Note 68: America is Dead

Back when I was cutting my first teeth on building websites, learning how the new World Wide Web worked, and learning to program back in the mid- to late-‘90s, the first site I built was an X-Men fan site, titled “America is Dead: The Age of Apocalypse”.

As a teen growing up in the middle of rural New Mexico, in an area where not too many folks shared my interests, that site (archived here) was my contribution to a growing international community of online X-Men fans. Living in an area where comic shops were non-existent, and the nearest decent bookstore was at least three hours away, it was next to impossible for me to get every issue of a full cross-title summer crossover story, and others faced a similar issues (no pun intended). Aided by e-mail LISTSERVs and a new suite of web-self-publishing tools (Geocities!), we collectively filled our respective gaps by having others summarize for us what we could not read directly ourselves. My site was my contribution to that effort.

“The Age of Apocalypse” was an alternative history that branched off the main continuity (Earth-616) and into a new timeline when Charles Xavier was murdered before he could establish the X-Men. With the X-Men absent, the villain Apocalypse conquered most of the Western Hemisphere with his mutant supremacist vision, leaving a token resistance of humans in Europe, and an underground mutant resistance (the X-Men, formed by Magneto) in North America. The story explored how that timeline unfolded over the summer months of 1995, after which, the main 616 continuity was restored. Over the past three decades, there have been a number of stories that visited that dystopian timeline (usually not for the better). I bring this all up, because the title of that early fan site is what keeps repeating itself in my head today: “America is Dead”, a phrase that came out of the intro chapters of that story.

Let’s unpack what that means to me.

As I mentioned in my last Note, Americans restoring Trump to power represents an event no less significant than Caesar crossing the Rubicon and transforming the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire. And that’s precisely what the American people did last night, and this time our Caesar won the popular vote (if his current lead isn’t whittled away too much). And the American people were not tricked into doing this, and important information about Trump (and his coterie) was on stark display. Americans re-elected a convicted criminal and insurrectionist with full knowledge of who he is and what he plans to do. “We weren’t told” isn’t a valid excuse this time.

I’m not going to hazard writing a set of predictions about how 2025-2029 will unfold (there are plenty in my last Note), but I want to reflect on what a majority of Americans no longer believe:

Americans no longer believe that every person is equal under the law. John Roberts inflicted a great injury on this principle with his immunity ruling earlier this year (Who wants to place bets on when his “leopards are eating our faces” mea culpa comes out, in the same vein as Mitch McConnell’s?), and we’re going to see the consequences of this weakening of checks and balances unfold moving forward. Americans have empowered – the for the first time – a criminal with the power to pardon himself of his existing conventions, and fully terminate (not just halt) ongoing criminal proceedings against himself, as well as issue preemptive pardons to those willing to break the law on his behalf.

Americans no longer believe in the sanctity of elections. Probably the most disheartening thing to witness last night is Americans collectively shrugging their shoulders about the last time Trump tried to stay in power against the will of the American people on January 6th and the weeks leading up to that shameful day. That should have been disqualifying all on its own (and it seemed to be for a short period), yet here we are.

Americans have replaced our faith in institutions with faith in con-men. One of my biggest worries in the upcoming administration is the treatment that some of America’s best institutions will receive under the thumbs of con-men like Elon Musk and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Health are two of the keystones in American medical and technological dominance, and the American people have decided to elect an administration who will run them into the ground (along with what remains of the federal gov’t) by the same broken men peddling pseudo-science (RFK2 and his whole vaccine schtick) and have destroyed the value of others’ hard work (like Twitter).

The problem with con-men isn’t the con-men themselves, but their marks. As I’ve mentioned repeatedly, we have an issue where those being swindled themselves are the biggest defenders of those conning them. Instead of to correcting course and booting out the con-men, the swindled choose to argue that they were not conned, as that admission adds onto the losses already incurred. This is the classic Trump Mulligan problem: enablers – like the evangelical movement – are unable to stop granting free passes to the man, because stopping now forces a reckoning over the gross violations of their basic principles that they’d rather continuing deferring. I had hoped that Americans as a collective body were smarter than this, yesterday proved that faith was misplaced.

And aside from the issue of the electorate being conned, yesterday may have been the greatest day ever for grifters and cheaters. Americans indicated that they are happy with removing the various hard-fought safeguards that we have erected to keep normal people from falling prey to sophisticated schemes by various institutions (Federal Trade Commission, Securities and Exchange Commission, etc.) and leaving how those things are run by men who have named their plans after a crypto shit-coin. It’s a great time to be an AI- or crypto-bro: the restraints are coming off, and you’re free to do whatever the hell you want (as long as you hold enough DJT stock) to unsuspecting marks just looking for a financial leg-up in life.

