34% of likely voters

[Catseye3]

@taiwan_girl said in 34% of likely voters:

I do not think there will be a civil war.

TG, for most of my life I believed as you do. From Nov 9, 2016 forward, I have concluded, however reluctantly, that anything can happen, anything at all. And none of it would be a surprise.

What little capacity for shock and surprise that was left in me after 9/11 got used up in November of 2016. Increasingly I am feeling like the Little Prince, sitting on my remote planet and observing events.

Anything can happen now.

[Jolly]

@Catseye3 said in 34% of likely voters:

@taiwan_girl said in 34% of likely voters:

I do not think there will be a civil war.

TG, for most of my life I believed as you do. From Nov 9, 2016 forward, I have concluded, however reluctantly, that anything can happen, anything at all. And none of it would be a surprise.

What little capacity for shock and surprise that was left in me after 9/11 got used up in November of 2016. Increasingly I am feeling like the Little Prince, sitting on my remote planet and observing events.

Anything can happen now.

Butterfly effect? Hand of God? Kismet?

Control is an illusion. Man does not have control, except in the individual and then only those things he actually does have control over. Entropy is always at work...Man always engages in the Sisyphian effort of building stable societies and empires, but forgets that the hill and the boulder reside in an imperfect Hades. An imperfect being tries to create the perfect world, and we wonder why it always comes apart...Silly us...

[Aqua Letifer]

@Jolly said in 34% of likely voters:

@Catseye3 said in 34% of likely voters:

@taiwan_girl said in 34% of likely voters:

I do not think there will be a civil war.

TG, for most of my life I believed as you do. From Nov 9, 2016 forward, I have concluded, however reluctantly, that anything can happen, anything at all. And none of it would be a surprise.

What little capacity for shock and surprise that was left in me after 9/11 got used up in November of 2016. Increasingly I am feeling like the Little Prince, sitting on my remote planet and observing events.

Anything can happen now.

Butterfly effect? Hand of God? Kismet?

Control is an illusion. Man does not have control, except in the individual and then only those things he actually does have control over. Entropy is always at work...Man always engages in the Sisyphian effort of building stable societies and empires, but forgets that the hill and the boulder reside in an imperfect Hades. An imperfect being tries to create the perfect world, and we wonder why it always comes apart...Silly us...

We keep getting better at it, though.

[Catseye3]

@Jolly said in 34% of likely voters:

Sisyphian effort of building stable societies . . .

Sisyphian or not, illusory or not, man largely operates within the society he has familiarity with and derives comfort in. It gets uncomfortable when that is ripped away.

[Jolly]

@Catseye3 said in 34% of likely voters:

@Jolly said in 34% of likely voters:

Sisyphian effort of building stable societies . . .

Sisyphian or not, illusory or not, man largely operates within the society he has familiarity with and derives comfort in. It get uncomfortable when that is ripped away.

Of course, which is why those who have a stable enough view of life can either weather the storm or surf the waves of Chaos.

[Jolly]

@Aqua-Letifer said in 34% of likely voters:

@Jolly said in 34% of likely voters:

@Catseye3 said in 34% of likely voters:

@taiwan_girl said in 34% of likely voters:

I do not think there will be a civil war.

TG, for most of my life I believed as you do. From Nov 9, 2016 forward, I have concluded, however reluctantly, that anything can happen, anything at all. And none of it would be a surprise.

What little capacity for shock and surprise that was left in me after 9/11 got used up in November of 2016. Increasingly I am feeling like the Little Prince, sitting on my remote planet and observing events.

Anything can happen now.

Butterfly effect? Hand of God? Kismet?

Control is an illusion. Man does not have control, except in the individual and then only those things he actually does have control over. Entropy is always at work...Man always engages in the Sisyphian effort of building stable societies and empires, but forgets that the hill and the boulder reside in an imperfect Hades. An imperfect being tries to create the perfect world, and we wonder why it always comes apart...Silly us...

We keep getting better at it, though.

Debatable.

We are technologically more capable. We cure disease in previously unthinkable ways, but ancient man probably couldn't even wrap his mind around the concept of thermonuclear war.

So the question becomes...Is modern society actually better, or just different?

[Catseye3]

This post is deleted!

[Catseye3]

@Jolly said in 34% of likely voters:

Of course, which is why those who have a stable enough view of life can either weather the storm or surf the waves of Chaos.

Whatever the fuck that means. The concept of stability of life view is subjective. There are numberless permutations.

[jon-nyc]

As I’ve said before, you’re not nuts, you’re just sentimental.

[Jolly]

@jon-nyc said in 34% of likely voters:

As I’ve said before, you’re not nuts, you’re just sentimental prophetic.

FIFY.

[jon-nyc]

Sentimental.

The military is very different today than it was in 1861.

[Aqua Letifer]

@Jolly said in 34% of likely voters:

@Aqua-Letifer said in 34% of likely voters:

@Jolly said in 34% of likely voters:

@Catseye3 said in 34% of likely voters:

@taiwan_girl said in 34% of likely voters:

I do not think there will be a civil war.

TG, for most of my life I believed as you do. From Nov 9, 2016 forward, I have concluded, however reluctantly, that anything can happen, anything at all. And none of it would be a surprise.

What little capacity for shock and surprise that was left in me after 9/11 got used up in November of 2016. Increasingly I am feeling like the Little Prince, sitting on my remote planet and observing events.

Anything can happen now.

Butterfly effect? Hand of God? Kismet?

Control is an illusion. Man does not have control, except in the individual and then only those things he actually does have control over. Entropy is always at work...Man always engages in the Sisyphian effort of building stable societies and empires, but forgets that the hill and the boulder reside in an imperfect Hades. An imperfect being tries to create the perfect world, and we wonder why it always comes apart...Silly us...

