For the better part of a decade, I’ve been fascinated by the following scenario — what if a Galactic Empire came to humanity and said, “Earth is doomed. We’ll give you a second chance in your own ‘homeland’ of a few habitable places in a different solar system, but there’s a catch. We will only zap you there, you have to use your existing technology and unite enough establish a planet-wide government.”
This would be an amazing opportunity, of course, but the story would deal with how difficult it would be to unite humanity to do such a thing. If you treat all humans as equal — as we should — how do you figure out how to unite the very, very diverse and divided humanity?
Given that under this scenario, the Galactic Empire would be zapping a huge number of people to this new solar system — in the hundreds of millions — it seems to me that the only way to do it would be to use the United States as the basis of your new, planet-wide government, culture and civilization. The reason is, the United States has a huge population and history of being a nation of immgrants.
Where the story gets really interesting is you could use the whole thing as a proxy to talk about fucking cocksucker MAGA idiots who want to turn the United States into white Christian ethno state of “blood and soil.” So, part of the plot would be how Americans balanced this amazing opportunity with the natural inclination of MAGA to flip the fuck out because even though say, 200 million Americans would settle this new planet, 400 – 600 million non Americans would also settle the planet as well.
So you have much gnashing of teeth about how the “American way of life” would be in jeopardy.
And this doesn’t even begin to address the whole bootstrapping issue. You could have all these really interesting scenes of how to start a global economy from scratch — it would be The Martian, but on a global scale.
Anyway, I don’t have a plot at the moment. And I have a lot of other stories I’m working on — four thrillers at the moment — but this continues to be fascinating to me because of how difficult and complex it is.
It is slowly beginning to dawn on me that now that I know how *I* handle a huge creative storytelling project, that it’s easy for me to piviot from developing and writing four thriller novels to working on screenplays.
I don’t intend to stop working on these novels, but I definitely have my eye watching a lot of YouTube videos in the near future so I can figure out how to use Final Draft (even though, according to the way the guys on ScriptNotes talk, that’s now passe.)
The biggest thing I’ve learned about telling a great story is how important development is before you even write a single word. So, once I get to a point with the four novels I’m working on that I feel comfortable shaving off some attention from them, I’m going to begin to do development on a few screenplays to see what I come up with.
Screenplays are different from novels because by definition if it’s on the screen, people are nearly forced to accept it’s real. You don’t have to spend 20 pages explaining why this or that thing happened — you see it on the screen, it exists. As such, I feel like I can engage in more elaborate flights of fancy because I don’t have to spend on this time researching things. Also, with a screenplay I have a very strict number of scenes to work with — NO MORE THAN 120!
I know the general structure of good storytelling to the point now that it is at least possible that writing screenplays — after doing development — will be much, much faster than working on novels. There are certain beats that you have to hit during the course of your 120 scenes and as a trained journalists, I love, love, love tight structure.
It makes things a lot easier, at least in my mind.
You can be as creative as you like, you just have to stay within the established conventional wisdom of structure.
But this is all very speculative. I continue to be very hard at work on four novels. And I idly think about writing some short stories when I need to take a short break from working on the main project. And, yet, I’m so absolutely consumed with these four thrillers that I doubt anything will come of that.
There’s a sexxy little black dress that a number of high profile women have come to wear at their high profile events. The Dress is just low cut enough that some tape has to be involved if these lovely women in question don’t want to pop out of their bodice.
Olivia Rodrigo is the most notable example of a famous woman wearing The Dress because she’s just barely 18. This led to much consternation on Tik-Tok by her well meaning fans who have gone to elaborate lengths to ascribe Ms. Rodrigo wearing The Dress to some nefarious plot of adults who just wanted to see her tits.
The Dress.
These Tik-Tokers point to a clip where Ms. Rodrigo is seen turning for a moment to talk to her stylist before turning around again for the press. Now, what *I* think was happening was not that she was upset with the dress, but she was feeling a little insecure that her boobs were on the verge of popping out and she didn’t want a wardrobe malfunction.
