I was gonna title this “And here I sit so patiently waiting to find out what price you have to pay to get out of going through all these things twice” and then write “Stuck inside of America with the fascism blues again” here, but I’m not sure if that comes off like gloating and that’s honestly the last thing I want to do this morning.
Democrats are completely out of touch. them expecting voters putting other issues on top of them making ends meets and food on the table (like mocking Vance’s egg prices ), all the while most polls showing the economy is the biggest concern with 38 % of all voters, is just simply delusional
And they have lost both the popular and electoral college vote. meaning the real problem here is them.
And don’t get me started on the propaganda of Iowa’s early voters polls showing a Kamala landslide just 2 days before election day. If you live in a left wing bubble and believe this shit, than this should be a hard smack back into reality.
So I guess people actually think Trump and Musk are going to help them with their egg prices?
Yes, you might find it stupid or illogical, but they (trump , elmo) are seen as smart and successful, and they lived under better circumstances in the last Trump term.
That’s democracy, everyone has a say, whether their opinions or feelings are right or wrong. but instead of the democrats putting the work to meet these people they have chosen to belittle them. and that has cost them so far the Presidency and the Senate.
“they lived under better circumstances in the last Trump term”
They lived under fucking Covid in the last Trump term, when everyone was confined to their homes while supply lines disintegrated and the cost of food more than doubled, while ashes from rampant forest fires rained down from a blood red sky.
That was only the end of it though. Through most of it, many aspects of the economy were better, for most people. He was just as complicit in why inflation, housing costs, etc. got so bad. However, do you think most people understand how the free money given, mostly under Biden, as a stimulus to the populace, had little effect on the inflation vs financial institutions drowning in oceans of free money, for 20 years? Do you think most people are even aware that was going on? Do you think most of them understand how private equity, and changes in its regulation, caused the housing cost crisis, and not supply being overwhelmed by the demand of immigrants?
I talked to someone I used to do underwriting, for things like mortgages, a few months back. He bought the immigrants buying up all the housing line. He just refused to believe private equity, something he definitely understands, is responsible, regardless of the fact that even those private equity institutions’ data say they are at fault. It is much easier to say “housing unaffordable, close border” than to have to address the massive systemic changes that need to be made.
they lived under better circumstances in the last Trump term
I was disinfecting my groceries, and Trump was confiscating my PPE to send it somewhere else. I was getting Covid checks, which was nice, but it wasn’t exactly the same as working. I couldn’t leave the house for a while. I couldn’t buy certain mechanical things without going on a 3-month wait list. I knew some people who died.
They think they lived under better circumstances in the last Trump term, because the media and people like you spreading a certain type of mental landscape and inviting them to inhabit it. But that’s not actually what happened.
instead of the democrats putting the work to meet these people they have chosen to belittle them
If belittling the people could cost you support in America, Trump would be in prison right now.
Now if you ask whether the media told people that Democrats were belittling them, now that’s a different story. That, to me, seems a lot more worth examining than it does to lecture the Democrats how important it is not to do some things they didn’t do, that the media said they did.
Lol! Most people get their information from social media. Most people interact with others on social media.
Most Republicans have been called “racist, bigot, misogynist, shitty, worthless, non-human, “Nazis” who deserve to be cast out if not “removed permanently” from society!!!” on social media.
For no other reason than they had a differing opinion than the hive-mind did.
The media didn’t have to tell me that liberals were belittling me.
Biden also called Trump supporters “garbage”. Clinton called us “deplorable”. And I have a funny suspicion that you don’t disagree. We have been dehumanized. I have to try my hardest to make it clear that I am, in fact, NOT a fucking Nazi before I post something that I know will be considered “Nazi speak”, just because it isn’t blind alegence to the Democratic candidate.
So…yeah…you can’t act like this is something the media implanted into our minds.
If you aren’t further left than the Democratic Party, then you are in fact a Nazi.
Oh of course they think Trump and Musk are very smart. That doesn’t surprise me.
I’m surprised that they think Trump and Musk give a fuck about egg prices.
People think that Trump is going to change things, which is very hard to argue against. Yes, it won’t be change for the better, but Harris was offering them 4 more years of the status quo that is currently hurting them.
No one can argue Trump didn’t get things done. He got a lot done, especially when you compare that to the perception people have of the Biden administration.
But I brought this up earlier: Trump may hate his followers, absolutely loathe them, but he still panders to them, even if it’s fake promises. He accomplishes things they want done, and shows he can make progress, something the Democrats botch literally anytime they get any semblance of power. Trump makes his constituents feel heard.
The Democrats, just, don’t. Everyone on Lemmy I’m sure has seen people offering criticism of Biden/Harris, and the response has been to immediately insult, scold, condescend, and shame the individual for not towing the party line. Your concerns, anxieties, hangups, none of that matters because fascism bad so stfu and vote and also fuck you anyway.
Trump’s supporters ask him to abolish vaccines, and he seriously considers it.
Harris’ supporters ask her to not support a genocide in Palestine, and she sends Bill Clinton to lecture them about why Israel has the right to do what they’re doing.
It’s a two-way street, the politicians just can’t keep demanding our votes and ignoring our issues. And if that’s what they’re going to do, then congratulations, you’ve turned your voting base apathetic, and you deserve to lose to fascism.
I saw someone else on here put it perfectly, Democrats feel entitled to votes. They think that because they are logically the lesser evil, not voting for them is wrong. They don’t even consider that American elections are not about logic, and are nearly entirely about emotions. They don’t feel the need to make their constituents feel heard because they think their constituents are idiots if they don’t vote for them. They don’t even stop to realize that they are still an evil.
Seeing some of that entitlement in these threads has been, frankly, infuriating. Blue MAGA is the right term, they act identically to Trump supporters. It’s everyone’s fault but Harris’.
I’ve been saying the entitlement thing since the midterms! You’re not entitled to someone’s vote just because the other option is fascism.
And this entitlement has turned a large part of eligible voters apathetic. What difference does it make if you vote if you’re always just voting for the lesser evil? If you’re never actually represented in the people you’re forced to choose between?
If you’re going to be fucked either way, what difference does it make if the party in power is fascist or not?
And yep, plenty of people today telling me I’m the problem, despite the fact I voted for Harris. I just am also not naive enough to think the average American should be impressed by the lackluster campaign she just ran, and the Democrats botched on the whole.
I never voted for Trump each time I was able to vote. Not once did it ever cross my mind.
And somehow we’re the evil people for wanting meaningful promises that improve the lives that fascism tempts. Never once voted for a Trump and since 2020, never voted for a Republican locally, I always skip the blanket primary when I can, since “I can promise you’re not totally crazy” isn’t a thing anymore.
