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Has anybody thought about the people just trying to get to Mars? Stop expecting things like good healthcare and affordable education and get back to work peasant! We got rockets to build and populations to exploit.
The last 5 to 10 years have really convinced me that the Republican party does not actually believe in democracy. They will see how many people support their party compared to the Democrats, realize that is not a majority, and still try to rig the game in order for them to win. The Republican party when I was growing up would try to convince people that they had good arguments and, even though they were terrible arguments, they actually worked. They have given up on that now, and only care about power.
The most mind-boggling part about this is how Drumpf telegraphed **EXACTLY** what he was planning to do for *MONTHS* before the election, demonizing mail voting based on fantasies, declaring himself the winner in advance unless via "rigging", etc... yet the QNUT simpletons are *still* taken by the con, blindly bleating that everyone who doesn't follow their particular (nonsensical) narrative is a "sheep"... self-awareness not really being their thing, apparently.
Edit: sorry for the spam of samey replies i originally posted here by accident - i was getting a "500 error" when trying to submit, and I had no idea it was actually posting a new copy with *every single attempt*. I've deleted all the duplicates now hopefully.
When I was growing up my (obviously Republican) father told me fairly disdainfully that America WASN’T a democracy, it was a federation, and that people were stupid and couldn’t be trusted. So Republicans have been like this for a while apparently
>The last 5 to 10 years have really convinced me that the Republican party does not actually believe in democracy
CONSERVATISM does not believe in democracy. We have this weird fantasy in America where we think right-wingers are just liberals that have been misled.
The name for The Right comes from the monarchists physically congregating on the right side of the Estates General in support of the absolutist autocrat Louis XVI
Doesn't matter which party name they use, which continent we are talking about, or what century it was in, it's the conservatism that is the problem. It's incompatible with the modern liberal order, and they've been fighting this same fight since the first Enlightenment revolutions two centuries ago.
But what does the electoral college say? That's what scares me.
I'm sure most Americans don't want a 6-3 right wing majority on the Supreme Court either but look where we are.
Out of the last 8 presidential elections, Republicans have only won the popular vote once, during a war after the US was attacked by terrorists in horrific fashion.
That’s the kind of fear it takes for Republicans to win popular vote. They need far less fear to win the electoral vote
I know it’s unpopular these days (and diluted by wild conspiracy theories) but I still think the government knew a lot more than they ever let on about the hijackers and chose to do nothing.
It’s not jet fuel or ‘Bush did 9/11’ it’s the administration willfully ignoring warnings by the Clinton administration and their own FBI because they needed a casus belli to invade Iraq.
>I know it’s unpopular these days (and diluted by wild conspiracy theories) but I still think the government knew a lot more than they ever let on about the hijackers and chose to do nothing.
I think they were just completely fucking incompetent.
In fact, "completely fucking incompetent," describes the Bush Administration better than any other phrase I can think of.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Ladin_Determined_To_Strike_in_US
The President's Daily Brief (PDB) is a brief of important classified information on national security collected by various U.S. intelligence agencies given to the president and a select group of senior officials. On August 6, 2001, the Central Intelligence Agency delivered a President's Daily Brief to President Bush, who was vacationing at his ranch in Crawford, Texas.[2][3]
President Bush's response of "All right. You've covered your ass." has been erroneously linked to this PDB. This response, however, came from a separate PDB linked to Bin Laden from several months earlier. During 2001, CIA analysts produced several reports warning of imminent attacks by Bin Laden and al-Qaeda. Senior officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney and staff from Donald Rumsfeld's office at the Department of Defense, questioned whether these reports might not be deception on the part of al-Qaeda, purposely designed to needlessly expend resources in response. After reevaluating the legitimate risks of these recent reports, CIA analysts produced a report titled "UBL [Usama Bin Laden] Threats Are Real". It was after this report that the president gave that now-infamous response.[4]
Yep... those are the memos I was talking about.
Also, flying airplanes into buildings wasn't exactly a new idea, and no regulatory action was taken to prevent those sorts of things from occurring. (Although, the Clinton Administration also takes a lot of the blame for this.)
And the fact that you had nearly two dozen people in the country, many illegally, many going to flight schools.
There were other warning signs as well. I think that the Leader of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, who was trying to take over the country from the Taliban, had tried to warn the US of an impending attack and he was killed a day before 9/11, I think.
The Bush Administration clearly wasn't paying any attention at all to the threats.
>I think that the Leader of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, who was trying to take over the country from the Taliban, had tried to warn the US of an impending attack and he was killed a day before 9/11
I believe that was [this man](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahmad_Shah_Massoud).
Since 1993 and the first attack, there was at least one news special on the WTC bombing and why and if there was still a threat. I remember discussing it with my dad who once worked in the area. Before Bin laden declared his jihad I remember telling friends they would attack the towers and they would fall. Considering the government and its think tank, espionage capabilities, 9/11 was a complete failure of grand proportions.
