This is the time of year when lazy writers post about the comings and goings of the previous year, usually in the form of a listicle. “The top-10 events of the past year” is a column that used to turn up in every newspaper at least once. Then you have the predictions for the coming year, which no one ever mentions as part of their year in review posts. With technology being what it is, you would think a new genre of year-end post would be the review of futures past type of post, but that has not happened.
There is some utility in looking at these things. It’s a lot like reading old articles about the glorious future of the 1990’s. It is a good reminder that most of the things we think are important turn out to be not so important. You look at some of the predictions from last year and wonder why anyone cared to mention it. Of course, you also wonder why no one mentioned what happens to be important right now. How many forecasters predicted a budget fight between Trump and his own party over wall funding?
Looking at your own past predictions is a bit humbling, which is probably why no one does it as a part of their year-end posting. Here is my post from last year with my crystal ball forecast for the upcoming year. I’m not a fan of the listicle, so it is written in the normal format. Looking back on it, maybe a list is not such a terrible thing to do for these sorts of posts. It does make it easier to read. That said, the very worst people write listicles, so I just can’t bring myself to do it. One has to keep up appearances.
So, how’d I do?
Well, I got the DACA stuff mostly right. The part I got wrong is that Trump would just drop the whole thing, rather than let the program expire unnoticed. Instead, he and his new boy-toy, Lindsey Graham are talking about trading 700,000 green cards to invaders in exchange for a down payment on his wall. In fact, Trump has gotten nothing from Congress with regards to immigration, so on that score I can only give myself a solid “C+” for getting close, but over estimating Trump’s political skill.
A similar thing is true with the Mueller probe. I got the easy part right. The farcical nature of the thing is now plain to everyone. Even the Democrats have stopped yapping about Russian collusion. The mask has dropped and they are clear about it being a way to hobble Trump. That’s not entirely true, as it is mostly a way to cover-up the Obama effort to subvert the last presidential election. I got the midterms right too, but that was so easy, so I’m not sure it’s worth grading.
I did nail the gene editing stuff. The Chinese may have used the new technology to “fix” the DNA of an embryo. That’s the claim, at least, but none of it has been independently verified. The Chinese will lie about anything, as it is a bandit culture. What has been released to the public that can be verified looks legitimate. Even if it proves to be false, it does reveal a willingness to do it by China, which has the West thinking about how to get past the ethics of it so it can be done here as well. Welcome to the future.
One thing I got very right is the continued growth of nationalist and populist parties in Europe. It is easy to forget that the smart people were all talking about the populist wave having crested last year, so going the other way was a bold prediction. Not only have the populists displayed staying power, new movements from the Left are turning up. The Yellow Vest thing in France is much more of a leftists cause, especially in Paris, than a right-wing phenomenon. That’s something to watch for next year.
Another thing I got very right is the IPO for Saudi Aramco. It’s funny to think that was a big news item last year. It’s a great example of how something we think is important in the moment turns out to be easily forgotten. Alternatively, it is a good example of something the mass media is instructed to forget, once the news turns ugly. Notice how no one talks about our second greatest ally in the world these days. A shrewd analyst might be thinking of a way to bet against the Saudis surviving next year.
What really mattered?
The dogs that were not barking last year, like the aggressive censorship of dissidents and the absolute failure of the Trump administration, have turned out to be the most important stories of 2018. This time last year most people thought the Left was starting to run out of steam with their Nazi hunting, but that turned out to be wrong. The move to a Chinese style censorship regime actually took a big leap forward. Similarly, people thought Trump was settling into the job, but it turned out he was getting worse at it.
If one were to honestly characterize 2018, it would be as the year that even cynical dissidents were shocked at the number of masks dropping. This year we learned that Congress is so frightened of Silicon Valley, that it is fair to say the real power base in the empire is in San Francisco. Similarly, Congress is so frightened of the intelligence agencies, they have become the Praetorian Guard of the empire. A shrewd analyst may be thinking that 2019 is the year we dispense with democracy altogether.
Doubt we will ever dispense with “democracy”. The farce will continue, with voting having progressively less of an impact on actual policy than the meager ripple it now creates (Trump’s election proving to be nothing but a 2 inch high speed bump on the road to utopia).
Censorship of the right will accelerate. The left has been testing the waters to see if they will receive pushback and so far very little. Conservatives just buy guns and make empty threats and the Republicans hate us too.
