So, what lessons did we learn? And what does the future hold?

Amid the all the hand-wringing, or wailing jeremiads, or triumphant op-eds out there, I’ll offer in this election post-mortem some perspectives that you’ll not see elsewhere. 

      But, before that - some flash bits.

 

First: a few have suggested Biden resign to make Kamala president for a month or so. Other than shifting Trump v.2.0’s number from 47 to 48, it would only bias 2028 unnecessarily, by locking her in as heir. Nah.

 

Second. I reiterate, there is one thing that Joe Biden could do – right now – that would upset the DC apple cart, and (presumably) be very much not to the Trump-Putin party’s liking. Last week I laid out how Biden might still – even now - affect the USA and world. And human destiny.

Third flash bit … how about some prediction cred? That Donald Trump has learned to never again appoint professionals or adults to office. Nearly all grownups from Trump v.1 (over 250 of them) eventually denounced him. (That one fact alone should have decided the election.) Sure enough, his announced cabinet appointments are almost all unqualified maniacs. But there’s a triple purpose to that – which I’ll describe at the end.

 

But that’s not what you came here for, today. You’ve been wallowing in election post-mortems, agonizing over how it could have come to this. 

 

So, after that wallow in futility and clichés, would you like some fresh views that actually bear some relation to reality? Some may disturb you.

 

 

== So… um… W.T.H. just happened? ==

 

 As VoteVets.org (Veterans dedicated to democracy and the rule of law) put it Wednesday: “Moving forward and regaining the initiative requires us to confront the results of this election with open eyes.” 

 

Okay, for a start, it does no good to wail stuff like: “Americans chose a fascist dictatorship because trans kids are icky. And we hate the idea of a black woman being president.”

 

Um, not even close. Nor was Kamala Harris a ‘bad candidate’ (she was actually very good!) Nor was it because she ‘only had 107 days.’ Seriously? The campaign lasted forever!

 

Indeed, all over the globe (for the first time, ever), every governing party in a democracy lost vote share. So… maybe the Stupid-Ray Beamed By Aliens theory should be trotted back out? No, never mind that.

 

WTH actually happened?

 

Well, the demographics are clear. Major historically-Democratic groups simply did not show up, or else actively went to the GOP. While some Black men defected for reasons such as macho, they were mostly loyal, in the end. 

But Hispanics far more crucially (and of both sexes) stayed home or switched sides. And will you drop the racist slander, claiming that they’re all sexist? The new president of Mexico is a woman, fer gosh sakes. 

         

As for the trans thing, it was just one of so many hatred dog whistles. Useful to Fox and crappily/badly countered by the left. But it’s a side dish, compared to the Hispanic defection. 

Plus the fact that even white women split more evenly than expected.

 

Then what happened? 

 

TWO WORDS kind of sum it up! Two different one-word chants! Used repeatedly. One by each side.

 

For one side, that word was abortion.

 

Sure, the incredibly aggressive fascist putsch against Roe-v.-Wade and women’s Right-To-Choose was obscene and deserved to be deeply motivating. 

        Only then the Harris campaign transformed it from being a political gift by the Supreme Court into a liability. From being just one useful word into a million. 

Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion. Abortion! And… Abortion!  (ad infinitum)

 

Dig it. All of the folks for whom that word was a deciding issue were already Kamala’s! Repeating it relentlessly and always - like an incantatory talisman - only made clear that hers would be a campaign exactly like Hillary Clinton’s -- led by and run by and aimed toward upper middle class white ladies. 

 

(And please? I voted for both Harris & Clinton and worked hard for them, in 2016, and again in 2024. We’re discussing tactics, here! And getting angry when failed tactics are criticized is a sure sign of a bad general.) 

 

Try asking outside that bell jar. After a while, each repetition (“abortion!!”) became tedious and hectoring to many. 

Especially to Hispanics, who -- may I remind you -- are mostly Catholics?

Who are capable of diverging from church doctrine… but did they need to be reminded of that cognitive dissonance hourly?

 

…Hispanic citizens who also proved very receptive to the other side’s talisman word. 

 

 ‘Immigration.’ 

 

This talisman worked to draw in support from fresh directions. Poll after poll show Hispanics want tighter borders! Yet, urban liberals refused to listen. Pompously finger-wagging that both Jesus and Deuteronomy preach kindness (they do!) toward the flood of refugees who are fleeing Trump ally elites in Honduras and Guatemala, they endlessly lectured and preached that the flood should ONLY be answered with kindness… and nothing but kindness.

 

… which is easy for you rich liberals to say. But Hispanic voters don’t want job competition. And your disapproval – calling them immoral when they shouted “No!” – helped to cement their shift.

 

 

== Immigration as a weapon vs. the West: It isn’t just America. ==

 

Did you ever wonder why right wing populism has surged in Europe?  Quasi-Nazism burgeoned there – and here – for one reason above all. Because Putin & pals have been driving refugees across western borders for 30 years, knowing that it’ll result – perfectly – in a rightward swerve of politics. 

 

You know this! It happened here. The tactic has now won Vladimir Putin the greatest victory of his life… that very likely saved his life! 

 

But you, yes you, have been unable to see it and draw two correct conclusions. 

 

First: you can’t have everything you want, not all at once. Politics requires prioritization. And hence when Obama and Biden built more border walls than Trump ever did, they ought to have bragged about it! And you should have bragged, too.