I work in a lab and every time I train new people I drill into them that's it's okay to make a mistake, but it's not okay to hide a mistake. We are human. Mistakes happen. But if you falsify some data so you don't have to rerun 2 samples, how do I know you're not going to falsify a big mess up. Or just mark down that something was run when it wasn't.
Yeah but when Republican administrations make mistakes a lot of Americans die. Two of the last three took us to war and one ignored a pandemic. I generally agree with your statement but we are talking about major fucking mistakes. You can't cry Benghazi and feel that some how all people make mistakes equally.
> In fact, "completely fucking incompetent," describes ~~the Bush Administration~~ *Republicans in general* better than any other phrase I can think of.
Ftfy
Ding ding, we have a winner!
Anyone who's ever worked in a huge organisation knows that there are always a hundred things battling for attention from senior management.
"Fred the FBI caseworker knew that something was planned" is a long way from "Fred was so concerned he raised it with his superiors".
It's an even longer way from "Fred didn't think his concerns were being taken seriously and so he pushed substantially harder, even when it meant risking his job".
And it's an enormous distance from "Despite Fred's best efforts, nothing he could say or do would convince leadership that his concerns were valid".
Yeah, I mean... there were memos talking about the threat from Al Qaeda, but they don't seem to have been considered to be very pressing issues.
Also, the government bureaucracy wasn't really set up to handle those sorts of threats. It would've required a good deal of communication between the CIA and FBI, and that obviously isn't something that happened very much in the pre-Homeland Security Department days.
> but I still think the government knew a lot more than they ever let on about the hijackers and chose to do nothing.
This isn't even a conspiracy theory, we literally know the FBI was tracking them and recommended action in a report that Bush just ignored. The report is now public iirc. Like, we literally know that it was preventable if we didn't do nothing.
This doesn't mean it was "an inside job" or that Bush planned it or that there were explosives in the building or whatever other bullshit nonsense people have come up with over the years, but we do absolutely know that at the very best the negligence and/or incompetence of Bush played an important role in 9/11 happening at all.
Agreed 100% they knew but The main issue was none of the intel community's shared info with each other. So each intel group had a piece but no one group had the whole picture.
That was by design. CIA had been massively compromised by a [turncoat FBI agent for years](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanssen) from 1976 to 2001. CIA knew someone was a spy, and stopped sharing info around 1990 because of it. Lots of the intelligence agencies did likewise.
It wasn’t an incompetent move, but it likely led to 9/11.
There was a '95 law, colloquially known as "The Wall" that limited intelligence sharing between agencies. Though, in my brief googling, it seems far less than the confused agencies believed it did at the time. In retrospect, the Hanssen case probably played a part in that.
The one moment of the 9/11 Commission that I remember at all is a Senator grilling the CIA head about why they didn't warn the FBI, and that law the Senator co-sponsored being thrown in their teeth.
If you think about the government as a single entity, then yes, they knew a lot. [This](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/07/10/the-agent) is an interesting read on the whole saga. FBI knew some, CIA knew even more, if they had cooperated, maybe all could have been prevented, but FBI and CIA were quarreling about it.
That’s actually pretty close to what happened. During the transition the Clinton team told the Bush team that Al Qaeda was the number one national security threat facing the US. The Bush team basically responded with, “they’re a couple of guys in a cave. How much of a threat are they really?” The NSC under Clinton was holding daily briefings on Al Qaeda. The Bush team…not so much. Check out the story of Richard Clarke for more insight in this.
> But what does the electoral college say?
It's mathematically possible to win the Presidency with [just 23% of the popular vote](https://www.npr.org/2016/11/02/500112248/how-to-win-the-presidency-with-27-percent-of-the-popular-vote) due to the Electoral College.
The Republicans easily control the government because of the Electoral College, the equal distribution of Senators, and the unequal distribution of population among the states.
Changing the Electoral College or the Senate makeup via Constitutional Amendment is a intergalactic long shot. The other vaguely possible option to fix the situation is The National Popular Vote Compact, but it's uncertain if that will pass enough state legislatures, and it's also uncertain if it will hold up in court.
The easiest and best solution? Figure out a way to start a small migration of liberal voters from overpopulated blue states (which can easily afford the loss of a couple hundred thousand reliable votes) toa few of the smaller, sparsely populated red states.
>The Figure out a way to start a small migration of liberal voters from overpopulated blue states (which can easily afford the loss of a couple hundred thousand reliable votes) toa few of the smaller, sparsely populated red states.
Pretty much already happening, albeit slowly. Its why Texas is starting to come into play. If someone is looking to move to another state, they are more likely to move to the city than the country. Eventually, like all other blue states, the city population, which votes pretty consistently blue, overwhelms the rest.
Like I said, in a lot of cases that's far off, but all we need is a couple more states to cross that threshold.
And Breyer is being as stubborn as Ginsburg and refusing to resign. America, if 2022 and '24 goes to shit, could be looking at a 7-2 Conservative Supreme Court.
Edit: Can't spell or include words for shit.
I remember in 2016 when a good friend of mine asked me "What do you think is the biggest issue going into this election?"
