While hurricanes might be unpredictable, unless of course, you have a large Sharpie, this is not the case with predicting hurricane Donald Trump. He may seem like a human Pachinko machine but he is nonetheless predictable. He will follow his main muses, personal financial advancement and self-aggrandizement. One of the things for which you have to give Donald Trump credit is his candidness. This “openness” is only obscured by conflicting statements and occasional meaningless blather. To understand his intent, you need to watch what he does, who he hires, and who he likes at any given moment and for what reasons. Over time he will tell you what he is about, but he will likely say what he thinks his audience wants to hear.
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| Pachinko Machine |
While it is easy to understand the frustration with our democracy and the current government, quick solutions can be worse than the disease. All common colds can be cured with enough strychnine. Lethargy and corruption in government are problems but the proposed authoritarian replacement of our democracy is not the solution.
So, what is a second Trump presidency likely to mean? What can we take from his statements, however obscure, and his proposals and associations? I have a list of likely outcomes.
1. President for life. Just as Vladimir Putin found a way around term limits, opposition candidates, and annoying elections, the laws that would ordinarily protect us are only as good as the will of those designated to enforce them. Donald Trump, his family, or close surrogates will rule our foreseeable future.
2. Christian nationalism will dominate the government agenda and a revisionist religious doctrine will become the law of the land. America will become a theocracy based on Christian teachings as interpreted by those who will twist its meaning for financial benefit. The original good intent of Christianity will be a cloak to disguise more nefarious goals.
3. Income inequality will further divide the nation into the haves and have-nots. Large corporations, lacking competition in their respective fields, will squeeze out maximum corporate profits at the expense of consumers. Very wealthy individuals will control our future to their benefit. Unions and other dissenting voices will be silenced.
4. Higher education will become unaffordable for all but the wealthy ensuring a further perpetuation of our caste system.
5. Government agencies set up to protect consumers will be gutted by executive decree and their function will be directed to protect corporate wealth. Project 2025 outlines the conservative plan to dismantle the federal government by firing over 50,000 federal workers and replacing them under Schedule F authority with individuals who will pledge allegiance and loyalty to their new authoritarian leader president.
6. The US will abandon NATO and will become aligned with other authoritarian states like Russia, China, Venezuela, North Korea, and Cuba.
7. Enactment of a federal abortion ban starting at the 16th week of pregnancy but allowing further restrictions by states and the possibility for other bans on contraception, IVF, mifepristone and any drugs that might be used for abortion or contraception. Women’s lives and future fertility will be sacrificed on the alter of religious dogma.
8. Rejection of climate science and all efforts that would move us away from fossil fuels. Withdrawal of federal incentives for solar, wind, geothermal, and electric vehicle technology.
9. Elimination of the Affordable Care Act that protects individuals with pre-existing conditions, women and families, kids, older adults, people with disabilities, etc. Trump vows to replace the ACA with something better but has no such “better plan” in development.
10. Expansion of trade barriers and increase in tariffs. Enactment of Trump’s four-year plan to eliminate all Chinese imports and a ban on US companies doing business with China. The cost of such a shift will be borne by American consumers. An immediate 60% tariff on all Chinese goods has been proposed by Trump on day one.
11. Federal control of all public education at all levels where the government decides the political, religious, social, and historical content of the curriculum. State school boards will be staffed with only those who follow the mandated conservative agenda.
12. Complete restructuring of DHS Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency (CISA) with loyalist replacements who would abandon efforts to curtail disinformation dissemination. This would adopt the Heritage Foundation's plan to limit CISA because they investigated and found that the 2020 election outcome was not influenced by rampant fraud.
13. Enactment of Trump's plan to use US missiles against Mexico to fight immigration and drug cartels by declaring the cartels terrorist organizations.
14. Use of 1792 law to allow the president to use the US military against Americans he determines to be violent or rebellious. Trump ally Senator Tom Cotton has promoted this idea to back local police to “restore order to our streets.” Oddly, this law is the Insurrection Act, and the president didn’t see fit to use it during our last true insurrection. We will have crossed the Rubicon.
15. Reversal of Trump's animosity toward cryptocurrency. Once a crypto adversary, he has since invested in crypto and NFT, even profiting from an endorsement of “superhero” NFT digital playing cards. Cryptocurrency is often used to hide assets and launder ill-gotten gain which he may see as beneficial for someone he loves dearly.
16. Weaponization of the Justice Department to retaliate against critics and the Trump-unfaithful with the appointment of a loyal special prosecutor to do his bidding. Executive control of the judicial branch of government will be sought with further appointments of loyal conservative judges to all levels of the court system.
17. Charter 10 new cities on federal land, Trumptopias if you will, that will feature manufacturing, economic opportunity, and new industry. A feature of these new cities will be flying cars. We can only hope they have pig avoidance systems.
18. Expansion of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act that featured massive tax breaks for the wealthy with a further reduction in the corporate tax rate from 21% to 15%. He failed to predict where this loss in revenue would be countered to avoid more national debt.
19. Promote a national concealed carry law to put more guns on the street and repeal the Biden executive order “targeting the firearms industry.”
Remember, Trump learned his lesson while serving as Trump 1.0 (beta). Next time, no more Mr. Nice Guy. Trump 2.0 will not have the guardrails like Mattis, Pence, and even Barr who helped avoid disaster in Trump 1.0. He will be surrounded by loyal sycophants fearing his wrath. America will be ruled by the court jester.
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