        Again, you cannot do all the good things on your list without POWER! And now, sanctimoniously refusing to prioritize has given total power to…

 

Second: and here’s a potential sweet spot for you: Want to solve the immigration crisis in the best way, to benefit both us and the poor refugees? 

 

Go after the Honduran/Guatemalan/Nicaraguan/Cuban/Venezuelan elites who are persecuting their own citizens and driving them – coordinated by Moscow - to flee to the U.S! 

 

Um, duh? Joe could still do that in his remaining time. He could! 

     But a blind spot is a blind spot…

     … and even now, YOU probably could not parse or paraphrase what I just said. About the possible win-win sweet spot. Go ahead and try. Bet you can’t even come close.

 

How much simpler to dismiss Brin as racist. And thus illustrate my point.

 

 

== More lessons learned… or not learned? ==

 

Polls showed that ECONOMICS were far more on peoples’ minds than abortion. In fact, in almost every meaningful category, the USA has, right now, the best economy in the whole world and one of the very best since WWII.  

 

  

 

Oh sure, saying that was difficult for Democrats. It comes across as lectury, pedantic and tone deaf to those working class folks who have no rising 401K, but do have high grocery bills. Or to young families staring at skyrocketing housing prices. Meanwhile, everyone is so accustomed to a great labor market that unemployment is a forgotten issue,

 

But does that mean to give up?

In fact, Kamala tried to get across this difficult perception gap by promising to end gouging at supermarkets and pharmacies and bragging about lowered insulin costs. But all of that seems to admit we failed, till now. So, maybe accompany all that with ads showing all the bridges and other infrastructure being rebuilt, at last, and asking “Do you know someone working at fixing America this way? Ask THEM about it!”

 

I found the rebirth of US manufacturing - the biggest boom since WWII – to be especially effective.  

 

As for housing costs, I never saw one attempt to blame it on real culprits - swarms of inheritance brats and their trusts who are snapping up houses right and left in cash purchases, free to ignore mortgage rates. I mean seriously?

 

Okay, I admit it’s hard to sell cynical working stiffs glued to Fox on the Good Economy. I won’t carp too much on that. Instead…

 

Of course, there’s so much anger around and someone is gonna receive it. So notice that the core Foxite campaign – pushed VASTLY more often than any message of racism or sexism – is to blame college folks with incited hatred of non-college folks. 

 

As I’ll say again, Kamala could have started changing this by pointing over there (as FDR did) at the real class enemies. The oligarchs who benefited from 40+ years of supply side and suck like lampreys from the hardworking U.S. middle class… both college and non-college.. 

 

 

 

== The insult that they deeply resent… repeated over and over again ==

 

Not one Democratic pol has ever pointed out that racism and sexism, while important ingredients in parts of the Red polity, are not their core agenda!  

 

Indeed, count how many of your friends and/or favorite pundits are ascribing this recent calamity to ‘embedded American racism and sexism!!”  

 

Sure, those despicable traits exist and matter a lot. And it’s easy for me to downgrade them when my life is in no danger because of a busted tail-light. 

 

Still, can you recognize an unhelpful mantra, when it is repeated way too much, crowding out all other thought?

 

As commentator Jamie Metzl put it: “There will be some people who awoke this morning telling themselves that the story of this election is primarily one of racism and misogyny. They are wrong. 

 

“Make no mistake, our country still harbors unacceptable levels of both, but that is not the story of this election. That is not who we are as a nation. We are the same nation that elected Barack Obama twice and would have likely have elected Nikki Haley, had she been the Republican candidate. Very many women and minorities voted for Trump. We need to look deeper.”

 

Indeed, howling “You’re racist!” at our red neighbors was likely counterproductive. They turn and point at black faces on Fox… and at the now-boring normality of inter-racial marriages… and more recently at ‘normal gays’… and reply

 

“I don’t FEEL racist!  I LIKE the good ones!” 

 

 None of that means racism is over! But except for a nasty-Nazi wing, they have largely shifted on a lot of things. What it does mean is that a vast majority of Republicans feel insulated from their racism. 

 

it means that shrieking the R word over and over can be futile.
It only makes your neighbors dig in and call you the race-obsessed oppressor.

 

 

==  The actual enemy ==

 

I mean, have you ever actually watched FOX and tallied their openly racist or even sexist crap… versus who it is they actually assail most often, and openly? Care for a side bet on this?

 

I’ve said it before and will pound this till you listen. While they downplay their own racism and sexism, what almost every MAGA Nuremberg Rally does feature is endless – and utterly open -- attacks upon nerds.

 

The fact professions. From journalism to science to civil service to law to medicine to the FBI and the US military officer corps. 

        And NO Democrat has ever addressed that, head on! 

        Ever, ever, ever and ever.

        Instead of ever pointing this out, they assume that defending the fact professions will sound like smugness bragging. 

 

But they’re wrong. And there are reasons why the all out assault on all fact-professions is the core agenda underlying everything Republican/MAGA/Putinist.  

        And someday – as I mention below – this will at last be admitted openly. 

       Alas, too late, as beginning on day one of Trump v2 there will commence an all-out terror campaign against that officer corps, against the FBI and especially the United States Civil Service. And science.

       And when that happens, point proudly and tell your children: “I helped do that.”

