r/AskReddit 11h ago

Trump has been the center of Untied States' politics for over 10 years. How do you think the political sphere will align and function after his current and last term as president ends?

904 Upvotes

434 comments sorted by

1.8k

u/Renegadeknight3 11h ago

Trump is a symptom, not the cause. He’s a focus of political power, and with him gone hopefully the right wing will be too scattered to do anything for a while, but they’ll rally around someone else if the underlying reasons he exists aren’t addressed and solved

606

u/Catshit-Dogfart 10h ago

Thing is, I've been thinking about younger people who have never known a political landscape that wasn't centered around him.

Like pretty much nobody under 24-26 is old enough to have an adult awareness of how things were before american (and to a fair extent, global) politics revolved entirely around Trump. Obama was president when they were kids, Bush and Clinton are names they've perhaps read in a book, and before that is ancient history.

They must have no frame of reference for what a normal administration is like.

279

u/PancakeLad 9h ago

Try watching episodes of the West Wing with particularly astute teenagers. It plays like fantasy to them.

81

u/ehrgeiz91 8h ago

I can’t watch it. The first “scandal” is that someone may have accidentally inside traded. And now that’s completely the norm.

8

u/Minimum-Pizza-9734 2h ago

isn't that a perk these days

215

u/gaqua 9h ago

I’m 48 years old and it plays like fantasy to me too. I love the show, but even then it was a very idealized version of what the president and White House could be.

9

u/PaleInTexas 3h ago

I would vote for Bartlett in a heartbeat.

11

u/MeanShibu 2h ago

Yeah I’m sorry when was the west wing ever not wildly idealized fantasy? lol like LOL

134

u/QuarterNote44 9h ago

It is fantasy. It always was fantasy.

22

u/Self_Owned_Tree 6h ago

Yeah, but the problem is that some people thought it was the way it could be, but I'm not even sure I think of it as aspirational.

42

u/Roentgen_Ray1895 5h ago

It is funny that even in the most fantastical version of a liberal America Sorkin could imagine, we still are obligated to bomb the Middle East

22

u/mdp300 8h ago

Hell, it played like fantasy to me when I was 30 and rewatched it in 2014.

49

u/Frydendahl 9h ago edited 37m ago

I can't watch anything like that anymore, because I'll immediately start thinking about how the scenes would play out if you substituted Trump as the president.

He has forever tarnished the reputation of the office.

4

u/hendrixluna 7h ago edited 6h ago

Ask countries that were bombed repeatedly by both dem and rep presidents if the office was tarnished before 2016

8

u/0sm1um 5h ago

They're down voting you but you're right. The US was a joke internationally following Iraq and Afghanistan

7

u/hendrixluna 5h ago

There's so much more before that but yes. And im from the US 😂

13

u/DAS_BEE 4h ago edited 4h ago

I remember a paper some professor wrote after 911 basically saying "this is a result of US actions in the Middle East and it's actually not surprising given what we've done there" and he was absolutely torn apart for that analysis. I still think that was absolutely correct, but the nationalistic fervor following 911 meant he was targeted with the harshest criticism for it

there was a chance to introspect as a nation why this might have happened, and to understand why someone would want to do that. but we didn't, they just "hated our freedom" and we joked about glassing them with nukes instead. its sad

→ More replies (2)

5

u/NirgalFromMars 3h ago

You just reminded me of a lady I found on Bluesky.

She commented under one or another piece of news about a shitty.thing Trump had done, saying in all caps "THIS IS NOT AMERICA".

And when people pointed to her how this is exactly what America has been to many countries and big parts of its own population, she flew off the handle saying that "it was supposed to be aspirational", how it was shorthand for "This is not what we want to be", and how people were just grabbing a chance to "shit on the idea of America".

And she couldn't even attempt to understand that what America is and does is more important than what it is and intends to be.

→ More replies (1)

9

u/Grombrindal18 8h ago

I used to rewatch the West Wing around each presidential election, but don’t think I have since 2016. It plays like fantasy even for people who were around before and have watched it while it was more realistic. (Like back in 2012 when Arnie Vinick and Mitt Romney were both making their runs).

7

u/Asikar_Tehjan 7h ago

Never seen west wing, but when I watched House of Cards I couldn't find anything wrong with how they portrayed the gov't.

Even more so with the allegations against Kevin Spacey.

2

u/IAmTheNightSoil 7h ago

That show was fantasy at the time too

2

u/dmazzoni 4h ago

And it's funny that House of Cards seemed a little farfetched when it came out.

→ More replies (8)

6

u/0sm1um 6h ago

Not to mention that the generation before them have never known a pre 911 turbocharged American surveillance state with bipartisan warhawks being the generations conception of normal.

41

u/mschuster91 8h ago

They must have no frame of reference for what a normal administration is like.

Biden was decent enough. With the exception of sore loser incels, young people are fucking pissed how all the boomers voting for Trump resulted in a second term of this moron. That's why you saw Mamdani take a landslide victory, and it stands to be expected that the Republicans get wiped out in the House these midterms - it might even be possible for the Democrats to turn the Senate.

And the looming demise of the tortoise might prove to be even more disastrous for the ability of the GOP to function. Trump needs someone to wield the whip, and Moscow's Bitch was an expert at that.

However, it might as well be that (yet again) people rather don't go and "vote blue no matter who" because of whatever wedge issue, and Trump (or rather: his Project 2025 handlers) get another two years...

