For those of you who watch YouTube geopolitical talking heads, Chas Freeman, who was Nixon’s translator on his famed visit to China and later ambassador to Saudi Arabia, is particularly cool, articulate, and measured. We feature a recent video below so that you can get a sense of his temperament. Freeman has also become more unsparing over time due to the rank ineptitude of US conduct:
So your humble blogger sat up and took notice when reader johnnyme found these remarks late in a wide-ranging interview by the South China Morning Post:
The United States is in the midst of a mounting constitutional crisis that will come to a head with the November 5 elections and the transition to the January 20 inauguration of the next president. Those in Beijing who have come to believe that there is no longer a viable path to peaceful reunification and that the only feasible way to end the division of China is to resort to force might see this period of confusion in Washington as an opportune moment to do so. This would, in my view, be a tragic mistake. The civilian government in Washington may disintegrate at the end of this year, but the US Armed Forces will not, and the American people would not fail to direct their anger at China were they to regard it as responsible for a war over Taiwan.
One has to think Freeman still has a lot of contacts, as well as his considerable personal perspective. If his were merely one view, it might be easier to discount it. But people with very different reference frames are voicing similar worries. For instance, Matt Taibbi, in his discussion with Walter Kim of the RFK, Jr. speech throwing his lot in with Trump, in passing expressed doubt as to whether the 2024 presidential election would take place.
We have pointed out how it would not be hard to brick the 2024 elections. The usual focus of this concern comes from Team Dem, over the inept efforts by Trump and his allies to contest the 2020 results. Perhaps they will get better this time. Or arguably, the sowing of doubt in a Kamala win would be corrosive to “democracy”. The wee problem with this position is that the Democrats have shown themselves very willing to put their hands on the dial, witness the how Sanders was denied the wind in his sails of an Iowa win, his 125,000 disappeared votes in Brooklyn, or even an entire documentary based on poll workers seeing shenanigans in California, or now with RFK, Jr., their scorched earth tactic to keep him off the ballot. RFK, Jr. also alleges party operatives leaned on allies to deny him media coverage (his comparisons to how Ross Perot was treated suggest he’s not off base).
But despite hand wringing about Trump thuggery, there in fact has been nothing resembling a brownshirt show (see Israel settlers for a reality check of what that looks like), save of the perfectly legal sort, that on the threat in some states to prosecute women who get abortions, even out of state. And why should there be? Trump has been ahead. Even with the Kamala fest, the Democrats have not moved into the lead. And Trump has just gotten a vote, money, and media attention boost from RFK, Jr. endorsing him.
Consider further this report from a discussion by a reliable reader with a Democrat superdelegate. Even though single-sourced, it is a litany of admissions against interest. The summary of the superdelegate account:
The overall take –
a) the DNC convention was not very good. Policies were never discussed – and it is becoming obvious now that there is a severe deficit here. Furthermore, the policies that have been put forward – he specifically named price control – have been an utter disaster.
b) the whole no-show special guest Beyonce or George W Bush thing was a completely incompetent disaster and not a good look. Apparently it was supposed to have been Beyonce but she was very offended by something that happened earlier in the day, possibly with the Kamala advance team
c) Trump was already ahead in the real polls – he is now well ahead in the RFK endorsement saga – the polls in the media are really wrong according to him
d) he reiterated that the Kamala idea was literally no one’s idea with a brain in the DNC. His prediction is she will be a disaster. There were apparently multiple issues with temper tantrums this past week with aides in tears.
e) he still believes this will be a Trump win
This tweet came out shortly thereafter. The superdelegate said the speaker was indeed a convention participant and the insiders were “shitting their pants”. The Twitter views are not overwhelming but one would need to track back to TikTok, where it originated, to get a better sense of whether or not it is going viral. A key statement:
When I first got into politics, I thought the Democrats were the party of the people and at the DNC this week, I thought I was in a building with the most elite and out of touch people in the entire world. It very much felt like let’s just have a huge party and forget all of our the problems because the vibes are brat…I didn’t feel any connection to the people that I know right now who are struggling to buy their groceries or pay their rent.
Former Democrat Campaign Worker
Speaks out after attending DNC pic.twitter.com/rRxroTc7yy
— TestDummy (@TestDummy04) August 25, 2024
So given the likely trajectory, and the weird terror that the Democrats have instilled in many loyalists, that Trump will impose an authoritarian regime (and maybe even engage in a bit of Pol Pot-ery), it seems more likely that the Democrats will brick an election than the Republicans. People more expert in election rules and Constitutional process are welcome to correct me, but as I read the Constitution, there is no mechanism for delaying the Presidential vote. So it could take as little as imposing martial law in a few key states over violence, real or manufactured or exaggerated, by Trump loyalists, to halt the vote in those states and make it impossible for the election to proceed.
An alternative scenario that Lambert likes is space aliens land and we have to pause everything to deal with the threat they represent. I have long wondered why John Podesta was so obsessed with them. With all of our wonderful visual fakery, it would not be hard to fabricate a greatly improved and more lasting War of the Worlds. Readers have noted in the last few years that the number of sighting of UFOs has increased.
Lambert further points out that they have been peculiarly concentrated in the US and even more so around nuclear facilities. My pet explanation is that these sighting are actually US experiments with advanced visual and perhaps signal spoofing technology.
Needless to say, I hate having to entertain this line of thought. Perhaps Freeman and Taibbi are inhaling too many swamp vapors. We can only hope so.
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‘Lambert further points out that they [UFO sightings] have been peculiarly concentrated in the US and even more so around nuclear facilities’.
In the late teens (2017 or 2018) I was on a small boat, around dusk, with three other people, on Lake Wylie, SC, near the Catawba Nuclear Plant, which is operated by Duke Energy. Someone saw a small light with a red tinge, which rose above the plant (we were at least a mile away) and then three identical lights following it. They flew into the distance–actually in the direction of the setting sun, far from the plant–and disappeared over about ten minutes. I caught a glimpse of the outline of the last craft against the sun. It seemed solid, but without wings. I didn’t think of my cell phone till the end, and got a very brief video of the last craft, not more than a second. Interestingly, the red tinge didn’t show up so much in the video as it did in life. The distances were so great I don’t think these could have been drones.
Cannot evaluate what you saw. But videos can be to varying degrees. Mick West has a series of analyses on the UFO videos the pentagon released a few years back. Includes model builds to test hypotheses. This sort of thing would help critical thinking skills starting at the middle to high school age.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PLyEO0jNt6M&pp=ygUZYW5hbHlzaXMgb2YgZ28gZmFzdCB2aWRlbw%3D%3D
Given that the Congress is still serving the remainder of its term (though, what happens in the next Congressional session if there are no newly elected congresspersons from specific states?), if the presidential election is interrupted in some number of states and consequently there are insufficient electors elected to give either candidate the needed 270, presumably other provisions of the Constitution would still remain in force, so that the result would be decided, after an inconclusive vote (or non-vote) by the Electoral College, by “one vote per state” in the House of Representatives. That favors DJT and Ds might hesitate to undertake to trigger such a scenario.
Thanks. So that may be why Freeman implied a full martial law scenario, the suspension of “civilian” government, Ukraine-style. Whoever is gaming this out went a few steps further than I did.
I would think you’d need martial law at the national level though. Doing it with a handful of states would definitely cause chaos and mentally put the legitimacy of any winner into question. However, it would likely in my opinion be the trigger to sending it to the House. In 1836, Virginia electoral delegates refused to vote for Van Buren’s VP so the VP slot was decided by a contingent election in the Senate.
A crazy knock on is that the new congressional session starts on Jan 3rd I believe. If not all of the house seats have had an election because of the hypothesized martial law actions… what does the make-up of the house look like? Is someone gaming that and is there a scenario there where you flip the house make-up so Trump is short votes?
Hi Yves,
You might want to listen to this Multipolarity podcast with Pilkington, where there is a long talk about the polls being biased, because they don’t consider the “shy Trump effect” – aka a segment of the population lying in their responses: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ybn7B2iRVyM&t=1423s
While I agree it would not be the desired outcome, but it might not be a total loss. The senate gets to choose the VP which then means team Dem (or other anti-Trump factions) only has to find a way to remove 78 year old president Trump. Sadly there are too many crazy and powerful forces working in bad ways these days. I expect only the worst regardless of who wins.
Under the 20th Amendment, Biden’s term ends at noon on January 20. If the presidential election is undecided, the House can elect a speaker who would be acting president. Mike Johnson would be far more of a nightmare than Trump.
Many thanks, and it does seem that the DNC was almost completely vacuous. However, I note the remark about price controls being a ‘disaster’, and note the assessment made by one of the leading students of various wartime controls and the Nixon experiment (where the abandonment of the gold peg worked against the simultaneous imposition of controls, as if Nixon was pressing hard on the brake and accelerator pedals all at once – though Nixon’s approach was quite effective and relatively popular for a while):
“The first [lesson] is that without monetary restraint controls will fail. If there is not an immediate breakdown, there will be evasion and a postcontrol inflationary surge. The second lesson is that controls must be removed with dispatch. To maintain controls permanently once reasonable expectations for price stability have been established would saddle the economy with a burdensome bureaucracy, an extensive black market, reduced economic efficiency, more acrimonious labor relations, greater incentives to corrupt the legislature and an irksome regimentation of economic life.
