So, is the USA screwed?

When it's all done and dusted, I hope it's the beginning of the end for corporate capitalism as we know it. Allowing them to become that big and powerful through corruption that they literally think that they can control the world, is insane.
This is happening because of greed.

Whether it's now or later, life has to get a lot worse before it gets better. People will have to feel a lot more pain than they're feeling now before they do more than bitch and moan online.

We are about to become a cautionary tale other countries use to warn eachother not to go too hard into capitalism

I joined Lemmy today, and while reading the TOS I had a sigh of relief when I got to the end and the US was not on the list of countries it follows the laws of. Instead it's the three countries at the top of my wishlist of places I'd like to flee to to avoid being sent to a camp, even! Well, Finland has the same problem Canada has of having one of the worst neighbors in the world right now, but Germany and the Netherlands are great options. Rule 1 would have only weeks, maybe months, to live before Elon Musk ordered discrimination against minorities to be mandatory instead of prohibited if Lemmy was following the laws of the dying country I live in. Well, "laws". We don't really have laws anymore, it's all royal decrees now. Everybody is currently holding their breath on whether they've consolidated dictatorial power well enough to enforce them.

So, in the best case scenario, the US as we know it is done and, after a hard fall and hitting rock bottom, will emerge as a country that is less of a capitalist hellhole. Ideally, in the process, other countries will find more independence from the USA, be it trade wise or security wise.
The more realistic scenario is that everything will stay the same/similar and just get slightly worse all the time but every other country will still suck up to the USA and everything gets a little worse. Oh yeah and climate change will fuck everyone up the ass.
The worst case scenario, I would argue, is that this ends in the destruction of the world via nuclear war within less than an hour. This is what I am scared of the most.

In a sense it is done. That sense is being a beacon of progress. All presidents before Trump understood the relationship America had with the world as being a world power. While there always was a conservative voice in America, conservative presidents were always able to mask self interest under the flag of progress, bringing democracy, peace and free markets. Now ultraconservative fascist are no longer masking, Trump and Musk are literally not smart enough to understand. The USA played a very important role in the world order and the current administration is basically giving that up.
Trump and Musk, because they really aren't smart (i can't stress this enough, they lack the mental capacity), are not considering the value of that role, the services the US provides. They only think about the value of things and of money. More rockets, tarifs on goods, expenditure... And see these as things along which progress is measured.
While that does, to a small extent, captures progress. It forgets the foundations of progress, peace, education, financial security, social cohesion, to name a few. Sorry, i say forget... But really what i should be saying is dismantling. They are also clueless about the value of services and the service economy. Which is, or has become, another measure of progress.
Anyway the point is, the US can't maintain their position in the world order. They can't maintain a government that understands their responsibility in that order. They abandoned their classic role without providing the world with a new/better one.
The US has been degraded to a trade partner.

Yes. How much and for how long is the real questions, luckily I live in CA and if the country dissolves we'll just do everything ourselves. In fact, We'll be better off as we provide 60% of the US tax revenue, and we get noting close to that in return.

Screwed is always relative.
I'm hearing chat that immigrants from places like Turkey or India are going "oh yeah this is what it's like back home".
So it's possible it just goes full neoliberal (i.e. no consequences or regulations for the rich) and the division of wealth grows even further.
Provided he doesn't cause a war or some kind of other mass-death problem (chemical spills, reactor meltdown etc) it might just have a cost primarily in human suffering, as opposed to human life.

Just wanted to say: react now. Their actions will slowly get normalized and it will be a much harder fight once culture starts working against you

We live in a criminally stupid country but Musk is doing his best to show everyone that being a billionaire should be a crime.
Edit: the tweet is fake, btw
- It's scary how plausible this tweet sounds in this age. I had to frantically Google to make sure this wasn't a true tweet haha 😅
  There's usually stuff "unspoken" and it seems the folks in power are slowly removing that veil.. with minimal repercussions.

We been screwed for decades; all the minor plot threads, foreshadowing, and chekhov's implements are all just coalescing at the same time for one last grand finale.

Probably.

It's never over.
Even the worst dictatorship can collapse. They get internally couped until the dictator learns to purge anyone capable of challenging them, then human mortality fixes that dictator and the government collapses
It's not good though. The best time to fix it was ages ago before Reagan. The second best time is right now before the police state is firmly in place
- The second best time to fix this was 4 years ago, when the Capitol was attacked to try to overturn a democratic election. But the USA has a big problem: nothing was done. A criminal staged a coup and failed. And nothing was done. He was allowed to go free, run for president and now he is in charge. The USA already failed years ago and now is just reaping what it allowed fascism to sow. Because nothing was ever done about it.
  
  Yeah it's just bonkers.
  A criminal tried to seize power in a violent coup.
  Not only was nothing done but voters elected him to be fucking president because they were confused about Palestinians and concerned about the price of eggs.
- Getting rid of dictators typically takes decades once they've built up their power base. I doubt Trump has that kind of mileage in him, given how old he is. But the damage has been done now. Trump has proven that the famous "checks and balances" of the US system just don't work.
  As for the US's reputation in the world, it'll take a long time to recover (if at all). One Trump Presidency was a blip; an experiment. A second Trump Presidency is like America saying "fuck you" to the rest of the world, especially its allies like the UK and the EU. Americans will be hated everywhere else as much as Russians are hated now.
  It's only February of the first year of Trump's second term. Who knows what might happen in the next 4 years; but honestly, I think the US is done as a superpower and a reliable friend to the West. Every empire dies, and I don't think I've ever read in history books about an empire dying quietly in its sleep; it's always a turbulent process that historians can usually pinpoint to a specific precipitating event afterwards.
  
  That's how you get new checks and balances, once the dictator falls.
  But you're right the US is rapidly burning its power and alliances. That would take decades to repair, and they might never reach the same position again.
- The wound predates Reagan and goes back to the Civil War. Sherman had the chance to cauterize it, but he held back and let it fester, and here we are.
- Damn you, McCarthy! Your imaginary list of communists doomed us all!!

We're cooked fam. Can't wait for the reboot.

It's telling that nowhere in this thread there's mention of the US demolishing it's relationship with its most important ally, Europe.
The US is a lost cause, nationally and globally. It might save it's state, but repairing a (already wobbly) international reputation will take decades.
- Yeah destruction is done quickly, reputation and generally constructive policies (especially internationally) takes time.
  What the US/Trump-Administration is doing, is just dumb (even for themselves). Europe almost has to slowly(?) cut ties with them, with what they're currently doing. And I do think "cutting ties with the US" increasingly gets more popular for a reason... Let's just hope that the same fate won't come over europe and that the current success of right-wing parties in europe is temporary...
- There's a few points I maybe want to bring up on this, though.
  Through Trump's installation, many learned what USAID was for the first time. For all it does in the world, it was never tooting its own horn. Sure, its existence is a tradeoff we made to allow for the fact of having one of the strongest military presence. But I still don't think its existence and actions up until now should've been taken for granted.
  Plus: Other nations in Europe cannot currently claim to be beyond manipulation via far-right rhetoric and misinformation. Germany is currently dealing with those issues in its own elections, and the very identity of that country is rooted in acknowledging the evils of 1940. Vladimir Putin targeted the United States because it was their biggest singular obstacle to expansion, acknowledging that there's no single presidency to easily "corrupt" the European Union.
  I agree that much blame lies on the USA's population for so gullibly accepting such terrible campaign lies. I just don't think that kind of evil ignorance is uniquely American, and the rest of the world needs to stay vigilant, rather than assuming all threat will come externally.

