Hasn't Trump made a major miscalculation in his plan to occupy cities?

[bigtree]

There hasn't been any end in sight to the myriad protests every week against this administration; demonstrators in the streets protesting federal job cuts by Trump and Musk's DOGE bros; the Big Awful Bill; Russia/Ukraine; Gaza; abortion rights; pro-diversity; CDC... more.

They haven't lost any steam, and they are having a positive effect in rallying Americans against Trump and republicans. What they have been lacking, up until now, is a cohesive theme which can be directed squarely at the White House and the president.

Trump has basically provided the unifying theme for them with his insistence on pushing forward with military force directed against American citizens under the transparently false pretext of fighting crime; claiming that it's so out of control as to trigger his authority to declare another opportunistic emergency to justify invading cities with armed troops.

It's been one thing to push D.C. around, as the federal government and legislators have done for decades; treating the District like their personal plantation with often southern representatives imposing laws on the residents there - laws they couldn't manage to impose on the nation - without D.C. residents having any vote at all in the halls where those decisions are made for them, not with them, and imposed on them.

It will be quite another to invade a state whose residents are accustomed to demanding and getting their voices heard and responded to by the people they elect. It's almost predictable, but perverse, how 'states' rights' turned into nothing but a political abstraction republicans used in election campaigns; but something much less when it comes to granting their political rivals' states the same consideration.

More occupations will just confirm the source of what ails Americans; from the cost of living; to their disappearing health care; to their lost employment; the occupations a funnel of blame against the administration for every complaint and grievance.

We just saw a march in D.C. today which was predicted to draw hundreds, but drew thousands instead. Anti-Trump protests are planned across U.S. for Labor Day, demonstrating against Trump's “billionaire takeover” which are going to swell with Americans worried that their own neighborhoods will be treated like Donald Trump's political playground.

Americans are just a few years past the time when the country was effectively locked down with a generation coming of age with the weight of the government restricting their activities and their immediate futures for the sake of their actual safety.

Typical for a republican party that has increasingly taken to talking out of both sides of their mouths, it was their whining about restricting and dominating Americans which hastened the removal of protections and released the country from government imposed restrictions.

Now this purportedly anti-government party is full-on acquiescing to Trump's regime sending soldiers into neighborhoods to dominate the people who pay for them. The anti-occupation response by residents of those states taking to the streets, with another month of good weather possible ahead, should be explosive.

And I get that protests could 'play into the hands' of Trump by providing further pretext to declare a national emergency. But I don't believe that's a reason to shy away from joining together with our neighbors and standing down these mercenarily deployed troops, many from states nowhere in the region; standing down the man who sent them there.

I'd bet folks in cities threatened, like Chicago and Baltimore, will be very eager to defend their states against this tyranny, and I really don't think republicans and Trump realize that they're about to set a simmering nation ablaze with resistance to their dictator domination scheme.

[Keepthesoulalive]

1. Sometimes it takes a baseball bat upside the head

To make people pay attention. It appears the pain is working. I just wish the folks who warned us wouldn’t have to feel the pain.

[Fiendish Thingy]

2. He knows he has power

But has yet to realize he has little, if any, actual control.

[newdeal2]

3. It's going to be real interesting seeing them brave winter and spring in Chicago

This operation will wind down before Thanksgiving.

[moondust]

4. Is it all a test?

To see if he'll be able to expand it enough to declare martial law and cancel next year's midterms?

[Septua]

5. Trump's throwing dried shit at the wall that doesn't stick

Here's Google AI reply to a search query "what drives Donald Trump."

Donald Trump's driving motive is not a single, clear factor but is often described as a mix of the pursuit of dominance and power, a high need for achievement, and personal vindication.

He craves power and money. He craves attention. He wants everyone to think he is the greatest President to ever hold the office. He wants a Nobel Peace. He wants people to think Adam Schiff or John Bolton or the Fed Governor or whomever, are the true corrupt people in the country, not him.

The issues he campaigned on are not coming to fruition. The only thing he's actually accomplished is removing a large number of non-citizens out of the job market, which is not what he said he was going to do. The Golden Age is not upon us and is not in the making or in the foreseeable future...

He's jumped on crime because it's another something he can do that distracts attention away from the Epstein drama, away from rising prices, away from his declining popularity...he's performing for the base. Which is all he's ever done. It's a bogus crusade because he's singling out cities that are not high crime cities...they're Democrat cities. And as Rachel Maddow says, watch what he does, not what he says. He has the power to militarize cities but so far, hasn't produced evidence of the necessary circumstances to authorize it.

There are 337 active cases challenging Trump administration actions...he's made several miscalculations.

https://www.lawfaremedia.org/projects-series/trials-of-the-trump-administration/tracking-trump-administration-litigation

[albert992]

6. I think you're right

I think you’re right that it gives protests a unifying theme. Before, it was a lot of different issues all boiling separately. Now they can be stirred together under "stop the occupation" and it becomes a bigger, clearer story. That’s dangerous politically because it stops being about one group or grievance and starts being about all of them

[bigtree]

7. I like the takeover theme to the Labor Day rallies

...'billionaire takeover' is a perfect encapsulation of concerns.

[peggysue2]

8. He's hoping to stir passions, bring them to a boil and provoke violence on the streets

Then declare another national emergency and enact martial law on the population--.complete control and suspension of all civil rights. To counter any traditional military defections, he's building his own private army through massive ICE hirings, seducing MAGA drones with relaxed training and educational requirements while increasing pay and bonuses.

What could go wrong?

Everything.

We need to be ready for the nightmare ahead.

Those detention camps spreading across the country? They're not only for immigrants.

They're being built for what's to come.

Never forget, never forgive.