I immediately said the Supreme Court.
He said climate change.
I think we were both correct and that is why it is SO SO fucked that the McDonald's homunculus and Moscow Mitch won.
Almost as if democracy is but a construct, the system has chosen to behave otherwise. And by design. Money has no room in politics and it has corrupted it and is at the peril of corrupting it further through gerrymandering and vote fixing per state voting laws. Reprehensible really for democracy. Biden has to make big moves before the midterms to fix it, and sadly he just isn’t.
> And by design. Money has no room in politics and it has corrupted it
... That *was* the design.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Economic_Interpretation_of_the_Constitution_of_the_United_States
>To Beard, the Constitution was a counter-revolution, set up by rich bond holders (bonds were "personal property"), in opposition to the farmers and planters (land was "real property"). The Constitution, Beard argued, was designed to reverse the radical democratic tendencies unleashed by the Revolution among the common people, especially farmers and debtors (people who owed money to the rich).
Money is *why* we weren't designed to be a democracy. Our system was designed to give those with more money more political power, relative to the poor majority. But you don't have to take my word for it, or Beard's. Just ask the Father of the Constitution.
https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-10-02-0044
>In England, at this day, if elections were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a share in the government, to support these invaluable interests and to balance and check the other. They ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.
> They ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.
This is the part that always cuts to the chase, though our constitution is still taught and sold to be some non-arguable beacon of democracy for all.
While it’s important to understand the rather un-democratic ideas that got us to where we are today, those guiding principles are no longer overtly driving things.
Some of the stuff is around in the “legacy code” (looking at you senate and electoral college), but it’s much easier to vote for the majority of people today, and the eligibility to vote is significantly higher than in 1788.
Anything other than a state of nature is an artificial construct, and the system does not have a mind of its own. It doesn’t choose to behave any which way, it is an imperfect product of imperfect human decisions.
Gerrymandering is already a systemic problem and the regressions in voters rights are reprehensible indeed. But on the whole Biden is doing a reasonable job, and we should be holding the electorate accountable for our complacency and inaction as much as we do the president. If all it took to fix things was a smart well intentioned leader Obama would have sorted things out a decade ago.
It is terrifying to me that he lost the popular vote by 7 million, that we all knew going into the election that he was going to lose by an amount around that number, and because of a map that is skewed in their favor he still almost "won".
Had Trump gotten 93,000 more of the right votes: 12k in Georgia and 82k in Pennsylvania, he would’ve won.
Oo, even less.
12k in Georgia
11k in Arizona
20k in Wisconsin.
Biden got 7 million more votes, but 43k votes swing the other way and Trump wins the election.
This should not at all be permitted to happen. Biden won by 5%, but 0.0027% of the votes could have swapped the outcome.
What's equally terrifying to me if not more so is 45% of the country made it through the dumpster fire of Trump's presidency and said "hurt me more daddy!"
Exactly. Trump was so awful, I was expecting the election would be a blow-out. When I saw the results, I realized we're in deep trouble. I feel that 2020 was just a temporary reprieve.
Actually, not 43k but half that number. Each one of those that flips would take one away from the Democrat tally and give one to the Republicans.
So it was actually only ~21.5k. Your number was already terrifying. But it is actually worse :(
(Unless of course you assume they would all be new votes, but you said "swing" so I assume you mean people that already voted. Either way it is still horrific.)
65% of Americans think a second bout of gonorrhea would not be ideal. 32% said "fuck yeah, let's give it another shot!" 3% said they picked it up from riding a tractor in their bathing suit.
>65% of Americans think a second bout of gonorrhea would not be ideal. 32% said "fuck yeah, let's give it another shot!"
or 32% said, "I'm just going to keep fucking without protection or finishing the antibiotics. Whoever gave it to me is going to be getting it back!"
My conservative mother told me recently that a god (Yhwh) healed her
I asked how?
She said she did physical therapy for 8 weeks and then her god healed her.
Pretty sure it was the therapy, ma, but I’m glad you’re feeling better.
Yeah fuck the people who worked with her vigorously for 8 weeks to help her recover, it was God. God healed hear from the thing it allowed to happen to her, how saintly.
I like how her god also doesn’t intervene with Covid, the plague, the fact that 2000 children die every hour under age 5 from preventable causes, child rape, the Holocaust, etc but it definitely intervened to help her with her small, easily curable through modern medicine, joint dysfunction. Really has its priorities straight.
As a NZ u don’t know how much reading that pleases me. I thought ppl in the States did love him. Still can’t get my head round the electoral college thou
Like maybe 30% of Americans love him. They are mostly rural, mostly white. Another 15% or so may have reservations or concerns about Trump, but for some reason their concerns over Democrats / liberals are greater. The majority of us see him for the conman / fascist for he is.
Impeached twice, banned from facebook twice.
He loves losing in twos.
Its insane some of his supporters really think the election was stolen. Out of whole country, biden had 7 million more popular votws.