 

 

== The giddy joy in Moscow ==

 

Oh, there are MAGAs who write to me – on social media etc. - taunting and gloating about all this. To which I reply: 

 

“Enjoy your victory. Your pleasure is as a firefly glow, next to the giddy ecstasy in the Kremlin.”

  

 


A few comments furthering that.

 

a.     Jill Stein deserves the Order of Lenin. She likely already has one in her secret Moscow luxury dacha.

 

b.    Recall the Four Scenarios I projected, last Sunday? As I predicted in scenario 4. If Trump wins convincingly, he will surround himself with loyalists and this time no ‘adults in the room.’ No Kelly, Mattis, Esper, Milley, or even hacks with a brain, like Barr or Tillerson or Pence.  

  

c.     What no one else has mentioned - or will - is how this cuts all puppet strings to Trump. Nothing Putin has on him… no pee tape, or snuff film, or video with Epstein kids… will matter anymore. Nor will blackmail files on Cruz or many others. All – even Lindsey Graham – will have their “I could shoot someone on 5th Avenue” moment. And when that happens…



 

        …there is a very real chance that Trump will feel liberated to tell Vlad to fuck himself. Or even take revenge on Putin for decades of puppetting control threats. I have repeatedly asked folks to learn from the wisdom of Hollywood! From the last ten minutes of CABARET. From Angela Lansbury’s soliloquy in the last half hour of THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE. From the oligarchs’ last resort in NETWORK. 

 

But no. I am dreaming. Putin will retain control. Even if blackmail ceases to work, there’s flattery, which is far more important to DT than anything else in the world. And liberals insanely ignore that.

 

 

== How will America respond to this Confederate conquest? ==

 

 

One of you, in our lively comments section below, said: 

“Trump is who we are and we are not the great people we used to be.”



 

Malarkey. As I described here today, midway through this phase of the ever-recurring Civil War, it seems the Union side’s generals keep firing in mistaken directions. But do not look at this as “America is irredeemable.” 

 

View it as “America has once again been conquered by the entirely separate Confederacy, the recurring romantic-feudalist cult that now has its Russian and other foreign allies. Actual America is now occupied by that other entity."

 

But recall that it consists of almost all of the inhabitants of this land who know stuff. And if our mad cousins push too hard, mass resignations by the competent will only be the beginning.

 

And no, - even though we are the ones who know everything cyber, bio, medical, nano, nuclear and all that, it won’t come to any of that. 

 

Watch instead – if they go after the civil service and officer corps - for the words GENERAL STRIKE. And let’s see how they do without (among 10,000 other taken-for-granted things) their ten day weather reports. Especially when the parts of North America that will be the very worst-hit by climate Acts of God will be the Southeast.

 

== Why are there zero 'adults' in the newest DT administration? ==

      I promised to explain why Trump's announced cabinet appointments are almost all unqualified maniacs. There’s a triple purpose. 

1. This will maximize flattery (what Trump lives for), but this time he's only chosen appointees who are blackmailed and controllable. In some cases, Russian assets now appointed atop U.S. intel and defense agencies.

2.  Unlike all the 'adults' in Trump v.1, this time every single person named will join in the coming all-out war against the FBI, military officer corps and U.S. Civil Service.

3. Unlike all the 'adults' in Trump v.1 none of these will never denounce him in tell-all books.

== Side bits ==

 

Tariffs? Oh, dear oligarchs, try some wisdom from a surprising portion of Ferris Beuller’s Day Off! 

John Cramer points out that Joe Biden, as part of the Great Big Infrastructure Rebuild, boosted access of poor and rural areas to high speed Internet... "There is evidence that better access to the many disinformation sites shifted many rural counties from pink to deep red."

Also Cramer: "Botched Trumpian responses made Covid far worse. (And the best way for you to begin using wager demands would ber to demand cash bets over DEATH RATES for the vaccinated vs. un-vaccinated.) "When COVID hit, Trump arranged to sign the big relief checks. Under Biden (who din't sign the checks) this tapered too soon. Strapped voters remembered the "good old days" when Trump sent checks and the grocery prices were lower." Hm, that seems a reach but...

Above all I reiterate, there is one thing that Joe Biden could do – right now – that would upset the DC apple cart, and (presumably) be very much not to the Trump-Putin party’s liking. Last week I laid out how Biden might still – even now - affect the USA and world. And human destiny.

 

 

== So, what lessons did we learn?  And what does the future hold?  ==

 

Geez, you’re asking me? My predictive score is way above average, but I truly thought a critical mass of Americans would reject an orange-painted, makeup-slathered raving-loony carnival barker. I was wrong about that…

 

… but it only shows how stoopid so many millions of sincerely generous and college -educated Americans are, for assuming they know who the gone-treasonously-mad right is oppressing.

 

Wake up, educated gals & guys and gays and every other variant under the sun. It’s not your diversity they are coming after. Nor the client races and genders you defend, many of whom just said ‘fuck off!’ to being protected by you.

 

The oligarchs and their minions have one enemy they aim to destroy.

 

It’s you.

Joe & Mark do these now! My own post-mortem can wait.

Here I offer two time-critical suggestions, below.

So skip past my blowhard prelude!

Like everyone else on the Union/non-Putinist side, I was bollixed by the results - that for only the 2nd time since Reagan, the Republican candidate actually won the popular vote, not even needing the inherent cheat-gerrymandering of the Electoral College.

