2024 Election: Acceleration vs. Consolidation of Power

Trump’s ten-point plan to dismantle the Deep State

Source: @TheCalvinCooli1 on X

Trump has signaled that he is out for revenge in his second term and vows to "root out" what he called "the threat from within." Trump has told his supporters that he will direct the Justice Department to investigate "every Marxist prosecutor in America." Trump is much more vindictive than last time, though his talk of dismantling the Deep State comes across as more rhetorical, despite his ten-point plan. Certainly, Trump will try to use the presidency to settle personal scores. However, he has no clear plan or strategy to carry this out, which is not as simple as these bullet points. Trump still lacks a real grasp on the nature of power and is unmatched by his adversaries. Trump is too old thus invested in the old way of doing things, and emotionally seeks out sycophants who kiss his ass. I am skeptical of him putting together the right team that has what it takes.

Source: @Indian_Bronson on X

The establishment has expressed fears of Trump’s authoritarian and vindictive tendencies. For instance, neocon Never Trumper, Robert Kagan, believes that a Trump dictatorship is inevitable, Trump’s former AG, Bill Barr, says Trump Will Deliver Chaos If Elected President, and Hillary Clinton warned in an appearance on the View, that “a second Trump term “would be the end of our country as we know it.” Trump has shown himself not to be competent enough to be an effective tyrant. While Trump uses quasi-fascist rhetoric, he has been more bark than bite.  

I do not doubt that some of the allegations against Trump could very well be true. No one who makes it that high up is totally ethical. The law only applies to common people, not to the ruling class. Thus when a member of the ruling class becomes a target, it is not a prosecution but a political purge. While imprisoning Trump might be too accelerationist, at the very least the establishment wants to provoke the Right to justify further political repression. Trump getting indicted makes him more sympathetic, and surprisingly does not seem to be harming him in general election polling. The more trouble Trump gets in, the more voting for Trump becomes an obvious way to say f-you to the establishment, though I don’t think MAGA is a hill worth dying on. Besides, the Left is so deranged that it doesn’t matter if it is Nick Fuentes or DeSantis, so “owning the libs” is futile.

The Stop The Steal stuff is really iffy, and even if partially true, Trump lost by his own merit, as well as due to demographic change. Conspiracy theories can function as an attempt to escape politically incorrect truths, like demographic replacement. However, Trump getting elected by say a 3% margin but then denied via prosecution is actually somewhat plausible. A scenario where Trump gets elected from behind bars would be extremely chaotic, though is not the most likely scenario.

Stop The Steal was also a huge distraction from building any effective populist movement and from policy issues. The Right would rather be vindicated as victims than do anything productive. Not to mention conservatives obsessively focusing on the ‘Biden crime family’ while not lifting a hand to establish any patronage. Even Tucker Carlson, who I generally respect, was promoting this conspiracy theory that the Deep State wanted to remove Biden from office, by using a new wave of BLM riots. Not to mention, rightwing grifters claiming that Biden will be replaced with Gavin Newsom or Michelle Obama, which is bullshit and more a way to get views.  

Source: @LauraLoomer on X

After the election, there will probably be civil unrest, regardless of who wins. If Biden wins, there will likely be political repression that could be much harsher than after Jan 6th. The main target of a political crackdown would be hardline MAGA, though pro-White types, who talk about replacement theory, could also be targeted. The Right is overly hyperbolic, expecting Biden or Kamala Harris to throw them all in gulags if Trump loses. Not to mention the conspiracist stuff from rightwing populists, from Alex Jones to QAnon and even Breitbart and Fox News, which comes across as hokey and unsophisticated. However, it is based on the reality that the ruling class is seeking to consolidate power and set up a more controlled, technocratic system.

Source: @populusaigeiros on X

While Democrats have major advantages, such as demographics and institutional power, the economy tanking is the main reason why Trump has a decent chance. The plan seems to be to prop up the economy with stimulus and perhaps a Fed pivot, and then let it crash or have inflation resurge after the election. I also suspect that corporations are waiting until after the election before mass layoffs. However, the economy will likely be in much worse shape by the election, and we are probably already in a recession. Not to mention that Fed chair, Powell, is concerned for his legacy, and does not want to go down in history as another Arthur Burns, thus may not actually pivot on rate hikes. Whoever is elected will be stuck with an economic catastrophe, which will further fuel civil unrest and political radicalization, and will be blamed for the crisis. For instance, if there is a severe recession/depression or high inflation under Trump’s presidency, the Left will be greatly empowered.

Source: @boxkicker2191 on X

There are all these copes that this time Trump will get it right, and that Trump is more likely to take anti-establishment actions, such as pardoning Assange and Snowden, reducing the scope of the military industrial complex, firing the leadership of alphabet agencies, enacting an immigration moratorium, and scrapping anti-freedom of association civil rights legislation. While Trump is too lazy to drain the swamp, when his real estate empire and his freedom are about to be taken from him, if he loses or if he fails to clamp down on his adversaries, maybe he will realize it, but it will be too late. Perhaps Trump’s failure will pave the way for Newsom to be the Blue Caesar.

It is hard to say if Trump grasps much more than, someone like Mike Pence does, that Americans are a colonized people. However, at least Trump damages the civic goodwill that sustains the imperial center. Trump is good for acceleration reasons, and getting re-elected as an outlaw is a shock to the system. However, it is idiotic to support him on some idea of bringing back the old America, which is never coming back. Since Trump symbolizes the last chance to save America, Trump’s defeat would be the symbolic end of America.