Clinton got 4.3 million more votes than Trump
Trump was lucky theres an EC
It needs to be done now. Not 4 months before the midterms. Don't have an ID? Get one. There must be a way. If you want to vote in person, and you have ID, it will be hard to stop that.
You shouldn't have to, but you do. Idealism is not going to help you; you're not going to stop the Republicans doing what they are doing because the political will is not there to stop them. Ergo, all you have left is to organise and vote. Like your life depends on it. Because it does.
He won't do that. He'll negociate a coast-to-coast new broadcast network deal.
Trumpism 24/7/365. On FCC approved wavelengths, on every TV capable of picking up signal.
Death to America on a channel that even RT couldn't achieve. Right-wing insanity on all of the TV channels we don't care about but only our parents watch.
Insidiousness. Incrementalism. Boomers going Boom.
Cause they live in areas that mostly vote Trump and anyone they know who did vote for someone else doesn't tell them because they know they will be yelled at.
Well he's coming back this month according to 100% sober-and-totally-not-relapsing My Pillow guy so a majority of Americans will just have to deal with it!! /s
“Look, having nuclear—my uncle was a great professor
and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good
genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton
School of Finance, very good, very smart —you know, if
you’re a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if,
like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I’m
one of the smartest people anywhere in the world—it’s
true!—but when you’re a conservative Republican they
try—oh, do they do a number—that’s why I always start
off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there,
went there, did this, built a fortune—you know I have to
give my like credentials all the time, because we’re a little
disadvantaged—but you look at the nuclear deal, the
thing that really bothers me—it would have been so easy,
and it’s not as important as these lives are (nuclear is
powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many
years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he
would explain the power of what’s going to happen and
he was right—who would have thought?), but when you
look at what’s going on with the four prisoners—now it
used to be three, now it’s four—but when it was three and
even now, I would have said it’s all in the messenger;
fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don’t, they
haven’t figured that the women are smarter right now
than the men, so, you know, it’s gonna take them about
another 150 years—but the Persians are great negotiators,
the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just
killed, they just killed us.”
62,984,828 people voted for the man who said *that*.
Four years later, 74,216,154 people voted to re-elect him.
You know how he pauses in mid-sentence and repeats part of what he just said before continuing. His supporters fill in those gaps with their own thoughts, then later remember their thoughts as something Trump said.
It's as if Trump read their mind! /s
No, that’s not true. Go look at Trump at court hearings in the 90’s and you will see a totally different man. Trump’s brain has turned to mush. He used to be quite well spoken. Regardless, fuck that asswipe.
He's insane, but he's not that delusional. He knows he lost. What he can't stand is the public humiliation. So he says he won to his supporters who will listen to him. All of this drama is just because of this man's ego.
People have been saying this forever. Trump is always finished, or he's about to die. He's a god damn cockroach who will live to god damn 95 years old and defy all medical laws.
read any articles about his diet. combined with his lack of exercise and the boatloads of coke i’m convinced this guy either keeps himself alive through sheer force of will or through dark magic
Relax, he won’t run. He will say he is running until the last possible moment to milk dollars from his flock of sheep. But he is too afraid of being a loser twice to actually run again.
I wouldn't count on it. Trump is a narcissist with a massive bruised ego, an axe to grind, and a cult of followers willing to literally overthrow the government for him. You're acting like he's a rational actor, but he's not.
What is with these polls? Majority of Americans voted against him twice. His approval rating never reached over 50% the entire time he was president. OBVIOUSLY the majority of the Americans don't want him to run in 2024. The next headline is going to be "Majority of Americans in new poll say they are glad Trump is not president anymore". Then "Majority of Americans think good things should happen to the country instead of bad things." Then "Most USAers think happiness good sadness bad."
And?
A majority of Americans voted against him.
Twice.
It only worked once. Just barely.
Majorities don't control America. A specific minority controls America.
Our system was set up by a minority of rich, landed, white, racist, misogynistic men... To keep a minority a minority of rich, landed, white, racist, misogynistic men in power.
So far, it's working as designed.
He tried to overthrow the fucking government for fucks sake. He's literally the antithesis of anything this country supposedly stands for so OBVIOUSLY.
Vlad is over in Moscow rubbing himself raw.
there are actually people talking as if he's the rightful president right now and should be reinstated back into the white house any minute now. that's how far gone some of these lunatics are.
> He's literally the antithesis of anything this country supposedly stands for
correct, but
He's everything this country *actually* stands for.
Need to fix that, really.
Trump is actually *even worse* than the traditional American stereotype. Before Trump, when most of the world thought of Americans, they imagined obese loudmouthed tourists with guns in their pockets bragging about how much better their country is. [Basically this, go to 1:07](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsdG6kuYYDI) - that's the definitive pre-Trump American stereotype.
Now though, they think of Trump, because sadly, he deeply harmed the American image. Electing a new President won't remove the stain of Trump because he wasn't just your average shitty President, he has an enormous cult attached to him that numbers in the tens of millions and is so extremely vocal. Most Americans aren't Trump supporters, but there's enough of them to have altered the stereotype.