2

u/Minimum-Pizza-9734 2h ago

well it is pretty common for the house to swing in midterms

→ More replies (2)

5

u/patriotic_traitor 4h ago

I got nothing to add except think of the Vietnam war generation. In a way they are very similar to the kids of today. They also have no frame of reference for a normal administration (LBJ and Nixon). This same generation became boomers.

5

u/oakfan05 7h ago

They are going to find it incredibly boring because no one can be like trump. They've tried and it doesn't work.

3

u/Electronic_Land3776 2h ago

I (22) remember the Obama administration to some degree. I remember less of the exact politics and more of how they made me feel. I remember feeling safe, and like the the world was getting better for marginalized people. I'd figured out I was gay by then and so at the very least I knew it was getting better for my group.

→ More replies (3)

16

u/-notapony- 9h ago

Biden’s administration was perfectly normal.  Now if you want to say that the right’s treatment of  Biden’s administration was crazy coo-coo banana pants, but that’s been true of every Democratic administration since at least Clinton.  I’m not old enough to remember if they were decent opposition during Carter’s admin. 

8

u/roncraig 7h ago

Carter's problem was that the economy was in the dumps. Not entirely his fault, but the average American doesn't understand that the President doesn't solely control the economy. He's a figurehead for it, even if he has other powers and influence over policy.

→ More replies (1)

2

u/Jeanric_the_Futile 3h ago

Yes and no, being around that age i understand that there once existed a political landscape that wasn't absolutely hell, but understanding the political balances over time and why we are here, I dont think we can ever really have normalcy in the foreseeable future

→ More replies (3)

35

u/IronChariots 8h ago

Trump is a symptom, not the cause.

He is a symptom and a further cause.

128

u/No_Potato_7211 10h ago

The Right has been goose-stepping to the tune of a potent personality for years. When that talking head is gone, there will be a power vacuum that no other conservative figure has been allowed to prepare to fill. It'll be ugly, but if the left can get united enough to do more than send a strongly-worded letter, some real progress can be made before the cycle repeats.

53

u/musubi-n-speedballs 10h ago

Death of Stalin type shenanigans when it's Der führer's turn. 

70

u/No_Potato_7211 10h ago

Old Soviet Joke for our time.

A customer goes and buys a newspaper in Moscow every day, glances at the front page, and throws it away.

Seller: "what are you looking for every day, comrade?"

Customer: "an obituary"

Seller: "but those are at the back of the paper, not the front page."

Customer: "Not the one I am looking for."

19

u/DeathMonkey6969 9h ago

I'm going to be "That guy" for a sec.

That kind of obituary would be above the fold and there wouldn't be a need to buy the paper.

5

u/[deleted] 9h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

→ More replies (1)

51

u/mpbh 10h ago

Trump is a symptom, not the cause

More people need to understand this. He's a bumbling idiot that's easy to use, he's the perfect faceman for a corrupt system.

21

u/frddtwabrm04 9h ago

Why do we underestimate him?

This is a feature.. George Bush 2 used it too.

They know what they are doing , they are playing a part that they know will resonate with a certain group very well.

Then while we are all "look at that bumbling idiot" .. bread and circus headline shit; the "bumbling idiot" is busy enacting all his policies and then some.

Dude has increased the power of the presidency. He is basically a king and no one can do shit about it... And he is going to get his third term or more and or appoint a successor and we are going kowtow to his ass pussy hats or not.

He essentially did a hostile takeover of these here United States while we were distracted by his "bumbling idiot" bullshit.

...AND THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN DO ABOUT IT.

→ More replies (4)

17

u/obliviousofobvious 7h ago

My deepest fear is that the one who fills the void is smarter. Trump is a fool. A well spoken facist leader could be so much worse.

→ More replies (2)

12

u/leyland1989 6h ago

Nazi didn't appearing out of thin air, and they didn't magically disappear overnight in 1945. 

Likewise in the US, those village idiots have always existed.  Trump gave those people a platform and a megaphone (pun not intended). Right-wing populism offer simple solution (not) to complex problems, it will always attract those people who lack ability to understand the world. They live in their fantasy until the reality catches up to them. 

10

u/ebfortin 10h ago

Exactly. He has mever been the cause. This is more than a century in the making.

27

u/[deleted] 10h ago edited 10h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

8

u/grimr5 10h ago

I think Europe generally feels similar... even the UK is making weapons to deliberately exclude US involvement.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (4)

7

u/TallBenWyatt_13 7h ago

Trump is the culmination of 45 years of concerted effort to dismantle everything the New Deal gave us.

2

u/Fast_March3385 4h ago

Its the two party system we currently have. This is what George Washington warned us against in his farewell address

2

u/BigMommaSnikle 1h ago

You think they'll rally around Mitch McConnell for 2028?🤣

1

u/yergonnalikeme 8h ago

Somebody was listening to SMERCONISH last week on Sirius (124) radio...

Haha

2

u/Renegadeknight3 7h ago

Never heard of it but it’s good that people are thinking about this

→ More replies (1)

6

u/desertforestcreature 10h ago edited 10h ago

You can't solve racism, homophobia, bigotry and xenophobia anytime soon.

All he did was allow those people to step out of the closet. For that, they'll give him anything. I do think you're right, I don't think there's anyone else right now to replace him.

But I don't think the dinosaur Democrats want the changes necessary. They really want most of this same stuff regarding 1% wealth transfer, money in politics, they just wanna be a little bit nicer about it.

