Tag: Fuck Neo-Confederates

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.

You Know All This MAGA New Right Bullshit Ends With Them Coming After Jews, Right?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m not Jewish, but I empathize with anyone who is attacked for being different. As such, when I was growing up, I always wanted to be black or Jewish. Anyway, one of the many pink MAGA New Right elephants in the room is the moment we turn into the autocracy they apparently crave so much, some pretty dark forces are going to pop out of our national psyche.

If historical form follows historical function, one of the things that is going to happen as we transition into America First’s Fortress America is there will be a growing collective attack on the Jewish community. And I can even tell you how it will happen — Qanon.

It’s easy to imagine some sort of MAGA New Right American autocracy being eaten up by Qanon people to the point where they go after the “liberal elites” that they think are doing all these horrific, bad things. And, strangely enough, a lot of those “liberal elites” are going to be Jewish.

So we get a replay of Nazi Germany, only in the United States.

What’s more, depending on how things work out, there could also be significant crimes against humanity against the American black and brown communities. And don’t get me started on what would happen if we go down the civil war road instead of autocracy.

Anyway. The point is — if you’re Jewish, I suggest you scream bloody murder about the growing influence of the MAGA New Right in the United States.

The Dangerous, Malevolent Magical Thinking Of The MAGA New Right


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

A lot of metrics in modern American politics indicate that we’re at the end of an era. A Big Decision is going to confront the United States very soon: autocracy or civil war. Things just can’t keep going the way they are now. Something’s gotta give.

One of the many political metrics that have me thinking seriously about getting a passport is the surreal magical thinking of the MAGA New Right when it comes to Trump’s immediate political future. American politics is being warped by something to the point that the MAGA New Right would rather concoct not just a false media narrative for themselves, but a completely imaginary reality. What, exactly is the origin of that warp is something I struggle with a lot these days. Is it race? Is it vast income inequality? What is it that is causing, in aggregate, one of the two major political parties in the United States — the Republican Party — to have been driven completely fucking insane.

They just can’t believe that Trump wasn’t REALLY re-elected. They are willing to pin their hopes on any possible idiotic conspiracy theory to further their goal of having Trump become president as soon as possible. That the MAGA New Right is so deranged that they have wrapped themselves up in the idea of Trump to the point that their entire existence is predicated on “owning the libs” is extremely disturbing shit.

But here we are.

I would note, in passing, that the MAGA New Right grift gravy train is still out there. If you want a get-rich-quick scheme that might actually work, just be a college educated (blonde) woman willing to give a cogent explanation on TV as to why Trump is still president.

One of the many reasons why I’m enraged by the MAGA New Right — besides the fact that they’re a bunch of fucking fascists — is they deny reality. They ‘re a violent personality cult that is born of racism and misogyny. I hate that. What I see as a craven idiotic ding-dong that is Trump, the MAGA New Right somehow sees as a veritable second coming of Jesus Fucking Christ. It’s surreal and extremely fucking dangerous.

At its core, this magical thinking on the part of the MAGA New Right is really a hatred of the usual ebb and flow of a liberal democracy. They want there to be A One True Way — their way — any divergence from it must be the result of fraud or some sort of Deep State conspiracy.

It’s all very, very aggravating.

I still don’t know if we’re going to drift peacefully into a MAGA New Right autocracy or if we’re going to civil war. The jury is still out on that one.

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.

The Abstract Paranoia Over ‘Cancel Culture’ & ‘Critical Race Theory’ As The MAGA New Right’s Rearguard Action In The Culture Wars


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

By all accounts, the MAGA New Right has lost the culture wars. America is browning. The Republican Party’s policies are extremely unpopular and it refuses to have any sort of re-calibration. And there’s an entire media bullshit infrastructure design to protect the Republican Party from any sort of introspection.

So, it was inevitable that the MAGA New Right would circle the drain down to the crack hit that is simple abstract fears on the part of white Christians about “cancel culture” or Critical Race Theory.

Let’s take Cancel Culture. Here’s my best attempt at some sort of definition, from the point of view of Republicans — “Cancel Culture:’ The ruining of a conservative’s life for being conservative, usually associated with a public event or comment being recorded by smartphone that goes viral.”

