There’s a lot of hype within the center-Left echo chamber about how Texas is “one day” going to swing Blue because of macro economic trends. All things being equal, if we were still a functioning liberal democracy — and if Texas Republicans were collectively lobotomized — this would be true.
But we’re not a functioning democracy and Texas Republicans know damn well they’re on the cusp of losing power if people vote so — they don’t want people to vote.
Texas Republicans are growing more and more autocratic in leaps and bounds to the point that I believe the only way they will ever allow Texas to turn Blue is if they’ve been destroyed and no longer have the ability to do anything about it. In other words, only after a Second American Civil War has destroyed the state of Texas as we know it and it’s being Reconstructed afterwards will Texas ever be allowed to vote for a Democratic president.
A Blue Texas would doom Republican hopes for the presidency to such an extent that not even Florida being a safe Red state now could help the situation. Add to this how fucking hysterical and anti-democratic Texas Republicans are on an systemic, existential basis and there is absolutely no fucking way they will ever allow the state to shift Blue peacefully.
The absolute white hot rage that Texas Republicans have about the mere notion of the state turning Blue is pretty much what’s going on in general with the national Republican Party. It is very tragic, but it’s clear to me now that only as the by product of a tragic, avoidable civil war will the United States ever be a functioning liberal democracy again. It’s possible that the U.S. Military might step in to fix all the problems necessary to get us back on the democratic track, but unlikely.
So you can add an autocratic Texas to the long list of macro trends that indicate we’re either going to slip peacefully into the autocratic rule of a white Christian ethno state — or we’re going to have a fucking civil war.
I have no idea what is going to happen at this point.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is one of those divisive political figures whose entire world could be changed if there was a severe crisis in the United States in January 2025 as I predict. When the type of existential choice of civil war, military junta or autocracy presents itself to a nation, it’s usually people like AOC who get shoved into a situation where they can rise to the occasion.
But, let’s talk more mundane things: is she going to primary Charles Schumer?
This is a complicated question because AOC is nationally popular within the national center-Left, but is so much of a lightening rod that she turns off a lot of moderates. And the only way she’s going to defeat Schumer is if she banks Right to the point that she no longer spooks moderates. But should would have to do it in such a way that she did not alienate the progressives who love her so much.
So…I dunno.
The case could be made that given that it would be a primary that she could use her Leftist support to win it, THEN bank Right for the general.
If she does mange to pull of that hat trick, then she is going to hurtle towards a battle royal with VP Kamala Harris to succeeded Biden — who I just don’t see running for a second term, no matter what he may have us believe.
But, as I mentioned, AOC is just the type of person who history would point its finger at if we face the historic, existential choice in January 2025 of autocracy, civil war or military junta. If that happens, everything will get scrambled in a jaw dropping manner to the point that we might see AOC cozy up with the leaders of the #NeverTrump movement.
A few pink political elephants exist whenever one talks about AOC. Traditional politics would dictate that she has about four years to get married and have a kid — in that order. She needs to do it, like NOW. But she is a Leftist darling, so, lulz, what do I know. I will also note that I am in awe that not one — not one! — bikini picture has surfaced of her since she caught national attention. AOC is a bombshell and the amount of forethought necessary for her political team to eliminate any photographic evidence of a what a babe she is, is impressive.
I think it’s annoying that it would hurt her politically if such a photo did come out — I mean, come on. But that’s the world we live in.
Yet, the key thing is — AOC has a greater-than-zero chance of at some point becoming a latter day TR if we somehow enter a Second Progressive Era. But I’m always wrong, so lulz.
Long Answer If you’re searching for some sort of easy answer as to if the Red States would win a theoretical Second American Civil War, I just don’t have it for you. You probably are out at the cabin, drinking Miller Lite with the guys and someone gets a little too worked up about Vaccine Passports or Cancel Culture or whatever the fuck it is that cocksucker MAGA New Right idiots are upset about at the moment.
You pull up your phone and ask Google, “Will Red States win the civil war?“
And so, here you are.
