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[wierd]

Need I remind that the difference in popular vote for trumps election this year was only a few hundred thousand, out of millions of votes cast?

Good media propaganda spin could easily keep the momentum going during such a thing.

By this, i mean Trump can swing it along the lines of "Look, I dont like strangling innocent people financially. Just give up your illegals, and things will go back to normal, this isn't hard", and when the cities naturally refuse, he just paints them as radically antigovernment, and anti-america.

If he didn't like strangling innocent people financially, he wouldn't be who, or where, he is.

what part of "Propaganda" was difficult here?

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Though that said, the scenario of the gov't cutting federal funding for these places and them deciding to, say, reciprocate by not paying taxes... it's outlandish fantasy, and it would be ruinous for the country, but it's oddly enticing as a thought. You almost want to actually see it, just for that few moments of gazing into the eye of pure absurdity. You don't actually want to, because holy hell, but still. It's a shiny thought.

Honestly? It's not that outlandish. Without federal funding, the cities and more importantly their residents are going to be thirsting for a way to shore up the losses. Keeping their taxes is like the first thing that comes to mind.

It wouldn't happen very quickly if it did happen, but as dissatisfaction with Trump grows in the disaster scenario eventually some would start taking the risk under the logic that the government that hates Trump won't help him strike back at them further.

Good media propaganda spin could easily keep the momentum going during such a thing.

By this, i mean Trump can swing it along the lines of "Look, I dont like strangling innocent people financially. Just give up your illegals, and things will go back to normal, this isn't hard", and when the cities naturally refuse, he just paints them as radically antigovernment, and anti-america.

It's not impossible, but I'd say Trump has the harder sell there. Everybody against him can say "We're not selling out our friends and neighbors to Trump's jackboots so we can get his approval, and we will never surrender our commitment to American freedom in the face of being attacked by our own supposed President."

Trusting the inclination of the federal government to go door-to-door, even for "illegals", is somewhat against the typical American mindset. Mass deportation has never been one of the more popular immigration solutions either.

[Max™]

Need I remind that the difference in popular vote for trumps election this year was only a few hundred thousand, out of millions of votes cast?

Good media propaganda spin could easily keep the momentum going during such a thing.

By this, i mean Trump can swing it along the lines of "Look, I dont like strangling innocent people financially. Just give up your illegals, and things will go back to normal, this isn't hard", and when the cities naturally refuse, he just paints them as radically antigovernment, and anti-america.

Trump got just about the normal number of republican votes that a normal candidate would expect, but he got them from some unexpected places, while Clinton completely failed to even try to get certain voters motivated at all.

It's not just plausible, but probable that a less hated candidate who ran a smarter campaign, or even just listened to Bill, would have gotten a significantly higher share of the votes in the Penn/Ohio/Wisc/Mich areas, going anywhere from just barely winning those states to taking them like they were expected, cutting another half a million or more off Trump and adding it onto the hypothetical smarter/more liked candidate.

Numerous states which were widely expected to lean towards Clinton ended up being very close or tilting in Trump's favor, suggesting the Not!Clinton votes were a significant factor there.

There's no mandate for Trump, there's no groundswell of inexplicable love like there was for the first awful human being who used the "make america great again" line: Reagan.

This year has been full of unlikely, inexplicable, and downright stupid behavior. I'm not going to say that there is no way people would be stupid enough to just accept something like that because they promptly will to prove me wrong, but when the alternative to Trump isn't Clinton I don't think he will do as well.

[Angle]

...Damn. I had thought things might cool down after this election, but it's looking like they might just keep escalating. :/

[Rockphed]

Plus, trying to lay financial siege to NYC, which includes the financial nerve center of the US, is guaranteed to send the stock market spinning.

Oh, and btw, Trump has properties in NYC and Chicago, trying to do anything in those cities would definetly screw his brand.

Denying Section 8 housing vouchers to people living in NYC or Chicago because they are flagrantly breaking federal law...would probably screw up the economies and real-estate markets of those cities.  It would be a horrible thing to do, but I don't think that NYC or Chicago would try to play chicken like that.  San Fransisco or Portland might.

[Frumple]

...Damn. I had thought things might cool down after this election, but it's looking like they might just keep escalating. :/

Oh you. Things don't even really get started until a month or two into 2017. What you're seeing now is the pre-game show.

[Max™]

Ah, had to go find it.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

[wierd]

Angle:

Our choices were between an extremely unelectable democrat with a bunch of baggage, and a raging orange idiot, with even more baggage.

Animosity is pretty much guaranteed.

[Sergarr]

It's hilarious and terrifying at the same time how we're discussing the potential siege warfare between the President, supported by rurals, and the major cities in the country.


It reminds me of a certain old (1910s) Russian novel "We", which had a backstory centerpiece of a "Great war between the city and the village", which the "city" has won, and after which most people live in 1984-esque conditions.

Display of emotions is banned, government control literally everything, people's houses are made out of glass because "honest citizens don't have anything to hide"...

Not that it has much to do with Trump, but seriously, the next four years are going to be pretty fucking interesting, in the Chinese sense of that word.


Speaking of China, how many countries do you think they'll try to conquer if Trump!USA pulls out of Obama's "Asia pivot" and leaves locals to fend off the Heavenly People's Army on their own?

[smjjames]

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/george-w-bush-aides-trump-administration-231351

So, Pence considers Cheney as his role model and a power behind the, *ahem*, throne, co-President almost, and some former Bush 43 staffers may join Trumps admin, though too early to say.

Sounds like we're having another 'idiot head of state, but powerful prime minister/vice president' situation.

@sergarr: We weren't talking 'siege' in the military sense.

[Angle]

Angle:

Our choices were between an extremely unelectable democrat with a bunch of baggage, and a raging orange idiot, with even more baggage.

Animosity is pretty much guaranteed.

I wouldn't say she was unelectable, just complacent. A better campaign and she totally would have gotten elected. But yeah, the animosity I should have seen coming. :/

[Max™]

Speaking of China, how many countries do you think they'll try to conquer if Trump!USA pulls out of Obama's "Asia pivot" and leaves locals to fend off the Heavenly People's Army on their own?

I don't even want to think about that until the hangover wears off, ask me sometime in 2018.

[wierd]

china has already threatened that if the US imposes tarrifs on them, or officially declares them currency manipulators (which they are. NO NATURAL ECONOMY mirrors the US dollar like that!) they will destroy the US in a trade war.

[smjjames]

Speaking of China, how many countries do you think they'll try to conquer if Trump!USA pulls out of Obama's "Asia pivot" and leaves locals to fend off the Heavenly People's Army on their own?

The first and most obvious would be Taiwan. There's also some disputed islands, but other than that, they don't seem to have any territorial ambitions, and the South China Sea region. Seems like their ambition is to have a sphere of influence over the East and SouthEast Asia region and boss other countries around like the US did to Latin America for a good deal of our history.

[Frumple]

Huh. Just noticed the thing with sanders and the nuclear waste dumping. Anyone done the work to check to see if it's legit, yet?

Because if it was, damn. Running him might have actually straight up lost the hispanic vote.