No, I don't think so. Large portions of government like the CDC, USAID, FEMA and the IRS will take 20 years to rebuild, but the dialed in states like the West Coast will probably be largely fine. It's just such an unnecessary waste of time, resources, and human lives.
Apparently some of us don't remember our values unless they get their mouth curbstomped every 70 years and remember some serious pain and suffering. Then the majority of people start voting for people that weren't dropped as babies and we will go back to a democracy again. Fuckin idiots.
In the meantime, enjoy the unencumbered spread of diseases like measles and HIV, preventable economic meltdowns from disassembling shit like the Fed, SEC and IRS and infrastructure stagnation due to gutting tax infrastructure and the firing of educated and experienced public workers that keep out road, bridges and internet working to say nothing of shit like sewers, water, power, rail, aviation, etc.
And just think, all of this rebuilding could have been prevented with one single vote for a normal candidate. We could have had 20 years of relative progress under our belt instead. 😊
- 20 years of progress?
  12 years is optimistic. Every Republican has been a mistake going back to Nixon, but the US is a fundamentally conservative country, we want corruption in the highest halls of power, and our voters will keep coming back to it.
- I'm going to be a bit controversial but I think Harris getting elected wouldn't have solved people not being able to afford to rent let alone buy a house, it would've have solved the cost of living, the abhorrent state of health care, the laughably poor labor rights etc. Harris would've had a better impact on an international stage (for example not turning former allies against the US) but for America it would've a road down the significantly less steeper hill than what Trump brought, however downhill nonetheless. Americans are getting screwed regardless of who they vote for because the politicians work for the corporations not the American people.
  
  The fact that Trump was voted back in shows that fascism here was inevitable. If Hillary had won, if Kamala had won, their milquetoast support of the status quo would have allowed the far right to continue to fester until it eventually took over regardless. Unless you take a hard stand against authoritarianism, it WILL win out. And then eventually turn on itself and collapse, taking everyone else with it.

I hate to say it, but yes. Everything we've predicted from trump has come true thus far.
The insurrection was predicted
The migrant camps were predicted
The ice raids were predicted
Roe v Wade was predicted
~~Selling~~ Giving Ukraine to Russia was predicted
Banning DEI was predicted
The list goes on but more importantly these were all seen as hypothetical worst case scenarios. We should stop treating the next steps like they are hypothetical. America has fallen, and civil war is next.
Former presidents at least recognized they had the responsibility to take care of both the people who voted for them and the people who didn't. Trump only sees the people who voted for him and the people he needs to make an example of.
I hate to say it, but the DNC is weak and won't help us anymore. I supported Kamala like hell and believed that they could figure it out but they just don't and won't.
I'm not a violent person. I hate the thought that I'd ever be forced into a situation where I need to either learn how to fight or die (because right now I'm SOL). I never wanted to find myself rooting for assassins and feeling like the world would be better off of certain people were dead. I'd rather believe the world would be better off if certain people were alive.
But all I see in the future is a federal coup backed by sycophants in the Senate and supreme Court that then collides with the governors of blue states who won't bend the knee.
TL;Dr if we don't go full dictator, we are going to civil war, and we deserve it.
- Trump only sees the people who voted for him and the people he needs to make an example of
  Let's not pretend like Trump gives a shit about the people who voted for him.
  
  Very fair take.
  That said he's not a full on idiot. MAGAts are useful tools for him, so he is more likely to try and make them happy, in some way. Currently the way to make them happy is to punish the left. In our post 9/11 USA, rage is what flips seats.
  W Bush won his second term because we were blind with rage after the attacks, and John Kerry didn't run a counter rage campaign.
  Obama won because the financial crash enraged the left.
  Obama won his second term because Romney wasn't able to stir up the needed rage.
  Trump won because he was the embodiment of rage.
  Biden won by the rage we had for Trump in the summer of 2020.
  Trump won again by running a campaign of rage vs Kamala who ran a "campaign of joy".
  We are a country of 50 mini countries. All you need to do to win is generate enough rage to pit purple states against the states who won't vote for you. So long as this country stands as it is, this is just how it's going to be. Sadly any diplomatic fixes for this are pipe dreams now.
  The only way this will end is when the fire of rage consumes the whole system and burns it down. After that... I don't know.
- When has the DNC last helped us regular people? I abandoned that sclerotic. spineless, feckless, ineffectual organization over a decade ago.
- Former presidents at least recognized they had the responsibility to take care of both the people who voted for them and the people who didn’t.
  I wonder if Americans are going to rewrite history to rehabilitate Trump the same way they do their other former presidents.
  
  Should he allow for elections again he will be given the same reverence as Regan. I only found out about how much of a monster he was in Junior/ Senior year of highschool and I grew up in Lefty Godless Seattle.
  
  rewrite history
  History is so full of rewrites that historians aren't even in agreement on a lot of it.
- we are going to civil war
  We're going to finish the existing Civil War. We vaguely, slowly stopped the south from having slaves, they replaced them with undocumented migrants. We let them put up statues, fly their old flags. Name military bases after their traitorous generals.
  This has all been fucked up for over a century.
  
  I wouldn't call the last ~150 years a civil war at all. Civil wars are much worse than that.
  But your observation that the split was never fully healed is fully correct.
  
  "What do you think is gonna happen in a civil war? You think the army, marines, and coast guard are all gonna be on the same side? What do you think happens in civil war, that half this nation is clammoring for? It's police departments against military, military against government, people forming their own militias against the police force. It's the randomness of killing."
  Immortal Technique
- Whatever the Fed is now is going to be an existential threat to many people if it isn’t already. Governors will start picking sides I think. The Illinois governor made a pretty bold statement today.
  We have a surveillance state, though, and they control it and the narrative.
  People will need to get it together fast.
  
  I live in Chicago now and I'm proud of our city for resisting so hard.
  With the ICE raids, Trump's immigration thugs complained that Chicago is near impossible to work with because they are met with such fierce resistance. We've been prepped for how to deal with ICE, and Gov. Pritzker and Mayor Johnson have been helpful with that.
  The main complaint is that we all know our rights and ICE can't just bulldoze through our city. Guess we're the town of law and order 🤷
  Sorry NYC, your mayor is a chicken shit who would tattle on Anne Frank before the Nazis got to the door.
- What are some major relevant events that were predicted but haven't happened yet?
  
  Federal abortion ban
  Gay marriage ban
  Derecognizing trans people, oh wait that happened
  Reviving the war on drugs by forcing states to criminalize weed
  Ending the ACA
  Ending any and every environmental protection entity
  Ending the two term limit for the president
  Banning protests and strikes
  Criminalize being homeless, oh wait that happened
  From this (my sad, sad, crystal ball)
  Protests erupt, at first peaceful until live ammunition is used as a suppressant. From this radical groups will likely work with established gangs to create an insurgency. Governors will be forced to either comply with the federal government, or may choose to unite with other governors to defy the federal forces as they see the writing on the wall. It will be a legal battle at first, but then there will likely be an inciting event that will create an interstate crisis. This crisis will either divide state governments, force them under trump, or they will collapse altogether. The battle lines won't be drawn on state lines, but rather between rural and urban territories. It will be more ethereal much like what happened in Syria.
  From an international perspective, the new Bloc of resistance (Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea) will use this chance to advance their agendas. Russia will absolutely support the Trump government, while China will invade Taiwan easily, and then try to keep America slightly stable but still as weak as possible. North Korea and Iran will likely send aid to the other members but not engage directly.
  Canada and the EU will have likely close their borders long before this as our alliance deteriorated due to Trump's intense isolationism.
  If you thought Brexit was a shot in the foot, we just straight up pulled a pin on a grenade and put it in our pocket.

