https://x.com/brianstelter/status/1968449834697834591 They're not even putting a veneer of legality on their actions anymore.
Serious question for you smart people on the board; What's your prediction on the US in a few years? I heard an analogy a bit back about Trump being the drunk uncle at Thanksgiving doing karate moves and everyone was like "yeah, yeah tough guy, let's get you another serving of gravy." And now it seems like he's the drunk uncle doing karate moves and has kicked a few people's heads off and everyone is terrified of him.
I think the next six months is going to tell us a lot. The Trump Administration clearly intends to ratchet things up. They've made a martyr out of Kirk in a way that would make Horst Wessel blush, they clearly feel comfortable breaking the law in a variety of ways, and they're getting to run the football down the field. If they succeed with little opposition, and implement the kind of country they're looking to implement, we are straight fucked. If however they stumble, if the country broadly gets very uncomfortable with what they're doing, and if places and individuals have success in pushing them back and frustrating their aims, we may survive long enough to get to a real midterm election. tl;dr: as gross as it feels, pray that Harvard, Gavin Newsom, and Pfizer get what they want.
The timeline where if you say true things about Charlie Kirk you get fired, where if you publicly call for the execution of every homeless person, you don’t. Hey—- better them than us.
Had a customer praise Kirk yesterday as a good man who wanted to spread love his country to the youth to break the brainwashing of our youth by academia. Country is completely fucked and done for.
A new inflation baseline that is higher than it is now. Some kind of NATO skirmish with Russia that quickly dies down. A schism forms in the Republican party. The Democrats get crushed in the midterms. Republican Congress that is weaker in terms of cohesion than the current one is forced to overturn the Jones Act. Supply chains remain fucked up for the remainder of the decade. Political turmoil causes a fracture in China between the Han ethnic groups and everyone else. China invades Taiwan and is repelled by a joint force of Japan, US and Korea. Trump gets critically ill by the end of the term. JD Vance takes over for <6 months. A centrist Democrat is elected.
Too tired and burnt out to know the pluses and minuses of each so if you could ELI5 this, that would be great.
What I’m waiting for is the moment sometime next year, when the media starts up the reporting on the 2028 election, and Trump starts coming out of the hypothetical weeds on his plans to run.
New inflation baseline. Bad economic policy (Tariffs) combined with limited capital availability (boomer retirements) means the cost of borrowing money increases. NATO skirmish with Russia. At some point Russia will likely fully mobilize. There will probably be some incident at some random hotbed like Kaliningrad or the Balkans. Republican schism. Some are looking at the elections beyond this upcoming midterms and things are looking bleak. There will be Republicans that push back on the MAGA wing as they'll see it as a necessity for long-term durability. As soon as the party shifts finish, the MAGA movement collapses. Republicans will realize they're heading into 2028 with an economy they damaged, so they'll be a Hail Mary like overturning the Jones Act, which prevents ships that are not American flagged or crewed from shipping on internal waterways (Mississippi River, etc.). This hopefully happens regardless. China has deep-rooted ethnic tensions that we don't hear about because of their totalitarianism. The Han are the largest ethnic group in the world, and obviously, the largest one in China. Once Xi dies, the ethnic and economic tensions will probably break China apart. Taiwan. Japan has the second most powerful navy. They do not want a multipolar theater. Trump is old and looks like shit. The Democrats lose hard in 2026, but a centrist you've ever heard of (and has little public political baggage) emerges and wins 2028.
If the Democrats lose hard in 2026, that's the ball game. We'll see an Enabling Act before we ever see a fair Presidential election again.
What's your definition of "fully mobilize"? So they've just been biding their time in Ukraine for the past three years?
The fact that it’s even a question makes me feel like we’re already doomed. I just can’t fathom looking around right now and thinking “oh yeah, seems like things are going well!”
Pretty much. Hard estimate, but Stratfor estimated roughly 20-30% mobilization so far. That doesn't account for their rapid depletion of equipment and arms though.
He's got that Pete Buttigeig problem where he's a Democrat in an irrationally Republican state. There isn't really a ladder for him to climb to higher office, and the leap from his current position to President is too big. He needs a Democratic administration to give him a federal job and get some seasoning first.