This is PART TWO in a five-part series of posts on the state of the US economy. You can read PART ONE, PART THREE and PART FOUR if you’d like to catch up.
American society is being held hostage by an expert in stochastic terrorism, who, beyond that, has absolutely no problem with removing free speech and habeas corpus, invoking the insurrection act and declaring martial law. Take a moment to reread these lines to understand the societal peril this nation faces.
The fact that Trump is openly instructing the Attorney General who to prosecute as retribution for those who have, in his mind, done him wrong, is the clearest of indications that there is no political solution to the threat Trump presents. The very fact that he can do this and his Party sits silent in the corner, unwilling to challenge his blatant illegal actions, should tell every American all they need to know about what the future holds.
His very real campaign against an anti-fascist movement (ANTIFA) that is an ideology and not a physical entity is not an on-the-fly decision; it is part of a carefully crafted strategy to defang ANY opposition to his agenda. Russell Vought, Stephen Miller and the like have been working on this for a long time. It has been war-gamed, as has mass deportation and the dismantling of the federal government. This is why they always seem three steps ahead when it comes to responding to pushback from the Democrats. They genuinely do believe that Trump has plenary authority and he should use it.
There is no question in my mind that they are going to use the No Kings Day mass protests to demonstrate to America that the opposition can all be labelled under the ANTIFA flag and not the American flag. They have already titled it ‘The Hate America March’, well in advance. This sets the stage for a crackdown on the battlefield, where the media narrative engagement will be fought, in Washington, D.C. It’s the perfect backdrop for an epic made-for-TV moment that they will record from every angle to gather footage for use in the 2026 midterms.
Even if 99% of the march is peaceful, they will exploit the incidents from the 1% that were ugly and plant enough agitators in the crowd to ensure that trouble arises. Most people will agree that the Democratic messaging savvy is virtually nonexistent; this is not the case when it comes to MAGA. They have become the unapologetic gold standard propagandists, and I fear that there will be little to no coverage of anything other than trouble spots, which will counter any media benefit from the event.
What you need to understand is that mass protests pose an existential threat to the Trump narrative, and that, in my opinion, makes them dangerous acts of resistance to participate in. There absolutely needs to be an awareness of this by anyone taking part. If you have any doubt about what I am saying, I would urge you to read this report by Michel Martin and Tinbete Ermyas from NPR in May 2022, in which they note the words of Trump’s Defence Secretary at the time of the Black Lives Matter Protests:
“The president was enraged,” Esper recalled. “He thought that the protests made the country look weak, made us look weak and ‘us’ meant him. And he wanted to do something about it.
“We reached that point in the conversation where he looked frankly at [Joint Chiefs of Staff] Gen. [Mark] Milley and said, ‘Can’t you just shoot them, just shoot them in the legs or something?’ ... It was a suggestion and a formal question. And we were just all taken aback at that moment as this issue just hung very heavily in the air.”
This was at a time when Trump had adults in the room and not sycophants. This is no longer the case, and the National Guard that will likely be deployed for the event will come from deep red states, where Trump is a hero and Democrats are the enemy. Hegseth will have no problem issuing rules of engagement that are vague yet adversarial rather than placating.
As this week progresses, you will see that Trump will intensify verbal attacks on the pending protest to begin to set the stage for a hard-line management of events. I have had some significant pushback on my risk assessment, but I feel it is my responsibility to highlight the VERY REAL dangers protesters are likely to face on October 18th. For example, I would under no circumstances take a child to the event, the risks are too elevated.
Another thing people need to be aware of is that high-tech surveillance will be in place. The Pentagon do not have contracts with the likes of Palantir and links to NSO Group (the company behind the Israeli Pegasus spyware) for nothing. Those managing the state response will likely have access to hardware that can hack mobile phones and target specific protesters. You should also be aware that it’s likely to be illegal to cover your face (wear a mask). Needless to say, facial recognition software will be used by those policing the protests.
Trump, in collaboration with Pam Bondi and Kash Patel, will want to make examples of anyone perceived to be breaking the law. Just as a reminder, Anti-mask laws were used against Occupy Wall Street protesters, anti-racism protesters, and police violence protesters, so expect them to be in use next week.
