How Things Actually Work

Along with many other people, I have pretty much abandoned X (Twitter), now that Musk has decided to use it as a vehicle to oh, I don’t know, overturn the government or some such thing. I have spent some time on Bluesky, an alternative social media platform, and I like it so far.

I came across something on Bluesky last week that I want to share with you. Because Trump has no filter between his thoughts and his mouth, he constantly says things that are false, mutually contradictory, or simply batshit. He doesn’t care. He has spent decades promising to do things (or claiming that he has done things) that are simply preposterous. But because the flood of lies, exaggerations, and absolute bullshit overwhelm our ability to push back in real-time, we lose track of what is actually possible and, thus, a real threat.

The author of the thread is Jamelle Bouie, a columnist for the New York Times and a Really Smart Dude. I’m going to present his thread here and then make some comments at the end.

A useful thing to ask is how specifically does a rule or regulation or order go from issuance to implementation. For instance, trump has said that he will issue an executive order denying birth certificates and SSNS to the children of undocumented immigrants. Okay. What happens next?

Well, states are responsible for issuing birth certificates and not all states collect citizenship information, so first and foremost, trump would have to somehow persuade the relevant agency in every state to collect citizenship information AND stop issuing birth certificates

This may require new state laws, which may or may not pass depending on the state. The social security administration only issues new ssns after receiving the relevant information from state agencies of vital records. The existing process does not require an SSN from the parents.

And so the SSA would have to develop a new process requiring states to collect that information. In the meantime, it attempts to stop issuing ssns may run into legal obstacles, including lawsuits from state ags

Assuming the new rule can be implemented, democratic-run states may simply decide to only transmit SSN applications when the citizenship of the parents is known, leaving the SSA in the dark but still issuing birth certificates as normal.

A grand trump pronouncement, in other words, becomes a muddled program with patchwork implementation and a lot of legal vulnerability.

This is how you should be thinking of these things. What specific steps need to happen for an order of any sort to become a live fact on the ground?

The reason to do this is because this is where politics enters the picture.

This is where the thread stops, although I want to know more. The comments add a lot of context and information. Here are a few:

• He can make a lot of headway in deeply red states but he won’t be able to have it happen everywhere. He has no simple solution to New York or California and they can hit back pretty hard

• I honestly believe that a big part of MAGA is the psychological thrill of saying and believing things, without the slightest interest in actually observing or doing things. They won’t care about whether the policy is actually implemented, only that Trump shares their belief that it ought to be.

• And if it doesn’t happen it’s because of some dastardly enemies and they just need to magic clap harder for Trumpletines

• See also: Infrastructure Week, solving the North Korea nuclear crisis, replacing Obamacare, Infrastructure Week, stopping offshoring of manufacturing jobs, and Infrastructure Week

• He gets sued because the US citizen children of undocumented immigrants have exactly the same rights to equal protection under the laws as any other citizen. No “second-classing” them. And as noted, issuing birth certificates is not a federal function anyway.

• I have helped to write EOs and PMs. Having them issued is exciting, but that's followed by the disappointment of realizing, months or years later, that they are not self-executing, and there has been little to no compliance.

• Of course, in Trump-world, actually implementing anything is irrelevant. All that counts is SAYING you’ve done it. In fact, actually doing something is undesirable, because there could be problems that have to be addressed. Announcing something splashy that has no effect is optimum.

• It’s a silver lining but it’s largely true. The only thing he actually did last time around that lasted was a tax cut for the wealthy, which sucked, and bungle a response to a pandemic, which really sucked. But all the decrees by tweet went nowhere.

• This helps. This time around, I will not consume what-ifs and digest them as fact. I watch and learn by what actually happens, I will help with what I can and I will not be reduced to a panic by his manic ravings.

• Someone said right after the election that he can’t just say things into being, and I have hung onto that sentiment and figuring out what I can do for my immediate community.

• In a similar vein, it's instructive to remember when Obama signed an executive order to close Gitmo, and made a huge public show of it. It had broad public support and he had no obstructions in Congress. It's still open, sixteen years later and two terms after he left office.

