Back from the brink
Trump finally facing some resistance, but will it be enough ?
A week or so ago, I wrote that the US was only days away from becoming a totalitarian state. I mentioned three threats each sufficient to end any kind of democracy
The report from Hegseth and Noem, due on 20 April, which seemed likely to recommend invocation of the Insurrection Act
The willingness of the regime to defy court orders on issue like the return of illegally deported Kilmar Abrego Garcia
The attempt to break the independence of universities and civil societies in general
None of these threats have been realised so far, but none have gone away. Nothing has been heard of the Insurrection Act, which may mean that the regime has decided in can’t get away with such an obviously spurious exercise. The courts have held firm and the Supreme Court (except for the open fascists Alito and Thomas) has shown itself willing to act swiftly to prevent at least the most egregiously illegal actions. Finally, the regime overreached badly in demanding a complete capitulation from Harvard, with the result that university managements finally found a spine.
That’s the good news. The bad news is that nothing much has been resolved. The regime is still refusing to comply with court orders. The resolution will only come, one way or the other, when regime officals are held in contempt. And the surprising strength of the universities, faced with near-existential threats, contrasts sharply with the capitulation of most of Big Law, on the pathetic pretext that firms are worried about having their staff poached.
With that summary, it’s time for another look back at the dictatorship flowchart. We are now on the right hand side, having ruled out the possibility that Trump will govern constitutionally. The next questions relate to the possibility that either the Supreme Court or popular resistance will stop Trump.
Until the last week, I thought the 0.1 probabilities (10 per cent) I had allocated to these survival routes were over-optimistic. Trump’s majority on the Supreme Court seemed to be holding and the utter failure of the Democratic Party to mount any kind of resistance (amounting to actual collaborationism in the case of people like Newsom) seemed more significant than large protest rallies.
But it seems that the SC majority have finally worked out that Trump is a dire threat to their position in the system, and Trump’s approval ratings have fallen significantly. The disastrous mess Hegseth has created at Defense may have raised concerns about whether the career military would obey unconstitutional orders.
So, I’d now raise the survival chances of US democracy a bit, maybe to 30 per cent. That’s still pretty pessimistic. My negativity has two main sources. First, none of this has had any effect on Trump’s support among Republicans which is still around 90 per cent in most polls. Nor has it been reflected in rejection of the Republican party in general
Moreover, Trump’s decline in popularity is almost entirely due to the mess he has made of economic policy. The gulags, corrupt shakedowns, abandonment of allies and so on have cost him nothing. If he can somehow walk back the mess created by his crazy tariffs, and the economy turns out OK, his path to a life presidency (and probably hereditary absolute monarchy) will be smooth.
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You've been very on the money when it comes to these things. I think your assessment of 30% is also correct --but it's not 100% the case that the only negative reactions to Trump are due to the economic blunders.
The general assholery is not particularly popular. It seems odd because many Americans like his asshole style. But I think it's more appealing to them when they are interpreting it a particular way--more as an anti-hero Clint Eastwood style macho bluster with some kind of redeeming core.
They want an asshole to get up there and say offensive things and make liberals cry but not the kind of full-blown Hitler asshole that turns the government into a terror machine.
When it comes across as pure nihilistic darkness, many people who didn't care or who like the whole 'he's an ass but he gets things done' don't find it as appealing. They may not find it unappealing enough to vociferously reject it but it's a different vibe than the one they like.
So combined with the fuck ups in other domains, that aspect is going to have a negative valence to them. There's a core number that wanted to vote for Hitler but there are more who wanted to vote for Dirty Harry.
Yes, those people are idiots. They are going purely on vibes. A certain kind of vibe shift will make them turn away. Not turn against Trump but turn away and wait for things to change --at which point, they will become annoyed at rational governance and yearn for Dirty Harry again. Which means we're trapped in a downward spiral no matter what but the bottom may be different.
Reagan did most of the damage that led us to Trump and was tremendously damaging. Bush II also did some of this massive damage. It was like a crack in the foundations. But note they came across as jovial fellows even as they committed massive human rights atrocities and ruined the possibility of a middle class or a rights-respecting government. So this is more the American style. Damien Omen III does not have quite the right tone. Trump seemed like a clown, a buffoon, but a 'CEO-leader asshole' and a cross between the anti-Christ in Damien Omen III and Reagan. If he begins to look like pure unleashed darkness, plus a shitty economy, people will start to peel off. (Not evangelicals, of course. They are dying for the anti-Christ.)
Seems like the whole Noem-Hegseth review has gone to ground - I can't find reference to it anywhere!
That said, surely the recent popular protests across the US (that don't seem to get much popular coverage) raise the chance of popular resistance marginally higher...
Do you see developments in the Trump-Russia axis affecting the flow chart? For example, do you expect we'll see a "1999 Russian apartment bombings"?