Honestly we were screwed long before now, but yes. Its going to be a slow decline into fascism until we collectively wise up. I do think there's a real possibility of that happening, but its going to take a lot of work.

My brother sent this to me the other day and I gave it a watch. It feels pretty unbiased (although I'm uneducated), and seems to have a more macro, zoomed-out view of America and just nations on the whole. I thought it was pretty interesting and it helped to put some things in perspective.

So long as there is people living in a place, having kids, and trying to improve their lives, the places will remain. The government may change, social structure's get overhauled, but the same fact that people are having kids and building a life means those places are unlikely to go away. The old republic is dead. We have supreme court justices taking bribes then passing judgments saying they can. We have the position of President where anyone in it can legally say "I was doing it for my country the laws don't apply." And get away with it. The United States of America as a Democratic Republic, is over. But there still exists a United States of America that has transitioned to a Democratic Empire/kingdom. So to the question; "Is the USA screwed?" The simple answer is No. It will continue on so lobg as the population does. Is the Democratic Republic of the United States screwed? Bitch be dead, screw the corpse if you like.

Although there's a lot of knee-jerk reaction in some circles, Trump issuing EOs that are illegal and unenforceable only go as far as all the other vitriol that slides it's way out of his mouth creases. Plenty of things he does are blocked by judges, including his demand that only him and his AG are allowed to interpret the law. It just doesn't work like that. Although the possibility of things being escalated and allowed through a compromised supreme Court still exists, it hasn't happened yet. I'm not giving into the mania while checks and balances still actually do exist.
Corporations dictating what people can do has been happening basically my whole life.
DOGE is another story. It's very bad, yeah, but I'm not sure how it affects me personally in my day-to-day.

Not yet, not necessarily. The further this goes, the closer they come to the point of no return.

Well, it depends on how you define the USA. You mean the Republic of the United States of America? Yeah, no, that's dead. It is currently dead. It died when the SCOTUS made the president functionally beyond criminal prosecution, and everyone has just kind of been playing weekend at Bernie's since then (though the Trump administration is dropping the pretense pretty quickly). Don't get me wrong, it's been dying for a long time, but that was the exact moment it was declared dead. No matter what happens, the republic as we knew it is dead and is not coming back. Nobody believes in the constitution anymore; among our leadership there are only either those who are in a hurry to destroy it, or those who are unwilling to defend it. I think a lot of the American populace haven't sincerely believed in the constitution as an effective charter for governance for a while, too. Imo, we're less than a year from the legislature being dissolved in some fashion of another, unless they just hang on like some ceremonial vestigial organ.
What we get to decide now is what comes next. That's what nobody's sure about. Are we going to have a middle-east style theocratic government? Italian fascism? Maybe the military defends the constitution from all enemies foreign and domestic and we re-form the republic? German fascism? Neofeudalism? Peaceful balkanization? Hot balkanization? COULD IT BE?! BY GOD, it's the ghost of Lenin with a steel chair! Or maybe we'll get something entirely new? It's frankly impossible to guess while we're living in it. I think cold balkanization is both the most likely and most optimistic scenario. IN THE MEANWHILE, yeah, you're still going to see all the window trimmings of the USA; the maps will still say USA, we'll at least nominally still have the things that make America America (like the constitution still sitting in its fancy protective case, as though the GOP didn't just wipe Trump's ass with it), it'll all look weirdly normal while they make the republic's corpse do a funny little jig.
- maybe we’ll get something entirely new?
  The French are on their fifth republic already. A new constitution with better guardrails and different voting system is possible. The USA has a very deeply ingrained idea of freedom and democracy and is unlikely to lose it completely. It might be a good idea to already start thinking about how that new constitution should look like.
  Balkanization or a civil war before that happens is certainly in the cards.
  Maybe the military
  Trump will try and purge all non loyalist officers from the military. That could lead to a fracturing of the military. California for example has big navy, air force, and marines bases, as well as military industry. The states have national guards already and whole units could defect from the federal military to the guard.
  If that leads to an internal cold war, balkanization, or a civil war remains to be seen. It will make the US far less able to project force internationally. Queue China taking Taiwan without much US intervention.
  
  Trump will try and purge all non loyalist officers from the military. That could lead to a fracturing of the military.
  We should ask what happens when there are a large amount of military trained men that are suddenly let loose and returned to the population, but I can't think of a single time that's happened........
  
  I think if there is a new Constitution, it would need to incorporate economic rights. People can't abandon work to strike or protest, which negates the voice of the poor and working man alike. The wealthy can afford to voice their politics, which is likely the biggest reason why Yarvin's Cabal succeeded. Ordinary people simply can't dedicate the time to research nor influence politics.
- ’s the ghost of Lenin with a steel chair! Or maybe we’ll get something entirely new? It’s frankly impossible to guess while we’re living in it. I think cold balkanization is both the most likely and most optimistic scenario. IN THE MEANWHILE, yeah, you’re still going to see all the window trimmings of the USA; the maps will still say USA, we’ll at least nominally still have the things that make America America (like the constitution still sitting in its fancy protective case, as though the GOP didn’t just wipe Trump’s ass with it), it’ll all look weirdly normal while they make the republic’s corpse do a funny little jig.
  to date, that 400,000,000 pew-pew stick and freedom rod are proving super effective against tyranny. Civil was is becoming more and more likely though.
  
  4 of the richest men in the world who own 7/10 of the most popular websites on the internet donated to and sat at The Presidents inauguration. They own the information pipeline and can literally control propaganda completely unchecked and unsupervised. Most of those gun toting freedom fighters use those platforms because it's all they know. Their family is on it, their business is on it, their news comes from it, they get their daily dopamine kicks from it.
  There isn't going to be any Civil War. It's just going to be a slow rotation into what Russia currently is now. Little by little by little, hardly noticable changes, over a long enough period of time (say 4 years or so), until one day they wake up and say "Well, it was better then but there's nothing we can do about it now." and go about their day.
  The next war is going to be a war of ideas and a war of messaging. We can't rely on online outreach and have to be proactive IRL spreading messages that it really is a class war. There's no better time than now, no more apparent point in history than today, it's just pulling those people away from the propaganda for them to realize it. Somehow, We The People, need to convince the Boiling Frogs.
  
  The problem is who holds them. The majority are the ones that voted for this crap.
- I mean, the American Constitution is dogshit. The people who wrote it didn't even mean half of it, and the other half became out of date about when globalisation took off. It's not surprising nobody wants to defend it, the U.S. Republic has been desperately, desperately overdue for a revision.
- I think cold balkanization is both the most likely and most optimistic scenario.
  I'm curious why you think it's most likely. Most optimistic, I agree.
  