With what kind of medicine should we compare comparable controls? In the debate over controls in the Continental Congress, two centuries ago, Richard Henry Lee came closest to the truth. He compared controls to a palliative. They are a medicine to be used to dull the pain and tranquilize the patient while monetary restraint and reform of our fiscal affairs would work the fundamental cure. To renounce controls completely would subject the patient to needless pain, assuming that he would subject himself to the treatment at all. But to rely on controls to work the whole cure, or to continue their use after health was restored, would create more problems than it would solve. Thus, the extremists on both sides of the debate over controls are wrong. Controls are more than a mere placebo. But they will never be a wonder drug for an ailing, inflationary economy.” (Hugh Rockoff, ‘Drastic Measures: a History of Wage & Price Controls in the United States’ (1984), at 246)
That the main plank of Harris’s near non-existent economic policy is, in effect, a mechanism for ‘dulling the pain and tranquilizing the patient’ perhaps tells us all we need to know about Harris and the essence of her meme-based campaign as she has conducted it so far.
I’m not sure how popular Nixon’s WIN campaign (Whip Inflation Now) was. I was a child at the time but I recall everyone noticing that although both wages and prices were supposed to be frozen, in reality the prices were not frozen. But wages were frozen of course
Nixon tried—emphasis on the tried—to control inflation with wage and price controls, a policy he learned and enforced during the opening days of WW2 as a staffet at the OPA. (This is before he joined the USN). Boy, Republicans sure we’re different to years ago!
“Whip Inflation Now” was an initiative of the Ford administration, dead on arrival, as it asked for consumers to voluntarily exercise fiscal discipline in their spending and savings habits. DOA.
I remember during the Whip Inflation Now period that after a little way into it, a reporter asked a Ford spokesman why Inflation wasn’t whipped, and the spokesman said something like . . . turn the badge upside down and it stands for No Immediate Miracles.
Something that was done by Nixon during the Nixon period was the national 55 mph speed limit during the oil crisis. The theory behind that policy was that the way most American cars were shaped at the time, right around or just above 55mph, they sharply increased their own air resistance to their own forward motion through the air around them. So keeping them at 55mph would allow them to get more mpg than allowing them to go at 60mph or even faster.
The law was passed primarily to conserve fuel, but there was an anticipated subsidiary benefit of reduced auto fatalities. There was indeed a significant reduction in auto accidents and fatalities, but the GAO concluded that law did not reduce significantly fuel consumption, as law enforcement agencies had difficulties in enforcing the new speed limit. More fuel efficient vehicles and reduced demand for fuel because of higher prices played a larger role in reducing fuel consumption. The best laid plans . . .
Ahh well . . . I was pretty young then.
So law enforcement had trouble enforcing the “double nickel”? I wonder if that was the beginning of people driving super fast way over the speed limit on interstate highways.
I think that crunch time would come if Trump won the elections in November. Will the Democrats just step aside in January and let Trump once more take the oath of office? Or will they pull out all the stops and use every possible trick, legal skullduggery and blatant attack on him that they could. I know even know how they would justify breaking all sorts of laws and procedures in order to stop him becoming President again. They would tell you ‘But it’s Trump! We have to stop him for the good of Democracy.’ What happens if the Democrats refuse to vacate office or even hold the inauguration? Come the 20th January next year, it may be a toss up as to who the government machinery decides to take their orders from – Trump or Kamala. It’s gunna get messy.
Remember Hillary and her allies briefly floated the idea of getting the electors to flip: https://thefederalist.com/2023/07/19/as-michigan-charges-trump-electors-with-felonies-recall-how-leftists-everywhere-urged-2016-electors-to-defect-to-hillary/
And that didn’t work so we got Russia-gate, which worked fairly well.
Briefly? They ran a long series of TV ads featuring then famous Hollywood TV actors, including West Wing actors (of course), encouraging and imploring electors in red states to flip their votes. As if there are not serious state legal penalties for state electors who do so. Condescending idiots.
Maybe that’s a reason they’ve kept Joe in charge while Kamala runs? It would be harder to pull off a sit-down-strike coup if you’re the one who lost “fair and square” as we used to call it.
It seems like Macron is a few months ahead in the same playbook. It sounds like after calling elections he knew he would lose, he is now refusing to seat the winning government. Did his move against telegram have anything to do with that? Any good coup seizes the media very early.
Just to be precise, there was no “winning” side in the recent French legislative election. No grouping of parties has a majority. The left grouping got the most seats, but to actually pass laws they would have to work with either Macron’s group or Le Pen’s (nahgahappen).
Yeah, the dems already have msm. But X might not knuckle under. Fox maybe a question.
Imo the armed forces are not likely to allow it. For starters many are rep, plus trump has always liked generals. And Although slow, dems seem likely to lose at the supremes.
Imo China is too conservative to do anything, plus they might think if they did something it would unify the us vs a common enemy; I assume they prefer us divided and distracted by Ukraine and, more so, israel. (Sure, we forced russia and China together. Imo Chinese leaders are too smart to do the dumb things we do.)
I see as more likely dems pushing Iran harder for a larger war that dems hope would rally the country ‘round the dem administration. Just do what bibi’s been begging for.
And another thing; any kind of revolution is dangerous for the rich, more so the filthy rich. Donors did fine under trump, imo a coup risk/reward ratio is unacceptable.
Then the question is then who is the police going to side with….? And US does have a militarized police, so the Military needs not to get involved.
American police are not the military. If they tried to prop up by force an even moderately unpopular government especially one perceived as illegitimate, they would likely crumple under the backlash. Riot control is something I can see the police doing and being acceptable to most Americans.
However, while there are very proto death squads in any areas with a strong gang culture or a neo-Nazi influence, maybe a weak framework is a better description, especially in places like Los Angeles and Alameda, plus Portland, Seattle, Detroit, Chicago, and some Southern cities/counties, they are still nothing like those overseas. Plus, it would be unacceptable to most Americans. People know who the local police are, where they live, and usually what they do. The threat of the use of Tannerite would be an excellent deterrence especially, if the police got used as a military force against the general population, as it is not as if there is an actual Weather Underground with its lack of support from the general population in the late 1960s and early 1970s; this would very likely quickly change.
If the police were to get involved, it would be as an auxiliary to the death squads. There would be chaos cause by the lack of law enforcement due to the collapse of actual law enforcement with its replacement by legal repression.
I also don’t see any Pol Pot-ery anytime soon. I do see the small possibility of an Augusto Pinochet style security state repression or a ramping up of the version of the modern Operation Condor, which is already in place.
Well, I think a reciprocal of the same crunch time would come if Harris won the elections in November. Will the Republicans just step aside in January, and let Harris take the oath of office? No. They will pull out all the stops they have and try every etc. etc. etc. from their end.
The only way out of that would be if one of the Brand Name Candidates won by such a huge Nixon-in-72 landslide that pretending it didn’t happen would feel so hopeless that the losing party would give in to the landslide. Neither side will accept losing by a whisker.
Was the Jamie Raskin alleged quote about intervening to stop Trump even if he wins ever confirmed or semi-confirmed? One can easily imagine advance planning along those lines.
There has been talk of the sitting president cancelling the election and remaining in power in every election since 2008, including partisans of both sides engaging in the same kinds of hysterical outbursts. While it seems that the furor has gotten more furious over the years–and anything is possible–I wouldn’t put bets on overt election cancelling.
Same. But perhaps Ted Cruz will shut down the government, again.
And certain Senators continue to try and shut down colleges for antisemitism and the IRS is telling them to stay out of IRS business. While Prager U’s non profit status is secure.
What a world…
Stark. But:
I tend to disagree that the Chinese would be that inept as to try to swipe Taiwan. I smell a blob fantasy.
Will the U.S. of A. hold elections? Yes. Afterwards? Lawfare, tantrums, and posturing. Americans aren’t the French. Et vive la France. Americans prefer collective hissing and beating up the little kid.
Expect reruns of 2016 and 2020. With more whining! Let’s start there with our analyses rather than with potential actions of Generalissima “Lethal Force” Harris. If the Democrats cannot organize a convention, how do they organize a coup?. Likewise, the Republicans, thinking back on America’s Shaman.
Aliens? The UFO stuff is all reflections in mirrors. Watch out for Mothra instead.
No mystery guest? I was pulling for Childish Gambino. Or at least Moms Mabley raised from the dead.
Pass the vitello tonnato.
G.W. Bush would have been the perfect mystery guest.
Shrub killed 3-4k Americans in Iraq. And many, many more Iraqis. That’s just the warmup act for what the neocons have planned.
Maybe he could have come out on a gurney in a body bag and been ceremonially unzipped by Wolfowitz. Or better yet, Hillary!
Pretty quiet from the non-Jackson part of Wyoming- Cheney households…
Idk about China taking Taiwan by force. It gives USA casus belli for the conflict that forces the Natostan countries pick sides (USA) and stop trade with China as they did with Russia. That plan will go into effect no matter who is in the White House. US presidents are puppets, or maybe not even that; just decorations around the bureaucracies that own and control the instruments of power and that survive all presidents. I’d be surprised if China doesn’t understand this.
Yes – this. It’s mostly smoke and mirrors and the real business of empire continues whatever political faction is in power.
They have no time dependent reason to do so. It has always been a long term goal.
