Trump Redux: The Death of Democracy, or Overblown Hyperbole?

[Auroras In Ice]

Well, I guess it's tariff war time.

Just got to stretch a bit and roll up my sleeves. Which one of you fucking yanks is up first? :p

[Trollheart]

Just to let you all know (not that you care) I've decided to start a journal chronicling the next four years under the Trump administration (assuming he doesn't launch the nukes before he's through), what happens to America, the world, and how he basically fucks everything up. It will be, I suppose, partially in the form of a diary - today Trump did this, his defence secretary did that, he declared war on the other etc - and partially a sort of record of what occurs and has occurred, from his bid for the second term to his election and beyond. Think of it as a modern-day Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (what?) or an ongoing news broadcast, or, hell, I don't know how I'm going to do it yet, but it may be interesting, especially as many of you have a vested interest in seeing how things turn out over the next 48 months.

Anyone who wishes to comment or contribute, or offer any assistance or on-the-ground knowledge, or correct anything I write which is misinformed or not properly fact-checked, can fuck off.  No seriously; happy for any help. Perhaps one day that journal will take its place among the great diaries of history, alongside Napoleon's War Diaries, , The Diary of Anne Frank, Churchill's account of World War II and The Diary of Adrian Mole.   

Or maybe it'll just be a good read, or gather dust.
I'll link it when it's up, once I've written something.

[Lucem Ferre]

I hope it's boring.

[Trollheart]

So do I, but I doubt we can bank on that. Look at his first week: we've already had 60-odd deaths. Not that that is directly attributable to him, but the way he's approached the accident shows you that whether it's a tsunami in Japan or a change of political leadership in Bolivia, he'll be there to blame the liberal media/trans agenda/add as needed, so unfortunately one thing I think Trump's presidency will not be is boring.

Of course, if you just mean that you hope the journal is going to be boring, then you're in luck, as all my journals are.

Finally, boring is another word for drilling, so make of that what you want. Bore, baby, bore!

I really hope I can record his not-at-all sad passing in the first few pages of the journal, but I'd have to believe in God for that to happen, so unlikely.

[GD]

CDC site scrubs HIV content following Trump DEI policies

This is so gross. Not even two weeks into his second term I think Trump is already a strong contender for the "worse than Reagan" award (that's saying something)

[degrassiknoll]

I think that bridge was crossed in his first term, no?

[Trollheart]

CDC site scrubs HIV content following Trump DEI policies

This is so gross. Not even two weeks into his second term I think Trump is already a strong contender for the "worse than Reagan" award (that's saying something)

This is just one example of how everything, or most things, America does affects the world at large. It's not just Americans who are impacted, but Trump either doesn't care about that or is well aware of it. The influence stretches out, and he casts a very long shadow. Could you see any pushback from the rest of the world, or are we all just too scared to even whisper a protest in his august presence?

[Trollheart]

INB4 Trump says "They should never have been in our country anyway"...


News Alert: 7 dead, including 1 on ground, after a medevac jet with a child patient and her mother crashes in Philadelphia, mayor says


Seven people are dead, including one in a car on the ground, after a twin-engine medevac jet carrying a child patient and her mother crashed in a neighborhood in northeast Philadelphia Friday night, Philadelphia's mayor said Saturday morning.

At least 19 were injured on the ground. The six people on the plane were Mexican nationals, Mexico's president said Saturday morning.

"I mourn the death of six Mexicans in the plane crash in Philadelphia, United States," Claudia Sheinbaum said. "The consular authorities are in permanent contact with the families; I have asked the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to support them in whatever way is required. My solidarity with their loved ones and friends."

[GD]

I think that bridge was crossed in his first term, no?

Maybe almost, but not quite imo. Trump's woeful response to the Covid pandemic certainly rivaled Reagan's non-handling of the AIDS crisis for instance, but I'm also taking into account the untold damage Reagan engendered internationally as well as domestically, which is still felt to this day.
On the other hand old Ron never mounted an insurrection trying to steal an election, so he does have that advantage, I'll say that

[Trollheart]

An interesting and disturbing article from the World Socialist Website. I found this claim particularly concerning:

The Democratic Party's capitulation is not an accident but a reflection of its role as a party of Wall Street and war. The continuity between Trump's first and second administrations—his efforts to invoke the Insurrection Act, suppress opposition and consolidate power in the executive branch—has been met not with alarm or resistance from the Democrats but with silence and complicity.

The clear inference being that far from attempting to stand up to Trump, the Democrats are going to quietly step aside and let him have his way, even possibly silently applauding his actions, while perhaps paying the barest lipservice to the preservation of some sort of democracy as America collapses into a fascist maelstrom.

Full article here: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2025/01/28/rlxj-j28.html

[Buck_Mulligan]

An interesting and disturbing article from the World Socialist Website. I found this claim particularly concerning:

The Democratic Party's capitulation is not an accident but a reflection of its role as a party of Wall Street and war. The continuity between Trump's first and second administrations—his efforts to invoke the Insurrection Act, suppress opposition and consolidate power in the executive branch—has been met not with alarm or resistance from the Democrats but with silence and complicity.

The clear inference being that far from attempting to stand up to Trump, the Democrats are going to quietly step aside and let him have his way, even possibly silently applauding his actions, while perhaps paying the barest lipservice to the preservation of some sort of democracy as America collapses into a fascist maelstrom.

