Tonight, I was repeatedly pushed eerie videos on Tik-Tok. Given that I had a long and interesting conversation about Tik-Tok’s ability to push “eerie” content to me with someone today, it’s almost like the service is taunting me at this point.
Here’s what happened.
I had a wide-ranging conversation with someone today over beer and pizza and at one point he mentioned how an online friend he met in person was “tiny” compared to what he expected. Well, lo and behold, what happens today, but I get pushed a video about that exact fucking thing — how tiny another woman was!
Then, I’ve been pushed what seems like six or so videos about elevators, of all things. And what did I think about intensely in the last 24 hours since I’m living in a hotel this weekend?
Elevators!
What the fuck is going on? How could the Tik-Tok “algorithm” figure out that I, specifically, was thinking about elevators a lot in the last few days. Or, more specifically, if you follow the logic that what I’m seeing in aggregated assumption about people like me, then why would there be a few thousand people like me who the “algorithms” thought would be interested in elevators of all things. I have no written about the situation with elevators. I have not spoken to anyone about it. The only metric by which elevators have come into my life at all has been in my thoughts.
I’m still not prepared to go full crank and actually believe Tik-Tok can read our minds, but…I dunno, man, something spooky is definitely going on.
Any discussion of how the MAGA New Right has a craven hatred of the otherwise prosaic Dr. Fauci has to address a central issue: deep down inside, Trump craves the validation of liberal elites. It’s what drives him. It eats him away inside so much that he ran for president to force them to take him seriously.
Add to this that Dr. Fauci wouldn’t kotow to Mad King Trump and it was extremely difficult for Trump to fire Dr. Fauci and you have the makings of a battle royal.
Also, even more important to understanding all of this is every moment we’re fighting over Dr. Fauci is a moment we’re not talking about how Trump, personally, caused 600,000 excess COVID19 deaths through his rank incompetence.
As such, it’s a win-win for the MAGA New Right to turn Dr. Fauci into a boogie man. They don’t have much of a winning hand when it comes to COVID19, so they hate on him to such an extent that just the invocation of his name is so loaded as to cause a fight between a progressive and a MAGA New Right person.
If January 6th taught us anything, it’s that it’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt. So, given how much I love dystopian scenarios, this particular tragedy writes itself.
Should, God forbid, anything happen to the poor man, Republicans will be quiet for about 24 hours with vague statements about “thoughts and prayers.” Then, once they have their talking points figured out, they’ll say this is an issue of mental health and OBVIOUSLY they can’t be held responsible for the tragedy.
What makes Trump so dangerous is he keeps being himself when it comes to the sham Cyber Ninjas “audit” of the 2020 Arizona presidential election results, which leads you to wonder if something like a far worse version of January 6th could happen because of it.
Chauncy Gardner, only far more dangerous.
That’s the thing about Trump and January 6th — he had absolutely no idea what the endgame for his ranting would be. He’s not smart enough to do the basic autocratic plays necessary to pull off an actual coup, so he just ranted about the Big Lie in abstract terms.
So, Trump and his toadies went through all this trouble to see if they could get Pence to not certify the election, but they didn’t really think through the political or historical consequences of their actions. There was no guile, at least on Trump’s part. His January 6th machinations were little more than a very stupid political grunt.
Trump suggests he’ll be returned to office following state-level audits of the 2020 election (he won’t be returned to office) pic.twitter.com/K2hOpfvqr9
The same thing with what’s going on with Cyber Ninjas in Arizona. Trump knows he wants to become president as quickly as possible — even if it means destroying the country in the process — but he’s a spoil little brat and thinks if he just uses The Secret enough that the law of attraction will make it happen. And, so, the rest of us are left wondering what’s going to happen.
To date, nothing has happened.
But Trump has begun to talk in concrete terms about the “decertification” of election results in states across the country and he honestly thinks he’s going to be “reinstated” because of such bullshit, even though it’s not, in anyway, possible.
And, as such, my prediction that we could go from “decertification” to “nullification” to “secession” seems a fair bet for a possible near future crisis.
But there’s a hitch.
On paper, it definitely seems as though my dystopian civil war scenario is possible. But at the same time, for such a thing to happen, Trump would have to not only go transaction in a concrete way, but Republicans in critical states would have to take him seriously and literally.
What Republicans like Trump want, I think, is simply have the abstract idea of decertification as a talking point to rile up the base and to make money. They see it as a possible way to maybe give Trump the option of being Speaker of the House when Republicans inevitably flip that chamber in 2022.
And, yet, as January 6th shows, it’s possible that things will take on a momentum all their own and if Trump rants about “decertification” enough, the the base will demand something be done about it. Then elected officials in MAGA states across the country will feel so much pressure that “Decertification Conventions” will be held.