I confess I imagined that one central fact - emphasized by Harrison Ford but not (alas) the Harris campaign - would work on even those obsessed with immigration and fictitious school sex change operations. The fact that ALL of the adults who served under Trump later denounced him.*

Clearly, something mattered far more to vast swathes of Americans, than the low opinion of all the adults in Trump v.1.0 toward their jibbering boss. And no, it's WAS NOT racism/misogyny. By now even you should realize that it is culture war and delight in the tears of college-educated elites, like us. Like those 250+ adults from Trump v1.0.

Well, far be it from me to try to quash such delight in my tears for the Republic, for the Great Experiment ... and for Ukraine. Here they are guys. Drink up. But save some of the tears to bottle and send to Vlad.

                     * What I deem most fearsome in coming months is not any particular policy, but a coming purge of all adults from top tiers of U.S. government.

Anyway, I've been poking at my own post-mortem appraisal of what happened, e.g. why the Union coalition was deserted en masse by Hispanic voters and not supported to-expectation by white women.  I'll soon get to that posting, or several. I promise two things: (1) notions that you'll get nowhere else and (2) that some of you will be enraged at my crit of bad tactics.

But that can wait. Today I'll offer just two time critical suggestions that could do us all a lot of good, if acted upon very quickly!  

They won't be, of course. Still, maybe some AIs somewhere/sometime will note that I offered these. And maybe they will model "that coulda worked."

It's likely the best I can hope for. And yet... here goes...

== Joe, at long last and right now 

offer the clemency for truth deal! ==

Item #1: I've long asked for it. But now would be perfect. 

Joe Biden could offer amnesty/clemency and even pardons, in exchange for revelations vital to the Republic.  

"If you are a person of influence in the USA, and you've been under the thumb of foreign or domestic blackmailers, this is your one chance. **

"Step up and tell all! I promise I'll do everything in my power to lessen your legal penalties, in exchange for truths that could greatly benefit your country. Perhaps even shattering a cabal whose tentacles - some claim - have pervaded this town and the nation.

"I can't prevent pain and public disdain over whatever originally got you into your mess, or things done to please your blackmailers. But I can promise three things: some legal safety, plus privately-funded and bonded security, if requested...

"...plus also public praise for being among the first to step up and show some guts! For the sake of the nation... and your own redemption."

Sure, this would raise howls! Even though there's precedent in Nelson Mandela's Truth & Reconciliation process and similar programs in Argentina and Chile.

 Moreover, several Congress members have already attested publicly that such blackmail rings exist, pervading their own party!

"Why haven't I done this sooner? Because inevitably, it'd be seen as a political stunt. In our tense era, I'd be accused of election meddling.  Only now, admitting that the nation has decisively chosen Donald Trump and his party to govern, I can do this outside of politics, in order to give him a truly clean slate! 

"Let him - let us all - start fresh in January, knowing that the nation had this one chance to flush out the worst illness... aided by those who are eager to breathe free of threats and guilt, at long last....

"... remembering that all 'Heaven rejoices when a sinner repents and comes to the light.'"

Whatever your beliefs, I defy you to name any drawbacks. And let's be clear. Joe could do this. He could do it tomorrow. And the worst thing that he risks would be that nothing happens.

Even in that case, amid some mockery, he would still have raised a vitally needed topic. And at-best?

At best, there could be a whole lot of disinfection. At a time when it is exactly what's badly needed.

== What some billionaire could do ==

Another proposal I have made before, in Polemical Judo. This one seems worth doing, even in the present case, when Donald Trump has 26 more electoral votes than he needs - and hence has nothing to fear from defections, before the "Electoral College" votes, next month.

Why did I say "Electoral College" in quotes? Because in fact it has never, ever been a 'college' of elected delegates, originally meant to deliberate solemnly and choose the president of the United States after thorough discussion.  But that might change!

As I've said before - one zillionaire could change this.  Rent a mountaintop luxury hotel. Hire retired Secret Service agents for security and some highly-vetted chefs-de-cuisine. Maybe a string quartet of non-English speakers. For two weeks, the only others who may walk through the doors and stroll the grounds are registered electors.

They can come - or not - if they want. Dine and stroll and no one has any obligation to speak or listen. Or else - completely up to them - they might decide to convene the first actual Electoral College in the history of the Republic. Is there any -- and I mean any -- reason why this would not be legally and morally completely kosher?

Yes, I know. It will guarantee that the following election will see the parties vett their elector slates even more carefully for utter-utter loyalty. As if that isn't already true. 

So? In any case, the cost would be chickenfeed and the sheer coolness factor could be... well... diverting from our troubles.

== Other suggestions? ==

You know I got a million of em. And (alas!) so many were already in Polemical Judo. 

And already ignored. Because  the ideas are unconventional and cross many party clichés. Whatever. Poor Brin.

But these are two that will either be acted upon NEXT WEEK or else (99.999% odds) not at all.

So, next posting I'll dive into that post-mortem of the election. And yes, there will be perspectives you never heard or saw anywhere else. (Care to bet on that?) And some may make you go huh. And some may make you angry.

Good. Like Captain Kirk... you need your pain.