Full article here: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2025/01/28/rlxj-j28.html

I don't buy it. Sure, the next two years are going to be difficult and unpleasant, and more for some than others, but the sky didn't fall during Trump 1, despite all the predictions of doom.
The US system of government with its many checks and balances is designed to slow down change. Much easier to effect change in a parliamentary system.
The WSWS are always good for a bit of overblown hyperbole, and I might say you're not exactly a slouch in that dept. yourself.
Fascist maelstrom?

[Trollheart]

Okay then: fascist well? Fascist apocalypse? What term suits you?

Yeah I know it's hyperbolic, but they make some good points. I'm not saying I believe everything they say or expect it to happen, but Trump 2.0 is going to be a WHOLE lot different to Trump 1.0 as I'm sure you know, and with both houses in his pocket now, and all his little minions in place it's going to be a lot harder to use the N-word to Trump. He doesn't like people to tell him NO, and I can't see too many who are going to stand up to him.

Hey, time will tell, and I'd love to be wrong, but things are sliding in a very dark and dangerous direction, and the guy hasn't even been in power for two weeks. Imagine what it's going to look like in 6 months!

[Lisnaholic]

In the wise words of Steve Winwood / Jim Capaldi / Chris Wood, "Who knows what tomorrow will bring." My guess, though, is that it'll be closer to Trollheart's maelstrom than Buck M's two "difficult and unpleasant" years.

I don't buy it. Sure, the next two years are going to be difficult and unpleasant, and more for some than others, but the sky didn't fall during Trump 1, despite all the predictions of doom.
The US system of government with its many checks and balances is designed to slow down change. Much easier to effect change in a parliamentary system.
The WSWS are always good for a bit of overblown hyperbole, and I might say you're not exactly a slouch in that dept. yourself.
Fascist maelstrom?

I think it's time to retire the phrase "checks and balances" when talking about US politics, because there have effectively been none, from the Senate, Mitch McConnell, the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland, Jack Smith, Aileen Cannon and of course the electorate: everyone has been complicit or outmanouvred and from what I see the only person to hold Trump accountable in the last 8 or so years has been E.Jean Carroll.
Here's Rachel Maddow sounding the alarm on the significance of Trump's purge of the FBI:-

The phrase she uses at one point is "permanent and irrevocable".

[Lexi Darling]

The fields of science and medicine are being censored because reality is too woke for the crybabies.

One of the first things the nazis did was destroy the world's first clinic that was studying and acknowledging transgender people and burn all its research. The nazis dismissed any scientific research they didn't agree with as "Jew science".

There was a question of whether Elon "Sieg Heil" Musk is a genuine practitioner of Naziism or just an edgy shithead, whether it's technically accurate to call the people in the cabinet and entourage of President Rapist nazis because they don't literally say "we're nazis", and I'm here to tell you that such distinctions are utterly meaningless; actions are what matters, and this regime's actions are Nazi to the core.

[Trollheart]

Unsurprisingly, I agree. I think it's time that people stopped saying "oh it won't be so bad" or "You're panicking" etc. Look around, people! One fucking week and the man has transformed the way America works and is governed! It amazes me that there are no memes of Trump as Big Brother, because that's exactly what's happening. Not only the Nazis (in reality) but Orwell's Party (in fiction) did this: remove any "unauthorised" words or references that don't sit with the Party policy. The next will be an attempt to have the OED (at least, any American editions) remove these words, and try to pretend they never existed. As Lexi says, actions speak far louder than words or intentions, and these actions are there for all to see. Some of you may want to hope that the next four years won't be a nightmare, and perhaps, if these "changes" don't directly affect you, they won't. But for those they do and will affect, the nightmare is only beginning.

I'm reminded of a quote (which may have been made up, or may have been from actual records, I don't know, but it's still appropriate) I heard in a drama about the Nazis agreeing on the Final Solution. One asked, "Do the Jews even believe in Hell?" And I think it was Heydrich or Goring who sneered "They do now: we create it for them on Earth."

Sure, you can call it hyperbolic (and remember how people didn't take Hitler seriously until he declared war on Poland) and play it down all you want, but it's not all that hard to see the Trump administration replace the word Jews with Transgender people. They clearly have an agenda to marginalise and if possible eliminate them altogether. They want the world to forget there was even such a thing as a third, fourth or more sex or gender, or that people could decide what gender they felt they were; they want a "Garden of Eden" fundamentalist Christian belief to prevail, where man is man and woman is woman and there's nothing else unless you'd like to visit our purpose-built torture cells. Buck and JWB and anyone else can call me alarmist or fear-mongering or anything else they wish: the fact is I would love to be wrong, but I know I'm not. What are the chances of Trump backing down on anything he's done, unless somehow it's deemed unconstitutional and he has to? And even then, he'll fight it. He's the most powerful man on the planet right now, and he has a grudge against a whole lot of people. He's not going to drop that grudge, and if people have to be imprisoned, be deported or even die to satisfy his lust for revenge, he's already made it very clear he's good with this.

It's not like there's anything can be done, I know that. But it should at least be ackowledged that this is where we are, this is the threat America faces, and while I'm sure some people will say it's easy for me to say all this, sitting safe at home in a little country that doesn't matter, that doesn't stop me feeling worried, terrified and not in the least positive for what the future holds.

In the end, a question: just exactly how much evidence do you need before you will be convinced this is not just a "blip" in American democracy, and that the whole history of the US, and possibly the world, is on a knife-edge, about to tip over into an abyss from which it may not escape?

And yes, I'm aware some of you will laugh at my flowery language. I'm a writer, that's what I do. Deal with it. It's going to be the very least of your problems.