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Comment by sAbakumoff | Hacker News Reader

America will not collapse, but American democracy likely will collapse.

At the end of 2022, GOP will win the mid-term elections and have the majority in the house and the senate.

They already have state legislatures effectively under control, and the supreme court is full of conservative judges.

In 2024 Ron De Santos, or another authoritarian candidate, will win the GOP nomination and easily win the election because Mr. Biden is a total loser.

With the supermajority, the GOP will establish an autocracy for decades.

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I'm still a little bit confident in the system, though.

Because in 2026, Dem will win back both congress and senate, it's just a normal pattern. Voters never liked any party owns it all.

Two parties keep playing this along the way, except each game are so close these days, it's tiring and boring and hard to advance any agenda when either one is in control.

The system is getting close to deadlock when both sides no longer honor the game rule: "debate before the election, work together after it and just wait for your next turn". Instead it's now about fighting every day, it does not matter who won the election anymore. The end result?

"Nothing Got Done(tm)"

In that sense, it's not because China is doing better, it's because US's internal problem stops itself, and may bring it down.

> Because in 2026, Dem will win back both congress and senate, it's just a normal pattern.

The parent's prediction is that there won't be a (free) election in 2026.

Hope that helps.

that's just fear mongering though, in 2008 the Republicans said Obama was the antichrist and would declare himself dictator for life ffs. And before that, the Democrats said the same about Bush, "he's going to cancel elections, declare himself dictator, and use 9/11 and the thread of terrorism as the justification!"

except after obama terms democrats didn't go on a insurrectionist rampage through the capitol with ARs and zipties while obama/biden were simultaneously cheering on. neither did dems have the audacity to send out fake election certifications just because. 'Both Sides' are not the same!

The narrative is that the rules will change so that your 2026 scenario doesn't happen.

That's why the voting rights bill is Biden's main 2022 agenda item.

> the GOP will establish an autocracy for decades.

do you just mean win elections for decades? That i can sort of believe (or at least comprehend), but wholesale destruction of Democracy? To me, that means canceling elections and the president declaring themself absolute power for life which i just don't see happening. I would expect a military coup before that since the military swears allegiance to the constitution first and then civilian leadership next.

What I mean is the following strategy:

- shredding off what remains of voting rights

- packing courts all over the country, including the SCOTUS with conservative or right-wing judges

- appointing right-wing figures to top positions in DoJ, DoD, and FBI

- cementing the state legislatures authorities to determine the outcome of elections

I think it’s more likely the Democratic party collapses.

They can’t seem to find a single thing to unify on.

"Conservative" literally means "averse to change" so of course they will always unify around a set of traditional beliefs.

The Democratic party has a harder time "unifying" because it's more accepting of change, but there is a wide spectrum of tolerance around how much and when people adapt to rapidly changing social and fiscal policies. Ultimately I think there is unification, but there's lag time for everyone to catch up and be on the same wavelength; a lag time of years, sometimes decades. This gives the perception of a disorganized party, but realistically it's more complicated than that.

...American democracy likely will collapse.

American democracy collapsed in 1788, when the wealthy forced through a "constitution" that overruled democratic regulation of debt.

People seem to forget that even if this happens, even the GOP will splinter and some point. When that happens, it'll be right back to split elections.

I find this prospect terrifying.

"If the other party wins, it's not democracy."

In this case, the Republican party is objectively authoritarian - and arguably neofascist. For all of the faults of the Democrats (and there are many) they are not actively hammering on the foundations of Democracy. Their leader did not just attempt to overthrow an election. They aren't actively undermining the ability to vote, or trying to put corrupt officials in place who will overthrow elections that don't go their way. The Republicans have done or are doing all of these things.

That's not what he said. It doesn't matter which party wins. The issue would be if representatives of any party end democracy, which he outlined in short how it could be done - and some of the representatives of the "other party" have expressed real interest in performing those actions.

If that happens, the democrats only have themselves to blame at this point. Biden came in with a 60+% approval rating, now he is in the high 20s / low 30s.

I actually think it's more likely that a third party like Andrew Yangs Forward Party emerges and wins an election. A lot of people are sick of two options, and feel alienated in by their own party (both sides)

Biden's approval rating is currently 43%. Third parties can't win in a first past the post system.

33 and heading south:

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/589450-quinnipia...

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/biden-approval-rating/?... meta analysis much better than a single poll

100%. The only promise that Biden can keep is that "nothing will fundamentally change".

Not sure why you think Ron desantis qualifies as an authoritarian. Also you admit the GOP will win the elections and Biden is a loser. Sounds pretty democratic. Predicting that the republican majority will inevitably establish an autocracy is birther level Dem propaganda. You shouldn't watch MSNBC.

I can see a few signs that Santis qualifies as authoritarian. Just from the recent news:

https://www.axios.com/desantis-florida-civilian-military-for...

Also, MSNBC & CNN are not different from Fox News. These are all propaganda networks. I despise them all equally.

Yes, different sides, same coin. Not sure how state run military forces are more authoritarian than one single centralized military force, though.

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