I’m feeling so uneasy with everything I’ve been seeing. I keep thinking about what we will be this time next year, and if shit hits the fan, what is your plan? I’m queer and was politically active in 2020, so I would potentially be considered a political enemy.
The only blueprint I can think of is what you do in an active shooter situation; Flee, Hide, Fight.
I know there’s that romantic notion of “don’t be a coward, get out and protest”, but I remember the brutality of the 2020 protests firsthand, and even then I thought “thank god I’m going toe to toe with the CPD and not the CCP”. Next time is going to be different. The president now has authority to send drone strikes. Protests and riots don’t stand a chance agains missiles and live rounds.
Flee- I have an Uncle in Montreal who my family could potentially use as a way to at least temporarily escape the chaos. The hope I’d have is that Canada and other countries would accept American refugees, however that’s not a guarantee.
Hide- If borders are closed, lay low and move away from major cities if possible. If civil war breaks out, try to get away from the violence even if you think your side will win. Todays losers may be tomorrows victors.
Fight- If cellular data/ social media algorithms can keep track of you, and surveillance can make sure there’s no movement, this would be the last resort of desperation. I guess if possible try to either find a group for safety in numbers, or conversely go guerrilla as groups of resistance would make easy targets.
Sorry my mind is running and I’m getting scared.
you guys have cried about your guns for two hundred years in case of this exact situation
i think the gun people might be voting for trump
Never underestimate dem/liberal gun ownership. We are just quiet about it and don’t make it our entire personality.
I am still sure that the right has more. Like you might have 1 or 2. A lot of those nutjobs have 1 or 2 hundred.
What, are they going to aim 200 guns at once?
Arm their friends? Make boobie traps?
Actually, there’s this one Demolition Ranch video… lol
I can’t be the only one to roll my eyes at comments like this. Like in one respect I get it, we want to say we will fuck up the fascists. But on the flipside, what the fuck are you guys actually suggesting here?
Bear in mind per Propublica reporting that the right-wing extremist groups want to incite a race/Civil War. They hate the fact that there is such a stark contrast in violence between the left and right and it’s making them look TERRIBLE.
Bear in mind firearm manufacturers are actively trying to break into the leftist market to sell more guns. Pretty obvious.
Forgetting the evidence that guns for all intents don’t make you safer. We need to use our brains before bullets, lest we’ve all already lost.
Civilians with guns against an actual military would never work, it’s just some fantasy those on the far right have.
It doesn’t seem like you’ve read much about insurgencies and rebel groups. It doesn’t actually take much firepower to inject enough chaos into the system that you cause issues with traditional militaries. One person with a rifle could keep a FOB alert and wasting resources for a couple of hours in Afghanistan. IEDs placed by individuals or small groups caused absolute terror in Iraq.
These types of things are unlikely to “win” a war. But if you make it costly enough, the other side will decide it’s not worth fighting. The point is not to engage in head-on combat, that’s suicide.
Or hell, look to the tactics of some of the rebels in the Revolutionary War or the Civil War.
Yes, I understand how an occupied enemy force is hard to dislodge. I actually was in the USMC for 8 years and was stuck in 29 Palms with nothing to do it in the middle of the desert but operation Mojave Viper over and over as groups cycled through. War in the middle east was hard because of ROI and a lower tolerance for collateral damage. You remove those and it’s not even a question. Just drop bombs and roll tanks.
I’ve also seen how we can take over a country or city in a matter of nights. I’ve seen buildings leveled because there was a singular shooter in them. If you roll APCs down a street with an armed patrol squad there isn’t much you can do. Sure you could make IDEs, setup daisy chains and such, that could take out a patrol for sure. But that just gets a bigger, more aggressive response that will not be so easily pushed back.
And let’s be clear, the middle east has been at war for generations upon generations, it’s part of their life at this point. Bill who hunts deer sometimes is not a battle hardened fighter. Hell, people who sign up for war, get training, then ramped up for deployment still freeze up in combat.
Also, civil war tactics don’t work anymore, hell,guerilla tactics barley work. We have drones, night vision, thermal, air support, satellite imagery. If the US military did actually attack it’s people, and members of the service actual did comply, it would be an extermination not a war.
To your point about one person looking out for a FOB. First, I don’t know how one person is covering every possible line of attack and approach vector, but that side. One drone or fly by could destroy that entire rebel FOB in second with not a damn thing you could do, with no warning. What is your defense against fighter jets or a blackhawk? Shoot small arms at it?