The censorship is needed because there is going to be a united push among democrats and suburban whites to defeat orange man which will bond the conflicted factions of the coalition of the fringes
The last year just shows the Republic is lost. We are ruled by 9 Shamans in black robes. What the president does or does not want means little.
The best hope may be for Mueller to attempt to prosecute Trump or his family. We need a major event that will lead to ending political norms.
In order for that to happen the President needs his back against the wall. He has no choice but to disregard convention or face jail.
I think Trump is already there, but he doesn’t realize it. As soon as he’s out of office the State will come after him and his family and at least financially ruin him to make an example. I predict the next democratic President will shatter the process so elections can’t ever be so poorly executed as to allow republicans to win.
Just waiting to see who crosses the Rubicon first and officially ends the pretense that we remain a Republic. I suspect it won’t be Trump though.
Prediction: Elizabeth Warren will label anyone who opposes or criticizes her “sexist.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/12/elizabeth-warren-2020-campaign/579214/
“Warren’s team doesn’t like the Clinton comparisons. They see any of that talk as reeking of sexism, people seeing one woman as the same as another woman because of their gender and aspirations.”
Kamala Harris will label anyone who opposes or criticizes her both “racist” and “sexist!”
Point to Harris.
Beto O’Rourke won’t be able to find his ass with both hands and a map.
Joe Biden will accidentally speak the truth, known as a “gaffe.”
I’ve always thought that the best use of a year-in-review post would be to focus on lessons learned during the prior year. What events or circumstances have occurred that resulted in a new bit of wisdom being gleaned from the experience? Passing around new-found wisdom is an important part of building and sustaining communities. One could argue that 2018 was the year in which the DC political class (and their co-conspirators in the national media) were finally exposed as being more than just frauds, and now constitute a clear and present danger to normal hardworking Americans.
Hear hear!
I think the only white pill for 2019 is that Trump will nominate Ginsburg’s replacement. Everything else is going to be a black pill, the most blackpilling of which Trump’s enemies on the right are going to get a second wind.
if the dems are worried about that – they might as well keep the government closed for the entire two years.
Please let 2019 be the year that we dispense with democracy altogether.
One way they could get the ball rolling is refusal to act on impeachment, although that already happened with Bubba Bill. We may have to wait until 2020 or even 2024 to find out if democracy is over.
IMO: Convergence of big tech is worth paying attention to. They’ve dropped the masks, yes, but convergence kills. Will 2019 be the year that Goolag and Fakebook start losing some of their dominance?
Democracy is already dead. Congress is a joke. The DOJ and FBI routinely tell the Senate and House to FOAD on multiple issues. Because they are controlled by the Deep State.
Impeachment? There is nothing to impeach Trump on. Pelosi will try but there is no way they can get the Senate GOP to go along with it.
Big Tech can operate in the open now because they know we won’t do anything but roll over. We can’t even pull off a YellowJacket style protest against them. BTW if we did, those spindly little geeks would freak out and stop what they are doing.
But Americans aren’t built that way anymore. We aren’t turn of the century striking steel and mine workers who went toe to toe with muderous Pinkerton men and Nation Guard thugs
As long as the bread and circus machine keeps on working, there will be no blowback. None. We’re Americans, little better than minions.
Frightened of SV how exactly? Too dependent on the tech oligarchs funding their campaigns?
One example: John Roberts (SCOTUS) was paid off in Facebook shares, while Scalia ended up dead in a brothel.
It’s a soviet of carrots and sticks, bribery and blackmail.
They know everything about the congress people. If you have a cell phone, pager, a new car, wifi in your house and maybe Alexa. SV knows where you are at all times, who you meet with, whose at your house, etc.
And with the proper software they can build a complete profile of every politician and how to pressure them.
People don’t get the DoD/NSA has had its claws in SV since the late 80’s when it started taking off like gang busters and the NSA was continually buying the latest hardware and software from various firms.
The later funding projects through DARPA which led to Oracle and Google.
As to predictions, Zman’s last paragraph is most trenchant.
Yes, intelligence agencys and Silicon Valley do run the world now. They’ve seized and weaponized social trust tech- social media- and electoral systems.
The debt buildup not only inflates the assets and bustouts of the .01%, it finances the buildout of the surveillance state.
We went high, so they went low.
Dedicated amateurs used the internet to start uncovering the byzantine web of top tier corporate shells, revolving doors, and shadow agencies, such as Serco and SES.