Ironically, the definition has drifted considerably from what it might have been around the time of #MeToo. During that era, a lot of very powerful men — usually white — were being “canceled” for legitimately doing shitty things. There was the occasional odd excess as the revolution made its way through culture and different industries — Aziz Ansari being a prime example — but, over all, bad men did bad things and they got “canceled.”

But here we are in the post #MeTo Era and Republicans have latched on Cancel Culture because just its invocation is enough to strike terror in the hearts of evangelical white Christian women in the suburbs. From my experience, people in that particular demo live in existential terror of themselves doing something “conservative” that evil liberals record and it proceeds to go viral. They will lose their jobs and be publicly shamed just for being conservative.

Another, similar, thing that really bugs the conservatives I know is “woke” corporate culture. I think what is really going on is the MAGA New Right has lost the culture wars and, as such, corporate trainers are doing a mop up operation — shooting the survivors, if you will. But if you’re a bed rock conservative whose self-perception is “I don’t see race” (read: systemic racism) if you have to go through any type of sensitivity training you get really, really, upset.

In fact “woke” corporate culture is probably the main source of the rage against Big Tech. While I have a lot of concrete, fact-based fears about MAGA New Right POTUS Mike Pompeo throwing me in an ICE camp, my conservative relatives have abstract fears that one day Google will listen to their conversations via their phone and turn them in to the evil libtards of the Deep State.

The specific instance of someone being “canceled” that comes to mind is the police officer in the Hampton Roads are of Virginia who lost his job after an online leak of a Kyle Rittenhouse’s donation effort reveled he had contributed $20 to his defense fund.

To me, the guy got what he deserved — Rittenhouse is a deranged triple murderer. I don’t care if we found out because of a leak — if you’re on a police force, you shouldn’t be contributing any money to Rittenhouse’s defense. But that’s not how my conservative relative saw the situation. He was upset that the police officer got in trouble because of a leak. And he was upset that it was just $20.

The fact that Rittenhouse went WAY out of his way to murder people for political reasons was a lulz.

The point of all of this is the reason why Republican’s attempts to keep the base enraged by screaming hysterically about “cancel culture” or “Critical Race Theory” are so successful is the center-Right and center-Left now rarely actually ever interact with each other. In 2016, I often got into it with MAGA people about Trump. Now, this almost never happens. As such, the two sides have an exaggerated sense of what the other believes.

At the core of all of this, of course, are the some pretty potent macro trends. In general, the nation is growing browner, more secular and more open minded about more “modern” sexual mores. All these changes are happening at an alarming rate — at least for conservatives — but they don’t even really know what, exactly, bothers them so much.

FOX News, OAN and NewsMax know this on an existential level, so they give conservatives a media narrative that helps them make sense of their general unease.

All of this is very corrosive, of course. But there are no easy answers. It definitely seems, at least to me, that as I keep saying, that all of these abstract fears will cause a very concrete choice to face America soon: autocracy or civil war.

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.

The Coming American Diaspora


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I don’t know anything about stocks, but I would vaguely suggest you long any stock of a company that might benefit from a huge exodus of Americans starting at some point in the near future. Say, by the end of the decade.

I say this because if you assume, like I do, that the United States is going to soon face the existential choice of civil war or autocracy, there are going to be winners and losers, no matter which one we ultimately decide to do.

Off the top of my head, it seems like Canada, Australia and New Zealand would have the most to gain if 30 million Americans bounced from the country all of a sudden. If it’s a liberal exodus, then the economies of Canada and Australia would likely benefit the most. Perth — which, as I understand it, is a very colorful and creative place, even if it’s in the middle of nowhere — could become a new Hollywood. (Or something.)

Meanwhile, if it’s the MAGA New Right that up and leaves, maybe Great Britain (or whatever is left of it by that point) would benefit?

Anyway, I guess what I’m saying is we’re all seriously, existentially fucked a lot sooner than you might realize. The 2020s are shaping up to suck.

At Least The New Right Makes Sense


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Jesus H. Christ do I fucking hate the MAGA New Right. I hate MAGA, specifically, because not only do they deny reality in service of their idiot ding-dong leader, but they both hate liberals and crave their validation. Meanwhile, the New Right at least is more forthright about what their intentions are.

They’re fucking fascists.

So, in that sense, that’s something I can work with in my mind. I call them “boring” because there’s no struggle to figure out how someone could possibly believe what they believe. There’s no mystery: they’re fucking racist misogynist fascists. There’s no quibbling about if their racists or misogynists or whatever because they refuse to even acknowledge that any fact that doesn’t help them exists.