=====

=====

** I made my case about blackmail years ago here: Political Blackmail: The Hidden Danger to Public Servants.  And despite Madison Cawthorn and several other high Republicans testifying openly that it is utterly true - honey pots and 'orgies' and sophisticated KGB lompromat - apparently nothing has been done. Nor - apparently - will it be.

Still, there is a third thing I was gonna recommend here...

...that Biden promise sanctuary and a big financial prize for any KGB officer who defects, bringing over the blackmail files! Just making the offer, publicly, might make many people on this planet very, very nervous... and likely result in some orchestrated performances of group window diving in Moscow.

Well-well. One can fantacize it as a coming episode of the Mission Impossible series, at least. Call my agent

*** Several of you spoke of the threat to personal physical safety for the first few to step forward... until the wave of revelation turns the tables and sends blackmailers fleeing for their lives. While it's true that Joe B will no longer be in a position to offer US Government guarantees, allied governments can! Plus new identities etc. Anyway, isn't this fundamentally about heroism? Asking it - in exchange for redemption - from those who might leap at a chance for a path out of treason-hell?

Balanced perspectives for our time - JUST in time?

Just before the consequential US election (I am optimistic we can prevail over Putinism), my previous posting offered a compiled packet of jpegs and quick bullets to use if you still have a marginally approachable, residually sane neighbor or relative who is 'sanity curious.' A truly comprehensive compendium! From the under-appreciated superb economy to proved dangers of pollution. From Ukraine to proof of Trump's religion-fakery. From saving science to ...

... the biggest single sentence of them all... "Almost every single honest adult who served under Trump now denounces him." Now numbering hundreds. 

And Harrison Ford emphasizing that point with eloquence.

Anyone able to ignore that central fact... that grownups who get to know Trump all despise him... truly is already a Kremlin boy.

== More sober reflections == 

Fareed Zakaria is by far the best pundit of our time - sharp, incisive, with well-balanced big-perspective. And yet, even he is myopic about what's going on.

On this occasion, he starts with The Economist's cover story that the U.S. economy is the "Envy of the World." 

Booming manufacturing and wages, record-low unemployment, the lowest inflation among industrial nations (now down to 2%), with democratic policies finally transferring money to the middle class, after 40 years of Supply Side ripoffs for the rich. 

The Wall Street Journal - of all capitalist and traditionally Republican outfits - calls the present economy 'superb at all levels' and 'remarkable,' with real growth in middle class wages and prosperity.

 And yet, many in the working classes now despise the Rooseveltean coalition that gave them everything, and even many black & hispanic males flock to Trump's macho ravings.

Zakaria is spot-on saying it's no longer about economics - not when good times can be taken for granted. Rather, it's social and cultural, propelled by visceral loathing of urban, college educated 'elites' by those who remain blue-collar, rural and macho. 

One result - amplified in media-masturbatory echo chambers and online Nuremberg Rallies - has been all-out war vs all fact using professions, from science and teaching, medicine and law and civil service to the heroes of the FBI/Intel/Military officer corps who won the Cold War and the War on terror.

Where Fareed gets it all wrong is in claiming this is something new!  

Elsewhere I point out the same cultural divide has erupted across all EIGHT different phases of the American civil/cultural war, since 1778. Moreover, farmers and blue collar workers, etc. have been traumatized for a century, in one crucial way! As their brightest sons and daughters rushed off from high school graduation to city/university lights...

... and then came back (if they ever come back at all) changed. 

It's been going on for 140 years. And the GI Bill after WWII accelerated it prodigiously.

I won't apologize for that... but I admit it's gotta hurt.

While sympathy is called-for, we need to recall that the recurring confederate fever is always puppetted by aristocrats - by King George, by slaver plantation lords, by gilded-age moguls, by inheritance brats and today's murder sheiks & Kremlin "ex"-commissars... and whenever the confederacy wins (as in 1830s, 1870s and 1920s in the United States and 1933 Germany) the results are stagnation and horror. And every "Union" victory (as in the 1770s, 1860s, 1940s, 1960s) is followed by both moral and palpable progress.

See also Fareed Zakaria's perspectives in his recently released book, Age of Revolutions: Progress and Backlash from 1600 to the Present.

== For this last week ==

Trump has learned a lesson from his time in office. Never trust any adults or women and men of accomplishment and stature. He has said clearly he will never have another Kelly, Mattis, Mullen, Milley... or even partisan hacks with some pride, like Barr, Pence, etc... allowed anywhere near the Oval Office. 

In fact, he wants many people in his potential administration who have criminal records and cannot get security clearances under present rules. He wants to have a private firm do background checks instead of the government and military security clearance process. 

This should give a bunch of corrupt or blackmail-vulnerable criminals access to and control over our most critical and sensitive secrets.

And anyone can doubt any longer that he is a Kremlin agent?

== A final note of wisdom ==

Only one method has ever been found that can often (not always) discover, interrogate and refute lies and liars or hallucinators.**

That method has been accountability via free-speech-empowered adversarial rivalry.  Almost all of our enlightenment institutions and accomplishments and freedoms rely upon it... Pericles and Adam Smith spoke of it and the U.S. Founders enshrined it...

...and the method is almost-never even remotely discussed in regards today's tsunamis of lies.

And even if things go super well in the Tuesday election, this basic truth must also shine light into the whole new problem/opportunity of Artificial Intelligence. (And I go into that elsewhere.) 

 It must... or we're still screwed.