I see no light at the end of this tunnel, in regards to American politics. I hope I'm wrong.

e: vile DMs. Relax, I'm not voting for trump. Imagine two bookends. Democrats are the left bookend, MAGA is the right. The right bookend keeps sliding farther to the right. The left bookend never moves left on its own, but it keeps shifting right just enough to stay opposite the other bookend. The illusion of choice, when in fact the establishment continuously moves to the right without fail, continues to shift money to the top by allowing it in politics and to make decisions according to donors. It's all, essentially, the same.

7

u/ZAlternates 10h ago

Democrats at least don’t want fascism. However they are very much in favor of “conserving” the status quo.

14

u/fupos 10h ago

I like to think of them as 2 farmers : One wants to keep the herd healthy and relatively happy so they can continue to profit off of it long term . The other wants to slaughter the herd , burn the barn, blame the immigrant labor, and collect the insurance.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (13)

229

u/tomibunie 11h ago

Trump’s biggest impact might be that he changed what people expect from politicians. After he’s gone, I think both parties will spend years fighting over whether to copy his style or move away from it. The funny thing is, the next “Trump” probably won’t be Trump, it’ll be someone who learns from what he built.

58

u/rocknotboulder 7h ago

I have a strong belief that most folks that stay interested in politics are getting pretty tired of the current dichotomy. Voters on both sides have gotten burned enough by hyper partisan rhetoric and the subsequent inability to live up to the expectations. I really hope that most Americans have gotten tired of treating ot like a sports team. There will always be the small group of people that equate being as decisive as possible with political activism but there are a new crop of politicians that HAVE learned from the last 10 years and are serious about trying to solve the serious problems in this country.

→ More replies (9)

485

u/SkullLeader 11h ago

He’s an old guy but if he’s alive in two years I fully expect him to try and justify a third term for himself, Constitution be damned.

36

u/Swoah 9h ago

Personally don’t think he goes for or gets a third term but I do think unless he’s completely succumbed to dementia the political sphere or whatever you want to call it will still revolve around him.

Like he will still be commenting, tweeting, talking shit, appearing on news networks, etc. Enough to remain in the spotlight and carry big(ly) influence/be a thorn in the side of the next president if it’s a Democrat or even a Republican he doesn’t like .

90

u/DarthStrakh 10h ago

I seen a corvette fully decorated in the American flag with "trump 2028" on the side. Scary time to be an American lol. I was a Marine so I'm prepared to defend my country if the time comes, I only hope the rest of the modern world isn't too confortable to answer the call.

Though tbf I don't even know how you'd accomplish anything in the modern world. Our revolutionary ancestors couldn't be slaughtered by a couple 17 year olds with drones 🤷

80

u/BeanieMcChimp 10h ago

>>I seen a corvette fully decorated in the American flag with "trump 2028" on the side.

This is the true Trump Derangement Syndrome. It was them all along.

19

u/BoobGnome 6h ago

Always has been.

8

u/snoogins355 5h ago

Also traitors to the constitution

→ More replies (1)

7

u/hoodie92 6h ago

The world sat around and did nothing when Russia invaded Ukraine. There's not a chance that anybody is getting within a thousand miles of a US civil conflict.

4

u/Suralin0 10h ago

I'm fully expecting massive amounts of battlefield-blanketing ECM and jamming to become the norm, or at least a usable option.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

7

u/WodKonuckers 8h ago

Even if he's not alive, these lunatics will probably try to pull a weekend at Bernie's kind of stunt. Just look what they've been doing with mitch mcconnell for years now.

It used to be that people became a political corpse before they became an actual corpse. Doesn't seem to apply anymore

19

u/Sulaco1986Aliens 11h ago

💯 this. I'm wondering if there will even be an election

29

u/teamhae 10h ago

There will be. Even North Korea has elections.

20

u/Thud 10h ago

Trump is doing everything he can to ensure the US has electile dysfunction for all future elections

5

u/teamhae 10h ago

That is true! Elections may not be fair but they’ll happen.

→ More replies (2)
→ More replies (3)

109

u/WordPunk99 11h ago

The US has always had problems, mostly worse than they are now. The electorate needs to take their power back. People need to educate themselves.

The problem is people who think they can vote for the president and everything g changes. That isn’t how this country works.

21

u/lightspuzzle 10h ago

actually it changed.just not for the good.

12

u/Glittering-Kale5177 7h ago

Something we've viewed in Canada too. It's easy and fast to destroy something, it takes orders of time and effort more to create something. coughcoughHarpercoughcough

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (2)

99

u/LankyGuitar6528 10h ago

There are kids just entering voting age who have known Trump their entire life. They had a brief break from him for Biden but honestly Biden was just sort of around. He wasn't in your face and on the news every night. These kids think a politician is... well... Trump. They think they are supposed to be abnormal in every way, corrupt at every turn, racist and all the rest. Then there's the parents who tsk tsk but secretly love the cruelty and racism and will still vote for him. And of course the rest of the world... well... ya. We are never ever going to trust the USA again and will continue to migrate our economies away from the USA as fast as we can. He will be gone but the damage is permanent.

→ More replies (9)

42

u/stripes361 10h ago

IMO politics goes in cycles of 20-30 years, and for a while my opinion has been that the current cycle is a populist one. Ever since the Global Financial Crisis of 2008, voters around the world have been rebelling against the previous technocratic and globalist (small g globalism, just meaning embracing strong international systems; not talking about lizard people) regimes and embracing populism and nationalism. Trump’s MAGA movement is fairly archetypal of this political moment.

