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THE FUTURE OF THE USA IF DONALD TRUMP IS RE-ELECTED PRESIDENT

The debate between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris tomorrow will be the most crucial moment for this presidential campaign, and perhaps also for the future of Democracy in the USA.  This clearly is an-anti Trump site, so here I go expressing my views on this matter.

Rolling Stone, that venerable source of popular music, well says what's on my mind:

  • In Donald Trump's four years as president, he regularly vented a violent fantasy to execute people.  He admired President of the Philippines Rodrigo Duterte and his executing death squads.  Duterte felt that Trump should be re-elected against Biden in 2020.
  • Mass executions did not ocur because advisors and the judicial system were able to make vague promises long enough to let Trump's tyrannical tantrum blow over.
  • But if Trump defeats Vice President Kamala Harris this November, America will encounter a Trump unbound, a man whose darkest impulses will not be checked by “adults in the room” — ­creating potentially catastrophic consequences for the American experiment. “This election is about whether or not we remain a democratic society or we move to authoritarianism,” Sen. Bernie Sanders tells Rolling Stone, insisting that Trump “does not believe in the basic tenets and foundations of American democracy.” 
  • Trump’s campaign to retain power after losing the 2020 election only collapsed because Vice President Mike Pence proved more loyal to the Constitution than to Trump’s cult of personality. But for 2024, Trump has a vice presidential candidate who appears even less committed to the democratic process than he is. J.D. Vance is a protégé and plaything of the billionaire venture capitalist Peter Thiel, who has written that “freedom and democracy” are not “compatible.”
  • More dangerous, Trump would reenter the Oval Office with powers that have been supercharged by the ultraconservative Supreme Court, which Trump helped build as president. A partisan 6-3 decision in July placed the presidency beyond the reach of criminal punishment for any acts that can be couched as “official.” The once-outrageous Nixonian maxim “When the president does it, that means it’s not illegal” is today a statement of fact, leading Justice Sonia Sotomayor to warn in a fiery dissent: “In every use of official power the president is now a king above the law.” 
  • “Barring his natural time on Earth coming to an end, he will never leave office,” says Ben-Ghiat. “And that’s very clear to everybody who studies autocrats.” Klarman, the Harvard Law professor, argues that even the constitutional prohibition against serving a third term is not an insurmountable obstacle. “There are autocrats in Latin America who’ve managed to circumvent clear term limits,” he says. “I don’t rule it out.”
Out will go Democracy, and in will come Autocracy.  He will become King Trump, with no checks.  Perhaps even a monarchical dictatorship, for if elected, he will become the oldest U.S. president ever.  Trump can establish a succession system restricted to his family, friends and supporters.

Given the above, I find it unimaginable for the American voter to allow for this ghastly future.  Frighteningly enough, polls 54 days from election day show that he can pull this off.

Further, in his mind, Trump must beat Harris, for the alternative is jail-time.  That House report today admonishing the Biden Administration for withdrawing from Afghanistan is but a tidbit.  A lot more will be coming of greater danger to Harris.  From Russia to state election officials to whatever, the Trump MAGA movement will do everything possible, legality not being a matter, to prevail on November 5.

To close, September 26 could help Harris.  Watch MSNBC describe this day when Jack Smith will provide input on the January 6 attack on the Capitol, a day when Donald Trump could well suffer as the worst day any presidential campaign has ever had.

I'll close with the Venice International Film Festival awarding the Golden Lion for best film to The Room Next Door, directed by Pedro Almodóvar, and starring Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton.  Rotten Tomatoes reviewers gave a 93 rating.  Vulture says, Moore and Swinton are perfectly imperfect together.

The story kind of reminds me of what I've long been contemplating.  The movie has to do with facing death on your own terms.  John Turturro plays a climate pessimist who has dated both.  While Turturro's character represents doom, Swinton has made peace with death.

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