When I ask “Why are we supporting these bad polices that Bush started?” I’m accused of being a useful idiot. When I ask “Why did we stop COVID protections and doing tests? Isn’t that what Trump wanted?” I’m called a Russian bot. At some point I just learned:
Oh you don’t care about kids in cages. You don’t care about the 9/11 amount of Americans dying from COVID. You don’t care about police killing innocent people. You don’t want anything good, you pretend to for votes. You got jealous of how devoted and rabid Trump’s fans are, and wanted a piece of that fascist pie.
I give up. Democrats don’t want answers and polices, they just wanna be “Not the current evil guy.”
It really does feel like that. “Vote for lesser evil” but do nothing to be less evil.
Blue MAGA was a joke that became reality. There’s several people more angry at “I was entitled to more votes!” than Trump winning the votes and ending everything else.
I’m not even American and I constantly see Lemmy users dunk on me for saying Biden/Harris are corpo dems who don’t have policies most people wanted. That DNC and democrat politicians will be to blame if Drumpf wins.Not voters. Not independents. The Party and the Party Leaders.
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The economy is in an objectively better position than when the GOP had office. The fault does lie with the dems, but if the economy was a concern as 38% of people said, then they would have voted democrat. The fact is they went too far right, floundered on their support of a genocide and failed to speak bluntly on matters such as healthcare outside of abortion.
I think people say the economy when asked as a catch all when they dont know what to say.
Every one and their grandma knows that what people mean by the economy is their own financial well being and not the ability of billionaires and capitalist class on racking up more billions. the rest is pedantry.
Again objectively better under biden
The “economy” does not help people pay their bills. And the unit of measurement only says something about the whole. The fact that a small portion of the people actually profit from this better economy is the issue, the unit of measurement has no bearing on normal people.
And now, we will see what trade tarrifs will do, and gutting the administration and filling it with partisan players (loyalty > capability). And what gutting protection and health agencies will do.
Now that it’s done I personally am morbidly curious what Trump, Vance, Kennedy and Musk can do to America in the next term (and possibly beyond). I really wonder if this will be as dark as it can be… but the project 2025 ghouls are scary as fuck.
What is the over under on a national abortion ban in the US?
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1351276/wage-growth-vs-inflation-us/
Trump fucked it, Biden unfucked it better than any other country in the world after Covid, and Biden got the blame.
As is tradition. Universally. It’s one of the few things in American politics that always happens in exactly the same way, with no real wiggle room depending on how you want to measure things or who you ask for the explanation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._economic_performance_by_presidential_party
Both rich people and working people do better under Democrats, and both rich people and working people do worse under Republicans. Always.
Exact same happened to Obama and the 2008 recession. Getting blamed for shit that happened before the election even took place. But Democrats refuse to play the blame game, people got to spout the lies about things being cheaper when Trump was in office unchallenged, and the Dems refused to promote solid solutions to even the most basic of core issues like antitrust, price controls, higher minimum wage, or even fucking climate change.
And now, with so many fewer people turning out to vote for Dems, even Trump’s lies about voter fraud will have been validated in the minds of the morons, who will attribute those low numbers to harsher rules stopping the fraud.
I was so confused because the voting pattern on this comment is so dramatically different than it was on the comments early on in this exact same discussion here, or in other posts where we’ve been discussing basically the exact same thing.
Sort the comments on this post by “old” and you’ll see what I’m talking about. You won’t see everyone claiming that the Democrats did nothing at all for the economy for the last 4 years. It won’t be all the other way, either, but you’ll see a healthy interplay between a couple of different main points of view. It won’t be all one way.
I don’t usually come to the big communities on lemmy.world for pretty much this exact same reason, so like I say, I was just confused. I looked back on some of my other comments in other communities, where there’s actually a large-scale consensus that yesterday’s tragedy was largely the fault of the people who were holding out voting for the Democrats because they hadn’t done enough to fix everything up, including for example the economy from the last time the Republicans broke it all.
One thing that I suddenly realized is that some of those comments with that very-different-from-this consensus are on Beehaw, which while it still has representation on it from the socialists and anti-liberals, whatever you want to call it, has defederated from sh.itjust.works and lemmy.world because they were at the time too infested with troll accounts. And I used some of my magic powers to look at who’s been voting for this comment with all these universal upvotes…
And lo, I was enlightened.
Edit: Another funny thing happened. The parent comment that this is in reply to was the top comment, 3 hours old, when I made this comment, which was the only reply at that time. Now, in just the last half hour, there are suddenly 7 other comments and replies competing for space at the top of the page, instead of it just being the parent comment and this one as a reply. A lot of those are some variety of “Democrats fucked it” comment.
My guess is that there will be a flurry of continued conversation, and then once things die down, it will all somehow coalesce into there being a few “Democrats fucked it” comments all the way up at the top of the page, with a whole bunch of upvotes, creating a narrative. I’m not sure. But that is how I would guess, if I had to guess.
Edit2: Called it. Look at the default-sorted comments now.
It doesn’t particularly matter. It’s over at this point. But it’s interesting to look at one particular microcosm on one particular platform of one thing that made it happen, I think.
largely the fault of the people who were holding out voting for the Democrats because they hadn’t done enough to fix everything up,
I don’t know how someone can blame voters for advancing their interests if their finances are in the red. and are holding their vote in protest of the democrats.
I don’t know how are the discussions on beehaw but over the rest of lemmy, it feels exactly the same as on reddit: well off Americans blaming the struggling other half for turning their backs on the Democrats, it isn’t Just Harris who didn’t deliver, it is the whole fucking party. Liberals won’t understand the struggle of people living paycheck to paycheck. and how they are not entitled to their vote if they let the neo-Liberal system fuck with the struggling class.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1351276/wage-growth-vs-inflation-us/
Like I said: Trump fucked it, Biden unfucked it starting in January 2021 and got it under control. And, because the media laps up a good narrative like no other, Biden got the blame for what Trump did, when the US recovered better from Covid inflation than pretty much every other country in the world.
If you’re struggling now, and “holding your vote in protest of the Democrats,” then I withdraw a little bit of my sympathy. You’re going to get it right up the ass very hard in the next few years, if you did that, and although it won’t be completely your fault you will have helped make it happen.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but this is a measure of average wage growth right? I think it’s possible that there are big variations between geographic regions and industries and income, so for some people wage growth more than outpaced inflation but for a lot of others it didn’t.