Before you know it, because of mission creep, we go nullification then secession.
Then you start talking about the provisional Trumplandia federal government and how many Republicans are willing to jump off a cliff to join this new Red State collection of states.
But I think that at the moment, that’s really pushing things. Trump is all talk and a scaredy cat to boot. He just doesn’t have the autocratic chops to do all these dystopian things I come up with. This is something he’s proven again and again.
As such, I think we’re going to kick the crisis of civil war down the road until the 2024 – 2025 timeframe.
So, there I was, talking to a bartender who in April 2016 would have been equally split between Trump and Bernie, when a guy walked up to him and showed him on his phone what was obviously a Facebook post. The guy said with baited breath that somehow through some sort of nullification process that all the COVID19 vaccines we have were about to no longer have emergency approval.
The person who said this was so absolute in his conviction that this Facebook was factual that it got ME doubting things. So I looked on Twitter to see if this was some sort of breaking news I didn’t know about.
Surprise! Nope.
So, apparently, there is some serious bullshit bouncing around Facebook when it comes to the various COVID19 vaccines. I’ve talked to some of my conservative relatives and it’s an absolute struggle to get them to agree to what is simply a cold hard fact: vaccines safe lives. And when once we are on the same page, they act like they’ve made some sort of horrible concession that they’ll never forgive themselves for.
So, I don’t know what to tell you. It’s very possible that the fall and winter could be something of a crisis AGAIN when it comes to COVID19.
The sense I get is my prediction that America in late 2024 to early 2025 will face the existential choice of civil war or autocracy is holding up. There’s a chance the Cyber Ninjas “proving” Trump “won” in Arizona or Speaker Trump might force the issue earlier, but, in general 2024-2025 seems to be it.
I’m so involved in my own center-Left echo chamber that it’s easy for me to forget that there are people who actually support Trump’s bullshit. They’ve become a lot more self-conscious about it, but they still support him. Not everyone, obviously, New Right talking head Jesse Kelly is all in on “Trumpism without Trump” and whenever you call him on some racist or asshole thing this would entail he just shrugs and says, “Welcome to the New Right!”
Anyway, this leads me to think a lot about what the endgame of an autocracy would be if we pick that option instead of civil war. What’s going to happen is Twitter and people like Norm Ornstein will grow apoplectic that our democracy has finally died. Meanwhile, MAGA New Right people will become quite smug.
Just as with Putin’s United Russia Party (I think that’s it name) the Republican Party will be the infrastructure for the autocracy and that’s it. At first, nothing will change. But then, in fits and starts the vice grip of autocracy will follow its function and the media will be purged. It will grow so difficult to vote that voting rates plunge.
There will be the occasional mass protest here or there that is promptly ignored. And, all my rhetorical quips about people — like me! — being pushed out of windows by ICE will be a pretty cold, hard realty.
And it will be taken for granted as just “life in America” like gratuitous gun violence. At some point, wealth liberal job creators will have seen enough and they will leave the country entirely. Until, of course, President Pompeo gets mad and makes it almost impossible to either get a passport our get out of the country.
Form. Follows. Function.
I guess what I’m trying to say is — when autocracy comes to America it’s going to be surprisingly popular. At least with those who still identify as Republican. That’s what they want, they want an autocracy. The only time they will grow unhappy with this new arrangement is when it becomes personal. Then they will get upset — in private — and regret what they allowed to happen.
Too late, shit for brains.
I have to accept that given what a loud mouth I am, that once I don’t have the luxury of living in a liberal democracy I’m going to run afoul of our new autocracy rules. I joke a lot about getting pushed out a window, but, sadly, that could very well be my fate if we have a President Pompeo or Cotton or Hawley or even DeSantis.
All the people who thought I was hysterical about that possibility over the years will shrug and say I had it coming.
What the fuck is up with Joe Rogan bringing on people who can’t hack the hyper competitive environment of SNL? Now, let me be clear — I BARELY listen to Rogan’s podcast on Spotify, but from what I’ve seen of the clips on YouTube there is a recurring theme. And that theme is SNL is some sort of shitty place to work where everyone is out to get you.
This, of course, is bullshit.
What I think is going on is there two things. One, Rogan probably couldn’t get on to SNL and he resents that. Two, the idea that SNL is some sort of viper’s nest plays into Rogan’s New Right lite grievance politics.
What is really going on is this — SNL is competitive as hell. Either you sink or swim. If you can survive — and thrive — in such an environment, then you have what it takes to be a huge star.
But Rogan brings on people who hate that type of environment and they sit around talking about what a shitting place SNL is. Ugh.
Shelt Garner @sheltgarner I’m on one of my regular writer’s retreats and I went to a nearby bar for dinner. The bartender was very vocal about everything he thought was wrong with America.