Mick West has a series of analyses on the UFO videos the pentagon released a few years back. Includes model builds to test hypotheses. This sort of thing would help critical thinking skills starting at the middle to high school age.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PLyEO0jNt6M&pp=ygUZYW5hbHlzaXMgb2YgZ28gZmFzdCB2aWRlbw%3D%3D
China isn’t in a hurry to reunify Taiwan. I suspect that China would only do so if the US went out of its way to provoke China on Taiwan.
As for the anger of the American people on China, I disagree with the interview. War with China is not the same as the War on Terror. It would mean mass conscription. That would be widely resisted, to put it mildly. The US is too divided today. I don’t see any chance for a war against the Chinese to be some uniting force.
Keep in mind that the casualties from any war in the Pacific with China is going to much higher. Then there’s the inflation the US will suffer when bereft of Chinese production.
Also, large amounts of the American people are now cynical becuase they have been lied to so much.
The rest of Freeman’s points, I mostly agree with. There may not be a willing transfer of power from the losing political party.
The media in the West will try to spin it for the Western oligarchs, but the media itself is losing its influence.
DJG, Reality Czar, I got late to this thread but it is now official: I love you.
We’ve got a situation here in France where the president is simply ignoring the results of the legislative election and refusing to name a prime minister, leaving us with a caretaker government that is still exercising power, including proposing budgets, discussing their portfolios on the TV, etc.
I’m not sure if the possibility exists in the US presidential election to do something similar, but it’s the least kinetic option.
I suppose Harris could just not certify the election if Trump won and the Dems don’t accept the results? It sounds far-fetched but we live in strange times. Perhaps more likely than an alien invasion?
I’m open minded to the big picture presented in the above article, but it seems to me that it should necessarily be easier to scam the vote counting than to cancel the vote counting. Among other advantages they control the governorships in Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania which I think means they control the vote counting in those states.
On Taibbi, I follow him on Twitter and it seems like people are calling him names every day, like every name and every insinuation in the book. I’m not sure if it’s getting to him, or if he just replies to them to remind his readers they’re dealing with a cult. He faces a lot of harassment, a lot of us would have a hard time dealing with it.
Speaking of talking heads, is Nima Alkhorshid’s Dialogue Works available in audio-only format? Podcast with RSS would be ideal.
If I want to just listen without the video, it’s possible but inconvenient with YouTube and consumes a lot of cellular data when I’m out and about.
Seeing that the DemRats control the priamaries in most states, it’ll be that much easier to fix the vote count. I suspect that it’s their back up plan if all else fails (lawfare, propaganda, lies, threats etc. have already failed).
The CIA and FBI are out to get Trump because he went against them in 2016. He made enemies of the FBI after getting rid of Comey (?). He even went to Langley and spoke out against the CIA.
Like Russiagate, Jan 6, and the recent Biden Harris switcheroo, it doesn’t have to be a good coup. They seem to have a special gift for getting these things done or else it’s apparently not that hard to do.
When you own the media, and any media you don’t own is “disinformation,” what can’t you do?
Half the articles on Boing Boing and Salon are Trump-is-evil-and-looney ad hominem hit pieces
…but it seems to me that it should necessarily be easier to scam the vote counting than to cancel the vote counting, I agree, but cancelling the counting 1) has precedence (see team blue primary), 2) is much more of a sure thing in regards to Anyone but Trump!, 3) carries less legal risk.
Now Senator Alex Padilla handed the 2016 California primary to HRC by issuing provisional ballots to those of us with no party preference and then not counting them, which was A-OK according to the rules.
3,000,000 votes were not counted.
YT may still have the video “Uncounted 2016” up for those curious about the actual process.
The Dems have form.
Thank you, and it’s still there – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eB3SWBDYung&t=58s
Three thoughts.
One, maybe it’s the after-effect of watching the Democratic Party drop the ball on so many “easy layup” political moves or policy initiatives over the past couple of decades, not to mention now three elections in a row where the pitch comes down to “the other guy is worse”. But I suspect that by now, so many people in and around the party apparatus have failed upward and internalized incompetence, that even if they wanted to pull off a coup or “brick” an election, they might not actually be capable of perpetrating such.
Especially since…
Two, it is very hard to tell from the outside, but somehow I get the feeling that the Democratic insiders and donors are not necessarily united behind Harris. Some undoubtedly are, I mean, witness Pelosi gushing about both her and Waltz in Politico on several different occasions. On the other hand, Obama took his sweet time getting with the program. My point is, if you hypothesized that some of the high muckymucks in and around the DNC would be comfortable with Harris losing so long as they keep a significant enough presence in Congress and the Senate…well, there would be no need to “brick” an election. In fact, I suspect that guys like Newsom actively want Harris to lose, because that would open up a path for them to 2028. But who knows.
Three, I find it useful to occasionally revisit the battleground state poll aggregation on Real Clear Politics, together with the electoral map. As of now, if you include only the “close” states, and assume Harris picks up Minnesota-Wisconsin-Michigan (or, rather, Waltz does), then the election could well turn on either Pennsylvania by itself, or on Arizona plus Nevada. I mean, there is still a long way to go, and we still haven’t even had any Trump-Harris debates, but as of right this second, the election looks extremely close, with Harris having maybe a 45% chance of winning? But to the point of the post above, if it’s really that close, I think there is a higher chance of the Democrats “thinking” they could win it all and then being “disappointed”, as in 2016, than of them trying any shenanigans. Maybe.
I align with your eloquent framing.
If I may be coarse, I think the democrats are too inept to pull off a coup.
If the race is close and actually won by the democrats, I expect the republican leaning folks to be more prone waging violence and mayhem.
I think Obama enjoys being THE “Black” President and doesn’t relish being devolved to only The First. He’s as petty as Trump, just with a bit more polish.
I have shared this opinion for quite some time – civil strife is far more likely in the event of a Trump win than a Demo win. However, I too think that the elections will occur one way or another. After all, even during WW II elections were held. I will not speculate on the means and methods, but Trump will not be allowed to govern. Over the last four years while there was no one with a grasp of reality in the administration, personnel and policy has been put in place for an impressively deep and complex machinery to acheive the fabled Full Spectum Dominance. This group, whatever you want to call them, will be loath to give it up to some boob who does not realize its importance.
I don’t think the DP will be allowed to subvert the process. If they do, the red areas of the country will revolt one way or the other. In my part of the country people are armed and ready. I remember my wife had a large social gathering of women and the subject of guns came up and nearly all the women pulled out their guns from their purses (I live in the South). Anyhow, the finance oligarchs won’t allow the Party to go too far–civil war would be bad for business.
If red states revolt against the DC-based Feds, then what happens to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Disability, and Veterans benefits for citizens in those states? Any precedents from the 1861-1865 event?
If it’s close, particularly if just one state is uncertain I guess that could lead to temptation. On the other hand it’s in the billionaires interest to have a smooth transition no?
Yes – why would they crash the system that made them wealthy?
They are just surfing that wave, not steering it.
The other question is how this election plays out internationally and it seems whatever happens, the feedback loops are increasingly negative, for the West in general.
A word I heard is that serious protests are being planned across Europe, specifically Germany and France, though England and the rest seem apt to join in.
Then with the Russians taking out the rest of the Ukrainian energy system, it seems that situation will implode in the not to distant future. Which will break NATO.
Adding in the total echo chamber Israel has become, with burning every bridge in sight and the Samson Option as Plan B, it is looking like history’s largest suicide cult.
So prepare for the Trainwreck.
The Ukraine War is, in part, ruled by money to be made selling arms, and money laundered and so on as is the case of ALL US wars except maybe WWII. The US has learned to profit from military defeats and those that profit are the strongest component of the true “Deep State” that actually governs us.
I’m convinced that no one cares if Ukraine is destroyed or not by Russia as long as money is made. Russia is playing a cynical game as well meting out just enough damage to beat NATO but not enough to appear to be going all-out. Putin is more interested in the economic well-being of his people than in conquering any country–there’s no point to seizing territory other than insure security for Russians to carry on life. The western Ukrainians appear to be fanatically attached to their Nazi-style ideology and will fight on to the last man and woman even if it is hopeless just as the Germans fought back viciously in the last year of the war.
Unlike many dissidents, I don’t think the “loss” of Ukraine will break NATO (too much money to be made there) but it will gradually decline and integrate with the EU which will do well no matter what happens. I don’t think, btw, that the Europeans who have embraced hedonism will revolt even as their standard of living declines–their populations have no cultural backbone (a colossal tragedy since European civilization is well worth preserving) at this point in their history.
Consider the federal debt began to grow with the New Deal, so not only was Roosevelt putting unemployed labor back to work, but unemployed capital as well. Then WW2 came along, as the largest public works project in history, making the military the golden child.
So my sense is, the MIC is more trophy wife of the banks than anyone quite appreciates. “Follow the money.”
The problem with Ukraine is it showed Western equipment is over designed, over priced crap, compared to the Russian stuff. And that will kill all but the captured markets.
I think we will be helicoptering off the embassy in the not to distant future.
FWIW (not much) I think the Ukraine War is about the U.S. being able to make any arrangements it wants with other nations etc (“rules-based order”) without a third party being able to say anything about it. If (say) Russian is able to block Ukraine from joining NATO that whole thing collapses, and we’re back to regional powers, spheres of influence, and so forth.