Here’s the median, in inflation-adjusted dollars:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/200838/median-household-income-in-the-united-states/
It bombed in 2022 and then went back up. It’ll be higher in 2024 than it ever was, and it’ll probably keep going up until anywhere from 0 to 2 years into Trump’s presidency, and then it’ll bomb again much harder as everything goes completely to shit. The normal cycle would be that it gets handed back over to a Democrat in 2028, he spends the first 2-3 years of his presidency fixing things from the previous Republican’s disaster as happened in 2009-2012 and in 2021-2022, and then during the next election everyone blames that 2-3 years on the Democrat and says the Republicans are better with money.
We’re about to go so far off the map that it seems unlikely for that cycle to happen this time, but that would be the normal cycle.
The economic struggle and inflation only fell on people under Biden’s presidency and vastly after Ukraine war. what people live under is what matters. not that a trump presidency will alleviate this. but you shouldn’t expect people to reelect the same team that choose to extend a war in Ukraine and send 100 billion to Ukraine while their own are struggling.
choose to extend a war in Ukraine and send 100 billion to Ukraine while their own are struggling.
a) they didn’t start that war,
b) out of all the stupid shit our federal government spends money on, why fixate on this one?
c) rich people and companies are under-taxed anyway, so it’s not like we’re hurting for potential revenue. We have more than enough money to fund Ukraine’s defense and take care of poor people.
what people live under is what matters
That much I agree with and have known since George W Bush won the popular vote in 2004 despite there being no WMDs in Iraq and all sorts of civilian casualties because gas stayed cheap
A haaaaaa
Hey, what do you think of Alexei Navalny?
Don’t care really! I don’t believe in heroism. He didn’t deserve to Die in a prison though.
My curiosity was just aroused because you blamed 8% inflation which hit every country worldwide and is related to how much companies want to charge individuals for private transactions, on US government spending on behalf of Ukraine, the total over all years of which added up to 1% of the federal budget for one year, and had nothing to do with either private individuals or companies. It’s a staggeringly weird leap to make. Unless you were, say, trying to find a reason why aid for Ukraine would be a foolish thing for governments to do, and trying to make the case that it was hurting the individuals in those countries using some sort of moon-logic.
Usually, the government spending money domestically on weapons or whatever, and then giving the product away somewhere so we have to make more of whatever it is right away, stimulates the economy. Even aside from those other weird aspects of your decision to say that, it’s also a backwards thing to say in terms of how government spending usually works.
One thing that I suddenly realized is that some of those comments with that very-different-from-this consensus are on Beehaw, which while it still has representation on it from the socialists and anti-liberals, whatever you want to call it, has defederated from sh.itjust.works and lemmy.world because they were at the time too infested with troll accounts. And I used some of my magic powers to look at who’s been voting for *this* comment with all these universal upvotes…
I’m confused, is the implication that Beehaw users are upvoting the comments blaming the Drmocrats? How can they do that if they’re defederated?
Actually I didn’t really understand your entire comment…can you ELI5 or do I need to up my ADHD meds?
I’m saying that the comments under this post look manipulated, especially when compared with comments on Beehaw, which makes sense considering that beehaw excludes Lemmy.world and sh.itjust.works which is where a ton of troll accounts come from.
Thank you, this might be a sign that I do need to up my dosage 😭
Also, I agree with you.
Yeah. My initial presentation was unclear. Partly because it’s such a weird conspiratorial thing to believe that I kind of had to come at it sideways.
And I used some of my magic powers to look at who’s been voting for this comment with all these universal upvotes…
And lo, I was enlightened.
If you’re aware of someone botting votes, I’m certain the admins of all instances would like to know, why don’t you post the data?
Democrats are completely out of touch. them expecting voters putting other issues on top of them making ends meets and food on the table
the economy is literally the strongest it’s been in a while, inflation rates are down, sure prices are still high but we’re literally at the tail end of the fucking tunnel here.
God i wish people would stop voting on schizoprehnia economics, it’s so stupid.
Democrats were too busy making sure progressive candidates were banned from participating in democracy.
🇺🇸 MISSION ACCOMPLISHED 🇺🇸
The reality is that neoliberals in power, and even many poor deluded neoliberal voters, would rather have Republicans in charge than people interested in addressing the intentional and by design inequity of our economy, despite all the social issues that very inequity causes and exacerbates they then falsely claim to care about, including abortion, which is often correctly an economic decision.
I voted blue out of harm reduction as I always have, without hope, just to minimize what little cruelty I have the power to potentially minimize, but they did this to themselves, as we never get a vote on our economic system or the cruelty it propagates, because (D) and ® are on the take, and I’ve yet to meet an affluent person of either party take issue with the economic system they benefit from despite our legions of homeless and barely subsisting people without the means to bribe officials on their behalf, and their very existence is proof of this economy’s failure as a lowly tool to better equitibly distribute goods and services in service to a society that an economy is meant to be.
Our economy, and by that I mean our oligarch class that sits above the society they have no stake in, instead orders our society around through the legislators they own solely to maximize their private profit against all other concerns, and it’s beyond perverse. We’ve just been propagandized our entire lives to consider it to be the natural state of things by self-serving for profit media and captured state government’s capitalist indoctrinating curriculum.
"The son of the worker, on entering life, finds no field which he may till, no machine which he may tend, no mine in which he may dig, without accepting to leave a great part of what he will produce to a master. He must sell his labour for a scant and uncertain wage. His father and his grandfather have toiled to drain this field, to build this mill, to perfect this machine. They gave to the work the full measure of their strength, and what more could they give? But their heir comes into the world poorer than the lowest savage. If he obtains leave to till the fields, it is on condition of surrendering a quarter of the produce to his master, and another quarter to the government and the middlemen. And this tax, levied upon him by the State, the capitalist, the lord of the manor, and the middleman, is always increasing; it rarely leaves him the power to improve his system of culture. If he turns to industry, he is allowed to work–though not always even that --only on condition that he yield a half or two-thirds of the product to him whom the land recognizes as the owner of the machine.
We cry shame on the feudal baron who forbade the peasant to turn a clod of earth unless he surrendered to his lord a fourth of his crop. We call those the barbarous times. But if the forms have changed, the relations have remained the same, and the worker is forced, under the name of free contract, to accept feudal obligations. For, turn where he will, he can find no better conditions. Everything has become private property, and he must accept, or die of hunger."
- Peter Kropotkin (The conquest of bread)
Kropotkin always hits.
The Democratic Convention had room on the stage for anti-choice Republicans, but none for Palestinian-Americans. I heard the speech that representative was going to give. There was nothing controversial in there. It didn’t mention an arms embargo. Having them present was too much for the DNC.
It’s a big tent party for “former” Republicans, oligarchs, corporations, but not anyone the Republicans are making hit lists of right now.
