Tag: We Are So Fucked

If I Have To Register With The Government Because I’m Bonkers Someone’s Going To Hear About It

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have been very careful to hold my tongue, as it were, as Trump pushes us further and further into regular old autocracy. But with the news that JFK Jr. is floating the idea of “registering” autistic people…I’m given pause for thought.

I’m not autistic, but I am clinically bonkers.

As such, as we lurch farther and father into autocracy, it doesn’t seem like too much a stretch to think one day bonkers people like me will have to register with the government. Why this would be the case, but if they’re going to come after autistic people, then bonkers people sure as hell will be next.

I’m going to cause a ruckus every way I can if I have to register with the government. I’m not going to shut up and it could be the refusing to register could be my first actual real world “resistance.” Of course, I say this now and then I just turn around and do it anyway because I will feel pressure to do so by my far more normal relatives.

And what happens if there is criminal liability for not registering? Then what am I going to do? I guess I can at least get really angry on social media — I do that already — and continue to work on my novel.

Hopefully — hopefully — things won’t get that bad. Hopefully I won’t have to register with the government and I can finish my novel in peace.

Chaos Is The Point

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It seems to me that all the chaos Trump is creating of late is the point — he wants us to be weak enough that we can be attacked so he can consolidate power as “war president.”

I will admit that I’m giving Trump way more long term, abstract reasoning abilities than he actually has, but that would be the end game. No matter what. Trump is going to make us so weak and poor that when we inevitably get attacked for his dumb behavior specifically, people will look to him as some sort of savior.

That could give him the cover he needs to cancel elections, or whatever else he wants to do. I just don’t think we’re ever going to have free-and-fair Federal elections again, at least in my lifetime.

Anyway, good luck, folks. You’ll need it.

My Suggestion For The Democratic Party: Bank Left On The Economy, Bank Right On Social Issues

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There is clearly an interest in progressive politics when it comes to the economy. But at the same time, the Democratic Party’s fixation on Trans Rights is alienating and unpopular. I’m not suggesting abandoning support for Trans Right, just maybe….modulate it.

If the Democratic Party could pull away some of the poorer people from the MAGA coalition of the poor, the wealthy and the religious by appealing to their pocket book instead of their racism and misogyny, maybe Blues could start to win elections again.

And if Democrats simply cooled it with Trans Rights being a “pressure point” for them and were a bit more mainstream in their views on the matter, then maybe those two combined would be enough to swing elections back their way. (Not that there will ever be any more free and fair Federal elections again, mind you. That’s just a thing of the past now that we’re an autocracy.)

The issue of “gender affirming care” for minors is something that is kind of absurd since I don’t think it even is necessary that much. And, yet, both sides use it as something of a political football, with Blues using their fixation on the matter as virtual signaling and Reds using their hate of it to make the faithful fall in line.

But I’m serious about no more free and fair elections. All of this is moot. American democracy is over. The only way we get it back is a revolution and I neither want that nor see it happening.

The Fear Of The ‘Woke Cancel Culture Mob’ Remains a Potent Force With Some Conservatives

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I was talking to a conservative relative recently when he went on a long tirade about, essentially the “woke cancel culture mob” and how this swarm of woke people can ruin a person’s life.

So, that is evidence that long after everyone else has moved on, the fear of the “woke cancel culture mob” continues to linger with a lot of people.

The key issue to me is there is something of an orthodoxy about certain elements of society that the “woke cancel culture mob” simply can not comprehend someone not adhering to. They are so potent within the Blue alliance that they really alienate people with their unpopular agenda.

There is a reason why fucking Hitler-Trump presses the pressure point of the transgender movement in such a gratuitous manner — he knows he got a lot of votes from people who should know better because they’re afraid of being “canceled” when they get someone’s pronouns wrong.

Blues need to do some introspection. But, in a sense, it’s too late. We’re an autocracy now and we’re never — or at least as long as I’m alone — going to have another free-and-fair Federal election again. Good luck.

We Live In Peculiar Political Times

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The United States is now an autocracy. And, yet, some of the last vestiges of the Before Times continue to linger. While Trump continues to do everything in his power to end free speech, Americans — at the moment at least — still have the ability to speak as they like and to peacefully protest.

It is only a matter of time, of course, before Trump and his MAGA Nazi toadies come after our basic rights in a full boar effort to finish the job they’ve started. I suppose we’re kind of in a liminal political space at the moment where it’s dusk, but nightfall as yet to officially arrive.

But arrive it will.

And that’s when the real test of the American populace will arrive. Trump is going to push us to the breaking point to see if we just give up or if we fight back in some way.

And, right now, I honestly doubt anyone will notice that we’ve become a legalistic autocratic state like Russia when it happens. I think the whole process will gradually happen in fits and starts to the point that in about 20 years we’ll be a Russian-style autocracy and a whole generation will assume that’s the way it’s always been.

