It occurs to me that we may not be seeing the whole picture. Trump may not be our real enemy any more. Things may be even worse than anyone thought.
OK, a little context: currently, Trump alone technically has the power to become a dictator. He can ignore Congress and the courts because he holds power over the police and the military. He can round up the Democratic leadership and have them executed, and no one short of a full-on military coup would be able to stop him. I wrote that three days ago, and Vance confirmed the very next day that such was their thoughts exactly.
Except… what if it’s not Trump anymore?
We have this image of Trump as the man in power… but there’s cognitive dissonance at play here. Trump is a 78-year old moron with mental illness and possibly dementia.
Why do we think that he’s the one controlling things?
Go back in time to 2021. Biden has won the presidency, but it’s clear he’s aging. The right-wing propaganda machine is more powerful than ever. The republicans are still slaved to Trump, who is still very popular with his base.
There’s an opportunity.
This is where you might say “conspiracy theory.” And maybe so. But consider that the raw levers of power and money are more vulnerable now as anyone ever could have imagined—just look at what Musk is doing. We know that the rich and powerful very much are bastards who don’t mind killing large swaths of people if it serves them. So why believe they won’t go for ultimate power when it presents as such low-hanging fruit?
If people with money and power saw the potential here, they could see Trump as a means to the greatest source of power. As a doddering old fool starving for adoration, he could be easily manipulated. He could also be threatened if need be. Sure, Trump has the Secret Service guarding him, but if you’ve got billions to play around with, an SS detail is nothing.
And yes, they saw it coming. Project 2025 and the Heritage Foundation prove that there was a vision from a few years ago at least. We imagined that they were doing nothing more than serving their own political agenda—but why assume it was not something more than that? Why do we disassociate these people from any semblance of control, and act like they serve at the pleasure of a man with dementia, or solely to a party line?
Imagine that individual or group meeting with Trump back in 2021 or 2022, and making him an offer he can’t refuse. Someone who can promise to sweep Trump back in to power, and can really do it, too. Pumping his campaign full of money, giving him all the wealth he could dream of, using their influence over the media and many other aspects of power to do everything they can to get Trump back in office. They promise Trump billions in fortune, and assure him that he will always get top billing. He gets the ultimate carrot, he can do whatever the hell he wants, so long as it does not get in the way of this new power. Whoever is forging this deal probably doesn’t even have to wield a stick. Trump might be delighted to play that way.
This scenario isn’t even new. Reagan was a figurehead for the neoconservatives, as was Bush 43. We never doubted the idea that the president could be a figurehead and a cabal of others could be controlling the real power behind the curtains.
So, what’s different? Well, this time, there is no law and order any more. Unlike in the 80s or the aughts, scandals mean nothing anymore, and Congress and the Courts mean even less. Unlike before, the government is wide open, and whoever is in control can become an absolute dictator.
So we feared Trump would be the one, but we feared him less because we see the unstable idiot, and we remember that while he did great damage, his own incompetence limited the damage, and we were able to recover.
But what if it’s not really him any more? What if it’s Musk, either by himself or with one or more other like-minded wealthy people? What if they are the real power here? That’s not a meaningless question; a tyrant with a powerful will to action, someone who is willing to truly wield that power in horrifying ways, someone so threatening that even Trump seems like a schoolyard bully, a bully but a child, in comparison?
Look at Trump: he never cedes power, and absolutely despises anyone in his administration who outshines him—and yet when Musk gets a TIME cover which shows him behind the Resolute Desk, Trump barely shrugs, as if he accepts the implied hierarchy.
And look at Musk. He went to work so fast that it seems obvious in hindsight that he knew exactly where to go and what to do.
Were Musk’s Nazi salutes just performative like we thought they were? Or was Musk enjoying a bit of a joke there, knowing that the Nazi salute meant more than just triggering the libs?
Imagine a new ruler or junta, comfortable with hiding behind the curtain, but capable at any time to start the concentration camps running. Someone with true ability and willpower to make our country a living hell, unleashing our power upon the world.
Maybe I’m just getting paranoid in my old age. The problem is, the more that I consider this, the simpler and easier it appears to be.
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