by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I like to run casual scenarios in my mind and of all the scenarios about America’s political future, not one of them ends with Biden being legally sworn in as president in 2021.
It just is never going to happen.
If Trump has to force the issue and start a civil war of some sort, he’ll do it and he’ll win for no other reason than MAGA are bunch of bloodthirsty assholes already, they just need a little prompting.
But, just like sometimes you feel like imagining what might happen if you won the lottery, let’s think about the implications of a Biden Administration.
The biggest thing that comes to mind is we’re all going to deal with the possibly of a former president being indicted. The divisions in the United States won’t go anywhere if Biden’s president and so, as such, in all likelihood Trump will get away scot free even if he is somehow miraculously forced out of off.
Even I am leery of setting the precedent of criminally charging a former president, even if it’s Trump who richly deserves it. Once you go down that road, then the first thing that will happen once MAGA-Qanon are in power again is they’re going to go after Hillary Clinton or whomever.
The case could be made that Trump is the exception that proves the rule. The problem with that, of course, is that’s not how MAGA-Qanon would see it. They would be so enraged that The Dear Leader was on trial that there would likely be significant political violence associated with it AND they would go after any major center-Left political leader once they got the chance.
Another issue in the Biden Era would be what the Republican Party would become. I see three major issues.
- Qanon will become gospel to MAGA.
- Trump will be the new Ronald Reagan
- The “Lost Cause.”
Put these together and, really, we might get a few months of “normal” before the Republican Party would come back with a vengeance. One reason I have no hope for the First Republic is the Republican Party, by definition, hates democracy. And if you have one of your two major parties actively doing everything in its power to destroy the very democracy it’s suppose to be participating in, then, well, lulz, your fucked.
Another thing we have to remember is, a lot of major Clinton Era figures continue to be established public figures. So it goes without saying that we have a solid 20, 30, 40 years of Trump Era people who will continue to linger in the public eye in various ways.
Just because Biden is president, that’s not going to stop at least three of Trump children from running for president in some capacity. What’s more, the moment the Republicans regain the House, they’re going to start plotting the impeachment of Biden. As such, given how they would, on an existential level, see Biden – Harris as illegitimate, there’s a chance they would impeach both of them and name Trump I as Speaker of the House in hopes that he would become president again that way.
That’s how insane the Republican Party is now. They are so bonkers and so craven, that they will stop at nothing to put House Trump back on the throne.
This all boils down to the existential problems with the United States. The United States is two nations that are zooming as far as possible away from each other in every regard.
So, either there’s a civil war sooner, or a civil war later.
It’s all very tragic. I hope I’m wrong.
Only time will tell.