It soon became obvious to me that in 2016, he was the guy who supported Trump and Bernie Sanders equally. He was just angry in general about “the Deep State” and felt everything would be fixed with term limits and tort reform.
Once I got over my shock at what I was encountering, I decided to use him as an “in” to the the angry mob that elected Trump president in 2016. I’ve been toying with the idea of if I was Steve Bannon, who would I pick at the next Trump. The only person I can think of at the moment is Chris Pratt. He’s personable, conservative (for Hollywood) and would be easy to use as the type of Trump-like empty vessel that Bannon loves.
Now, there are a few problems.
The biggest problem is much of the nation is once bitten twice shy when it comes to that type of candidate. So, it makes sense that that gambit is no longer viable. From a political operative perspective, you probably need to spend your energy on Pompeo, or Hawley or Cotton or DeSantis. You just can’t get away with running a Trump-like dingus again.
Anyway, the fact that I actually talked to a guy who in April 2016 would have been equally interested in Trump and Bernie kind of blows my mind. All I know is, he fit the bill of that type of mythical voter.
I’m really struggling with the (new) first book in this four book thriller series I’m working on. But I definitely get the sense that there’s something there. I just have to be willing to put the work in to make this as great a yarn as I know it can be.
But it’s not going to be easy, just as it hasn’t been easy the last several years I’ve been working on writing a novel. I’ve redoubled my studying of Stieg Larsson’s stuff and I noticed something: he doesn’t cover every single solitary day in the chronology of events.
He focuses on one or two important days. I used to think that The Girl Who Played With Fire was the perfect textbook for me to use to write my own novel, and now I realize, on a structural basis, it’s not
It doesn’t really follow the structure I need. So,lulz.
But I do still study it a lot to get some sense of how to write A Novel, just maybe not My Novel.
I saw this on Twitter and had to comment. Sometimes, I feel like I’m just talking into the aether when it comes to my fears that at some point between now and January 2025 the United States is going to face the existential choice of civil war or autocracy.
So, when I read the above imagine on Twitter I almost gasped — this is just the type of talk that one would expect from a modern antebellum America. On a basic level, I just don’t know what exactly California is doing to Texas that is so bad to warrant bloodshed on a mass scale.
All things being equal, the United States — Texas and California included — is a stable and prosperous nation. There’s no need for the individual states of the United States to be at each other’s throats. Also, as I have mentioned repeatedly on this blog, there’s a big difference between being in peace afforded the luxury of being a latte sipping soyboy and having to put your blood on the line to defend your personal freedom.
As such, at the moment, it’s easy to see why a ding-bat Texas nationalist might think California would collapse like a “rotten door” as Hitler might say. I would suggest that if the United States actually buckled AND California felt it was in its self-interest to fight the good fight against seditionist Red States that we would all be very impressed with how well they will fight.
A lot of what the MAGA New Right thinks about places like California is complete self-serving bullshit that once put to a test is going to come back bite them. In other words — California has a huge population and economy that could easily be converted to a deadly weapon of war should it be put on a (civil) war footing.
And, yet I doubt anything can stop the momentum, the dead hand of history, that is hurdling us towards civil war or autocracy.
Upon the news that Lorne Michaels will be feted as part of upcoming Kennedy Center Honors festivities, I saw someone complain on Twitter about how Lorne Michaels hasn’t promoted enough POC comics over the years.
That’s a fair point, and, yet, it also misses a crucial aspect of what’s going on: that’s not SNL’s function. SNL is not meant to be The Chappelle Show. It’s not meant to be edgy or challenging or go way out of its way to introduce mainstream audiences to unknown POC comics. Though the show has begun to promote non-white comics more of late which is good, SNL is meant to be the exact center of American comedy.
In this respect, SNL is similar to Taylor Swift. Tay-Tay serves a function. And that function is to be the exact center of American pop music. If you want songs about WAP, turn your ears elsewhere.
So, in a sense, woke complaints about Lorene Michaels and SNL are more attacks on the idea of any sort of “mainstream” at all. There’s nothing wrong with simply being mainstream. There are so many other off beat, edgy venues for people to enjoy non-mainstream content that it’s annoying when people attack something for being mainstream for simply being mainstream.
Ugh.
It’s this type of thinking that aggravates the culture wars and makes MAGA New Right cocksuckers want to burn the whole thing to the ground. Welcome to the New Right, as Jesse Kelly keeps say. (Double ugh.)
There are no easy answers to any of this. We’re careening towards a moment in time when either we have a MAGA autocracy and everything goes to shit, or we have a civil war and there’s some sort of culture “reset” where we all agree that having a “mainstream” this or that thing is fine. (Because once such a horrific civil war is over, people are going to cling to the traditional again — at least, that’s my thinking.)
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