ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
Blogger, Christian convert, general strange one. https://shapesinthefog.substack.com/
User ID: 3709
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
What is the bright line for you that would show an actual overthrow of the system?
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
On the sqs thread, @Capital_Room had an interesting query, about whether Trump is actually being authoritarian:
Is there anything to this: "The Coup We've Feared Has Already Happened"?
The coup we’ve been fearing has already happened. Utterly servile to Trump, Speaker Mike Johnson refuses to convene the House of Representatives for even pro forma business (and by extension Congress) indefinitely, thereby shielding Trump from all manner of inquiry and accountability, not least the Epstein files, and giving him de facto full dictatorial powers. The longer the shutdown continues, the more irrelevant Congress becomes. Next expect unilateral executive decrees on assuming full funding authority, essentially rendering Congress defunct. It may never reconvene. Suspension of the Constitution cannot be far behind. Dictatorship came to us while we slept.
Is this what it seems like to me — just more lefty pearl-clutching and crying wolf — or is there something to the arguments James Bruno and Tonoccus McClain are making?
Some of the commenters like @MadMonzer offer an interesting response:
That substack is a bad take on it - the best version of the theory I have seen is spread across multiple posts on lawfaremedia.org. But the underlying story is absolutely serious, and as far as I can see it is true. The three-bullet version of the story is
- Trump is trying to replace the Congress-driven budget process established by the Constitution with a White House-driven budget process.
- Johnson is helping him, and Senate Republicans are not trying to stop him
- So far he is succeeding
The slightly longer version is:
- Trump has, on numerous occasions, refused to spend money appropriated by Congress. Congressional Republicans have not complained. As well as using his partisan majorities in both houses of Congress to pass recissions under the Impoundment Control Act (which can't be filibustered), Trump has used a dubiously-legal pocket recission to cut spending without a Congressional vote. SCOTUS has helped this along by setting up procedural barriers to anyone suing over this.
- Despite the Republican trifecta, Congress did not pass a budget in FY 2025, and does not appear to be trying to pass a budget in FY 2026. Notably, Johnson has shut the House down rather than trying to make progress on any of the outstanding appropriations bills.
- Rather than moving a mini-CR to pay the troops (Enough Democrats have said they support this that it would pass both houses of Congress), Trump has paid the troops with a combination of private donations and funds illegally transferred from the military R&D budget. The White House ballroom is another example of using private donations to pay for what should be Congressionally-approved government spending.
- On the revenue side, Trump has raised a helluvalot of revenue with dubiously-legal tariffs. He also did a deal with Nvidia and AMD where they pay what is in effect a 15% export tax in exchange for Trump waiving controls on advanced chip exports to China. Export taxes are unconstitutional. There has been no attempt to incorporate any of this revenue into a budget passed by Congress.
- An obvious combination of this type of "deal" and funding specific programs with private donations is to set up a parallel budget where money is raised and spent outside the official Congressional budget process, all backed by more or less soft threats of government coercion. Trump hasn't done this yet, but it is a logical continuation of things he has done.
- Trump has also claimed in social media posts that he can spend the tariff revenue without Congressional approval.
The claim that Trump and Johnson are trying to change the US budget process to one where (at least as regards discretionary spending - the only changes to entitlement spending have been done in regular order through the OBBBA) Congress does not meaningfully exercise the power of the purse seems to me to be straightforwardly true.
Overall I tend to agree that Trump's admin is acting in authoritarian ways, and even moreso than past administrations. However, it seems to me that the Congressional structure is so broken that, it kind of makes sense?
The way I see it, and the way Trump et al probably sees it, is that the Three Branches as they exist are extremely dysfunctional, and cannot do the actual job of governing the country pretty much at all. This has allowed NGOs and other non-state actors to come in and basically take over by deploying social and cultural capital in key areas, craftily created a sort of secret network of influence, etc.
The only way for us to get out of this morass, the theory goes, is to have a strong executive who basically burns this gridlock down. Though I don't know if Trump's team would want to restore a functioning American government after or just keep an extremely strong executive.
Anyway, I can't say I fully agree with Trump's seeming plan to just destroy jurisprudence for the executive and do whatever he wants, but I admire the sheer boldness. OTOH, I'm also not convinced that the U.S. has more than a 2% chance of meaningfully falling into an authoritarian dictatorship under Trump, or even in the next 10-20 years. Hopefully I don't eat my words!
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Ok fine I'll do it!
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Can you repost this in the cw thread?
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Yeah the constant distractions of communicating with various teams etc. gets to me too. It's frustrating because it's hard to quantify that time, exactly.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
I can agree with the point that, in an ultimate sense, your own skills are more reliable than being on the dole. However, the dole has been pretty good for the last ~60 years or so, and requires far less effort along almost every metric. I'm not saying that people on the dole have it equal to someone on a career, but that the relative security and comfort for effort is INSANELY disproportionate.
