May 2026 – Page 2 – Wilder, Wealthy, and Wise

Civil War 2.0 Weather Report: Reviewing Timing

“Since when can a weatherman predict the weather, let alone the future?” – Back to the Future

I am nearly perfect at predicting what is in festively wrapped packages. It’s a gift. (most memes as-found)

Those who have an opposing ideology are considered evil.
People actively avoid being near those of opposing ideology. Might move from communities or states just because of ideology.
Common violence. Organized violence is occurring monthly.
Common violence that is generally deemed by governmental authorities as justified based on ideology.
Opposing sides develop governing/war structures. Just in case.
Open War.

Volume VII, Issue 12

Most memes except for the clock and graphs are “as found”. I have maintained the Clock O’Doom at 9., given the open support of assassination and criminality by the GloboLeft and the increase in violence as well as direct interference with ICE and the insertion of the military into law enforcement. Beware: the number can climb quickly.

My advice remains. Avoid crowds. Get out of cities. Now. A year too soon is better than one day too late.

In this issue: Front Matter – Timing – Violence and Censorship Update – Misery Index – Updated Civil War 2.0 Index – Links

Front Matter

Welcome to the latest issue of the Civil War II Weather Report. These posts are different than the other posts at Wilder Wealthy and Wise and consist of smaller segments covering multiple topics around the single focus of Civil War 2.0, on the first or second Monday of every month. I’ve created a page (LINK) for links to all of the past issues. Also, subscribe because you’ll join nearly 840 other people and get every single Wilder post delivered to your inbox, M-W-F at or before 7:30AM Eastern, free of charge.

Timing

After seven years of these updates (84 issues plus specials) it’s time to talk about what is probably the most difficult thing to predict: timing. This is probably the question that most people have: When will the Civil War start?

We have entered the zone that I predicted back in 2019 or so when I thought the Civil War would be most likely: 2026 through 2038, peaking in 2032.

This isn’t just something I made up by throwing darts at a board. Okay, there were some darts, but also some spreadsheets.

If you’ve read Strauss and Howe’s book The Fourth Turning, they make a very good case for societal chaos at this time as society unravels. This is based on the way that the generations who are in charge control the economy. The long-lived Boomers have been in control of power since 1992, much longer than usual. When their generation (and their analogs through United States history) have given up power, it’s usually the sign that we’re ready for either a civil war or an international war.

There are reasons for this.

The economic situation was screwed up in 1932, and taking action back then just made the Great Depression worse. Back then, the playbook was to steal the gold of the people to shore up government finances. Today? We’ll just print more money which is theft via inflation of the cash held by people.

We’ve reached a point which was trivial to calculate seven years ago where the debt is bigger than the GDP. Oh, and interest costs 18% of federal revenues, and federal spending on healthcare is over 27% and the only words that are off limits in congress are “deficit reduction”.

You can always drink a bit too much at the party, but when you go on a decades-long bender, it’s going to be a hell of a hangover. Right now, the party is still going with DOW 50k in sight.

Is it sustainable?

Yes, for a while.

But what happens when it crashes? I think we’ve seen that the economy has already priced-out many middle-class people from doing luxury things like, oh, going to McDonald’s®. And this leads to people being miserable. And happy people don’t take part in a civil war, miserable people with nothing to lose do. And, yeah, going to war because you can’t get Chicken McNuggets™ may seem like an overreaction, but by observation, Wilders Rule No. 7 applies: “The biggest fights are over the smallest things.” I’ve seen adults nearly explode when something simple is in error. People are strong for the big things, but running out of ketchup?

Yeah, that might lead to a meltdown.

In addition to popular immiseration, Peter Turchin notes that you need someone to lead the civil war. This would members of the overproduced elite. Turchin had a recent post on lawyers where he noted that their incomes peaked in two regions: $60,000 and $190,000.

There were a lot more lawyers making $60,000 than $190,000.

Sure, there are a lot of lawyer jokes out there, but lawyers are ambitious and often are good at making arguments. These are the types of people that become the backbone of a civil war’s leadership. Remember Robespierre? Yeah, he was a lawyer.

