Tag: Tyrant Trump

How Low Could Tyrant Trump Go Before The Military Steps In?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Now, before I lay this scenario out, let me be clear — I’m not advocating anything. I’m a man of peace. A man of ideas. And, what’s more, we all know that what I’m about to suggests happened that it would be just the opening salvo into pretty much a civil war / revolution situation.

But, having said that, here goes.

While it’s of course possible that Trump won’t win the 2024 election, it’s also true that at the moment it seems as though he is, in fact, going to win and we have to start to think now about what our reaction to that will be. Trump has made it very clear that he’s pretty much going to become a fucking tyrant the moment he is in power again.

He’s going to arrest people he doesn’t like. He’s going to invoke the Insurrection Act, the list goes on.

Really, the only thing that gives me any hope at the moment is that all these tyrannical things would not happen in a vacuum. If Trump really does go full tyrant straight out of the gate, there may come a point where a lot of well-meaning Traditionalists who voted for Trump because of negative polarization will finally, at last, sit up and take notice.

If Trump actually starts to not only round his critics up so he can “lock them up” AND he uses the military to crack down on any form of dissent, then, lulz, we got a problem on our hands. We may, very well, be going to the show. That’s what so dumb about tyrant Trump — if he had any self control he could get everything he wanted in due time.

But, no, Trump is so dumb that he could do what a civil war and two world wars could not do — cause an actual Glorious Revolution where the 60% of the population that hates Trump and MAGA with a passion actually collectively does something about it.

If Trump is a tyrant and makes all my hysterical doom shit fears become a reality, then there is at least a small possibility that the U.S. Military will step in and depose him in some way. The most logical way such a thing might happen is they could use the legal cover of the 14th Amendment to say both Trump and his veep aren’t legally in office to begin with.

We may find ourselves with a military junta (President James Mattis anyone?) who exists specifically to call up a Constitutional Convention that would enact a series of much-needed structural political reforms.

Another wild card is the issue of impeachment. If Trump goes totally completely fucking tyrannical and nuts from day one, if the House is Democratic, there is a chance that if the country is wracked with massive, rolling protests and there is even a General Strike, then there may be a snap impeachment that flies over to the Senate where Republicans may, at last, find their guts.

Or not. They’re all wussies.

But as I mentioned, Trump is really popular with about 38% of the population. If there was some sort of “Glorious Revolution,” well, there would be a counter-revolution that would probably happen in the guise of a secession crisis.

So. I don’t know. It’s all very curious. I can’t predict the future, so it’s possible that Biden will win re-election and, rather than demanding a National Divorce to stay out of prison, Trump just rants a lot and finally fades into oblivion. We’ll be safe another four years until the usual ebb and flow of a democracy causes a far more sly fascist revolution to take place in 2028 -2029.

Keep the faith.

Mental Masturbation About Using A Combination of The 14th Amendment & A General Strike To Depose Trump In His Second Term

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Two things are generally true about me — I can’t predict the future and no one listens to me. In fact, not a lot of people even take me very seriously. But I am pretty good at making abstract concepts more concrete and also running scenarios.

With all that in mind, let’s mull how we might topple a tyrannical Second Trump Administration. The key issue is it hasn’t happened yet — and may never. So, lulz. But as recent polls indicate, we need to at least begin to contemplate what the fuck we’re going to do if Tyrant Trump gets a second chance at turning us into a Russia-style autocracy.

Now, remember, if it ends up being any other Republican then all of this is moot. Any other Republican would have the wherewithal to be sly and more orderly in their guiding us into a managed democracy. But this is Trump we’re talking about and he’s so dumb and erratic that there’s a good chance that he will really start to do some tyrannical bullshit that causes people to think seriously of something akin to a Glorious Revolution.

But there is a lot I just can’t game out.

It could be that I’m underestimating the patience of the American public. It could be that Trump really can go full tyrant and, well, lulz. He will be so legalistic about doing it that the U.S. Military will shrug and, well, there you go. As long as, in general, he doesn’t touch some basic rights like those found in the 1st Amendment, he will get a pass.

The people who might organize direct action, like a General Strike, will be too busy using their second passports to live in Europe and record their circle jerk podcasts.