In terms of the second couple - they worked for their money and made smart decisions. They deserve to reap the rewards. Earning money via investing is again, a world of difference away from forcibly redistributing other's wealth to yourself via taxation.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Ok fair, but we often pretend we do, no?
Also, if you factor in that both parents work, it isn't as great as it seems.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Wow, how many lawyers do we have on this website?
I for one appreciate your sacrifices.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Yeah, somebody in the gooning thread said a huge problem with modern America is that we lack the ability to utilize or feel shame.
I think that's true, but only for certain groups...
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
If I had heard about this 100 years ago, I would have supposed people would work a lot less, or we would have something like a UBI, but that's not what we have. Maybe we have bullshit jobs and gaming the system instead? Which isn't great, plenty of people are upset about the current state of affairs. I don't particularly want my kids to spend 40 hours a week, for 40 years doing fake work, that seems in some ways worse than farming and textiles, but it seems to be the direction we as a civilization are heading in.
Yeah I have to say, on the face of it, it really does seem absurd that we are so incredibly wealthy compared to our ancestors and yet we work just as much, or at least pretend we do.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
The reality is twofold: first, that welfare will continue until the affected nations are more or less forced into a New Deal of sorts, because those benefiting from welfare planned their lives around receiving it and aren't remotely prepared for the consequences of not having it; and second, that it is much, much better to not be on welfare than to be on welfare. Look at your two examples.
I disagree with this idea that it's "much better not to be on welfare" in the most strident of terms. What are you even talking about? You go on about how it's "insecure" for these people, without even mentioning the fact that they are far MORE likely to have security than someone actually working, paying for their benefits, who has to worry about losing a job or getting priced out of their area, etc.
This is just a completely nuts take imo. Not even mentioning the fact that these people DON'T HAVE TO WORK!!!
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Hah that's fair. I suppose I have trouble seeing things in such a cynical light, but yeah.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Yeah the latter view helps me quite a bit more. I know that cynically the former view is correct it just... feels terrible to actually live/think that way. Part of the reason labor is fundamentally disadvantaged in these relationships, I think.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
How come?
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
So do you feel guilty about it??
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
If you put meeting blocks on your calendar it takes longer to show you as idle.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Ahh yeah, I am blessed to work hybrid and be able to leave early. It's worth looking for a job like that, trying to pretend to be busy at the office is horrid.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Does anyone else feel guilt over not working the full 8 hours in a laptop job?
Even though I do something very provably useful, and bring in millions for the company while being paid basically entry level, doing something that requires (imo) rare talent, I still feel a lot of guilt that I tend to work only 4-6 hours a day.
Most people I’ve talked to fall into two camps, either telling me it’s fine and I should slack more, or that I have a fake email job and should join a startup instead. Sadly I did the startup path for many years and got burned pretty hard.
Anyway, seems like most others in my corporation also don’t work a full 40 hours but, I detest this sort of fakery most of us feel forced to do. I wish I could be honest about how I do the tasks I’m assigned, often going above and beyond, but it just doesn’t take me 40 hours.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
On the religion piece, I feel your frustration. Mainstream Christianity is not in a good place at the moment.
I’ve found my own niche of weird Christians that have a focus on contemplative prayer, mysticism, and generally are much more open minded, which has been a beautiful thing. It takes some doing though, and you have to be willing to I suppose moderate what you say around “normie” Christians. I’ve found the juice of regular church attendance worth the squeeze, however. Very much so.
As for dating I’ll echo the recommendation I always do - partner dance! I found my fiancé doing west coast swing. It’s an extremely Lindy way to meet women.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Wait really??? What!
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Sorry to hear my friend. Remember that most startups fail, and much of it is out of your control. I wish ya luck in the next venture.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
I'm a bit more Protestant at heart than most Orthodox, I suppose. Then again, see the way Orthodox people talk about Saint Augustine...
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Probably! I didn't come to Orthodoxy because of the history of the church, I came to it because God led me there. Frankly every church has committed horrible atrocities throughout their history. The Catholic ones are more well known, but Orthodoxy has our fair share of skeletons too for sure.
Anyone who thinks their specific church is spotless is simply deluded.
ThomasdelVasto
Κύριε, ποίησόν με ὄργανον τῆς ἀγάπης σου
1mo ago
Heh yeah it’s a cop out for sure. Don’t have a great answer I think reconciling Christianity with violence is a tricky and difficult task.
Yeah, you make a strong point. I suppose ultimately the 2016 campaign with the FBI covering for Hillary, and then subsequent FBI involvement in the 2020 election and the Covid "misinformation" thing is evidence of utter corruption in our political process.
Nuts that it's all relatively out in the open, and yet half the country seems to not be aware or not care about it. Sigh.
More options
Context Copy link