They may not have “cultural backbone” (tell that to the yellow vests from the Real France) but the majority are becoming poorer, feel that their national leaderships have abandoned them for the vapourings of the EU, and have loyalties to their families, friends and regional and nationalist cultures, all of which are well worth preserving against an overweaning EU and it’s ever grubbier “values”, to bring about the collapse of the political system of one country after another.
The only question is, does the breakup of the EU begin the process or will it come after fundamental changes in three or four of the EU’s major players or will it come after the destruction of the Ukraine and Israel and the attempts of millions of bloodcrazed fleeing Banderites and Zionist genocidaires to make new homes in an unwelcoming Europe (of course, all three may well fall into place together at one and the same time). And will the common folk of Europe still see a continuing NATO as a friend or the greatest threat to their peace of mind
Very interesting report. Freeman is the real deal and, along with a lot of ex-FP professionals and military people out there needs to be listened to. However, several things are clear to me. First, is that, in my area of the country (the South) ordinary people are armed and, in some cases, heavily armed and “the people” are simmering just below the surface. Second, the rulers in the suites do not want a civil war or a world war because both would be bad for bidness (as we used to say in the old days) and won’t take kindly to shenanigans by Democratic Party machinations. Third, as the Democratic Party Convention showed me in very graphic terms, the Party has now become some kind of cult with a level of corruption that has grown toxic even for the cult itself–it can’t last for too long because cults usually implode when forced to deal with very real problems. Fourth, people of all political stripes I’ve encountered (who aren’t rich) are suffering from the cost of living which inflation figures do not reflect since statistics have also become deeply political and can’t be relied upon. These middle class people (who will become the new poor as they are beginning to suspect) will not tolerate a Democratic Party putsch.
Finally, as for “aliens” they are real because my wife was abducted by something that appeared “alien.” But, I think these beings are not what the movies and fantasies about them, i.e., “men from outer space” I think they are beings who may come from other dimensions, outer-space, or what people used to call the realm of the gods. They, in various forms have been here since early man and figure in myths. I’ve studied this closely and the field of UFO studies is very deep and complicated–I’ve talked to many other people who have had direct encounters and, I myself, have had a couple of encounters with beings from alternative realities one of those encounters had two other witnesses. I believe we are in a historical moment wherein cultural confusion opens us up to alternative realities so that we can make the next step which is to stop this hyper-realist, left-brain dominated society (which is why so many things no longer make much sense) drift into self-destruction and begin opening up spiritually to who we really are as souls. Therefore as Yves implies, we may be saved in the end by “aliens” (meaning alien to our normal way of thinking).
Those “floaters” are just dimples on the surface.
Having had the tape cut and spliced a few times, there is a lot bubbling under that surface that is more powerful than those messing up on the surface care to consider.
Lol
I’ve said this before but those who support law enforcement regardless have a worldview which makes their actions and decisions, no matter the circumstances or changing up the details, rather predictable.
I think it was Nietzsche who said: “Mistrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.”
You can place them in any historical scenario from Adam and Eve to MLK and you’ll know with high degree if probability which sides they’ll be on, what they’ll do. Law and order sorts just tend to do the wrong thing almost every time.
So if the US is heading towards civil breakdown, Kamala would handle it very differently than a Bernie or RFK Jr. Having said that, Trump is unfortunately also a law and order sort. So we’ve got the two worst possible leaders were there to be a constitutional crisis. However, of the two, I see Kamala as most likely to reach for the punishment and control levers.
Won’t the crisis be Israel/mid-east centric? Big battle for hearts and minds theirbetween Trump/Nutting-yahoo and hand-wringing winkin’ Blinkin and Nod?
Swamp vapors I say. Kirn is an interesting guy who knows a lot about the media world and has some inside sources but also seems a little too open the the CT world.
And it’s one thing to call Trump a Russian agent when he hadn’t been president for four years and another to get all hysterical when he is offering a repeat of his rather chaotic rather than directed initial go. Trying to cancel an election would indeed be the end of the Dems IMO. Better that they go out with a whimper rather than a bang. I do think the Kamala thing is going to go south and that they think that might happen as well or they wouldn’t be selling so hard. But for people who think “it’s all about the PR” it’s what they do.
It was not Kirn that made the remark but Taibbi, as I reaffirmed at the end the post.
I always wondered if Taibbi suffers from the same bias as yours truly and, apparently, Alexander Mercouris. We all spent our formative years in (or under shadow of) non democratic regimes–former USSR/early Russia, South Korea in 80s/90s, and Greece in 60s/70s) where all sides, including self claimed “pro-democrats” were all too eager to engage in anti-democratic skullduggery, justified because they are doing it for “the greater good,” with the real motives being a mixture of genuine sincerity and utter cynicism–hypocrisy is easy when both coexist.
I keep coming to suspicions that one side or the other (Dems more than Reps because so many of them actually seem to believe in their own righteousness, in “democracy ™,” and all that) will pull off something crazy, then I keep having to tell myself that there are too many old practices and traditions in US that’d have to be uprooted for stuff like that to work, but then, things have changed a lot last couple of decades, where US increasingly looks like South Korea–and that’s not a compliment…
I haven’t been able to see all of their podcasts but I think both of them have mentioned in passing various extreme measures including the jailing of Trump at the upcoming hearing.
So a president with approvals in the thirties and no close ties to the military is going to conduct a coup for the benefit of his veep whose coup negatives are roughly the same? This seems paranoid to me but that’s just me. The Dems are more than willing to pr their way to victory using any wild attack that may stick. Going any further than that doesn’t seem their style and Clooney may have to intervene.
Until Biden stepped down the MSM or at least parts of it seemed increasingly resigned to a Trump return–particularly after the assassination attempt. I don’t see the big Kamala party as changing much except in the fantasy world of committed Dems. Guess we shall see.
It seems like I’m definitely in the minority in seeing this election as inconsequential, at least in terms of policy. In which sense, it matters not at all who wins. Even on one of the few significant differences, abortion, it would take many years, longer than the next presidential term, for the Democrats to regain what has been lost. So it’s ironic that what is of consequence about this election, the lengths either side is feared to go to assure victory, is so extreme. Confirming to me that what is at stake is tribal dominance, not policy.
I’ve always been kind of partial to Project Blue Beam. But it seems like such a bizarre thing to do merely to decide which candidate gets to be the next puppet of the empire. That’s the sort of thing to do if you needed an excuse to establish martial law, not to decide a meaningless election.
The hope of Trump winning is that he will bring in a very new political team this time. He picked a VP that represents new ways of thinking rather than a tired POS like Pence who he picked to mollify the RINOs whose support he required. Trump made a mess of trying to stay alive politically and did fairly well in just surviving with his life–but his policies were mediocre at best and his personnel decisions were hopeless though, clearly, he needed the Blob to not kill him. If he wins this time he can put in place more pragmatists rather that Swamp rats he selected last time–remember, now he has Vance and Kennedy by his side to remind him.
The Democrats demonize anyone they oppose because they are a cult just like the old Communist Party was in Stalin’s time. I’ve known (before he was in politics) people who knew Trump rather well and he is not the narcissistic monster the media portrays–yes, he is “weird” but well-meaning.
Nice comment. I also don’t think much of Trump but I’ll bet he’s not stupid. He’ll just float as prez but this time, with strategic appointments like Kennedy and Vance, some nibbling around the edges of the Mafia state may occur. And, Trump seems to look up to Kennedy and trust him. So if Kennedy says “we should do this” Trump may follow his lead. This is all my hope anyway. Once again, it’s the lesser of two evils.
US political changes are slow. But Trump offers a theoretical opportunity to install populists (who care about the American people) in government offices and that would, in itself, move the US back to a Constitutional rule in spirit at least. The System is systemically corrupt and interfering a bit with the rule of bribery and cronyism may cause an avalanche of change as younger people enter the political game.
Especially since Kennedy is such a big supporter of Israel, eh?!
I don’t know how far back it goes, I’m not American, but it seems to me that’s how the DNC has installed the last few candidates at least, possibly always has, and that this is a fundamental difference between the DNC and RNC. In that the DNC has a unelected vanguard committee deciding behind the scenes who Democrats will get, so what we saw with Kamala being put in place is not actually new, whereas at the RNC someone like Trump is possible by virtue of the fact that votes and popularity and something like an election process put him where he is? I could be wrong…
Somewhat tangential synchronicity: Glenn Diesen just posted a youtube video featuring a presentation by Chas Freeman among others. Freeman’s analysis of Ukraine was concise and to the point. I watched the entire thing but the comments allow you to advance to any of the segments separately. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ksYzAqdmrI
Appreciate the post here that made me curious to watch this.
Thank you A.S. Diesen’s talk is among the best I have watched on the issue.
Thanks Socialist. Diesen is a contributor to the Duran and has many insights into (especially) European events. Looking at the cast of the link you shared are some serious heavyweights: Wilkerson, Sachs and Mearshheimer. Perhaps Jimi Hendrix composed the background music? Sorry, couldn’t resist.
Yes, I’m appreciating this as we speak. Thank you.
This is what these clever fellows have Continuity of Government for. They promise to have the Constitution re-activated as soon as feasible. : (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continuity_of_government
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_government_continuity_of_operations
Well, both Beyonce and GW Bush have one thing in common, neither has any talent whatsoever…
I enjoyed her role in the second Austin Powers film.