Sure, if they’re willing to just destroy everything then it’s less of a solid tactic. Will the American military be so willing to just destroy the places they grew up in? Perhaps. Will they be willing to shoot the neighbor they grew up playing with? Perhaps. Will they be willing to level the school they have so many fond memories of? Perhaps. And if so, then yes, that’s game over.
The US military has historically been pretty terrible when it comes to insurgencies. But obviously they haven’t been fighting in their own backyard.
It’ll be interesting either way. I sure hope it doesn’t come to pass.
Hey. We got through the last trump presidency. If it happens, we’ll fight like hell to protect the ones who are most vulnerable, and we’ll figure it out. Personally I am still hopeful that it won’t happen. We all need to vote and not get complacent, but this panic is good, electorally speaking. One reason Clinton lost in 2016 was that a lot of people didnt take trump’s chances of winning seriously. Biden’s polling low right now because leftists are mad at him (and rightly so). But as the election starts to ratchet up more and more, we’ll hopefully see people fall in line on at least keeping Trump out of office.
I hate it, personally. I hate that we get government-induced anxiety every election year, just to get people to vote the way they should. All this attention on Trump and Project 2025 is meant to force the undecideds to choose where they stand. If you’ve already decided how you’ll be voting in November, take a break for your own mental health. Last election cycle I made myself crazy listening to political podcasts, checking 538, analysing polling data. I can’t do it this year, so I’m trying not to get too deep into it.
I will note that not everyone got through the last Trump presidency. Clinton would have had an actual response to Covid because she wouldn’t have disbanded the NSC unit that would have saved most of the 1.1 million Americans who died of Covid-19.
That’s absolutely true. But we can do more about the future than we can the past.
I’m lucky enough to have some security, so my plan is lay low and where I can play safehouse for the folks that need it, I’m not a fighter, but I have what I need and a little more, and I can use that to help whoever needs it.
I’ve got ideas for what the post crisis should look like, so probably try to find ways to network with the folks who are likely to be making that transition once this inevitably burns itself out.
Meantime, vote. Vote like your life depends on it because the odds are that you know someone who’s life does.
Time is our shield, and even if it’s only another four years, it’s four more years the windbag has to survive into his 80s to take another crack at it, by which time the crop of Dem governors are going to be making enough noise to be suitable replacements for Biden, and if he drops dead in that time, it is very likely the movement will be demoralized the same way JFK and RFK dying took the wind out of the Democrat’s sails.
The Redcaps are a cult, when the prophet of a cult dies without an already established right hand who can take over and reconsolidate the movement, the whole thing collapses under its own weight and the shock and grief of its members.
They aren’t gonna wake up to how wrong they’ve been, but they are gonna spiral hard and be unable to keep up the energy.
To be honest, I don’t think Trump has the attention span to do any more than hold a bunch of gloating rallies. Ironically his own immunity may end up working against his desire for revenge, as some justice department lawyers will push back until Trump gets distracted by a squirrel or a coloring book or something.
That being said, I kinda dream of moving to Canada. Fun fact: the median Canadian wealth per capita is higher than in the US, meaning it may have a better claim to “land of opportunity” if we’re talking about ordinary people instead of the richest few. Plus the people really do seem to be nicer. The mosquitoes though…Canadian mosquitoes are no joke.
It’s not trump, it’s the federalist society.
Same shit.
It’s really not. Either you don’t know what you’re talking about or you’re lying to yourself for comfort.
trump is an uncoordinated, LOUD kid with a slingshot and a pebble. The federalist society is an unceasing barrage of remotely guided cluster bombs launched from the shadows.
Keep saving until I can get a used car, so I can stop renting to drive Uber. After that, rapidly save up a buffer using the eliminated rental cost, and then get my second career started. Sales, I’m thinking. Lots of outside sales requires having one’s own car.
I did not need to change my plans when he was president a first time, why would I this time?
He was no less a fascist in 2016, but there were enough checks on his power that he mostly managed to simply be incompetent and chaotic. He bungled Covid response and gave free handouts to billionaires, sold who knows how many state secrets to foreign entities, but there are a lot of positions in government held by actually qualified and competent people who waylaid his whims. Conservatives have been carefully putting the pieces into place to prevent this from happening again, for instance reclassifying higher ranking government employees so that the president would be able to fire/dismiss them without cause. If the leader of the FBI attempts to investigate him again, they could just hire a new one who won’t. The supreme court being full of right wing extremists is another purposeful and deliberate step to undermine the checks and balances system. Conservatives want kings, and they weren’t prepared the last time Trump was in power. They will be able to do much more damage this time.
there were enough checks on his power that he mostly managed to simply be incompetent and chaotic
There were no real checks. He had way too many Republicans in Congress for there to be. Most of what protects America is gentleman’s agreements that we all assume a normal president wouldn’t defy.
