Summary: In a time of political turmoil, the urgency of recognizing the destructive nature of Donald Trump’s administration is paramount. Fueled by narcissistic injury from his 2020 loss, Trump seeks revenge against anyone he blames, extending his wrath to all Americans. His transition mirrors a bait-and-switch tactic, distracting the public while surrounding himself with billionaires intent on exploiting the country. With the existential threat of climate change looming, Trump’s actions reveal a nihilistic vision for America. As the window for meaningful change closes, it’s time to confront the alarming reality: we must panic before it’s too late.
Key Terms: Narcissism, Narcissistic Wound, Grievance, Revenge, Climate Change, Oligarchy, Kleptocracy, Dystopia, Nihilism, Existential Threat
Comment: What do you think our future holds for us? How do you think the Trump era ends?
- The Narcissistic Wound That Just Won’t Heal
- The Master Baiter and Switcher: Creating Trump’s Kleptocracy
- The Nihilistic Oligarchy
- The GOP Dystopia has Arrived
- Image Attribution
One of the things that I find hardest to cope with in this post-election period is that I don’t think most people realize just how fucked we are. I scroll through my social media feeds and peruse the mainstream and alternative liberal media, and it’s like I’m living in a parallel universe. Is no one else panicking about how utterly fucked we are? Because, spoiler alert: we are.
The Narcissistic Wound That Just Won’t Heal
Election 2020 Fuels Trump’s Grievance and Need for Revenge
We all know that the Orange Caricature is a narcissist extraordinaire, fueled by grievance and a thirst for revenge since his 2020 loss. No matter how often he repeats the Big Lie, he knows he lost. It still gnaws at the bitter edges of the void where his soul should be. His only goal is to obliterate everyone he blames for that grievous narcissistic injury. Everyone.
It buggars the question, who’s on this hit list? Let’s break it down, shall we?
The Obvious Enemies List
First off, he blames the Bidens and the Harris-Emhoffs—obviously. The Clintons? Naturally. The Obamas? Of course. Every prominent Congressional Democrat? You bet. Hell, let’s just say every Congressional Democrat. He’s got a special disdain for liberals, progressives, democratic socialists, and anyone who doesn’t fit his narrow view of America: LGBTQ+ folks, trans individuals, and anyone who dares to be Black, Brown, or an immigrant (documented or not).
Those were the easy ones.
The “I Thought He Wouldn’t Come After Me” Enemies List
But it doesn’t stop there. Trump’s ire extends even to the Republicans and MAGA supporters who let him down. Just like Hitler who hated his generals and the German people at his bitter end because they had lost the war and wouldn’t continue fighting for him, Trump hates everyone who voted for him because they didn’t do enough to get him elected. And, everyone who didn’t because—DUH!
Let’s see, who does that leave out? Um… no one. He hates us all. He hates every American. He hates America. He blames us all for his narcissistic injury, and when a narcissist feels that level of betrayal, they want nothing more than to destroy the source of their pain.
He wants to destroy the country. He wants to destroy the world. Literally.
Do you see anyone else out there coming to this conclusion? Is anyone else feeling the same sense of urgency that I do?
The Master Baiter and Switcher: Creating Trump’s Kleptocracy
Like his campaign, Trump’s transition has become a masterclass in bait and switch. You might even say he’s a master baiter and switcher! We should be well-acquainted with his tactics by now—he’s still following Hitler’s Propaganda Playbook. Right now, we see two of the rules in action: never let the public cool off and seize every opportunity to create political chaos.
Oh my god, Matt Gaetz! for Attorney General?!!? How could he?
Not Tulsi Gabbard??!? That’s crazy!
Robert Kennedy?!? Head of our health? Who does he think he is?
We’re all so busy memeing about his shadow puppets that we can’t do much about what he’s really doing… or going to do.
His cabinet is filled with two types of people: the political distractions I just mentioned and the billionaires. The distractions keep us busy, fighting among ourselves, while the billionaires are there to loot the country.
The Nihilistic Oligarchy
It’s not just oligarchic, it’s nihilistic.
The Existential Threat of Climate Change
The existential threat of climate change is so severe that no one can really look at it without going blind or mad kinda like looking directly at a solar eclipse with the naked eye. However, the threat is real. Trump openly solicited a billion-dollar bribe from the fossil fuel industry, a sector that knew about its role in causing climate change SEVENTY FREAKING YEARS AGO, and instead of investing in renewable energy, they doubled down on squeezing every cent out of the planet before the whole ecosystem collapsed. You think they didn’t pony up his billion? You think he’s not going to deliver?
The Deluded Billionaire
The billionaires he’s surrounded himself with are as deluded as he is. They are in as much denial about climate change as you and I are. Occasionally, they might think, Holy shit, if we keep on like this, we won’t be able to support the lives of eight billion people! and then, Hey, if I continue dumping carbon into the atmosphere, I could be a $500 billionaire instead of a mere $300 billionaire. Let’s GO!
The GOP Dystopia has Arrived
Like all of us, they are assuming someone somewhere will figure out a solution to climate change… or not. Putin’s solution, I’m sure, is that it opens up Siberia to farming and denser habitation and their northern coastline becomes navigable. Victory smells like freshly thawed tundra to him.