The thing I have to point out is — while I’m not a woman so I don’t know, I do know enough about history, status and women to tell that for some reason wealthy women have a different relationship to their boobs than poorer women do. For wealthy women, having the odd nipslip here or there is a flex. I will suggest you throw in how age works into all of this as well. Older women have zero fucks left and, for them, a bit of conspicuous T&A in public now and again makes them feel sexxy. (I presume.) And, even more importantly, I’m thinking in extremely broad terms.
There are plenty of older, wealthy women who are rather chaste –Alexa Chung, Julia Roberts and Emma Stone being prime examples of this.
But I’m a CIS white male who likes seeing boobs, so fuck you. (Wink)
I’m pretty good at strategic thinking and when it comes to traditional American democracy as we’ve known it for 240 years, its goose it cooked. All the talk of indicting this or that Trump goon is tactical and being taken on the edges of the massive clusterfuck that is America’s political system.
I say this because of one thing: our MAGA infection has gone septic.
We need to move away from assuming anyone is going to save us and start thinking about the potent antifascist antibiotics we need to take if we want to save the patient.
As of right now, things are so bad that I start to focus on gaming out what democratic forces will do when we either slip into autocracy or have a civil war. Or, more specifically, have those two scenarios games out as well as possible now so when they happen we won’t get sucker punched.
I remember how before election 2020 there was some gaming out of various catastrophes that might happen. I would suggest something even more ambitious. Something akin to a Foundation, if you will, for democracy that would be made up of Thinkers who would think about what to do between now and January 2025.
The reason is — on a macro level, we’re fucked. There’s no going back. We’re all going to face some deep, existential questions on a personal basis at some point in the next few years. And no amount of “booms” about what Trump may, or may not, have known about January 6th is going to change that.
Something Bad is on the cusp of happening, I just don’t know what.
It should would happen if there was a Foundation of patriots that would think existentially and take the threat of autocracy or civil war seriously. You would probably have to do it in secret because MAGA people would freak the fuck out. But what exactly would this Foundation do?
Well, talk to people in the government in private and ask them to game out how they think the government would respond to this or that existential domestic threat. But the key is to accept that we’re probably going to lose a significant amount of liberty.
So, I hate to say this, but any Foundation as I suggest would probably go from mulling autocracy or civil war and turn into a small group of people who would try to game out how Blue States could win a second civil war. This, I suppose would be closer to a Second Foundation.
Anyway, the point is — no one is going to save us. There will be no magical booms that prevent our decent into civil war or autocracy (or a military junta.) If you have the means and you’re not inclined to stand your ground in the United States, I suggest you get a passport and leave the country the moment things go nuts.
The thing about Taylor Swift is, she is in the exact center of our culture. I generally like her newer stuff, but for one thing: it’s grown to be almost entirely fan service. That’s why she keeps churning out albums and, outside of her core group of fans, there’s almost no buzz.
Taylor Swift / Image — the Internet
If Tay-Tay were to do a reveling spread in Maxim (or Rolling Stone) as part of a new album dropping people might sit up and take notice. Or if she cut (or dyed) her hair in conjunction with a new album, then….maybe she would generate more non-female buzz?
I’m not saying such fan service is bad. I’m just saying if Tay-Tay wants to take her career to the next level (read: Hollywood star) she might have to start thinking about risking upsetting her fan base. As it is, there are two people in the public sphere who are obsessed with fan service — Donald Trump and Taylor Swift.
And, really, the only reason why I even say anything about any of this is I saw Tay-Tay on the late night shows promoting her SNL appearance and was taken aback by how drop-dead gorgeous she continues to be. And, yet, she still has the long blonde hair. She was wearing that low cut black dress that seems so popular with female stars these days, which is an improvement from her usual modest school marm attire.
There is going to come a point when Tay-Tay is going to have to shake things up some. She’s going to have to cut her hair, maybe into a pixie? Or, hell, dye her hair jet black? Something, anything to change her Taylor Swift, Age 21 appearance she’s had for what feels like decades now. Now, I know she probably is wearing a wig, but, still. Every other major female vocalist does a radical personal brand shift whenever new music comes out…why not Taylor Swift?
Anyway, absolutely no one listens to me. But I had to get that off my chest. Grow up, Tay-Tay!
I can begin to feel the old white hot rage against MAGA from the early days of this writing project begin to creep into my soul again. I’m livid and powerless. So, not being a violent man, I’m throwing myself back into working on my art. The first two books of this four book series are not overtly anti-MAGA and while the last two books are pointedly anti-MAGA, hopefully they won’t come across as too terribly preachy.
