Tag: Cyber Ninjas

Apparently, I Was Right About Dingas Trump & Cyber Ninjas — But….He’s Getting No Traction?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So, my dark predictions about what might happen with Trump and Cyber Ninjas in Arizona have proven to be correct: idiot Trump is now demanding that Biden’s win in Arizona (and other states) be “decertified.”

If the events of January 6th have proven anything to us, it’s that under the right conditions, the constant barrage of bullshit that Trump generates can have actual real-world consequences. Given what happened in January, it’s reasonable to assume that what starts off as an effort to “decertify” Biden’s win in Arizona becomes Nullification Conventions which become Secession Conventions.

And, yet, Trump isn’t getting any traction with this insane demands — to date. Is it possible that I will be both right and wrong? One one hand, Trump will demand that the Biden Administration be “nullified”…but nothing happens. No one listens to him and it just becomes another MAGA talking point.

It’s a very curious situation.

MAGA New Right’s Dangerous, Comical Magical Thinking And The Cyber Ninjas Maricopa County Election ‘Audit’


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Just a brief glance at Twitter this evening proves I was right about what’s going on with the Cyber Ninjas’ “audit” of the Maricopa County election results. The Right’s bullshit echo chamber has already established a baseline of “we may never know” who really won the 2020 election. That’s just the basics of the talking points Cyber Ninjas hope to provide the cocksuckers of the MAGA New Right.

I’m sure in the far dark reaches of the MAGA New Right echo chamber, someone, somewhere is deciding that the only solution to this “proof” that Trump “won” Arizona is for MAGA state legislatures to hold conventions to see if they can “nullify” the Biden Administration. What will start off as simple magical political thinking — a joke — will quickly spread like wildfire throughout the MAGA New Right echo chamber.

As I’ve written before, one of two things will then happen. Either there will be a huge push for just enough other states to do the same sort of “audit” to prove that Trump “really won” and then we either see a demand for Trump to be named Speaker when Republicans inevitably flip the House in 2022 or we flip that stage and we go straight to the nullification crisis.

If we go the nullification route now, the crisis would have the same dynamic as what happened on January 6th. Trump and his toadies would see these “nullification” conventions as a source of ready grift cash and they would say a lot of provocative things to the base not thinking through the implications of what they were saying.

Once the bolts started popping off the Union when these “nullification conventions” become “secession conventions” a lot of the people who make up the rock solid core of the MAGA New Right base would have a pretty huge existential crisis — do they stay with the Union government or do they jump ship to any sort of putative Trumpandia rebel government? I can think of about a dozen who would make that final plunge, but the momentum would have to be pretty powerful for folks like Mike Pompeo or Tom Cotton to risk their future presidential careers by leaving the Union altogether.

Which, come to think of it, would produce a rather comical cleaving between the MAGA New Right people who proved they were willing to drink the political Koolaid and “kill” themselves on a political level within traditional American politics, and those who weren’t. Depending on who won any such civil war, you might even have a surprising number of MAGA New Right people attempt to act like nothing happened after the U.S. Military crushed Trumplandia.

But that is extremely speculative. It could be the US will just Balkanize and there really won’t be any set endgame to any civil war that began.

And, yet, even THAT is extremely speculative. It could be that this entire bullshit audit is nothing more than a talking point for the next four years and the main event will be in the late 2024 – early 2025 timeframe.

Just can’t game things out at the moment. Too many variables that could go either way.

Take A Deep Breath: Maricopa County ‘Audit’ Results Begin To Come In Today


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So, apparently, there will be a press conference today by Arizonian Republicans about the first results of their “audit” of Maricopa County. This is a moment of truth, in a sense, because even though this is just the first ping of the results, it will give us a first indication of how our political system will react to “proof” that there was “fraud” there.

If Trump goes hysterical and, most importantly, transactional, on this little bit of fake information alone, then we will know we’re in deep, deep trouble should the “audit” ultimately “prove” that Trump “won” Arizona. Also, if not only does Trump go transactional, but his hysterics get some traction among other Republican controlled states then…oh boy. Things are going to get bumpy by about August.

It’s possible that I’m really overestimating things and all that will happen is the MAGA New Right will harp on all of this forever within their own echo chamber. They will use the total bullshit “proof” that Trump “won” Arizona as something to piviot to whenever people like me start talking about what a fucking insane, racist fascist Trump is. “But Trump won Arizona!” they’ll say.

But everything is up in the air.

It would go either way. We could be looking at a severe political crisis, or it will be nothing but a lulz because no one will take the next step of trying to “nullify” the Biden Administration and “reinstate” Trump by August.

