Tag: Insurrection Act

2025: Tyrant Trump

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There are a few things we have to take into consideration before we think about Trump’s second term. The first is, we have to work on the basic assumption that Trump is simply going to ignore the Supreme Court if they rule in any way he doesn’t like.

So, if he fires several hundred thousand civil servants using his Schedule F idea, then, lulz, he’ll just do it no matter how much SCOTUS rules against him. He will invoke Andrew Jackson and go about his business.

Another issue we have to think about is the total fucking chaos Trump is going to cause when he begins to build out the infrastructure necessary to put millions of undocumented people in concentration camps. Just providing these people with food and housing will be a logistical nightmare.

What’s more, I have serious doubts with the idea that a variety of other people that Trump doesn’t like — everyone from trans people to loudmouth cranks like me — won’t find themselves in any sort of dragnet that Trump begins to employ across the country.

And I’m sure there are all sorts of bonkers counter-revolution things that Trump will do as early as possible in 2025. One key issue for me is if Trump will have the abstract thinking ability to propose a Constitutional Convention that would pass Amendments that would make America a white Christian ethnostate. It could be he will be so stupid that he just announces that he’s going to stay in office the rest of his life because “he deserves it.”

No matter what happens if Trump wins in 2024, we have to accept that the U.S. Military will ultimately decide the country’s fate. If the country collapses into chaos, whomever can convince the U.S. Military to take their side will determine who has power.

Of course, there’s a non-zero chance that not even the U.S. Military will stay stable. It, too, could collapse for a variety of reasons. Then you have WMD that might begin to be lobbed here and there across the country in the context of a global WW3 erupting.

Good times!

I just don’t know what to tell you. It could be that Biden wins and we muddle through another four years. But….I have my doubts.

Something Wicked This Way Comes

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Reading the above, I’m growing even more alarmed with our fate should Trump get re-elected. And, before I write any more, let me be clear — I’M NOT ADVOCATING ANYTHING!!! I’m just making my abstract fears concrete then thinking about in a general way, what might happen.

Please, any ATF people reading this blog post — chill the fuck out. I hate violence. I hate guns. I really fucking hate guns.

Ok, back to the point — what the fuck are we going to do if Trump goes full tyrant in early 2025? Now, remember, at this point, Trump will have two ways to knock heads — the Insurrection Act and a weaponization of the existing ICE infrastructure. At the moment, at least, Tyrant Trump would not have an paramilitary MAGA SA to browbeat the average Blue into either allowing him to establish a military dictatorship or to flee the country to avoid being put in an ICE camp.

One possible way that the freedom-loving American populace could remind Tyrant Trump that he can’t just turn us into an autocratic state without some consequences might be a Women’s Strike or General Strike. But that would be so unpreceded that I just don’t see them happening. But if they did and the American economy ground to a halt, that might be enough to get the U.S. Military at a minimum to stand down.

At best the U.S. Military might topple Trump using the guise of the 14th Amendment — stranger things have happened. But it could be that Trump succeeds despite himself, like he always does.

About 1 million smug, wealthy liberals will leave the country starting the moment it’s clear that Trump will be POTUS again and we Poors will just have to fend for ourselves. I will get snatched off the street by an ICE agent because I kept calling Tyrant Trump a “fucking cocksucker” on this blog over the years.

If so, so be it. I’d rather die on my feet than live my life on my knees a slave.

Is Trump About To Be Charged Under the Insurrection Act or Nah?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So, ding-dong “truthed” this today.

And, yet, a little while later, he deleted it and replaced it with a new version that mentioned the Espionage Act instead of the Insurrection Act. So, which is it? Is he admitting to something new or just ranting about the usual old shit?

It’s all very curious.

I will note that we’ve entered the period of the year where Big Things happen. Between now and Labor Day, HUGE EVENTS are probably going to happen because, lulz, all the Elites are on vacation.

Anyway. It’s all something of a mystery at the moment.

Four Days That May Shake The World


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

As I keep saying, I’m always wrong. Always. I make all these wild predictions and then…nothing. But the following is, if nothing else, entertaining in its own dark, disturbing manner. It’s possible that Jan 3rd to January 6th may be some of the most eventful in American history.

Here’s why:

The one year anniversary of the assassination of Iranian military leader Qasem Soleimani is on January 3rd. It’s easy to imagine Iran striking either in the Middle East or the American homeland in retaliation. Depending on what exactly occurred, that, in itself, could be Trump’s “Reichstag Fire” that makes him a wartime president.

Trump is already extremely unhinged right now, and it’s easy to see him wagging the dog right before Congress is set to certify the Electoral College vote on January 6th.

If you throw in Proud Boys in DC flipping out and causing a lot of mayhem in DC on or about January 6th as well, that’s the excuse Trump might need to invoke the Insurrection Act in DC. Additionally, as all of this chaos is going on, Pence might REALLY take things to the next level and nullify the certification vote by not doing him job.

That would really destabilize the country and…then…I don’t know. There are some basic elements of a successful coup that Trump hasn’t done. He hasn’t done his autocratic homework, if you will. So, in a sense, he’s thrashing about in desperation, making everyone else’s life hell because he’s not an autocrat at all, but a deranged ding-dong.

Ugh.

As such, while in the abstract it gives the Far Right a boner to think about how they can overturn the results of the election this way, the moment they actually do anything…it definitely seems everything will fall apart. For no other reason than Trump isn’t even an autocrat, but just a very lucky ding-dong. We’re an autocracy without an autocrat. We need to marinate in our pre-fascist juices for about one more election cycle before we finally descend into a Russian-style managed democracy.