At the moment, I’m taken aback by how smooth things are going with the first draft of this first book in the series. I’m just trucking along, following the outline and, really, the only issue at the moment I have to worry about is keeping myself entertained. I don’t have the challenge that the struggle of the first act has associated with it.
The past….and the future?
All I have to do is, as they say, “just write.”
Of late, I’ve been jumping ahead as I work on this first novel, trying to nail down the outline of the second book. I’m really going to try to force myself to have no more than maybe 120 scenes at 1,000 average words. The first book is way too close to 200 scenes for my liking, but that’s just the first draft. I can always always trim that down some in the first draft.
You can’t edit a blank page, as they say.
And I continue to have a lingering insecurity about writing all four novels at once. I mean, I guess I could just try to get the first novel published and see how that pans out. And, yet, if Stieg Larsson can write and sell three novels, I can write and sell four novels. I have a huge ego and thinking like that is just the jitters associated with being an aspiring novelist.
Also, all four of these novels tell a compelling story. I’m going to keep going until something concrete prevents me from doing so. While it’s very possible that someone is going to steal a creative march on me and I’ll have to piviot to some other concept, you have make decisions on what you know, not on what you don’t know.
You can’t live your life in fear.
Or, as my father would say, “No one ever got anywhere in this world without taking a risk.”
The sense I get from the bedrock conservatives in my immediate family is they’re grateful that Trump is out of the picture. They can now turn all their attention to the dozen or so racist, misogynistic autocrats who promise them all the policies they love without the personality traits they can’t defend.
Here are some reasons why we won’t have a civil war:
It’s not in our nature to have a civil war. For all the hateful rhetoric on the part of the MAGA New Right, it’s possible that in the end, they manage to pull off a peaceful transition to autocracy. In fact, at first, at least, the chance from democracy to autocracy could be so subtle that only a few hysterical people like me even notice. For the average person, it will just be a replay of 2000, only worse: it will simply be accepted that the only way a Democrat can become POTUS is if that party also control Congress. People will say “the system worked” and move on.
Republicans have gamed the system. It could be that by 2024 – 2025 the actual administration of elections will be so corrupt that it will be a fact of life that people shrug and take for granted. It will be the first step towards Americans becoming Russians in that they will no longer feel as though the government expresses the will of the people. And that will be that.
Not Trump 2024 Another reason why we could slip peacefully into autocracy is it’s not Trump who is the Republican nominee, but someone other than Trump. If this is the case, when I honestly don’t see why we would have a civil war. Autocracy is so popular within the United States –and the opposition to it is so weak — that our transition to an actual autocracy will in the end be so easy to pull off that there will be no need to resort to violence. Blue States will get angry, but, lulz, they always get angry, right Mr. Eastman?
Autocracy is very popular in the United States A sizable portion of the United States’ electorate wants an autocracy. They want one so bad that they seem like a cult to people who aren’t all that thrilled at the prospect of one. So, it’s possible that they will wrap up the transition into autocracy without any violence at all. By the time people realize what they’ve lost, it will be way, way too late. The United States will be nothing more than a Russia clone with an identical political dynamic. There will be a MAGA-themed Constitutional Convention to “pass a balanced budget amendment” and we’ll still have President DeSantis (or whomever) 30 years from now.
Anti-MAGA forces are just too weak willed. Again, it could be that when push comes to shove, the whole thing will be over before it even starts. There will be a lot of angry tweets on Twitter, but in the end, because Twitter liberals aren’t willing to risk anything in the real world, we slip peacefully into autocracy and that, as they say, will be that.
And that’s why when I talk to Republicans I know about Trump running again, they either FLIP THE FUCK OUT or simply look at me with a blank stare and say, “No, he won’t.” They don’t back up why they think it is, that’s just what’s going to happen in their mind.
What I believe is going to happen is, Trump runs again, the entire Republican Party votes for him and we’re back where we were in January 2021. Trump is going to win fair and square in 2024 — even though he will cheat out of habit — and the question will become is Trump such a massive self-own artist that he, on a personal basis pushes the nation into a civil war. And this civil war would happen not when Red States left the Union, but when Blue States did.