One thing I do know is given how fragile our political system is, having the entire Republican Party have what they believe is “proof” that Trump “won” the 2020 election is not great.

The U.S. Military Is The Wildcard When America Faces Its Existential Choice Of Autocracy Or Civil War


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

While ostensibly Trump’s soft, chaotic coup attempt after election night 2020 was as close as we’ve ever come to a real coup in our nation’s history, it could have been far, far worse. The thing about Trump is, people like me constantly give him a level of guile and willingness to do basic autocratic things that he obviously doesn’t have.

In short, with just the barest amount of autocratic work Trump could have easily stolen the 2020 election. It was his to take. But what he didn’t do was far more astonishing than the idiotic things he did do. He never invoked the Insurrection Act, even though he wanted to and his followers came to believe it was magic coup pixie dust — which it isn’t.

He didn’t think up some reason to arrest Hunter of Joe Biden at any number of critical moments in 2020. He ranted about a lot autocratic moves all throughout 2020 and early 2021, but for the large part he sat on his hands and let the natural democratic momentum associated with an American election to do its thing.

The failsafe during Trump’s rhetorical and half hearted coup attempt in late 2020 and early 2021 was, of course, the U.S. Military. Two things are absolute about the U.S. Military — it’s apolitical to a fault and it won’t follow an illegal order. Those two things, given how obvious and ham-handed Trump was post election night 2020 made the endgame to Trump’s long term soft coup a forgone conclusion — failure.

But we may not be as lucky next time. Whenever the next MAGA New Right POTUS is elected, he or she is likely to make sure that their actions are “legal” and, as such, the military won’t have anything to worry about.

Where things grow frightening is is a MAGA New Right POTUS bungles that transition — or Trump himself jumps the gun and tries to turn us into autocracy. So, you have one scenario where the U.S. Military at last steps in sometime around January 2025 because the country implodes on a political level because MAGA controls Congress and refuses to certify a Joe Biden win. (Yes, there is the throw-the-election-into-the House gambit that MAGA might try to keep things legal, but let’s say they don’t manage to pull that off.)

The other scenario is we have a nullification crisis that turns into a secession crisis after Cyber Ninjas “prove” Trump “won” Arizona. Then it would be the Biden Administration having to put down a MAGA New Right insurrection. In a sense, if it’s inevitable that we have a civil war, I’d rather it happen sooner rather than later so at least the U.S. Military will be under the control of democratic forces.

But what the U.S. Military ultimately decides to do when we’re faced with the existential choice of autocracy or civil war may be it — it may be the even that transitions us into something different than we’re used to. If the American military has to step in and we no longer enjoy civilian rule (acting President James Mattis, anyone?) then the United States really will be just another country, just another republic that has transitioned to its final form of empire.

August Sucks: Fresh Hell Scenarios For August, 2021


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The reason why August is such a sucky month is it’s the nadir of the year for most normal people who work at the big media companies. Huge swaths of the newsroom leave town for this or that pleasant vacation retreat, leaving the fate of any reporting on a breaking news event to a bunch of wet behind the ears cub reporters.

As such, huge news events are drawn to August.

Everyone has to leave their vacation at a moment’s notice to cover this or that huge news event. So, that leaves the question — what will it be this year? Here are my guesses.

Cyber Ninjas “Prove” Trump “Won”
It’s my impression that not only does Trump think he will somehow be magically re-instated in August, but Cyber Ninjas will finally come out with the results of their dumb sham audit. If they come through for Trump and “prove” he “won” Arizona, either that in itself starts some sort of secession crisis by the end of the year, or it begins a process that leads to House Speaker Trump telling Senate Democrats to convict Biden and Harris or risk a civil war.
Someone Drops Dead
A lot of old people are in powerful positions. If any number of 70+ powerful people dropped dead, that, in itself could be The Thing that we think of what made August 2021 suck so bad.
The DPRK Does Something Stupid (Or Implodes)
The DPRK has been pretty quiet since the pandemic hit. August 2021 seems like just the right moment for them to pop out and scare the shit out of us all one way or another. Or implode. You name it. Anything could happen.
Iran Does Something Stupid
It’s easy to imagine a situation where Iran and Israel have at it suddenly and before you know it, WW3 has started.
China Does Something Stupid
A lot of people talk about China going after Taiwan by about 2027. What if China struck in August 2021? Then what?
Russia Does Something Stupid
It’s easy to imagine Russia starting some sort of late summer general war against Ukraine.

Wildcard: a major domestic terrorist attack.
Trump is doing everything in his power to destabilize the United States with his dumb nearly-transactional rhetoric. What if there was a large scale, coordinated MAGA New Right terrorist attack all across the country in some sort of proto-coup effort. How would we handle that?