I just don’t see Americans doing what would be needed to end this nightmare — we need a General Strike organized with the clear objective of ending MAGA tyranny once and for all. If that means we have a Second Revolution, so be it. (Not that I want that, because if it was successful, a Second Civil War would happen immediately.)

So, I continue to hope I sell a breakout hit novel so I can get the fuck out of this country and never come back. It’s inevitable that me ranting about Trump and the MAGA Nazis will come back to bite me.

The United States Is An Autocracy — Now What?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

All my “hysterical doom shit” has come about, it seems. All that’s stopping Trump from doing some of the darker things I’ve worried about is he hasn’t figure out how to do them yet, or hasn’t gotten around to it yet.

So, there you are — the USA is an autocracy now.

I really need to get out of this country. I need to sell a best selling novel and get the fuck out of doge. Should that happen, I want to move somewhere hot an exotic where they speak English and have a pretty good medical system.

Or, hell, I’m so desperate, I’ll move to Great Britain if need be. I’m just done with worrying about ICE or the FBI swooping in an murdering me in cold blood because I won’t stop calling Trump a fucking cocksucker.

Anyway, we live in dark days, folks. And it’s only going to get worse.

Everything Is So Fucked Up

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The issue at the moment is Trump is the spearhead of a sever macro problem in the United States — MAGA. Something like MAGA was going to happen, especially after Obama was elected. But it could just have well been the first female president, if Obama had lost to Hillary in the primaries.

It definitely feels as though the US is imploded. We’re definitely an autocracy now and, really, it’s just a matter of where we stop on the Hungary – Russia spectrum of autocracies.

All I can say is my rage over MAGA fuels my continued writing. That was the point of the first novel (now the last two novels in this specific project.) I wanted to write an allegory about America set in a small town. I got pretty far in the project until at some point I realized that I had enough backstory thought through in my mind for a few novels, so I decided to write those first instead of saving them as some sort of potential “prequel” idea.

There definitely has been an ebb and flow when it comes to this novel project over the years.

But back to how fucked up everything is — there is a greater-than-zero chance that the US will buckle and have a revolution then civil war. A lot will depend on the economy and if Trump freaks out, shoots a few people then declares martial law.

Anyway, I just want to sell a novel that is a big enough success that I can get the fuck out of this country and chill out somewhere hot an exotic for the remainder of my years.

No Coachella For Old Men

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The thing about finishing a novel good enough to query is even if I’m successful, I won’t get what I want. I mean, I could be on the near side of 60 before someone could physically hold the novel in their hands in a bookstore, even if I stick the landing and everything goes according to plan.

That sucks.

It sucks for so many reasons.

I want to be young again, and be wild cand crazy like I was in my 30s in Seoul. I want to chase women, drink too much and be a bon vivant this time in NYC, not Seoul.

But, barring the Singularity allowing us all to live to be 500, I’m kind of fucked on that front. I mean, if I try to do all the cool stuff with my “DJ money (read novel money,)” I’ll stick out.

I won’t be able to date 24 year olds without it being taken note of.. I can’t go to music festivals or Burning Man without young people looking at me and rolling their eyes.

And that doesn’t even take into account that I STILL want to get married and have kids. Again, I suppose if the Singularity happens then I can be a father at 65 and live to see them have children of their own.

But, my worry right now is I’ll be like Stieg Larsson in the bad way — I will drop dead just as I successfully query the novel.

I Fear I’m On Some Sort Of Fucking Watch List. (Ugh)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There have been a few times in the last few days when I saw a ping in my Webstats that seemed…curious. Like, who is this person in Chicago who is interested in me so much? It makes me worry that the FBI has a cyber monitoring field office in Chicago and they’re keeping an eye on me.

Even if that’s not the case, I still think the FBI is probably aware of me — that I at least have a file. This is so dumb! I’m totally, completely harmless I’m just a loud mouth crank and that, the last time I checked, is still legal.

I hate violence. I hate guns. I’m a man of peace, a man of ideas.

I do get worked up sometimes, but I’m just venting. And this blog gets such little traffic — usually no more than maybe 50 hits a day at the most — that I feel reasonably comfortable just being myself.

Of course, I am well aware that should I start to query my novel that all the literary agents doing due diligence on me will be aghast at what a kook I am. But, can’t go back, gotta move forward.

Bulls On Parade

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m in a weird — and bad — mood tonight. I just don’t like the direction the USA is going right now and I’m totally powerless to do anything about it. So, as usual, I’ll probably wake up tomorrow and just throw myself into my novel.

What I really need to do is read and watch more. They say if you have time to write you have time to read and, as such, lulz, I need to read more. I need to do things to stimulate my creativity more.

Anyway. Everything is so fucking dumb. Sometimes, it seems as though MAGA policies are designed to come after ME, SPECIFICALLY. I hate it so much. I just want to make enough money from this novel to get the fuck out of this country and live peacefully somewhere cool like a nice nation somewhere in Southeast Asia.

Something hot and stable where they speak English a lot.