I appreciate the intention of your comment but, vocally, Beyonce has a spectacular talent which is woefully underserved by the crap music she sings and the crap music business she is (richly) a part of.
Bush, “born with a silver foot in his mouth” (Ann Richards) is a moron.
I dare you to try to do Beyonce’s concert routine.
Re: “An alternative scenario that Lambert likes is space aliens land and we have to pause everything to deal with the threat they represent. I have long wondered why John Podesta was so obsessed with them. With all of our wonderful visual fakery, it would not be hard to fabricate a greatly improved and more lasting War of the Worlds. Readers have noted in the last few years that the number of sighting of UFOs has increased.”
This is possible, but highly unlikely, no? I mean, really highly unlikely (this doesn’t mean it should be entirely discounted).
I do think there is a good chance of some form of political violence, no matter who wins, Anni di Piombi style. I think that, as in the past, this physical violence will be initiated by elements of the hard right. They don’t seem particularly organized, to me, thankfully.
Something I want to flag from a 50-50 Red Blue area of a very blue state — based on my obsessive reading (I am an environmental activist involved in local government) of local town Facebook pages, the local hard right is much more dominant here thus far. E.g., a discussion of whether a Town should adopt the Mass. Community Preservation Act (short answer: yes, it’s a great statute!) quickly veers off into a series of xenophobic rants and anti-Biden rhetoric, with a good sprinkling of just general anti-LGBTQ stuff, as well. This is true on almost any subject, nota bene.
What is happening, which I find both interesting and worrying, is that there is what I call a local hard left forming in reaction to the local hard right. The former are often younger, Gen Z and younger Millennials, with a few older people involved. They reproduce the negative qualities of the local hard right (they are punks, basically, both of these groups; they slander people, baselessly; they won’t do the work, largely boring, of showing up to our directly democratic Town Meetings and governing) in their effort to oppose them.
So, while I think these groups will both be active after November, I’m dubious about how effective they will be if they actually engage in violence. (Right-wing, I predict, would be violence against persons; left-wing would be various sabotage activities — I hope I’m wrong).
I do think Disunion is a real threat — I can see a scenario where enough states call a constitutional convention, after which point all bets are off. (We can easily imagine either Red or Blue states inserting poison pill provisions into any constitutional revision that make it nearly impossible for some states to agree to it).
*I should be clear that the example I gave was not exact, but rather, reproduced from my memory, and as such, to some degree an amalgam — I’d have to go back to the Comm. Preservation Act discussion on the Halifax, Mass. Facebook page to see what exact hard right material made its way there — I definitely recall the xenophobes coming out; the LGBTQ stuff perhaps not on that particular discussion, but it’s pretty common on various threads on unrelated matters.
I also see a lot schismogenesis on local Facebook, but that’s a subject for another day.
If there is any physical violence after the elections, it will be initiated by cops. Like it always is.
Then it will be used to crack down on everybody else.
I think you may not be accounting for FB algorithms. For all you know, your town is probably 90% lefties but recall that during the Occupy years FB collborated with DHS, FBI and law enforcement fusion groups to identify all left groups, including environmental, as “multi-issue extremist” and domestic terrorism and has since been algorithmically suppressing and dampening communications among these groups. This was long before “community standards” were invoked in the name of suppressing Trump, anti-vaxxers, etc.
I expect that any group, and anyone, which the algorithm determines to be in categories targetted for suppression are probably not getting the same reach as the hard right (which will be pro-Zionist, pro-law enforcement, pro-government, pro-military, nationalistic, etc). So just because those hard right groups seem louder or more active on FB doesn’t mean this is representative of the real world, outside of FB.
Town groups need to go low tech or else find ways to circumvent the FB algorithms.
I agree, Es s Ce Tera, one must account for the algorithm, which can be done to some extent if you read the comments chronologically. It is certainly the case that the noisy minority are not broadly representative of local public opinion.
There are some other factors allow one to discern local public opinion, namely that the towns are relatively small, and we have mostly Open Town Meetings, which are directly democratic. So I think you can in fact get a good sense of the cross section of the community factoring all these together.
With that said, I’d say that local opinion is probably left of center for the median US community, but right of center for Massachusetts.
In links today there is the story:
The inside story of the secret backchannel between the US and China – FT
I thought “diplomacy” should be able to occur out in the open.
Secret backchannels and ‘cloak and dagger’ summits remind me of reading about relations between countries that are already at war.
I couldn’t shake that thought, so I don’t know what the FT story was supposed to prove.
I have settled on the term ‘Bush Democrats’ to cover the current pro-war party that has adopted/been absorbed by the Neocon core of never-Trump republicans, but still retains the most terrorized and gaslit bubble of traditional democratic voters. If you look at the Iraq war supporters, you find them in this government.
Tangential to the main point of the post, but I find stuff like this fascinating and infuriating at the same time –
“When I first got into politics, I thought the Democrats were the party of the people…”
The Democrats haven’t been the party of the people since at least the Clintons and the DLC. The woman who made the quote looks like she may not have even been born in 1992, so the Democrats haven’t been anywhere close to this “party of the people” ideal for this woman’s entire life, and yet this belief persists. And not just in younger people. I was speaking to a member of the Blue Cloistered Cult who is pushing 80 recently, and when I expressed my reluctance to engage with the Democrat party, he told me that if I truly wanted to help labor and the working class, I should be supporting the Democrats because they were the party of the working class. This is an extremely well educated gentleman who pays close attention to politics, but clearly not close enough. I think I mentioned how the Democrat party did not really support labor as evidenced by Biden telling the railroad workers to get back to work, and left it at that – there is no convincing the Blue No Matter Who crowd.
The Democrat party can’t run on brand fumes forever can it? Yet somehow it has managed to do so for decades now.
My friend’s orthopedic surgeon told him that most doctors are a product of when they went to med school. It’s rare for a non-teaching doctor to substantially update their skills and techniques because there is no time. They are busy doing the surgeries they learned in med school. Want new procedures and techniques? Find a younger doctor.
I think there’s a similar concept with the 2 team uniparty. For most people, the Rs and Ds are whatever you learned in high school or told by a family member when you were even younger. Most have neither the time or interest to update their world view until reality punches them in the face. It seems to me that even then, like a domestic violence victim, many often think it’s their fault.
You have to go to specialist institutions to find orthopedists who are on top of new developments, like NYC’s Hospital for Special Surgery. HSS pioneered in using epidurals for hip replacements, for instance. I would take anyone at HSS over a new ortho.
Many of their doctors do research. The guy I see, who is a specialist in non-surgical interventions, has over a dozen peer-reviewed papers to his name. The doctor who did my hips specializes in malformed hips and robot-assisted surgery, which means they can make much smaller incisions. He also did extensive measuring based on a full-body X-rays; he modeled over 100 parts and picked one he still had to modify.
There are apparently a few guys at Stanford who practice at that level.
I understand they have a boatload of dry “powder” somewhere down below, ready to be shot off at any moment:)
Daily KOS had an article on that:
In the vaults where the dry powder is stored
From 2007 but still applicable today (and no doubt the future).
I guess one thing I’m finding baffling is how the public polls, assuming there are “real polls” that are closer to the reality, are being manipulated (since the implication from the superdelegate story seems to be that it’s not just systematic mistakes induced by prejudice, but a real conspiracy to keep the public in the dark while some people “know the truth.”)
The poll numbers do look odd, but we haven’t had a situation even analogous to this either since 1912 or 1892 (a former president running as a challenger), in addition to all the personal quirks, so the oddities are somewhat explainable. I just don’t see how all the pollsters could be conspiring to feed the pols and the public totally different numbers.
Weren’t the polls wrong in 2016? (Yes, I’m familiar with the narrative that Hillary won the popular vote, but I’m talking about the polls in the swing states being wrong.) Hillary’s campaign crowds were sparse. That was the clue that she wasn’t destined to win the election.
We know the tecgnical reaso s behond 2016 mistakes–mostly sampling and wrong estimates of likely turnout. Pollsters learned and errors were much smaller i 2020, and for 2022 midterms, they erred in the opposite direction somewhat.
I don’t disagree that the current polls feel eerily like 2016. Back then, at leadt, I could guess before election why ad how numbers might be wrong (although that involved a numbers mistake on my part to get there.) Now, I’m not sosure, though.
What I’m finding even more puzzling is that somehow, the insiders know the real numbers and know that public polls are wrong (and, implicitly, how and why they are wrong). I will accept that there is something odd with the public polls and I strongly suspect that there is something fishy with them with high probability. But I don’t see how they could have a better information than this, unless, possibly, they have illegal data (and, even if they do, they know how to make sense of that data, which I can’t imagine.)
You’re operating under the assumption that the MSM public poll data that they’re showing you is real, I would suggest given the DNC’s deep ties to the MSM, you don’t. I said the day that Harris was announced as taking over, that the “public polls” would show her growing closer to Trump, then after the coronation she’d over take him. The press will relentlessly echo what ever the talking points are and regardless of the actual vote come Nov. those polls will show she was ahead, and that she won, and that exit polls showing discrepancies will be glossed over and then blacked out, and any attempt to look at the vote totals will be denied because those companies need to protect their propriety tech. And well, we all KNOW Trump tried to steal the election last time, so when he challenges the results, well he’s just a crazy would be dictator .