Wildcard: Cuba
It’s within the realm of possibility that of possibility that Cuba could implode in August, given the massive protests there right now.

Second American Civil War Scenario 1: Cyber Ninjas Makes Us Do It


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

This scenario is actually two scenarios. In the first scenario — the more logical scenario — Cyber Ninjas “prove” Trump “won” the Arizona and this sets off a cascading series of events. Suddenly, the pressure on other MAGA state legislatures to have similar recounts grows exponentially. In this version of the scenario it’s not until around November 2022 that things come to a head and, as such, Republicans feel compelled to make Trump Speaker of the House when they inevitably flip the House.

Trump, being Trump, ignores all of his other duties in the job to push for the impeachment of Biden and Harris for Not Being Him. He gets that quickly enough and then once the impeachment process goes to the Senate, he goes transactional and there’s enough political violence in 2023 that Senate Democrats “do the right thing” and convict (or force the resignation of) Biden and Harris “for the good of the country.”

Trump becomes POTUS again and we’re right were we were. Trump picks someone like Mike Flynn to be his new Veep and we’re actually far worse than we were. In this version of the scenario the “civil war” happens either in 2022 or 2023 (should the Senate not convict.)

I will note that am notorious for giving Trump a lot more guile than he actually has. He’s actually so stupid, lazy — and unwilling to be directly responsible for knocking heads in pursuit of being an autocrat — that, lulz, he could very well become Speaker and still manage to fuck things up and simply be an asshole with no power other than an office title.

The OTHER scenario in this situation would be that Cyber Ninjas “prove” Trump “won” and instead of waiting for other MAGA states to follow suit, just “winning” the single state of Arizona is enough to cause other MAGA state legislatures to demand the Biden Administration be “nullified” (somehow.) These Nullification Conventions quickly become Secession Conventions — at least in states like Texas and the lily white, small states of the Mountain and Plains areas.

A number of old CSA states would also (hope) to follow suit, but because of race these efforts either fail or start a race war of some sort.

The only reason why I think the latter version of this scenario might happen is Trump has become such a totem for white rage that if you combine this with the glorification of political violence found in the Right these days, you have a recipe for some major strategic miscalculations on the part of MAGA “thought leaders.”

If this latter Cyber Ninjas civil war option happened, all it would do is destroy the country for no damn reason. Or, hopefully, it would be a tragedy that would destroy MAGA for a very specific reason: they’re fucking cocksuckers.

Of the available potential Second American Civil War scenarios, a Cyber Ninjas induced one seems the most dubious because it relies upon MAGA being willing to actually risk their own destruction now, instead of a few years from now after they’ve marinated in their hate a bit longer.

But, who knows. I’m always wrong and no one listens to me, anyway.

Cyber Ninjas’ ‘Recount’ Of The Arizona Vote Is Extremely Unnerving


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Something smells in the state of Arizona. It definitely seems as though Cyber Ninjas is doing everything in its power to get to the result it wants with its “audit:” Trump really won the state.

Now, there’s a lot to unpack with this.

One one hand, the whole endeavor is obviously bullshit. It’s meaningless “gesture politics” meant to give the faithful a talking point on Twitter. That’s it. And, yet, there is a risk that one of two things will happen — either Trump demands other states that he lost fair and square do the same thing or he really goes nuts and doesn’t even wait for that to happen. Trump seizes upon his dubious Arizona “win” and demands he be “reinstated” ASAP.

Then we have the same dynamic as January 6th, but on a national scale. If the first option happens, then just around election day 2022, half of the country will think there is “proof” that Trump is really POTUS. He becomes Speaker when the House flips and Speaker Trump has one goal — impeaching of Biden and Harris. He goes transactional, there’s massive political violence in 2023 and, Democrats in the Senate buckle because they don’t want a civil war. Trump is back in office in 2023 and we become an autocracy.

The other option goes like this — Trump gets his “win” in Arizona and freaks the fuck out just because of that one state. He demands that MAGA state legislatures “nullify” the Biden Administration. This quickly turns into a secession crisis and we have a civil war at some point between about now and, say, January 2022.

And, yet, both of those options, on the face of it, sound rather fantastical even to me. There is a lot I just can’t game out. I have no idea if anyone would actually listen to Trump if he went transactional about being “reinstated.” At the moment, Trump definitely seems politically dead in the water outside of the entire Republican bullshit echo chamber. But given the fact that the Republican Party is now a violent personality cult and, well, lulz. Who knows.

I don’t have any answers on this front. Just unease.

