I can tell you from what the conservatives in my family — whom I love dearly — have told me that a massive number of people will have to start dying each day for any sort of political response to a new pandemic to happen. It could be as high as 10,000 people a day before we can get our act together.
I don’t know, it might even be more — 20,000? 30,000? 50,000?
There is now a strict orthodoxy within traditional conservative ranks that under no circumstances can there ever be any sort of lockdown or restricts imposed because of a health emergency.
So, things will have to grow rather apocalyptic before there is any collective action when we have the next pandemic. I have this on my mind at the moment because I’m growing nervous that this fall and winter might be really bad in regards to COVID.
At the moment, it definitely seems as though, lulz, we’re just going to let people die needlessly, no matter how bad things get this COVID season. Ugh. Everything is so dumb.
It’s clear from talking to my conservative relatives that the thing at very absolute forefront of their minds isn’t policy — it’s vibes. They usually don’t know why they’re angry, just that they are. This “vibe” anger is so potent that most of the country thinks we’re in a recession when we are not, in fact, in a recession.
As such, I don’t know how much credence I give to people who think that we can only have a civil war / revolution if there is some sort of economic element to it. Even though abortion is definitely an economic issue, I think civil war (Reds) / revolution (Blues) could happen just because of vibes.
This “vibe” civil war / revolution we’re careening towards appears in all sorts of ways. One conspicuous way this expresses itself is when MAGA people online say the most ridiculous things about Trump — things they do not, in fact, believe — just so they can “own the libs” and do some virtue signalling to their fellow MAGA cult members.
So dumb. This particular dumb technique on the part of MAGA cocksuckers really has become rather absurd. It’s totally bonkers and dumb. It’s one of those things, though, that makes me very uneasy.
Given a few more months to marinate and the passions of a presidential election, it definitely seems as though “vibes” will be enough to ultimately destroy the United States — or at least put in it a very precarious position while we figure out if we’re going to become a MAGA autocracy or a have a civil war / revolution.
I continue to grow alarmed with how otherwise normal, sane people have bought into the populist bullshit that ding-dong Trump keeps pushing. A growing number of people have serious misgivings about the honesty of “the elites” to the point that they are willing to vote for a fucking fascist like Trump.
It definitely seems as though we’re careening towards a very, very, very dark situation in late 2024, early 2025. Of course, there is always a possibility that we’ll find some sort of “third way” or off ramp before things get as bad as I fear, but, lulz, I doubt it.
Some severe macro forces are a play at the moment. While I still believe The Fourth Turning is nothing more than astrology for dudes, I do think the idea that some sort of catastrophic event may occur around 2025 has some merit to it. All signs point to a massive clusterfuck in late 2024, early 2025 because we just can’t keep punting our problems down the road any more.
It’s officially put up or shut up time.
Any major change in America’s political system will cause a series of cascading events that will probably lead to WW3. It doesn’t matter if we turn into an inward looking autocracy of blood and soil or if we have some sort of civil war / revolution — if the United States is distracted, then the entire post WW2 global order will be at risk.
There doesn’t seem to be any way to stop it all. We just have to prepare for something dramatic to happen in less than two years. Whatever it is that happens, I think will mark the end of the silly “woke” era that we’ve been living in. It’s difficult to get too up set over the misuse of pronouns when you’re hiding from ICE agents or dodging missiles.
The social media era is over. There’s just no buzz around it anymore. After a lot of crypto hype, we’re now fully in the AI Revolution. But occasionally, I find myself mulling what could have been, especially given how fucked up Twitter is now because of Space Karen.
There are a few key elements that could have been included in a new social media service that I think would have made it a success. One is, having some sort of paid editorial staff. If you had people who were paid by your social media service specifically to churn out high quality reporting, I think that would be a key advantage over other, similar services.
Also, I continue to believe that could have be useful is the idea of Groups. Now, of course, some will say that was tried with Google+’s “Circles” but that’s not at all my vision. In my version of things, everyone would have the ability to create as many “Groups” as they liked and even be able to manage who might be able to Post in each Group.
You would have a full page Post to work with and threaded discussions of those Posts.
But, alas, I just don’t see any of this happening. The moment is over. We’ve all moved on.
Well, I obviously don’t understand the Republican MAGA base as well as I thought I did. It seemed to me that “Vivek The Fake” had successfully positioned himself after the first debate to rocket into second place.
Whoopse!
As far as I can tell, there really hasn’t been any change in the standings. Everyone remains about 40 points behind malignant ding-dong Trump. This does not bode well for the country going forward. The Trump cult of personality is so absolute that not even dangling a younger, more organized Trump replacement that makes all the right people angry is enough to cause the MAGA base to give up on Trump.
So, at least at the moment, it seems that it’s going to be Trump V. Biden 2.0 in 2024, for better or worse.
