• Whoops: The oligarchs tell Trump to stop the trade war, because it's not aligned with their interests, and he does. America's hegemony is maintained, and the US continues to be The Main Character of the world economy. Fascism eats away at the United States, but slowly and prolonged, while the US can still project power on the world stage, maintaining its economic hegemony.

• Big war: The US Federal Government is undone, the clueless Fox News host Secretary of Defense is incapable of mounting a defense. Domestic and foreign terror attacks become the norm. "It's like 9/11 every day!" The "lab leak" hypothesis looks more like a plan, so a foreign adversary capitalizes on the anti-vax anti-mask sentiment, knowing their population will be able to defend itself better against another new pandemic. It's 50/50 if the US wins the new war or not.

• We still have the bombs: Different from the above, the US sees its economic hegemony fade, and decides to enforce its hegemony in a different way. Using the same playbook of "sue advertisers who leave X", the US sues countries who form economic ties which exclude the US. The US starts up nuclear weapons tests again, breaking the worldwide agreement not to test nukes, allowing adversaries like China to catch up.

• We use the bombs: The US is full of mentally incompetent dumb mother fuckers and they have keys to 5000 nuclear warheads. You know all those historic false-alarms that nearly kickstarted a nuclear war? We can start a nuclear war by responding to a false-alarm, or by responding to a real bombing, or by throwing the first nukes ourselves.

But my favorite is the Neoliberal Revolution:

It's the year 2027. The 2028 elections have been cancelled. The "100% Hitler" thing seemed quaint because, by the numbers, Trump's looking like a 200% Hitler. "Deportations" were a euphemism for killings-- it was never economically viable to transport so many living people. Most of the trans people alive are the ones who never left the closet. The genocide in Palestine has been completed. You're unable even to post online, since the surveillance is so great and inescapable. Leftism was a memory which faded. The idea of the Marxist revolution feels like a fantasy.

You're chewing on a miswak stick -- you stocked up before things broke down. You start journaling and writing inventory of ration before the sun sets -- you no longer have electric light -- when you hear a knock on the door. Your heart races, worried this might be the Proud Men, and you hide. The knock returns, louder, firmer. Fuck.

Then, you hear the voice call out, in that slightly-nasal tone, roughened and wizened only slightly with the years,

"It's me, Pete Butigieg. I'd like you to join me for the revolution."

Fuck. What? Pete Butigieg? You look through the crack in the door. You can't quite make his face. You look to your dwindling supplies of dried oatmeal, and decide to take your chances. You open the door, and it's him, unshaven but unmistakable.

"We saw your posts on our back-up of the internet for billionaires only," he says, "they were really good posts. I hope you'll join us on this. It's time to return liberalism to America."

His suit is tattered and blue. He looks like a savior, standing against the red miasma of a sun setting through thick smog. Fuck, you think, fine, liberals are better than this.

You are inducted into a year-long underground effort to subvert fascism. You feel like a young adult dystopian novel character, or like the V for Vendetta guy. Pete compares you all to the founding fathers, or to the 1910 Mexican Revolution. But you prefer to think about V for Vendetta again.

It's an epic tale, but by three years end, you see it: Musk's head, ashen and pale from age and lack of dye and tan, on a pike. A successful coup. A return to regulated but mostly-free-market capitalism. A new Declaration, a new Constitution, and a new government, built so that none of this can ever happen again, maybe.

It's a victory, but how much did you all give up on the way here? This is just how things were in 2012.

But... You think back to September 3rd, 2025, when you shared one of the very last oranges from Florida. You shared the ten segments with three people, two of which are no longer alive. You would give anything to eat an orange again with them.

"We did it," Pete says, addressing his inner circle. "Nothing bad can ever happen again," he says through coughing fits.