Here are some reasons why we will have a civil war.
Republicans have come to glorify political violence Something you see a lot these days within the bullshit echo chamber of the MAGA New Right is the belief that because “liberals won’t leave us alone” that they are being “driven” to extremism. There’s a lot of leading not-so-vague talk as to what all this would ultimately mean. But it’s clear that for a number of “thought leaders” within the MAGA New Right that they have accepted that at some point in the future, they’re going to have to resort to violence to get what they want.
Republicans no longer believe in democracy It is now clear that like any good fascists, Republicans no longer believe in democracy unless it’s for the specific purpose of gaining and keeping power. This view of the system they’re supposed to a part of leads them do extremely destabilizing things that help push the country to the brink.
Trump 2024 Just Trump being the 2024 nominee would, in itself, be enough to cause a civil war at some point in late 2024 – early 2025. He just has a special knack for “owning the libs” in such a way that if he stole in 2024 election and said the “quiet part outloud” that Blue States would grow so enraged that it would be they, not Red States, that left the Union and caused a Second Civil War. But Ron DeSantis is polling exceptionally well at the moment, so either Trump politically shivs him at some point, or he co-ops him, making him his VP, opening the door to DeSantis becoming America’s Putin at some point down the road a little bit.
Steve K Bannon. Bannon and his toadies are actively working to destroy the framework that weuse to administer free and fair elections. So, it’s very easy to imagine a situation where this gambit works in ways that Trump himself is too idiotic to pull off personally and it will be so egregious that, again, Blue States leave the Union and we have a Second American Civil War.
Extreme negative polarization We’re in for a bump four or so years, no matter what, because negative polarization, on a systemic level, has reached a critical mass. When one of your political parties is fascist and would rather crash the global economy instead of even appear to work for the good of the nation — you got a problem.
A lack of shared values As the big blow up on Twitter in the last 24 hours about a Stephen Colbert song and dance gag about getting vaccinated proves — we can’t even agree on what’s funny. A combination of this and negative polarization is leading to the United States being two nations, one Red, one Blue and when we get around to attempting to elect the next president, the system simply won’t be prepared for the passions it will stir up.
A potentially historic miscalculation on the part of Republicans It’s possible that, much like European powers in the lead up to WW1, when the time comes and Republicans have a choice between peacefully transitioning us into autocracy or fucking with us all so we want to take up arms, they will choose the latter not because they have to, but because they want to. It’s possible that by the 2024 — 2025 period, Republicans will see a civil war as their only choice to consolidate power, even if it’s clear that they could get everything they ever wanted within the system they so obviously loath.
Anyway, it’s very possible that something will happen and Trump decides not to run. Then we drift peacefully into autocracy under Republican rule and that will be that. At first President Desantis (or whomever) will be praised as a “new type” of Republican who will run the nation from the center now that they’re in office.
Then, gradually, because form follows function it will become clear that we’re no longer a democracy, but rather an autocracy. The media will purged when it is bought en masse by allies of the autocrat. ICE will be weaponized. Then the center-Left begins to vote with its feet…until the autocrat freaks out and makes it impossible to leave the country for any reason.
Or we have a civil war at some point during that process.
Good luck.
Macro trends are not on America’s side. As I keep saying, 2024 is going to be it. It’s the year when either the United States turns into a Russian-style “managed democracy” or there’s a civil war. Now, this isn’t going to be a complete list of the 50 states, but I am going to highlight some of the states that may be more problematic should a Second American Civil War erupt.
Oregon The state is really two states and, as such, is probably going to be a major flashpoint in any Second Civil War. What’s likely to happen is Portland will buck any attempt at a putsch on the part of bonkers Right wing nutjobs in the rest of the state and, as such, either there’s a really blood struggle in the state or there are a massive amount of political refugees from the Portland area as the rest of the state sides with MAGA.
Virginia Again, this is really two states. There’s the NOVA-Richmond-Hampton Roads urban corridor and everything else. It’s very easy to imagine a situation — especially with Virginia’s historic ties to the first Civil War — where the state implodes as we grow closer and closer to a Second Civil War. Too many good old boys in the rural areas of Virginia might get wrapped up in the “Lost Cause” mythos and decide to seize places like Danville (the last capitol of the Confederacy) or Richmond (another Confederate capitol.) If nothing else, simply because of the larger population of the “Blue” parts of the state, there will be significant violence and political refugees as the Blues consolidate power.