  Okay, here we go
  The US is fucking YUGE. Historically speaking, it's very, very difficult to keep countries that span huge geographic areas together. There seems to be some fundamental limit of size per population that can be tolerated before your cultural and geographic differences start becoming significant enough to start forming separate identities. The US has like 14 such subregions, and each one has a little different idea of what "America" means to them. A strong single national identity is not the default case here, you've got to really work at it or have some big unifying cause, which we no longer have.
  We already have pre-fabricated governments in the form of state governments. State governments tend to be pretty strong, in the sense that they tend to have a whole lot of administrative capacity, much stronger imo than what I believe of European provincial governments. The whole original idea was that the states were mostly independent states joined together under a trade federation and its government. Of course, it hasn't been that for a long time, but that's the root that we grew up from.
  We have almost no history of state on state violence, and most Americans do share some sense of national identity. Maybe not a strong one anymore, but it's there. I think most people would be pretty shocked about the idea of going to war with another state.
  This isn't really an ideological separation, as much as the federal government is just, like, vanishing in a puff of smoke. There's a lot of states where they've depended on the federal government's administrative capacity to handle stuff, and that's just going away in a real haphazard, scattershot way. At some point, these states will ask themselves "if we're handling all this shit ourselves, what the hell are we sending the Fed tax dollars for?"
- Lol wut. It died a lot longer ago
  
  Okay, I'm not trying to be shitty with you, I'm actually interested. Why don't you make your case for when you think the US republic died?

Yes.
The amount of harm already done to your country by Trump and Musk is immeasurable, and will take a generation or more to recover from.
The amount of harm done to your standing in the world is equally bad. The world was skeptical after Trump's first term fucked over the rest of the world, but we were hopeful that maybe the US had learned their lesson?
Nope. They elected a fascist. They RE-elected a known fascist, felon, rapist, idiot-child, psychopath. Worse, they bolstered Musk to get into a seat of unauthorized and unimaginable power.
When Trump announced his idiotic tarrifs, Canada collectively said "that's it - we're divorcing." When he pulled back on the idea for 30 days, Canada said "don't care, still divorcing."
Trump is following the exact model of Hitler, and it's only a matter of time until he actually invades either Greenland or Canada if he's not stopped. The USA has to collapse into ruin and rebuild from scratch before anyone is going to trust them again.
- Yep. We will need Nuremberg trials to actually move on from this.
- A generation seems very generous. The only path back to US hegemony I see is Fascism: we've burned our bridges and I don't think the world will be willing to work with us for a long time. But I don't even think the current batch are interested in US hegemony.
  
  Military power and wealth have an irrisisatable pull. China can still make deals and do diplomacy. Even North Korea can cut deals with Russia. Russia and Iran work together. One nations pariah state is anothers opportunity.
  The rest of the world will hedge their bets, but if the US negotiators start talking sense again after the trump admin they will attend the meetings and make agreements hoping for the best. International law people live and breathe the hypocrisy of tyrants and democrats alike.
  The optimism of the 1990s is dead, but that was a lie even then. The US reputation as the "leader of the free world" is dead. It was a self appointed title anyway.
  The world will keep spinning and deals will still be made by non idiots.
  If the predictions in this thread of a hot civil war in the US prove true, then deals will be made with whatever comes out of that.
  I hope not, but I am not optimistic about the next few years/decades
- It's a good point and deeply concerning.
  It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if Trump decided to invade somewhere just because he can.
  Especially if his economic measures start making him look bad.
  
  Trump ordering an invasion of Canada and the military going along with it, will be his demonstration of full powers.
  He wants a grand victory parade.

In the short term, yes.
If trump remains in office after this term, absolutely yes.
If we get a different admin - not just another republicrat trump clone - they’re going to have to spend an inordinate amount of time fixing all of trump’s fuckups. One of which should be restricting any wannabe monarch’s ability to rule by decree in the US. So yeah, we’re fucked, and we’re gonna have to spend a lot of effort getting unfucked, digging ourselves out of an oligarchy hole, instead of moving forward from a continually advancing starting point.
E: allies are already turning away from us, politically and economically. They’ll form new alliances and relationships that the US doesn’t get to be a part of, or at least won’t get a leading position in. Same with things like soft power from international aid. China will step in, maybe the EU or even Russia. We lose the goodwill, stability, and any economic “ins” we could have achieved with that soft power. We’re fucked in lots of ways.
- During my lifetime, the view people have of the US has completely changed.
  It used to be "When I grow up, I want to move there." and "Oh, you went to the US on vacation? AWESOME".
  Now it's "Why the fuck would you go there, are you stupid?"
  
  Agreed on all counts.
- We lose the goodwill
  Gone. It's gone. I'm your neighbor. There's no more goodwill. It's been completely replaced with desire to see your hubris teach a collective lesson, and a process of internal reflection on how we can not end up like you.
  
  a process of internal reflection on how we can not end up like you.
  Better focus on that really hard, because the rise of far-right parties around the world shows a lot of people are heading in the same direction. Absolutely condemn us, but watch your own back yards as well.
  
  My country looked up to the US as a charismatic winner with a big ego and an anger problem, who turned full coked up psychopath now. I listened to the Fall of Civilizations-Podcast a lot and this feels like one. It's scary to watch and I feel sorry for all the good people living in this mess. But I agree, there is no sympathy left. Let the raging insanity humble the evil empire.
  
  Hope you effectively learn that lesson. I don’t blame any country for turning away from the US. Stupid people electing destructive narcissists and doing absolutely nothing to prevent it.
- Yeah no, this will be long term
  First trump term, him fucking over all allies is something the allies could forgive. Second time, not so much. Allies now know they can't rely on the US to be a trustworthy ally.
  Trump already destroyed all soft power, he wants to reduce military spending by 50% too, so hard power will be down the drain as well.
  Then he's destroying the economy, he increased highcorruption like there is no tomorrow, he is destroying education and he is destroying all oversight on companies
  He's working hard on destroying democratic institutions too so forget fair elections, as if the US ever had any.
  IMHO, the US will never recover from trump, and that is what it deserves. It always had the great chance to be truely great but it fucked itself around every corner trying to please the rich
  
  he wants to reduce military spending by 50% too, so hard power will be down the drain as well.
  You say this like it's a bad thing
  
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mentally_ill_monarchs
  Trump is the first very televised idiot for this list... Tho the people are even less sane for REelecting him
  
  It's some very good news if he's indeed dramatically downsizing the military. Gives Canada and Mexico a fighting chance! Will Canada be USA's next Vietnam experience?

It's to the point i believe myself the second coming. Rapture always perplexed me.

its been screwed since OBAMA was president, conservatives including poc cant get over the fact they had a half-AA as a president. ever since putin and the gop have been riding on racism and sexism as thier key election goals, and only recently anti-lgbtq+
- Or we just have rich people who played idiots with these clown narratives and culture wars, while they gutted us in a class war.
- If you think conservative anti-LGBT sentiment is a recent phenomenon I'm...almost impressed at the cultural blackhole-ing there, lmao.