First and foremost, you’re going to have to make concrete your hazy, abstract thoughts about a “civil war” and give me some sort of war aims. Even more important, is the issue of why do Red States even need a civil war in the first place? What, specifically, would make Red State people think that they need to start killing their fellow Americans in an organized manner because of their political views?
As I tell my conservative relatives at every opportunity, all Red States have to do is be patient and they’ll get everything they ever wanted and then some. Blue State leadership — at the moment — is divided, tepid and weak-willed and, as such, Red States could very easily establish a MAGA New Right autocracy without firing a shot. It’s when you leave the realm of politics and start making things existential that Red States have a severe problem on their hands.
But, lulz, the MAGA New Right glorifies political violence and is itching for the opportunity to eliminate the “liberal problem,” so it’s something that is at the forefront of a lot of Red State people’s minds.
If you’re still eager for a Second American Civil War and want to know if Red States will win it, I need to know what your war aims would be. What’s the point of the civil war relative to you? With the First American Civil War, the war aims of the South were clear — independence in order to protect slavery. With any Second American Civil War, Red State war aims seem extremely abstract.
Red States so hate the way Blue State people think that they’re willing to risk everything for the opportunity to physically harm them en masse. But why? Why do that when you could simply be patient and have the country slide peacefully into autocracy. It appears that the glorification of political violence on the part of the MAGA New Right is nothing more than what you would expect as part of a Fourth Turning — it exists because it exists.
Back to war aims.
I’m having to do some political reverse engineering here, but here goes. The first problem that the MAGA New Right Red States face when gaming out a civil war is, at the core of their desire for a Second Civil War is a severe existential fear of the browning of America. So, after the initial political violence began, it would soon become clear that establishing some sort of white Christian ethno state would be the chief Red State war aim.
As such, Red State people, who to date have been getting everything they want via traditional politics will get a rude awaking — POC will freak the fuck out the moment the MAGA New Right makes it clear they want to “put them in their place.” Hence — a race war will begin. And part and parcel of that race war will be crimes against humanity on the part of Red State governments (collectively known as Trumplandia) who will begin to systematically kill POC in a frantic effort to maintain control.
So, right off the bat, Red States have a race war to deal with — they just don’t have a unified polity because of that.
Then, you have two other major issues: population and economics. If California stays in the Union at the onset of a Second American Civil War it, unto itself, would be enough to allow Blue States to dominate everything from the West Cost to Texas in the South to the Mississippi River in the center to Minnesota to the north.
Add to this, in general, the Blue States have far bigger economies and more dense populations geographically and things aren’t looking good for Red States.
But if you STILL want to have a Second American Civil War because you “just want to be left alone” then Red States have a few things going for them. First is, Blue States aren’t really taking seriously how deranged Red States are going into any Second American Civil War. So, it is possible that some sort of sucker punch could happen that would knock Blue States off their feet long enough for Red States to consolidate power — still a problem: race.
Additionally, it’s almost inevitable that WMD will be used by both sides, so you could sketch out a scenario whereby the MAGA New Right is simply so much more fanatical than the Blue States that when push comes to shove on the use of WMD, Red States win because they’re willing to vaporize more people.
The argument could also be made that if Trumplandia simply wants to leave the Union to form its own white Christian ethno state, then, yes, Red States would then probably come pretty close to achieving their war aim. There would be a massive migration of POC out of Trumplandia, but the MAGA New Right hates POC to begin with, so win-win, right?
And, remember, none of this clusterfuck would happen in a vacuum. The DPRK could lop nuke our way to scramble things. WW3 would probably break out during the second civil war, the list goes on.
So, no, Red States wouldn’t win the Second American Civil War, or if they did, they would severely regret the whole thing by the time they “won.”
The #NeverTrump people are what I like to call “radical moderates.” You can quibble about how “moderate” they really are relative to the Left-Right divide before Trump, but #NeverTrump goals are pretty moderate in my opinion. They want simply to protect our liberal democracy at any costs.
