2025: The Year We All Become Antifa ‘Radical Moderates’

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Trump is not only growing more deranged of late, he’s also growing more and more angry and radical. And he’s not going anywhere. The FBI’s raid of Mar-a-Lago has caused the entire MAGA movement to lurch into a frothy radicalism that sometimes doesn’t seem to make any sense.

And, yet, at the moment, the center-Left in the United States is so weak that we have to take even this new, bonkers version of MAGA seriously as a political force.

My fear is that by late 2024, early 2025, MAGA’s agenda for the United States will have grown so radical that once they steal the 2024 election and begin the process of consolidating power that what they want to do will shock even Traditionalists and away we go. There really is something akin to a revolution, and a group I call “Radical Moderates” will pop up as they usually do in times of political distress in the United States.

Radical Moderates are people who are usually pretty laid back, but because of the crisis that the country is in, they sudden are willing to entertain concepts that were once considered radical. The most notable example of this was when Lincoln freed the slaves and, suddenly “everyone was an Abolitionist.” The same thing could happen if MAGA flips out and ties to, overnight, turn us into Fortress America.

Blue States will begin to leave the Union as the MAGA counter-revolution begins to happen in Trumplandia. There could be a race war in the Deep South and we might find the United States in a situation comparable to Revolutionary Russia as the Russian Empire began to implode.

This makes me want to read a book about the Russian Revolution.

Anyway. There is a greater-than-zero sum chance of mass chaos and unprecedented political upheaval in the United States starting in late 2024, early 2025. But I’m always wrong. Always. I mean, I can’t predict the future. So, it might ultimately get punted down the road a presidential cycle. Or DeSantis becomes president and our decent into autocracy is far more gradual that might happen with Trump.

All I know is — we’re in the danger zone now.

The Fourth Turning Of 2025 & The Radical Moderates Of The Second American Civil War



by Ender

The thing about the first civil war was how it radicalized President Lincoln, who was, for the most part, pretty moderate. It is difficult for the average modern person to understand how radical abolition was when Lincoln embraced it as a war aim. If you want some sense of the lead up to the Emancipation Proclamation, the late William Safire wrote a huge tome of a historical novel called “Freedom” which is about that very thing.

Anyway, since Americans are the vast majority of the time extremely laid back on a macro political level — we’re not French, after all — only very rarely do you see moderates pick up the banner of radicalism. The most obvious time this happened was the Civil War Era, but, to a far lesser extent “radical moderates” also popped up around the Great Depression as well.

In fact, when it came to the First Civil War, it was these radical moderates who ultimately saved the Union. Only by embracing the radical war aim of freeing the slaves could the Union be saved.

And, now, the United States may be in a modern antebellum period. I only say “may” because a Second American Civil War is one of three options before us — autocracy, civil war or some sort of military junta that might lead to a Constitutional Convention.

The prime candidates to become Radical Moderates are all of the NeverTrumpers, a smattering of the Usual Suspect talking heads on CNN and MSNBC and maybe a few Hollywood celebrities with political ambitions. The key thing to remember is, however, once you slice the seal on a civil war, there’s no going back. Everything — and I mean everything — would be thrown up in the air. Strange alliances would be made. New heroes would arise. Historical figures that you could never imagine might spring into the public imagination.

But there’s one thing I have to make absolutely clear — no matter how much people like Jesse “Welcome To The New Right!” Kelly want to glorify the prospect of a civil war, it would suck. It would suck so bad that everyone involved, no matter who won, would live to regret it ever happened for the rest of their lives.

I say this for a number of pretty obvious reasons.

One, everything would grow existential. When things grow existential, it’s not where you went to school, or your race, or gender or if you’re a hipster in a coffee shop or a transgender person upset over the latest J.K Rowling attack. What would matter is how, you, as a person, could help the war effort. Starvation would be everywhere. Death. Despair. Tragedy. Hate. All these things would become a basic part of everyday life.

I believe this because if things got so bad that there was an actual Second American Civil War, WMD would be seized and used (a whole lot!) The lights would go out. Internet may be blocked or not available. You wouldn’t know anything because your access to any form of mass communication might be controlled or non-existent.

What’s once the United States buckled, the rest of the world would not be far behind. We’re talking WW3. Billions could die if not from a number of limited nuclear exchanges, then from the starvation that would result from the following Nuclear Winter.

All because Tucker Carlson convinced Baby Boomers that the Worst Thing That Could Happen To Them Is To Be “Canceled.”

Because of all of this, the aforementioned Radical Moderates would rise to the surface and probably be in control of the Blue States.

I find myself wondering how long a Second American Civil War might last. A lot would depend on the specifics of what caused it and the leadership the two sides had when it began. Or, even more importantly — what would be the two sides war aims?

The MAGA New Right would have some very clear war aims at the beginning — establish a White Christian Autocratic Ethno State — while Blues would probably have to gradually come up with them. And, as I have repeatedly said, a lot would depend on what California did. If it left the Union altogether, the Reds probably would win and consolidate power in the rump USA.

If, however, California stayed united with other Blue States, then we’re going to the show. California would be the Union’s Arsenal Of Democracy.

But, let me be clear –while I like to think the high-risk, high-reward of a Second American Civil War would lead ultimately to a stronger, more perfect Union just like the First Civil War, it might just suck. The United States could simply devolve into a number of rump states like the old Soviet Union.

It could be that after a number of years of chaos, that you would have something that looked like this: California, Texas and Florida would be their own nation-states. NYC might be a “free state.” Some sort of American Taliban might control huge swaths of the South.

Meanwhile, you would have a number of regional alliances that would exist with the goal of giving people some sense of security.

But all of that is extremely speculative. It could be that, in the end, we simply slip peacefully into autocracy and that’s that. Wealthy liberals leave the country for, I dunno, Perth and the cities of Europe and the remaining Americans slowly, but inevitably, circle the drain to “shit hole country” status.

Good luck. You — and the Radical Moderates — will need it.

‘Radical Moderates:’ The Future Is #NeverTrump


by Ender

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