Michigan I don’t know as much about this state, but it definitely seems as though once the pre-war process of coups and political consolation begins that there will be at least a coup attempt on the part of the Far Right. Again, don’t underestimate how once you actually start murdering people that the dynamics of things change significantly. It’s very possible that there would be a coup in the state, it would fail, and there would be significant political violence as the state’s Blue population fought back and put the state firmly on the Blue side.
New York Yet again, we have a situation where once politics fails us that the otherwise banal regional differences in a state tears it apart. New York City is far more progressive than the rest of New York State and, depending on how things work out, it’s possible that New York City could become a revolutionary hotbed to the point that is tears itself away from the rest of the state and proclaims itself a Free City. This almost happen during the first Civil War. If nothing else, there will be a serious jiggling of the relationship between NYC and the rest of the state to the point where it aligns itself in any Second Civil War with New Jersey and Connecticut in a way that update New York does not. Or, again, there could be significant political consolidation as Blues from all over the northeast flee to New York and the MAGA-friendly natives of the state flee elsewhere.
Maine I really don’t know that much about this state other than a vague belief that the northern part of the state is far different than the southern part. It’s very easy to imagine significant consolation in the state one way or another as people flee to it as the rest of the country buckles. The state is big — if sparsely populated — and it’s strategic location near the Canadian border might be enough for it to be the home to large refugee camps.
Texas Texas would be in an odd situation as the country fell into civil war because its long-term political trend is shifting Blue, but it’s part of the South and a lot of people consider themselves Southern and MAGA. So either it simply buckles into its own intra-civil war or the MAGA cocksucker fucktards push out all the Blues who flee to Blue States nearby. The end result would be a lot of pissed off former Texans who would be of great benefit to the Blue cause.
California In a sense, the whole fate of the United States rests on what California does. If it simply bolts from the Union, then that significantly hobbles the Blue cause on the ground. California sitting on its hands and become its own nation in the event of a Second Civil War makes it far more likely that either Red states win or there is some sort of half-ass balkanization of the United States. But if California stays and fights, then they could provide not only the necessary economy and population for a Blue state victory — after many, many dead — but also something of a vision for what America would look like after we’re finished bombing ourselves into oblivion.
The Deep South It’s very easy to imagine at the onset of a Second American Civil War most of the old Confederacy on a political level getting extremely excited and having a massive amount of momentum to either leave the Union outright or support the Republican controlled Congress’ attempt to brazenly steal the election. Then reality would sink in — all of the Southern states have significant African American populations and once politics is no longer a viable method of solving problems then the far more brutal dynamics of realpolitik would kick in. I just can’t imagine millions of African Americans lulzing a return to the Confederacy, no matter how badly the white political establishment of those states may want it. So, even though the South has a lot of people and a big economy, it would be, on a regional basis, too busy fighting a race war to really help the Red cause all that much. If things really grew as radical as I fear they will — probably because WMD are stolen and cities start to get vaporized — it’s the Deep South where you’re most likely to see some WW2 level atrocities as radicalized whites begin to murder blacks en mass.
As for the rest of the states, their ability to pick one side or the other is probably far easier and their biggest problem would be dealing with political refugees.
My introduction to French cinema and one of the strangest movies I’ve ever seen was “Betty Blue.” That was one fucked up movie. One half hour in that movie could have been turned into a full length American film. In short, a lot was going on.
I’ve slowly grown into a big Wes Anderson fan as he’s become more of an auteur. I’m probably showing myself to be a stereotype of some sort, but Wes Anderson and Paul Thomas Anderson are two of my favorite living filmmakers. Anyway, the reason why I bring this all up is how…French…The French Dispatch is.
Let’s start with the gratuitous amount of nudity in this movie. It’s not prurient or titillating, but there is a WHOLE LOT of Léa Seydoux in this movie. And, weirdly enough, there is a brief glimpse of full frontal nudity on the part of Tilda Swinton. (Who holds up really fucking well for 61!)