We got color revolutions (911/Iraq was one) and Migrant Springs as a result. The resurgence of brute Gladio operations will overwhelm any amount of investigative noticing. The pretense of consensual democracy will soon be unnecessary.
” They’ve seized and weaponized social trust tech- social media-”
Not quite right. They developed it.Look at where the seed money came from.
When the Constitution and Constitutional avenues of redress continue to be ignored, extra-Constitutional responses will rise to the fore. The process will accelerate for 2019. Doubling down on all sides will be the order of the day.
It’s easy to predict certain very important things for 2019:
1. The white percentage of the overall U.S. population will fall slightly
2. The white percentage of births in the U.S. will fall slightly, again being below 50%
3. Florida, Texas, Georgia and Arizona will move closer to turning blue, thus guaranteeing a Democratic president for generations to come
4. The share of births to Muslims in France will slightly increase
For whites in the U.S. and France, these trends make all others superfluous. What Trump does or doesn’t do simply doesn’t matter much. Anything he does can be undone by a future Democratic administration.
For me, 2018 was the realization that “we not going to vote our way out of this” nor are we going to debate our way out of this. (And, yes, Z-Man was heavily responsible for this.) It’s a difficult thing to accept because this reality has some many implications.
That said, having a clear view of the situation is liberating in many ways, and I know that whites are the most resourceful people on the planet. If only 10% of us wake up and band together, there’s nothing that can stop us. It’s very doable.
Happy New Year everyone!
We already know what to do, that’s why we don’t need community organizers. Look at any natural disaster.
That’s why I have some hopes if and when the Day of the Rope comes.
Heh. Just saw this on Heartiste:
“…white lefties hoping to avoid la dia de la pinata blanca (mexican dotr)” in coastal Cali
Not only will Trump lose in 2020, he will lose big time. His face, and with him the face of White America (which is to say actual America, for all practical intents and purposes), will be curb-stomped, smashed in for good. The Democrats will allow no other outcome: sufficient numbers of mail-in ballots from Uttar Pradesh will be found, if that’s what it takes. The Left was caught off-guard in 2016, but They will NOT make the same mistake again: they will never, ever, ever again permit themselves to be formally out of power (they’re in power right now, of course, just not formally).
There will never, ever, ever again be a White American (in the realistic sense) man (again, in the realistic sense: Beto O’Rourke, Trudeau and Macron are not “men”) who is President. In this country, as the borders for the moment conceptually define it. Your country is gone, you may as well admit reality. Trump’s slogan was “Make America Great Again”. The future is “Continue Making America Into Not – America”.
One hears the Left say things like “The future of America is POC.” All that really means is, the future of the particular piece of real estate formerly called America is POC. Without Americans there is no America, just as, without the Iroquois, there is no Iroquois Federation. The Jewish bullshit idea that anyone on planet Earth is an American if they have the correct paperwork is exactly that, Jewish bullshit; and politely tolerating Jewish bullshit is precisely how you let your country be taken from you. Fuck, man, you didn’t even NOTICE as it was stolen right out from under you.
The Sung Dynasty did not say, “Well, I guess the future of China is Manchus and Mongols and Khitai,” they simply said, “China will withdraw to defensible borders until such time as the barbarians can be driven hence.” Smarter than White people, them Chinese: that’s why they still have a country and a civilization, and you fuckwits won’t. Happy fucking New Year.
The host and most of the commenters voted for Bush and supported the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq because reasons.
Like, they just had no other choice, man. No one could really know what was happening, man.
The guys who comment here are as responsible for the state of this country as the Frankfurt school, and those guys weren’t even Americans.
You stole my thought
Seen on twitter:
We should make the Wall a corporate-sponsored Holocaust victory stele, thus renamed-
The Exxon-Mobil Holocaust Memorial Wall!
FFS you white nationalists are annoying. Everything is DA JOOOOOS.
There will never again be a “White American” president because there isn’t, and never has been any such thing as a “White American”. Italians and Irish don’t act or vote like WASPs. Blacks have been here longer than most Europeans. Appalachian culture could not be any more different from coastal.
Yes, fine, progressives constantly shitting on white men is *creating* a sense of solidarity in those white men who otherwise have very little in common. But everybody, especially those white men, should understand that this is a totally new thing.
