収束ゾーンでのライフ: Life in the Convergence Zone

There are a lot of stories about Republican MAGAt officials in various states getting ready to refuse to certify a Trump loss, and that’s legitimately something to be worried about.

Georgia – a state they’ve called “their laboratory” for this – has serious MAGAtry issues in the State Board of Elections, all while making it easy for people to deregister you. Mother Jones has an in-depth article on the new rules they’re passing to make it easier to refuse election certification.

Similarly, if you’re in Texas, make sure you stay registered. They’re deregistering or conditionally registering you, and across the country (but particularly in red states).

Republican fash have been setting entire up “non-profits” to do nothing but challenge Democratic voter registrations. It’s vicious and evil, and 100% about power, as is everything they do in the end.

So the job of everyone, particularly in red states, is to make sure you stay registered, and that you actually vote, and in overwhelming numbers.

This is something you can directly control. If you’re somewhere they’re targeting, check your registration status monthly, because you are not immune, including if you’re white; then come election day (or before, depending), get your vote in, and vote the entire ticket, all the way down. Don’t just vote for President, vote the entire ballot, because keeping them out of power is important at literally every level now.

But the after-election challenges, well. That’s another matter. What can you do about that?

The answer is pretty straightforward, honestly.

Make it overwhelming, so they can’t credibly try.

This is a simple game, for a large number of players. It’s about demoralising the MAGAts, demoralising the fash, making them decide that anything… untoward… after the election would be futile.

We have a huge advantage in this, because, well… look at any Trump rally. It’s about anger and depression and doom, every single one of them. That’s not even new; it’s just been creepy, hypnotic, and effective on his audience.

But the wheels are starting to come off. Even the fashiest of the fash are smelling the loser stench and starting to peel away. Trump himself is mostly hiding and sulking, getting more paranoid and more bizarre by the day in ways his base are having a harder and harder time not noticing.

Right now, they’re still able to intimidate people back into line with violent threats – see what they did with the suddenly-less-beloved Kyle Rittenhouse and Joe Rogan. But the fact that they’re having to threaten their own with violence to keep them in line really does tell you how dramatically the ship is sinking.

Even with that – even if that holds the hate alliance together through November – the larger the loss, the less they’ll be willing to put their money where their mouths are. They’ll never believe they actually lost – but they will feel defeated enough not to do anything about it. And given the age skew of Trump’s movement, that, too, will fade.

That’s yet another reason why I keep coming back to working on your Trumpy family and friends. People with whom you have a direct emotional connection who are still attracted to that celebrity shitshow, somehow.

(Work on them. Not just once, not hard and over the top, but persistently, and gently. Don’t alienate them, just chip away, one little piece at a time. Pick the topics that matter to them, ask them what they think of these topics. They hate Project 2025? Trump is steeped in Project 2025. Are they seeing their house insurance go up because of climate change? Tell them Trump is on the side of climate change and will burn the world. Figure out what they care about. Focus on that.)

Whatever you do, make sure it’s something they care about, and – hopefully – care about a lot. Don’t make it about what you want, make it about what they want.

You may and may not tear them away. Don’t necessarily expect that you can, though you can certainly try. But you can make them less enthusiastic.

Which gets us back to doing something about trying to overturn the election afterwards.

Trying to overturn an election takes a lot of enthusiasm, just to fuel the willingness to put in serious, dangerous work. Trump and MAGA have found themselves in very short supply of that lately. Stay hyped, keep them distinctly un-hyped, and when they lose – and if we do the work, it is when, not if they lose – they’ll just go “fine. Fuck it. Whatever.” and stay home.

Keep them demoralised, so they won’t answer the call.

Throughout my life, the left have been real, real good at demoralising themselves. Progressives have been better, but only so much so. Aim that power at the enemy, this time.

If you do, we might just get the landslide we need.

85 days remain.

Posted via Solarbird{y|z|yz}, Collected.