We keep getting better at it, though.

Debatable.

We are technologically more capable. We cure disease in previously unthinkable ways, but ancient man probably couldn't even wrap his mind around the concept of thermonuclear war.

So the question becomes...Is modern society actually better, or just different?

Better. Categorically. We know about individual sovereignty, how to live meaningfully, and that stable societies must rely on the rule of law to maintain our values. Ancient man had barely a clue.

Modern life isn't perfect but all things considered I'll take BLM and my individual pursuits over dying from a tooth infection or a club to the face any day.

[Copper]

Just keep giving blm everything they want, everything.

And before the election blm will be more hated than the 9/11 hijackers.

[taiwan_girl]

I hope I am right, but I just cannot see it happening in the US.

For example, pick a topic that gets people excited - for example, guns.

Let us say that the government does something that is major against your position.

It is one thing to go out and march around on the weekend, and even do it again the next weekend. But if you are making (for example) $70,000 USD and have a family to support (and actually your life is not too too bad), I dont think you would be willing to be out there for weeks at a time, lose your job, lose your house, etc etc. I just dont see it.

Maybe I am projecting a bit from what I have seen/experienced in other countries, but I just do not see that level of desperation or passion that would have a LARGE number of people to sustain it.

Of course, there will be some people, and I am sure that people here know people like that, but in my mind, just not a critical mass.

Look at the current protests about the police. First weekend, tens or hundred thousands, next weekend, thousands, this weekend, hundreds, next weekend ????

Again, it is so so hard to sustain anger, rage, passion

[Jolly]

@taiwan_girl said in 34% of likely voters:

I hope I am right, but I just cannot see it happening in the US.

For example, pick a topic that gets people excited - for example, guns.

Let us say that the government does something that is major against your position.

It is one thing to go out and march around on the weekend, and even do it again the next weekend. But if you are making (for example) $70,000 USD and have a family to support (and actually your life is not too too bad), I dont think you would be willing to be out there for weeks at a time, lose your job, lose your house, etc etc. I just dont see it.

Maybe I am projecting a bit from what I have seen/experienced in other countries, but I just do not see that level of desperation or passion that would have a LARGE number of people to sustain it.

Of course, there will be some people, and I am sure that people here know people like that, but in my mind, just not a critical mass.

Look at the current protests about the police. First weekend, tens or hundred thousands, next weekend, thousands, this weekend, hundreds, next weekend ????

Again, it is so so hard to sustain anger, rage, passion

Dead letter certainty...If the United States started to confiscate all guns, there would be armed insurrection.

[taiwan_girl]

@Jolly Partially agree. There may be a armed insurrection, but not a critical mass of people I dont think.

I know people in the US who have guns and are very pro gun. Would they be willing to take to the streets and protest? Yes

Would they be willing to take to the streets and protest for weeks and weeks on end, lose their job, lose their house, have their family go hungry? Ummmmm, probably not.

Of course, there are fanatics everywhere, and I sure that there would be quite a few people, just not that critical mass.

:woman-kiss-man:

[Jolly]

@taiwan_girl said in 34% of likely voters:

@Jolly Partially agree. There may be a armed insurrection, but not a critical mass of people I dont think.

I know people in the US who have guns and are very pro gun. Would they be willing to take to the streets and protest? Yes

Would they be willing to take to the streets and protest for weeks and weeks on end, lose their job, lose their house, have their family go hungry? Ummmmm, probably not.

Of course, there are fanatics everywhere, and I sure that there would be quite a few people, just not that critical mass.

:woman-kiss-man:

Only took a third of the populance to start the American Revolutionary War. There are people who own guns, and there are people who own guns. And then there is the South and much of the MidWest and West, where I think you may be surprised at the attitude of large segments of the population to gun confiscation.

[Renauda]

On several occasions during the Obama administration years and right up to my hiatus from TNCR I maintained that the USA is approaching its 19 Brumaire. I still hold that view.

Out of the political circus and clown show of the Trump years - and I think the world will have to endure yet another tortuous 4 year term of that vacuous blowhard demagogue - the stage will be set for a clever and highly focussed strongman to take charge. It won't be immediate either, or at least not until traditional governance has become untenable. Out of it all will emerge an American Napoleon who will disslove the moribund Congress and hold power under the guise of maintaining the Constitution and proclaiming an end to the fear of anarchy and civil war.

While not bloodthisty he will be nevertheless ruthless. Most folks will nonetheles support his policies and actions. The coup, for lack of a better word, will happen and all will rejoice or at least grow immediately passive. Once in power he will slowly and methodically dismantle the liberal democracy of the Constitution and rebuild the republic into a centralised liberal authoritarian state that will only superficially resemble present day USA.

His foreign policy will be quite straightforward as well. He will build an autarkic fortress North America (that will be all encompassing) that will seek to unite or, at the very least, ally all English speaking nations of the world under his banner.

So no folks, I do not see a civil war in the crystal ball. There's growing popular distrust and even hate, but only enough to allow for an American Caesar to pick the oak leaves of power out of the gutter and crown himself.

[Catseye3]

I don't see anything that Draconian. I think we Americans are too variegated -- though I could be talked out of this by someone who knows more than I.

OTOH, we're putting up with the "vacuous blowhard demagogue"* a whole lot better than I would ever have predicted, so who knows? By the time he's gone, we may be so exhausted and forgetful of what it's like to live each day without Trump-rage headlines giving us something to be agitated about, that we may be ripe for your scenario.

*Love that and I'm stealing it.

[Copper]

You missed it.

Mr Trump was Mr. Bonaparte.