Month: June 2021

I Struggle To Understand MAGA — A Lot


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Because of the quirks of my own personal history, if I were to become MAGA I would have an extensive support network of friends. I would stop alienating people who like me on a personal level, but don’t like my politics. So, by continuing to be anti-MAGA I’m only hurting myself.

As such, I often find myself — against my better judgement — struggling to figure if I’m missing something. Are they right? Why do I continue to put myself in a corner when my life would be demonstrably better if I just became MAGA and agreed with all these people who otherwise would be my friends.

I say this because there are a lot of things coming out of the center-Left echo chamber that really gets on my nerves. So, in a sense, not only would my personal life be better, but the case could be made if I could somehow square the circle when it came to MAGA then maybe my political life would make a lot more sense, too.

But every time I do this, logic and reality make it damn near impossible for me to do this. There simply is no way to rationalize supporting an idiot racist misogynist bigot grifter like Trump. This makes me struggle more. Why are all these people — many of them good natured, educated people — so wrapped up in their devotion to a ding-dong like Trump? What am I missing?

All I got is there are a combination of things that came to a head in 2016 that continue to influence events. A lot of white people who don’t see themselves as racist are alarmed by how fast America is browning. Something about the social changes of the second Obama Administration really frightened a lot of middle class conservative white Americans. As such, while they are often disgusted by Trump the person, there is a well developed permission structure established that allows them to hold their nose and support MAGA as a movement.

I don’t even know if a lot conservatives who effectively are MAGA even see themselves as such. They like Trump the “idea” but they don’t like Trump on a personal level. But what’s the “idea” of Trump that they’re so infatuated with? It seems as though a lot of white, Christian conservatives feel overwhelmed, on an abstract way, with the changes going on in American society and because Trump is a “fighter” for “real America” they support him.

Among the things that are so alien to me relative to this train of thought is that people who otherwise seem sane and normal to me are willfully allowing a demonstrably autocratic ding-dong continue to have sway over our politics. What exactly is Trump a fighter, for? What is at the heart of these all consuming abstract fears that white Christian conservatives are so terrified by? What would be so terrifying to them that when you confront them with this or that cruel thing Trump did while as president they embrace it, even though they call themselves Christians?

There’s just so much to unpack. But it definitely seems as though a lot of white Christian conservatives don’t really even know what is upsetting them so much that they support MAGA — they just know that, in general, that they don’t agree with what’s going on. A frequent refrain from MAGA people is they “just want to be left alone.”

This “just be left alone” mantra is another thing I struggle with. It seems like such an all-purpose complaint to describe any time where white Christian conservatives don’t feel comfortable, and, by extension, feel “oppressed.” The shorthand that white Christian conservatives use to describe this is “cancel culture.” And, to be fair, the thing they’re so afraid of — that something they say or do that they don’t think is wrong will go viral and ruin their life — has a grain of truth to it. There are limited, specific examples of conservatives getting in trouble for not following the media narrative and, as such, losing their job or whatever.

But not enough of a grain of truth to hand power to fascist MAGA for any reason. And, yet, here we are. That’s exactly what they want to do. They’re so paranoid about being “canceled” just for being conservative that they are willing to turn the United States into a white Christian autocratic ethno state. They look at modern Russia and see it as their goal for America. They’re willing to turn the United States from an idea, a melting pot, into an autocratic state based on the idea of blood and soil.

I’m beginning to feel a political existential dread about America’s future. I don’t know the ultimate end game or how far we’ll slide into an autocratic managed democracy, but the conditions are there for Republicans to at some point establish minority rule in the United States that will last for generations.

But I also am done arguing. The two side’s positions have hardened to the extent that debating politics is a moot point. Which, in itself, is a bad sign for our democracy.

So, Could Trump Become Speaker Of The House?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Could Trump become Speaker of the House? The short answer is, of course, yes. But it’s a lot more complicated than you might think. The rumor we’re hearing now is he would run for a House seat so he could get the job. But that’s kind of besides the point.

Given that Trump has some serious autocratic inclinations — even if he is really fucking lazy — it would be far easier for him just to demand being named Speaker should House Republican win the chamber. (Nowhere in the Constitution does it say the Speaker have to actually be a House member.) It’s kind of a historical gimmie that they will, so it’s very possible that Trump will really screw over his lapdog Kevin McCarthy by stealing a position that should rightfully be his.

