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5,000 for every American citizen? Might sound farfetched, but the president just proposed it https://apnews.com/article/trump-dividend-5k-5000-check-republicans-cc80644e3168acd31c892129fb849436
First of all this is obviously retarded, there's no ability to mince words here, it would be about 1.3 trillion dollars almost doubling the annual federal deficit, causing massive inflation, and generally fucking the economy. Second of all, it's obviously not happening just like the DOGE dividend and tariff dividends and all the other free money constantly promised. We all know it, there's no need to pretend that this isn't just constant lying.
Rather I'm more interested in what this suggests, here's some thoughts.
Trump is really worried about the midterms to the point he's trying to outright suggest bribing voters. This concern makes sense given the Dems have a 50% chance of a complete sweep. Trump arrived, disappointed Americans, and his legacy is already ending.
As I spoke earlier about the plan to pay parents to stay at home, it's another highlight of how modern "conservativism" just doesn't give a shit about money anymore. The entire concept of fiscal responsibility is just a joke now. If we take the president seriously (which I would hope we could given the prestige of the office but obviously we can not), it's one of the most destructive singular policies someone could possibly suggest.
Likewise, there's not even an attempt to hide the corruption anymore. I can not even imagine how much more blatant he could get that this is attempted bribery. People can play the whataboutism game of former admins if they want, but at least those had the shame to hide it behind closed doors a bit.
The magical tariffs continue to do everything. Trump has promised so much with tariff revenue (a number I can't even cite him on since like many of his claims, it fluctuates widely). CATO has an excellent list of everything they're claimed to fund. It's not just fiscal responsibility that is a joke, the entire idea of government funding has become one.
And this isn't occuring in isolation, it's another sign of the GOP transformation into a populism powered welfare socialist party. Fiscal responsibility is a joke, redistribution from the rich to the poor in bribes is based, trade is evil and companies should be owned by the government.
And what political coalition now exists to point out the obvious and say this isn't smart? The stereotypical conservative response before was "how will we pay for that?" in regards to big sending. The response now is crickets. Negative polarization has gone so far that the DSA, a group that literally calls themselves socialist are now the most free trade voting bloc, so will we reverse polarize ourselves into a small government balanced budget "socialist" president at some point?
But most importantly, what does this say about politics now where promising $1.35 trillion in direct payments to voters is presented as the conservative campaign message. How much further into the slop can we possibly descend, and how we can ever pull ourselves out of it? Maybe the Dems can just promise 5,001 dollars or something.
Can we just agree Trump is now Caesar?
I think it’s clear the American Republic has fallen. The question is will we get an Augustus?
Democracy just doesn’t work in non Anglo and definitely non European societies. It’s time for an emperor.
Edit: I’m probably being too dramatic. It likely felt like the Republic had fallen during the last migration wave in the thirties and fourties. But we likely only have a window to fix it.
I expect we'll skip directly to Romulus Augustus. But no, Trump is not Caesar. Sure, he'd like to be, but he's still got way too much talk and way too little action to come close.
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Trump is Marius. He’s pissing off the elite, he’s violating all sorts of unwritten rules, he’s engaging in poliorketic egotistical excess, but he’s not actually breaking the organs of the republic.
He's engaging in siege-warfare egotistical excesses? Or are you referring to Demetrius Poliorketes?
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Odds of an Augustus are not good. Unless Kushner or his children are unusually capable.
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Trump is a Gracchi Brother, we are in the late republic era. He's the first wave of populist politician in the modern American republic elected due to rising dissatisfaction with the establishment. Dissatisfaction is probably a bit euphemistic, people are pissed that the government isn't and hasn't for awhile been perceived as working in the interests of the people.
If this DSA surge is anything to go by, the democrats are having their own populist civil war. We really are in the optimiates vs populares section of the republican history.
Technically, I think the non-consecutive terms make him both brothers.
lol possibly, though the establishment lawfare and potential deep state assassination attempt feels like its still a single brother at this point. The 2nd brother inherited the effect of the first. Nobody has inherited Trump's effect and attempted to develop it further. History does not repeat itself, but it rhymes.
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Lincoln was Caesar, and FDR was Augustus. We are already 150 years into Empire, and you're seeing the results of late empire, not late republic.
Washington was Cincinnatus
Lincoln was Caesar
FDR was Augustus
Trump is Julian the Apostate
Now, we wait for our Justinian. After that comes Muslim domination, a long afterlife as a shadow of our former selves, and finally conquest at the hands of nomadic horsemen. Fits.
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It kind of fits. I guess nothing is a perfect parallel. Lincoln personality wise isn’t Caesar and the issues he faced seemed less like Caesar’s time while modern America seems much more like Caesar. FDR does seem to be the start of true Empire America.
He inherited a republic, of which a large portion did not want him as President/Consul, and first initiated then won a civil war against the faction which rejected him, that swept away the republic that came before and got him assassinated for his trouble.
Personality has very little to do with it.
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I don't like this comparison because Caesar had a successful military career and was overall competent in many respects. Trump is much closer to a jumped-up Hugo Chavez or Napoleon III.
Democracy is fine, it's the electorate that's the problem. And an actual dictatorship would almost certainly be worse in the long run.
Napoleon III seems fine to me, the worst you can say about him is that he's not his uncle, and he's not Otto von Bismark.
Twenty two years, rapid industrialization, rise of French influence after decades of instability. Longest reigning head of state since the Revolution. Where's the downside? I wish Trump were as good as Napoleon III.
I am a notable fan of Napoleon III on balance for his impressive domestic accomplishments, but his foreign policy pretty uniformly blew up in his face - even the unification of Italy just bogged him down in the Papal question.
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Napoleon III flitted from whim to whim, and France's population growth slowed substantially which essentially ensured it would no longer be the pre-eminent land power in Europe. Then he utterly failed to contain the rise of Prussia, which would go on to wreck France in multiple wars over the next century. A lot of this wasn't his direct fault, but Napoleon III certainly played a mediocre hand badly.
And yeah, I also think Trump is a step below Napoleon III.
Are we really judging historical rulers for not raising the birthrate? I mean, its 2026, and still nobody has figured this out. And France was the first country to undergo the demographic tradition. What exactly was Napoleon III supposed to do?
But yeah, there's an alternate history where France had the birthrate of England and we're all speaking French right now.
No I don't really blame Napoleon III for being unable to address France's demographic issues for the reason you laid out: nobody's really demonstrated a consistent way to fix it. That's why I said he had a mediocre hand.
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I think you're correct. My main gripe actually is that Trump is too old to serve effectively in that role, and there's no clear successor.
But I'd like to see you make the case rather than just stipulate it.
K-shaped economy and a struggling native class. Widespread slavery made the rich very rich in Rome but the average Roman Citizen saw lower wages.
Bread and Circus. Basically the policy proposed today. And he’s definitely done circus.
Legal attacks and threats of imprisonment followed by a crossing of the Rubicon and winning.
Assassination. Trump did survive.
Potential - An adopted son taking over after death. Vance obviously. Though Kushner could fulfill this role
I think Rome also had a fall in morality and falling tfr in the native population
Agree with all of this except K-shaped doesn't match 2026. Working class wages are rising faster than others. The perception of the K-shape comes from the upper middle class who are most affected by elite overproduction. Not coincidentally, they are the same ones who do most of the narrative production.
It's an up-down-up shaped economy.
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