Lawyers and engineers are finding that their earning capacity has been drastically lowered due to H-1Bs and outsourcing to foreign firms. Soon enough, it’ll be worse as A.I. reduces the number of jobs that entry-level lawyers and engineers will get even more. Smart people who feel that their future they planned for no longer exists have nothing to lose.

And they’re smart. And dedicated. And ambitious. And angry.

I didn’t see A.I. coming, but I did tell both of my sons this: “Don’t take a job that someone can do in Mumbai.” The global displacement of American knowledge workers will have consequences. A.I. will multiply it.

The final factor is polarization. The idiot who tried the most recent assassination in Washington D.C. has support from many on the GlobLeft. Many. They only see one solution for the Nazis, and that’s to kill them. Who are Nazis? Everyone to the right of them, including normies in the middle who just want to grill.

There is no national consensus at all on anything. If Trump said he loved oxygen, half of the GloboLeft would hold their breath just to spite him.

If the market collapses, or the infinity deficits have to stop because the dollar loses its reserve-currency status, those are likely the sparks that drive us over the cliff from the cold Civil War 2.0 that’s going on right now into a hot war flaring up across the country.

Are there off ramps that avoid Civil War 2.0? Sure. It could be that Trump is attempting to replace civil war with a sustained and popular foreign war, but although Trump may get a sustained war, it’s unlikely to be popular. The other offramp is that we end up with a candidate on either the Right or GloboLeft that wants to unite the country, but finding a candidate that could satisfy all sides is very unlikely.

In the end, are there off ramps? Sure. Do I see us taking one? Not really. I think we’re at the front-end of when Civil War 2.0 could start though I don’t see it quite yet. After this summer, I see the next big danger point being in July of 2028. I still don’t see us going past 2038 without a collapse. 2032 and a contentious presidential election after the Supreme Court was packed and the economy in shambles?

That’s been my most likely selection for seven years, and I’m sticking with it.

(No second story this month.)

Violence and Censorship Update

Violence is still on the menu, boys:

A GloboLeftist with social media that sounds like every other GloboLeftist went on an attempt to shoot-up the White House Correspondent Dinner. If there are two groups that hate each other in the United States, it’s Trump and the press. Will this stop the press from calling Trump a Nazi since doing so put them in danger?

No.

The SPLC was indicted because they didn’t have enough racists, so they had to pay money to create racists to be against. Oops.

A breath of fresh air hit when Amazon®, after banning The Camp of the Saints, unbanned it last year. It then banned it again last month, but the backlash was immediate and Amazon© caved.

Misery Index

The new Trump administration is shown in red. Results continue to be much better than Biden’s misery numbers.

Updated Civil War II Index

The Civil War II graphs are an attempt to measure four factors that might make Civil War II more likely, in real time. They are broken up into Violence, Political Instability, Economic Outlook, and Illegal Alien Crossings. As each of these is difficult to measure, I’ve created for three of the four metrics some leading indicators that combine to become the index. On illegal aliens, I’m just using government figures.

Violence:

Violence indicators are down this month. I think the attack in Washington hasn’t filtered into the numbers yet.

Political Instability:

Down is more stable, and it went up again this month. We’ll see what May brings. Down, I think.

Economic:

The economy took a drop last month, but then completely recovered.

Illegal Aliens:

Still the near lowest level since the Weather Report started.

LINKS

The links are again done by Ricky this month. Thanks, Ricky!