Palestinians can’t even attend, “she’s talking right now.” Meanwhile she just has lunch with the people who made the War
for Oilon Terror, and acts like this is true progress and you’re the bad guy for not warming up to Dick Chaney.hey man Cheney and Bush are monsters and we have to stop them by voting blue no matter who
checks calendar sorry I mean Cheney and Bush are moderate Republicans who endorse Kamala let’s give them a hand
So this proves we need to rebuild or create a true opposition party. Running as a moderate party just continously pushes America politics right. Those that wanted a fully different option just stay home on election day. This isn’t a both sides argument, just facts. We can’t keep failing in this way when the writing is on the wall. We need to change the leadership in the dems. They all need to go! Yes race and gender played a role but Trump is projected to get 6 million less votes this time around than last time. So that means the base for dems just didn’t vote. Yes that’s upsetting but trying to shame and meme them into voting will never work. Give people something to vote for, not just against. Republicans get it but using fear and promising a better life for their base. (even at the expense of others they at least give that to their base.)such a sad day in America and the only thing that’ll save us is to come together as a community and create a party that represents that community.
Running as a moderate party just continously pushes America politics right.
100% this
In the UK the left-wing party, Labour, very drastically moved themselves to the centre, rebranding as New Labour.
Since then, the Conservatives have increasingly adopted far-right policies and everybody just accepts it as normal.
Last time we tried to make a new party it failed and called spoilers.
Last time we tried to do grassroots on the federal level, they pushed him out and said you’re the bad guys for supporting him.
They say to push the next person to the left but when you ask “Hey why are we bombing brown people when we can help Ukraine?” you’re called a Russian asset who hates Americans.
I don’t think Americans want actual policies that help. Every time someone tries to help on all levels of engagement to government they’re shafted, outbid, marginalized, and then blamed for when the milquetoast candidate loses. And pure evil just wins, again.
We’ve been fucked in 2000, the DNC should have used 2016 as a wake up call for what went wrong, and instead learned nothing.
Does anybody know if there’s groups organizing already that are trying to cause that kind of reform? Would be good to spread the word if somebody has the ball rolling already. I think a huge portion of the voter base feels disenfranchised by not having an actually progressive platform to vote for.
Doubtful. Best case scenario is the old leadership literally dies off. Because any real progressive organization is deemed a Iranian, Russian, or communist and gets zero funding. Sad truth is, if all the progressives pooled all their none essential resources and money they still wouldn’t scratch the amount of money the two major parties spend on TV ads. Honestly. A collapse of the US is more likely to bring about a progressive change than any “conventional” processes.
What’s a TV ad?
Last time we tried and succeeded in send some of the most progressive representatives to the House. They did run on a Democratic ticket but were far to the left of anything that Democrats have ever stood for. Democrats co-opted them, used them to increase their progressive credentials and then sidelined them.
Swinging left wouldn’t have worked either.
There is no high horse. There is no right path. Us Americans have the critical thinking skill of an ant. The left should have fought dirty with a full blown propaganda machine, populist lies, and blatant collusion if they wanted to win, simple as that.
It needs a leftist Trump.
What are Republican’s gonna do… demonize democrats even more?
Swinging left wouldn’t have worked either.
It absolutely would have. Progressive policy is insanely popular and easy to campaign on by virtue of being designed to help everyone. Do you think Bernie had such high favorably ratings because they have a thing for 80 year old white dudes?
Tell people “healthcare will be free” or “We will cap rent and build housing that won’t cost more than 3x local median income” and then people can’t afford not to vote for you.
Biden could have cut off arms to Israel, and hundreds of thousands of students so politically activated they’re willing to risk their degrees to protest would be doing everything in their power to keep Trump out.
Instead they sent the police to kick the shit out of those kids, at great expense to the colleges, and called them antisemitic.
Why then do countries with existing left parties and proportional representation elect further and further right-wing parties in Europe?
It’s simple: They promise easy solutions for complicated problems. Banning immigration will fix all crime and the economy, opposing LGBTQ+ rights will ensure a return of the better olden days, climate change is nothing to be worried about etc etc
And even people depending on social support will gladly shoot themselves in their feet if it means someone else will have it worse.
Why then do countries with existing left parties and proportional representation elect further and further right-wing parties in Europe?
Obviously they haven’t gone far left enough. /s
Some people want easy solutions. Not unlike Trump voters.
I’m afraid exit polls say otherwise. Kamala’s economic policies were the most left wing we’ve seen in decades (a wealth tax?). If people cared about actual economic issues, such as inequality, they’d have elected her.
This election was lost because Latino men voted for Trump (for starters). We needed populism, not progressivism, to appeal to the small minded American voter. Don’t you see that? Most American men are misogynistic, racist psychos. And they’re unhappy. You appeal to them with populism full stop.
Wealth tax to collect more money to give to Israel and the most lethal military and killing immigrants is what she ran on, she ran as a right wing populist and lost because Trump is a better right wing populist
Small minded voters are told what to think, Harris refused to tell them to want free healthcare because that shit pisses off donors
Delusional
Yes, Democrats don’t know how politics works, they ask Republicans to decide which issues are important, and then argue a slightly more moderate response to those issues is best. Sometimes they accidentally win doing that, if the economy is good and people are happy with moderation, but that’s probably not going to be true any time soon.
they ask Republicans to decide which issues are important
I love this. They are so reactionary and seem almost incapable of counter messaging. I say almost because they managed it once with the tarrifs are sales tax response.
I’m not going to say that the Latino shift isn’t huge, but this really feels like a strawman (to a certain extent). Even without the full 2024 turnout numbers, we know less people turned out to vote than 2020. I think NBC last night said Harris was projected to have 15 million less votes than Biden, and Trump voter numbers were steady, so I don’t think it all went to Trump.
There are multiple factors that went into the outcome we have today, and only mentioning the Latino men or the pro-Palestine constituents and ignoring the failures of the DNC (starting with not having a convention) feels really weird.
The Latino men are one example. My point is that Democrats focused on policy and policy is ineffective when the electorate is a bunch of barely sentient macho dipshits angry about economic issues they can’t understand (not to mention most young men are broke and can’t get laid). You use populism. You blame the rich. You blame the wealthy elites. You channel Bernie Sanders.
Every other sentence out of Harris’s mouth should have been about the billionaires stealing from the working class. Instead we saw a bunch of well reasoned economic policy that went completely over everyone’s head.
Ok, I see your point. You’re not wrong here. But I’m always surprised at how averse US politicians are to anything perceived as left wing populism, while they tolerate (or even eat up) the right wing version.
Maybe it’s a remnant of McCarthyism.
Tell people “healthcare will be free” or “We will cap rent and build housing that won’t cost more than 3x local median income” and then people can’t afford not to vote for you.
- It would have to go through congress, which wouldn’t approve it, so it would be a lie.