Now, the ominous implication of all of this is the reason Trump would want the job is so he could short circuit the Constitution by leading an impeachment charge against Biden and Harris so he could be come POTUS via the line of succession. This is a classic late-stage democracy play by a would-be autocrat. I will note, in passing, that the very thing we were always afraid the Republicans would do if Speaker Nancy Pelosi ever found herself in a position to become president –challenging the Constitutionality of the Presidential Secession Act — Democrats might do in this situation. Though, come to think of it, SCOTUS is now full of MAGA hacks, so lulz.

As such, we need to take this possibility seriously. It’s very easy to imagine Trump becoming Speaker, impeaching both Biden and Harris and then ranting hysterically about MAGA needing to “protect the 2nd Amendment” in such a way that there’s enough political violence across the country that the Senate convicts both Biden and Harris simply to protect the nation from a civil war.

I say this only because MAGA is now American fascism. It’s an Americanized version of the Nazi Party in 1933. The only thing stopping Trump from doing any of this is he’s extremely lazy and — and stupid. So, I can come up with all the hysterical dystopian political hellscapes I want to, but in the end, Trump could be so fucking lazy as to bungle even something as obvious as this.

So, I dunno.

Call MAGA What It Is: American Fascism


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It’s been a struggle to get mainstream media to get to the point where it calls the “untruths” that Trump has said over the last five years what they are: lies. And, as such, I don’t have a lot of hope that MSM will ever get around to calling MAGA what it is: fascism.

The upsetting thing about all of this is, of course, the last time fascists won an election — in Germany of 1933 — there were some pretty extraordinary circumstances involved. But in the case of the United States, fascists will come to power because of one of the major parties of our undead liberal democracy would rather establish minority autocratic rule than let scary brown people and women gain any additional power.

All of this is happening, it seems, because a lot of white middle class people are terrified, in an abstract fashion, with the social changes taking place in what they feel is an alarming rate. Something about Obama winning re-election in 2012 was some sort of weird racist wake up call for people like that. And most of them can’t even articulate in any concrete terms the origin of their intense negative polarization. They would never admit that they’re racist, or misogynistic — they don’t even believe in systemic racism or sexism in the first place!

So, a lot of well intentioned conservative white people feel as though they don’t have any other option than to vote in fascist MAGA. Just from my casual conversations with my conservative relatives they are really terrified by the idea of being “canceled” — and having their life ruined — just for being conservative.

And that’s how America turns into a fascist state. Or we have a civil war. I continue to vacillate wildly in my mind between thinking we’re going to slip silently into autocracy and thinking we’re going to have a civil war.

I still honestly don’t know which one is going to happen.

‘Flughazi’ & The Rise of American Fascism


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

MAGA Republicans have already telegraphed their intentions for Dr. Fauchi. The moment they are swept into power in 2023, all their going to do is drag him in front of every possible committee to yell at him. In fact, the only thing that will stop them from just forcing him to testify at every possible turn will be their efforts to impeach both Biden and Harris.

It’s shit like this that gives one pause for thought.

Republicans are so craven, so fascist in their inclinations that I have begun to question if they will ever let go of power, any power that they get once they have it going forward. We have to take their fasciation with Russia seriously — they really do want to turn the United States into an autocratic white Christian ethno state like Russia.

Democrats are just too limp wristed, to beholden to staying within conventional wisdom and trying to find some sort of bi-partisanship. If I had my way, Democrats would get woke and take the vicious nature of Republicans at face value. I’m aware that there’s a huge downside to this — once BOTH sides fight dirty, then politics collapses and you, well, uhhh, fight things out through a force of arms.

Let me put it another way — it seems obvious to me that we’re lurching towards an existential choice of autocracy or civil war. I would much rather go down fighting — if Republicans are determined to destroy everything in an effort to establish white minority rule, then we should at least be prepared to make it as difficult as possible for them to do it.

But in the near term, Republicans are going to wallow in their new narrative that the Deep State and Dr. Fauchi released COVID19 from the Wuhan Lab specifically to bring down Trump. I get the sense that some pretty mainstream Republican media outlets essentially imply this already. It will be all we hear about once MAGA Republicans control Congress again.

