rolling “Trump is gonna win” containment thread

still, that lets us do an apples-to-apples comparison. about 38% of the country is in the 25-54 age range, so that's about 125 million people. so 680K people out of 125 million are watching fucker carlson's show every night. less than 1 out of 100! that's good

sorry, i'm still kind of staggered by how unrelentlessly old fox's viewership is, wow

It’s a fantasy to assume that more white people can’t become fascists or fascist-adjacent in a time of greater strife

― Donald Trump Also Sucks, Of Course (milo z)

here's the thing: speaking as a white person, pretty much all of us are already fascists or fascist-adjacent. and i ain't excluding myself from that judgement. people all wanting to play the popular parlor game "who goes fascist?" and they all write the rules in such a way as to exclude themselves from the equation, which just seems bizarre and fucked up because, i mean, there's only one person where i have any say whatsoever as to whether they go fascist or not, and it's me, i'm the monster at the end of the fuckin' book.

people want to worry about fascism, fine, but if you're gonna do it start by asking yourself by what would make you a fascist, and do what you can to minimize that risk. if you got time left over for other stuff, i don't know, post on an internet message board or something.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNMwRH5UGYY

people want to worry about fascism,

I’m not “worrying about fascism” I’m responding to the demographics are destiny arguments being presented that accept the decline of the GOP as fait accompli.

That’s predicated on a lot of stasis in voting patterns.

I’m not “worrying about fascism” I’m responding to the demographics are destiny arguments being presented that accept the decline of the GOP as fait accompli.

That’s predicated on a lot of stasis in voting patterns.

― Donald Trump Also Sucks, Of Course (milo z)

if this thread isn't worrying about fascism, what is? i mean, none of us have any hard data that would allow us to accurately predict the future, do we? oh god, who's going to run in 2024? will he win? what happens to the republican party in 2021? will the president concede? i mean, aren't these questions basically just creative writing prompts, giving us the opportunity to fantasize about things we have no control over?

i mean, this isn't a serious discussion, this can't possibly be a serious discussion, because there's nothing to discuss here. it's just wouldn't this be awful, i wonder if this will happen, or maybe this will happen instead, or who knows?

sorry i'm being so argumentative today

just leavin this here

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/07/24/2020-election-disaster-perfect-storm-372778

phew

I mean, it’s a good piece, pretty comprehensive

i think at this point assuming there will be a national election held in the united states of america on november 3, 2020 is a pretty big leap. if you haven't started to question this assumption already, it is time to start.

There's nothing he can do to stop an election.

The scenarios in the Politico article are more plausible than a cancellation of Election Day.

Congress is extremely unlikely to move the election. The end of the President’s term is set in the Constitution. I’m not buying any of the “he won’t concede” fantasies. It doesn’t matter if he concedes.

It seems like a good idea to think and prepare and write about this stuff, but I also cringe inwardly at the thought that Trumpy and the MAGAnauts are reading these pieces and saying "hmm, good idea, I hadn't thought of THAT strategy," while frenziedly fapping.

There's nothing he can do to stop an election.

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn)

he is literally starting a civil war in several cities simultaneously right now

Yes he is. If he loses an election and refuses to leave, it doesn't matter because he's no longer president.

ok i questioned the assumption. it refused to tell me anything new tho. i assume i should start waterboarding it to get it to spill?

kinda tough to lead a coup when the military doesn't even like you

Kate, with all due respect, I just don't find it plausible whereas, yeah, I find it quite plausible he'd send unrequested federal agents into cities.

kinda tough to lead a coup when the military doesn't even like you

― k*r*n koltrane (Simon H.)

which is why he's trying to lead a coup with DHS contractors, which he has the legal authority to do. which he seems to be doing just fucking fine with at this time. oh, the military don't like him and they won't show up to enforce martial law over the mayors, you know what, they won't act against him, because if they did so _they_ would be the ones conducting a military coup, which literally nobody wants.

i don't find what's happening right now in my city particularly plausible either, alfred, but my opinions regarding its plausibility don't seem to be preventing it from happening.

I'm gonna need somebody smarter than me to draw a bright clean line from "mercenaries vs protesters in US cities" to "there is no election, Trump remains president indefinitely". Cause I'm not seeing it.

i'm not postulating trump remaining president indefinitely, unperson. i'm postulating a breakdown of the effective rule of law. which isn't much of a stretch imo.

like, in portland, do we have any effective legal recourse whatsoever against what the president is doing? if so, what is it?