Americans no longer believe that our elected gov’t officials are public servants (emphasis on “servant”). The reelection of Donald Trump shows that Americans are perfectly fine treating the American presidency as a prize to be won to enrich oneself directly while in office. With the lack of people in his administration with a loyalty to the American people over Trump, look at stocks like DJT to become officially sanctioned channels for those with wealth and influence (including foreign actors with aims inimical attitudes towards the American people) to trade that wealth for favors and advantages that would not normally be acceptable in an administration with guardrails and actual public servants to say “no way”. Look to Trump and his enablers to leverage the power of the US gov’t into dodgy financial schemes like crypto shit-coins to enrich themselves at the expense of the American bag holders. Americans just voted into office an explicit authorization for their elected officials to engage in as much mob-style corruption as they like.

Americans no longer believe in preventative actions to prevent larger conflicts overseas. The reelection of Trump and his neo-isolationists have doomed the nation of Ukraine, and invite Russian aggression through Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania as Moscow seeks to reunite its territory with Kalingrad and establish naval dominance over the Baltic Sea, likely sparking a conflict with NATO. Other NATO members can no longer believe that America will continue as the “arsenal of democracy” or even fulfill its treaty commitments under the NATO charter. American isolationism will revert the world back into a Cold War state where local hegemons dominate their spheres of influence, instead of allowing the people behind the new Iron Curtains to determine how they will live their own lives through free trade and free elections.

Given yesterday’s election results, I expected to feel a bit more dissociated, as I did eight years ago, but I’m actually feeling pretty grounded today. The weak optimism of expecting to see a competent administration remain in place has been replaced with the knowledge that we’re in for another term of outright chaos. To what extent America follows 1930s’ Germany and Italy’s path into authoritarianism remains to be seen. I expect blue areas like Illinois, New Mexico, Colorado, and the coasts to experience less change than we’ll see in outright Trumpist areas ready to subordinate themselves to a national strongman, at least in the short term. Long term – who the hell knows?

One thing that is clear, though, is that the effort to try and direct America back onto the same general path that America followed in the post-WWII era by convincing Americans that was a country worth keeping has failed. We’re in entirely uncharted waters here, and a new vision for the country is required, as the old one no longer holds water and we have entire generations of Americans coming up who remember it the same way I remember the Eisenhower presidency – a story in history books. Whether or not the current anti-Trump coalition has the juice to come up with that vision is unclear. (I’m already seeing articles exhorting “responsible” people to join the Trump administration – as if Project 2025 and loyalty lists were not already a thing – see again, “leopards eating faces”.)

Another thing that yesterday revealed is the complete failure of trying to rescue the Republican Party from itself from within itself. Since 2016, I’ve cast the as many votes against Trump and Trumpism in the primaries and general elections as were possible. The courage of folks like Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger to try and leverage anti-Trump sentiment within the Republican Party failed. The chorus of the “responsible conservatives” that worked in the last Trump administration shouting at us to not repeat this mistake didn’t move the needle within the Republican Party or outside it.

As a fan of classical liberalism, law and order, Federalism, free trade, and accountable gov’t, I’ve tried within the GOP to support those who shared those classic Enlightenment values. Given the lack of results from the past eight-plus years, yesterday was a confirmation that approach is a waste of time and energy. Effective immediately, I am no longer considering myself as a Republican, casting votes in their primaries, or anything that being a member of that fully-corrupted party entails. This will almost certainly curtail some of the public service that I’m allowed to engage in. (Illinois election law doesn’t currently accommodate Independent poll workers.) I remain as committed as ever in opposing Trump and the #MAGA movement, but the GOP is a dead end on that path, and the sooner it goes up in flames, the better.

The final thing that this election has left me with is feeling like an exile in my own country. I thought that Americans held one set of beliefs, but yesterday’s results indicated that they held another wholly different set of beliefs. Contrary to Trump and Stephen Miller’s demonization of immigrants, being an American is more about a set of commitments and beliefs than it is about blood and soil. Where you are born and the family you are born into is historical accident that no-one is entitled to claim credit for - you don’t choose your birthplace or last name. You do choose your own basic beliefs and commitments, and it’s clear that a majority of Americans are a different people than I am on those fronts. As someone with a commitment to democratic governance and people choosing their leaders, I’m not going to begrudge a nation freely electing themselves into fascism with their eyes wide open. That said, I no longer consider most of this nation “my” people, and that’s going to shape my attitudes and future plans accordingly.

To the extent other democratic nations are paying attention (and boy, are they!), I’m fairly certain that I’m not alone in feeling more unmoored to this country than I am now, and there’s a solid opportunity take advantage of this sentiment and engineer a “brain drain” from America (and other countries) to your own nations. With America’s neo-isolationism blossoming, there’s a concrete opportunity to transplant what was working well in the USA into your own societies, much like how America absorbed key scientific refugees from Europe as fascism blossomed there. Just a thought.