• He doesn’t care if it actually happens. He’ll issue the EO, and then move on to the next Sharpie-scrawled piece of paper that’s in front of him. Follow-through isn’t exactly his strong suit. Now, the Bond villains he’s surrounded himself with, they may be a different story.

• So it will be red states like mine who comply. That could result in lower formula fund grants to those states and a loss of representatives in Congress. Cool!

• I don't know if you noticed, but Trump is full of shit. It's advisable to take what he says with a mine of salt.

• Here’s the play: Big high-visibility raids on a periodic basis. Large numbers arrested. Massive press coverage. Images played over and over on TV and all media. Stories of criminals apprehended. Wrenching stories of children and parents. Rinse and repeat. Numbers actually deported won’t matter.

• But it does matter. It matters because it’s already scaring the shit out of people in Spanish-speaking migrant communities. It will get to the point where people won’t want to leave their home, won’t take their kids to school and they won’t seek out medical care even in an emergency.

• My point is that there is no possible way for them to deport 11 million people. And, yes, people who aren’t deported will be hurt, also part of the plan, the “rinse and repeat” to keep the enemy terrorized; they will be able to take credit for much more than they accomplish by actual deportations.

• Exactly. For every trump imagined decree that he threatens, our first reaction should not be to panic but to ask, “Ok, what are the logistics and mechanisms that will need to be put in place to see this through?” The only answer is there are no logistics. No mechanisms. ½

• Trump thinks only about the bullying and how our freakout can get him his next fix of narcissistic supply. He’s a moron. He does not have the capacity to imagine a process for anything. He’s a child. He wants to snap his fingers and make anything he says simply happen. 2/2

• The authors of Project 2025 are not morons, however. Someone has a plan. This is not to say it is ironclad, but they will have some means of pursuing their goals. Lots of litigation ahead.

• Trump is the moron. Not necessarily every person around him.

• I’m pretty sure you’ve spent more time thinking about how to do this than anyone in Trumpworld has

• Yes birth certificates are very local and controlled by state laws. I don’t know if citizenship of parents is recorded or even noted in the long form or application anywhere? Is this covered in international treaties or law, isn’t the recording of births and deaths and marriages done everywhere?

• I replied to you earlier with a prediction that incompetence (both by his team and maliciously by good people) is the ultimate barrier to right-wing American fascism. I sincerely believe it's the best chance we have. Logistics are hard and these idiots are used to bossing people around, not doing.

• Thank you for this thread, it is the first concrete thing I have seen that provides an actual reason for non-doomerism instead of just "aw c'mon guys"

This thread provides one reason for finding good sources of information, reading or otherwise consulting them regularly, and spreading the information in whatever ways you can. I have begun to follow Jamelle Bouis on Bluesky. You should too.

But this may not be enough, because, as I have been saying often enough that people have begun to ignore me (BEGUN, you say?), the problem is not with the messengers on our side. The problem is that a whole swath of elected officials (we see you, MAGA GOP) and TV folks (we see you FOX, OAN, and the rest of you) have decided to hide reality from their voters. viewers, and listeners. When only one side is out there trying to explain how things actually work, it’s a fool’s game. There is no amount of accurate information, legal explication, or logic that can change the minds of the Americans who have become invested in the lies, misdirection, and toadying from the other side. The problem is that any Republican who opposes Trump is labeled as a RINO and is threatened with prosecution. Any media entity that speaks the truth about Trump becomes the enemy and is threatened with prosecution.

Leopards would have to change their spots, my friends. Or tigers their stripes.

I always find the philosophy of Calvin and Hobbes useful. (I dived down a bit of a rabbit hole yesterday to see if the cartoon characters Calvin and Hobbes represent the philosophical positions of theologian John Calvin (founder of Congregationalism and Presbyterianism) and early enlightenment philosopher Thomas Hobbs. They apparently do not.)

The Trump administration is playing Calvinball. No one can win a game of Calvinball. The only purpose of Calvinball is the game, not the result.