I find myself getting angry just thinking about it.

Ranting on Facebook about all of this doesn’t seem to matter. The Trump supporters I like on a personal level, while the ones I don’t like stick around and are oddly silent. The few times I do talk directly to my Trump supporting Facebook friends, it’s like talking to someone at Jonestown as they cruise towards the koolaid stand. They have so invested in the cancerous growth that is Trump that they’re a political zombie. They have reached a level of sheepdom that I don’t quite know what to do. They talk in a political language that is so surreal, so detached from my own personal reality that it’s literally like we’re on two different political planets.

I give then proof that Trump is a racist, they say he’s “tough on crime.” I give them any number of different reasons why they shouldn’t have voted for Trump in the first place, and they tell me Hillary Clinton was worse. This boggles my mind. I was no big Hillary Clinton supporter, but to me Clinton was a flaming pile of poop compared to the alien facehugger of Trump. I was right in 2016 and I’m right now.

The tragedy of all of this is that Trump supporters do, in fact, have any number of legitimate reasons to be furious at the established liberal order. But they got conned. They got conned by snake oil salesman who apparently put some potent mind-control substance in his elixir. My biggest fear is that Trump’s constant playing to the base, will, for various quirky reasons, actually work. It seems as though the Republican Party is hell bent on near-permanent power and if they do, they will reshape America in some pretty significant — and dystopian — ways.

It goes without saying that Trump’s victory laid bare the problems with the American body politic. I’m enough of a student of history to know that given the ebb and flow of presidential politics, it was inevitable that the situation we find ourselves in would happen. What makes it unique is Trump’s lack of an ideology and complete incompetence. Add to that his extremely ill-suited temperament and you have the makings of a pretty disastrous moment in American history.

Italy’s former prime minster Silvio Berlusconi is a lot like Trump and the only way he was extracted from power was his connection to an underage prostitution ring. I get upset and tell Trump supporters that Trump could literally strangle someone live on FOX News and they wouldn’t care, and they just chuckle and say it depended on who he strangled. Thus, at this point I honestly don’t see how Trump doesn’t serve out two terms. Trump is shaping up to be much like Reagan in how he defines his moment. The only thing that might, just might cause Trump not to be able to pick a successor — President Tom Cotton, anyone? — is, if anything, we’ve seen that by the end of a president’s second term, people grow tired and want change.

Before you get your hopes up, though, remember, Democrats were out of power on the presidential level for 12 years. It took them that long to find a new vision — the famous Third Way — that was so successful in the guise of Bill Clinton. So, it’s very possible we’re in for about 12 years of this insanity before someone bubbles up to the political surface and fixes things. Though, just as Reagan changed everything, I suspect for a lot of Trump’s changes in our political environment, there’s no going back.

You can’t screw things up this bad without changing things long-term. This doesn’t even begin to address the significant risk of continued Russian — or Chinese! — meddling in our politics for many, many years to come. It could be decades before we straiten things out and things begin to sort themselves out.

The ultimate tragedy is while liberals like me are distracted by the near daily outrages of the Trump Administration, Trump is pulling an epic fast one on us. He’s changing our government and some basic assumptions we have about the social contract in ways we simply aren’t going to be able to understand for generations to come. But, like said, this was inevitable. Trump is just putting his own bizarre spin on things.

Of #Trump, #Art & #Immigration In The Context Of The #Screenplay I’m #Writing

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

It’s interesting how the more I think about it, the more this screenplay I’m developing is about, in real terms, immigration in the Trump era. Humanity — and specifically the United States — is given the greatest opportunity in human history and the screenplay asks out loud if because of political dysfunction if anyone would be willing or able to take advantage of it.

At least, that’s my vision of the concept. I see my efforts as a stepping off point. If I’m able to finish something, anything, I can pitch it to others who might be able to make it better. I’m sure I’m going about this all wrong, but, then, I never do anything right.

The key is, of course, to simply finish something, anything, instead of screwing around and daydreaming. I have produce “paper” as they call it so I can prove that I’m actually serious about all of this. But the process itself is fun. A lot of fun. And I believe I’ve come up with a really, really unique take on the First Contact cliche. But only time will tell. Maybe I’ll grow bored of this like I have everything else.

I guess we’ll have to wait and see.