Or, put another way, the New Right is Trumpism without Trump. It’s based more on a fascist ideology that you can game out rather than an irrational need to own the libs. With the New Right, there’s no confusion over what they believe or what they’re aims are.

They’re fucking American Nazis.

The New Right isn’t a pure 1-to-1 with the Nazis, of course, because their not expansionist and, to date at least, they’re not anti-Semitic. (But that’s coming, of course.)

All I can hope is eventually history will do with the New Right what it did to the Nazis. It’s going to fucking suck getting rid of them, of course, but in the end hopefully we can move on to a new and brighter future.

The Dead Hand Of History & America’s Ultimate Near-Term Fate


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The conditions are there, at least, for the United States to experience something akin to a second civil war between now and at around January 2025. And, yet, I struggle to figure out if I’m just being hysterical or if there is, in fact, some reason to be honestly worried.

I just can’t game things out.

Every metric that I would use to say, “Oh, of course we’ll have a civil war,” at this point could also be used to for, “Oh, of course we’re going to turn into an autocracy.” So, I dunno. MAGA and the New Right are, in fact, actively destroying our democracy in hopes of establishing some sort of race-based, permanent autocratic minority rule.

And, as of the moment, I would say they’re going to peacefully get away with it. It’s theirs to lose, if you will. In fact, I would go so far as to say if they can just control themselves once they get what they want, the MAGA New Right can run the nation (into the ground) for generations to come. The United States will become Fortress America, China will gradually rise in power and by the end of the century the idea of a “free” America will be looked back upon as quaint.

But form follows function.

Once President Pompeo (or whomever) rewrites the Constitution via a MAGA dominated Constitutional Convention, purges the media and weaponizes the existing ICE infrastructure, it’s very easy to imagine some pretty bad shit happening. The excesses of the newly unbound MAGA New Right regime might grow so severe that there is something akin to a popular uprising and we finally drive a stake through the heart of the MAGA New Right vampires.

The counter argument is, of course, Russia.

They have huge protests all the time and jack shit happens.

So, again, I don’t know which direction the country will take once we finally are forced to decide autocracy or civil war. I do know, however, that if the MAGA New Right gets the civil war they apparently crave, shit is going to get real really quick.

If the last civil war America had is any indication, once the establishment of the United States gets woke on such matters, there is an element of institutional radicalization that doesn’t happen very often. Once it’s impossible for, say, the chatty Cathy’s of Morning Joe to avoid that we’re in the middle of a civil war, they’re likely to take what seem as rather radical political stances virtually over night.

Having to deal with an existential threat does tend to do that to even the most establishment moderate.

Know Your Right Wing Cocksuckers: MAGA Vs. The New Right


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Do you find yourself confused as to the difference between MAGA and the New Right? Well, let me break down what (I think) the difference is.

MAGA
MAGA is a violent personality cult that revolves around a bonkers idiot who is an avatar for the rot within the American political system. Trump is “playing himself,” if you will. He’s lazy. He’s stupid. He’s willfully ignorant and generally latches on the whatever the most destructive possible thing someone could do in his position is. MAGA both hates liberals and cares, deeply, about what they think. Since there’s no overall ideology to MAGA because it’s leader is a racist, misogynistic ding-dong they vacillate widely as to the specifics of what they believe at any particular moment.

The New Right.
Now, let me say up front that any idea I may have as to what the New Right is gleaned from hate reading Jesse Kelly’s Twitter feed. But, just from looking at what he has written, it SEEMS as though the New Right has some sort of ideology. And, surprise, that ideology is fascism. They — or at least Mr. Kelly — are very forthright in how they live in an idyllic mental state because they no longer give a shit what liberals think, even if it’s fact base and true. They are very coy about the whole fascism thing, saying that while they’re not fascist NOW, liberals are driving them to fascism and liberals will have only themselves to blame when that transformation finally happens. The New Right, apparently, is populated with people who have cogent, logical reasons for why they’re fascists. So, in that way, they’re very much like smart Nazis. You know, the ones that helped put the Untied States on the moon. They’re college educated, often lawyers. And they fully embrace autocracy and racist minority rule. That’s their jam.

Anyway, fuck both MAGA and the very boring New Right.