Whenever an art film has a lot of nudity in it, I wonder as to the reasoning. Is it a “gift” to art film nerds? Is it an effort to generate buzz? Ms. Seydoux — who was once was a part of a 23 minute lesbian sex scene in Blue Is The Warmest Color — may have been doing all that nudity not only as a flex but also to help her career.
Wes Anderson movies are Event Films for actors — given how many great ones tend to be in his films — and a lot of directors watch his movies, too. I find Ms. Seydoux to be a serious babe. She does look like a very glamorized version of my first serious girlfriend, too.
Anyway, the point is — I had to drive 35 miles to see this movie and it was worth it. I did check my watch and roll my eyes a few times. But, overall, it was well written, directed and acted. As always with Anderson, the cinematography was great, too.
Trump has never, ever really faced any political consequences for anything he’s ever done since becoming a major political figure. Absolutely nothing has stuck to the point that he’s been winded or changed his behavior. In fact, whenever he gets some pushback, he gets worse.
A lot of reasons exist for this. The most obvious reason is he’s nothing more than an avatar for systemic rot in a retreating Republic’s political system. As such, the only people who could stop Trump — well meaning conservatives who ultimately stopped Nixon — lulz the whole thing. They have an expansive permission structure built out by negative polarization.
Here are some reasons why we won’t have a civil war:
It’s not in our nature to have a civil war. For all the hateful rhetoric on the part of the MAGA New Right, it’s possible that in the end, they manage to pull off a peaceful transition to autocracy. In fact, at first, at least, the chance from democracy to autocracy could be so subtle that only a few hysterical people like me even notice. For the average person, it will just be a replay of 2000, only worse: it will simply be accepted that the only way a Democrat can become POTUS is if that party also control Congress. People will say “the system worked” and move on.
Republicans have gamed the system. It could be that by 2024 – 2025 the actual administration of elections will be so corrupt that it will be a fact of life that people shrug and take for granted. It will be the first step towards Americans becoming Russians in that they will no longer feel as though the government expresses the will of the people. And that will be that.
Not Trump 2024 Another reason why we could slip peacefully into autocracy is it’s not Trump who is the Republican nominee, but someone other than Trump. If this is the case, when I honestly don’t see why we would have a civil war. Autocracy is so popular within the United States –and the opposition to it is so weak — that our transition to an actual autocracy will in the end be so easy to pull off that there will be no need to resort to violence. Blue States will get angry, but, lulz, they always get angry, right Mr. Eastman?
Autocracy is very popular in the United States A sizable portion of the United States’ electorate wants an autocracy. They want one so bad that they seem like a cult to people who aren’t all that thrilled at the prospect of one. So, it’s possible that they will wrap up the transition into autocracy without any violence at all. By the time people realize what they’ve lost, it will be way, way too late. The United States will be nothing more than a Russia clone with an identical political dynamic. There will be a MAGA-themed Constitutional Convention to “pass a balanced budget amendment” and we’ll still have President DeSantis (or whomever) 30 years from now.
Anti-MAGA forces are just too weak willed. Again, it could be that when push comes to shove, the whole thing will be over before it even starts. There will be a lot of angry tweets on Twitter, but in the end, because Twitter liberals aren’t willing to risk anything in the real world, we slip peacefully into autocracy and that, as they say, will be that.
But, there’s also another huge reason why Trump breezes past any attempt to control or stop him — he can always simply take his MAGA base and leave the party if things get too hot for him within the Republican Party. Think of it as the Mad Man Theory, only for domestic politics.
The point of all of this is — keep these cold, hard facts in the back of your mind going forward as the possibility that incriminating presidential records from the National Archives may come out. This whole struggle is a construct. It’s Trump’s usual MO where he fights and fights and fights against something to the point that it either become politically moot or when it does come out….nothing happens on a political basis.
Now, if I was writing for VOX, I would lay out what all of this means for you and your family, maybe using a Tik-Tok video with received heavy vocal fry English. But, sadly, I went to the wrong school am no longer cute enough and Twitter liberals think I’m just another Internet crank.
But as I’ve come to believe, I will suggest that what all of this bullshit really means is you need to do a gut check. Figure out what you believe int the real world. What are you willing to suffer for? What are you willing to risk your life and scared honor for?
