Category: Cold Civil War

The Regime Risks Growing Arrogant

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

There is pride before the fall and I’m beginning to worry that Trump is going to really do something crazy with the FBI to the point that people might…begin to care?

If Trump actually makes good on his desires for a police state then, at least in some of the Blue States, this is going to cause some problems. I’m a man of peace, a man of ideas, but the idea of some sort of Blue revolution does seem in the greater-than-zero range right now.

I hope, I really hope, that doesn’t happen, but if Trump uses the FBI to literally snatch people — like me! — off the street then, well, we got a problem. But hopefully that won’t happen. Hopefully.

But it definitely, at least, SEEMS that we are headed in that direction. What will be interesting to see is the reaction on the part of the population to such thuggish shenanigans.

I suppose what Trump might do is purge the FBI to the point that he has to find whack jobs in police departments in Red States to fill all those high paying positions and then he uses them to do is bidding in Blue States. That causes mass protests, he calls in Red State National Guards and, tah-dah, we’re a military police state under martial law for the foreseeable future.

After The Fall

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The United States is now an autocracy. Everything I kept ranting about for years has or is happening. The only big miscalculation I made was about protests. I thought if Trump went full tyrant from the beginning that there would be a General Strike or mass protests.

But, fun fact, no.

I know we’re still early in Trump’s administration, but it is clear to me that even if there were massive protests, there’s a good chance that the mass media is so beholden to Trump that they wouldn’t even cover any of it. I do think a prolonged General Strike with very strong leadership and a clear agenda could probably bring Trump and his regime down…but that’s just not going to happen.

People on the center-Left are just too busy being keyboard warriors to do something as dramatic as actually risk their “lives and sacred honors” in the real world. So, here we are, an autocracy.

The only lingering question is who gets to be the guy or woman who is president for 40 odd years once Trump shuffles off this mortal coil. I honestly don’t know at the moment. Maybe it’s going to be Musk, his legal inability to have the job be damned? Who knows?

I suspect the person is going to be a Trump, one way or another. And given Trump’s fascination with being a king, I wonder what would happen if he styled himself an emperor. Would anything happen? Anything at all?

The Final Surprise

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Much of what I predicted over the years — and a lot I didn’t — has happened in the short time since Trump became president again….and….nothing. No General Strike, no mass protests, nothing.

So, as of this moment, it seems as though the path is clear for Trump to become a Putin-like figure. He will transition us into a legalistic autocracy and the real question becomes who will be his successor, the one who will be president for decades to come.

I have no doubt that Trump is going to run for and win an illegal third term. That goes without saying. But he is old and he’s not going to live forever, someone, somewhere, is going to pick up the autocratic mantel. It’s probably going to be someone named Trump.

If we were still a democracy, I would say someone like AOC or Jon Stewart would have a chance to swoop in and fix a lot of the problems Trump has caused by the time 2028 rolls around. But I think our elections will no longer be free and fair and Trump will rule by decree for the most part, leaving the legislative and judiciary branches as moot.

We have to take seriously the prospect that the FBI is going to investigate and arrest AOC, Jon Stewart and anyone else who might actually have a chance against Trump in 2028, even if the elections won’t be free and fair.

So, this is it. They will come after me soon enough, I suppose, probably by pushing me out of a window.

‘You Can Just Do Things’ (Ugh)

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Tech Bros can just fuck off. While the “you can just do things” mentality might work well with AI, it’s not the best form of government. In fact, it sucks. Big time.

I actually had an argument with some Tech Bro about the DOGE shenanigans and he invoked the “you can just do things” bullshit. It’s amazing that people who should know better would think that the literal use of a Tech Bro catch phrase in government might actually work.

Fuck that and fuck them.

But, here we are, with DOGE running rampant across the government breaking things that could take decades to fix. I still think that This Is It. You just can’t unring the MAGA bell. We’re in a new age and either we become a Russian-style legalistic autocracy or we go through a bumpy patch and….a Third Republic is founded.

At the moment, I just don’t know which outcome is going to happen.

What If You Held Massive Protests Against Trump & The Press Didn’t Care

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

If Social Security checks aren’t cut on time, there’s a real risk of severe protests across the country. But my fear is that just because there are massive protests, doesn’t mean that the press will cover it.

In fact, I would go so far as to suggest that only if there’s a General Strike will and the economy crashes will anyone give a shit. And I just don’t see American being willing to risk their “lives and sacred honors” in the real world instead of being just keyboard warriors.

Resistance Media Is Letting Us Down

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’ve largely tuned out of center-Left media because, well, it sucks. They just aren’t taking the coup Trump and Musk are engaging in seriously enough. They just seem sort of meh as Trump and Musk are destroying everything around us and there’s no sense of urgency on the part of “Resistance Media.”

I honestly don’t know what to make of it all or what might happen going forward. I do think that we’re careening towards an crisis of some sort — maybe a big one — and that might be the moment when Resistance Media actually begins to get its act together.

Anyway. I guess we’ll see going forward.

You Can’t Unring A Bell

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The thing about what’s going on as we slide into autocracy is we’ve reached point where everyone is learning the weaknesses of the system. So, no matter what, this is it, the end — you can’t unring Trump’s bell.

We either go full Russian-style autocracy, or we have a Great Turbulence where the Good Guys win and a Third Republic is established. There is no middle ground anymore.

I honestly don’t know which direction things are going to go. It could be either way. The only way we “solve” this problem is via something akin to a Revolution and I just don’t see Americans prepared to do that. So, I suppose I’ve answered my own question — it seems like we’re going to become a very legalistic dictatorship with two branches of government that exist, but don’t do anything.

That’s the dystopian hellscape that we’re zooming towards at the moment.

‘I, (AI) Trump’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I hear Elon Musk is trying to make Grok a conservative. The paranoid in me fears that Grok will be infused with Trump’s personality and one day it will be hooked up to the government and Trump will live forever in the digital sphere.

Stranger things, and all that.

That seems our fate. It seems as though we’re just never going to get rid of that motherfucker Trump. He’s going to become an ASI and rule the world under the principles of MAGA.

I wish this would just my usual historical doom shit, but that definitely seems the future we’re rushing towards.

Recipe For Disaster

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

House Republicans want to gut the social safety net to pay for massive tax cuts for plutocrats. This transfer of wealth is a recipe for disaster. In general, the more income inequality there is, the greater the chance for severe social disruption.

Now, remember, all of this is happening in the context of the rise of AI. It could be that the powers that be will use AI Androids to control not just the United States but the entire world. That might be our dystopian future.

But the fact remains that the second half of the 2020s could be extremely disruptive. In a way that leaves the old order in rubble and a new age being founded.

The 2025 – 2035 timeframe could see not just WW3, but a Singularity happen and who knows what the world will look like on the other side. So, lulz? All I know is that Trump and Musk are ringing a bell that can’t be unrung and something new, a new era is going to rise one way or another.

‘Implosion’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Words elude me sometimes when it comes to try to describe how bad things are right now. The system has imploded and Trump and Musk have free reign to establish a dictatorship. I really need to piviot back to working on some novels.

I need to just shut down the political part of my mind and avoid Twitter as much as possible. But my life may become rather…bumpy…very soon so that is kind of difficult to do. The outside world may demand my attention, no matter what.

But I do think that very soon — as soon as tomorrow — I’m going to focus my mind on being creative in a constructive manner, at last. I just can’t be in neutral forever, I have to do something with my life.

I’m not dead yet, as they say.