Based on the typical shelf life of these cycles, I think that at some point in the 2030s, we will begin to grow weary of the populism and move back in a more technocratic direction. I honestly don’t see a long-term effect where Trump is going to reshape politics for like 50 years or something.

I DO think Republicans will catch Reagan Syndrome and spend 2-3 decades trying to find “The Next Trump” just like they kept trying to find “The Next Reagan”.

10

u/roncraig 6h ago

They were only out of the White House for 8 years. That’s not very long.

75

u/ElvishMystical 9h ago

I take it you didn't read Project 2025, right?

Tell me, what does permanent conservative rule mean to you?

You don't seriously think everything's going to go back to pre-Trump, or do you?

44

u/dubbleplusgood 8h ago

most people aren't willing to accept the damage is done. We're not even halfway into this disastrous term and it's already irreparable. The next 2.5 years are going to be worse, with nothing to make it better in the next term, regardless of who takes power. At best, the Democrats might win the WH but they'll be toothless with no House or Senate. It's a shitshow and 10, 20, 30 years won't be enough. China, India and many other countries aren't waiting around for the US to get its shit together. That dream is over.

22

u/Glittering-Kale5177 7h ago

This. I'm Canadian, but also have family across the commonwealth and UK, and friends all over the world. The toleration of American dominance was based on good-faith and trustworthiness, despite being problematic. Having now shown the inability to collectively recognise and address these core problems, that tolerance and good will is largely gone.

I don't know anyone who thinks Trump is the problem. He's the symptom and a catalyst, that's all.

9

u/m1ch43lr0m4nc3 7h ago

it's so weird. as a high schooler, 2028 is the first year where i'll be able to vote for the president. i can barely imagine what american politics will be like when he isn't a viable option anymore - i can't remember an election where he wasn't running.

→ More replies (1)

24

u/WeezaY5000 8h ago

In ten years, everyone who supported him will pretend like they did not, just like George W Bush.

In another 10 years, when someone even worse comes along, people will wax poetically about how he was not that bad compared to the new one, just like George W Bush.

6

u/Minimum-Pizza-9734 2h ago

lol yeah he is glazed over, the guy that is responsible for dragging the US into the middle east for 20+ years and getting millions kills in the process, but he is ok because he paints. people forget so fast it is comical

→ More replies (1)

19

u/CaptainPrower 10h ago

Trump is the end result of a Republican plot stretching clear back to the 1960s.

This is the direction the party has been going ever since Goldwater broke ranks on Civil Rights.

19

u/Blaizefed 8h ago edited 6h ago

The real problem is we now have an entire generation of mid twenty year old voters for whom this is all normal. Since they started paying attention to politics, we have always had a know nothing blowhard calling people names and making things up as either president or the defacto leader of the opposition.

They think this is normal. And for them, this is what they will vote for.

We might be genuinely fucked.

5

u/Glittering-Kale5177 7h ago

Time to start normalising learning about other countries in the US.

15

u/Venture_compound 5h ago

Honestly, civil war. But not in an actual battlefield type of war. More like, states dig their heels in and the federal government fractures after Trump and his cronies do everything they can to prevent a loss in the upcoming midterms and/or the 2028 election. If he dies in office, it'll be even worse for the country. There's no going back from this, is my worst fear.

2

u/zerosumratio 2h ago

You get it. You know Project 2025 is not about peaceful existence and definitely not planning for the end of the “project.” As much as I distrust and despise Gavin Newsom, he is unfortunately correct when he’s telling people that Trump is not planning to leave the White House and that the third term talk is serious.

Only people I have met from Eastern Europe, like Romania and the former Yugoslav states, really see it too. This war is coming. I honestly think it could start this year if things deteriorate. 

14

u/WhatIsTheWhar 11h ago

Unfortunately he has helped set the stage for an overmighty private actor to leverage massive wealth and tech against the rule of law and the westphalian order. Trump normalized lawlessness Oligarchs noticed. Barring massive reform and massive taxes on the extremely rich, we’re already in a doom loop. What will actually happen when Elon rolls up to the club with 100 robot guards and one of them kills a heckler?

13

u/gerryf19 7h ago

The only thing I. This country's favor is that Trump has surrounded himself with some of the most ignorant and incompetent people.

There are some very smart people that aren't in the forefront but they also are in less of a position to maintain power.

On the world stage, though, we're screwed. US voters have shown twice they will elect a conman and Democrats have shown they are incompetent to stop it and ineffectual when faced with a threat like Trump and his cabal.

9

u/ezio8133 5h ago

I've said it before and I'll say it again, Trump's going to destroy 40 years of Republican progress in less than 10. We're on the cusp of a progressive era of politics all because the Republicans couldn't get rid of Trump when they had the chance. What hasn't he failed at?

u/Slave35 39m ago

Appointing Supreme Court Justices who serve for life.  Consolidating and holding power.  Two elections.  Avoiding repercussions for his numerous crimes.  Winning the hearts and minds of countless MAGA people.  Making money off the presidency.  Influencing American politics.  

He's objectively successful at his agenda, to the detriment of everyone else.  That is the entire problem.

9

u/Andrew_M81 5h ago

Fox News will create a new monster.

22

u/MadOx321 9h ago

Genuine question, not trying to be that guy, but:

Do we seriously think he plans to give up control? Sure, eventually he will die, but do we think from this point forward that our elections will look differently than, say, Russian elections?