None of this is good, and it's going to cause a lot of big problems across just about everything but, theoretically at least, none of it is unsalvageable.
Remember that elections are run by the states, not the federal government.
So unless you live in one of the most hardcore Trump-sucking red states, you likely will be able to vote in 2026 and 2028, your vote will probably be fairly counted, and you will be able to determine not just the makeup of Congress 2 years from now, but also the types of people that we send to represent our interests and fight back against Trump.
Of course, Trump is wasting no time grabbing power, but it still remains to be seen whether or not Congress and the Supreme Court will surrender their power enough for him to get away with it. As much as the massive cucked-out bitches in Congress and SCOTUS pretend they love Trump, they actually hate his guts and are just as hungry for their own power as he is for his.
Finally there is the possibility of a genuine constitutional crisis in which Trump rejects the concept of shared power by coequal branches of government, in which case the entire constitution is rendered null and void and the USA completely ceases to exist as a federal entity and the union breaks down.
This would probably lead to a civil war, in which case the side that wins is the one that has the best logistics and strategy. I'm confident that the blue states, especially in an alliance with Canada and Mexico, would have no problem beating the land-locked redneck morons in flyover country. All that would be required is to bring the fight to the Southern coastal areas. They'd be totally surrounded and blocked in from trade on every side.
- You're forgetting that the US military is what would be pointed at the blue states, not random rednecks. No way in hell Mexico or Canada will be fighting that, nor should they be expected to.
  
  You're forgetting that there are plenty of people, bases and equipment in blue territory. The neo-confederates will have no access to trade as they will very quickly be cut off from both the Pacific and Atlantic coasts, and you've already blown any chance at a alliance with neighboring countries. These dumb fuck Republicans in flyover country have already painted themselves into a corner and they don't even know it.
  Come what may. We will fight, and we have all the infrastructure, money and equipment to win against y'all fat ass redneck farm boys. We beat those dumb fucks once and we will beat them again. Make no mistake.
- My congressman with an infamous Christmas card ran unopposed in 2024.
  Looks like I'M running against him in 2026.
- Your confidence in blue states is misplaced. Canada and Mexico will not come to save them.
  
  Need I remind you how the last civil war went?
  The west and the north east will be ready to fight, and we have plenty of military bases, equipment, infrastructure, logistics, money and people to fight with. The neo-confederate rednecks will be cut off from trade in every direction, as we quickly take both coasts and form alliances with allied countries (not just Canada and Mexico, but also Europe, Japan, and South Korea, who will need to continue trading with coastal American states).
  All the 400 lb good ol' boy mall ninja rednecks in the world are not going to be able to face the reality of what will come to them if they fuck with the west coast. People in Buttfuck, Oklahoma will be eating dust off the ground in the dark by the time we are done with them. And this time there will be no forgiveness or reconstruction.
- And then we burn Atlanta again!
  
  We take the Pacific and Atlantic coasts first, blockade the gulf and then move inwards with our allies from all sides.
  
  Of course. Atlanta gets burned in every timeline.
- For what it's worth, my congress cretin is loving polishing trump's asshole and ceding away congressional oversight to the executive branch. At a town hall lady week, he said that the DOGE department was always DOGE, they just changed the acronym (wat?!) and it was always under the executive branch, not an independent federal agency.
  
  There is a grain of truth in all of that.
  It was essentially an IT department under the executive branch, that I don't think anybody had even been staffed at since September. Trump basically renamed it and gave it a new mission statement.
  They picked a department, and converted it into Doge. They did this essentially to bypass congressional approval, because the department was already there.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Digital_Service?wprov=sfla1

Intensionally, the USA is going to lose its status as a hyperpower. Europe is going to decouple from American defense policy to the point where I can see American military bases close in Europe. An anti-Chinese military alliance will function with or without the USA anchored by India and Japan, but I see that force yielding some territory to China in the near term. There will probably be an increase in the number of wars in general as regions go into conflict without an American threat to maintain borders. Nothing the USA does is likely going to fix this.
Domestically, the administration is the greatest threat to the republic since the Civil War. If Trump is able to be pushed out in the future, there is going to need to be a major re-evaluation of how the American federal government works. This is going to require constitutional changes and the removal of major powers that the President has collected as the federal government grew.
- The US Constitution had plenty of ways to control someone like Trump. Not the least of which is the absolutely clear barring from public office for life of anyone participating in an insurrection. It's just that the people in charge of enforcing these statutes lacked the courage to enforce those statutes. Legal statutes and so forth are useless if they aren't enforced.
- American here. Maybe I'm going through the five stages of grief and now I'm at acceptance.
  Everything in your first paragraph sounds accurate and maybe something that probably needed to happen. America as the World Police is/has been a problem. There were some positives, but a lot of negatives.
  The sooner America gets off the stage, the better. We don't deserve the recognition. We can't even feed our own people and yet wield tremendous influence internationally, and maybe it's a positive thing that it ends soon.
  
  My only concern is that I expect an increase in international conflict as the American security guarantee is gone. The only remaining countries capable of projecting power internationally can't do it on nearly the scale of the USA. I expect a lot of wars until new spheres of influence get established.
- This is going to require constitutional changes
  I think it's going to require a new constitution. The American constitution was pretty good for a first try at modern democracy, but it has weaknesses. Look to European constitutions for inspiration regarding balance of power, parliamentary systems, electoral systems, basic rights. A less powerful president and a voting system that doesn't lead to two parties might be prudent for example.
  
  Having term limits on politicians (including judges) would be key. At some point, an old person simply can't relate to the world that younger people grew up in. More importantly, they either become angry codgers (Republicans) or domesticated sheep (Geronocrats), which is innately an imbalance in political influence. An assertive person, in most situations, gets a bigger piece of the pie, be it political, fiscal, sexual, or some other thing.
- Orwell just got the year wrong.
  
  Trumpism isn't Orwellian, it doesn't need to be.
- China is focusing on itself, maybe that's what the US and Europe should do for a while.
  
  With Belt and Road, and all the colonialist projects China is doing in Africa, I would absolutely not say that "China is focusing on itself". Or, at least: Even if it's mainly focusing on itself, there is a very noteworthy imperial and colonial project going on.

In the short term: Yes. Unless the US military decides to remove a sitting president but that is extremely unlikely.
In the long term: Yes, but also no. Fascism is extremely inefficient and expensive and the US is destroying its own economy and pushing away all of its allies and former trade partners. Things will get very rough but it will not last forever. There will be a lot of rebuilding that needs to be done.
Unfortunately this has been a long time coming. The United States has never really been united and it was only a matter of time before another possible civil war loomed on the horizon.
- It is also with saying that America will be a different thing on the other end of this. No crumbling empire comes back the same.
- The US is less one country than the EU members are and we are a long way off of becoming one.
- You are being way too optimistic. A lot of people will needlessly die, not only from violence but also disease, starvation, suicide and natural disasters.
- Personally I think this resurgence is a highly specific cultural moment that is coming as religion dies off and the white population of America teeters toward minority status.
  Since the US birth rate began to decline (natural phenomenon that happens to all developed nations) its strong immigration has held it up. But that has had an accumulating demographic effect. White people lost their official hegemony a long time ago but now they are facing the prospect of losing their simple majority and it scares the living shit out of them. It’s not just because privilege sees equality as oppression. It’s also because they know that they have treated others incredibly badly, and deserve to be castigated should they lose power.
  That’s why this Trump admin is so ugly. It’s the death spasm of a dying culture. That’s why this Trump admin is hollow at the center: it’s backed by a group that has no future and can only harken back to the past. This is why this Trump admin is openly undemocratic: they no longer have the numbers to play the game.
  This too shall pass, but at great cost. The USA is the greatest political prize there has ever been and it won’t be let go of lightly.
- I would say it's been coming since BEFORE the civil war.
  People always take my words out of context when I say that life in general would have been better for everyone long term if the south won.
  People take that to mean that I'm pro-slavery. I'm not. If the south won, slavery would have died out naturally by the early 1900s (assuming confederate america lasted that long)
  But if the south had won, and been able to leave the union? I feel like they'd have made the worst possible choices for their country on a repeated basis. I feel like their country would have crumbled and disolved into multiple smaller countries. The united states would have continued expanding out west. Texas is probably the only former state that wouldn't have crumbled.
  The rest of the confederate states? They'd be struggling to survive, last in the world in education, terrible healthcare, basically a bunch of 3rd world countries. But the rest of the USA? SO MUCH HEALTHIER FOR IT!!! All these cancers trying to tear down OUR country today, wouldn't be part of our country. They can go fuck up the country of Alabama. Go nuts.
  The pure amount of butterfly effect policies that would be different is mind blowing.
  To me, the south winning isn't about slavery. It's about taking this large lump sum of the worst people in the country, and cutting them free like you cut away a tumor to get rid of cancer.
  
