[Maark Abbott]

He's beyond damaged. He is a walking, talking example of advanced dementia. He cannot hold a coherent thought train together and regularly comes off as batshit insane.

What he does do is make people who have nothing but their bile and hatred feel enabled and that's probably why the world is suffering the USA's second collective act of utmost fuckwittery a second time.

[the broken]

Honestly, I think this is the same trick he pulled with NATO, making crazy threats so that other nations have to step up and protect Greenland against Russia, the same trick he used to make them actually meet the 2pc contribution

Maark Abbott, on 20 January 2026 - 09:22 PM, said:

And yeah, I'll be calling him that because he has literal gestapo on the streets disappearing and spot executing people.

How many have been disappeared and executed so far?

[Maark Abbott]

the broken, on 21 January 2026 - 08:53 PM, said:

Honestly, I think this is the same trick he pulled with NATO, making crazy threats so that other nations have to step up and protect Greenland against Russia, the same trick he used to make them actually meet the 2pc contribution

Maark Abbott, on 20 January 2026 - 09:22 PM, said:

And yeah, I'll be calling him that because he has literal gestapo on the streets disappearing and spot executing people.

How many have been disappeared and executed so far?

I mean, one has been executed extremely publically and the video is not something I would recommend watching.

As to how many have been disappeared, I can't give you a number because they aren't keeping count. Frankly, one is too many, but after the Honduran prison there have been the other internment camps, kidnappings of folk off of the streets... Madness.

[the broken]

It should be trackable, at least at the ballpark level, there must be some organisation at least trying to keep track of these things.

[amphibian]

the broken, on 21 January 2026 - 09:51 PM, said:

It should be trackable, at least at the ballpark level, there must be some organisation at least trying to keep track of these things.

You don't know how messed up the answers to your question are. American police are intermittently interested in or capable of reporting accurate numbers and the non uniformity of them plus unwillingness of federal law enforcement agencies to compel accurate reporting means the numbers reported are hard to decipher and often aren't accurate.

This is so messed up that the Guardian has a multi multi part series that is as true today as it was ten years ago. https://www.theguard...police-killings

Add to all this that ICE is not actually arresting a good chunk of the people seized. Their officers are doing a forced abduction and drop off often many miles away from where they were picked up. They are vanishing small children without parents, they are tear gassing and pepper spraying people, and they are shooting people then leaving the scene of the crimes.


On top of this, ICE/DHS have been distributing a secret memo that says ICE agents are able to enter homes without warrants (which is counter to American law and jurisprudence until now). This is only known because of whistle blowers. https://whistleblowe...thout-warrants/

Things are extremely messed up and something like 20+ people have died at the hands of ICE in the last year alone.

This post has been edited by amphibian: 22 January 2026 - 12:07 AM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Tapper, on 21 January 2026 - 05:31 PM, said:

I honestly don't know how you see a Russia/China/US alliance appearing. If anything, the US pivot away from NATO is to put the emphasis on China over Russia as the US' main enemy. I also don't see the bromance of Putin and Trump survive past either of them. Trump is nearing 80 and Putin will hold on for as long as he can, but who knows until when, and who comes after him and how long that power consolidation takes?

As for MAGA, let's see how long it lasts. I highly doubt more than 3 years, even though the damage will take decades to undo. MAGA will (eventually) eat itself.

I also don't see how the split in influence spheres you see would work. My wife is Polish. Every single Polish person I talk to hates the Russians with a passion. Every Fin says the same. Even the Russia sympathisers in Hungary and elsewhere don't want direct Russian rule, and there is nothing Russia has to offer that would keep a country in Russia's orbit for long. Victor Orban can do what he does in Hungary because the EU was, despite everything, up until 2025 a net investor in Hungary and is loathe to truly slap his hand because it wants its members to cooperate. He won't have such leeway or such funding with Russia. Russia meanwhile, whatever they conquer, their oligarchy sucks dry; it's not used to accelerate their economy. So,

Finally, most anti-EU sentiment in the EU is because people feel the EU is expensive and makes life complicated and bureaucratic. That does not mean they want more Russian/US influence, or are open to it.

The Trump administration's NSS (National Security Strategy) document reframed China as primarily an economic rival rather than a military rival, and the EU as the administration's primary ideological enemy. The administration also revised US policy towards Taiwan to indicate that their only objection to China seizing Taiwan is the current US technological dependence on Taiwan for chips, strongly implying that once US domestic manufacturing eliminates the need for Taiwanese tech imports, China can have it.

Xi really, really wants Taiwan. His successor probably will too. But they're willing to be patient.