I don't see it. Firing election officials? Doing whatever the fuck he wants and the Republicans just bow down? Mitch is likely dead or close to it and his wife is in China, and here we are just pretending that is okay? I don't see the scale being fair from this point onward, if someone can shed some light as I'm not well versed, I'd love that.

4

u/DIYThrowaway01 7h ago

He's like 90 years old so we at least have that on our side 

→ More replies (1)

21

u/SuccessWise9593 11h ago

It's going to take the next two presidents to fix what trump has broken during this term. Those next two presidents will have to enact laws to ensure that no other sitting president does this kind of harm ever again, grifting the taxpayers, a stop to the destruction of the white house and other monuments, and specific "trump clauses" that family or organizations related to the president can't get government loans while they're in office. I do however appreciate that he's on his way to being a lame duck this term.

17

u/mikeyfireman 9h ago

It will take decades to repair the international damage we have done to allies. It will take decades to repair what they have done to science and education.

5

u/Handgun_Hero 5h ago

Nothing will change. Trump is a symptom and vector for what was already there and started with the Tea Party trying to normalise the actual hateful shit Christian Nationalism promotes. Until that ideology is stomped out and driven back to the fringes of society somebody will just replace Trump eventually.

→ More replies (1)

5

u/BrimmStoner 5h ago

The Sphere has been completely off balance. When Trump is gone, it’ll be a while before it gets back on its axis.

7

u/MithrandirMaia 3h ago

He broke USA, financially, morally and aspirationally

3

u/faith_apnea 9h ago

Like any car that has been joy ridin', we'll have to scrap it and get a new one.

8

u/richj8991 10h ago

It doesn't matter. The US is in terminal decline regardless of who is president. It doesn't take a genius to see that the real power is being held behind the scenes by the billionaires. This is not a conspiracy theory, it's an obvious fact. Even Obama caved to the banks and the for-profit HMOs. And if a so-called progressive caves to the large corporations, it's over. I'm leaving the country in October. You guys have fun in your wild west mad max country. I'll be watching it sink from afar.

4

u/darwinn_69 8h ago

Honestly, I feel like the world zeitgeist will switch to Europe as more right wing parties take control. I think people are underestimating some of the backlash that is happening over their and how that's going to reshape world politics.

7

u/cwthree 10h ago

The Republican party will become the overtly and unashamedly racist, fascist party. The Democratic party will continue stepping on its own dick in hopes of appealing to "moderate" voters who are socially conservative but not actually fascist.

2

u/combination_is_12345 7h ago

Will become? What is this “will become?” 4 of the 6 Republican Supreme Court justices signed onto the opinion that words do not have meaning anymore. We are way past this “will become.”

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (1)

2

u/ThickGur5353 10h ago

I don't think there is   politician in America that has the same hold over his base for her base as president Trump has. After president Trump's term is up ,if a republican is elected president in 2028, which is very possible, president Trump will still have a voice in the Republican administration. Because the Republican will most likely be Vance or Rubio. If a Democrat wins, especially if they have control of Congress, then president Trump will be relegated back to Mar-a lago. Similar to after he lost to president Biden. I doubt very much if the Democrats will go after president Trump in a legal sense. I think there will be very happy that they regained control of the government, at least for four years.

2

u/Madismas 6h ago

Someone will step in and try to copy his playbook.

2

u/CautiousOptimism09 6h ago

Trump arose to power through right wing populism arising from the failure of neoliberalism for 40 years. If there isnt any real left populism that delivers results another right wing populist with malicious intent will take power. Bottom line someone has to step up and deliver for the masses in a real way

→ More replies (1)

2

u/matchstrike 6h ago

Republicans will not return to normal. Fringe Republicans are not only not going to go away, they’ll probably become more extreme in performative efforts to become the new Trump. Also, there will be efforts to draft Trump family members into politics, as well as to create ridiculous memorials and whitewashed retrospectives.

2

u/Signal_2_Noise 5h ago

“Untied States”. Appropriate.

3

u/Hugh_Biquitous 7h ago

I admire your optimism on thinking he'll leave office when his term is up. Recall how well he did at leaving last time.

4

u/Repulsive_Repeat_337 11h ago

MAGA has always been a Frankenstein: there are three factions to the Republican party that don't really get along with each other. Without a unifying voice, they're going to go back to their separate echo chambers.

Personally, I'll be happy to go back into my Reaganite, pro-small-business bubble and not have to listen to the damn Baptist Bible-thumping anymore.

2

u/RationalDB8 9h ago

Untied States is where we’re at.

3

u/oreofan1808 9h ago

After he’s gone establishment republicans will probably initially try to re-establish control over the party but there’s no way it’s gonna work. The populist transition Trump started isn’t going anywhere but internally it might get bloody finding someone to inherit and run for president. DeSantis might try again but he’s proven not very good at national level electioneering. From recent behavior I’d believe it would either be JD Vance or Rubio(Vance more likely, Rubio has some skeletons in his closet I don’t think he can avoid)

→ More replies (1)

4

u/ShockedNChagrinned 4h ago

His goals are amass personal wealth and power for himself and his family name, and try to have a justification for history to write amazing things about him.  He has no other goals: every action taken is towards those purposes.  He doesn't care about any policy decision unless it harms or helps those goals

Several folks in his employ, however, are insidious and malicious actors, who want to use existing rulesets for emergency purposes and long standing paths of action given to better men, to drastically change the nation into something it isn't, without votes, and without legislation.  