Abraham Lincoln, Radical Moderate
In a sense, they really do harken back to Lincoln. Father Abraham was the quintessential radical moderate. At his heart, he was pretty moderate, but in the severe crisis of the Civil War he made a very radical choice out of desperation: free the slaves so as to make the war one of liberation and Union, not just Union.
As such, because the United States is hurdling towards an existential choice of autocracy, military junta or civil war, it’s at least possible that for a moment in time everyone will be #NeverTrump — there will be a United Front with the leaders of the #NeverTrump at its head.
Should it happen, it will be astonishing on a political level because such a unification of political views has only happened one or twice in our history. I would say the Civil War and WW2 are the last times it happened. For AOC to join forces with someone as conservative as, say, Rick Wilson, under “radical moderate” rubric we would have to be suffering a very, very severe political crisis.
Now, as an aside, let me address something I’ve mentioned before – are #NeverTrumpers the modern equivalent of “War Democrats?” At the moment, they are. But the moment we’re facing the type of severe political crisis I fear we’re hurdling towards occurs, they will be something totally different — the vanguard of the the radical moderates.
In other words, the leadership of the people who will have the opportunity to finally destroy the scourge of the fascist MAGA New Right will come from the group of conservatives who are now #NeverTrumpers. The center-Left simply does not have that many leaders to use for such a cause. AOC is pretty good, but she’s still too young and untested.
I can think of half a dozen #NeverTrumpers who could provide crucial leadership for the — glup — war effort, should things get that bad.
Or, put another way, if the crisis grows as severe as I fear it will, instead of the current political situation where you have a huge center-Left then the #NeverTrumpers, you would have a United Front with the #NeverTrumpers providing the leadership.
But all of this is extremely speculative. I’m always wrong, at least to date. I’m just kind of sketching out possibilities given what usually happens in revolutions and civil wars
When it came to predicting the ultimate effects of COVI19, I did a fairly good job of predicting things. Where I made the biggest mistake was on how severe I thought it would be. Given how the Chinese government freaked the fuck out when it was first reported, I assumed it was far more deadly than it ultimately turned out to be.
Anyway.
Let’s look at why, specifically, I think we have three options — autocracy, civil war or military junta — before us between now and January, 2025.
The United States is far less politically stable than we appear. The MAGA New Right talks openly about how liberals are “forcing” them to become radical fascists. They talk in sometimes not-so-vague terms about how soon enough they’re going to embrace fascism once and for all and it will be all liberals’ fault.
When you begin to accept that the Republican Party is now nothing more than a modern version of Slave Power that will stop at nothing to protect its interests, then, lulz, you have a recipe for disaster on your hands. The Republican Party has officially embraced autocracy and minority rule as its path to perpetual power from here on out.
What did you do to defend democracy, daddy?
What bothers me the most about Twitter liberals is they continue to frame the behavior of notable MAGA New Right elected as if we had a functioning liberal democracy. This, sadly, is not the case. The very thuggish, autocratic things that people like Ron DeSantis advocate are the very things that make them popular with the anti-democratic Trumplandia base.
Now, the ironic thing about all of this is Trump is such an idiot moron that he could very well, simply by existing be the thing that prevents us from peacefully transitioning into an autocracy in all but name. He’s so popular — and yet such a fucking idiot — that what should otherwise be a very easy political transition to autocracy on America’s part may turn into one of the other two options I keep thinking about: civil war or military junta.
The United States has been so stable for so long that it’s difficult to wrap one’s mind around the idea that there might be a civil war here. A lot of people simply can’t grok it as a possibly at all. And, yet, according to all the metrics I keep in my mind about such things a civil war is definitely among the three options we face.
And now, we come to the great irony of all of this — the very same macro trends that could lead us to civil war, autocracy or a military junta — could very well simply give the MAGA New Right everything it wants without destroying our democracy.
For the moment, the center-Left is divided, fractious and ineffectual. America has been drifting towards a more conservative political center for about 50 years now. There’s every reason to believe that the Republican Party — even with the browning of America — could dominate American politics within the context of American political tradition for at least another generation if not more.