The NSS also laid out the Trump administration's vision of the world in terms of the American sphere of influence. What Trump is calling the "Donroe Doctrine", after the Monroe Doctrine: US dominance of the Americas. It's rejecting the previous dominant international order, which the EU still endorses, and instead embracing the Russian and Chinese ideology of "spheres of influence".

And MAGA idolizes Putin because his regime embodies many of their reactionary ideals: perverted violent "Christianity" (and legal homophobia), authoritarian "strong man" rule, "masculinity", patriarchy, "tradition", militarism, kleptocracy.

Unfortunately MAGA fascism is not limited to Trump's cult of personality; it preceded him, he latched onto it and rode it and managed to popularize it with his awful charisma, and it will continue after him---but perhaps without a charismatic leader with such broad appeal (bizarre as that appeal may seem to most of us). But if Trump succeeds in subverting the election system, it won't matter if his MAGA successors aren't nearly as popular: they won't have to win fair elections, though sham elections may still be held.

As for how the Russian "sphere of influence" would work in the scenario I described before: by coercion through military force, most likely after World War III (perhaps at the same time that China takes Taiwan, in about 15 to 20 years). It would be more of a revival of the Russian Empire than anything voluntary. As I mentioned before it would probably need to rely heavily on future automation---surveillance, drones, and other robots---which it would have to produce or purchase in large quantities, as well as relying on substantial technological advances.

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 22 January 2026 - 12:33 AM

[amphibian]

This is an article about the 5 year old taken by ICE in Minnesota and moved to Texas. 4 other students have been vanished from that place. https://sahanjournal...dents-detained/

"“Instead, the agent took the child out of the still-running car, led him to the door, and directed him to knock on the door, asking to be let in, in order to see if anyone else was home, essentially using a 5-year-old as bait,” she said.

Liam’s middle-school brother returned home to a missing father, a missing little brother and a terrified mother, she said.

“This family is following U.S. legal parameters and has an active asylum case with no order of deportation,” Stenvik said. “I have viewed the legal paperwork with my own eyes. Why detain a 5-year-old? You can’t tell me that this child is going to be classified as a violent criminal.”"

[amphibian]

https://apnews.com/a...91b160758aeb2d?

[the broken]

amphibian, on 22 January 2026 - 12:07 AM, said:

Add to all this that ICE is not actually arresting a good chunk of the people seized. Their officers are doing a forced abduction and drop off often many miles away from where they were picked up. They are vanishing small children without parents, they are tear gassing and pepper spraying people, and they are shooting people then leaving the scene of the crimes.

Still. With all the efforts to document what ICE is doing, someone should be collating it.

[amphibian]

the broken, on 22 January 2026 - 02:15 AM, said:

amphibian, on 22 January 2026 - 12:07 AM, said:

Add to all this that ICE is not actually arresting a good chunk of the people seized. Their officers are doing a forced abduction and drop off often many miles away from where they were picked up. They are vanishing small children without parents, they are tear gassing and pepper spraying people, and they are shooting people then leaving the scene of the crimes.

Still. With all the efforts to document what ICE is doing, someone should be collating it.

Ok, who would be doing this if the police do not want to, if the FBI does not want to, if the federal government appointees do not want to? Then with which disclosures and what money?

What you are asking is a Very Big Task - even if it's the right thing to do - and the methods to get that information are extremely piece meal and frequently unsuccessful.

[Cause]

the broken, on 21 January 2026 - 08:53 PM, said:

Honestly, I think this is the same trick he pulled with NATO, making crazy threats so that other nations have to step up and protect Greenland against Russia, the same trick he used to make them actually meet the 2pc contribution

Maark Abbott, on 20 January 2026 - 09:22 PM, said:

And yeah, I'll be calling him that because he has literal gestapo on the streets disappearing and spot executing people.

How many have been disappeared and executed so far?

Defend Greenland against Russia? It’s 2026 not the 1950s. Russia can not occupy Greenland. They can’t even take Ukraine and you think they are going to have there fleet get past NATO, the US, Canada and land troops, dig in and hold it?


Submarines can’t take and hold the island and it’s no longer possible to hide warships and troop carriers. On paper Russia’s navy is the 3rd largest in the world but only the subs are a threat. The surface fleet still has ships from ww2, and their aircraft carrier is at dock more than at sea. I forget if Ukraine attacked it or if it spontaneously combusted recently but the thing is on fire a lot.

Russia has the same economy of Italy roughly 11 or 12 th in the world. They haven’t been a superpower in decades.

[Maark Abbott]

Greenland does not need defending against Russia and the notion that it does at all is sort of weird.