- They told people “I won’t do mass deportations or order the assassinations of my enemies” and it didn’t work. Why do you assume that this other stuff would?
- It would have to go through congress, which wouldn’t approve it, so it would be a lie.
The policies are extremely popular and universal. Doesn’t really matter in a politicalcampaign if you struggle to achieve those ends. Trying is important and failing gives you ammunition against those who oppose extremely popular policies for next campaign.
- They told people “I won’t do mass deportations or order the assassinations of my enemies” and it didn’t work. Why do you assume that this other stuff would?
The bottom line is that the average person isn’t listening for anything besides “how is the candidate going to help me because I feel like I’m drowning”. The right scapegoats something and promises to fix your problems by hurting the scapegoat (immigrants, minorities, socialists, whatever). This is a lie, but it’s just as, if not more, direct of a solution so some voters will support them.
Harris had attention when she said things like stopping price gouging and providing in-home elder care. Those were extremely popular ideas that she didn’t focus on. Instead, she pivoted right.
It would have to go through congress, which wouldn’t approve it, so it would be a lie.
The US president is probably the single most powerful position in the world between explicit powers and people who serve at his pleasure and can be replaced at will, and undefined powers that that extend as far as anyone is able to stop them, as we saw under Trump. If they just flagrantly broke the law and kept doing it until the SCOTUS and others actually stopped them, the dems would be far more popular than just throwing their hands up and saying "better things aren’t possible.
There’s a lot of indirect ways they can get what they want done, whether it means appointing an AG and other department heads who will punish people who don’t go along or using the military’s vast legal protections and resources.
They told people “I won’t do mass deportations
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That’s not saying how you’ll improve people’s immediate conditions, just that trump will make them worse
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You can’t credibly say that when Biden deported more people than Trump.
If they just flagrantly broke the law and kept doing it until the SCOTUS and others actually stopped them, the dems would be far more popular than just throwing their hands up and saying "better things aren’t possible.
This is basically what FDR did with a lot of his social and work programs during his presidency. He’d establish an agency or authority or whatever, regardless of the legality, and by the time the court’s or whoever made the decision to close it, they’d have 5 others going simultaneously, and/or they’d make another one. And the process would start all over again.
Yup. The nice thing about policy that helps everyone is that it’s incredibly unpopular to kill. Biden could have burned student debt in the most visible way possible, and then dared the SCOTUS to create new debt. If they took the bait, you’d have 46.2 million people ready to vote for anyone who promises to expand the SCOTUS.
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This was also a congressional election you know.
It’s easy to get students to protest. They’re young, it’s exciting.
Voting isn’t loud or angry, so it doesn’t feel effective. It feels like actual work. And so they skip it.
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Yup, other than picking Walz each new thing the campaign did made me less excited aboit voting for Harris. I would have rather had Walz lead the ticket, at least he would have been an unknown white guy that the right wing propaganda would have had trouble vilifying.
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You underestimate the racism and sexism of rhe general population.
OK, but the people who are that racist and sexist are voting republican anyway. Of the dems many mistakes, running a black woman wasn’t one of them.
I don’t think you’re wrong but I also have to add that I won’t accept that we just can’t run black women for offices for that reason
e; I should have read this thread further, it looks like other people are already discussing this
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They don’t need to lie, they just need to get better at being direct and stip pulling punches or taking the high road to avoid offending moderates or whatever their stupid logic is.
Instead of cozying up to Cheney, just call Trump a felon constantly, remind people about how he put migrants in cages and is now using durect nazi rhetoric against them. Those aren’t lies, and they jind of half assed brought them up, but they need to actually lean in hard and constantly.
They did call him a felon constantly! They plastered everything he says in every outlet, screamed his threats at the top of their lungs.
No one cares!
That doesn’t get you in people’s facebook, tiktok, and youtube feeds.
Dems need a candidate who’s already famous. They need one totally unchained, unhinged, who would say awful but barely not illegal things in public, so they’re plastered on every news outlet constantly. They need someone who’s a little iffy about vaccines, who will print money and send people fat checks with their face stamped on it, who will straight up collude with the powerful in public, so calling it out does nothing.
They need a liberal Trump.
I’m not sure who it would be… maybe a big pop star that kinda loses their marbles? Think Taylor Swift. But the dems are not going to win a Trumpist election running someone like Bidden, Harris, Bernie, AoC or whatever.
Don’t think it has to explicitly be a shitty person but the Left definitely needs to realize it’s a popularity contest. Charisma and moxie win it cuz voters want it simple.
Look how FDR swept Hoover. Went around promising Happy Days are Here Again and he’ll whip the government into fixing the individual’s problems. Blasted his aura on the radio and newsreels which kept voters’ eyes on him. Then kept them for 3 more terms by saying fuck the red tape and making tangible things happen (which is probably what drives people to Trump despite the different results)
People want to back the cool guy who tells em it’ll be alright. Simple as
Then kept them for 3 more terms by saying fuck the red tape and making tangible things happen (which is probably what drives people to Trump despite the different results)
Please don’t kill me, but I saw this appeal when Trump first ran. In 2016, his rhetoric on withdrawing from foreign wars and similar stuff, when Hillary was the other choice, was very appealing. Of course my eyes were opened wide by his actual statements/history, and then his presidency.
I think what’s different now is the feedback loop is broken. In the 30s, I assume people connected what FDR was doing to what was happening. Everyone lived in the same reality.
But now people live in complete personalized realities inside their phones and apps. Perception is extremely selective, issues are complicate. And just, like, looking him up on Wikipedia and news archives like I do is completely alien now. I know children and relatives who literally don’t know how to use the internet and just live in their scrolling feeds.
Nah you’re completely right. The appeal was that he’d push past the usual ineffectualness of politics and get things done.
Bumble through the red tape too quickly for consequences to catch him while claiming everything as a win.
The warping of reality hides what he’s actually doing/who he is and too many people are just red team vs blue now so will keep on supporting. They’ll think a win for him is a win for them and won’t look further to think otherwise (because who wants to think they’ve lost?).
Almost wish Biden would’ve gone full Mr. Bean and just oopsied his way through using executive power. Oops, forgave student loans. Oops, taxed the rich. Oops, legal weed. Trump already showed the system is too slow to stop it and doing things that actually helped folks would be disastrous for any group trying to undo it once people felt the effects. Oh well…
Almost wish Biden would’ve gone full Mr. Bean and just oopsied his way through using executive power. Oops, forgave student loans. Oops, taxed the rich. Oops, legal weed. Trump already showed the system is too slow to stop it and doing things that actually helped folks would be disastrous for any group trying to undo it once people felt the effects. Oh well…
He was trying to preserve the image of the US president as being dignified. measured and cognizant, but only now are we certain that’s not what voters want.