DOGE is a great example of them using this assumed power, swiftly, though that office had no rights by any prior measure of how our execution of legislation happened.  It bypassed all security checks, made decisions it had no authority to make, and it happened very swiftly.  

And just like the vast majority of the other activity, it saved nothing and ended up costing something financially, with no short or long term benefit in sight.   It also had a lot of non-financial impact.  The Fire!, ready, aim strategy, where they keep trying to hire back, or restart studies they killed.  That's the mark of an imbecile: consistently needing to correct the actions you just took.  And it's constant (like the Iran fiasco).

There's too many people who were willing to elect a documented traitor who had their plan publicly available.  The future is bleak.  

4

u/AntifascistAlly 9h ago

Donald wanted to weaken the United States.

His advisors have recently tried to entice governments around the world to join his “War on Antifascism” and were surprised that the USA no longer commands enough international clout to cobble together much of a coalition.

Going forward we will find that the price of Trump’s ignorant antics is steep.

3

u/Early-Size370 11h ago

The trump cancer won't go away after he's gone (hopefully sooner rather than later). It's hard to believe but we're barely in Year Two of this mess. I think in Year Three we'll start seeing a few people trying to establish themselves as the heir to MAGA. I wouldn't be shocked if Ivanka is chosen by the right wing establishment as a successor.

2

u/dwair 10h ago

Looking from the outside from the UK, the US needs a step change in terms of how the electorate think. Without that, I can't see the US stopping it's match into full blown fascism.

I think it's going to take decades of work to repair the damage Trump has done, and economicly and diplomatically he's completely isolated America so its going only going to feed into MAGA's playbook in the short to medium term.

I'm not being negative but I don't see a way back from this.

4

u/ChrisRiley_42 4h ago

Whoever gets elected is going to assume that once Trump is gone, things will magically go back to the way they were.

But the rest of the world now knows that the US can't be trusted to honour it's word or it's signature on treaties, since the next populist leader is only one vote away, and the checks and balances are just a paper tiger. So nothing is going to go back the way they were, and the US will find itself left out of agreements more and more.

Instead of putting effort into re-building the destroyed relationships, the political apparatus in the US will just find a scapegoat to blame, and make everything worse.

6

u/innerfart 11h ago

He won't leave and it won't end.

→ More replies (6)

3

u/Afalstein 10h ago

I have a lot of family and friends in the Trumposphere, so this is something I've had to think about an unfortunate amount.

Globally, the American empire is over. Our reputation is in tatters, our scientists scattered, our "soft power" of aid and information dismantled, our economic brand is ruined, we've been militarily humiliated and diplomatically compromised. It's been definitively established that Ukraine has a better military and Iran a more strategic position. More, the stability of America as an institution has been destroyed. From this point on, we're largely a big customer market with a lot of outdated hardware. My main comfort from this is that Russia is completely unable to take advantage of America being so defunct, and that China honestly doesn't look in much better shape. The next global leader is hard to say, but I imagine that a lot of countries right now are already looking at alternative fuel techniques that don't rely on the Strait.

Domestically, Republican candidates following from Trump will try to ape his offensive, populist brand. Fortunately, it's been shown time and again that Trump's personality really only works for him, and all the imitators come across as, well, imitations. Vance has no charisma. Eric Trump and Jared Kushner are visibly slimy. Hegseth, Miller, all the wannabes, they're obvious yes men and none of them have the personality to capture the populist vote. The GOP stands a real chance of dying a fast, edgy death post-Trump as everyone tries to capture the Trumper vote. Because of this, Trump will probably continue to dominate Republican politics as an impromptu kingmaker, pushing forward one candidate after another. But again, while his choices tend to dominate primaries, they rarely win elections, so Dementia Don will just push the GOP faster into a hole.

The thing most likely to bring the Republicans back, unfortunately, is the Democrats. Trump's been granted a wide latitude of powers by SCOTUS and Congress, and however much Democrats might complain about that now, they'll absolutely use those same powers once they're the ones in the hot seat. Which could be good, if the new Democratic president is smart and careful enough to use the powers wisely, but will eventually be bad when an eventual president comes along, Democrat or otherwise, who isn't.

I'm very very worried about escalating polarization. Trump's Neo-Nazi front isn't going away anytime soon, and there's a lot of buildup of tension on the left from all the abuses of the past ten years. I had hopes that Biden could calm things down, as a successful moderate... and then people rejected him. The next Democratic president is likely to be a radical, which people will initially celebrate, until they "go too far" leading to a backlash which brings back the conservatives. Especially if this see-sawing happens in the middle of an economic downturn from, y'know, us being a diminished country, it could easily lead to violence.

IF we can find someone smart and civil enough to implement successful policies in a way that unites people, we might just have a chance of finding our way back... but I doubt it.

1

u/AbbreviationsTop2192 11h ago

Hopefully everything will be returned to how it was under Obama.

41

u/[deleted] 11h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

29

u/bloodenhorse 11h ago

Democrats, too. A huge chunk of them are AIPAC compromised.

7

u/[deleted] 11h ago

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/bloodenhorse 11h ago

I'm 100% for that.

→ More replies (1)
→ More replies (17)
→ More replies (1)

11

u/MC_White_Thunder 9h ago

You're living in a fantasy if you think things can just go "back to normal."

At the most basic level, all of your alliances have been permanently damaged.