  This is complete hogwash speculation. You have no idea what would have happened to the North if the split had been permanent.
  
  On the one hand... First World War would've ended very differently.
  On the other... Maybe eugenics would already be discredited by the 20s with how it went in Dixie.
  
  If the south won, slavery would have died out naturally by the early 1900s (assuming confederate america lasted that long)
  Do you have access to some alternate timeline or something? Where can I get this secret information that you have?
  
  How exactly would slavery have died out “naturally” in a union made up entirely of slave states who’d just fought and won a war to defend it? I get your point about letting the south stand in its own so it could fall, but you are too casually sweeping aside the issue of slavery. “Yeah yeah - that would pass naturally - now let me tell you my MAIN point….”
  
  You say this but it's hardly just the south that voted for trump. As you mentioned, the butterfly effect could have changed things dramatically. Things still could have turned out worse for everyone.
  Though things are pretty crap now so I can definitely relate to your thought process.
  
  To be fair though, Texas seceded once already and within a year or two was begging to be taken back. They probably would have crumbled too.
  
  What if this is karma for invading and taking half of Mexico? There weren’t slavers or shittier-that-usual people in the region before that.
  
  You've convinced me. I hadn't thought if it quite that way.
  (The previous comment was unedited at the time this was written, just in case)
  
  In this timeline, nazis got the atom bomb and rule the world because no "United" States
- All these years, preppers may have been right. Having a well supplied fortress of your own can turn out to be very handy.
  
  It's still a shitty situation. Really what's a shitty situation with an extra 20 kg of coffee in your basement, but still a shitty situation? The prepper fortress is a very unrealistic thing to try to strive for anyhow for anyone living in a city, majority of people. It's the widespread doomsday mentality and the downward spiral of the conspiracy nutheads that got the USA where it is today anyhow... Good luck hanging on in your basement for 10 years. That's easily how long it can take if it goes full fascist. Even then, hard to compare, the implosion of a nuclear armed superpower has only happened once before in history (Soviet Union), and that shit ain't over yet either, Ukraine is a direct continuation of the process. So they're like 35-ish years in, where USA seems to be heading now. Abandoning NATO is the equivalent of the implosion of the Warsaw Pact.

The funny things is americans were like "We need guns to protect ourselves from tyranny." But of course, the ones with the guns are precisely the ones siding with tyrants.
- I mean, they wont do anything until the economy crashes and the leopards eat their face.
  The last time the economy crashed, the US got 40 years of progressvism.
  just waiting for the economy to crash 👀
  
  Power market's going to get real funky in over the next 6 months as utilities run out of runway on their renewable programs.
  
  They were still a democracy back then, now it's an oligarchy.
- 'Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempt to disarm the workers must be frustrated, by force if necessary'
  -Karl Marx
- Those pricks had one fucking job and they absolutely blew it. Boot lickers all of them, it makes me sick.
- Lots of Americans have guns. Not just conservatives.
  
  Oh yeah then explain this gestures broadly at everything
- Being a shitty person is multidisciplinary, apparently.

I heard there was a mentor coming to fix this soon....sorry, I apologize. I mean to say Meteor. Chances of landing up my own ass have increased once more. I probably won't feel it so I'm not too worried about it.
- Mom's gonna fix it all, soon. Mom's coming 'round to put it back the way it oughta be.
- as new data allows more accurate predictions the chance of impact will rise as the earth takes up more and more of the predicted orbit until it suddenly falls to zero.
  
  Are there chances of hitting after it hits us and we're all gone? I'm going to as my wife for an open marriage. You know, maybe have a little fun while we wait for total nuklier or meteorite annihilation. Or gas chambers. I'll be totally naked in the gas chamber!

Been screwed.
Chump and Elon just accelerated shit.
This was always gonna happen.

I'm really hoping that Churchill's quote about Americans doing the right thing is evergreen, because this first month (!!!!) of Trump has been A LOT.
I feel like we're really close to having tried every alternative by now, right?...right?
- Bullet box has yet to be opened. But I can hear the hinges creaking.

Unless you get good with a sniper rifle its going to stay screwed for ever. Or if you actually have the gall to try to annex one of your neighbours. Then we'll take care of your problem for you.
- I’d say he’s headed for his billionaire bunker but he likes golf too much to follow the scared dictator playbook.

Yes and and beyond screwed.

- "He who saves his country does not violate any law." -Donald Trump (reading a post-it note handed to him by Felon Musk, quoting Napoleon, or something)
- Shoot the dictator and prevent the war? But the dictator is merely the tip of the whole festering boil of social pus from which dictators emerge; shoot one, and there’ll be another one along in a minute. Shoot him too? Why not shoot everyone and invade Poland? In fifty years’, thirty years’, ten years’ time the world will be very nearly back on its old course. History always has a great weight of inertia.
  -Terry Pratchett (Lords and Ladies)
  Been thinking about this quote a lot lately. The fact that Trump is so popular shows that he’s just the symptom of a deeper, possibly terminal disease.
  
  The fact that Trump is so popular shows that he’s just the symptom of a deeper, possibly terminal disease.
  Capitalism
  
  Nobody is saying it would solve the problem but it might make me feel a little better
  
  This is the thing making me lean more toward leaving than trying to change things. Even if Trump were magically impeached today, and our election system were left as near-intact as it is, somebody just like him could be just as likely to be elected in the next cycle. And odds are he's going to pull off rigging the system to make sure that happens by then.
  I think that on a long term scale, to get at the root, something needs to be done about the media machine behind him. Culture eats policy for breakfast.
- He's old and doesn't have much time left. The really problematic people are all around him and they are many.
  
  Yeah he's like the very obvious and prominant pus-filled boil on a body riddled with disease. He isn't the cause of the disease, just one of the symptoms.
  
  And yet in all their past few decades none of them rallied the base like he did.
  Remove Trump and you remove most of the power.
  
  True hydra situation going on
- inb4 moderation
  
  Shitty time to be alive when it's no longer cool to shoot Nazis.
  
  Any media that silences it is in support of Trump.
  