You can’t retcon an identity using bits and pieces of pan-European continentalism, Nazism, prison culture, neo-Confederate nonsense and no small amount of Marxism and then claim it’s actually an ancient ethnicity, the REAL American identity! It’s not, it’s just a dumb thing you invented that 98% of Americans not only don’t identify with, but find literally repulsive.
Back here in reality, a lot of us are trying to figure out what a system that works might actually look like. You guys offer no solutions, and no serious analysis of any kind, just endless mindless bitching. Go away.
Wow, what a retard.
Naked, in strawberry 6 mil PLEASE!
I kinda think you’re right — and the Dems will cheat like hell to ensure Trump is defeated in 2020, that is, if they can’t throw him out of office in 2019. Meanwhile, Trump and his family might be under such threats that they will breathe a sigh of relief to be defeated, leave the White House and get back to their lives, with their lives intact. As soon as Kamala Harris or Hillary or ??? takes office, they will implement a social merit policy such as China has, as soon as possible, with social media, tech and banks diligently assisting.
I could be wrong but I thought Trump did cancel DACA, and a federal judge overturned it, calling it arbitrary and capricious (even though it was an illegal program in the first place). The judge, a Bush appointee, ordered the U.S. to continue to accept applications. There are also few states that are suing to stop the program.
What bothers me about the Trump era, along with Trump’s disappointments and the Democrats almost open efforts to subvert democracy, is the willingness of many federal judges to all but appoint themselves co-President.
I remember in early 2017 when Trump’s “travel ban” was struck down by a federal district or circuit judge the judge admitted in his written opinion the ban was constitutional. He just found it “unfair”.
Utterly shameless
By fighting back, Trump has forced the ruling scum to reveal themselves. I still hope that “the majority is always sane”.
What I’d most like to see in 2019: The House of reps refusing to seat new reps from (D)irtbag areas with fraudulent voting practices – let them sue, let’s discuss this shit in court, then, when the courts crap on democracy again, I’d like to see the executive branch ignore the rulings, and invite the (D)irtbags to secede.
I think the only possible cure at this point is the gangrene treatment, cut off south coastal california especially, and charge them dearly for water – they will exploit their ports for leverage, it will increase import costs but be a major boost to US industry. Soon we won’t need the imports so much, but they will always be paying US for water – or they could import it from china, who cares as long as they pay dearly.
Stupidity and greed must be costly, not rewarded – or there will never be an end to it.
We need an Andrew Jackson who would be willing to defy the Supreme (and lesser) court.
James, apparently Trump/DHS tried to rescind the DACA policy but courts have halted any changes pending litigation outcomes. Since DACA is a *policy* of the Dept of Homeland Security and *not* a law, how is it that courts can prevent the policy being changed or rescinded? Sounds like an over-reach by the judges (surprise, surprise) but I’m no lawyer.
The Dem judges hate Trump and will do whatever they can to stop his policies, knowing it will take two years to get to the Supreme Court. The law is irrelevant to them.
Drop the fig leaf of democracy and the trend of whites moving to predominantly white areas will accelerate. Blacks and browns will head south white YT heads north.
Regions will begin to assert some form of independence from the rule of DC-NYC-LA-SF.
Guns and ammo sell even better than during the Obama years.
Imagine a situation where a guy ran for President on the strength of the slogan “Make America Great Again!”, and literally half the country rallied violently against the very notion. They were quite literally violently opposed to making America great again. Because a) in practical terms, we all know what that really means, and b) at this point in time, literally half of America is not American in any meaningful sense.
Face this. Charles Schumer is not an American. Diane Feinstein is not an American. Rahm Emmanuel is not an American. Alexandria Occasional-Cortex is not an American. Cory Booker is not an American. Keith Ellison is not an American. Your next President, Kamala Harris, is not an American. Google is not run by Americans. Facebook is not run by Americans. Your local car wash is not run by Americans.
Your country has been successfully invaded and overrun by a foreign people, and you have been successfully conquered, without a shot being fired.
“And you may ask yourself, Well…
HOW DID I GET HERE?!!”
— Talking Heads, who you thought were dumb leftists, but who were smarter than you realized
Anyone see the 12-16-18 cover of the NY Times magazine? Photo of a black, Elijah Cummings, and two jews, Jerrald Nadler and Adam Schiff, who will be judging Donald Trump. Non-American occupiers of our land will be figuratively speaking shoving a knife into Pres Trump and, by extension, Heritage Americans. Part of our ontinued dispossession and continued slide into third worldism.