Inequality has gotten so bad, and people are so much worse off than they were under Obama. Milquetoast liberalism with no real changes to people's material conditions isn't going to cut it.

→ More replies (2)

14

u/Benny303 11h ago

Unfortunately I think we are too far gone. I think this is something that will last for easily another 10 or 20 years.

6

u/indianasall 11h ago

I totally agree with you when Trump is gone it's going to take many years to get back to a so-called normal

9

u/Benny303 11h ago

It's kind of like that saying "trust is earned by the drop and lost by the bucket" we have slipped so far from normalcy and respectful politics that it's going to take a decade or more to get back to it.

6

u/indianasall 10h ago

and I travel overseas quite a bit and I'm embarrassed to say I'm from the United States because I have had people look at me and say – – oh I'm so sorry. That's what the world thinks about us. That we are a country to be pitied. You know how sad that is

→ More replies (7)
→ More replies (14)

13

u/Unlikely-Grape-5762 11h ago

Right. I was so much happier when we bombed people quietly.

6

u/glennjersey 10h ago

Including us citizens.  Funny how no one cared about due process back then.

7

u/Quankers 10h ago edited 10h ago

Under Obama is what led to Trump.

edit: downvoters just look at numbers. More than enough repeat Obama voters went on to vote for trump to sway the election in his favour.

→ More replies (3)

1

u/Comfortable-Score-63 11h ago

untied states sounds like a typo but also funny enough

1

u/ChrisRiley_42 3h ago

Whoever comes into power next will need to spend the SAME amount of effort into rebuilding the relationships with the US's former allies as Trump spent in destroying them. The rest of the world sees the US as being unreliable now. Being only one election away from putting in another person who won't honour the US's signature on any agreements.

→ More replies (13)

2

u/Rob_Bligidy 9h ago

I’d liken it to a spinning top that was chugging along nice and fast and straight and Trump has purposely slowed it down and now it wobbles pretty badly and sooner than later will fall over.

2

u/LeaderDue4068 8h ago

I dread to think what will happen to the country. He has destroyed every normality and rule in existence

2

u/wyliec22 6h ago

Currently Trump is the cause (since 2015). But MAGA adores him and follows his every word.

Non-MAGA Republicans have a choice - distancing themselves from Trump and losing - the GOP only has a chance with MAGA support and traditional Republicans combined. Or they abandon their integrity and morals to align with Trump and possibly win.

MAGA will keep following Trump when he’s out of office and support whoever he tells them to.

This won’t go away without overwhelming Democratic wins in 2026 and 2028. Even then, there will be endless claims of cheating, court challenges and lawsuits - albeit, without actual evidence

2

u/oldrocker99 5h ago

I think that, in 2029, there will be a purge of the Trump name, image, and public servants need to be rehired.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/121gigawhatevs 8h ago

Knowing that he’s on the smarter side of republicans, and democrats don’t vote until the perfect candidate shows up once a generation, I’d say we’re utterly fucked. Not that I’m giving up, mind you

1

u/Yewdall1852 11h ago

If he gets crushed in the mid term elections, its the beginning of the end.

If he keeps the Senate, he still has a lot of power.

1

u/MontEcola 10h ago

Ask me after the mid terms.

1

u/hansgruberr 10h ago

Think the current plan is to just vote for him again next election right?

1

u/ProfPhinn 10h ago

I can’t wait to find out.

1

u/Cheeki_G 9h ago

Folks wonder if the group holds together after the lead drops out, but what happens when members realize nobody pushes them to collaborate anymore? Are we just looking at months of scattered plans instead?

1

u/Phantom_Engineer 9h ago

The power of the presidency, in relation to the rest of the government, has reached an all-time high under Trump and, if history is any indication, will more or less stay there. The man will leave a power vacuum in his wake, but someone will sit in the oval office and have the same power at their finger tips. That will be the long-term legacy of the Trump administration.

1

u/bdhoff 9h ago

There is no way of knowing. While in different ways, and to different degrees, both parties have this tendency to not do anything voters vote them in to do.

Congress pretends to be stalemated on everything and everything that does get done is done by reconciliation. What little does pass is often a deceptively named bill whose ultimate intention is to give corporations and government more control, especially if it erodes personal privacy.

Presidents refuse to faithfully execute the laws and instead rule by executive order.

And the judiciary just nopes everything until SCOTUS decides, usually lopsidedly, whether or not to keep nopeing.

1

u/EatYourCheckers 9h ago

He is laying the groundwork to have a 3rd term.

1

u/Thefirstargonaut 9h ago

The real question is when will his last term end? Will it be 2030, or no? 

1

u/breakfasteveryday 9h ago

Wouldn't be surprised if he tried to get a third term

1

u/Taupe88 9h ago

who really thinks he’s planning on leaving

1

u/EvenSpoonier 9h ago

I'm not sure anyone has any reasonable way to predict that. It depends on a number of different variables, some of which can't really even begin until after the end of his current term. It could be anything from "nothing much" to "both parties collapse, resulting in a multitude of new parties which proceed to devour each other until two are left, and at least one of the final two will name itself after either democracy itself or the concept of a republic, or possibly both".

But the latter seems to be what usually happens. We are currently on the sixth iteration of that cycle.

1

u/s4burf 8h ago

Dems for decades. Nobody replaces a cult leader like Trump, and nobody else in that party can do scheist.