I don't know what you'd count as effective, but I think there are several lawsuits in progress.

I don't know what you'd count as effective, but I think there are several lawsuits in progress.

― Josh in Chicago

i would count as "effective" anything that gets the federal mercenaries to leave portland.

The city and the state could file against DHS and the administration and tell them to fuck off. The rule of law depends on people exercising it.

nb the DHS FPS cops are not contractors

I opened but then didn't read that Politico piece, btw, as soon as I saw the "8 Things ..." clickbait sort of headline. What is this, Cosmo? Why 8? There has been so much shit that's happened in the past four years, let alone four months, or hell, four weeks, that no one really expected that I'm reluctant to read about more predictions, however well considered.

The city and the state could file against DHS and the administration and tell them to fuck off. The rule of law depends on people exercising it.

― sound of scampo talk to me (El Tomboto)

and who would enforce these actions? the police. and do the police obey the mayor? they do not, tombot. and the mayor, he would prefer to pretend otherwise. so the mayor is not taking action, unless by "taking action" you mean "going downtown to get jeered and teargassed".

I go back and forth on the plausibilty of these scenarios. The thing that always has me erring on the side of plausible is the lack of recent precedent for conscientious obhjection inside the system

like ok the military "doesn't like" Trump, but I've not yet read about a single "soldier" in the nat guard or one of these agencies, ICE, etc., who has resigned or refused in protest

Why 8?

Because the Antichrist is the eighth king according to the Book of Revelation, duh.

I'm gonna need somebody smarter than me to draw a bright clean line from "mercenaries vs protesters in US cities" to "there is no election, Trump remains president indefinitely"

I think this is part of the problem though, in real life we don't get these bright lines, only subtle gradations. Everybody keeps looking for markers and clear signs when the slippage is constant and daily

Hadrian there are plenty of people who have left under this administration, it’s just not newsworthy. Most if not all of them are quietly moving on to their next career and not interested in talking to journalists about why they quit

It's true, they've left, but almost w/o exception they have the privilege of leaving quietly and w/o having to run publicly afoul of the WH or "refuse orders."

Kate I can’t extrapolate from the particular breakdown of civil authority / chain-of-command disasterfuck happening in Portland to the rest of the country. I understand why it makes you feel the way you do, that sucks.

Why doesn’t the mayor have any control over the local police?

By and large we have not seen any systemic resistance to these policies—just the broken, exhausted anomalies who throw in the towel.

The lesson I fear most will take from the whistelblowers, IG's, Col. Vindeman etc., is you just "don't* do that.

I often think back to Barr's nomination, the consensus take that he was a lifer, an institutionalist, "bigger than the moment," etc.

I am no longer confortable believing the same about a given general

“by and large” doing a lot of work there but fine, I’ll acknowledge I have my own biases and leave it there. It’s not like I’m going to convince anybody of what I think

To be clear I don't think it will come to this. But no way in hell am I handwaving the possibilty. It seems dangerous at the moment to discourage imagination.

i guess what's weird to me is that the defining characteristic of trump is his incompetence but my expectations for a coup in the US requires someone with immense competence and ability to coordinate among many different people, organizations etc skills i've never seen from the potus. if ppl haven't aggressively stopped trump yet that's bc he's the legal president and they respect the office and system, not bc he commands their undying loyalty.

I often think back to Barr's nomination, the consensus take that he was a lifer, an institutionalist, "bigger than the moment," etc.

Why doesn’t the mayor have any control over the local police?

Because Portland is a city in the United States.

I think some of the distaste for this speculation has to do with ppl conflating "acknowleging the possibility" and remaining on guard w/ alarmism

some sentiments expressed itt have the undeniable flavor of alarmism tho

It doesn't require a huge amount of competence and ability to sow complete chaos.

I remember reading a lot of, yeah, Barr's an ideologue but he's ultimately independent, takes the long view, etc.

ending american democracy and installing oneself as a dictator != sowing chaos

end != means

I think we should be alarmed about what's happening today

and that alarm should inform preparedness for what "could" happen tomorrow

there will always be people who say down to the very last moment that everything is fine

yep