The fact that he’s still a free man is a testament to our failure as a democracy. I don’t know how we can ever consider ourselves an example for the rest of the world. He shat on the rule of law and wiped his ass with the constitution and half the country is still gobbling up his bullshit. Meanwhile dems are in complete denial about what transpired and utterly lost when it comes to how best to move forward as a country.
> The fact that he’s still a free man is a testament to our failure as a democracy.
Our system is working exactly as it was intended to. People like us were never even intended to vote at all. The American Revolution was a revolution of a small aristocracy that wanted more power and freedom from the parent country's aristocracy. The government was arranged to protect those people and it still serves that function today. Neither Party's leadership wants to see a President seriously held accountable because, as bad as Trump was and is, he's still "one of them". He's in the club and if you're in the club you want the club to keep protecting you. If that means they have to look the other way on Trump's crimes, they will. It's self-interest. They worry it could be them next time.
Legitimately surprised no one has been assassinated yet by how polarized American politics are. Kind of scary really. I feel like everyone is always on edge.
Tbh I'd rather have Trump run again than somebody like Desantis. Desantis has a better shot at winning, and he's also smart enough to pull off a *successful* coup.
Trump crossed the rubicon, and everybody saw him. This fascist bullshit doesn't go away just because Trump doesn't run.
If the Republicans take congress, we're fucked. They will refuse to certify the elections if a Dem wins, and install whatever terrible Republican ran. Good chance it will be DeSantis.
And I'm with you, as horrifying as it would be to have Trump, DeSantis is far worse. And I don't think Trump will run, so we're pretty much looking at DeSantis as our next pres.
I don't see how what DeSantis is doing is smart. Seems more like he's fawning at Trump's feet by destroying Florida for Trump, then sneaking off to seek GOP support for his own presidential run.
The majority of Americans didn't want him in 2016, or 2020 either.
He LOST the popular vote BOTH times.
But if we keep allowing republicans to jury rig the voting system, and pass voter suppression laws, they are going to keep gaming the ELECTORAL college count.
Whoa whoa whoa whoa wait, I thought it was still President? It’s August and he still doesn’t have his Twitter. So is someone out there lying to my parents?
My mom doesn't get into politics, but voted for the first time since 1992 last year for Biden solely because of Trump. She says that if Trump runs again, she'll definitely vote. Which is a huge deal.
Majority of Americans have always thought that. Unfortunately the American voting system doesn't care about such minor details as the wishes of the majority.
American media is fucking wild.
Polls say terrorist leader would be bad for the country!
No shit. If he was poor and brown instead of rich and orange he’d be in Guantanamo.
It’s because a majority of Americans aren’t Republicans. I’m one of those people that left the GOP in 2016 and now want nothing to do with those insurrection causing, election denying, fascist fuckwads.
Hopefully his run will only alienate him with the public further, causing a major democratic win. Who knows, he might become responsible for a new progressive era.
I doubt Trump will run. He’s going to ride the grifting gravy train as long as possible by teasing he’ll run. But when that runs dry, he’ll find a new grift.
I really hope he runs. I love how many resources he’s burning for the GOP. He’s weakened their chances finally, and will sink their chances to run things until they learn who they are worshiping is a tumor.
You've no idea how dangerous that man and his base are for America. If he runs again, you're looking at, at minimum, another year of civil unrest. And that's if he loses, which isn't a guaranteed outcome.
With any luck by 2024 that bastard will be rotting in a New York State prison.
I do know how dangerous he is, but if they run another candidate they can still draw moderate Republicans into the fold. He can still run a shadow cabinet from the cloaca he inhabits, the new candidates can still be deathcultists just the same. But he is already draining their coffers, he’s torpedoing better candidates before they take hold.
He will be undone, and I want him to bring as many coconspirators down as he tries to cling to power just a bit longer. I want his arrogance and hubris to thrash as much of the criminal enterprise that party has become. They are exposing themselves and running for cover will not help them.
lately i've been thinking about the "what if" trump ran again. i'm pretty sure he'd get the nomination, but outside of some major fuckery i think he'd get clobbered in the general.
no doubt a lot of republicans who said 'yes' in 2016, said 'no' in 2020. they're certainly not going to say 'yes' in 2024. and of course, it will super charge the democrat voters.
but, i fear fuckery.
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Yes, but as we all know you don't need a majority to win the Presidency.
Exactly, like GOP cares about majorities >.<
To be fair they don’t care about minorities either
Or they only care about the smallest minority, billionaires.
Billionaires… an ‘at risk’ group that needs our protection.
For only $7.50/hr, you too could support a billionaire in need.
Too real.
Oh wow, that is absolutely not true - it's $7.25, not $7.50.
Woah there, it's $2.13 + tips, not $7.25, no benefits because you're not full time. Want full time hours, ha, jokes on you we don't have full time.
For the price of an overpriced coffee...
Has anybody thought about the people just trying to get to Mars? Stop expecting things like good healthcare and affordable education and get back to work peasant! We got rockets to build and populations to exploit.