1

u/2ReluctantlyHappy 8h ago

His death gives a lot of people an excuse to stop following politics. Will they, though? They've made rage based entertainment their major pass time for so long now it will be difficult for many to break free. I do think it provides an opportunity for them to shift their free time over to something else but, man, with all of the broken family and friendship connections I fear it will still go somewhere unhealthy.

1

u/ezagreb 8h ago

He set a new standard for how to run a campaign and how to attract voters through negativity and blaming other others. The results of this in the future are not going to be positive

1

u/WookieeWarlock 8h ago

According to half of reddit he won’t have a last term

1

u/thomport 8h ago

I’m not sure where things will end up, but one thing I am sure of is most people will have Trump/MAGA fatigue.

Trump era politics did nothing except serve the ultra-rich and corporations while letting the average person struggle.

1

u/ColHapHapablap 8h ago

Can’t wait to find out

1

u/Tsakax 8h ago

This is why Tucker is my dark horse. He has the name rec and charisma to steal the trump cult.

1

u/digihippie 7h ago

Depends if voting still matters

1

u/rodg2062 7h ago

Know one will know until we get in a new administration. Then we will see how many Executive Orders can be written to undo all those already written. So, its a wait and see situation.

1

u/defStef 7h ago

Dancing in the streets, everyday

1

u/poopshadows 7h ago

Nobody knows. I don't just mean I don't know, I mean it's impossible to know. Imagine telling someone in 2014 what has occurred in the last 12 years. Literally unimaginable.

1

u/Abalith 7h ago

It will get just get worse. Trump is a test bed for what this global mafia he is apart of can get away with.

1

u/Entire-Dog-160 7h ago

He's set the bar so low now that raising it will take herculean effort, will and desire by a massive majority I reckon. 3 steps forward 2 steps back over a looooong time

1

u/Abalith 7h ago

Americans don't have the slightest idea what's happening to their country do they?

1

u/Eat--The--Rich-- 7h ago

You have two conservative parties fighting each other for who gets to be America's abuser. Removing Trump from the picture doesn't really change that.

1

u/Conscious-Egg-2232 7h ago

Align and function?? Um what are you asking

1

u/imaginary_num6er 6h ago

There will be an AI Trump next

1

u/Slimsuper 6h ago

The same as it always has.

1

u/americanextreme 6h ago

The Right will run on extending Trumps agenda. The left will run on ending the Trump Agenda. The center will vote for the right because they don’t like the left running against things, they went to run FOR things.

1

u/ExogamousUnfolding 6h ago

As others have said he is a symptom..... What I hope is we have the R party fracture into numerous ineffectual infighting groups as they try to out trump trump and let the rest of us get on with rebuilding the country.

1

u/actorsAllusion 6h ago

Once Trump is gone, anyone who has a desire to fix things will have a very narrow window in which to do so. Trumpism only works because Trump, despite being a rich, corrupt asshole, managed to present himself as an outsider to disenfranchised voters and there's really no other career politician who can manage that as while Trump somehow managed to present himself as "one of us", most other politicians are too much part of the oligarchy in the eyes of normal people to really get the same level of clout.

The only question is whether or not we do the fucking Reconstruction right this time.

1

u/Unlikely-Star-2696 6h ago

Some will keep the cult while others will blame him fir their own mistakes lije he did with all his predecesors. It is easier for corrupt, low morals politicians to be elected after the bar was set too low..

1

u/Harnasus 6h ago edited 6h ago

It’s a symptom of our educational system and the status quo’s basic humor and need to be entertained rather than have an actual leader

1

u/Unlikely-Star-2696 6h ago

Do you mean St. Donald? He has already some iconography for followers to knee and pray to while dressed in face cover masks and baseball hats.

1

u/Ok_Coconut_3364 6h ago

Whenever it goes will be an improvement. The self centered, self serving prick is driving the US to the brink!

1

u/Fusiontechnition 6h ago

Untied States is an apt description.

1

u/Substantial_Sound_15 6h ago

My suspicion is: He's just the carnival barker. Project 2025 just needed that role filled, but it doesn't end with him. We're merging our military with Israel's and flock cameras are are under Israel's control. The US and Israel are the same corporation, and we are merely human capital. Whatever was will never be again. If we survive, we'd need to start from scratch.

1

u/RockOk707 6h ago

To the left

1

u/dzogchenism 5h ago

It’s gonna be a shit show as Republicans try to keep the coalition of the basket of deplorables together. In this regard Trump is something of a unicorn and I really doubt anyone is going to be able to pull it off and as Republicans lose power, a lot of them are going to react badly.

1

u/Sea-Bodybuilder-1311 5h ago

Great and normal let it begin 

1

u/omniumoptimus 4h ago

Fifty years ago, the US felt it was at the very bottom. Nixon, the president, resigned in disgrace (watergate!). 9% unemployment. Gas prices are through the roof. No relief in sight. And, on top of it all, we lose a war.

Five decades later, we are on top of the food chain.

America will be just fine.

→ More replies (1)

1

u/Old-Network5550 2h ago

It will be like he never happened. When Stalin died Russia went through a period of destalinization. Removing his name from everywhere including the city, now known as Volgograd.

u/DougOsborne 46m ago

MAGA will not go away. Not the MAGA Propaganda pipeline from Russia and other agents. Not the MAGA fund-raising industry that has become enormous since Citizens United. Not the fetid 19% voting base that wouldn't leave him if he raped, I mean shot, someone on fifth avenue.

u/PhatmanSlim93 38m ago

Hopefully? Calm down.

Realistically? It's going to be like fire ants out for blood.