Predictions for the future ? Would love to predict Doom and Gloom but me thinks it will just be same old song and dance. Our overlords are in no hurry to let go of their indentured servants courtesy of the banking cartel.
Hyää Uutta Vuotta ! Happy New Year
My hope for 2019 is that a few of the more self-congratulatory Noticers and Pattern Recognizers may begin to consider that what we are seeing with climate data from 1995 to date may no be a crypto-Marxist plot but an actually-existing trend, perhaps even a self-reinforcing one.
The great migrations of the 21st Century are not going to be driven by George Soros and intersectionality but by the intersection of The Most Important Graph In The World with a climate that is both hotter and drier.
Some think that foreign aid today is excessive. But that will be nothing in comparison to emptying the Sahara of sand, which might be less expensive than the Iraq/Afghan war. And turning the desert green will in any case be cheaper than having them all migrate to the First World. I see no indications that the white First World will use force against migrants, so bribery is a worthwhile triangulation.
Umm. Not so warm in the near future. https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/solar-cycle-progression
After 2030 or so… Who knows?
The third worlders are eating themselves out of house and home due to excessive reproduction.
You moron. The only pattern that actual smart people have been seeing is one of fraudulent data, untestable models and failed predictions.
The Republican Party, and the American People, “failed” President Trump. Trump gave them everything they ever asked for. Turns out they never really wanted any of it. It was all just so much bullshit.
This “Republic” is dead.
How did the people fail Trump? The one thing the people asked for was border control, and precisely zero elements of that have been delivered.
“Mid-Terms.” Get a grip.
Sorry, I did my part. I can’t be responsible for the rest. Nice try though.
Nice that you did your part but that doesn’t take away from the factual correctness of what Carl B wrote. The American people happily gave the Democratic Party a majority in the House. Why? Because deep down they really don’t want what pundits, right and left, said they wanted when they voted for Trump. I have said repeatedly to all who will listen that a large proportion of the votes for Trump in 2016 were not votes FOR Trump so much as votes AGAINST Hillary Clinton. Hillary fumbled on the one-yard line, plain and simple. She has an insulting and off-putting manner that makes even hard-core Democrats dislike her. Many of those who voted against her still go along with all the social justice nonsense we see in entertainment, sports, and popular culture. Why else do we see not a backing off from SJW messaging in commercials but rather an increase in the number and fervency of such messaging in all forms of media? Those who did vote for her fall into one of two categories: the true believers in social justice nonsense at any price and the habitual Democratic voters who vote as they do without really thinking because it’s an addictive habit to vote Democratic and besides they don’t really have a problem with the SJW agenda.
Any predictions for 2019?
Don’t be shy!
Tomorrow.
Ever the optimist — assuming there will be a tomorrow!
At lease one impeachment vote is held in the House.
Theresa May loses a confidence vote, and the Brexit is scuttled.
Several Conservatism Inc. organizations might shut down.
Extralegal methods will be used in an attempt to shut down Gab, possibly extradition.
Julius Malema’s EFF party comes in second place in the South Africa elections.
Several Alt-Lite grifters will migrate back to the left.
The media will push a narrative of former Alt-Right participants seeking “redemption”.
No wholesale banning of Dissident movements will occur on social media, but Roosh is likely to be entirely deplatformed. Reddit in particular will ban many more communities as it seeks an IPO.
What won’t happen but I wish would: A union is organized at a major Silicon Valley company. Unionization spreads like wildfire.
China will lose the game of chicken, and tariffs will be imposed. Causing a recession in China, and probably causing an impeachment vote.
Large-scale leftist protests will occur weekly in the major cities to force Trump into resignation. Think a “colour revolution”.
Jeff Flake will declare his candidacy for the GOP primaries.
Prosecutors in New York will indict at least one Trump family member on something.
In reaction to tariffs hitting Iphones, Pope Tim may try something like what wikipedia did in reaction to the SOPA bill. Apple will reveal a kill switch in the Iphone and shut them down in protest.
In response, some GOP congressmen will openly muse about nationalizing Apple. (Ok, this is mostly wish fulfillment, but Apple will do something nasty if they are hit with tariffs)
Georgia defeats Alabama to become the SEC champion.
(Upvoted because I have a sneaking suspicion you’re using college sports as a proxy for rigged elections. I plead ignorance, as I’m allergic to sportsball.)