They want President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho
Hasan😈
But I don’t know who that is, lol. Not until now.
Dems need a candidate who’s already famous. They need one totally unchained, unhinged, who would say awful but barely not illegal things in public, so they’re plastered on every news outlet constantly.
They need a liberal Trump.
What chuds like about Trump is that he jokes around and appears to be passionate about what he talks about, and instead of backing down when challenged, will face it head on and double down. Someone who will spit in the face of his enemies without apologizing after. Get anyone who can riff and mock their enemies while standing firm on their positions.
They need someone who’s a little iffy about vaccines, who will print money and send people fat checks with their face stamped on it, who will straight up collude with the powerful in public, so calling it out does nothing.
I dont think they actually like any of this, just the way he does it inspires confidence. They care very little about the actual policy specifics.
That’s all they really want is confidence. They aren’t confident in their place within a changing world and want someone who exudes that confidence so they can delegate their trust to someone who has it where they have none.
I only said Hasan because he’s funny, comfortable being an asshole, confident, and isn’t a pushover.
The checks, IMO, worked very well. People loved that.
Don’t underestimate the power (and historical precedent) of simple populist policy. It’s not super effective campaigning, but its very effective at keeping someone in office.
But the left in the USA is like half a dozen people, they don’t even have a party, how would they organize it?
Because Democrats are just a more “moderate” right.
I can’t believe the bullshit with the Cheneys. When a war criminal like Dick Cheney endorses you, you disavow them.
Harris even got endorsed by Richard Spencer, who’s a white nationalist, and she didn’t say shit! What was she thinking? “I’ve got the neocon vote, now maybe I’ll get the Nazi vote”?
“Stein got a Nazi to endorse her even though she disowned it, she’s horrid.”
“Harris openly loved Cheney and didn’t say anything Spencer, she’s the the most progressive person to ever run!”
I can’t believe the bullshit with the Cheneys. When a war criminal like Dick Cheney endorses you, you disavow them.
And lemmy’s centrists were so goddamned happy that Cheney endorsed. They finally got the party to move so far to the right that they got Dick Cheney’s endorsement. That was when they considered it a win and they didn’t care about what happened after.
Normalizing republican extremism is about the only thing modern neoliberalism has accomplished, and likely why the same billionaires donate to both.
They want the return of feudual society, they just know the only way they get it is if the only other option is a shit sandwich.
So we’re not downvoting anything even slightly critical of the democrats anymore?
Good. Because they fucked this one up.
There is a tiger on the lose. Let’s blame the people who are against caging the tiger in the first place.
Isn’t it amazing that both the female democratic candidates for president in our history have campaigned with war criminals and then lost. I wonder if there’s a lesson there?
Famed pacifist Hillary Clinton
Poor thing was under sniper fire one time.
I switched my registration party from Democrat to Independent today. Tired of this shit. Enough is enough I’m voting my values from now on.
Speaking as a hungarian having lived under Orbán’s rule for 16 years and counting, don’t worry; after this point you will have either no elections or they will be a pointless mockery only.
The fact that you’re registered is wild to me. One of the few things my state has right is having open primaries imo
I went to check Reddit for the first time in a while. It is interesting to see the difference in reaction on Lemmy and Reddit. At least Lemmy is admitting that running a Republican campaign with Lez Cheney might not have been the best idea.
There is absolutely zero self reflection on Reddit. All blame lies on “racist imigrants”.
On Reddit Democrats had the perfect economic plan. Forget Kamala failing to secure the Unions. No teamsters endorsement. Forget the railroad strike shutdown. Forget massive inflation. The genocide is never even mentioned on Reddit. Kamala was 100% perfect in every single way.
No mention of the massive increase of young white voters for Trump either
Democrats will lose again in 2028. They vehemently refuse to learn from any of this. Instead of doing anything progressive they will say everyone is a racist and move right.
Remember when everyone hated Cheney? Not sure why the Democrats thought they would help them win an election.
I think their intention was to appeal to older Republicans who remember the bush years with rose tinted glasses and don’t approve or the pivot that the GOP has done post-Obama.
Evidently they don’t make up a significant amount of red voters when compared to the frothing fascists who would eagerly re-elect a rapist.
Democrats keep extending the olive branch out of naïvety only to have it used to smack them across their stupid fucking faces.
I mean the over-65s (turned 40 before bush was elected) leaned heavily to Harris. It was the Hitler youth that was a shocker.
I was like uhh ok? And?
I figure that’s probably one of the better reactions because in hindsight who the fuck cares what that warpig thinks or who it endorses?
I don’t even care whether your attitude is, “Oh no, we fucked up,” or you go with option B which is what you’re saying. If you have to wonder whether you’re gloating or not, then fuck you.
I’m not sure what your problem is. Is nobody allowed to point out the failures in the Democrat campaign?
No post mortem. Blind support for neoliberalism is the only way.
“Now’s not the time”
“Nobody could have predicted this”
etc…
As one of the dozens of people who are not American, I was chatting to my cousin the other day, and he said that after seeing the amount of dead kids that have come out of Gaza this year, and taking a mental health week off work due to the anxiety of watching the world not give a shit, he hopes Trump gets elected and America collapses into civil war… That Americans suffer for what their government has done, and is doing. He’s not a bad guy. Bad guys don’t have breakdowns from watching foreign children murdered.
I can’t logically support his view, but I completely emotionally understand it. He knew Trump would be objectively worse for humanity, but is a fascist genocide that kills 2 million people better than a fascist genocide that kills 5 million people? At that point you’re really just splitting hairs between failed states, and systems that deserve to be burned to the ground. After enough chances, opportunities, and desensitisation, you want the schadenfreude of watching the American electorate who voted for Trump shooting themselves in the face, destroying their livelihoods and lineage, along with all of their false patriotism and exceptionalism. I still suspect the conserva-russian PsyOps to be the main source of Trumps win, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Israel’s genocide is the straw that broke the Dems back.
With sympathy, panicked thoughts about what to do next, and quite a bit of horror? Absolutely.
With a casual blaming attitude, waiting for someone else to make it better? Sure, they’re allowed to, just like I’m allowed to tell them to go fuck themselves.
With a casual blaming attitude
What should my attitude be after decades of saying “triangulation doesn’t work, going to the right to chase ‘moderate republicans’ just depresses turnout.” and watching the dems do this over and over and over while getting accused of being a secret republican because I point this out?
You know what else doesn’t work?
Not voting and letting Trump get elected.
That shit’s going to do more damage to the left than a million Hillary Clintons depressing the turnout.
(I have more I could say on it, especially pertaining to the difference between accurately describing sins of the Democrats which are depressing turnout versus making up imaginary sins of the Democrats which people will then believe which will depress turnout, but I’m not planning on a long exchange so I’ll leave it there.)