Having said all that, it is clear to me that if things really did get that bad that we could use the 14 Amendment combined with a General strike to potentially entice the U. S. Miliary to depose Tyrant Trump. The argument of the Glorious Revolution would be that legally Trump was ineligible to run in the first place, so neither he — nor his running mate — are legally in office.

Now, some context.

Not only would both the United States and the entire world be in the middle of a massive clusterfuck if things get so bad that we’re talking like this, but there would be an equal and opposite reaction by MAGA. It’s not like they would just shrug and be cool with deposing their Dear Fucking Leader.

So. Any talk of combining a General Strike with the 14the Amendment is essentially advocating a civil war and I’m not prepared to do that. But I do think we all need to prepare ourselves for something astonishing to happen in the United States starting in late 2024, early 2025.

I can’t predict the future, so I suppose it’s possible that we may punt our problems down the road again, like we did in 2020. By my fear is even if we “just vote” and defeat Trump that he will, unto himself, spark a National Divorce — civil war — simply because he doesn’t want to go prison.

Sigh.

Keep the faith.

What If Trump Goes ‘Full Tyrant’ During His Second Term?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

In general, Americans are collectively pretty chill. It takes a whole lot to rile us up. We’re not French, after all. In fact, the last time we really got ornery was in the late 1960s, early 1970s in the context of the Vietnam War. Once The Draft ended, then, lulz, everyone just wanted to shake their booty and being politically engaged was a thing of the past.

A book I really enjoyed as a young man is William Safire’s “Freedom,” which is a huge tome of a novel that deals with the early days of the Civil War leading up to the Emancipation Proclamation. The book deals with what I would call “Radical Moderates.” This is epitomized by when one of the characters says, “We’re all Abolitionists now.”

The average person in 2023 has no comprehension as to how radical freeing the slaves being a war aim was in 1862. So, in a sense, if you want to know what a Radical Moderate is, just think of how President Lincoln only gradually warmed up to the idea of freeing the slaves.

ANYWAY.

The point of all that is — if Trump goes totally bonkers and full tyrant, what happens? Anything? All the signs point to Trump winning in 2024 and then, in a very, very fucking erratic manner, shoving tyranny down the throats of Americans in an unprecedented manner.

And, as an aside, remember — if Trump does happen to lose, there’s really good chance that he will single-handedly provoke a civil war in an effort to avoid going to jail. Let that sink in.

This is where I note that general macro political trends are for the United States to drift (peacefully) into autocracy. It’s a gimmie at this point. Now, in late 2023, the United States is an “anocracy” or even, maybe, an autocracy without an autocrat.

So, if any other Republican was in Trump’s position, we would simply wake up on day 20 years from now — or less — and wonder why the United States is invading Canada to free it from the “woke mind virus.” But this is Trump we’re talking about.

He’s so stupid, lazy and idiotic that what should be a historical gimmie, could turn into a massive fucking clusterfuck. But, again, this all raises the question — how tyrannical can Trump get before there’s some sort of “Glorious Revolution” lead by Radical Moderates?

And, remember, pushing things to the limit is kind of Trump’s thing. The man has been a one man stress test to our entire political system, ranging from the courts to the election process itself. So, yeah, I could see Trump going stark raving mad and tyrannical at some point in his second term to the point that, say, there’s a General Strike of some sort that might bring the nation to its knees.

This, of course, raises an interesting idea — might the U.S. Military step in? I don’t think so. And, yet, if Trump was running around demanding the U.S. Military to do things to the domestic population that were clearly illegal and un Constitutional….maybe they would step in?

An interesting way that Trump might be deposed is the an novel use of the 14th Amendment. Remember, the Radical Republicans of Reconstruction were able to fuck with the South for a few years by saying the did not have a “republican form of government.” As such, if Trump went crazy and started to do things that the U.S. Military simply could not brook, it’s at least possible that the legal fig leaf that would be used would be that Trump was illegally in office to begin with because he was in violation of the 14th Amendment.

But all of that is just a speculative daydream at the moment. I think that while Trump is likely to go full bonkers tyrant the moment he’s in office again, that, in the end, he’ll solve all his problems with the U.S. Military by demanding a Constitutional Convention that rewrites the Constitution in the likeliness of MAGA.

