Obligatory election-poasting
Early 2022: I have a dream in which I am watching a fictional drama, except that it is somehow immersive and 3-dimensional. I am in the situation, but removed. Kyle Rittenhouse and a gang of young right-wing militants, including a Japanese man evidently inspired by Yukio Mishima, are preparing for the imminent civil war. There is an atmosphere of excitement and jubilation; admiring young women surround the men, and the feeling is one of enterprise and adventure.
Flash forward: Rittenhouse is completely eviscerated, but somehow just about alive. The Japanese man has been captured by an elite rapper and his crew, who are torturing him to death in some kind of VIP backroom in a nightclub. Invisible, I make my way out of the room, and wake up.
While thus far we’ve been spared the Second American Civil War (subtitle: Electric Boogaloo), the elite rapper in the dream does remind me of P Diddy, whose rather dramatic fall from public esteem looks set to be merely another footnote in age of perpetual socio-cultural freefall.1 It seems strange that we had confirmation of P Diddy’s p-diddling just before Donald Trump was re-elected (or perhaps re-selected); was it an excuse for the FBI to seize Diddy’s celebrity-kompromat to make sure everyone stepped in line behind Kamala Harris, or is it more that the old liberal cabal of the 1990s and 2000s is being thrown under the bus to make way for something ostensibly newer and shinier?
In any case, far more informed commentators than me have weighed in on either side of the “Trump is a total psy-op” debate, although nobody will be surprised to learn that I would lean heavily towards the ‘psy-op’ camp. However, in the interests of maintaining the equilibrium by alienating both sides, here’s a meme summing up the conversation:
What does appear likely is that Trump back in the White House represents the crest of the wave of Woke crashing and beginning to roll back, at least for now. If so, many will be dismayed to learn that Woke of the 2015-2024 variety is merely a symptom, not a causal factor.
Here in Bongland, what will be intriguing to watch is how the Trump regime interacts with the Starmer regime. Rumours of “all-out war” are probably exaggerated, but the friction could be interesting. With Germany’s coalition government disbanded, it’s quite possible that most of the Western world will shift towards centre-right populism, with the United Kingdom quarantined, like 28 Days Later but with transgender bathrooms.
The dream I described above appeared to be a warning not to get too enthused by political conflict. My own position in the dream was that of a passive observer, vicariously experiencing the initial excitement crashing into a horrifying reality. I was powerless to intervene. Trump, Starmer, and the rest are simply manifestations of something else happening at a much deeper level of reality; the shadows dancing on the wall of the cave.
Remember that weird Satanic gig the Kardashians attended where loads of people died in a crowd-surge while Travis Scott mumbled into an autotuned microphone? Yeah, I’d forgotten all about it too.
Late to the party, but yes, there are a number of cultural commentators online who are noting that Trump is not going to be the savior his followers want him to be, and that despite the Dem propaganda, he's not a cause, but a symptom of what ails the US. And until they stop projecting their shadow content onto him, they won't see the way through the mess.