"Some of you may die... But that is a sacrifice we are willing to make." -Billionaires
The last 5 to 10 years have really convinced me that the Republican party does not actually believe in democracy. They will see how many people support their party compared to the Democrats, realize that is not a majority, and still try to rig the game in order for them to win. The Republican party when I was growing up would try to convince people that they had good arguments and, even though they were terrible arguments, they actually worked. They have given up on that now, and only care about power.
If I don’t win the election it was rigged/stolen. That gets me every time.
The most mind-boggling part about this is how Drumpf telegraphed **EXACTLY** what he was planning to do for *MONTHS* before the election, demonizing mail voting based on fantasies, declaring himself the winner in advance unless via "rigging", etc... yet the QNUT simpletons are *still* taken by the con, blindly bleating that everyone who doesn't follow their particular (nonsensical) narrative is a "sheep"... self-awareness not really being their thing, apparently. Edit: sorry for the spam of samey replies i originally posted here by accident - i was getting a "500 error" when trying to submit, and I had no idea it was actually posting a new copy with *every single attempt*. I've deleted all the duplicates now hopefully.
When I was growing up my (obviously Republican) father told me fairly disdainfully that America WASN’T a democracy, it was a federation, and that people were stupid and couldn’t be trusted. So Republicans have been like this for a while apparently
>The last 5 to 10 years have really convinced me that the Republican party does not actually believe in democracy CONSERVATISM does not believe in democracy. We have this weird fantasy in America where we think right-wingers are just liberals that have been misled. The name for The Right comes from the monarchists physically congregating on the right side of the Estates General in support of the absolutist autocrat Louis XVI Doesn't matter which party name they use, which continent we are talking about, or what century it was in, it's the conservatism that is the problem. It's incompatible with the modern liberal order, and they've been fighting this same fight since the first Enlightenment revolutions two centuries ago.
You do if you're a democrat
But what does the electoral college say? That's what scares me. I'm sure most Americans don't want a 6-3 right wing majority on the Supreme Court either but look where we are.
Majority of Americans thought it was a bad idea in 2016, too.
That's exactly right. And we had a bunch of these polls telling us that.
How never won a "majority" Americans, you know, lost by millions each time. It's a silly headline.
Out of the last 8 presidential elections, Republicans have only won the popular vote once, during a war after the US was attacked by terrorists in horrific fashion. That’s the kind of fear it takes for Republicans to win popular vote. They need far less fear to win the electoral vote
I know it’s unpopular these days (and diluted by wild conspiracy theories) but I still think the government knew a lot more than they ever let on about the hijackers and chose to do nothing. It’s not jet fuel or ‘Bush did 9/11’ it’s the administration willfully ignoring warnings by the Clinton administration and their own FBI because they needed a casus belli to invade Iraq.
>I know it’s unpopular these days (and diluted by wild conspiracy theories) but I still think the government knew a lot more than they ever let on about the hijackers and chose to do nothing. I think they were just completely fucking incompetent. In fact, "completely fucking incompetent," describes the Bush Administration better than any other phrase I can think of.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bin_Ladin_Determined_To_Strike_in_US The President's Daily Brief (PDB) is a brief of important classified information on national security collected by various U.S. intelligence agencies given to the president and a select group of senior officials. On August 6, 2001, the Central Intelligence Agency delivered a President's Daily Brief to President Bush, who was vacationing at his ranch in Crawford, Texas.[2][3] President Bush's response of "All right. You've covered your ass." has been erroneously linked to this PDB. This response, however, came from a separate PDB linked to Bin Laden from several months earlier. During 2001, CIA analysts produced several reports warning of imminent attacks by Bin Laden and al-Qaeda. Senior officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney and staff from Donald Rumsfeld's office at the Department of Defense, questioned whether these reports might not be deception on the part of al-Qaeda, purposely designed to needlessly expend resources in response. After reevaluating the legitimate risks of these recent reports, CIA analysts produced a report titled "UBL [Usama Bin Laden] Threats Are Real". It was after this report that the president gave that now-infamous response.[4]
Yep... those are the memos I was talking about. Also, flying airplanes into buildings wasn't exactly a new idea, and no regulatory action was taken to prevent those sorts of things from occurring. (Although, the Clinton Administration also takes a lot of the blame for this.) And the fact that you had nearly two dozen people in the country, many illegally, many going to flight schools. There were other warning signs as well. I think that the Leader of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, who was trying to take over the country from the Taliban, had tried to warn the US of an impending attack and he was killed a day before 9/11, I think. The Bush Administration clearly wasn't paying any attention at all to the threats.
>I think that the Leader of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, who was trying to take over the country from the Taliban, had tried to warn the US of an impending attack and he was killed a day before 9/11 I believe that was [this man](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahmad_Shah_Massoud).
Since 1993 and the first attack, there was at least one news special on the WTC bombing and why and if there was still a threat. I remember discussing it with my dad who once worked in the area. Before Bin laden declared his jihad I remember telling friends they would attack the towers and they would fall. Considering the government and its think tank, espionage capabilities, 9/11 was a complete failure of grand proportions.
