Category: From The Editor

Apocalypse 9/11 Redux: The Moment War Starts In Korea, Everything Changes

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

For those of us who were alive and politically active on that Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001, we remember what was going on when we opened our eyes that morning before the towers were struck. The Bush Administration was coasting on fumes as was the economy. It seemed as though we were about to enter a recession and Bush would get blamed for it.

Then everything changed.

We woke up eight years later and realized we had been in a waking dream, a nightmare we couldn’t escape.

Now, about 20 years later, we find ourselves on the cusp of a horrific war with the DPRK (North Korea.) Estimates are that 500,000 people would die the first month of such a war and who know how many could die if the war became protracted. And that’s working on the assumption that WMD aren’t used at some point. The DPRK has made it clear that they don’t even consider chemical and biological weapons WMD in the first place, so if they felt cornered they probably would use both gratuitously not just on South Korea but on Japan as well.

What makes all of this really scary is the United States has an unhinged president looking for an opportunity to fire Bob Muller, who may finally get to Trump’s tax returns. So, given how batshit insane the political calculus of the Trump Administration is, it wouldn’t take a lot to think they wouldn’t blink an eye at a cost of life and property needed to have the cover to fire Mueller and assure not only keeping Congress Republican, but come within shouting distance of winning re-election in 2020.

But, really, who knows.

It could go either way. But Trump’s behavior is sufficiently unhinged that it’s enough worry about. It’s enough to think seriously about a monumental wag the dog situation that would be a tragedy of unprecedented levels.

Talk To Me Internet: Mulling The State Of Covfefe Magazine #Zine #RVA #AmWriting

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Here I continue to talk about the state of Covfefe Magazine. Things continue to go fairly well. They could be better, but I guess they’re as well as to be expected given the circumstances.

Working On A Print Zine For #RVA

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I love zines. I love to write and a I love to take pictures — and I can layout a print publication fairly well — so it seems I have all the ingredients needed to pull off a zine that is decent. It isn’t going to happen anytime soon — probably will be a few months from now at best — but I think the finished product will be pretty cool.

I just need to be patient.

It will be interesting to see how everything does — or doesn’t — fall into place.

Talk To Me Internet: My Trip To #Brooklyn #NYC

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I went to NYC recently. Here’s my report.

We Have To Take Trump’s CNN GIF Tweet Seriously

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

I am hearing some people say that Trump’s faux GIF of him beating up the CNN logo in a WWE match is something silly that we shouldn’t take seriously. I totally disagree. The point is that he’s the President of the United States and he’s signaling to his mouth breathing supporters that he not-so-tacitly advocates violence towards the press.

It is probably only a matter of time before something tragic happens to a news organization because of Trump’s anti-press Tweeting. Something really tragic and memorable may happen that we will all — including even Trump, maybe — may regret. I feel as though we’re hurdling towards something that in hindsight will seem very obvious.

We have to take this tweeting by the president seriously. There have to be, at last, consquences. Someone, somewhere, needs to stand up to the president in a meaningful manner. We are slip-sliding towards a classic fascist situation that may be difficult to snap out of.

Remember, the fascists of the 1930s did not start off by being the evil, sinister people that we think of them as now. They started off as a joke. They were comical and entertaining to the masses. It wasn’t until later that things grew dark. So, we need to collectively stand up NOW, while we still can.

This is something of a joke now, but it won’t be a joke when real lives are in danger — or worse.

Talk To Me Internet: Daydreaming About Living In #NYC

By Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

This is a really long, really good edition of Talk To Me Internet. This is probably the longest one I’ve ever done. I talk a lot about wanting to live in NYC in this one. I think it’s worth watching most, if not all of. The wide-range of topics I cover are pretty interesting, at least to me.

Korean War 2.0: DPRK, TrumpRussia, Ukraine & A Possible WWIII

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Something’s up. My spidy senses are tingling. I have grown very jaded and cynical about anything having to do with North Korea, but the curious statements coming out of the Trump Administration the last few days about the DPRK make me scratch my head a little bit.

I see the North Korea situation as a major gimme for Trump. It’s his huge backup fail safe should the TrumpRussia problem finally go China Syndrome and look like it’s going to end his administration. It may very well be that nothing happens. It could be that Trump will leave office in four to eight years and the DPRK will still be there and this long-term problem we have with them will be kicked down the road for another long bit.

Or…the Trump Administration is singling that they’re going to strike the DPRK in some way and let the chips fall where they will. Now, remember, the DPRK is very unpredictable and they very much want to survive, so the States might do some limited bombing and, well, nothing might happen.

Or, all hell will break loose and 500,000 people in Seoul and beyond might die in the first month of the conflict. Such an enormous regional war would have a dynamic all its own and some pretty amazing things might happen. It doesn’t take too much to think maybe Trump might use the DPRK to wag the dog. He might attack the North Koreans, sit back for them to freak out and in the ensuing chaos use pardon the hell out of people left and right and maybe even fire Bob Mueller along the way. There simply would be so much going on in Washington D.C. and beyond that the press wouldn’t be able to keep up. Add to this the possibility that Trump doing this might be seen by Russia as a green light to attack Ukraine in a big way — not to mention whatever Iran might cook up — and you have the makings of something that would be marketed by the American press as WWIII.

Or not. I am so jaded that I have a feeling the whole kick-the-can-down-the-alley option is what is going to happen with the DPRK. It would be so callus, so transparent if Trump wagged the dog with the DPRK at this point that, well, I don’t quite know what to think of that prospect. That Trump would use the potential death of half a million people — at least — as political cover to save his own presidency kind of blows my mind. But it would make a lot of sense. By the time the States finally got around to winning the war in three to six months, TrumpRussia would be a forgotten scandal and Trump would be in a strong position to win the mid-terms and potentially a second term.