If the leader of the FBI attempts to investigate him again, they could just hire a new one who won’t.
That is literally what happened last time. The house (where Republicans are a majority) wouldn’t pass a bill that makes firing the FBI director illegal so there’s no real difference.
There isn’t exactly a single candidate in the past ten years I would’ve called competent. In 2016, every last person running was out of touch, the only thing that enormously benefitted were the memes. Which is why I often mention my biggest qualm with Democrats, that in 2016 they wanted votes so badly they shunned third party voting as “throwing away your vote”. Uhm, no, throwing away your vote is what we’re doing right now. If the system wasn’t simply a monarchy with two choices and if people voted honestly, this is a situation we wouldn’t even be thinking about. I feel sorry for nobody.
Don’t underestimate the US military, as an ally. They are primarily younger, and the upper echelons are educated and all take their oath very seriously, to defend the Constitution, from enemies foreign and domestic. Of course there will be factions that will stick to Trump, like certain national guards, but that will fracture command and weaken our ability to react internationally. The military understand those implications, the potential literal end of the world. In the end, they push the button, not the president. The lower ranks have no desire to fight American civilians either, it’s antithetical to everything they are taught, and the age range is generally people in their 20’s and 30’s.I trust a Marine, a soldier, an airman, a seaman heheh, coast guard too, oh and the spacemen, way more than a cop, to do the right thing.
A vet.
Buy a gun or two. Nothing in this country has more rights than a gun.
Get up, send my kids to school and go to work.
“What did you learn at school?”
“That life begins at contemplation”
My kids both have autism and higher needs. I also have this population of clients. I can’t just uproot, honestly. Sit back and have a drink. Continue to teach the kids skills for stay-at-home careers and maintain a low profile.
I’d like to try to assuage your fears regarding a protest meeting missiles or drone strikes. Yes, the President can order drone strikes with impunity. It’s been that way since the first use of drones, early as the Obama era (maybe earlier, but I was a bit young then).
However, this does not apply to US soil. One of the benefits of state sovereignty is that federal armed forces can’t operate on US soil. National guard gets involved, at the governor’s request, but they don’t have missiles or drones. Police are barbaric, but they also don’t have missiles or drones.
So I don’t think we’d see much of an escalation in terms of weapons of violence with regards to protests when compared to 2020.
If he declares it an official act, then it’s not illegal. Drone strikes are pretty official.
SCOTUS fucked up super-sized
He can order it all he wants, but that doesn’t mean any branch of the military has to actually carry out an obviously illegal order. All it means is that he theoretically “can’t” get prosecuted for trying.
A huge portion of the military supports him.
And a huge proportion doesn’t.
Dont underestimate how many people join the military at 18 for financial/career reasons and often end up living overseas and meeting people from different backgrounds. It’s not as conservative as people might imagine.
I know that many do not, but I have no idea what the actual proportions would be. Polls are iffy.
Soldiers swear an oath to the Constitution to not commit illegal orders, regardless of who orders them.
The issue is that the president cant issue illegal orders anymore. Since hes the commander in chief of the military, his orders are an “official act,” i.e constitutional.
The supreme court has said that the president can order military executions of anyone at all and the military can no longer legally refuse. The above is constitutional, because the people who decide what is constitutional said it is.
SCOTUS still decides what is or isn’t an official act.
Haven’t been following the news, have we? What you said was mostly true a week ago. Now, NO ONE has legal protection under U.S. law against crime committed by an American president.
While this may be true, and a drone strike may be ordered on US soil, the President will not be the one controlling the drone, not directly in command of that person. The UCMJ supercedes in the case.
However, this does not apply to US soil. One of the benefits of state sovereignty is that federal armed forces can’t operate on US soil
From the Project 2025 wiki page:
In November 2023, The Washington Post reported that deploying the military for domestic law enforcement under the Insurrection Act of 1807 would be an “immediate priority” upon a second Trump inauguration in 2025. That aspect of the plan was being led by Jeffrey Clark, a contributor to the project and a former official in the Trump Department of Justice (DOJ). Clark is a senior fellow at the Center for Renewing America, a Project 2025 partner. The plan reportedly includes directing the DOJ to pursue those considered by Trump as disloyal or a political adversary
I was unaware of “Project 2025”, interesting read! While that does contain multiple concerning ideas, this is far from a reliable manifesto. Additionally, ties have been drawn to the Trump campaign, but these are loose ties and appear primarily to be op-eds. Trump has also disavowed ties to this “publication”. Lastly, that “Washington Post report” is another one of those vague articles featuring “according to sources familiar”.