Source: @moldbridge on X

My prediction is that the system will allow Trump to win as false hope but will keep him neutered while serving as the harbinger of doom. They want him around as a boogeyman but on a leash, or as a lame duck and token opposition rather than totally out of politics. Trump energizes the establishment and the Left while doing little policy-wise that is radically anti-establishment. This is the true black pill, not the election being stolen outright, and why I was sort of glad that Trump lost in 2020, because the Right needed a serious wake-up call. Trump’s legacy will be as the person who revealed the true nature of America’s power structure but then fell short at the most crucial moments.

Source: @empireenjoyer10 on X

While I think chaos is inevitable whoever is elected, if Trump’s 2^nd term is successful it could very well just prolong the slow decline rather than be a revolutionary change or Renaissance. For instance, a scenario where Trump turns the economy around, cracks down on crime, strengthens American hegemony abroad, and restores patriotism. Under this scenario, White military recruitment might go way back up and middle class White conservatives would return to just “grilling,” as the meme goes. Also, a non-White shift toward the GOP could further sustain colorblind civic nationalism and delay balkanization. I think that a successful Trump presidency could have bought the US empire another 20 years. However, the distinction is between positive revolutionary change, and Trump making peace with some of the establishment, as the business community is already warming up to him.  

Source: @Blair_A_Nathan on X

Trump has to appeal to MAGA partisans and esoteric rightists with an agenda of political revenge and institutional damage, while simultaneously convincing suburban women and right-leaning regime loyalists that he is good for the country. Trump’s 2024 campaign is turning out to be an awkward coalition of “Make America Great Again” and “Death to the Great Satan.”  Trump is also making inroads with the “purple tribe” demographic that is moderate social democrat on economics and cultural libertarian, but does not particularly like woke social issues, and is also for border security. However, RFK jr. also has a strong appeal to this demographic.

Source: @TKeithPreston1 on X

Even if Trump wins, I just don’t see how the GOP can hold together a coalition of country-club regime loyalists, oil interests, big agriculture, and people who want to burn it all down. Trumpism sort of recognizes that 20th-century America is gone but can’t offer a coherent program to restore American greatness. So MAGA ends up being a cult of personality and a symbolic yet politically incoherent movement. We don’t need an accommodationist stance to preserve late 20^th Century America nor do we need empty symbolism and dog whistles.

A lot of people are expecting one of the biggest transitions or paradigm shifts in US history. If Biden wins, the establishment will further consolidate power and the historic American nation is pretty much done for, at least symbolically. Things will get bleak for non-affluent and non-liberal Whites, with the symbolic winners being new immigrants and the University educated coastal managerial class. Biden winning would also be a symbolic repudiation of Trumpism, as well as nationalism and populism. For better or worse, Trump is the avatar for non-cosmopolitan White America. If Biden is re-elected, expect immigration to be further ramped up, like Canada or post-Brexit UK.

Source: @camiloreports on X

While the chance of RFK Jr. becoming president is slim to none, hypothetically he would be anti-acceleration and ease polarization, through bringing people together, even though the establishment detests him as much as Trump. I support RFK Jr., but if the only options are Trump and Biden, then I would tepidly back Trump, just as a middle figure to the establishment, as well as an obstructionist force within the State and ruling class. Polarization can be good, as the UK and Canada show that having a strong establishment center is much worse, though the elites are nowhere near as polarized as the people.

The Democratic anti-Trump coalition is not without vulnerabilities, as there is a growing divide between neoliberals and socialist sentiment. This divide will only increase, as inequality continues to get worse, the split over Israel, and especially if Biden is re-elected. I get the accelerationist position, that it is preferable to just have Democrats in office, as normie cons are forced to critique the system rather than play defense for ineffective GOP politicians. The best case scenario, from an accelerationist standpoint, might be Biden stepping down for Kamala Harris, who would be extremely incompetent, unlikeable, and especially if there is an economic collapse.

Source: @TKeithPreston1 on X

The Democrats are now the party of the dominant ruling class factions, including corporate America and the professional managerial class. They want a permanent one-party technocratic regime that maintains the GOP as token opposition to prevent genuine opposition from emerging. As the Democratic Party will come to dominate national politics, the GOP will further be exposed as irrelevant and feckless. For the liberal American system to be maintained, the establishment has to make some peace with the Right. This is why the GOP needs to either be radically transformed or totally defeated and made obsolete. There is a need for alternatives outside of electoral politics, such as building enclaves, patronage networks, and counter-elites.

While there are pros and cons to accelerationism, I am somewhat sympathetic to the passive accelerationist stance of Curtis Yarvin, where you just sit back and watch the chaos unfold. Mainstream Republicans are turning into accelerationists on transporting migrants to blue cities and sabotaging Biden’s compromise immigration bill. It is like they are starting to give up on America, so why not just make things worse for the other side? I am also inclined to say that Biden has been a sort of accidental accelerationist.

In contrast with the pro-acceleration stance of neo-reactionaries, Alex Jones or Tucker Carlson would say that the elites are causing chaos to justify consolidating power. It is not that the elites are accelerationists, but rather that they care less about the impact of their policies on the people. Despite the neuroticism of liberal journalists and hysteric hyperbolism from shrill pundits on MSNBC, the political elites, those at the very top, are generally confident in maintaining their power. However, they still don’t want any major disruptions to their power, and a Trump presidency is unpredictable.

I foresee a hybrid scenario where there is almost total institutional capture but a big decline in soft power among ordinary people and Red States viewing themselves as occupied territory. We are simultaneously going to see signs of global populist uprisings, as well as signs of elite consolidation, which makes these narratives of acceleration vs consolidation seem convoluted. Out of all the potential scenarios and outcomes of the 2024 election, all are dubious regarding benefits to Americans. As for acceleration, sometimes there isn’t some big backlash or rebirth but things just get worse and stay worse.