As I have said previously, I support direct action; however, if you are going to engage in this type of action, you must be fully aware of the risks and the technology that will be used against you. Ideally, protesters should not bring a phone with social media accounts that criticise the administration. Instead, get a cheap burner phone and set up a support network where you periodically check in with a buddy. You should ensure that you have water and a saline mixture available in case the authorities use tear gas. You should also consider taking a snug-fitting pair of swimming goggles.
Research your rights in advance, and consider creating a plan for accessing legal assistance. Gather contact information for local legal support groups or the ACLU. It’s essential that if you are detained, friends and family can locate where you are being held. Of course, this advice is provided in the hope that you will not need to rely on it; however, I would strongly advise you to be well-prepared, as a highly adversarial militarised policing effort will be in place to manage the protests on October 18th.
The primary reason I am advocating for an abundance of caution is that, despite the outward confidence the administration is attempting to display, there must be a severe concern that the entire deck of cards is under threat of collapsing. He may be hiding the job numbers and real inflation figures, but he can’t hide them forever, and the big mistake he has made is that his intoxication with power can’t protect him from the truth, which will soon be knocking at his door.
Trump has not used tariffs as a strategic policy tool, as they should be; instead, he’s using them as a personal weapon to lash out at those he perceives as disrespecting him. This is a bit tricky, really, because nobody respects him, so the target list is endless. It will not have escaped your attention that he is now reimposing tariffs on China, reverting to 100% from November 1st. This was an emotional response to China's restriction on exports of rare earth minerals, which the US is highly dependent on.
As Politico put it in a piece earlier today by Megan Messerly and Phelim Kine:
Trump wanted a trade deal. Xi opened a new front instead.
They noted, and they are right to say:
The vast potential reach of China’s action, and the U.S.’s counteraction, was on display Friday: Trump’s tariff announcement sent stocks tumbling, with the S&P 500 dropping more than 2 percent, its worst day since April.
Former Trump officials say China’s latest salvo is a particularly sophisticated show of force — one that underscores a growing mismatch between China’s long-term strategy and the Trump administration’s more improvisational approach.
What Trump has failed to realise all along is that just as the Heritage Foundation had planned his ‘second coming’, China had planned and gamed it too. Trump had expected China to fold in March when he started flexing with tariffs, but far from folding, they have embraced the fight and are proving they can flex too. The US has long restricted access to AI chips when it comes to China, to slow them down in the race to win the AI Tech Stack war. Unfortunately, that has backfired as it has just encouraged further domestic innovation, to the point that they have banned the use of new Nvidia chips in their AI development process.
This move is akin to the US slowing China down. Xi knows that he controls most of the global rare earth minerals processing capability. The International Energy Agency (IEA) estimates that China accounts for about 61% of rare earth production and 92% of its processing. Call me old-fashioned, but I’d call that checkmate. The truth is that the US cannot destroy the Chinese economy, and Trump should really be worried about how far Xi is prepared to keep a chokehold on the critical raw materials that the US cannot function without.
I’ve said it many times: China does not think short-term, which is how US politics is structured to operate. It thinks decades ahead, and rest assured, Trump’s predictable responses will all have been gamed out. He’s gone all in on the US AI tech Stack, and as a result, AI investments have created an absolute false sense of security. The markets are booming on the promise of big rewards, but they are particularly vulnerable to upcoming Chinese progress in this space. That’s before we consider market concerns that the AI bubble is about to burst.
It has led to an infrastructure boom in the US energy sector. Not only is it proving ecologically highly damaging, but it will also push US consumer energy prices to a breaking point at a time when the public is already suffering from Trump’s tariff policy and the potential loss of healthcare, as well as catastrophic healthcare premium rises. He is creating a perfect political storm, and if you think China aren’t aware of this, you need to seek help.
What I plan to do with this series of posts is outline not only the domestic economic challenges but also the impact that China's geopolitical moves will have in the months ahead. Xi is using the rare mineral export restrictions as a test balloon to gauge the global reaction. What if, for example, he cuts off all supplies to the US but opens them up to Europe, thereby providing them with leverage over US trade? There are so many ways this could play out, and Trump is merely a passenger with a country that holds $765 billion of its debt.