That’s the future that Trump and the billionaires envision for us. They want us to live in Cancer Alley, drink Flint water, use Texas utilities, receive Florida educations, and die quickly and quietly when we can no longer contribute more than we cost.
They see us as a natural resource for them to exploit like coal, oil, and natural gas, and as soon as we’re used up, they’ll move on to the next promising oil field.
Admittedly, my vision of the future is bleak, but it’s hard to see it any other way. Trump literally wants us all dead. He’s found allies willing to kill for fun (like bigots and misogynists such as Stephen Miller) or for profit (like Elon Musk).
The window for stopping them is rapidly closely and the smaller it gets, the more radical the action it is going to take to prop it open. It is well past time to panic.
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Image Attribution
This image was found on Nuestro Futuro Comun using a DuckDuckGo Creative Commons License search.
The Psy of Life 
Thank you kindly, sibling! It is much appreciated.
Jack
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Jack, I’m a little worried for you. And some of your comments make me uncomfortable as to what you feel we should be doing here. For me, I think it’d be better for us to look at the fact that the Don’s inauguration is a good month away. So.
Looking at that as a sort of D-Day, the thing to do now is to utilize all our civic duty avenues to avert and forestall all we can, while looking around our very selves and our loved ones, to see we what we will need to secure if, on inauguration day, the Don picks up a wand and makes the results of all maga plans happen right after his oath. I am not making light; he might think that’s day 1, though I’d presume Day 1 would be the next business day. Anyway, we still have that time. Plus, he’d likely wait until after his military parade. Then, the time it will take for things to actually become said dystopia likely will be more days. And weeks. And maybe months. And there will be things we can do during that time, too. By then, a sign might be whether there are people preparing for midterm elections. It’ll be a positive if they are, it seems to me.
It’ll be important to remember what happened under GW when he picked cabinet members determined to destroy that which we the people paid them to administer. I remember the melanine-dog-food, and the salmonella peanut butter, as just 2 examples. Leave No Child Behind is another. There are more. Preparing ourselves and our loved ones for possibilities like these will be important whether the Don becomes dictator, or just does his term the way he did last time. Things are not burning, except literally the planet, right now, and we even have time to prepare for that as best we can.
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Howdy Ali!
If you’re worried, you care. There is comfort there. I appreciate it.
I am and have been in a very dark place seeing a very bleak future. I didn’t think we’d make our climate goals with Biden and Harris presidencies, and I’m pretty darn confident that we aren’t going to be making them now. As you said, the planet is literally burning. The collapse of complex systems is difficult to predict, but at some point they failure becomes a cascade and the whole thing comes tumbling down. We knock out enough pieces of the global climate system and none of it is sustainable any longer. That seems like our future to me. Sorry. I don’t see any way of avoiding it.
We all needed to and need to vote like that is our future. We all needed to and need to act like that is our future. It is only with that level of urgency pumping through our veins that we have any hope of avoiding that future.
Trump does mean to destroy us. He and his billionaire buddies mean to loot the richest country that ever existed, but Trump wants us all to suffer for humiliating him in 2020. There is no other way to see it. It’s what narcissists do. We have to start acting like that is the level of danger we’re in because his rage is murderous.
Here I was thinking I was going to jump on the maybe there’s hope after all bandwagon, but now I’m just back down the hole of Trump really does want the world to burn. I simply can’t see it any other way right now. And, I can’t help but think that unless we act with that level of urgency there is no way to stop him from destroying our democracy and climate.
Merry Christmukkah!
Jack
PS I mean the Merry Christmas part unironically. Honest I do.
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Hey, I’m well aware that we are fucked. Trump is going to be hugely destructive to this country, and if he continues to be Putin’s BFF, then my native continent of Europe is fucked as well. And, of course, the climate apocalypse looms over it all.
That being said, my state of Oregon is actually making progress on the climate issue, the health care issue, and other problems. So, I will continue working with my county Dem party and my local legislators who are interested in improving things rather than making billions. Does that mean I’m in denial? Possibly, because I doubt one state has the power to stop the worldwide disaster. But I think my activism falls firmly into the category of “I don’t think I’ve got any other choice.”
Hopefully you find something to sustain you during what is admittedly a bleak, bleak historical moment.
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Howdy Euro!
If there is any saving grace in any of this, it is that the states may be the bulwark that stymies Trump’s destruction of the US democracy and the global climate. Unfortunately, there is no escape from global climate collapse.
There are other interesting caveats, too, since with Trump everything is for sale. We won’t defend Europe from Putin because Putin’s already bought and paid for Trump’s cooperation. We won’t defend Taiwan from China because Xi has already bought and paid for it. We won’t be exploring space or the moon because Xi’s already bought and paid for it. The only question mark is whether Russia and China are willing to buy South Korea and Japan for North Korea.
I see nothing but destruction both physical and mental in our future. The only hope lies in good folks standing up to him when and where we can.
Huzzah!
Jack
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Well, that doesn’t sound particularly cheery, but…huzzah anyway! We will do our best to stand up to him.
