The following are meant as ruminations on the title topic with full admission some of it is somewhat speculative. I mean it as a way to put thoughts out there to think about and stimulate thoughts or discussion with whoever reads this, instead of any final conclusion. I’m drawing on several pieces, including the New York Times (NYT) opinion piece mentioned below, a book by Nancy Maclean mentioned below, but also my own thinking.
Do Trump and His Regime Want a Recession?
With the stock market diving after Trump’s back and forth imposition of tariffs and the response from trading partners and other indicators, some economists are saying the possibility of a “Trump recession” is growing. Added here are the mass firings of federal employees and shuttering of whole government agencies, cuts to science and university funding by the Trump regime, targeting of immigrants, moves to slash social security and Medicaid, etc. The slashing of the Federal Aviation Administration by Musk’s DOGE comes right when there have been 6 recent plane disasters, and air travel from Europe and Canada has also dropped with U.S. tariffs being imposed and airline stocks dropping.
Some are asking, what “end game” are Trump and Musk going for? And as some NYT opinion writers recently asked, “Is the Destruction the Point?” A question I’ve been ruminating on is, these people are fascists, don’t they need to create through their chaos and destruction still some type of stable new fascist status quo?
I don’t know, but it does look at least more possible with Trump’s whipsawing tariff policies and their effect on the stock market and overall economy that Trump and the billionaires backing him may even be aiming for recession, or at least fine with it. And they may see it as a way to generate enough misery, grinding down of the populace and chaos that they can even advance their position.
I fully admit here I’m speculating about how such a situation could be used by them.
A recession may mean bankrupting of certain companies or industries and if that happens, those associated with or favored by Trump who have the capital would be best positioned to snap them up.
This would flow with a strategy of further building their fortunes and personal empires by seizing larger market share and even taking over other whole industries their capital has not penetrated yet, or to the degree they would like. Musk in particular, (and no doubt other tech and other capitalist interests behind Trump), likely has goals of spreading into and taking over other industries and markets.
Musk has got Tesla, SpaceX, Starlink, Twitter, and Neuralink-which has already planted chips in people’s brains, frightening as that is. It appears he is moving to have Starlink take over the FAA air traffic control system. Gee, what could go wrong? Starlink is what the Ukrainian military uses and provides internet access to 125 markets worldwide. He wants to develop sex robots, as he recently said in an interview with Joe Rogan. They likely have all kinds of insane and destructive ideas, maybe to more completely privatize and take over health care or myriad other industries and markets globally.
A good bit of the slashing of government Musk’s DOGE has focused on targeting agencies and individuals that were providing oversight of his own companies or even had cases in front of them involving his companies.
Of course glorying in dreams of ultimate power and unlimited expansion is one thing and doing it is another. As seen by the myriad problems Musk is now facing from Tesla’s sales tanking globally, diving stock price, spreading boycotts and protests at Tesla dealerships. Other capitalist electric car companies from China and Europe and even Mexico are seeking to expand sales as they seek advantage with how hated Musk and Tesla have become. Meanwhile, X is crashing, SpaceX rockets exploding yet again, etc. Not to mention growing anger and revulsion worldwide and resistance within the U.S. at his ugly billionaire, chain-saw wielding, Nazi saluting, Cybertruck flaunting, AFD supporting arrogance.
Trump and his billionaire backers are so stuffed with arrogance they believe they’ll be able to fool the people into believing something else is to blame if there’s a recession – other countries, immigrants, trans people, the “Radical left Democrats” -or else suppress, intimidate and cow into submission the rest. They think they will be able to control the narrative and overwhelm any other narrative from taking hold. This is the way Trump has been operating for years and he has mainly gotten away with it to this point.
The Twisted Workings of the Trump/Musk Mind
It’s a dark and ugly place to go, but I’d like to try to delve into the Trump/Musk brain, or more accurately, what seems to be the mindset they operate from and their “logic” if it could be called that.