GOOD GUYS AND BAD GUYS
https://www.firstalert4.com/2026/02/04/he-was-just-giver-good-samaritan-shot-killed-after-offering-ride-woman-seeking-shelter/
https://www.ksat.com/news/local/2026/04/01/a-roving-good-samaritan-friends-speak-lovingly-of-murdered-east-side-man-whose-body-was-found-burning/
https://news4sanantonio.com/news/local/man-arrested-after-sending-child-porn-to-good-samaritan
https://www.fox13now.com/news/crime/suspect-on-the-run-after-crashing-car-stealing-good-samaritans-car-in-south-salt-lake
https://www.wesh.com/article/good-samaritan-becomes-victim-ambush-attack-video-florida-highway/70930393
https://people.com/good-samaritan-helped-stranded-man-gas-station-then-was-murdered-11961324

ONE GUY
https://archive.is/C2i9a

BODY COUNT
https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/environment/a71051702/global-population-shortage-humans/
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2026/apr/19/us-population-fertility-rate

VOTE COUNT
https://thenationalpulse.com/2026/04/21/revealed-rnc-blew-va-referendum-due-to-lavish-cornyn-spending-and-misplaced-priorities/
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/former-dem-mayoral-candidate-admits-forging-voter-registration-applications
https://www.judicialwatch.org/inactive-voters-removed-colorado-voter-rolls/
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/alabama-governor-calls-special-session-move-primaries-redistricting-ge-rcna343125

CIVIL WAR
https://www.science.org/content/article/what-plunged-these-chimps-civil-war-new-study-traces-breakdown
https://www.forbes.com/sites/andymeek/2026/03/20/the-maga-media-civil-war-is-getting-ugly-and-personal/
https://newrepublic.com/article/208958/trump-iran-war-critics-maga-civil-war
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2026/4/29/800029865/community/make-no-mistake-the-democratic-party-is-in-a-civil-war-between-oligar/
https://news.syr.edu/2025/10/02/secession-in-the-us-could-it-happen/
https://fortworthinc.com/commentary/could-texas-still-secede-some-haven-t-given-up-the-fight/
https://www.cityandstateny.com/personality/2026/02/desire-secede-may-be-one-thing-most-new-york-regions-have-common/411310/
https://thewalrus.ca/can-alberta-keep-foreign-meddling-out-of-its-secession-vote/
https://kevinmlevin.substack.com/p/we-are-not-living-through-a-civil
https://jonathanturley.org/2026/05/01/contempt-of-court-hakeem-jeffries-denounces-the-supreme-court-as-illegitimate/
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/treating-politics-like-war-leads-to-our-collective-demise-opinion/ar-AA22dv21
https://jonathanturley.org/2026/04/28/a-nation-divided-new-survey-shows-changing-views-of-democracy-and-political-violence/

Falling Down: A Movie You Should Hate, Because It Hates You

“I am not a vigilante. I am just trying to get home to my little girl’s birthday and if everybody’ll stay out of my way, then nobody’ll get hurt.” – Falling Down

I think I’m done with the “It Came From . . . “ series. Now I’ll probably just spend some time (once a month) looking at propaganda in movies and TV and how it was used to manipulate us. I’ll miss those because they were fun, but I’ve just nearly run out of good years to review.

For no reason other than I was thinking about it for some reason, I’d like to look back at the movie Falling Down to discuss how, even though it was popular among some people on the TradRight, it wasn’t a love letter: it was a hate letter. Back in 1993, the movie Falling Down came out. I went and saw it that one time in the theater. I recall being repulsed.

I wasn’t very wise then. I didn’t and couldn’t exactly put a finger on why I was repulsed other than walking out of a movie with the distinct feeling that I was just in the presence of Evil. It was a memorable movie, though. I still remember many of the scenes and the setups and the way those scenes made me feel even though it’s been nearly 33 years since I watched them.

This movie is pure propaganda dressed up as action-adventure.

First, the propaganda is firmly against white people. There is something very wrong with all of the white people in the movie, and we’ll get into more details on that. Second, it’s against families as no intact family is shown in a positive light. Third, it’s utterly against not just white people, but white men in particular.

That’s where our protagonist comes in, with Micheal Douglas playing a white guy. Michael Douglas plays D-FENS (he has a name, but who cares), a generic replaceable technical guy or manager in the defense industry in Los Angeles.

The main technique used by quite gay and quite leftist director was to put the quite white main character into a sympathetic position so that the audience, mainly white men for “action” movies in 1993, sympathizes with him.

So, it starts in traffic. Everyone hates traffic. Everyone has been in traffic.