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Yep. I’ve been in a pretty dark place. I’ve been bah, humbugging my way through the holiday season. My usual response to Merry Christmas is what’s so fucking merry about it? Same for happy holidays or happy New Year. I’m just not feeling it.
Blog On, Sibling!
Jack
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You are not the only one–a lot of friends I’ve connected with this year have said the same thing. They are just not feeling festive. I can understand why, but I also don’t want to allow the Orange One to wreck my life….
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I wish I had your discipline. Hope you’ve enjoyed the festive season and the New Year.
Blog On, Sibling!
Jack
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Good post….I have watched all those naysayers about Trump begin to change their rhetoric to “give him a chance’…..I refuse to do so chuq
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He’s had every chance. He’s the same as he ever was. We need to treat him as such. It just seems like we as a group we won’t do so in time.
Jack
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I want to re-post this to IST next week if that is okay with you. chuq
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Never have to ask. Re-post away.
Thank you for the vote of confidence and kind words.
Jack
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It will be next week and thank you chuq
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I keep getting reminded that for at least 45 years, the Republican Party has been selling the idea that government doesn’t work (unless it is doing something they want to do, or doing nothing about something they are doing). It is hard to imagine a better way to prove that claim than appointing a lot of incompetent and deluded and corrupt people to the important positions in the government, who also will be competing with and obstructing each other, even when they don’t intend to, because they are incompetent. That makes a fine show for the distraction of both friends and adversaries alike. I have to wonder whether the damage they do unintentionally will far outweigh the damage they try to do and fail to accomplish.
I think it has come to the point that we, as a species, hunger for the refuge of some version of “normality” in a world in which “Normal Times” ended decades ago.
I don’t know what the appropriate panic response would look like. It is difficult to imagine Americans rising up to depose the Trumpian Regime as people did in Syria last week, even if a large percentage of MAGAs suddenly realize they’ve been baited and switched and betrayed.
Perhaps the crashing of the economy will be swift enough to prevent much of the other damage and wake up those deceived masses.
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Kevin Kruse, the historian, has an excellent substack post about TFG picking a Chaos Cabinet…their job is to dismantle the agencies they’re in charge of.
Kruse points out that this is hardly the first time, as this was Reagan’s strategy as well. He related the story of his Director of OSHA pick, then the bete noir of conservative ire.
Karma always has the last word…
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Howdy Bruce!
Thank you for sharing Kevin Kruse’s substack. He makes some interesting points. That the anecdote was poetic, there is no doubt. Not great for Kevin, though.
It would be nice if we could avoid all that, but it doesn’t look like we’re going to. We really need for people to understand the big picture here, but I don’t have hope that we will. Individually, we do, but as a collective, we don’t.
Huzzah!
Jack
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Howdy Bob!
I think the whole government doesn’t work, so let’s make sure it doesn’t with incompetent people explains most of the candidates the Republicans have run for office since Reagan. W? Really? Greg Abbott? Ron De Santis? Tom Cotton? Sarah Palin? Dan Quayle? These are people just from the top of my head. They aren’t serious about governance. They haven’t been for a long time.
Unintentional damage is just bonus damage.
It’s hard to imagine people rising up and disposing of Trump like they did in South Korea the other day or are trying to do in Georgia. If we are to successfully resist Trump and his Nazis, we will need to act and endure the consequences of our actions. I don’t know that we have it in us. However, the support for the murder of the UHC CEO shows just how deeply angry and desperate people are. We may be surprised at what tips us over the edge.
Blog On, Sibling!
Jack
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Nothing enrages people more effectively than suddenly understanding that their loyalty to a cause has been betrayed, that it had been a con all along. When that happens, it spreads as a cognitive and emotional virus. And, the tipping point is unpredictable.
I think of the Arab Spring. One man, in desperation, set fire to himself, and that fire spread in a matter of days and weeks across the region. The oligarchs of the various countries did manage to regain control, but if was a close game and took time. Nobody expected it, The tipping point was a true Black Swan. So, yes, we will be surprised. These kinds of things cannot be planned, only planned for.
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And 13 years later, Assad fell. Who thought that was going to happen? Clearly not the Russians.
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No, not them, and not the Iranians either. And, I strongly suspect that when the rebels began their push, even they did not expect the Syrian army to just take off their uniforms and disappear. That is so often how these changes happen. I would like us not to have to endure 14 years of Trumpist rule. The thing is that there are a lot of angry, frustrated, and disappointed people in this country. A lot of them voted for Trump or stayed home. He is not going to get them what they want and need. They are not the MAGA Cult, just unhappy people wanting a change in their prospects. Their disappointment and disillusionment can be explosive.
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Howdy Bob!
It is an abject lesson in the future being difficult to predict. It is one reason for me to kick myself in the rear-end and quit moping and get to doing something about it. It may seem bleak, but feelings are not facts. And the future is malleable.
I do seem to be getting over the blahs and back to something remotely resembling normal.
There are a lot of angry people in America. So far, many of them have been expressing that anger by voting Trump, but it doesn’t have to stay that way.
Blog On Sibling!
Jack
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