Next time, we’ll drill into the dangers on the horizon for the US economy, because every American needs to understand the power they hold in their hands to bring Trump’s government to its knees, and spoiler alert, it’s not marching in the streets, inviting Trump’s thugs to shoot you. I know I may sometimes be perceived as the Clarissa Ward of US political commentary, in that you never want to pass her in the street while she's reporting, because it means your neighbourhood is under attack. Still, it’s crucial to grasp the broader economic context if you are to make informed decisions on how to protect yourself against the potential incoming fiscal tsunami.
Read PART THREE
This is the Land of the Free because of the Brave. Know your rights - take care of yourself - do what you can with what you have from where your feet touch the ground so that you can join with We the People peacefully making good trouble on October 18th.
The Peaceful Solution-Part 2
Why a Spending Strike is the Best Option:
TINA: There Is No Alternative. There is no peaceful alternative.
Plan A
Plan A consists of phoning/writing your legislators, and street demonstrations, neither of which have worked nor give any sign of working. His Royal Heinous controls the majority party in the legislature and they are doing his bidding. As for street demonstrations:
From Professor Erica Chenoweth:
…”they often subject their participants to a higher risk of repression or communal violence from opponents. So movements that are capable of having the capacity to shift to methods of dispersion, like stay-at-homes or strikes or forms of economic noncooperation, tend to be much more effective because they have the capability of maneuver when the state begins to ramp up violence against them.”
Soft Secession
Federal funds make up 35% of California’s state budget, with $173 billion in federal grants awarded in Fiscal Year 2021 alone, making up a significant portion of state and local budgets for programs like health, education, and infrastructure.
Are they really going to anger HRH to the extent that he cuts off their federal funding?
Soft secession? Only to the point when HRH feels threatened.
He will move in with all his resources and stop it.
This soft secession idea is a political ploy by state officials to get their constituents to believe the officials are doing something to stop the takeover.
It’s also another distraction to the resistance in that it keeps us from organizing and uniting around what must be done and what will work. It’s another example of hoping for an easy fix, one that will not take any sacrifice.
In addition, soft secession is divisive, pitting blue states against red states, playing into the narrative of HRH, who wants to start a civil war. MAGA not only wants to “own the libs”, they’d like to kill as many as possible, to eliminate the opposition.
Targeted boycotts
Why targeted boycotts are ineffective:
Boycotts often fail because they require massive, sustained participation to create meaningful financial pressure, lack clear alternatives for consumers, generate insufficient negative media attention, and are easily weathered by companies waiting for the protest to fade. Additionally, the complex nature of modern capitalism and the proliferation of corporate conglomerates can make it difficult for boycotters to effectively target and impact a company's bottom line or reputation, especially when companies have multiple revenue streams, like real estate, that aren't affected by consumer boycotts.
In 2020, Goya Foods praised President Donald Trump on social media, which caused those in opposition to Trump to boycott their products. Trump loyalists simultaneously initated a counter-boycott, where consumers bought mass quantities of their products, in response. The boycott caused Goya profits to increase dramatically because Trump supporters started an opposing campaign.
The midterm election
Will it be free and fair? It won’t be. Will it occur at all? HRH has already said that if we’re at war there’ll be no election. Guess what? If it’s looking bad for him, we’ll be at war to stop the election. The election is important to him because having the majority in the legislature gives the fascist regime the look of legitimacy.
People are putting too much faith in what the midterms will do. They may have a beneficial psychologic effect but in reality the outcome will have little or no practical effect, unless the Dems can get 2/3 majority in the house and senate, which they won’t. They will not be able to undo anything HRH has done or pass new legislation because of his veto power.
The Courts
While some lower courts have ruled against HRH, slowing his takeover, the rulings have been fast tracked to the Supreme Court. It has almost universally ruled in HRH’s favor. SCOTUS members Roberts and Barrett may have an epiphany and save the country from civil war, but it’s doubtful. It’s going to be up to us to stop this.
Time is running out for a Peaceful Solution. Please Spread the Word!, far, wide, and quickly, before the fascists takedown our means of communication.