Here are some reasons why we will have a civil war.
Republicans have come to glorify political violence Something you see a lot these days within the bullshit echo chamber of the MAGA New Right is the belief that because “liberals won’t leave us alone” that they are being “driven” to extremism. There’s a lot of leading not-so-vague talk as to what all this would ultimately mean. But it’s clear that for a number of “thought leaders” within the MAGA New Right that they have accepted that at some point in the future, they’re going to have to resort to violence to get what they want.
Republicans no longer believe in democracy It is now clear that like any good fascists, Republicans no longer believe in democracy unless it’s for the specific purpose of gaining and keeping power. This view of the system they’re supposed to a part of leads them do extremely destabilizing things that help push the country to the brink.
Trump 2024 Just Trump being the 2024 nominee would, in itself, be enough to cause a civil war at some point in late 2024 – early 2025. He just has a special knack for “owning the libs” in such a way that if he stole in 2024 election and said the “quiet part outloud” that Blue States would grow so enraged that it would be they, not Red States, that left the Union and caused a Second Civil War. But Ron DeSantis is polling exceptionally well at the moment, so either Trump politically shivs him at some point, or he co-ops him, making him his VP, opening the door to DeSantis becoming America’s Putin at some point down the road a little bit.
Steve K Bannon. Bannon and his toadies are actively working to destroy the framework that weuse to administer free and fair elections. So, it’s very easy to imagine a situation where this gambit works in ways that Trump himself is too idiotic to pull off personally and it will be so egregious that, again, Blue States leave the Union and we have a Second American Civil War.
Extreme negative polarization We’re in for a bump four or so years, no matter what, because negative polarization, on a systemic level, has reached a critical mass. When one of your political parties is fascist and would rather crash the global economy instead of even appear to work for the good of the nation — you got a problem.
A lack of shared values As the big blow up on Twitter in the last 24 hours about a Stephen Colbert song and dance gag about getting vaccinated proves — we can’t even agree on what’s funny. A combination of this and negative polarization is leading to the United States being two nations, one Red, one Blue and when we get around to attempting to elect the next president, the system simply won’t be prepared for the passions it will stir up.
A potentially historic miscalculation on the part of Republicans It’s possible that, much like European powers in the lead up to WW1, when the time comes and Republicans have a choice between peacefully transitioning us into autocracy or fucking with us all so we want to take up arms, they will choose the latter not because they have to, but because they want to. It’s possible that by the 2024 — 2025 period, Republicans will see a civil war as their only choice to consolidate power, even if it’s clear that they could get everything they ever wanted within the system they so obviously loath.
Otherwise, I got nothing.
We continue to careen towards a dark future where no later than January 2025 we face the existential choice of either civil war or autocracy.
Good luck.
Macro trends are not on America’s side. As I keep saying, 2024 is going to be it. It’s the year when either the United States turns into a Russian-style “managed democracy” or there’s a civil war. Now, this isn’t going to be a complete list of the 50 states, but I am going to highlight some of the states that may be more problematic should a Second American Civil War erupt.
Oregon The state is really two states and, as such, is probably going to be a major flashpoint in any Second Civil War. What’s likely to happen is Portland will buck any attempt at a putsch on the part of bonkers Right wing nutjobs in the rest of the state and, as such, either there’s a really blood struggle in the state or there are a massive amount of political refugees from the Portland area as the rest of the state sides with MAGA.
Virginia Again, this is really two states. There’s the NOVA-Richmond-Hampton Roads urban corridor and everything else. It’s very easy to imagine a situation — especially with Virginia’s historic ties to the first Civil War — where the state implodes as we grow closer and closer to a Second Civil War. Too many good old boys in the rural areas of Virginia might get wrapped up in the “Lost Cause” mythos and decide to seize places like Danville (the last capitol of the Confederacy) or Richmond (another Confederate capitol.) If nothing else, simply because of the larger population of the “Blue” parts of the state, there will be significant violence and political refugees as the Blues consolidate power.
Michigan I don’t know as much about this state, but it definitely seems as though once the pre-war process of coups and political consolation begins that there will be at least a coup attempt on the part of the Far Right. Again, don’t underestimate how once you actually start murdering people that the dynamics of things change significantly. It’s very possible that there would be a coup in the state, it would fail, and there would be significant political violence as the state’s Blue population fought back and put the state firmly on the Blue side.