“An alternative scenario that Lambert likes is space aliens land and we have to pause everything to deal with the threat they represent. I have long wondered why John Podesta was so obsessed with them. With all of our wonderful visual fakery, it would not be hard to fabricate a greatly improved and more lasting War of the Worlds. Readers have noted in the last few years that the number of sighting of UFOs has increased.”
That’s something that would affect the entire world. So more than people in the USA captivated by psuedo-events would have to be convinced.
So the “we” that would have to pause everything would need many of the bigger players in the world to go along with the show.
And I’ll add this: if the other countries in the world go along with the show…so much for narratives about the USA’s declining influence.
The entire world would have to admit to being the USA’s B!#@&’s.
I vote for swamp fumes. The democrats are the party of the military industrial complex, big finance, big tech, and others I can’t think of. How would some version of a coup be to the advantage of the oligarchs who run those industries? They already control the country without any substantial opposition. Recruitment for the military to impose US hegemony on the world would collapse even more than now. I don’t see it at all. The fine differences between the dominant US parties are irrelevant to them.
I recall the debt limit spectacle of a decade or two ago. Lots of heavy breathing in the media about imminent catastrophe. But in the end little actually happened. The debt limit was passed before anything very nasty occurred. Again why would the oligarchs who control the country want chaos? It made no sense and doesn’t now.
I believe that underlying all the angst is the fact that if Trump loses he will go to prison, and he knows it. The over-the-top lawfare process has made this election an all or nothing proposition for him. From the view of the other side, Trump has often stated quite clearly that he will dismantle the Deep State. Whether he would or could is not the issue. Many iron rice bowls are at stake and how far the current holders of same will go is an open question. (For the record, I don’t currently subscribe to a conspiracy idea for the assassination attempt, but the one inch from death has surely concentrated Trump’s mind).
If you assume the trial in NY was an utterly cynical and partisan event (I do) then why would they put him in jail after he had lost in November. Winning the election is the whole purpose. Putting him in jail before or after the election would be a disaster for the Dems. There will be other future elections.
If you are referring to the NYC business records case, most not TDS attorneys think Trump will win on an appeal. The judge’s failure to allow testimony on what election interference amounted to OR instruct the jury on the law looks like a slam-dunk winner for Trump on an appeal.
The tweet from the Former Democrat Campaign Worker currently has 1.3M views and the account handle is rollinginthedeepstate.
https://www.tiktok.com/@rollinginthedeepstate/video/7406853675416620331
FWIW, the tweet from the former democrat campaign worker currently has 1.3M views on TikTok and the account handle is rollinginthedeepstate.
https://www.tiktok.com/@rollinginthedeepstate/video/7406853675416620331
Sorry for the double post. I was trying to edit.
“…the weird terror that the Democrats have instilled in many loyalists, that Trump will impose an authoritarian regime (and maybe even engage in a bit of Pol Pot-ery), …”
I’ve actually seen this “weird terror” amongst my more liberal friends, and I can’t quite figure out where it comes from. In terms of what to expect from a second Trump presidency, I’d largely expect it to resemble the first Trump presidency. Lots of sound and fury, signifying nothing. He was fairly useless as a president the first time around, but he also did little that was actively destructive. The same cannot be said of Joe Biden, and I’m not at all confident that Kamala Harris would be any less destructive.
Isn’t it just as likely that, rather than preparing to coup a winning Trump out of a second term, the Democrat insiders embrace the thought of hobbling a second term Trump with bogus “investigations” like they did with first term Trump? And then letting all the biggest disasters they foresee coming in the near future hit during his return engagement? And that Harris, a dimwitted nobody with no base of support in the party, is being offered up as a sacrificial victim because they have to run somebody?
Then they can watch Trump “lose Ukraine” and get bogged down in a losing war with Iran and have the AI bubble burst and the stock market tank for a while. Maybe threaten to default on the national debt so cuts to Social Security and Medicare will happen on Trump’s watch. Make Trump and his party the goats for the big accumulation of bad stuff that has been building up over the last 15 years. Then come back in 2028 riding a white charger and promising to save us from Republican bad management. Yes, there’s some downside. People have to line up think tank and hedge fund and university jobs to tidy them over the interregnum, but the top level players have all had to do that before, so it’s not a dealbreaker.
This would be the reasoned and strategic approach our overlords should take, but they are as aware as I am of what Tom Stone posts just below us, and may justifiably fear how the “left” would react to a second Trump term. For instance, I don’t believe secession of the entire west coast and some of the northeast would be off the table.
I think the pseudo-left is all talk. They’ll put up new lawn signs and more rainbow flags and feel righteous. They’re comfortable enough that something like secession that would upset their apple cart is going to just be a topic for earnest conversations that lead nowhere.
If Trump loses, I could see his followers doing something more substantial–though just as dumb and counterproductive as the capitol invasion. But Trump has to be way more ineffectual as a campaigner than in either of his last two runs in order to blow the Republicans’ built-in Electoral College advantage.
While there are not many people I know with TDS who will still speak to me those that will are convinced that if Trump takes office he will become a dictator and impose Christian Nationalist rule instantly.
The made it crystal clear that stopping Trump at any cost is necessary to preserve “Our Democracy”.
And they do mean at any cost, including an assassination or the imposition of Martial Law.
Those are their words, “Our Democracy” and “At any cost”.
I am very concerned by this and believe that there is a very good chance that the Election will be cancelled or that Trump will be prevented from taking office if he does win.
The righteous fervor of these people and their lack of concern about the consequences is terrifying.
So who is going to do this election cancelling or marshal law declaring? Biden? Would even the MSM go along?
Just as a point of historical context, UFO “hysteria” (and sightings) reached their peak in the 1950s – including the famous Lights over Washington incidents (there was more than one) – and yet the Democrats, who controlled much of the machinery of government from top to bottom, did little to stop Eisenhower from becoming president.
If one were to suggest this occurred in the absence of any particular real or perceived existential threat to “American Democracy,” I would counter with one word: “Communists!”
Conspiracies are fun to entertain, I will admit, but the abject failure of the hapless Party to successfully damage Trump, much less ding his level of support, suggests to the clear-eyed and social media abstinent their abilities are rather more limited to kneecapping those who fall into their particular orbit. Bernie and RFK Jr. were squarely in that category. Trump, and a national election, are not.
In a more recent context, I am not sure what polls Yves is looking at, but a quick perusal of RCP polling ahows Harris at worst marginally behind Trump in NC and Nevada – and tied or leading (often within the MOE, of course) in the other “swing states.”
So, one has to ask, who has the greater need to run a false flag of election conspiracy up the pole – Democrats or Republicans?
Wow, that took a turn I wasn’t expecting. I do appreciate the “out-of-the-box” (or “out-of-this-world”) thinking.
I think that, if space aliens land, we have bigger fish to fry than figuring out whether Donald Trump or Kamala Harris becomes the next President. And who says these aliens represent a “threat”? They might not do any worse with regard to the planet and living things on it than we are, especially if they can manage to get a spacecraft from their planet to ours. (“I, for one, welcome our (X) overlords.”) I guess we’d want to ascertain if they are, in fact, a threat, preliminarily.
Go read “The Three-body Problem”. ;^)
Ha, I’ve heard of it. Now I’ll definitely take a look at it. Thanks!
And the second book, “The Dark Forest.” ;)
The trilogy is worth reading every word. It challenged every sci-fi idea I’d ever read before.
It can be a little slow in parts, but persevere. It will then hit you with a two by four between the eyes ;^) strongly recommended.
People aren’t blank slates that are swappable from one skill set to another and this includes operative level political actors and political leaders.
I think the lack of ability to flex from one role/office to another due to skill issues is the untold story of modern U.S. politics. To me it looks like regardless of political party, the players are just barely able to function in their role. And this isn’t workable in any era, let alone one of the edge of significant changes.
I suspect that Ambassador Freeman was simply warning his Chinese colleagues against military adventurism and continuing down the gradualist path. Taiwan has been broken-off from China for 130 years; there’s no rush. Taiwan will integrate with China under its own volition when the West collapses economically.
U.S. presidential elections have been a contested joke for a quarter century. The Dems have been sinking into totalitarianism ever since Bush v Gore. In 2016 I had to stare-down a Dem Central Committee operative in order for the ballot scanners in my Bernie-leaning precinct to be booted-up for voters on their way to work to cast their ballots.
However, nothing changed under four years of the obnoxious know-nothing from Queens other than the usual GOP tax cuts for the wealthy. As a coastal lumpen-PMC my effective rate went up with the cap on local tax deductibility. Is either party going to stop the genocide in Palestine, the only issue that should matter in this election? Not bloody likely.
Paranoia strikes deep; Into your life it will creep. I’m glad that I avoided even touching that toxic RFK Jr thread the other day. I can’t believe that I’m reading serious talk about alien invasions (real or fake) in what used to be the only materialist reality-based discussion group on the internet. Our Billionaire Overlords are laughing at our descent into madness…
You say “materialist reality-based” as if those were equivalents. I am thankful that there are others here who acknowledge the existence of not-so-material dimensions, however they may reveal themselves and whatever our interpretation of them.
Jacques Vallée, anyone?
I think the sign of a heterodox independent-thinking Left person or group is its willingness to give thought to some of these not-so-material dimensions and also material things with no current consesus-reality explanation.
Rigorous Intuition 2.0 is one such blog. Its legacy archive output still exists on line. One of its article categories is . . . ” The Military-Occult Complex, ritual abuse/mind control, and “High Weirdness” ” Some of the articles in that category are about UFO and UFO-adjacent things.