The House of Reps might as well dissolve itself. Could not force testimony from anyone important in the administrative state or punish anyone for lying or any of the ‘laws’ broken. It seems immaterial who is in charge now. The demonRats can stamp their little feet and yell all they want. Who is going to enforce contempt of congress resolutions? Divided government is unworkable. There will be no ‘laws’ passed these next two years. The American system is officially unworkable. Time to start over.
It turns out you really can buy the entire Congress.
Its actually pretty cheap. There are 435 Reps , assuming you only need say 235 votes at 100,000k a pop its about 23 and a half million which is pocket money for the rich . If you need the Senate as well. another 40 or so at half a mil for a filibuster proof majority
So long as the Deep State is OK with whatever you want, a mere 43 or so mil per anum in campaign contributions and they are yours.
That said anyone with an IQ above room temperature knows that the US has always been utterly corrupt and that its in the end game. We’ll try for a bit more but some combo of collapse , civil war , or 3rd world is inevitable baring a minor miracle.
The Israelis did in the 60’s
That’s my theory. The USA is probably not worth saving. The very fact that we now have a corrupt secret police working hand-in-hand with Silicon Valley is visible evidence of what we’ve become. Add to this a political establishment that is for sale. Blow. It. All. Up.
Also, Epaminondas don’t forget to add the Fourth Estate which has become a Fifth Column for communists.
people thought Trump was settling into the job, but it turned out he was getting worse at it.
That’s the take the Elites and their running-dogs are emitting. They’re wrong, as they have been for near 100 years.
Dad29, you and Z are both right. The messaging is “total fail”, but The Donald has fallen off his game this year. He needs to win the battle of “feelings”, not just the battles in the real world.
Off topic: Apparently some semi-famous Afrikaner boxer’s father was killed in South Africa. Blacks were jubilantly celebrating this apparent public execution for “insulting”. The boxer has an ironclad case for asylum (political persecution) in the US, except well, you know…asylum is for Central American gangsters.
https://twitter.com/Greg7Dunn/status/1078678924236861442
For me, the genuinely new horror (as opposed to just the worsening of a familiar horror) of 2018 was the realization that the credit card companies, and perhaps much of the banking system along with them, are part of the totalitarian left now. Very unpleasant discovery.
Well Zman, thanks for being our Virgil, i.e., our tour guide in hell.
I represent your local water company. We’ve cut off the water to your house because we don’t like a post you made on the the Z Man blog. Have a nice day.
Don’t laugh, that day may be coming. Whoever thought a person could get fired for using the “wrong” pronoun?
to get your service restored, submit a correctly filled out absentee ballot to your local ballot harvester.
We are getting there. Texas requires commitment to not boycotting Israel to receive disaster relief. I can just imagine the fun leftist governments will have with this concept
I thought people realized this during the ’08 bailouts. The left doesn’t eagerly hand trillions of dollars over to its enemies.
The 08 bailouts were a Bush project. Don’t you remember Paulson threatening riots if the banks weren’t bailed?
My hope is this– Given the VERY hard stance Trump is now taking vis-a-vis Shutdown / The Wall I hope that is a harbinger of things to come.
I hope his mentality is, I have one year left to go balls out the way I initially spoke and my base empowered me to do. He alreadys know they are gunning for him no matter WHAT he does. Economy doing the best it has in decades means one iota of jack shit to the Cult of Prog.
So with all those factors in mind I hope he becomes the Benevolent Tyrant we desparately need for 2019. And that his autocratic dictates / mandates propel him to another term with this mindset. That is my New Year’s Wish for this administration and more importantly, We the People.
I saw a post recently bemoaning the fact that Trump keeps putting swamp snakes in charge of stuff and then having to fire them when they don’t do as he asks.
I’m thinking that swamp snakes are all that is available to him.
It’s that bad.
Trump does not seem to have a grasp of how government works. He certainly does not get how Congress works. He should not be in the position he is in at the moment. He traded favors for promises, which is what stupid people do in politics. You trade favors for leverage. Person X needs a favor from Person Y. Person Y only agrees as long as Person X sends a hostage. That’s how politics works. it is how it has always worked. Yet, Trump can’t grasp this.
Back when McConnell was ramming through the budget, Trump should have vetoed the thing and got his $5 billion and a promise for $5 billion more at a later date. He had McConnell by the balls and let him go for a promise.
