I went to NYC a couple months ago and thought, what was I thinking? No one, no thing can repress the surging messy boisterous life of this wild place. I agree with the author. Trump v America? No contest.
Sadly, it's not really a case of Trump vs. America. A plurality of voters voted for this guy. And according to the latest info I've seen, there are still very few signs of regret among his voters. Nor are they disturbed by his authoritarian agenda. It's a big part of what they like about him. So Trump's takeover attempt is just the tip of the iceberg. What's really going on is more like a civil war between people with irreconcilable values, beliefs, and information sources. And I suspect these fractures will only become more extreme as the AI revolution kicks in, because rapid change generally leads to panic.
I hope you are right, but am not at all confident. The real test will be the state of the economy six to twelve months from now. I suspect that it will be poor, with stagflation eating away at people's ability to keep pace and, thanks to the severe cuts in Medicaid & the ACA, many working-/middle-class folks without access to affordable healthcare.The questions is, will Trump declare some phony emergency in an effort to cancel the mid-terms. I;m inclined to think that he will.
Trump himself may fall before Trumpism. His performance, or lack of performance, at the G7 meeting once more exposed his physical and mental deterioration. He's dying of dementia in front of our eyes. He is completely incontinent at this point. He can't stay awake in public. At some point he won't even be able to deliver rambling word salad. When he gets to spewing random syllables his handlers will have to go to the 25th Amendment.
That will put JD Vance in charge, who is more intelligent (low bar) and focused, but who will have multiple handicaps.
First, Trump will still be alive, making Vance a kind of half president. Lame duck from the start. Second, he has no following. The MAGA crowd doesn't care about him, and will be busy grieving and making up conspiracy theories about Trump's absence.
Third, he has no political skills. He is awkward and false and doesn't understand politics or people. Without the base the GOP will not fear him.
Fourth, he has the charisma of a potato. He will not be able to gain the loyalty of Trump's base.
In short, he will be extremely and obviously weak.
He is from the finance/tech billionaire side of the GOP and will alienate the racist anti-immigrant side. I can imagine him ditching Miller and Noem in favor of a status quo pick who will keep big ag supplied with cheap docile labor. Aside from abortion he'll probably de-emphasize the social issues in favor of stuffing cash into his backer's pockets; tax breaks, subsidies, sweetheart deals. This will not play well, even with conservatives, and he won't have the political backing to push through.
The whole authoritarian exercise rides on the shaky shoulders of a dying man.
I really want to believe this point of view that a Democrat-led resistance will coalesce at some ‘tipping point’ once Trump and MAGA overstep, overreach, or otherwise flameout. But I am constantly hit with the opposing view, which is that the American voting public trusts democrats far less than Republicans on just about every policy measure except healthcare. And Democrats nationwide have lost critical margins of their precarious electoral and electoral college majorities. To me, the big missing piece continues to be, “What are we Democrats FOR?”
I went to NYC a couple months ago and thought, what was I thinking? No one, no thing can repress the surging messy boisterous life of this wild place. I agree with the author. Trump v America? No contest.
One risk of moving too quickly is that agents of the regime get exhausted.
The DOJ is already running out of lawyers. ICE is at the breaking point. Military morale is low.
Every move that the regime makes makes the next move more difficult. For deportation, the amount of resources required per arrest continues to rise.
Trump will fail because the whole thing is being run by a bunch of political consultants and Fox News talking heads. All they know is show.
Sadly, it's not really a case of Trump vs. America. A plurality of voters voted for this guy. And according to the latest info I've seen, there are still very few signs of regret among his voters. Nor are they disturbed by his authoritarian agenda. It's a big part of what they like about him. So Trump's takeover attempt is just the tip of the iceberg. What's really going on is more like a civil war between people with irreconcilable values, beliefs, and information sources. And I suspect these fractures will only become more extreme as the AI revolution kicks in, because rapid change generally leads to panic.
I hope you are right, but am not at all confident. The real test will be the state of the economy six to twelve months from now. I suspect that it will be poor, with stagflation eating away at people's ability to keep pace and, thanks to the severe cuts in Medicaid & the ACA, many working-/middle-class folks without access to affordable healthcare.The questions is, will Trump declare some phony emergency in an effort to cancel the mid-terms. I;m inclined to think that he will.
Trump himself may fall before Trumpism. His performance, or lack of performance, at the G7 meeting once more exposed his physical and mental deterioration. He's dying of dementia in front of our eyes. He is completely incontinent at this point. He can't stay awake in public. At some point he won't even be able to deliver rambling word salad. When he gets to spewing random syllables his handlers will have to go to the 25th Amendment.
That will put JD Vance in charge, who is more intelligent (low bar) and focused, but who will have multiple handicaps.
First, Trump will still be alive, making Vance a kind of half president. Lame duck from the start. Second, he has no following. The MAGA crowd doesn't care about him, and will be busy grieving and making up conspiracy theories about Trump's absence.
Third, he has no political skills. He is awkward and false and doesn't understand politics or people. Without the base the GOP will not fear him.
Fourth, he has the charisma of a potato. He will not be able to gain the loyalty of Trump's base.
In short, he will be extremely and obviously weak.
He is from the finance/tech billionaire side of the GOP and will alienate the racist anti-immigrant side. I can imagine him ditching Miller and Noem in favor of a status quo pick who will keep big ag supplied with cheap docile labor. Aside from abortion he'll probably de-emphasize the social issues in favor of stuffing cash into his backer's pockets; tax breaks, subsidies, sweetheart deals. This will not play well, even with conservatives, and he won't have the political backing to push through.
The whole authoritarian exercise rides on the shaky shoulders of a dying man.
I really want to believe this point of view that a Democrat-led resistance will coalesce at some ‘tipping point’ once Trump and MAGA overstep, overreach, or otherwise flameout. But I am constantly hit with the opposing view, which is that the American voting public trusts democrats far less than Republicans on just about every policy measure except healthcare. And Democrats nationwide have lost critical margins of their precarious electoral and electoral college majorities. To me, the big missing piece continues to be, “What are we Democrats FOR?”
What could be more important that you didn’t mention is overshoot, since that likely will send us back to the Stone Age if unaddressed