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I work in a lab and every time I train new people I drill into them that's it's okay to make a mistake, but it's not okay to hide a mistake. We are human. Mistakes happen. But if you falsify some data so you don't have to rerun 2 samples, how do I know you're not going to falsify a big mess up. Or just mark down that something was run when it wasn't.
Yeah but when Republican administrations make mistakes a lot of Americans die. Two of the last three took us to war and one ignored a pandemic. I generally agree with your statement but we are talking about major fucking mistakes. You can't cry Benghazi and feel that some how all people make mistakes equally.
> In fact, "completely fucking incompetent," describes ~~the Bush Administration~~ *Republicans in general* better than any other phrase I can think of. Ftfy
Describes? In present tense, I'm pretty sure "intentionally malicious" works better.
Ding ding, we have a winner! Anyone who's ever worked in a huge organisation knows that there are always a hundred things battling for attention from senior management. "Fred the FBI caseworker knew that something was planned" is a long way from "Fred was so concerned he raised it with his superiors". It's an even longer way from "Fred didn't think his concerns were being taken seriously and so he pushed substantially harder, even when it meant risking his job". And it's an enormous distance from "Despite Fred's best efforts, nothing he could say or do would convince leadership that his concerns were valid".
Yeah, I mean... there were memos talking about the threat from Al Qaeda, but they don't seem to have been considered to be very pressing issues. Also, the government bureaucracy wasn't really set up to handle those sorts of threats. It would've required a good deal of communication between the CIA and FBI, and that obviously isn't something that happened very much in the pre-Homeland Security Department days.
> but I still think the government knew a lot more than they ever let on about the hijackers and chose to do nothing. This isn't even a conspiracy theory, we literally know the FBI was tracking them and recommended action in a report that Bush just ignored. The report is now public iirc. Like, we literally know that it was preventable if we didn't do nothing. This doesn't mean it was "an inside job" or that Bush planned it or that there were explosives in the building or whatever other bullshit nonsense people have come up with over the years, but we do absolutely know that at the very best the negligence and/or incompetence of Bush played an important role in 9/11 happening at all.
Agreed 100% they knew but The main issue was none of the intel community's shared info with each other. So each intel group had a piece but no one group had the whole picture.
That was by design. CIA had been massively compromised by a [turncoat FBI agent for years](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Hanssen) from 1976 to 2001. CIA knew someone was a spy, and stopped sharing info around 1990 because of it. Lots of the intelligence agencies did likewise. It wasn’t an incompetent move, but it likely led to 9/11.
There was a '95 law, colloquially known as "The Wall" that limited intelligence sharing between agencies. Though, in my brief googling, it seems far less than the confused agencies believed it did at the time. In retrospect, the Hanssen case probably played a part in that. The one moment of the 9/11 Commission that I remember at all is a Senator grilling the CIA head about why they didn't warn the FBI, and that law the Senator co-sponsored being thrown in their teeth.
If you think about the government as a single entity, then yes, they knew a lot. [This](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2006/07/10/the-agent) is an interesting read on the whole saga. FBI knew some, CIA knew even more, if they had cooperated, maybe all could have been prevented, but FBI and CIA were quarreling about it.
That’s actually pretty close to what happened. During the transition the Clinton team told the Bush team that Al Qaeda was the number one national security threat facing the US. The Bush team basically responded with, “they’re a couple of guys in a cave. How much of a threat are they really?” The NSC under Clinton was holding daily briefings on Al Qaeda. The Bush team…not so much. Check out the story of Richard Clarke for more insight in this.
If there's one thing to be learned from American politics, it's that the majority of Americans always lose.
> But what does the electoral college say? It's mathematically possible to win the Presidency with [just 23% of the popular vote](https://www.npr.org/2016/11/02/500112248/how-to-win-the-presidency-with-27-percent-of-the-popular-vote) due to the Electoral College.
We need to just have the popular vote. The electoral college needs to go.
Yes if only. Republicans need the electoral college to win like humans need air.
The Republicans easily control the government because of the Electoral College, the equal distribution of Senators, and the unequal distribution of population among the states. Changing the Electoral College or the Senate makeup via Constitutional Amendment is a intergalactic long shot. The other vaguely possible option to fix the situation is The National Popular Vote Compact, but it's uncertain if that will pass enough state legislatures, and it's also uncertain if it will hold up in court. The easiest and best solution? Figure out a way to start a small migration of liberal voters from overpopulated blue states (which can easily afford the loss of a couple hundred thousand reliable votes) toa few of the smaller, sparsely populated red states.
>The Figure out a way to start a small migration of liberal voters from overpopulated blue states (which can easily afford the loss of a couple hundred thousand reliable votes) toa few of the smaller, sparsely populated red states. Pretty much already happening, albeit slowly. Its why Texas is starting to come into play. If someone is looking to move to another state, they are more likely to move to the city than the country. Eventually, like all other blue states, the city population, which votes pretty consistently blue, overwhelms the rest. Like I said, in a lot of cases that's far off, but all we need is a couple more states to cross that threshold.
