And so it begins…
Hope for the best, prepare for the worst.
The only right way to be an optimist about the big picture is to make sure you’re ready for when shit goes sideways on the day to day stuff.
For instance a big silver lining about four years of trump, this is one of the few scenarios people stay politically engaged after the election, thru the midterms, and onto 2028.
Republicans have the Oval, the House, and the Senate. There is not much they can do that people will blame on Dems.
Historically he’ll lose House or Senate in two years. Hopefully both, but ideally the Senate. There’s benefits to the other way around too tho.
Adjust your timescale you’re looking at this with. 4 years ain’t long, two years ain’t shit. Think of all the fucked up horrible shit we’ve done as a country. Realize that even if things get worse then they ever been in America (incredibly unlikely) we’ve bounced back before and we’ll bounce back eventually again.
This is going to suck.
But 20 years from now we might look back on this as the last speed bump before we finally fixed our political system. Empires burn down all the time, but ash makes fertile soil.
There is a possibility that in their haste to suck him off, the Republicans either all but eliminate or completely nuke the filibuster. If this happens and we have another election, there is no way it isn’t a positive development IMO. The filibuster absolutely sucks and is a clear obstacle to majoritarian rule in the country.
If they pull this to do wildly unpopular things on a short time scale, it will suck, no doubt, but they will likely pay a huge price for doing unpopular things in the next cycle.
Ideally, we would have avoided all this risk, but we didn’t, and for the time being, the best self-care for most of us is to keep in mind scenarios that may play out to reduce harm. Infighting has long been a normal to happen when the GOP asserts itself, so it’s not crazy to imagine it being ultimately the block for attempts to dismantle some of the political structure (the powerful players know how to play this game, and are hopefully worried enough about losing that power in any big change that they will work to protect the mechanisms currently in play).