But they’re fucking greedy and want an autocracy because they lost the culture wars and they want to “own” the libs once and for all.
And, yet, once the MAGA New Right make shit existential for Leftist soyboys, they could very well have a lot more kick in them than expected. It’s human nature. Let me repeat that: IT’S FUCKING HUMAN NATURE.
The MAGA New Right Red States could very well make the same mistake about the Blue States that the Axis Powers made about the United States in late 1941. Red States think Blue States are “degenerates” who will collapse the moment there’s any political violence.
Surprise! That’s not true!
And, yet, this all raises the issue — why am I so certain that one of three unthinkable options will happen between now and around January 2025.
Besides the glorification of political violence on the Right, the hardening of the political divide and the death of politics in general, I would point to the coordinated efforts on the part of the Republican Party at the state and local level to highjack any election result they don’t like.
Sorry for the shitty quality.
Why give the Republican dominated legislature the right to take over local election certification if you don’t intend to use it? Why make it so fucking hard to vote if you don’t intend to abuse your ability to dissuade people from voting in general. I’m simply taking Republican anti-democratic moves both seriously and literally and then extrapolating from that.
A lot of the people who poo-poo my “doom shit” about our political future either refuse to realize that we’re no longer a functioning democracy or they would be the people who tuned out entirely once we become an autocracy and it becomes clear that it’s pointless to vote.
I’m beginning to think that maybe — just maybe — when we finally face the options of civil war or autocracy the U.S. Military will step in and tell everyone to cool it. We may live under military rule for a few months — years? — but in the end all that will happen is there will be a Constitutional Convention that sorts out all our structural issues and then we move on without a lot of bloodshed.
Doom Shit
But, in general, the macro trends are definitely drifting towards Something Big happening no later than January 2025. At this point, in my mind, the biggest known unknown is if Trump will still be politically viable enough to fuck everything up so we start killing each other for political reasons.
The guy above is one of a few MAGA New Right “thought leaders” who establish the talking points that will be watered down and disseminated throughout the Right wing bullshit echo chamber. These now far more palatable talking points will be parroted by your conservative relatives at, say, Thanksgiving Dinner.
That’s why such people like Kurt Schlichter are actually far more important than you might think. Even though some of what they rant about is nothing more than bad faith bullshit meant to “own the libs,” usually the general drift of rhetoric on their part does give you some sense of what they actually believe.
As such, it definitely seems as though the on-going fascist radicalization of the Republican Party continues. And, as I’ve mentioned before, it definitely seems as though should Republicans ever gain power again — they’re never going to peacefully give it up.
These days, I vacillate widely between thinking that when the MAGA New Right autocracy finally is established that things aren’t going to change the much for a while, to thinking there’s going to immediately be a civil war and or military junta established.
It’s possible that when the autocratic white Christian ethno state is finally established, the Republicans will drift towards a Russian style autocracy, but, at first things won’t change that much. There will be excesses — like the media will be purged — but for the time being people like me will be allowed to continue to rant about what fucking cocksuckers the MAGA New Right is.
Though, truth be told, if it’s Mike Pompeo who is our autocrat, that may not last very long –that guy is a real asshole who, once president, will be just as corrupt and autocratic as Putin has ever been.
Anyway, back to Schlichter. His Twitter thread definitely gives us a sense of what we’re up against. It’s not like they’re hiding their vision for America. All I can compare it to is how Hitler wrote a whole fucking book laying out exactly what he was going to do….and then he did it.
I can’t predict the future, but the macro trends definitely indicate that the conditions are there for at some point between now and January, 2025, there is going to be some sort of catalyst that forces us to make the existential choice of autocracy, civil war or military junta.
The Right, as exemplified by Schlichter are locked and loaded to strike Blue States on an ideological basis. They’ve established what they’re going to do and why they’re going to do it. But it hasn’t happened yet. Something would have to happen for me not to think we’re just going to peacefully transition into autocracy.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is very, very popular with my conservative relatives. The origin of his popularity is he is perceived as a “fighter” who attacks “the libs” on every front for any reason.