This group seems driven by extreme corruption and exterminating any limits to capital-expansion and profit-making, as well as attaining what they hope will be unchallenged power for themselves . Their worldview is that they are “the makers”, the “Kings”,-smarter, better, and more deserving than the “takers”-the mass of people, (See Nancy Maclean’s book on the roots of this ideology “Democracy in Chains”)
This is why they see every type of government service that provides anything for people’s health or survival-whether AIDS drugs in Africa, Medicaid or social security in the U.S., or the myriad other governmental services for food or aviation safety, scientific inquiry and knowledge, education, national parks, environmental protection, or programs benefiting non-white people or women as simply “waste” to be eliminated. Eliminating this “waste”, which drains money and thus influence and power that should accrue to the “takers”, is what the Department of Government Efficiency aims to do.
They also see themselves as the ones with the guts, smarts and audacity to shoot for the moon and remake the world according to their own desires, unlike the “losers”-other politicians and businessmen who are still playing by the old rules. Power is measured in what you can acquire, how you can shatter what has existed before and what you can get away with that no-one else could previously.
They revel in their ability to make people do what they want and think what they want them to think. They glory in making others submit, in destroying enemies, in “winning” as Trump sees it, and not being “a loser”. Trump wants to be able to say, “I want Greenland for the U.S. and I have the power, so it should be mine.” Or the same for making Canada the “51st state”.
I agree with psychiatrists who from afar, have analyzed Trump as an extreme or pathologic narcissist. A sociopath with no social conscience, no compassion, no regard for how many people suffer or are destroyed by the actions of he and his regime. A man who is pathologic too in how he is viewed and portrayed, as seen by his obsession with rally numbers, his exaggerating his popularity, or his actual non-landslide but declared “landslide” victory over Harris and the size of the “mandate” resulting. A person, who as the aforementioned NYT opinion writers piece said, sees what he’s doing as creating a spectacle and desires to be the biggest spectacle.
This is lunacy, pathological depravity, yes, but also a depravity created out of the logic of capitalism, his own inheritance of wealth and entitlement, and the broader “American experience” of empire, war, genocide, racism, oppression of women, and destruction of the planet.
Those in this regime headed by Trump and Musk, (no matter his official title), are out to accomplish what the extreme right has dreamt of for many years, doing away with government support of all or almost all social programs-Social Security, Medicaid, U.S. supplied aid globally, and many others goods and services that people rely on to live. Then privatising whatever’s left.
The aim is to destroy any limits to this groups self-aggrandisement and profiteering. To knock down any laws, rules or convention that stands in their way. And to achieve an iron grip of control over the entire political process, the law, the culture, education, etc.
They want to destroy public education, take over colleges and take a sledgehammer to intellectualism, science and anything else that would cause people to be able to think, reason and figure out what is really going on.
They want to outlaw political dissent and deport or lock up those who oppose them, as seen so sharply in the arrest and planned deportation of Mahmoud Khalil despite bringing no charges against him and him being a legal green card holder with supposedly the same Constitutional rights as citizens in this country. They want to set a precedent, that anyone can be accused, without evidence, of “support for terrorism. They’re starting with a Palestinian protester who did no more than speak out and organize people against the U.S. backed genocide in Gaza. But it will not stop there. White supremacy, racism, mysoginy and unparalleled American chauvinism are all bound up in this single fascist package.
The MAGA vision and especially the base is increasingly looking like a road to power, to be used and brought into motion whenever some opponent needs threatening or targeting, or else in future repression vs. resistance to Trump. Apparently some Congressional Republicans told Democrats that they won’t take a position opposing Trump for fear they will be so vilified on social media someone will come after them or their family. Whether this is true or an excuse, or both, isn’t clear.
The Christian nationalist element within the regime here is interwined and I don’t think really at odds with the above. Many of these power elements with Trump are Christian nationalists, like Pete Hegseth, along with being fine with serving billionaire profit-making. Whether there will be more tension here, or with the MAGA base more generally, such has been seen between Bannon and Musk, remains to be seen.
They think they can do it and they are on the road. It’s very dangerous and also completely illegitimate. It will only be stopped by massive, unstopping opposition and resistance throughout society with millions in the streets repeatedly. In this, there is real potential, as seen by the spread of protest currently throughout the U.S.
For the Planet and Humanity 