  Who has a good recipe for cooking the rich
- Trump is just the convenient caricature of a puppet pushed forward to be the face and disorganise everything. When he dies he'll be replaced by someone else capable of filling that role. It wouldn't surprise me if the follow-up person is already known in their circles.
  Trump is old and messed up. The propaganda rocketing him up can just as easily shoot him down. He is here to do damage and to disrupt and corrupt the system. He's here to weed out the failsafes against fascism/monarchy so a new political model can take over.
  When he's done enough, someone else will step forward to rebuild and 'repair the damage' but only in such a way that the fascist/oligarchy gains more power and the majority of people lose more power.
- Not that I'm opposed to the idea on principle, but realistically that kind of long wolf adventurism would only make things worse.

There is saying things, there is not doing things, and there is doing things.
Trump could say: "What if there was one day where there was no laws and people could just do anything, like the purge..." and... oh, he did say that during his first term. And democracy still survived. Saying things just make people loose respect for America. It is why Obama got the Nobel peace prize. Cause he stopped saying the shit that Bush was saying.
What people should be worried about is actions and inactions. It takes competency to do things. The more fascist a thing Trump wants to do, the more competent people leave and the less likely it is to be done. The true problem is it takes no level of competency to not do a thing.
So Trump's end game is "Ask not what your country can do for you ... because it can no longer do that."
- Unfortunately he's following the playbook of people who do know how to do things and accomplish goals. And they were much better prepared this time than in 2016.
- I thought that Obama won the NPP because of Norwegian political stuff involving NATO.
  
  Well, yes, but it was a very weak case - but people were so sick of Bush that that was enough.

Yes, and we knew this would be the outcome the second he won the election. I'm staying in the U.S. because my life is worthless anyway and I'd prefer death in glorious revolution than survival, but anyone who values their life should have started their plans to leave in August 2024 when it became obvious he was going to sieze control.
- Wolverines!
- Until November 2024, there was actually a good chance for Trump's plans to be foiled. But yeah, after that the case's been quite clear. Those were the last presidential elections of USA. Or, at least the last ones were the votes matter.
  
  Pfft, this is almost hilariously naive. Unless you think Kamala Harris seriously had a chance of winning an 80%+ landslide victory, Trump's election was determined when our Supreme Court made a clearly partisan ruling declaring Trump was an untouchable king. At that moment, it became clear that any contested election would be resolved by the SC in Trump's favor, ala Bush v Gore in 2000.
  I'm as disappointed as anyone else that he won cleanly, but Trump was inevitable. He's been inevitable for decades. No country becomes fascist overnight, the American people have been voting towards this outcome since before I was born.

I wont give a knee jerk response to it. a country the size, economy, and history of USA doesn't get done for by one President. While Muskrump will cause plenty of institutional damage and suffering on American and global populace, USA will come out stronger and better nation at the end of this (whenever this ends). Case in point, Germany before WWII and Germany after WWII

Not even close to being done. Right now the biggest changes are a reduction in non law enforcement/immigration government staff and contracts being paid out. The biggest thing coming down the pipeline is Trump clearly wants to free himself of the courts and congress. But it's far too early to say he's won that. And even that wouldn't be the end of things. In the US the states have a lot of autonomy. They are actually the ones responsible for holding elections. So let's look at a worst case scenario, where he tries to say we shouldn't have elections.
The first thing that's going to happen is all the blue states are going to tell him to fuck off and hold them anyways. The second thing that's going to happen is some red states will also do so, although they'll likely be less coarse with the language. Then a few more red states will be pressured into having elections by massive protests of people angry they can't vote anymore. Then while Trump is having a fit because there's no real way for him to stop this process, we get to learn about a fun feature of the US Congress. There is no law requiring it to meet in D.C. Trump would likely try to claim whatever is left over is the real congress, but without having been elected the Constitution is clear that those states forfeit representation until they hold an election.
So we'd be left with a House that is majority anti-Trump, after all, he tried to make them irrelevant at best. In the Senate we'd likely be looking at something of an even split in 2026. There's probably 5-7ish red states that would hold elections anyways and combined with the blue states and senate democrats leaving DC they would be able to convene elsewhere with a majority to declare rules of the Senate without Trump's interference. The new Congress would likely swiftly vote to impeach Trump. The remnants of the old one would protest this but they don't have any legal power. Only the backing of Trump and propaganda power.
This leaves Vance with a choice. This would be by design because our democratic party leaders only appear to be stupid when convenient. Vance can throw his weight behind Trump and get impeached himself or he can order Trump removed from the White House thus acknowledging the primacy of Congress. If he chooses the first option then Congress simply repeats the process and the presidency goes to the next person in line, the speaker of the house. Yes, Congress can effectively vote one of it's own members into the White House at any time. This president then declares an emergency and orders the military to secure DC. The military loves process, and loves the Constitution. It is highly likely this order would be followed.
However all would not be well, it's not a fairy tale. It would likely be the start of an American Insurgency that would take decades to root out. It would certainly be the end of the US as the hegemonic world power. Our Aircraft Carriers would rust in port and our projection of soft and hard power over the world would wither. But we would still be here, just much diminished and never the same in our lifetimes. This is certainly scary but if we all do our part this is as close as we would come to losing our democracy. Far more insidious is the threat of slowly revoking the right to vote. They'd start by raising the age, then by requiring you to not have any debt of specific kinds, then by making harsh punishments for illegally voting, and other such things until voting is effectively restricted to land owners. Certain factions would like to get it to white christian male landowners but that's probably a decade or more down that line if at all.
Notes -
Why wouldn't he just send in the military?
2028 isn't enough time to purge and train enough people to make the military loyal to him. He would be mid project on that at best and the states could effectively counter him into a stand still with their national guard. This would make many people stay home, but the determined voters are likely to be anti-trump because that's the change incentive. Loyalists will feel like the elections don't matter.
What's stopping SCOTUS from declaring the elections invalid?
The states. SCOTUS is only relevant as long as they have reputation of being an impartial arbiter of Constitutional Law. That opinion is already in the trash heap. They could not make such a decision today, or after 4 more years unless they spend the next 4 years setting themselves as at least a mild opposition in a long game. But they haven't shown that kind of patience.
What happens in Trump surrounds himself with thousands of armed loyalists in DC?
We select a new capital and wish him the best of luck dealing with DC. There is no law requiring DC be the Capital. The Constitution doesn't even require the states to give up a district, it only provides the legal possibility. There's no need to engage in that kind of a conflict. Such a group would be arrested bit by bit by Maryland, Virginia, and Federal authorities until it could be resolved swiftly.
- The flaw with this scenario is that it assumes Trump would try to simply cancel the elections. Instead, he would be more likely to regulate them in a way that makes unseating him impossible. For example, federal regulations might be implemented that required states to use voting machines, voting machines that are produced by corrupted companies. He just straight up steals the election through rigged voting machines. Or they mess with registrations and voter purges to a level more than the amount that already got Trump elected this time. See the SAVE Act..
  Or alternatively, the election systems themselves will be unaffected. However, the candidates will be carefully managed. Any Democratic candidate that would present a significant threat to MAGA will be arrested on trumped-up charges. The courts will miraculously cease to give the Democratic candidate the same leeway they did to Trump when they "didn't want to interfere with the election." Or he'll manipulate the Democratic elites so much that they end up electing someone even more conservative. They end up running Ted Cruz or something insane like that.
  Remember, even the citizens of the Soviet Union got to have elections.
  
