The 2024 reelection of Donald Trump may look like a populist rebellion against the establishment, a victory for “real Americans” over the so-called “elites.” But look a little closer, and you’ll see it’s just the latest chapter in the saga of America’s fractured ruling class, an endless brawl of competing corporate factions cloaked in the language of patriotism and freedom.This is a power struggle that’s been simmering for decades. Back in the day, the country was run by the Yankees—finance elites from the Northeast who believe in stability, order, and “global norms.” Then came the Cowboys, big-money oil tycoons and agribusiness giants from the Southwest, who wanted to rip down regulations, go wild on the frontier, and make their fortunes without a pesky federal leash. For a while, these two groups tussled it out, each wrestling for control over the country’s resources and policies. The Yankees wanted a world order where American capital could flow freely and predictably, while the Cowboys wanted a rough-and-tumble empire where the U.S. could flex its muscle without answering to anyone.
Now, this classic brawl has a new contender: the Tech Titans—or, let’s call them the “Digirati.” They don’t care about oil wells or stock markets in quite the same way; their currency is information, the data mined from every click, every post, every interaction in our digital lives. These are the Silicon Valley elites who’ve got their hands on something neither Yankees nor Cowboys ever dreamed of: control over the flow of information, over what people know, think, and even feel.
So, what does Trump’s return mean? It’s simple: the Cowboys and Digirati managed to band together just long enough to outflank the Yankees, giving Trump the boost he needed to capture the White House once more. This isn’t a movement of the people reclaiming their voice; it’s a recalibration within the ruling class, a temporary alliance between two factions that share a common disdain for federal “interference.”
The Cowboys see Trump as their knight in gilded armor, someone who’s eager to rip down regulations, open the spigot on fossil fuel projects, and let them turn America’s landscape into their private profit machine. They love his talk of “independence,” his swaggering disdain for environmental rules, and his unwavering support for American oil, gas, and agriculture. For them, his “America First” mantra means protecting their interests and deepening their grip on the nation’s economic arteries.
And the Digirati? They may have looked down their noses at Trump once upon a time, fancying themselves progressive, global citizens. But make no mistake, they’ve found common cause with the Cowboy faction. They see Trump’s hands-off approach to Big Tech regulation as a green light for their endless appetite for data, their hunger for “innovation” without accountability. A good portion of them have realized that under Trump, they can continue to harvest personal data, shape public opinion, and build their influence in ways that defy scrutiny. They don’t need to like Trump personally to appreciate the corporate playground he’s created for them.
Meanwhile, the Yankees—the old-school bankers, insurance magnates, and multinational business executives—have been left scrambling. They saw Trump’s rhetoric and erratic policies as too unpredictable, a danger to their precious “global stability.” So, they threw their weight behind the Democrats, hoping for a steadier hand. But as we saw on November 5th, that steady hand didn’t inspire much enthusiasm in a nation increasingly bitter about inequality, weary of endless wars, and hungry for economic security.
To the average American, the divide between “left” and “right” is all that’s visible. It looks like a showdown between Democrats and Republicans, a high-stakes clash over the “soul of the nation.” But this is merely the theater. What we’re really seeing is the raw struggle for power among three factions of the American ruling class: the Yankees, who want a predictable, manageable world order; the Cowboys, who want a freewheeling, domestically focused empire; and the Digirati, who dream of a world reshaped by their technologies, where they control not just wealth but human behavior itself.
This coalition of Cowboys and Digirati backing Trump is not built to last. They may share a distaste for oversight, but their needs don’t align perfectly. The Cowboys want tangible wealth, the kind that flows out of oil wells and farmland. The Digirati are playing a different game, where dominance doesn’t come from territory or resources but from controlling the digital ether, the information we see, the stories we believe, the decisions we make. For now, they’ve made peace, but each faction has its own vision for America, and there’s no telling how long they’ll continue to see eye to eye.
Trump’s return to power, then, isn’t some grassroots revolution. It’s the Cowboys and Digirati taking their turn at the wheel, a new phase in the ruling class’s effort to wring every ounce of profit from the system they built. They’ll wrap their policies in patriotism, paint their tax cuts as populism, and continue to call it “democracy.” And the Democrats—backed by the Yankees—will continue to wring their hands over Trump’s “authoritarianism” while pining for a return to “normalcy.”
This “normalcy” is nothing more than a myth, a comforting illusion. The average person may believe they’re choosing between two competing visions for America’s future, but in reality, they’re witnessing a game of musical chairs. The faces in Washington change, the slogans shift, but the script remains the same. Each faction of the elite maneuvers for power, calling on the public to rally behind their cause, while the actual levers of power remain firmly in corporate hands.
This, in a nutshell, is the tragedy of the American political system: a ceaseless competition for dominance among a small cadre of wealthy interests, each faction claiming they’re “saving the nation” while treating the people as pawns. And now, as the Cowboys and Digirati bask in their victory, we’re left with a government that is more captured than ever by private power.
What the working class needs is not more empty promises of prosperity or freedom from one faction or the other, but a real break from this rigged game—a system that is actually accountable to the people, not to the boardrooms of Wall Street, Big Oil, or Silicon Valley. Only then can we hope to escape this endless cycle of manipulation and misdirection. As always the only viable option for humanity is socialism or barbarism.
Weaponized Information 
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