Weekend Update: The Wingnut Caucus of the GOP Makes News
A few weeks ago I wrote a “weekend update” in response to a challenge from a friend to predict just how bad things will be under a Trump administration. You can re-read this here if you want a refresher.
Today I want to write about one of my predictions that is coming true as we round the corner into 2025. Here is prediction #10 from my list:
Trump and Musk will have a falling out, and Musk will no longer be in the picture. DOGE will disappear into the woodwork.
The projected falling-out is happening sooner than I predicted. The relationship between Trump and his wealthiest and most visible supporter – Elon Musk – is rapidly going South. Meanwhile, Ramaswamy is publicly professing his belief that America needs immigrants – specifically, brown immigrants from India – because Americans are simply too stupid and lazy to succeed in today’s technocratic world. MAGA voters are more than a bit flummoxed by this; they were led to believe that ALL brown immigrants were the bad guys, and now they’re being asked to condemn the brown immigrants who come from Latin America while accepting the brown immigrants who come from the Indian subcontinent.
And let’s not forget Laura Loomer, who was MAGA before Musk and Ramaswamy. She believes that these latecomers to the movement are betraying its ideals and wants them both out. Meanwhile, the original MAGAT criticizes the new guy in town, who then responds in exactly the way you would hope to hear from the guy who’s going to help make the country great again.
A lot of people who know more about this than me have written about it over the past few days. I can’t do better than them – and I don’t have much time, because I had company over the weekend and wanted to spend time with them rather than dig into GOP chaos. So for today I’ll share the substacks that give the most information about this issue and let you pick the ones you want to read.
There are more, but this will get you started.
I frankly don’t know exactly how to think about this. Is it a good thing that the upcoming administration doesn’t have a f**king idea about what it’s doing? Is it a good thing that the people who thought they were choosing competence when they voted for Trump are realizing that they have been duped?
Schadenfreude is an intoxicating drug, my friends. Right now, I’m kinda happy that I was right about this prediction. Incompetence and the existing guardrails saved the country from the worst of MAGA during Trump’s first term. Even greater incompetence coupled with enormous hubris may save us this time around. Maybe they’ll be so busy mud-wrestling that they’ll forget to try to run the country.
The level of immaturity of Musk always astonishes me. I agree, he won't last long. And he shouldn't. I'm keeping my chin up, but there's also a little quiver in it.
Schadenfreude is an intoxicating drug, my friends. 😂😂😂