kontextmaschine:

I had been saying I could only see 3 days out. By now, for known major issues I can see vague outlines of likely pathways for a few months, but even there there’s noise and a minefield of black swans I can’t see 30 minutes through.

Like, for the travel (“Muslim”) ban I could guess at maybe 3 immediate outcomes and as we come closer make pretense to weigh them, but that’s within the given system.

As for changes to the system, beats me. Like,

• The Supreme Court tires of staying circuit decisions against the same executive actions over and over AND…

• The American Bar Association proposes a plan to “fix the problem” of big states filing against the executive in obscure federal courts with judges who are outliers on the issue, like Texas did against Obama and California does against Trump. It IS…

And then there’s the black swans. Individually low-probability but even the ones I can imagine are numerous enough that you’re likely to get at least 1. That’s where the whole country if not world can turn on heat-of-the-moment actions of a tiny random sample of humans. Like, try to tell me any of these are impossible:

• Faced with reform DA Larry Krasner, the Philly police work-to-rule. Violent crime soars. The “collar counties” that decide Pennsylvania are watching. Bricks are tossed through the windows of Independence Hall. Optionally, molotovs.

• On a third-tier city street, 3 antifascists are kicking a man on the ground outside a bar. By pure chance, an off-duty deputy with a Cowboys sweatshirt, a concealed handgun, and a drinking problem walks around the corner 10 yards away and yells at them. A 6’2” black trans woman charges him. There are no video or audio recordings. Journalists find their respective social media accounts were full of memes.

• In separate incidents over one late November night, assassins kill Elena Kagan and put Sonia Sotomayor in a coma. A viral twitter post claims with certainty there was inside assistance from multiple security forces. The new Senate takes office on January 3. Within a week, 6 Senators have been accused of rape. Sotomayor is declared brain dead. A living will is produced, and contested.

• Full Clancy: In a BJP-controlled state of India, communal rioting escalates into a door-to-door Muslim extermination campaign. Pakistan threatens retribution and mobilizes its Shaheen missiles. Malaysian protests threaten to overthrow the government unless it acts against India. A popular Indian public figure makes a high-profile statement that if one drop of Hindu blood is spilled Mecca will be turned to glass. In the confusion, Israel dusts off a contingency plan for a strike against Iran. The US prepares its own contingency plans to secure foreign nukes. Russia has exported one more S-400 SAM system than the world knows.

We’re running on Interesting Time, now

– December 25, 2017. I’m cheery on Christmas, aren’t I?

The pandemic was a hell of a black swan, I suppose if you generalize back we got “Supreme Court allegiances shift post-RBG”, “street unrest challenges police reform politics”, and “events caught on tape become flashpoints with radically divided audience sympathies” too