But so much could go wrong with a war with the DPRK that I just don’t know. I just don’t know if I’m reading too much into all of this or what. I can’t get a handle on it. I think everything is going to work itself out and nothing is going to happen. The alternative is to horrible and bloody to brood on for too long. I mean, the Chinese and the Russians could get involved, the DPRK could attempt to bomb Japan. Or they could attempt to nuke Seoul in some sort of blackmail situation. Wars are easily started and difficult to end as the old adage goes and Korean War 2.0 would be no different.

Only time will tell, I guess.

Let’s Talk Trump, Collusion & What Happens Next For The Resistance

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

It pains me to say this, but the Right is, in real time and right in front of our eyes, processing the fact that Trump probably really did collude with the Russians and by the time the process is over they will say they’re cool with it and we should just move on.

Let that sink in for a moment.

So, if you think that when and if collusion on the part of Trump and or his “satellites” is proven that we’re all going to hold hands and collectively get rid of Trump, you got another thing coming. There won’t even be a moment of silence on the part of assholes like Sean Hannity. They won’t even skip a beat. They will have their talking points prepared, they will rationalize it out of existence and for them, at least, there won’t even be a hiccup.

Let that get through your haze of fury when it is one day — maybe sooner than you think! — proven that Trump is, relative to previous standards of such things a fucking traitor. The Vichy Republicans are going to suck Trump’s treasonous cock so hard that they’re going to gag. All they care about is power. All they care about is winning the argument of the moment. They don’t care about the country, they don’t care about you and your patriotic feelings. They just care about keeping Trump president for as long as possible.

I used to think that there would be the Pence Pivot if Trump was proven to be a traitor. But given what’s going on with the Right right now, that won’t even happen. They’re going to stick with Trump until the sun burns out. And, given the evils of gerrymandering, it’s possible nothing will ever happen to Trump. He will not only survive, but prosper.

He will prosper because people like me will waste months of our time being furious about Trump’s collusion as he pushes through insane Federal judges, even more insane legislation and executive orders. So, really, we’re fucked. The only fucking thing that’s going to save our sorry asses is some sort of magical Blue Wave in 2018. Think of all the horrific damage Trump and his ilk can do to the nation between now and — at the earliest 2019. That’s only if we’re able, as The Resistance, to overcome some big hurdles.

And it’s very possible that should we manage to get anywhere close to impeaching and convicting Trump that the real crazies will pop out of the woodwork, go mainstream and demand a few states leave the Union. I’m being completely serious. It’s possible that, like President James Buchanan, Trump’s the only thing stopping a real secessionist movement from happening now instead of later. In hindsight, just like the late 1850s, we will say that the late 2010s were obviously the moment in time when the nation was about to tear itself apart, it was just a matter of the conditions being right.

So, for the duration we are stuck with Trumplandia. We live in a dystopian present. Nothing is going to happen. And it’s very likely possible that it could be four or six or maybe never before Trump is impeached and convicted. And if he is, there could be consquences far beyond what we ever imagined.

I don’t have much hope in the short term. We’re fucked. Even if there is proof that Trump colluded in some way, the Right will have already processed it and moved on to something else. This is not fiction, this is reality. This is what’s really going on in America right now and there doesn’t seem to be much we can do about it for the time being. I would thus suggest we all take a deep breath and figure out ways to engage, not rage.

There doesn’t seem to be much other course of action for the time being.

Wayward Sisters, Part In Peace, Redux: What If You Held A Civil War & Nobody Came?

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

Oh boy. All signs are pointing towards the dissolution of the American Union within, say, 10 years. No later than maybe 2025. Whenever we have another center-Left president, I’d say.

But the question is, is there any center left to hold? Is is possible that we’d go the route of the Soviet Union and split into our individual tribes peacefully? Is there really anything, at this point, that would cause the central government to attempt to keep states that want to leave, like, say, Texas or California, from doing so?

Is it possible that there would be a “wayward sisters, part in peace” movement like there was in 1860? Is it possible that we’ll wake up and the South will have risen again and no one will give a shit? I find that specifically, to be kind of doubtful because of race, if nothing else, but it’s possible that other, less complicated states may bolt the Union successfully.

It seems to me that the upper West is the most likely to leave the Union en masse because there’s not the race issue. But I could also see center-Left “Blue” states leaving and joining Canada, maybe. A United States of Canada? Regardless, unless we come up with some leadership, the United States looks pretty finished.

Only time will tell.

Watch & See, Trump Is Totally Going To Fire Bob Mueller

by Shelton Bumgarner
@bumgarls

All the conditions are there for Donald Trump to fire special council Bob Mueller. Trump is laying down the groundwork to do it, at least. He’s complained that Mueller and former FBI director Jim Comey are too close. And he’s generally made it clear that he’s thinking about it.

I am not one of those who thinks anything will happen should Trump fire Mueller. Though there would be an instant Constitutional crisis, as I understand it, it was about a year from when Nixon did something similar to the point when things came to a head in the Watergate scandal. And that was at a point when things were a lot less partisan than they are now and generally both sides did the right thing when they were called to do so.

So, there will be a lot of gnashing of teeth. A lot of people like me be furious. But, in the end, this bloody, pitched political battle will continue. It could be years and years before the right thing happens and the Special Prosecutor law is brought back again, and that point, Trump could almost be out of office.

And, so, in effect, he will win.