Why is this fucker still alive?
Clearly “the system” isn’t capable of handling the threat of right-wing extremism and something needs to be done, but anybody murking Trump would probably make things worse, not better. He’d become a conservative martyr, and they could point to his death and say “see, we told you they’re violent” and use it to deepen hatred and oppression. This is what happened after the failed assassination attempt on Robert Fico
Whether you’re left, right, or center, focus on becoming ungovernable.
If you build up your local community and supporting institutions, and commit to ignoring unjust laws, you can greatly minimize the degree to which anything at the federal level impacts you.
This involves a lot of self sufficiency and privacy efforts that many are resistent to because of the loss of convenience, but it is well worth it.
Stay and vote. The way I see it, Canada is fucked if PP wins anyways, and will be hurt by Trump regardless. Europe is fucked if the alt right wins in France and hobbles Germany in the next couple elections. Nigel Farage is going to parasitically eat the conservatives from the inside out in the UK. Trump will pull put of NATO, which means war on Europe’s doorstep and probably all of south east Asia if China decides they don’t mind war.
Running isn’t going to work. Voting and protesting and political action is what will keep us all at peace and ever vigilant against populism and later, fascism. All hope isn’t lost. We still can undo the damage and categorically reject hate and corruption that is threatening democracies worldwide (and already dooming authoritarian countries with massive population gaps and economic damage)
You escape BEFORE the regime change. You do not wait to escape.
It was evident that this was the path the US chose in 2008 election vitriol and then 2012 with the tea party. Then in 2016 Trump, it was as blatant as can be. You’ve had 8 years to plan and leave. You now have 6 months.
Make sure you have a passport. You should have been trying to obtain secondary citizenship. Even with all the money and education, you are only allowed to stay in a foreign country on a residency visa. Americans call theirs a green card for example. It is tied to your passport. When your passport expires, OR IS CANCELLED, then all the visas tied to it are also affected. In some places you can stay as you transfer your visa to your new passport. Some places you cannot, you must exit and re-enter. If your passport is invalid, you can only exit back to the USA if you are only American. The cancelled part is the scary part because the USA already does this. If you don’t pay your taxes, or child support or if you have a warrant or even probable cause against you the US will cancel your passport. It’s the easiest way to force Americans back home for prosecution.
Your #1 goal should be starting to obtain citizenship elsewhere. If you have grandparents from Europe, see if you can get it. You have relatives in Canada, mayve you can get it. If you can’t, then start looking to buy citizenship or residency with a path to citizenship. This is 6 figures and can be instant like Vanuatu or take years like most of Europe. But again, better to start now.
As the Chinese routinely say, the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time, is now.
The US is vast and it’s unlikely to devolve into anarchy. It may get very violent and bloody or it may become more like a governmental issue where you just get locked up if you’re bad. In that case storing some of your stuff in a storage area isn’t too risky. If it goes into anarchy, then it’ll be lost. Otherwise just keep paying and avoid.
I believe we’re looking right at 1930’s Germany. The parallels are uncanny. Those who survived, left. Those that waited until they were being rounded up to leave, mostly did not make it. And they lost everything they had and their families ever had.
I completed my move out 4 years ago now. I can now eat popcorn and watch the US implode from the other side of the world. I will lose some money, some possessions, and unimportant things. But my keepsakes and most of my assets are now free of the US.
Most Americans are too poor to leave. Those who have the money aren’t likely to care enough.
While I know most Americans feel that way it isn’t true.
Migrants, refugees, immigrants… These words apply to white Americans as much as they do to brown central Americans or darker Africans. When you’re wealthy you become an expat.
A expat can pack up their stuff, fly somewhere else, get residency and citizenship based on investment, and that’s it. Very easy in the 2010’s.
If you don’t have the money for it, you can still go but you’re going to be limited where you can go fully legally. You may have to illegally work to get to a “desirable” location.
But most people who are in the USA came because of relatives that left everything behind except 1 trunk/suitcase and went for it. It is not easy. But it is possible.
To say you just can’t because it’s expensive is the lazy way out. You can’t do it comfortably and easily if you’re poor. But you can walk across the Mexican border, 2000 miles walk, just like others do in reverse. You just choose not to.
For Americans and Canadians on a budget, southeast Asia is a great place. Easy cheap visas and lots of countries to do border runs if you need. You can cheaply buy residency in many of them.
Keep my head down and power through the next 4 years same as last time.
This is VERY MUCH not last time. There’s intent this time, you really need to tune in.