This is probably the most destructive of Trump’s legacies and the thing that could ultimately be his political downfall. My theory is this — now that Trump has established the blueprint for being a successful Republican politician, he no longer serves much purpose for his many, many would-be autocratic successors.
Trump, unto himself, is a blockage in our now inevitable transition into autocracy. Trump is just a big old ding-dong who is way too lazy and idiotic to successfully shepherd us into autocracy. His would be younger, more focused — and potentially more bloodthirsty successors, however — don’t have those problems.
As such, it is within the realm of possibility that there will come a political tipping point where people like DeSantis support Trump’s political demise because he’s outlived his usefulness. He has shown the path to autocracy, but doesn’t have the good sense to get out of their way, so they’ll be there throwing punches when the end comes, if it ever does.
Or, put another way, DeSantis, specifically, is growing popular enough that either Trump tries to co-op him by naming him is 2024 veep or he’s able to destroy Trump should the two have at it at last.
At the moment, DeSantis appears popular because he holds out the promise of MAGA without Trump. A lot — A LOT — of people who support the craven, racist ideals of MAGA can’t defend Trump and DeSantis gives them an out. In their mind, if the debate over MAGA is strictly one over polices — and not the fascist and ethical implications of it all — it’s a win.
They point is — as I keep saying, America is an autocracy without an autocrat. Once the autocrat is in position, we’re probably just going to transition into an autocracy and that will be that. There is a chance, of course, that either the military steps in or we have a civil war or both.
I can’t predict the future, I don’t know.
But at the moment, DeSantis has it within his power to destroy Trump. It will be interesting to see if he uses it, or allows himself to be co-oped.
These are the times that try men’s souls, as Thomas Paine would say. The reason is, we now are confronted with the cold, hard fact that every election we have now is existential — if Republicans gain power again, they’re unlikely to ever peacefully give it up.
Combine this with Republicans’ growing glorification of political violence as a means to an end and their blaming of liberals for “forcing” them to radicalize and you have a recipe for disaster.
In the end, we either have a civil war with the specific objective of destroying the Republican Party or we slip into autocracy peacefully. At the moment, that’s what I think is going to happen. It will become political conventional wisdom that that Republicans — one way or another — always win the presidency, people stop voting and ta-da autocracy.
The only reason why I’m willing to entertain then notion of a civil war in even abstract terms is the MAGA New Right’s alarming, and growing, glorification of political violence. They keep ranting on Twitter that their fascist radicalization is the fault of liberals who “just won’t leave them alone.” Jesus, what a bunch of fucking cocksuckers.
We have to begin to gird our loins for the very real possibly that the otherwise peaceful transition into autocracy will somehow be bungled and we do, in fact, have a civil war. The North’s, er, I mean, Blue States‘ war aims should be: destruction of the Republican Party, a just and equable Reconstruction of the former Red States then a Constitutional Convention.
In short, we would need to renew the American Covent that has we last forged in 1865.
But, again, because the method that the MAGA New Right intends to use to initially turn us into an autocracy — the whole throwing things into Congress — is actually in the Constitution, that’s enough hook for the press to shrug and tell everyone to calm down.
The way the MAGA New Right might bungle things is if they are so aggressive and ham-handed in their efforts to win that people see it for what it is, then, well, the country is going to buckle and a civil war will start.
I find myself these days thinking a lot about what the U.S. Military will do should our transition to an autocracy somehow be bungled and it’s clear we’re going to have a civil war. I’m beginning to think rather than a civil war, the U.S. Military would step in — acting President Jim Mattis, anyone? — and that would be the way, ultimately, things would be sorted out.
The U.S. Military is the one remaining institution with the means, motive an opportunity to save us from ourselves.
So, I guess there are three, not two, choices facing us: autocracy, civil war or military junta.