  He can certainly try, but he can't pass laws about elections without Congress, which brings the filibuster into play.
  Arresting the party leaders of the opposition also generally doesn't work if you do it more than once or the situation is already very politicized.
  At the end of the day it's going to require us to be in the streets no matter what he tries. Our state leaders need to see that they have support to stand up to Trump.
- You seem far more hopeful than me, and far more intelligent, so I am going to try and hold on to a sliver of hope.
  
  Man that read is some high grade level Hopium of the best quality dang if only the DNC would do half of this instead of rolling and die with a billionaire cock in the mouth.
  
  I'm probably not smarter than you, this is just in my field of study. And to throw a little water on it, it depends on people doing things. We can all sit on our couch and watch the ministry of newspeak broadcasts or we can be in the streets. Our leaders are humans and we can't expect them to act in a way that endangers themselves without visible support. But it actually takes a heck of a lot to kill a country. We aren't anywhere near that point yet. Get mad, get in the streets.
- I really only lurk on Lemmy, but I felt the need to comment. Thank you for writing this. I've been stressed out since the EO was announced. I felt like we were doomed, but this gives me some hope. Even if this doesn't happen, I feel better knowing there is still a way to possibly course correct.
  
  This is actually one of the more pessimistic courses. It's probable that Trump gets enough push back that his legacy consists of massively handicapping the civil service, screwing up the economy and our alliances, and then peacefully transferring power to a democratic party president.
  One of the other things we need to do is seriously organize to support a more left candidate in the 2028 primaries. Part of this shock and awe is meant to make us give up, not only resisting Trump but also in organizing within the Democratic party.
- Thank you for this. It's so easy to feel hopeless in the face of everything that's happening, which is exactly what they want.
  
  Yeah, there's still quite a few good paths here. I can't guarantee we do what's needed but I can show how if we demand it from our leaders and publicly support them it becomes really hard for Trump and friends to reach their goals.

It depends on if Barron Trump is like his father or not.
Because that is who Trump has chosen to lead once Trump dies.
- Source?
- You’re sure? I’ve had this hunch because, well, obviously, but I don’t know for sure.

As you failed to prevent fascism at the voting booth, you will have to learn how to stop it now. This is the situation the second amendment had been written for. After being abused to allow criminals and mentally retarded to get access to weapons they should never have, you can now put them to good use.

Nah it's gonna get looted and pillaged and generally go to shit but will be saved by the aheer economic power of being one of the few places left on earth with enough farmland to feed billions when the other breadbaskets start getting decimated by ecological collapse
- It is interesting that you assume that breadbasket will not also be decimated by climate change like the rest of the world. Is that some of that American exceptionalism I keep hearing about?
- Enough farmland? I suggest reading up on the Ogallala Aquifer. Also, where the best climate zones for agriculture will be 50 years from now.

Screwed, and unfortunately screwing around too

The silver lining here is that with now 8 years of abolishing civil/workers rights, technology and social development being suppressed and Americans falling so objectively behind in most measurable fields, hopefully Americans can get over their blatantly false sense of exceptionalism and become comfortable just being another part of the world.
- Exceptionalism and nationalism has more to do with the propaganda people are being fed, and less with the actual reality they are living. It will take more than a hard downturn in quality-of-life I think.
  
  Yeah. I think that Russians feel the same inside of their country, because they're been fed with propaganda.
- Yea. I'm sure they will be humbled like the people of North Korea, who think their supernatural leader invented hamburgers and the electric guitar.
  
  North Koreans don't think this. Everybody knows its bullshit. The point is not for people to believe in the bullshit, the point is normalizing the government to get away with obvious bullshit. And this pattern is not exclusive to North Korea at all.
- Nah there's still plenty of cognitive dissonance to go around
- technology (…) being suppressed
  What technology or technology development is being suppressed?
  The USA are still leading in most technological fields and have a dominant position.
  
  The US does not have a dominant position in:
  microchips.
  batteries.
  solar.
  material science.
  fusion.
  energy.
  computer science.
  automotive.
  displays.
  The list goes on.
  If you still think the USA is leading in tech, you are sorely misinformed about the state of the technological world(to be fair, it Is startling how rapidly the US has fallen out of grace in many of these technological fields).
  The US is either barely clinging to previous legacies of prowess in tech fields to match other countries or falling behind rapidly, and without innovative latitude, federal grants or funding for research, they're falling behind even further.
  the US does not have the technological edge it once did; scientists, officials from the department of defense, everybody in the know agrees and have been making public statements about how quickly the US is falling behind in critical scientific and technological fields.

It won’t end without armed conflict
Fascists don’t understand anything else

If we can't get enough people protesting and taking action, yes. The window is closing.
- The fuck is protesting going to do at this point, lets be real here. Why do you think a protest has any sway of the bulldozer that is happening in the US Legal system?
  Protesting is just not gonna accomplish much, a little bit more than that is needed I think.
  
  General strikes are the only answer.
  
  Such bull pucks! History shows 3% of population protests work.
  
  That just means your target changes. You're not protesting to change an unchangeable administration. Instead you're building consensus and creating a movement that can activate if certain lines are crossed.

We're on the way down. The Right in this country (well, really, everywhere, but it's more maniacal here) are growing more unhinged. The Dems keep pulling to the right as a result (since at least the 80s). The overtone window keeps shifting. We're absolutely fucked.
William F Buckley was a major source of inspiration for the Right for decades. I recently watched his debate with James Baldwin at Cambridge in 1965. He argued racist points about Black single moms, but he tried to sound compassionate and denounced racism. He hid his racism in plain sight but sounded educated. There's nothing like that now. "They're eating the dogs."
- Kamala Harris and Biden before her ran on the most liberal platform in history
  
  Bernie was more liberal, FDR ran and won 3 times on a more liberal platform.
  
  Most neoliberal
  
  X
  
  Genocide is a liberal position? Now you tell me?

I would say so. The only question is whether the good guys win a civil war. My money is on 'yes', since Yarvin's Cabal is hellbent on exiling all of the competent people from their society, along with being jackasses who have alienated many peoples. It will be a bloody struggle, but I think that Dogey America will ultimately receive the Old Yeller treatment. I only hope that every member of Yarvin's Cabal are executed - Elon, Thiel, ect.
Let's not make the mistakes of the 1st Civil War, 1st Business Plot, and 2nd World War, where many high ranking members were permitted to escape justice.
- Who will fight that civil war? The American population is overfed and over-entertained and way too docile for such things.

Going from decline to fall. To be fair it took Rome 200 years or so I'm sure the US will limp on for a while yet. But it won't ever be what it was again.
- The "limping on" has been the past 40 years already. Ever since Neoliberalism became the dominant economic ideology and fully embraced by both mayor parties.
  Capitalism declines into Fascism. The current administration is not the root cause of the US problems. It is a symptom that is accelerating the decline into Fascism. But the ground work was laid many years ago and defended ever since. We see a similar trend in many other countries that adopted the US Neoliberalism to various extends.

"screwed" seems a little mild to describe it

Unless there's a coup when the Supreme Court finds against Trump and he ignores them and Republicans keep Congress from holding him accountable the only way the Court will let them.

- somehow he pisses off the base enough
  Trump has to placate the billionaire class. If everybody is still making money and gaining power, they're unlikely to break with him.

More and more every day...