Panic doesn’t help anything. Neither does horror. We survived one Trump presidency, we’ll survive this one, despite it being monumentally worse.
Do what you can to help those you can around you. Work in and grow the support structures in your local community, family, and social circles.
Panic leads to stupid, rash, not well thought out decisions. It should be avoided as much as possible while you take a long, honest, realistic look at the situation and evaluate what is and isn’t in your power to effect.
You’re right that passive defeatism isn’t helpful, but you don’t have to go straight to the other extreme of emotional turmoil.
I have to be honest, I am panicking a little bit.
Nothing will change instantly, or everywhere all at once, but it could get very bad, and not even a long time from now.
I have to be honest, I am panicking a little bit.
I don’t have any great insight to offer, but - yeah, me too
They could, or they might not. The biggest thing is that we already have been through 4 years of Trump. We have some idea of what that will look like, we aren’t going in completely blind.
As far as this “being the last election”, there’s too many safeguards in our governmental system and too many armed people (in both the civilian and military population) with deep vested interests to ensure real elections still happen for that to change.
There’s a hell of a lot of posturing and hot air going on and that has gone on from Trumps camp that has absolutely no true way to get force behind it.
Things will be bad, but panicking will just make it thay much harder to distinguish true threats and problems from what isn’t.
Think of it like this: Your car is stalled on a train track, and there’s a train coming a few minutes away. There’s also someone with a gun in your backseat about to shoot you. The train makes more noise, but the more immediate threat is the guy with the gun. Being more calm helps to discern those sorts of distinctions, and that the best solution would be to run from your car rather than try to pump the gas.
For every could, might, and may there’s a didn’t, might not, etc. You could start pissing blood tomorrow, but I assume you’re in good health that you probably won’t. But you still technically could.
The news media across the board is optimizing for ad views to support their existence with money. Keeping people stressed out increases viewership, so it’s in their best interests to put everything through a funhouse mirror and rely on technicalities and speculation to stoke emotional response. There’s been studies done and books published on this.
Bad times are not end times.
As far as this “being the last election”, there’s too many safeguards in our governmental system and too many armed people (in both the civilian and military population) with deep vested interests to ensure real elections still happen for that to change.
I’m not so sure considering there’s a good argument to be made that this wasn’t a “real” election, given all the voter suppressing bullshit that happened. I think we need to ask ourselves what a “real” election is and how we will know if we lose them, because I don’t think even our good elected officials are going to tell us about it (because they think, arguably correctly, that living under a stable autocracy is better than the chaos that could happen when a mass of people reject the legitimacy of the government).
Bad times are not end times.
This is true and cannot be said enough. The world doesn’t end, it moves on to the next struggle, and there is always a way to make it better. It might be very small, but there is always something to do. Like, yesterday I ended up up hanging out with some very sad old ladies who volunteered for my local League of Women Voters chapter and got them to laugh a couple of times at how ridiculously bad at bridge I am, and that was the little bit of good I could do yesterday. It wasn’t much, but it was something.
Maybe you’ll survive, bunch of people will survive, but not a lot of the minorities the Republicans currently have in their crosshairs. Maybe you’ll find all the skeletons in the camps after however many years or decades it will take to defeat fascism.
We had four years under Biden to find the skeletons from Trump’s last presidency. Please point me to them, as obviously I’ve missed something huge like roving squads of minority slayers or something.
It’s going to fucking suck. Yes, people will die as a result of horrible policies and the general sociopolitical climate, but people claiming that minorities are literally going to be hunted en mass are out of their gourd.
Too many armed civilians spread through all the population demographics for that to work to the level a lot of people are screaming about.
There will be a lot of this. Same thing happened with Hillary. I’m not American, I don’t need to discriminate here, I’m writing off all of the US.
But if you’re there… yeah, that anger seems justified. When the shit that’s about to happen happens don’t let them hide behind the blame game.
I wasn’t talking about Hasan Piker, really. I don’t agree with him, of course. Let me put it this way: If he’d flipped it around and talked about what a good strategy it was for Trump to get all his followers heated up on lies and ready for violence, get billionaires and media to go in the tank for him, and coordinate with enemies of the US to destabilize our democracy in order to get elected so he could keep kicking out the safeguards and guard rails once he’s back in and firmly above the law, seize on any imperfection or compromise in the Democratic side and play it up to the point that a whole bunch of suckers on the left buy into it and depress the vote so he can win, and unfold whatever’s coming now… well, if he’d said that, then he wouldn’t be wrong. But looking at it purely from a standpoint of strategy, in this context, is missing a massive other aspect. Talking about the Democratic strategy, which I think Piker is probably doing sincerely here, is missing the point in the same way. Even talking about how elected officials can get the support of the voters seems like it’ll probably be almost a moot point by 4 years from now.
What I was talking about was OP and the little gang of people who’ve been spreading the narrative that the Democrats are the worst thing, basically indistinguishable from fascism, and are now having trouble hiding their eagerness to double down on assuring everyone that it’s all the Democrats’ fault and this whole thing was inevitable. If any of you guys are inside the United States and honestly believe this, have been withholding support until something more to the your liking comes along, thinking that is a good way to make progress… oh my brother, just you wait, and I hope it’s not too bad for you, when it comes.
That’s why I posted the meme. If OP’s really in the US and on the left, they’re going to be learning a whole bunch of new songs to sing over the next couple of years, I think.
But why would you talk about the republican strategy? After-all Trump got almost as many votes as he did back in 2020, only ~2,5 million less. And it’s not like their strategy wildly differed from what they did 2020. Trump got his followers heated up, he tried to coordinate with foreign entities to find kompromat, he tried to undermine the electoral process, he tested the safeguard and guard rails Jan 6. The only really new thing he did was having billionaires be more prominent in supporting him. But none of it changed his votes.
The question you should be asking is “If trump got roughly as many votes as he did back in 2020, how did he win both the electoral college and popular vote?” I don’t see how that question could be answered by looking at the republican party, they didn’t do anything new and their result was also the same. IMO the answer to that question lies with the democratic party. There is something the democrats did or didn’t do that cost them 14 million votes (81 mil in 2020 vs 67 mil in 2024). And realistically a large part of those 14 million voters were “Fuck Trump” voters who were sick and tired of his shit. But this time Trump went full fascist and somehow people were more apathetic towards his?
I kinda agree with Hasan on the part that trying to appear more moderate when your opponent is a full blown fascist doesn’t really do anything. You just come across as a lite version of fascism. Maybe democrats should’ve stayed more in opposition to the republicans because when the voters don’t want fascism, they also don’t a lighter version of fascism. I don’t know what went wrong, I’m not a political pundit. I just see republicans getting roughly the same amount of votes and the democrats losing ~20% of the votes and I just don’t see how that is not the democrats fault when they’re the ones who lost the votes.