Something Big would have to happen to change that, something so big and unexpected that it would be historic in its magnitude. At the moment, it seems as though the political forces are locked in and there’s no going back. Trump will be the 2024 Republican nominee and either we have a civil war when he loses or we slide peacefully into autocracy when he wins. (Even though I talk lot about it, I just don’t think Blues have it in them to do any sort of Resistance Revolution if Trump wins in 2024.)
Anyway.
We’ll see I guess. But I will again say that late 2024, early 2025 is shaping up to be the most monetu span of time since between Election Day 1860 and Lincoln’s swearing in in 1861.
I generally am not a superstitious person — or at least like to think so. And, yet, given how fucking old Joe Biden is, I find myself worrying about the Curse of Tippecanoe.
What’s more, the moment the 2024 presidential ballots are printed, the American political system will be at its weakest until the election is certified, and maybe even until the president is sworn in.
All of this is really alarming with ding-dong Trump being neck-and-neck with Biden in the polls at the moment.
All of this is happening at the same time. We have fucking Nazi MAGA fascists who want to turn the United States into a Russia clone, just as we have a very, very old president and a very, very untested veep. Even a casual glance at history will tell you that usually nothing changes for decades and then WHAM, everything changes virtually overnight.
So we’ve kind of entered the danger zone already. Anything big that happens to change the political equation for 2024 could have far more massive consequences than we could possibly imagine.
In an effort to puncture my own center-Left media narrative bubble, I have come to at least try to listen to the All-In Podcast. And I will admit that I like how they challenge some things that I take for granted. But sometimes, oh boy, do they really know how to fling shit.
According to the All-In geniuses, the evil overlords of the Biden Administration are out to get Space Karen Elon Musk because he’s allowing fucking Nazis to take over Twitter in the name of “free speech.” Or something like that. Some sort of fucking bullshit.
Meanwhile, they grate on my nerves by so brazenly sucking their own cocks about this or that act of conspicuous consumption they have done together since the last pod. I mean, ok, I get it, guys, you’re rich as fuck and you don’t give a shit about us Poors.
Makes me mumble “eat the rich” under my breath.
Anyway, I guess listening to the All-In Podcast serves the purpose I wanted it to when I started listening to it.
I have just about completed a three chapter addition at the beginning of the novel that helps lay out the universe of the novel and also builds out characters. And, yet, my fear is the first thing that any manuscript consultant will do the moment they look at what I’ve written is lop those three chapters off.
As such, I continue to vacillate wildly between thinking I should do the lopping myself and thinking that the three additional scenes serve a really important purpose and I need to keep them.
I just don’t know.
At the moment, I’m going to wrap up the these three new chapters and start work on the rest of the novel. I also need to start giving myself some clear metrics.
If I don’t start setting some deadlines, I will just continue to drift towards my goal and it will be 2036 by the time I actually reach it. There is, of course, the issue of everything seems to be falling apart at the same time, which is probably going to delay things some.
Or not. I don’t really know yet. It could go either way. But I do need to get into put up or shut up mode. And I also need to take seriously the idea of reading more and also working on other creative projects that would serve as my “back ups.”
Back in the 1990s, Bill Clinton’s team was famous for saying, “It’s The Economy, Stupid.” Well, lulz, these days, we can’t even agree if the economy is doing well, even when the facts indicate that it is, in fact, doing well. We’re so divided that MAGA Republicans want to will us into a recession because of “vibes.”
This is why someone who might otherwise stand out, like Nikki Haley, can’t get any traction. She came out swinging at the most recent debate, basing her campaign on such quaint issues like “spending.”
No one — especially MAGA Republicans — give a shit about “spending” when there are libs to be owned.
The absolute core, the central tenant of MAGA is owning the libs. MAGA just does not give a fuck about any policy agenda at all other than strangling the “woke cancel culture mob.” MAGA lives in a post-truth, post-policy universe. And, what’s more, the whole thing is a cult of personality around Trump so good luck managing to pry any support away from the malignant ding-dong that is Donald Trump.
The closer we get to the 2024 election, the more my so-called “hysterical doom shit” doesn’t seem so far off. The die is cast, the lines are drawn. There is no center and, baring some “third way” I simply can’t predict at the moment, we’re either going to slide peacefully into autocracy, or we’re going to have a civil war (Reds) or revolution (Blues.)
But I can’t predict the future. So, lulz, anything is possible. Yet I am very worried. Election 2024 is shaping up to potentially be the most historic election since 1860. Republicans, by definition, are fascists and want to establish an autocracy.
If they don’t get that, then they may start a civil war. And if they do get it, there’s a minor possibility that Blues will do some sort of “Resistance Revolution.”
I hate violence, so I want none of it, but it’s definitely something to think about.
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