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Wednesday, November 13, 2024

Today's News: Canadafornia, and other ways to survive the Trumpocalypse


As we watch the United States take a right turn and go sailing off the Trump cliff, I have been looking for articles and tweet threads that give advice on what for God's sake we can do about it. 
Here's the initial batch that I found: 

First of all, there might be something to this plan:

I could live there if Mr. Trudeau would rescue us.

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— segsig.bsky.social (@segsig.bsky.social) November 12, 2024 at 9:59 PM
And here are some other, mostly serious, ideas for surviving Trump.

Protection from surveillance: 
...President-elect Donald Trump has promised to deport millions of undocumented immigrants. He’s vowed to jail his political foes and journalists. A Republican-controlled government could further restrict abortion and transgender rights. Influential conservatives have called for a crackdown on left-leaning activist groups, a replay of Trump’s hardline attitude against protesters in his first administration. 
To carry out all of those spoken and unspoken threats, the incoming Trump administration and Republicans in Congress will tap into—and may very well expand—the American government’s vast surveillance machinery, and they appear poised to use it more than any administration in recent US history.... 
The article goes on to discuss data security, encrypted communications, encrypted devices, online anonomity, cloud storage, location data, financial security, burner phones. It ends like this: 
Even if you haven’t tried to protect your digital privacy in the past, your future self may be in a situation, someday, where you appreciate that you started taking precautions now. With a new Trump administration weeks away from inauguration—a government openly committed to targeting its enemies with every tool available and hunting many of the country’s most vulnerable people—that someday may be sooner than you think. 
Limits on intelligence-sharing: 
...While Canada awaits the inauguration of President Trump 2.0, now is the time for reading the manifestos and appreciating what is in the public playbook of the Donald Trump movement. 
Right wing institutes and influencers in the United States have been circling for years, relishing the idea of a second, better prepared, fully aggressive Trump presidency, ready to swoop in and “Make America Great Again” (again). Their ideas permeate the Trump campaign platform and have deep roots in think-tank advocacy.... 
... For Five Eyes countries like Canada the dangers are many. ...Canadian intelligence officials are, I think, inclined to optimism that the ties that bind the Five Eyes intelligence sharing relationship are so strong they can resist any President. I would not be so sure, if the President goes to war against the intelligence community he inherits from Joe Biden. He failed to fix the “deep state” the first time around. He seems sure to have another go. 
We don’t spy on the United States. But a concerted effort will have to be made to map the new US intelligence ecosystem and the people who will run it. Follow every move of the President’s transition team and follow beyond it. Mapping who’s in, who’s out, what their views are, what past history, what their power base might be, their connections to the administration, all of that should be an intelligence priority for Canada. 
Spying without spying, or open-source intelligence, will have to be done at high tempo leading up to January 20, 2025, and will have to be sustained beyond as the new President reaches for early goals in his first 180 days. 
 The results may not be pretty. 
Personal "duck and cover" steps: 
Tweet thread from Danielle Moodie @DeeTwoCents 
So, here is the reality. Everything that you thought would be worse case scenario—double it. There is truly no real bracing for what this full on assault will bring but key things: 
 1. Try your best to protect your money as a recession if not deep depression is coming. 
 2. If you’re using ACA I suggest you book all health appointments now before January 20th. 
 3. If you’re a woman of childbearing age I suggest you stock up on all birth control and Plan B. 
 4. If you’re living in a mixed status household contact an immigration lawyer. 
 5. If children you love attend public school I suggest you begin sourcing other options as this will most likely be their last school year. 
 6. If you’re headed to college you may want to look abroad for options as this administration is going to cut funding. And by cut funding I mean completely decimate colleges and universities that don’t comply with their standards essentially turning the country’s education into Florida. 
 7. If you work at a non-profit they are getting ready to pass a measure that would allow the president to defund. The defunding would come after such groups are labeled as terrorist orgs. 
 Folks this unfolding isn’t going to take years it will take months. We can’t prepare for what we don’t know but history is our guide here. 
Just don't care anymore: 
...This isn’t 2016. This is 2024. We knew exactly what we were getting. And despite everything he’s done, millions of Americans would rather have a cruel, aging vulgarian than a competent Black woman become President. 
This is more a revelation of their lack of character than anything else. They chose to vote for him. No one forced them to do it. This includes a majority of white men and white women. Without that bloc, Trump never comes close to being President. This bloc also includes margins of Latino, Black and Asian men. 
The two groups that understood the assignment were 90% of Black and Jewish women who voted for Harris. A majority of Black men also came through. The two religious groups that voted for Harris were Jews and Muslims, although many defected from Muslim and Arab communities due to the Gaza war.
 For those who say every middle-class worker voted for Trump due to the economy, they fail to include Black workers who remain some of the most marginalized but stepped up to save us from a wannabe authoritarian. They also pay a lot for eggs and bread right now, but they understand the stakes and the threat. 
Please spare the rest of us, especially people of color, that racism and misogyny had nothing to do with this result. 
Regardless, Trump is on his way to becoming the next President. 
I for one did my part and saw a large part of my country fail us and itself. Unlike 2016, I have no desire to “reach out” and understand these people. 
For some reason, it’s always the rest of us who have to be civil while MAGA and Trump voters are allowed to be cruel. They get to mock and ridicule us while we have to bend over backward to understand their “economic anxiety.” 
Nah. I’m done. 
And so are most Black people, a majority of people of color, and 48% of white women who voted to protect women’s rights. 
Since I’m not a sociopath, I don’t wish suffering on anyone. I don’t need anyone to suffer to “feel” great again. That’s MAGA, and it’s a major difference between us and those who vote for Trump. 
That being said, when the pain comes for Trump voters - and, sadly, it will come in waves for the next decade - I certainly won’t celebrate, but I won’t care either. 
Like Batman told Ra's al Ghul: “I won’t kill you, but I don’t have to save you.” 
You shit in your milk. You enjoy drinking it... 

Finally, this:
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