The fact that Trump’s incompetency directly lead to 500,000 additional, unnecessary COVID19 deaths will be a lulz to them.

Known Unknowns Of Trump’s Belief He Will Be ‘Reinstated’ By August


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have gamed out in pretty explicit detail on this blog my fears about what might happen this year should Cyber Ninjas “prove” that Trump “won” Arizona. It doesn’t matter that the whole thing is a fraud and a sham done to further Trump’s Big Lie that the 2020 election was stolen from him — all he needs is a win, any win and he will hysterically say he is still “really” president.

Oh, now take a deep breath.

The crux of the crisis we may be facing is…then what? Trump’s popularity outside of the violent MAGA personality cult is seemingly at a historic low. And, yet, even at this nadir, Trump’s devotees are still a solid 20-30% of the electorate. Given that political science tells us it only takes an organized 5% of the population to take over a country, if Trump really leans into his bonkers belief that he has to be reinstated, well, we could be fucked.

Logically, Trump taking the sham Cyber Ninjas “win” and running with it to make surreal declarations about his return to the presidency would have him laughed off the public state. Or, at least, would be ignored to the point that the only place he can rant about it in public is OAN, NewsMax or FOX News. And, yet, this is Trump we’re talking about.

The Republican Establishment lives in abject fear of Trump because they’re afraid that if they don’t kowtow to him, he will bolt the party, taking a huge chunk of the Republican Party with him. As such, his hold over the Republican Party is near Hitler over Germany in early 1945 levels. It’s very easy to imagine that Trump might pull off one last hat trick and get elected Republicans across the country to entertain his insane rantings to the point that they convene some sort of conventions to study the idea of “nullifying” the Biden Administration.

Or something. Whatever method they picked, it would happen spontaneously and, at first at least, be done to “own the libs” and provoke a lot of ridicule from said libs. My fear is, all of this will turn pretty serious — and dark — pretty soon when suddenly what started off as a joke turns into a secession crisis.

As an aside, this does make one wonder which state might be the first to actually jump off the cliff for Trump and attempt to secede from the Union. There are so many to choose from. South Carolina seems the one to have some sort of historical reason for doing it for obvious reasons. But, of course, its large minority population would never stand for it. Then there’s Texas, which likes to think it has one foot out the door already. But while hysterical Texas Republicans talk a good game, the state is shifting blue too fast and it’s difficult for me to imagine them actually pulling it off. That leaves the small population, lily white plains states. I could see maybe Montana, Idaho, Montana or South Dakota being the state to break that particular glass.

And now we come to the part I don’t know what to expect — is it even possible that MAGA will “cross the Rubicon” and follow the Dear Leader towards the path of actual disunion?

That very important element of this dystopian hellscape scenario I simply can’t figure out. It’s possible, I guess, that Trump will finally saunter into political irrelevance when he demands he be “reinstated” or the Biden Administration be “nullified” and…nothing happens. Or, put another way, Trump’s power outside the MAGA base evaporates when this happens. Meanwhile, within the base, the fact that this didn’t happen will be see as yet another grievance to be thrown onto the funeral pyre.

So, I dunno. It really could go either way. Which, unto itself, is rather dark and disturbing. When the richest, most powerful country in the world has a 50/50 chance of a severe political crisis within days or weeks, that does tend to make one sit up and take notice.

‘Stop Being Poor’ — MAGA’s Views On Poverty Are Bonkers


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It’s becoming clear to me that the political divisions in the United States are hardening. I say this because those times I’ve spoken to MAGA people of late, I realize I’m wasting my energy. They have their orthodoxly, and I have mine.

But, sometimes, I have to vent. Sometimes, their augments are so batshit bonkers that I have to write about them.

Recently, I saw a middle class MAGA person give the spicy hot take that said, essentially, that poor people in the United States are ungrateful mooches. They should be grateful that the meager life they live as a poor person in a First World nation is better than a rich person in a Third World country. Or, actually, if I recall correctly, the actual argument was poor people in the United States are making more than a lot of rich people in Third World countries.

The stupid, it burns.

This type of thinking is so goddamn stupid that I can only guess that it comes from when MAGA only talk to people who agree with them. This line of reasoning conflates things so badly and is so poorly thought out that it really fucking grates on my nerves.