New York Yet again, we have a situation where once politics fails us that the otherwise banal regional differences in a state tears it apart. New York City is far more progressive than the rest of New York State and, depending on how things work out, it’s possible that New York City could become a revolutionary hotbed to the point that is tears itself away from the rest of the state and proclaims itself a Free City. This almost happen during the first Civil War. If nothing else, there will be a serious jiggling of the relationship between NYC and the rest of the state to the point where it aligns itself in any Second Civil War with New Jersey and Connecticut in a way that update New York does not. Or, again, there could be significant political consolidation as Blues from all over the northeast flee to New York and the MAGA-friendly natives of the state flee elsewhere.
Maine I really don’t know that much about this state other than a vague belief that the northern part of the state is far different than the southern part. It’s very easy to imagine significant consolation in the state one way or another as people flee to it as the rest of the country buckles. The state is big — if sparsely populated — and it’s strategic location near the Canadian border might be enough for it to be the home to large refugee camps.
Texas Texas would be in an odd situation as the country fell into civil war because its long-term political trend is shifting Blue, but it’s part of the South and a lot of people consider themselves Southern and MAGA. So either it simply buckles into its own intra-civil war or the MAGA cocksucker fucktards push out all the Blues who flee to Blue States nearby. The end result would be a lot of pissed off former Texans who would be of great benefit to the Blue cause.
California In a sense, the whole fate of the United States rests on what California does. If it simply bolts from the Union, then that significantly hobbles the Blue cause on the ground. California sitting on its hands and become its own nation in the event of a Second Civil War makes it far more likely that either Red states win or there is some sort of half-ass balkanization of the United States. But if California stays and fights, then they could provide not only the necessary economy and population for a Blue state victory — after many, many dead — but also something of a vision for what America would look like after we’re finished bombing ourselves into oblivion.
The Deep South It’s very easy to imagine at the onset of a Second American Civil War most of the old Confederacy on a political level getting extremely excited and having a massive amount of momentum to either leave the Union outright or support the Republican controlled Congress’ attempt to brazenly steal the election. Then reality would sink in — all of the Southern states have significant African American populations and once politics is no longer a viable method of solving problems then the far more brutal dynamics of realpolitik would kick in. I just can’t imagine millions of African Americans lulzing a return to the Confederacy, no matter how badly the white political establishment of those states may want it. So, even though the South has a lot of people and a big economy, it would be, on a regional basis, too busy fighting a race war to really help the Red cause all that much. If things really grew as radical as I fear they will — probably because WMD are stolen and cities start to get vaporized — it’s the Deep South where you’re most likely to see some WW2 level atrocities as radicalized whites begin to murder blacks en mass.
As for the rest of the states, their ability to pick one side or the other is probably far easier and their biggest problem would be dealing with political refugees.
Please note: I’m not an expert! I just have a long-time interest in this situation.
Something is going on — again — between the Ukrainians and the Russians. But, what? There has been a years-long “frozen conflict” in eastern Ukraine, to the point where it’s not somewhere one thinks anything is ever going to happen.
For the time being, the Russians like the status quo and, given how small their economy is, even if they were able to take Kiev and and try to establish some sort to Novorossiya, the Russians would not be able to keep it for very long. The one way they might make their Novorossiya dreams come true is swiftly take Kiev, have the Ukrainians sue for peace and then gobble up the land they want strictly through pollical means.
But even that somewhat ideal situation for Russia would be problematic. Eastern Ukraine’s political and ethnic makeup is far from uniform and there would be a lot of nationalists Ukrainians in Eastern Ukraine that would take up arms even if the Russians were able to conslodate power in the region as part of a peace deal.
What’s more, Ukraine signing off that much land to the Russians would enrage nationalists in the rump state and it’s very possible to imagine a far-Right government deciding to do everything in its power to take the lost land back. Which would put Russia in exactly the position was trying to avoid in the first place.
So, it’s very possible that the frozen conflict between Ukraine and Russia might heat up some, but something pretty big would have to go wrong for both sides before we were talking about any sort of general war.
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