Trump Is Powerful But Not Popular


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Right now, Trump has completely dropped off the public stage relative to my center-Left echo chamber. It’s like he never existed, or, at least, doesn’t exist now. And, yet, within the MAGA echo chamber, they love him so much they’re struggling to think up ways to get him back into office as soon as possible — even if it requires fantastical — and extra-legal — means.

So, it’s going to be very jarring to a lot of people when Trump magically pops out again in a rather abrupt and unexpected way. It seems to me now possible that Cyber Ninjas will “prove” that Trump “won” in Arizona and this will be at best used as a talking point to win the 2022 mid-terms and at worst used as the catalyst for some sort of weird nullification crisis.

Another possible dystopian hellscape scenario is that even though Trump — who looks like shit right now — has seen his support outside of the MAGA base evaporate will demand he become Speaker of the House should MAGA win the House. Then he impeaches both Biden and Harris and gets a conviction in the Senate by inciting political violence. Democrats in the Senate will be cowed into voting for conviction because the nation appears on the cusp of a civil war if they don’t.

Or something. Something like that.

The point is — we are in a very surreal post-Trump era. While Biden does everything in his power to bring back “normal,” Trump is lurking in the shadows like some sort of movie monster waiting to come back for the sequel. It’s very strange and is not exactly the sign of a stable liberal democracy.

It Definitely Feels Like We’re Careening Towards A Second American Civil War Sooner Rather Than Later


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Almost all the Web traffic this site gets is what seems to be Southern “Lost Cause” types stroking one out to the idea that there will be a Second American Civil War sometime soon. Or, at least, the idea of a such a tragedy is so much in the forefront of some people’s minds that they search for the discussion of the possibility of a second civil war and stumble across my dystopian hellscape scenarios.

One reason why I’m growing ever more concerned about America’s political fate is even people like me find myself beginning to feel squeezed. My hatred of MAGA is center-of-the-sun-white-hot, and, yet, there are growing number of excesses on the part of the center-Left that have begun to really get on my nerves.

If someone like me is beginning to feel like a political orphan, that means the far Left and far Right are consuming what is left of the middle. To the point that you wake up one morning and realize all you have is negative polarization. And that’s all the other side has, too. That is not a recipe for a stable liberal democracy.

And I don’t have any ready answer for how we get out of this situation. Trump’s power with the MAGA base is still absolute to the point that should Cyber Ninjas “prove” he “won” in Arizona, there’s a serious possibility of severe political violence across the nation up to and including a secession crisis that starts a civil war.

Or not.

It could be this is a passing political phase for the United States. We’ll punt the structural problems we face constantly down the road and all my hysterical, dystopian hellscape predictions will looked back upon as just silly. But as the old saying goes, a person goes “bankrupt gradually then all at once.”

So it’s at least possible that we’re careening towards the biggest geopolitical shock since the fall of France to the Nazis in 1940 — the most powerful nation in the world could very well buckle and start to bomb itself into oblivion because…. Of scary brown people?

Who knows. I just continue to be uneasy.

America Is Careening Towards A Violent Political Crisis


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I can’t predict the future. There is no revealed truth. But the United States is on edge. I just don’t see us making it beyond January 2025 without some serious political violence. I say this because Republicans are so hysterical about the browning of America and various other perceived political and structure slights that they are finally at the point where they will do anything necessary to push us to the breaking point.

The question is now, of course — how exactly are things going to fall out. While plenty of MAGA people think their brethren will take up arms and have a Glorious MAGA Revolution, I find this idea dubious. MAGA people want to fuck their guns, not actually use them in anything beyond an abstract way. They’re really frustrated and want to “own the libs” at every turn, but actually having any kind of popular revolt against “cancel culture” seems extremely unlikely.

But there are two instances coming up where I could see us having an actual civil war. In the near term, of course, there is the Cyber Ninjas recount of the presidential vote in Arizona. The whole thing is a fucking fraud designed to give MAGA a talking point at best and an excuse to attempt to found Trumplandia at worst. It’s very easy to imagine a dynamic similar to January 6th, only on a national scale.

Republicans see a chance to win political points by saying Trump is “really” president then, even though Arizona is not enough to make Trump POTUS, this idea whips around the country. Before you know it, states are leaving the Union to found Trumplandia. We have a civil war and lulz, I have no idea what happens or who wins.

The other option is essentially the same thing happens, only in the 2024-2025 timeframe.

The issue remains that the United States’ political system is very unstable right now. It wouldn’t take much for the whole thing to come crashing down in some way, probably by states beginning to bounce in a rather abrupt fashion because they feel Trump is “really president.”

But I could be wrong. I often am.