It is possible that Mueller has dirt on Trump’s family, but that’s unlikely. Maybe Trump worries that there is undiscovered dirt somewhere. Thus far, the evidence says he is just not very good at his job.
But who could actually do a “good” job as president? If you think back on the politicians we’ve endured since WW2, which one would you place at the helm right now? And what could he do? I’m thinking that we need a dissident right version of Lincoln…someone ruthless enough to kill millions to change the culture. And what are the chances of finding another weirdo like him?
He’s from an environment of enforceable contract. One can’t countersue patronage’s unwritten promises, favors, and threats.
He is, after all, our first citizen President. Now we know they really are a seperate country, an occupation regime.
Alzaebo nailed it. We have all been in a hall of mirrors for years. There has been little enough overt strangeness for most of us to exercise our normalcy bias and assume things are somewhat to mostly OK. Trump solved that dilemma.
Yep, Alzaebo did nail it. I was a Trump guy from the moment he got the nomination. After I saw what aneurysms he was giving leftists I really became a Trump guy. I still think he’s been a good president all in all but he can’t seem to get around the Deep State. I don’t know if he just does not know how or if he really does not want to become the tyrant he’d have to be to do it. Me? I’d go full out Napoleon on their asses and change the world. That’s how it’s done, Donald!
Not Napoleon. Sulla.
He’s a negotiator at heart, not a dictator.
If you wanted to buy a million yards of concrete, you could negotiate that; both the seller and the buyer have aligned interests -they both need the sale to go through.
Trump’s dilemma is that he’s trying to negotiate something the counter-party doesn’t want to do at all. What’s to negotiate??
Either he’s reduced to gutting what he wants, or making concessions somewhere else. Or dictating terms to what have become his enemies.
Trump is the embodiment of the Peter Principle which means he had risen to his level of incompetence.
There were many reports in 2017 and 2018 that the bureaucracy was intentionally blocking MAGA-ists from work in the Trump administration. And they would have been able to do this because Trump stupidly didn’t clean house on day one like every other president before him.
And by now, everyone knows that to be associated with the Trump administration in any way is to have the entire apparatus of the state and NGO system mobilized against you and your family, while enjoying little if any protection by the man himself. By now it’s too late, and no one but swamp snakes will even apply.
Trump made a mistake with hiring former generals. They are some of the worst people he could have selected as they are devotees of the Neocong – invade the world,. invite the world agenda.
Kelly in a recent interview linked by Drudge told a reporter he was the person not pushing for a Wall as well as trying to get Trump to listen to the intelligence agencies as they know best, don’t pull out of NATO, etc.
Basically trying to turn Trump into Bush 3.0.
Mattis has been a promoter the Neocon agenda from day one, fought Trump on banning trannies in the military, wanted to keep the occupation of Syria and Afghanistan going on forever. Then on his way out, he writes a poison pen letter to the president as a parting shot. It’s no wonder Trump then fired the SOB.
The funny thing, early on in the Trump administration. Trump asked Mattis and the other generals what victory looked like in Afghanistan. None of them could answer him. They were just addicted to war.
Economy doing the best it has in decades (as measured by GDP) means one iota of jack shit to the Cult of Prog. Economic expansion does not really benefit the average citizen much–Prog or otherwise. We live in a hamster wheel economy in which expanding federal debt and money supply fuel growth and expansion while immigration holds wage growth in check. This situation fuels the inflation of assets like real estate, but that just makes home ownership even more expensive. It is possible to have a lot of economic expansion and a declining standard of living at the same time. Of course the alternative of a contracting economy, crashing asset prices, and massive lob losses is seen as horrible. Republicans, including Donald Trump, are still stuck in 1980 as far as their economic thinking.
Agreed. The “stuff their mouths with gold” tactic doesn’t translate to political support after all. Just look at all the joyful reports that black unemployment is the lowest it’s been for 40 years. Did that produce a wave of grateful black voters rewarding the Republicans in November? Nope, and it never will. People will just fill their pockets and continue to vote for “virtue”, which for Blacks is left, lefter and more left.
Giving thousands of dead end low paying service jobs to blacks improves their lives compared to giving them welfare, but it does not turn them into Republicans. Even the talented tenth in the middle class tend to pull the lever for the D.