If that happens, may God have mercery on all our souls.

What Am I Going To Do If Tyrant Trump Wins Re-Election?

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Now that we’ve reached just about a year before the most significant election in American history since 1860, I find myself wondering what the fuck I’m going to do if Trump is re-elected. I already know what I’m going to do if there’s any sort of civil war or revolution — head north.

But what do I do if we just slide into a MAGA-themed autocracy?

A lot will depend on my surroundings. I live in an extremely MAGA-conservative part of Virginia. It could be that I won’t have any choice but to head for, say, Richmond, where I have some relatives. It could be that the choice will be made for me — things will just grow so hot for me because too many people know my Blue politics.

There is the longer-term issue of what happens if I do move to Richmond and ICE gets weaponized. I’ve been a loudmouth crank in a liberal democracy my entire life and I don’t quite know what I’m going to do when I can’t get drunk and shoot off at the mouth anymore.

It could very well be that my very conservative relatives — whom I love dearly — are going to be put between a rock and a hard place. They’re going to demand I shut up and I’m just not going to do it. I would rather, in fact, they be the ones to turn me in than have to wait for me to get drunk and say Tyrant Trump can suck my dick.

I do think that the existing ICE infrastructure will inevitably be weaponized in Trump’s second term. And I think we’re going to see a MAGA-dominated Constitutional Convention. The United States will leave NATO. We will pull our troops out of South Korea. And it’s possible there could be a total re-alignment of the global order, with the United States aligning with other autocratic nations like Russia, Turkey and Hungary.

But as for my personal fate, I’m at a loss. I just don’t have the funds to flee the country like a least 1 million smug Twitter liberals will do. No matter what, I’d rather die on my feet a free man than live a long life on my knees as a slave.

MAGA As American Fascism



by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

The thing about fascism is they don’t play by the rules of democracy. Or, if they do, they use the rules for their ultimate goal — to win. So, it seems as though 100 days before the 2020 election there are two macro trends happening at the same time.

On one hand, we have about 240 years of liberal democratic tradition all pointing towards Biden having a decent shot at winning a major victory against Trump in the fall.

Meanwhile, we have the “new rules” of the fucking fascist MAGA movement, which means, lulz, fuck you Trump’s never leaving office.

So, what I guess I’m saying is, when the dust settles, Trump is going to still be in office come Jan. 20, 2021. He’s simply never leaving office. I say this with the likelihood that he’s going to demand a Constitutional Convention at some point in his stole second term in the back of my mind. He’s going to be around for the next 10-15 years being more and more crazy and more and more criminal. Then we’re going to have a series of Trumps for the next few decades until the Graying of America crosses the Browning of America and AOC, I don’t know, manages to overthrow the government about 2050.

I can’t predict the future — I don’t know exactly how this is all going to work out — but that’s definitely where the macro political trends in the United States are pointing right now. The center-Left is so busy scoring density politics points on Twitter, that they’re completely oblivious to how they might need to address the fascist infection in real life.

Real “resistance” is hard work. You have to risk things that are important to you. There’s no assurance that you will live. There’s no assurance that you won’t be anymore than a number. And, really, the actual number of people who will resist MAGA tyranny is probably going to be pretty small.

It’s kooks and cranks like me who will have to take up the burden because I have principles and will refuse — absolutely — to shut up when everyone around me tells me I had better do so “for my own good.” I’m a man of peace. A man of ideas. And I’m not going to be violent. That’s just not me. But will note that sometimes you can have a shit tone of guns and not do jack squat.

For instance, when Napoleon escaped from Elba in 1815, he famously stood before a huge army and told them to shoot “their emperor” if felt so inclined. They had all those weapons. They could have killed him on the spot. But they didn’t they made him their leader and they rode to Paris, starting the 100 Days.

I’m not comparing myself to Napoleon — that would be pretty bonkers — but I am saying that history is made by people with nothing to lose. For me — a bonkers loser in the middle of nowhere — to be of note in anyway, things would have had to have grown extremely dire.

So, hopefully, while things are obviously going to get REALLY BAD in Trump’s stolen second term, they won’t get SO BAD that I have to use my native skillset for anything other than developing and writing a novel.