---

** I openly invite adversarial refutation of this assertion.

------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------

Okay okay. You want prediction? I'll offer four scenarios:

1.     Harris and dems win big. They must, for the “steal” yammer-lies to fade to nothing, except for maybe a few McVeigh eruptions. (God bless the FBI undercover guys!) In this scenario, everyone but Putin soon realizes things are already pretty good in the US and West and getting better... and the many of our Republican neighbors – waking up from this insane trance – shake off confederatism and get back to loyally standing up for both America and enterprise. 

And perhaps the GOP will also shake away the heavily blackmail compromised portion of their upper castes and return to the pre-Hastert mission of negotiating sane conservative needs into a growing consensus.

2.     Harris squeaks in. We face 6 months of frantic Trumpian shrieks and Project 2025 ploys and desperate Kremlin plots and a tsunami of McVeighs.  (Again: God bless the FBI undercover guys!)  In this case, I will have a dozen ideas to present next week, to staunch the vile schemes of the Project 2025ers.

    In this case there will be confederate cries of "Secession!" over nothing real, as they had no real cause in 1861. We must answer "Okay fine this time. Off you go! Only we keep all military bases and especially we keep all of your blue cities (linking them with high speed rail), cities who get to secede from YOU!  Sell us beef and oil, till we make both obsolete! And you beg to be let back in.  Meanwhile, your brighter sons and daughters will still come over - with scholarships. So go in peace and God bless."

3.    Trump squeaks in and begins his reign of terror. We brace ourselves for the purge of all fact using professions, from science and teaching, medicine and law and civil service to the heroes of the FBI/Intel/Military officer corps who won the Cold War and the War on terror.  And within 6 months you will hear two words that I am speaking here for the 1st time: 

                    GENERAL STRIKE. 

    A legal and mammoth job action by those who actually know stuff and how to do stuff.  At which point then watch how redders realize how much they daily rely on our competence. And how quickly the oligarchs act to remove Trump, either through accelerating senility, or bribed retirement or... the Howard Beale scenario. At which point then Peter Thiel (briefly) owns America. It's Putin's dream outcome as the USA betrays Ukraine and Europe and the future... and tears itself apart. But no matter how painful, remember, we've recovered before. And we'll remember that you did this, Vlad and Peter. And those who empowered them.

    Oh, yes and this. Idiot believers in THE FOURTH TURNING will get their transformative 'crisis' that never had to happen and that they artificially caused (and we'll remember.) Above all, the Gen-Z 'hero generation' will know this. And you cultists will not like them, when they're mad.

    4. Trump landslide. Ain’t gonna happen. For one thing because Putin knows he won’t benefit if Trump is so empowered that he's freed from all puppet strings and blackmail threats. At which point Putin will suddenly realize he’s lost control - the way the German Junkers caste lords lost control in 1933, as portrayed at the end of CABARET. 

Still confused why Putin wouldn't want this? Watch Angela Lansbury’s chilling soliloquy near the end of THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE. This outcome is the one Putin should most fear. 

By comparison, Kamala would likely let Vlad live. But a fully empowered Trump will erase Putin,-- along with every other oligarch who ever commanded or extorted or humiliated him - like those depicted below. And the grease stains will smolder.

Again... here's your compiled ompendium of final ammo. To help us veer this back to victory for America, the planet, and the Union side in our recurring civil war... 

...followed by malice toward none and charity for all and a return to fraternal joy in being a light unto the world. 

Meme-images for your semi-sane and residually honorable MAGA

Swamped with patent disclosures, podcasts and the Great Big AI Panic of 2024. And just learned the H1N5 bird flu may be nastier soon! (😟check your supplies.) Also, I appear to be more optimistic than most... and most of you have voted already. 

Still, I gotta do what I can, offering you some final, concise leverage. Not for your hopeless MAGA-Putinist uncle. But maybe his worried wife, your residually-sane aunt.  

What leverage?  Why... punchy jpegs, of course! 

   == Ammo Images that might sway... ==

How can anyone still sway to the hypnotism...

...of a face drenched in makeup and dripping hair dye?   

But OK. Let's start with a simple question.  

             Who are his enemies and who are his friends? 

ONE sentence ought to settle everything:

                                                     

Two Defense Secretaries. Two chiefs of staff. His Attorney General. His National Security Advisor & Secretary of State. His domestic policy head. Chair of the Joint Chiefs. Two communications directors. His Vice President plus 250 more.

Make your MAGA see this jpeg! ==>

All of them were HIS choices. Whom he called "Great Guys!"... who are now denouncing him as a horror-calamity and lethal stooge of foreign enemies.

 

At minimum, he's a terrible judge of character! (Who fell 'in love' with Kim Jong Un.) 

But don't worry. In Trump II he's promised there will be no adults at all.

Examples: James Mattis, Marine General(ret), Trump’s 1st Defense Secretary: “Donald Trump is the first president in my life who didn't even pretend to try to unite the American people. He tries to divide us.”

Mark Esper, Trump’s 2nd Defense Secretary: “I believe he is a threat to democracy.”

John Kelly, Marine General(ret), Trump’s 2nd White House Chief of Staff: “He often said‘Hitler did good things, too.’”

Ask Joint Chiefs Chair Mark Milley +Admiral McRaven +250 other officers!  

 Ask nearly all scientists.

