Tag: Tyrant Trump

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I continued to have a sense of unease about this fall and winter. I know I’ve been writing for years about this moment in time, but that doesn’t make it any easier to process.

It definitely seems as though this maybe be it. We’re going to find out, one way or another, if the USA is going to collapse in to civil war and / or revolution because of Trump or if his election in 2016 was something of a fluke and the high water mark of fascism in the country.

I just don’t know the answer at the moment, which is the source of all of my unease. I can already see it in my mind — Trump loses, demands a National Divorce and my state, Virginia, collapses into an intra-state civil war. I have to leave my home and, before you know it, I’m living in a refugee camp in up state New York or something.

Ugh.

Or, alternately, Trump *wins* and things get so bad that I have to figure out a way to get out of the country. This is a bit tricker because, well, I have no money. But maybe there will develop some sort of “Underground Railroad” for Blues who need to get out of the country or something.

Something like that.

I just don’t know. The whole thing puts me on edge. But, I suppose, we will all learn soon enough one way or another.

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The key thing about the 2024 election is, because of the Electoral College, the fact that we have a collection of anti-MAGA interest groups going against a fascist party is hidden. As such, I just don’t know what to tell you — if Trump wins, this could be it — American democracy as we know it could be over.

Now, of course, MAGA shitheads will say I suffer from “Trump Derangement Syndrome.” The reason this is so dumb is “TDS” is more about hand waving on the part of MAGA cocksuckers than it is about having an honest political debate about anything.

Anyway, the point is — if Trump wins the key issue is how bad things might get. If Trump “autocrat-lite” like Orban in Hungary, then he can found an autocratic state in the United States pretty easily. We won’t have free and fair elections anymore — but we will have elections.

The fear is, of course, that Trump is so stupid that he will attempt to end elections all together — then we have a problem. A big problem. I just don’t see the American populace accepting something so dictatorial. There’s one thing for such tyrannical behavior to be abstract and yet another for to actually happen in the concrete.

So, I just don’t know. It will be interesting to see what happens. I hope Trump loses, but we have to prepare for him to win.

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Even though Kamala Harris is beginning to look like she might win, I’m still very uneasy about the consequences of a Trump victory. We have to take seriously the idea that Trump may very well make good on his vow to deport 20 million people.

I talk to my far more conservative relatives — whom I love dearly — and they seem either eager for the deportations to begin or simply blasé and non-committal about it all. They wave their hands and mutter something about “both sides.”

Anyway, if Trump does somehow win, I still am uneasy that he may go “full tyrant” and, as such, somehow be deposed. I have no idea how such a thing would happen, but if he really did go full tyrant…some pretty shocking and historic things could happen one way or another.

I don’t want such things to happen, but I like to think in the macro and it seems if Trump tried to deport 20 million people overnight someone, somewhere in the United States might take notice of such a shocking thing.

But, who knows. No one listens to me. And they probably shouldn’t.

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

As I keep saying, I’m prone to “magical thinking.” That is, thinking that really doesn’t have much connection to reality. It’s the type of weird thinking that caused people to think that they could cure COVID by….drinking bleach?

But given improvements in AI video technology, I have an unease about what might happen in the near, near future. The plot of Live Free or Die Hard revolves around some huge terrorist attack being faked via the use of deep fake technology (or something.)

I just worry…what if something like that happened as part of us careening towards civil war / revolution in late 2024, early 2025? I worry.

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

No matter what happens this fall, there is a real risk of domestic political violence in the United States at a level not seen since the end of the Civil War. There is a non-zero chance that the most powerful nation the world has ever seen could buckle because of some pretty dumb shit.

What’s worse, the state I live in — Virginia — is two states, one Red, one Blue, fused together who hate each other. So if the absolute worst happens, there’s a good chance that I will become a domestic political refugee.

I wish I was joking, but I’m not. I could literally have to make good on all my quips about “heading North.” And I’m sure — sure — that somehow I’m going to endup in some sort of waystation in Maryland before I being shipped to a bigger refugee camp somewhere like upstate New York or maybe Maine.

But we have to start to buckle down and game out, on a personal basis, what the fuck we’re going to do should the absolute worst happen. I’m not smart enough to tell you what you should do, but I can tell you that you need to take all of this seriously.

We could be seriously f u c k e d no matter what happens. If Trump wins, he could go full tyrant and be deposed, which would cause a civil war when Red States leave the Union. If he loses, he could demand a National Divorce and…civil war.

But I am known for magical (over) thinking and so…maybe nothing will happen? Maybe Project 2025 will happen, about 1 million smug Twitter liberals will leave the country….and that’s it? About 20 million people will be put into camps, God-only-knows-what will happen to them and it will be just a Big Meh?

I just don’t know what is going to happen. No one does. But I would definitely accept that This Could Be It.

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have no idea what’s going on with Biden, but all things being equal, he should drop out of the race and let an open, brokered Democratic convention take place. Then all this weird angst going on within the highest ranks of the party can have some catharsis.

The goal would be, of course, that after all the yelling — and amazing TV — that the party would be far more united against Trump and the forces of tyranny and fascism that he leads. But, I don’t know what to tell you. I’m getting a strong 1872 American election mixed with 1933 Germany election vibe with this current election.

Biden is so old, it’s very, very easy to imagine him shuffling off this mortal coil at, like, the absolute worst moment — which would be any time after election day. But I’m known to be really paranoid about such things. And I am prone to magical thinking.

So, I dunno. I do think that Biden has lost the collective Mandate of Heaven when it comes to the leadership of the Democratic Party and, as such, he should step aside, even if he continues to have a lot of support with the base. I’m kind of indifferent.

I still support Biden and think he can win, but, it definitely seems as though that’s kind of moot at this point. The momentum is there for him to drop out and, well, there you go.