No matter how much the modern Slavocrats may think they can defeat the “woke” soyboys of the Blue States simply by starting a dumb, tragic Second American Civil war, they face a huge fucking obstacle to any such victory: California.
The thing that would make California a new “arsenal of democracy” should a civil war break out is its economy, population and unified polity. It’s a big enough state that it, itself, is a nation. This is where it becomes VERY OBVIOUS how fucking stupid a civil war would be. If you look at what the war aims of the Red States would be, they’re very self defeating.
How could Texas and / or Florida fight back against a California plains state blitzkrieg if they’re fighting a fucking race war? The MAGA New Right wants to establish a white Christian entho state — not something that really engenders a lot of support from POC.
The Liberators
As such, if you can just get California to stay in the Union, you put the state on a war footing as quickly as possible, secure Oregon and Washington then race across the mountain and plains states to Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan. Texas would likely be suffering from an intra-state civil war so you catch them on the back foot. The fighting would be horrific, but California would win. At the same time you have another horrific battle in Ohio and Indiana, but the momentum would be on Blue State’s side.
If things have gotten THIS BAD –where is the Federal government and U.S. Military? — then a race war has erupted in most of the old CSA. you do a peincer movement heading west and south in hopes of hooking up with Atlanta which is probably a strong Blue holdout.
Wildcard: if Red States are panicking, they’re going to use stolen WMD.
And, remember, the entire post WW2 global liberal order will have collapsed so to add to what’s going on domestically in the United States, a number of limited nuclear exchanges will likely have happened.
This entire clusterfuck would be the Fourth Turning. A huge reset. What the endgame would ultimately be would be up to us, if we survive.
One reason why the American MAGA New Right is very, very dumb to crave a second civil war is they’re assuming that all such an event would be is nothing more than politics with the opportunity to use violence against liberals.
The MAGA New Right is so busy sucking its own cock that they forget something: once things become existential for both sides the state of play is dramatically different. A lot of the dumber “woke” shit that Leftist spout off about would suddenly evaporate. It’s hard to be a trustafarian when your family is staring down the barrel of a gun.
That’s probably the single biggest strategic miscalculation of the MAGA New Right — they glorify political violence, blame liberals for “forcing” them to engage in it because they assume the center-Left is made up of a bunch of transgenderd soyboys who will be easy to get rid of. This goes against all of human existence: even the most fey of people are going to fight back extremely hard if their lives depend on it.
That’s why, it’s in the interests of the MAGA New Right to stop being such crybabies and to continue work within the confines of politics — all they have to do is be patient and they’ll get everything they want without firing a shot. I would compare it to Slave Power in 1861. If they had just stayed in the Union, they had probably could have kept their slaves a solid 10 more years at least.
Even the election of Lincoln was, on a political level, a very soft, general indication of political trends. But they South decided on war and they lost everything in a very violent manner.
So, too, could the MAGA New Right lose everything if they turn to organized political violence. Just sketching things out in my mind gives me a lot to work with if things become existential. Blue States have bigger economies, are more politically unified and have populations that are more concentrated. If the U.S. Military somehow collapses and you have essentially state- verse- state warfare without any central military, then California can easily on its own seize everything between it and the Blue States of the midwest with only Texas standing in its way.
America, 2021
But even Texas is shifting Blue and if an actual civil war started it might implode, especially once the state government radicalized and started some sort of “Final Solution” against POC.
And it’s because of how quickly Red States would realize what a huge mistake they had made by pushing us into violence that WMD would be seized and then we bomb ourselves into the stone age. Once WMD were used, everything would be taken to the next level with both sides growing far, far more radical than they ever imagined.
It would be a huge, historic reset not only in the United States, but the entire world. Everything would change, nothing would stay the same. So, it’s best if we just don’t do that, ok? Let’s not start killing each other for political reasons? Please?
But I fear I’m wasting my breath. Just like how war was glorified in Europe leading up to World War 1, so, too, does the MAGA New Right glorify the prospect of a Second American Civil War.
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