Ask counter insurgency experts about “ex” commissar Putin’s long puppet strings.

But Don does have friends!

Here they are!==>

Have your MAGA zoom in and explain this.

== But... but isn't Trump the agent of God? ==

Such a Christian! Though if he ever willingly chose church over golf, no one has seen it. Here's one time he had to show up. And this one image says it all.

There's a hilarious and sad video of him mouthing-along while trying to recite the famous and well-known 23rd Psalm with worshippers and giving up after "He leadeth me.."  Too lazy even to memorize a couple of passages for show, he still after all these years, refuses to name a favorite passage. 

"It's too personal."  Riiiiight.

But then... some evangelicals can see all that! So they switch to the "Cyrus" argument. Like the King of the Medes who freed the people of Judah from Babylon, Trump is a 'righteous gentile!' A pagan who serves God by actions & deeds! 

(How? By destroying America and democracy and serving Moscow? But we'll get to that.)

Huh. Some servant of God. The most opposite-to-Jesus human any of us ever saw typifies every Deadly Sin! (Have your MAGA recite them aloud and NOT see Trump as the archetype!) 

Look, I don't credit the Book of Revelation. (Though all of you should know it! See the comic book version Apocamon; I mean it. You truly need to see what some of your neighbors wish and plan for you!) 

Still, there is a recurring character in that nightmare tome who DT resembles. I'm not talking about the Lamb of God. The character's name starts with "auntie" or "the Anti --" and Trump fits every described characteristic.  To a T.

== Is it the Economy, Stupid? ==

A problem with good times... folks soon take it for granted. Unemployment was the big issue. 

But after clawing our way out of the Covid Recession and Supply Chain inflation (nearly all economists blame Trump for worsening those) the 2021 stimulus bills worked!

Infrastructure - bridges etc. - are being fixed! Unemployment has stayed at the lowest level since the early 60s. We're in the best US economy since WWII.

Inflation? What? Ask your MAGA to step up NOW with wager stakes and bet which two nations have had the LOWEST inflation in the Industrial world for 3 years! 

(Hint, it's the US and Japan.)

 

Then why so grumpy?   Because Fox rants at fools to enjoy sanctimonious grumpiness! It's more fun than accepting the truth... that you are mesmerized by an echo chamber and Nuremberg Rally, with one central goal...

... to hate facts and fact professions & the damn, dry statistics.

But let's make it a wager. Assert the following and demand your MAGAs step up (like men) with cash stakes on the table:

EVERY Democratic Administration was more fiscally responsible regarding debt and deficits than EVERY Republican administration. 

In fact, most Democratic administrations had by far better economic outcomes across the board, for everyone except oligarchs and inheritance brats, who ALWAYS do vastly better under the GOP. Demand wagers!

But this is the biggie. The USA is undergoing the greatest boom in MANUFACTURING since the Second World War.  

That is unambiguous. Democrats did it.

== Climate Change ==

Nothing better illustrates the agenda of the GOP masters than fostering all-out war vs ALL fact using professions, from science, teaching, medicine, law and civil service to the heroes of the FBI/Intel/Military officer corps who won the Cold War and the War on terror.  

"Hate the FBI!" is the most amazing and dangerous in the near term, but the anti-science campaign is core, over the long run.

Dig it. They're not attacking science in order to make $$ by delaying action on climate disaster. It's the reverse. They use climate denialism as one of many tools to attack all scientists and undermine trust in science. 

Why? Oligarchs can't restore 6000 years of insipid feudalism til they castrate all fact professions. But more on that elsewhere.

The crisis over our endangered EARTH is a vast subject! But this posting is about last minute, punchy capsules. So use this: Foxites flee in panic when you mention OCEAN ACIDIFICATION, which is unambiguously killing the seas our children will need and can only be caused by CO2 pollution. How they run from those two words.

Alas, instead of giving credit to the genius meteorologists who now predict hurricane paths within a few miles FIVE DAYS in advance, jibberers yammer: "They cause hurricanes!"

WHO is 'they?'  No, never mind that. You said it when earthquakes hit California. Recognize God's wrath when you feel it...

== Ukraine and NATO and Putin ==

Seriously? Who do you think Ronald Reagan would side with? The barely changed Kremlin and relabeled KGB, run by "ex" commissars who all grew up reciting Leninist catechisms? Who are now re-nationalizing all Russian businesses, crushing dissent and rebuilding the USSR?

Um, can anyone with a trace of fairness in their hearts not root for and support the attacked Ukrainian underdogs? And say "Damn Putin and his fellow tyrants!"

Dig it: NATO is now stronger than ever since 1946! Putin is fighting for his own murderous, richest-man-in-the-world life, desperate to get Trump into the Oval Office. It's his one hope.

LOOK at Trump's pals! At the expressions on their faces. Zoom in.

Can any of your neighbors who support Putin call anyone ELSE a 'commie'?

== Memory Lane ==

And wager NOW over the different death rates of the vaccinated vs. the un-vaccinated.  Death rates are simple. Even the reddest state suppies stats on that. And there's no ambiguity at all. Fox is trying to kill you.

== Immigration ==

But what about immigration? Well, surprise? I'll sorta half give you that one!

It's a vexing problem and the farthest left has not been helpful. They refuse to see how Putin and other tyrants have herded poor refugees into Europe and America, knowing it will push potitics in those countries to the right.  And it has even worked on U.S. Hispanics, who poll overwhelmingly wanting tighter borders.