Black unemployment may be at record lows, but it is still above the 5% level of full employment. In any case, we lack data from WW1 and WW2 when black unemployment was at its lowest point. In any case, blacks have little reason to favor the party of tax cuts when many are still EITC eligible.
Most people vote how they “feel”, so there is a full court press to make people “feel” miserable about everything. Silicon Valley, the media, and the Uniparty all have a hand in it.
That’s why political duds such as Elizabeth Warren and Beto the Potato are all in. Whoever gets the Democrat nomination is likely to win, given that our cultural misery index will be turned to eleven on a scale of ten by the fall of 2020.
Exactly. People feel like they have been dealt a bum hand even if economic stats appear good. Example: Education costs are way out of control. An ABET accredited engineering class that would have cost less than $200 in 1980 may cost nearly $5000 at a state school today. Since the raw material cost of providing this instruction has not changed much, one must wonder just what in the hell these universities do with all that money. Health care, pharmaceuticals, nursing homes, etc. are all similar cartel operations. The democrats have an answer for this in the form of government checks. The right could call for trust busting, RICO investigations, etc., but I hear crickets from them.
The economy, as measured by GDP does not, and should not matter a damn to most Americans- The Swedish economy is being lauded as having grown the fastest of the Nordics because of Immigration.
A host of government functions have exploded: Welfare, hospitals, schools, prisons etc.
This is a tragedy not a boon.
In a sane world government spending would be recognized as Gross Domestic Consumption, to be subtracted from GDP not added to it.
That doesn’t make sense. The US wealth distribution curve is so screwed up that minus the 40% of the economy that is State spending the real GDP average folks live under is around 4 trillion or less.
Wealth redistribution is the only thing keeping the system afloat after wages have arbitraged by about half since 1973
And note no amount of tax or regulatory relief will create long term growth or a healthy economy.
Nearly all corporations want cheaper labor above all else but those wages are the entire foundation of the economy.
Lower wages means less customers , more poverty and/or a larger state. However the drive to higher profit at the expense of wages is unavoidable so you always get the above
The State as bad as it can be forces inefficiency into the system and too some degree, not enough in the US because of Citizens United IMO ,checks the bad habits of corporations
Otherwise yo\u get a race to the bottom.
Now this doesn’t mean there is never excess regulation or room for regulatory relief . there can be but corporations a the multinationals especially are as big a problem as the State.
Lower wages also means more dependance on cheap and plentiful imports, another communist strategy.
Never forget, it’s perfectly ok to Proggies if you have to eat your pets to stay alive…any sacrifice by others for their cause…
Two years and no wall. The rabid Trump rally supporters should be very disappointed by now, but they aren’t. Why? Cult of personality. They would chant, “BUILD THE WALL!” and “LOCK HER UP!” and “DRAIN THE SWAMP!” There is still no wall, and not even any reasonable evidence of an honest intention to build a wall. The Clintons and the Deep State have not been held accountable. Not even close.
You mentioned the economy doing the best it has in decades. You seriously need to stop reading government statistics. The fundamentals are very poor, Wall Street is teetering in exactly the way it did before the 2008 crash, and this time The Fed is still so overextended from papering over the 2008 mess that they have no play when the next crash happens (next Tuesday?). The Trump administration is continuing to exponentially accelerate the $22 trillion national debt with $1.3 trillion annual deficits.
If all of that wasn’t bad enough, your Benevolent Tyrant has achieved more gun control in two years than Obama was able to get in eight years. Trump publicly advocated for blatantly unconstitutional Red Flag gun confiscation laws and many states passed them. A Maryland resident who committed no crime was killed in a recent 5 AM Red Flag gun confiscation. There is a bill coming up in 2019 that will use federal funds to bribe more states to enact Red Flag gun confiscations. Trump also had the BATFE reverse all their past rulings that bump stocks are not machine guns. Now, a bump stock suddenly IS a machine gun, and US citizens have 90 days to turn in or destroy their lawfully purchased property or they’re felons.
Your tyrant doesn’t look so benevolent from my perspective. I’m not surprised. He was a big government New York City Democrat all his life until running as a Republican.
Small government advocates, like Liberty4Ever, are literally incapable of seeing the people who populate our world clearly. These advocates live in a theoretical world inhabited solely by high-IQ individuals without tribal loyalties and these advocates demand that the real world conform to their theoretical world.
Liberty4Ever, go join Rand Paul in converting some “Detroit Republicans” and learn something about the world we inhabit.