But there’s one thing to keep in mind — Trump is no longer thinking in political terms, but rather strictly in terms of self-preservation. So it’s possible Trump is so deranged that he might force the issue of some sort of coup well before we’re ready and not even the rotting rage found within our political system will be enough to save him.

He may so enrage the 60% of the electorate who don’t support MAGA that all the people who have totally invested in Trump’s rise to power over the last five years might, at last, find him a lability and cut him loose. But what’s more likely to happen is we’re just going to punt all these problems down the road one election cycle and someone like Tom Cotton or Josh Hawley or Mike Pompeo will be the one to finally strangle traditional American democracy.

Trump is not an autocrat.

It’s a very curious situation we’re in for the next few days. And, really, if we make it past January 6th, that’s just the end of the beginning of this shitshow. It’s possible that once Trump doesn’t have ANY hope of overturning the election, he just explodes mentally and things grow extremely dire. So dire, in fact, that we might have some sort of snap impeachment and conviction of Trump, but not without him extracting one last pound of political flesh from the nation on his way out the door.

My fear, of course, is things grow really, really dark. That Trump goes the literal Hitler-in-the-bunker route. I hate to even think about the implications of that, but if we were honest with ourselves, it’s something we would begin to game out.

The Conditions Exist For A Severe Political Crisis


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

No one listens to me and they probably shouldn’t. But I would like to note that it’s self-evident that the most powerful country in the world is careening towards an unprecedented political crisis.

It’s going to be abrupt, it’s going to be severe and it’s going to scare the shit out of everyone.

Now, let’s break things down a little bit. A number of macro trends are all coming to a head at the same time and it’s only a matter of if they come crashing down on us now or in, say, the 2024 timeframe. Given that it’s self-evident that Trump has totally lost his fucking mind and, is, as such goading otherwise sane people to do bonkers things, it definitely seem as though our “political 9/11” is going to happen NOW, not later.

A huge amount of what’s going on doesn’t make any sense politically and that’s because the person who is forcing this issue isn’t sane — Trump is thinking now not about about his political future but cold, hard self-preservation. So, he’s willing to take risks and do things that could blow up in his face first because he’s not thinking clearly and two he doesn’t care — he just wants to stay in power so he doesn’t risk going to prison. You could also speculate he’s a fucking traitor and he’s doing all of this at the behest of Putin, but lulz, nothing matters.

It’s easy to imagine something like this happening in the next few days — there’s a major domestic terror attack on the part of Iranians for the assassination of Soleimani on January 3rd. This, in turn, gives Trump the opportunity to bomb the hell out of Iran and, as a “war president” take “total control.”

It’s easy to imagine a situation that in the context of the Proud Boys causing problems in D.C. on January 6th just a Congress is meeting to certify the vote, Trump invokes the Insurrection Act thinking it’s some sort of fascist panacea (it’s not) and all his problems will go away.

Now, this is when Trump’s tenuous connection to reality would smash up against some pretty cold, hard facts. The U. S. Military isn’t going to follow an illegal order. And even though I consider SCOTUS controlled by a bunch of MAGA hacks, it’s a dubious supposition to imagine them throwing their lot entirely with a tyrant when he needed them in such a massive Constitutional crisis.

But we have to be clear — the conditions are there, at least, for not only rolling political violence between January 3 and January 20th (and beyond) but Trump, having completely fucking lost his mind, pushing the Constitution to its limit and scaring the shit out of all of us when he starts to grow not only transactional on Twitter, but extremely passive aggressive.

Let me be clear — I can’t predict the future. I’m just talking about the conditions for a severe political crisis. I’m almost always wrong and it could be that this whole thing is going to — thankfully — be a dud. But when you have someone as crazy as Trump feeling like a caged rat for a few weeks with zero accountability, anything and I mean ANYTHING is possible.

The Phony Second American Civil War


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Things are very surreal right now. The reason — what should have happened after the election, hasn’t happened yet. What SHOULD have happened, given the metrics of the moment is a Second American Civil War.

Trump SHOULD have struck in some way before the race was called, Blue States SHOULD have reacted violently, Trump SHOULD have used the Insurrection Act and then the United States SHOULD have imploded into a full blown civil war.

But, thankfully, that’s not at all what happened.

It feels like everyone has put their affairs in order for a civil war….and nothing has happened. So, in a sense, many of us are kind of looking around in a daze, wondering why we still have lights and ready access to food. Everything is there, right now, for a violent civil war in the United States and yet the country continues to miraculously run on fumes.

So, in a sense, America is extremely lucky — to date — because the specific person who would otherwise destroy the United States, Donald John Fucking Trunp — is such a lazy opportunist that he just hasn’t done what many, many, many people in the Republican Party are begging him to do — take “total control.”

It’s a very surreal situation.

So, either something unexpected happens pretty quick, or we simply punt this problem down the road a few years. The traitors who hate America — the Republican Party — will continue to be a cancer on our politics, but not enough to start any violence. Until, of course, something changes and what SHOULD have happened in the Winter of 2020 finally happens.

But we’re not out of the woods yet.

America is on edge and pretty much all it will take is something, anything that puts a little bit of extra pressure on our political system and the rolling political violence that would be the first stage of the country’s implosion will happen.

But it could be the fall and winter of 2024 that that happens.

Just be thankful we apparently have managed to escape our destruction for the time being.