You see, there’s this thing called the cost of living. And just because you are making a certain amount of money on government assistance in the United States and that that would be some sort of extravagant life elsewhere, that doesn’t mean that it’s any easer to feed yourself where the fuck you are.

Idiots!

And, yet, trying to point any of this out to MAGA people is a waste of time. Most of MAGA’s political arguments are little more than grunts mixed with a shit tone of self-serving rationalization.

Yet Another Version Of The Novel’s Outline


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve been working on this novel for several years now. There are a number of ways to look at this. One way is to say I’m simply spinning my wheels and I’m being too hard on myself — I need to just finish a first draft, any first draft. Another way to look at this I had absolutely no idea what I was doing when I started and it’s just taken a lot of different versions to finally produce something good.

But if the reaction of my alpha readers is any indication, I’ve finally reached something akin to what I want to do. The latest reason why I threw everything out is the first act had grown very bloated. This became very obvious when I changed the indicting incident and realized that I had way too much going on in the first act.

I hope to wrap up a new version of the outline very soon. Things have really clicked with this version and I think I should be able to get back to writing very soon.

That’s the goal, at least.

Olivia Rodrigo And The Deep Echo Of 80s Pop


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Olivia Rodrigo’s “Sour” is probably the best pop album I’ve heard in 15 years. It isn’t as danceable as maybe it could be, but it definitely seems to be something of a deep echo of 80s pop.

Every once in a while listening to Sour, I feel as though she’s so close to producing a song that The Cure might have done. It’s a testament to how musical tastes have changed that all the great pop hits of the 80s are now very niche. Young people are so interested in listening to 30 second bites of songs that they are completely oblivious to all the great songs that have come before. I keep hoping for some sort of revival of pop rock but…I’m beginning to lose hope. It definitely sees as though pop rock doesn’t exist and will never come back.

But having said all that, I really like Rodrigo’s album. She’s just a baby at 17, so she potentially has a very long career ahead of her. She’s a great singer and obviously a really good writer. (I’m assuming she wrote her songs.)

It would be nice, however, if in the future she might produce songs that “have a beat and you can dance to” like I grew up listening to.

Goodbye To All That: Maybe It’s Time To Let Gawker Go


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I keep hearing rumblings that Gawker is coming back in some form. While I’m all for something like Gawker coming back, I don’t know if bringing the Gawker brand itself back is all that great an idea. It’s too loaded. Any new version of the site would be judged by the old version.

Also, the Web is a lot different than it was nearly 20 years ago when Gawker first came out. The Web is now a mature medium. It’s almost impossible to organically grow a brand. A lot of the youthful vigor that helped grow Websites back in the day now is found on video services like Tik-Tok.

As such, I think literally bringing Gawker back may be a bit misguided. I would love to be involved in founding a new site similar to Gawker. I could do a really good job. I love shit like that.

But no one listens to me. I will note, in passing, how strange it is that the audience has moved on from the snarky, heady days of 2003-2004. There’s a fundimental change in audience tastes that I struggle to understand.

Pondering The MAGA Desire To ‘Just Be Left Alone’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

A recurring theme whenever I talk to MAGA people is their desire to “just be left alone.” Given how willing they are otherwise to embrace autocracy — which will definitely not just leave them alone, I struggle to understand what they’re really talking about. What, exactly, do they mean by the idea of “just being left alone.”

Under our current liberal democracy, who is not leaving them alone?

It’s this type of abstract fear on the part of MAGA that eats away at me. One reason this is so is FOX News and Trump really lean into this fear. They promise MAGA people that if only they support The Dear Leader, that they will stop the evil liberal-progressive forces that will mess with them.

I guess if I wrote for Vox, I would be smart enough to figure this out. I know this sentiment is some sort of MAGA code for a specific situation, but I still can’t figure out what they really mean. Maybe what they’re talking about is how they have a different interpretation of the social contract than non-MAGA people. Maybe they see “just being left alone” to mean the right to be openly racist, bigoted and misogynistic?

But I fear that doesn’t really even properly express what’s going on. We all want to just be left alone, regardless of political leanings, and yet I see that freedom as something we already have and MAGA sees it so currently imperiled that they would burn the country to the ground and install an autocrat to defend it.