It does now however need defending against a fellow NATO member which is sort of nutty.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Quote

Trump backed off on the tariffs he had threatened to impose on the countries standing against his seizure of Greenland, claiming he had just had "a very productive meeting" with NATO Secretary General [...] and had "formed the framework for a future deal with respect to Greenland and, in fact, the entire Arctic Region. This solution, if consummated, will be a great one for the United States of America, and all NATO Nations." Because of that framework, he said, he would not be imposing the tariffs he had threatened on those nations opposing his designs on NATO.

[...] this was not a new deal, but Trump surrendering. [...]

[...] Amongst all of Trump's other lies and threats at his Davos speech, one stood out. [...] "the 2020 U.S. presidential election [...] was a rigged election. Everybody now knows that." [...]

But then Trump went on to say: "People will soon be prosecuted for what they did. It's probably breaking news but it should be. It was a rigged election. You can't have rigged elections."

This is an astonishing threat. It says he intends to prosecute Department of Justice officials and others for refusing to help him steal the presidency.

Political historian Heather Cox Richardson, professor at Boston College

One implication being that any officials who fail to help him rig the 2026 election will be prosecuted. To be effective, if necessary he'll start having his loyal thugs at least "investigate" them before the election is over and all the votes have been counted.

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 22 January 2026 - 12:16 PM

[Tiste Simeon]

So am I right in understanding that after all the blustering, insults & threats, the new deal is basically the same as the deal they've had since 1951? Trump and the entire American right are utter morons.

[the broken]

amphibian, on 22 January 2026 - 03:36 AM, said:

the broken, on 22 January 2026 - 02:15 AM, said:

amphibian, on 22 January 2026 - 12:07 AM, said:

Add to all this that ICE is not actually arresting a good chunk of the people seized. Their officers are doing a forced abduction and drop off often many miles away from where they were picked up. They are vanishing small children without parents, they are tear gassing and pepper spraying people, and they are shooting people then leaving the scene of the crimes.

Still. With all the efforts to document what ICE is doing, someone should be collating it.

Ok, who would be doing this if the police do not want to, if the FBI does not want to, if the federal government appointees do not want to? Then with which disclosures and what money?

What you are asking is a Very Big Task - even if it's the right thing to do - and the methods to get that information are extremely piece meal and frequently unsuccessful.

Organisations that give a damn, because that is what happens any other time there are mass disappearances, an estimate can be made, even when it's during wars and collecting that info is much more difficult. It isn't more difficult to collect info on disappeared in the modern US than it is in say, Argentina in the 70s. It could be the centre of all the protests, chanting 'where is (list of names) and such.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Tiste Simeon, on 22 January 2026 - 01:33 PM, said:

So am I right in understanding that after all the blustering, insults & threats, the new deal is basically the same as the deal they've had since 1951? Trump and the entire American right are utter morons.

If he was trying to distract people from the Epstein files with Greenland... it turns out that Greenland is the only issue that gave him worse poll numbers than the Epstein files:

CNN Data Guru Harry Enten Stunned by Donald Trump Plan 'Polling Worse Than the Epstein Files'

But his proclamation---in that speech where he said he's dropping the Greenland related tariffs---that he intends to prosecute people who stopped him from stealing the 2020 election implies that he intends to become immune to democracy. Which he segued to right after mentioning Russia's invasion of Ukraine. And in that speech he also claimed that "sometimes you need a dictator." Taken together, in context, it suggests that he may try again after he seizes Putin-like control over the United States, which is what MAGA is aiming for.

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 22 January 2026 - 02:28 PM

[Maark Abbott]

"You know what we need? A board of peace to oversee Israel no longer genociding Gaza"
"OK who should we have on there"
"They guys who has been genociding Gaza"

You cannot make this shit up

[QuickTidal]

ICE says its officers can forcibly enter homes during immigration operations without judicial warrants: 2025 memo

So I don't EVER want to hear an American tell me about their 2nd Amendment rights (or use it to defend doing nothing after school shootings) EVER again. Ever. It will fall on deaf ears. The Tyranny is here, and crickets.

[Abyss]

Maark Abbott, on 22 January 2026 - 04:52 PM, said:

"You know what we need? A board of peace to oversee Israel no longer genociding Gaza"
"OK who should we have on there"
"They guys who has been genociding Gaza"

You cannot make this shit up

I also liked the part where he wanted them to pay $1 billion for the seat at the table.

[Abyss]

QuickTidal, on 22 January 2026 - 04:52 PM, said:

ICE says its officers can forcibly enter homes during immigration operations without judicial warrants: 2025 memo

So I don't EVER want to hear an American tell me about their 2nd Amendment rights (or use it to defend doing nothing after school shootings) EVER again. Ever. It will fall on deaf ears. The Tyranny is here, and crickets.

The people being stomped on aren't the ones clutching their guns. Those people are sitting smugly in their living rooms watching the news while cleaning their sixth AR-15.