Yeah, no, we’re on the same page. Whether you pin it on the OP or Piker. There are a bunch of presumably leftist pundits that have been asking to see the left’s management all through this process (and I mean since 2016) and will continue to act offended that anybody would suggest there is a responsibility in not being persuaded when the alternative is a fascist anarchocapitalist cabal.
As last time, the response to any mention of this will be “it’s their fault for not convincing me”, which has never been a legitimate argument but will be outright insulting if (when) things start to go poorly.
A better case is that the entire country shifted right, especially fed by a mass of new protofascist youth, but you don’t get extra credit for only being part of the problem and not the whole problem.
In any case, like I said earlier, I have no obligation to split hairs. The US has failed as a country and as a people. They can apportion blame however they see fit. For the rest of us it is now a matter of how to build an international community of democracies in the upcoming climate. We all have to write off the US and find a new way forward without them.
What’s the alternative? Democrats do not fail, they can only be failed?
Democrats can maybe not run a totally dogshit campaign?
I’m not gloating, I just said I didn’t want to seem like I was because I’m not trying to antagonize my political allies. I’m sorry if it seems like I am because that really is the last thing I want to do. I want Republicans to lose elections and I’m just putting forth a theory of why they didn’t last night that seems persuasive to me because I’m still operating under the assumption we’ll have more elections (which, like, very TBD, but either way I think building a coalition of like-minded people will be important).
I am absolutely gloating.
Four fucking years of telling liberals exactly what will happen.
Four years of liberals plugging their ears and closing their eyes, continuing to spew their neoliberal fascist rhetoric.
To any liberal reading this: yes, I fucking told you so. Guess reality was on my side again. You deserve Trump.
As if the party that wholeheartedly accepted genocide as a means to an end was going to do shit for any queer folks or leftists if they won.
Obama won his election after being a good bit to the right of either Biden or Harris. I think most of what’s changed since then is the awesome power of the influence operations which succeed at creating alternate realities for people where Trump is important to vote for, and Harris is important not to vote for, depending on the person being targeted.
I’m not trying to be closed-minded about it, and maybe my meme as applied to you was unfair. I’m a little bit on edge when talking with the “what the Democrats did wrong” crowd on Lemmy, since a lot of them also like to make up imagined sins for the Democrats, helping to create that alternate reality, to go alongside any well-intentioned criticism they are giving.
The bottom line is, the Democrats lost for a variety of reasons some of which were their fault and some weren’t, and we are thoroughly fucked as a result. I don’t think people realize how bad it’s going to be.
This is correct. Propaganda works, its just that simple.
Obama was about as moderate as Harris and Biden. I’d even say his campaign was more progressive than theirs. He’s been the only Democratic candidate to run on a platform of change in the last two decades. All the others have run on a platform of the status quo, even Biden.
Til a few hundred words by rando dude I’ve never heard of is an “autopsy”.
Less than 50 words!
But it felt like a Harry Potter book to him 😮💨
Harry Potter is liberal political scripture.
What the actual fuck, man? (Yes, you write like either a man or ai)
Okay?
Oof I was just giving the benefit of the doubt since I didn’t feel like counting. What a real absolute take down that 50-word autopsy was.
…Is this somehow a big block of incomprehensible text to you, or are you somehow looking at a different image? It’s a tweet.
Ermm…yes? I honestly can’t make the connection between your response and my message. No idea what you’re getting at.
If this is a big block of text “from weirdo I’ve never heard of” then what is a book to you?
I think you need to re-read what I actually wrote with a clear head. I genuinely don’t know how to help you but you seem to be mad at me for something you very clearly misunderstood. You appear to be laboring under the idea I said almost the exact opposite of what I actually said.
Everyone from Sanders to Dick fucking Cheney endorsed Harris. Anyone who was paying any attention and wasn’t a literal fascist voted for her. The direction of the swing seems irrelevant.
The swing fell short because it’s not so much about direction than strength. Macron in 2017 ran the most “hard center” presidential campaign imaginable. Difference is it worked, not because his centrist program was particularly novel but in large part because he is a very charismatic figure and managed to create a voting base of hopefuls for himself. The same can broadly be argued about Obama (whose first act as president was to essentially absolve the previous administration and Wall St of their many sins in case anyone forgot how moderate he was).
Harris ran on a platform of… “I’m not him”. Which to any reasonable person is an obvious “yeah OK”, but unfortunately most Americans are apathetic cretins who will refuse to move their asses to a polling station if the guy on the telly doesn’t promise them a blowie at the voting booth. And the Democrat establishment is simultaneously too big to fail and incapable of producing an actually charismatic leader.
Well, all that and the obvious election interference from Musk, Putin, and the ontological inability of traditional media not to platform literal fascists.
“How did you vote on your California ballot with several highly contentious ballot measures, Madam Vice President”
“I will not speak on this 5 days before the election.”
Leftists have been telling all the libs exactly what this path would lead to.
Looks like liberals ushered in a fascist regime, again. Funny how that always happens.
(whose first act as president was to essentially absolve the previous administration and Wall St of their many sins in case anyone forgot how moderate he was).
I think this very thing led to the 2010 tea party wave election that fucked us for a decade and a similar thing has happened here, except it was the seeming inability of the Biden administration to hold Trump and his supporters accountable and not going after corporations making record profits during an inflationary crisis (“So how would you recommend they have done that?” Great question, I will let you know when I have a good answer).
e;
Well, all that and the obvious election interference from Musk, Putin, and the ontological inability of traditional media not to platform literal fascists.
This absolutely played a huge roll (also, voter suppressing laws passed by GOP governments), but I don’t know how to change any of that without having a Democratic party that consistently wins elections first
The FBI apparently learned some lessons on how to deal with Russian interference since 2016 and made some arrests this time around. Way too little too late though, and in January Trump’s cronies will take over and that’ll be that. Other countries should take notes though and start being much harsher on Russian trolls and their puppets. Unfortunately Von Der Layen recently fired the guy who was prosecuting Musk over Twitter so I’m not too confident anyone in power learned their lesson. Which is mind-boggling because russian-backed far-right parties are a meaningful electoral threat to people like Von Der Layen.
Hey! Don’t forget that it also alienated anyone who is even moderately humanist!
Democrats will have two years to build their reputation as Vocally (but ineffectually) opposing Donald Trump.
But I think the bigger question is whether they actually do that. I can see a lot of Dems turning coat after this and just going along with Trump like they went along with Bush in 2001.