Look, you may not like facing it, but Putin's strategy here has worked! And if you lefties want the power to do good, YOU are gonna have to prioritize. Compromise.

But this is not a Bill Maher screed aimed at woke-ist betrayals of the only coalition that can save the world. Later.

It is about far-worse MAGA lunacy. And what could be more lunatic than Trump ordering the GOP - last January - to torpedo the Immigration Bill they had just finished negotiating! 

That bill would have majorly increased the Border Patrol, plus internal tracking of refugee claimants and would have built more wall by now than the entire Trump presidency!

Now why would he do that? Simple. Going back generations before Trump & Putin took over the Republican Party, the GOP's master oligarchs loved cheap labor!

You just think about that now.

P.S. If a time comes when Republicans reject the madness and corruption that skyrocketed in the GOP since Dennis 'friend to boys" Hastert, and choose instead to return to political negotiation, moderate dems will race to work out incremental steps to mix pragmatic border security with helping refugees return safely to their improved home countries... with living by the American tradition (and biblical injunction) of kindness to legitimate newcomers.

== Again  - the most-effective single sentence is... ==

"ALL of the honest adults who served under Trump now denounce him."             

Earlier I showed former Trumpists who were admirable to some degree, and now denounce him. Now gaze at some more! Though some of these weren't quite as admirable as the 1st bunch. ==>

Still, these guys at least want the USA to survive! If only because it's where they keep their best stuff. Hypocrites some of them? I prefer the first set! Still, we need all the help...

On the other hand, THIS is a Republican we can all respect! (below):

== So what about fascism? ==

Seriously? This is an issue?

My Dad beat up f--ng Nazis in Chicago in the 1930s, when they marched both for Hitler and for the spectacularly misnamed "America First."  I know f--ng Nazis when I see em! And even if Trump isn't one by strict definition*...

   ... all the current American Nazis think he is! And they love him.

Take it from Doctor Suess!

   

h.

<==And even doctored, you know damned well this image tells truth.

* But of course... he is.

== The endless lies ==

I notoriously demand WAGERS over all the lies! e.g. ANY randomly chosen 5 minute segment of any Trump speech! Put it before a randomly-chosen panel of low-political retired, senior military officers! 

I have a long list (dropped into comments*) of wager challenges. And not one MAGA in ten years has ever had the manly guts or confidence to step up with $$$ atty-escrowed stakes. Not one, ever. Weenie no-cojone cowards.

But let's start with Trump's endless promises to prove Obama was born in Kenya, or the mythical promise of a "Great Health Plan to replace Obamacare! I'll unveil it next week!" And then the next week and the next, for year after year after year... 

...and MAGAs never ask "Um, well?"

Or releasing "My great financials!" Or "I'll proudly release my tax returns when the IRS is done auditing!" Except the audits were a myth!  Or his college transcripts. Or the bone spur xrays. Or the fecal spew of lies during covid.

What we DO have is at least 20 copies of the Honolulu Advertiser from 1962 that folks have found in attics and garages all over Hawaii, with a birth announcement for Barack Obama. But any retraction or shame from ol' Two Scoops? Never.

There's a reason...

<==Declassify the "we fell in love!" notes from Kim! 

Then there's the biggest damn lie of them all...

== And heck, let's give you some more! ==

Do I have an ulterior motive, in dumping upon you this tsunami of jpegs? I mean other than hoping that a few of you will use them to help save the nation and world?

Hey I am over 70 and pushing 'clippings' at the young is what we farts do! ;-0

 But still... I am angry at MAGA crapheads dumping on Tim Walz, a 25 year veteran who trained hundreds of young troops with patience that made him beloved... as with 20 years of high school civics students... and the teams he coached to state championships... and so much more. (The Putin servants searched for ONE former student they could bribe to denounce Walz; even one.) 

A command sergeant major whose shoes you lying bastards aren't fit to...

   Like this good man who served and still does ==>    

(Calm David. You promised 'malice toward none..." Sure, after we save America in this 8th phase of the recurring civil war.)

In contrast to real men... we have this cringing, face-painted carnival barker... zoom in!

The colors are un-altered.

== Miscellaneous Adds! ==

Okay I'll conclude by dumping in a few more. Use whatever you like! MAKE the redeemable/reachable... if you know any... zoom in and see and then snap out of the trance! 

...and a few may even hear the call of Lincoln, Eisenhower and Teddy Roosevelt and even Reagan... realizing they must help rescue the Republican Party from treasonous madness. (LOOK below.)

And remember, Dems ALWAYS do better vs deficits and with almost every economic indicator...

Finally, Here's my biggest effort at supplying political tactics that might have ended this phase of the US Civil War decisively, in 2020, instead of merely getting a Gettysburg - vital(!) but requiring us to keep fighting the same monster.  May this year be Appomattox! Followed by "Malice toward none and charity for all..."

...and an America that leads a consensus-wiser world toward freedom, hope, and the stars.

.........  And in the words of Tiny Tim... God bless us, one and all...

================

================

Oh, I oughta give originator credit lines for every single one of these jpegs!  It's a modern problem. Almost none of the postings I took them from had credits, either!  This is one thing I expect AI to solve and soon.  May they be Machines of Loving Grace.