Some are more strictly earth-bound. Here is an article from that category, about John Perkins and his book Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and moving outward from that base. Here is the link.
https://rigint.blogspot.com/2006/08/confessions-of-economic-shapeshifter.html
I also heard Taibbi say that and it stopped me in my tracks (as I walked though Walmart).
My fear is that USG uses the OKC strategy ahead of the election to tar Republicans as terrorists in the minds of independents. This would also demoralize committed Rs. In the phrase of Phillip Zelikow in 1999, they need a “catalyzing event; one that creates a before and an after”, that would formalize one-party rule for a generation, preparing and unifying the Regime in advance of high intensity conflict with Russia, Iran and eventually China.
Assuming Trump does win, we will see the riots deployed immediately. We will see “people familiar with the matter” chattering about sources and Russian meddling. Kitchen sink.
LOL. Whenever I see the MSM quote “people familiar with the matter” my BS alarm goes off immediately.
Two people I know have seen UFO’s.
One a retired pilot who was flying from Seattle to SFO had two of them fly in formation with him for 15 Minutes at a distance of 1/4 mile.
The other was my Grandmother Fuller who saw one land and take off at a distance of a few hundred yards in the early 1960’s.
What they are is unknown, however there have been too many sightings by highly qualified observers ( Including workers at White Sands) for me to dismiss casually.
“…there have been too many sightings by highly qualified observers…”
There are some, like the well-known 2004 “Nimitz incident” with multiple observers involving multiple instruments over multiple days or the 11 near misses with UAP acknowledged by the Navy, that are, similarly, difficult to dismiss.
At this point, I’m not even interested in whether these sightings are of extraterrestrial origin—maybe they are, maybe they aren’t. My question is, with all these sightings, why are they so hard to explain? Why, at this point, with the ubiquity of mobile cameras and far more sophisticated equipment, is there no evidence that everyone agrees on, one way or the other? (Well, there is “evidence” that everyone agrees is fake, but I mean bonafide, good faith evidence.) I’m not suggesting there’s some sort of cover-up (and also not ruling it out)—it’s a genuine question.
I’ve come around to thinking Amendment XX might have been a mistake. Under the old calendar, Congressional and Presidential terms ended in March. The regular session of Congress ran Dec – Mar. With electors voting in Dec, that gave +/- three months to sort things out. I guess the idea was, with Congress mandating congressional elections in Nov since 1872, it didn’t make sense to wait to March (though until Amendment XVII of course legislatures determined when Senate elections were held).
Would electors still meet in Dec under these scenarios? In my state I don’t see any provision to appoint them without a popular vote having been certified, though the Gov could call a special session and get the law changed.
ISTM if even one state/DC appointed electors, that would meet the Amendment XII threshold to have HoR one vote per state, but it seems like only one candidate would have received votes, and thus be eligible.
I’m with Lambert on the “something weird is coming about aliens” thing. I’ve tried to write a simple overview of why below. I can add more links to sources etc, but tried to keep it tight
I’ve been loosely following the UAP (Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena, the rebrand of UFO) story for about a year and a half. The “field” (mostly “independent researchers”, a twitter hive, and various spook-aligned easter-egg offerers) is to put it mildly an epistemological cesspit. The story is covered often in main news media almost always as a one-off without context. Only NewsNation and The Hill seems to be pushing a serious broader narrative. Most coverage, analysis and “evidence” is garbage
There are however a number of anomalous data points that I still cannot find a non-extradinary explanation for:
Since 2017 there seems to have been a coordinated effort from within DoD towards “disclosure”.
It began in 2017 with the release of 3 (UAP) videos and accompanying articles in NYT etc
In 2023 a whistleblower (David Grusch) came forward and testified to congress, alleging an 80 year cover-up. Specifically he alleged that there are craft and bodies that have been recovered and are being held by private defence corporations. Anomalous data point 1. The whistleblower’s lawyer is Charles McCullough ex Inspector General of the Intelligence Community who seems to have quit his job to take on this case. Why would someone so credentialled and so much part of the establishment take this case? Grusch claims to be a spearhead, selflessly paving the way for other whistleblowera to come forward.
Concurrently there is a push for the “Schumer Rounds Amendment” which contains very specific language about UAPs that is suggestive of a battle between the Feds and some defence corporations over NHI (Non-Human Intelligentce) tech/remains. It passes without the eminent domain language.
“First, that amendment mandated that the Federal Government exercise eminent domain over any and all “recovered technologies of unknown origin and biological evidence of non-human intelligence” held by private persons or entities. This would have obligated commercial entities, including defense contractors, academic research entities, and private citizens to turn over to the government UAP-related material and information in their possession.”
https://www.insidegovernmentcontracts.com/2024/01/implications-of-the-unidentified-anomalous-phenomena-uap-amendment-in-the-2024-national-defense-authorization-act-ndaa/
Anomalous data point 2: why is Schumer expending political capital in this. . Why such specific language? Other sketchy actors like Matt Gaetz appear in this story often.
Grusch testified alongside two navy aviators who claim multiple direct sightings of UAPs and allege there is much video and other data.
These whistleblowera along with the purported head of AATIP Luis Elizondo continue to make specific claims. These are recently crystallized in Elizondo’s August ’24 book ‘Imminent’. It is also often mentioned that Elizondo was the “Torture Czar” at Gitmo although I cannot find a source for that.
The Pentagon repeatedly responds with versions of “we’ve found no evidence of extra-terrestrial life”. This appears to be careful language as the whistleblowers suggest the NHI may not be alien at all. A more useful answer would be “does DoD have evidence of NHI?”.
The story being sold:
Roswell was true, NHIs were recovered, there is a secret crash-retrieval and reverse-engineering program (which was spun out of The Manhattan Project). The tech/biologics are held by private companies. There are an increasing number of contemporary UAP sightings by navy and other aviators. The UAP often appear around nuclear sites (both here and in Russia). They are capable of activating/deactivating nukes. The UAP exhibit clearly non-human flight capabilities. The UAP often disappear into the ocean. There are also various “psi” aspects which I’m gonna skip entirely here. There is also suggestion that the NHI live among us, and/or made agreements with human leaders in the 1940s/50s.
The claim is that these heroic whistleblowers are alerting the nation and it’s leaders to an Imminent threat from these mysterious crafts/beings.
BP take:
Their is seemingly either a genuine or well crafted fake push for disclosure about UAPs. Both would seem extraordinary. It’s backed by at least some powerful actors. The “plucky whistleblowers” story is unbelievable to me, as I can’t see how any of this happens without DoD/spook approval.
I’m reminded of Nina Illingworth in the early days of QAnon being convinced that it was a dry run for something. This would fit that. Some critics noted Grusch’s claims were a little too perfect, as they basically ‘validated’ most every part of UFO lore and were thus enthusiastically lapped up. Like QAnon, there is an Easter Egg trail being laid, and like QAnon there is ample space for people to project on their own kooky beliefs.
The process has been one of gradual disclosure to allow time for us to process the ‘ontological shock’. This obviously also fits the psy-op interpretation.
To actually convince the masses more broadly we would need a revelation OR an incident. I’m struggling to see how that can be sold with just video (in our age of fakery and cynicism). Personally, I’d need the flying saucer to land in my yard, come in for a cup of tea and a chat, and I still might not believe it. I no longer believe anything that comes through a screen.
Another option would be the release of new physics/science or tech derived from the reverse-engineering process. New wunder-waffen, anti-gravity devices or materials perhaps. Again, hard to see how this can be done as part of a fake.
So currently it’s a mess. It vibes to me like an info hazard, perhaps a more virulent QAnon. I also cannot discount that there may actually be NHI here.
Will we see aliens on the news? More fuzzy photos?
One more note: that the claims made include “other nations especially Russia and China also having UAP reverse engineering programs” adds an additional wrinkle. If it’s a psy-op, is the expectation that R and C will play along? Or that they will be tarred as “denialists”?
A UAP/NHI revelation supported by USA’s enemies would really be shocking.
I enjoyed your post. I am in the ‘information hazard’ camp, but have an open mind. Agree about screens and the need to have the saucer land in my yard. I think it is a psy-op distraction.
The American electoral system is a creaky Rube Goldberg machine that has, by design, so many ways to ‘cheat’ built into it that it’s no wonder we will never tolerate international election observers.
Its nothing new that the uniparty is controlled by elites. What seems to have changed is that its getting pretty crowded in the billionaire class. Both domestically and internationally. There are only so many rentier cash funnels to go around. And most are now 2nd-nth generation who may have had no direct exposure, even as children, to the basics of the business they are nominally in. They have developed their own, often extremely warped, view of the world. And politics was an easy seeming game to get a leg up on whoever they thought their enemies were. It was highly responsive to just pumping in cash. Cash in, good results out. However, everyone got into the game and the prices at the casino just go up and up. And the results get less sure to them personally. The elite as a whole might benefit handsomely but not particular elites.
When we thought of billionaires we used to think of cartels. Railroad barons, oil barons of a few decades ago and tech barons of today. Though the members of the cartel are still in competition with each other they have enough of a common interest to want the same things. We are past the point now of the cartels just clashing. Now they are at each other’s throats. Today there are more and more competitors and what they want is often at cross purposes. So ‘countries’, are getting to be too small a playground. Except for the fact that currently they still have militaries attached to them. Though they are trying to break that by privatizing it.