We see D-FENS stuck in traffic and his air conditioner fails, and he says “screw it, I’m not parking it, I’m abandoning it.” Every single man I know has fantasized about at abandoning at least one car.

We understand D-FENS.

The fact they choose minor things to make the character relatable is in Wilder’s Rule 7: The biggest fights are over the smallest things. This is the trick to make you feel what he feels. They chose to do that by picking relatable things, and then magnifying the reaction to them to the level of the darkest fantasy that I’ve ever had.

Then, D-FENS is confronted with another minor annoyance, this time a crappy convenience store with an asshole owner/clerk and ludicrous prices. In this case, it’s a Korean who D-FENS tags as being insufficiently grateful to America.

It’s that pattern again. But we’ve all been there to the shitty convenience store with outrageous prices offset by surly service. In this case, though, after being threatened with a baseball bat after asking for the owner/clerk to make change so he could use a pay phone, D-FENS takes the bat from the owner/clerk and smashes the place up.

Again, we’ve all been there.

Except we didn’t smash the place up, though deep down we understand and sympathize with D-FENS. Heck, to show how morally righteous he is, D-FENS even pays the inflated price for his beverage.

He ends up fighting with some gang members over a pay-phone, beats one with a bat so they try to shoot him. They crash their car after trying to kill him (convenient, that), and D-FENS takes their convenient bag of weapons. The GloboLeftist critics HATED this, because the gang members were Hispanic.

“How dare you show anyone but a white, blonde man as a member of a gang. Or not have one of those multi-racial gangs that only exist in movies?” This is a second point aimed at the white male audience. “See, we’re on your side. Ethnics in gangs with no adherence to Western values are scary. See, we’re not GloboLeftists if we show we’re race realists.”

As we go through this, we find that D-FENS was laid off from his defense job.

Why as he laid off?

The Soviets no longer existed, so why did we need a defense industry? It was going to be nothing but peace forever, and in fact the only question was which moslem country was first going to turn into a liberal democracy and make celebrating gay sex a national requirement.

Except . . . well, here are the words of the guy who actually wrote the screenplay:

“To me, even though the movie deals with complicated urban issues, it really is just about one basic thing: The main character represents the old power structure of the U.S. that has now become archaic, and hopelessly lost. And that way, I guess you could say D-FENS is like Los Angeles. For both of them, it’s adjust-or-die time–that’s what the movie is about.”

If you’re a white guy and thought that this movie was about you, from your frustrations with fast food to the epidemic of divorced dads who couldn’t see their kids, notsofastguido. The author hates you. The director hates you.

They hate you and want not only to replace you but to eradicate you from memory. In the end, D-FENS is shot to death in front of his ex-wife and kid. Erased from history just like he was erased from his job and erased from his family. His life, his dedication, turns to dust. Even the lines, “I’m the bad guy? How’d that happen? I did everything they told me to,” are meant to demoralize you.

When a bad guy that you’re meant to see yourself in is killed and his legacy is wiped away the intent is clear: to demoralize you. You have been symbolically sacrificed by the movie.

They want you to know how they feel: Nothing you do matters, white guy. Your life is meaningless. Worse than meaningless. We will tear your statues down. We will erase your genes from history.

Oh, and who kills D-FENS? Robert Duvall, a retiring cop. And the precinct he’s retiring from?

Almost all of they younger cops are black or Asian or Hispanic. Duvall’s character is being replaced, too by a sassy Latina. But since Duvall is going gracefully, he gets to live.

The lesson that you were meant to take away as a white guy was simple: you are being replaced. You will lose. Resist, and we will erase you. Retire, and we will give your culture a retirement while you whither and die.

The California the writer and director lived in wasn’t the California they wanted.

Not long after this movie came out, the populace voted to deny welfare benefits to illegals.

“Not constitutional,” said the judge.

Then California voters mandated that nearly all public school instruction be in English. Student performance increased. Yet, in 2016, that new California, the California the director and writer of Falling Down wanted, the California without room for people like D-FENS, voted to overturn it.

So, I hate this movie. And unlike younger me, I now know why.

Because it hated me first.