What I think we are seeing today is a series of deep seated clashes between the billionaire level of the elites. If you look at the convention structure pointed out in this post, yes, as usual most of the regular attendees are drawn from local elites. Many many are getting squeezed now just like those below them. They are scared. Looking for someone or something that will ensure their continued ‘rightful’ place. And those in the very pricey sky boxes aren’t worried about what they think. They are eyeing each other. And I’m thinking this might be the year where they start to think that this American political charade isn’t worth the money they are putting into it.
And this is creating a period of significant confusion. They’ve got mob control down to a science. They’ve fleeced them for about all they can under the current political model. But someone is going to break out and change the rules and the victims of that won’t just be those on the floor below but some of them. And many have realized that they’ve screwed up. They’ve started to lose control of the ‘colonies’. Those well controlled vassals have their own billionaires and their own armies (which we mostly sold to them, yet another screw up) and they aren’t eating the dog food any more.
Its like the calm before the storm. And I don’t think there is a single unified idea of how that is going to work itself out. They chose poorly in the Business Plot. We might not be so lucky again.
But I think there is a growing idea in many corners of the elite HEPA UV sealed rooms that the current form of American ‘democracy’ charade is no longer useful for them. Not all. But many.
“…there have been too many sightings by highly qualified observers…”
There are some, like the well-known 2004 “Nimitz incident” with multiple observers involving multiple instruments over multiple days or the 11 near misses with UAP acknowledged by the Navy, that are, similarly, difficult to dismiss.
At this point, I’m not even interested in whether these sightings are of extraterrestrial origin—maybe they are, maybe they aren’t. My question is, with all these sightings, why are they so hard to explain? Why, at this point, with the ubiquity of mobile cameras and far more sophisticated equipment, is there no evidence that everyone agrees on, one way or the other? (Well, there is “evidence” that everyone agrees is fake, but I mean bonafide, good faith evidence.) I’m not suggesting there’s some sort of cover-up (and also not ruling it out)—it’s a genuine question.
The conventional answer is that there is evidence but it remains classified. It’s also claimed by whistleblowers that the UAPs are able to distort human perception and thus only be seen when they choose to be seen.
[I’m in no way endorsing these claims. Other more cynical answers are available]
Thanks! I figured one possible answer might be that the evidence is classified. And that can cut either way—the evidence points to terrestrial origin or, well, not. (And I guess the existence of the classified evidence is itself classified.)
As for UAPs distorting human perception and choosing when to be seen, well, okay, but in lots of these cases they were seen (or observed via instruments).
There is a definite bug in the commenting functionality.
I wrote and submitted the comment above, realized it was in the wrong place (which is due to some other unexpected behavior in the comment system)—it’s a reply to Tom Stone above—deleted the comment within the time limit (actually, well within the time limit as I noticed the problem immediately)—and I’m sure I did; I saw a confirmation message for the deletion on screen, reposted the comment in the right place, and, yet, here it is. (More or less the same thing happened when I was checking that comment behavior at the beginning of August.)
I dunno. What happens when a nation of 340 million people gets gaslighted and lied to about national policies for decades, since the early 90s in my thinking, when the USSR disintegrated. It prevents democracy. So now it feels like the USA doesn’t really exist. It’s a political-existential crisis. The constitution is only as valid as its people, and we are all wondering what sort of country we are. Those honorable words don’t mean much if all our representatives and leaders have gone rogue, become incompetent, been co-opted, or worse, corrupted. It hardly matters what stage of dementia the president suffers. I think the system is resilient because we are a federation and democracy still works on a local level. So this almost begs the question that if the nation is going through this crisis politically, how can the military avoid a similar crisis? How does the military define its objective?
“and maybe even engage in a bit of Pol Pot-ery”
Boy, that’s an image that’ll stick for a while.
Time for listen to the Dead Kennedys, seems apropos, all things considered.
Since Kamala is not doing it either, expect “aliens” to show up during the next televised debate where they will considerably liven up the atmosphere or/and use the super secret Havana syndrome microwave rifle to turn both candidates’ brains to mush.
No need for it as a more elementary solution exists. State legislatures can simply ignore the vote or not hold one and choose the electors themselves. Majority D or R legislatures could simply vote as they pleased. It would only take one to break ranks for the rest of the wingnut states to fallout.
I personally rate this scenario as “likely”.
> space aliens land and we have to pause everything to deal with the threat they represent.
To clarify, I don’t think our timeline includes the possibility of real space aliens landing. (It is amusing to speculate that benevolent aliens quarantined our solar system, and when they land, it’s to prevent us from destroying our planet with a nuclear war.) Podesta et al are of course capable of anything, as we saw with RussiaGate.
A serious alternative scenario is one I have actually written about (see from 2016, “Federalist 68, the Electoral College, and Faithless Electors”). Post RussiaGate, the Intelligence Community arrogated to itself the task of legitimizing the popular vote (less politely, delegitimizing a candidate unacceptable to them) with regard to “election interference.” Given the close ties between Democrats, the Intelligence Community, and the press, it’s certainly a plausible scenario that come Wednesday, November 6, a spate of stories from anonymous sources would reveal that either the vote or the voter roles in some swing states had been hacked, to Harris’s detriment. How to game things out from that point above my paygrade for now, but one thing the Democrats would need to do is make sure the matter never reached the Supreme Court (unlike 2000’s Bush v. Gore). So, broadly, this already introduces a “party before law” aspect. However, delegitimizing Trump’s win in the minds of Democrats alone would be a win, no matter how the game was played.
I have an odd question , is this superdelegate “TestDummy” in her TikTok video genuine, authentic?
As someone who worked with actors it appears rehearsed like a casting video. The content is nothing I couldn´t write down too. This is not intended provocativley. I don´t quesion the good intention behind it. But is she really a superdelegate with all the background knowledge (including the confidential behind-the-scene info which she of course wouldn´t reveal?) In this new world of social media is there any way to verify such a piece?
p.s. Which is why I don´t watch these sources. So I am really a stranger to this kind of media.
I believe in texts and footnotes which I can check and if necessary falsify.
Please read the post!
The video was sent by a DNC superdelegate. As we indicated, “The superdelegate said the speaker was indeed a convention participant.” In fact he had heard that from multiple people. And that video is an admission against his interest.
Moreover, the video was reposted on Twitter. Twitter had a community “readers added context” or phrasing along those lines, where readers dispute or qualify the veracity or completeness of a tweet. There is no such correction on this tweet. You can sure there would be one if it were a fabrication.
I don’t understand why Freeman would think that China would take the initiative and use force.
Taiwan, is closely, economically allied with China. I thiink China is its largest trading partner.
Many of the Taiwan factories are off-shored to China?
The USA, is clearly, in a state of deterioration. NATO has just been defeated in the Ukraine.
Most of the global community is turning against the West, because of its manifest imperialist actions.
Why would China marry the cow, when they can get the milk for free?
Freeman’s fears of a Constitutional crisis are well-founded, but IMO, Trumpist Republicans are far more likely to push it over the edge than Democrats.
The Democratic Party is a *centrist* party; the idea that “Democrats are going to cancel the November elections” is preposterous. The median Democratic politician is more concerned with finding money for their next campaign and providing “constituent services”, and would never support anything so drastic.
It’s far more likely that the elections will happen – with a bit more chaos than usual – on Election Day. I’m far more concerned with the Certification of the Electoral College votes by Congress (Jan 3, 2025?). It seems very likely that there will be a “serious” challenge to at least one State’s votes (where “serious” could mean any combination of “plausible” and “noisy”). At that point, it comes down to four options determined by two things: who “won” the election (as declared by US media?), and which Party controls the House.
If Trump AND Congressional Republicans get clear wins on Election Day, Democrats will squawk a lot but knuckle under to “keep the peace”. They will claim that Trump and the GOP will proceed to tear up the Constitution, and they may be right, but they won’t do anything about it.
If Trump is declared the winner in November, but Democrats somehow win the House, it could get sticky, but probably wouldn’t get to the level of violent crisis. If there are blatant cases of cheating in swing States run by the GOP, some Democrats may well try to challenge the results, but “centrist” Democrats would vote against any challenges. And if Congress deadlocks, Trump will easily win the “one-State one Vote” stage.
To me, the scary scenarios are those where Harris seems to win in November.
Trump Derangement Syndrome is a Real Thing, but it’s a trivial problem when compared with the Harris Derangement Syndrome we will see on the Right. In case you missed the DNC Convention, Harris is both a *woman* and a “Person Of Color”, attributes which disqualify her from the Presidency in the eyes of many voters. And where Gore, Kerry, and even HRC [eventually] accepted defeat, Trump – and his Mob – won’t.
If Republicans control the House, they would probably challenge a few Blue States. This could set up a confrontation between Trumpist and non-Trumpist Republicans (if there are any left); no idea how that would play out, except that I’d rather see them tear apart the GOP than the USA.
If Democrats control the House, they would certify Harris’ election, of course, but the Trumpist Right would raise hell, violently. Young lefties may imagine some glorious “struggle”, but the Trumpists have the guns, AND they know how to use them. Clever protest signs won’t stop a bullet; and most US police will side with the Trumpists.
Frankly, I don’t view any of these scenarios as “good”.