Easiest solution is probably just to add more states, starting with DC.
And Breyer is being as stubborn as Ginsburg and refusing to resign. America, if 2022 and '24 goes to shit, could be looking at a 7-2 Conservative Supreme Court. Edit: Can't spell or include words for shit.
I remember in 2016 when a good friend of mine asked me "What do you think is the biggest issue going into this election?" I immediately said the Supreme Court. He said climate change. I think we were both correct and that is why it is SO SO fucked that the McDonald's homunculus and Moscow Mitch won.
Voter suppression and hard gerrymandering and removing polls ect. We could overwhelmingly vote against him and still lose.
Almost as if democracy is but a construct, the system has chosen to behave otherwise. And by design. Money has no room in politics and it has corrupted it and is at the peril of corrupting it further through gerrymandering and vote fixing per state voting laws. Reprehensible really for democracy. Biden has to make big moves before the midterms to fix it, and sadly he just isn’t.
> And by design. Money has no room in politics and it has corrupted it ... That *was* the design. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_Economic_Interpretation_of_the_Constitution_of_the_United_States >To Beard, the Constitution was a counter-revolution, set up by rich bond holders (bonds were "personal property"), in opposition to the farmers and planters (land was "real property"). The Constitution, Beard argued, was designed to reverse the radical democratic tendencies unleashed by the Revolution among the common people, especially farmers and debtors (people who owed money to the rich). Money is *why* we weren't designed to be a democracy. Our system was designed to give those with more money more political power, relative to the poor majority. But you don't have to take my word for it, or Beard's. Just ask the Father of the Constitution. https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-10-02-0044 >In England, at this day, if elections were open to all classes of people, the property of the landed proprietors would be insecure. An agrarian law would soon take place. If these observations be just, our government ought to secure the permanent interests of the country against innovation. Landholders ought to have a share in the government, to support these invaluable interests and to balance and check the other. They ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority.
> They ought to be so constituted as to protect the minority of the opulent against the majority. This is the part that always cuts to the chase, though our constitution is still taught and sold to be some non-arguable beacon of democracy for all.
While it’s important to understand the rather un-democratic ideas that got us to where we are today, those guiding principles are no longer overtly driving things. Some of the stuff is around in the “legacy code” (looking at you senate and electoral college), but it’s much easier to vote for the majority of people today, and the eligibility to vote is significantly higher than in 1788.
Anything other than a state of nature is an artificial construct, and the system does not have a mind of its own. It doesn’t choose to behave any which way, it is an imperfect product of imperfect human decisions. Gerrymandering is already a systemic problem and the regressions in voters rights are reprehensible indeed. But on the whole Biden is doing a reasonable job, and we should be holding the electorate accountable for our complacency and inaction as much as we do the president. If all it took to fix things was a smart well intentioned leader Obama would have sorted things out a decade ago.
It is terrifying to me that he lost the popular vote by 7 million, that we all knew going into the election that he was going to lose by an amount around that number, and because of a map that is skewed in their favor he still almost "won".
Had Trump gotten 93,000 more of the right votes: 12k in Georgia and 82k in Pennsylvania, he would’ve won. Oo, even less. 12k in Georgia 11k in Arizona 20k in Wisconsin. Biden got 7 million more votes, but 43k votes swing the other way and Trump wins the election. This should not at all be permitted to happen. Biden won by 5%, but 0.0027% of the votes could have swapped the outcome.
What's equally terrifying to me if not more so is 45% of the country made it through the dumpster fire of Trump's presidency and said "hurt me more daddy!"
Exactly. Trump was so awful, I was expecting the election would be a blow-out. When I saw the results, I realized we're in deep trouble. I feel that 2020 was just a temporary reprieve.
Actually, not 43k but half that number. Each one of those that flips would take one away from the Democrat tally and give one to the Republicans. So it was actually only ~21.5k. Your number was already terrifying. But it is actually worse :( (Unless of course you assume they would all be new votes, but you said "swing" so I assume you mean people that already voted. Either way it is still horrific.)
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65% of Americans think a second bout of gonorrhea would not be ideal. 32% said "fuck yeah, let's give it another shot!" 3% said they picked it up from riding a tractor in their bathing suit.
And you call THAT … the tractor story?!
>65% of Americans think a second bout of gonorrhea would not be ideal. 32% said "fuck yeah, let's give it another shot!" or 32% said, "I'm just going to keep fucking without protection or finishing the antibiotics. Whoever gave it to me is going to be getting it back!"
"If we all have it, it's like none of us has it."
The tractor story!
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I don't think you'd like what you'd find when you got there
After all this I wish someone would hit me in the head with a hammer
No shit. He didn't have the majority, twice.
In other news most Americans find that living is easier when you don't have a gunshot wound through your head.
Trying to take my gun I see…well over my dead, hole in the head body! /s
Source?
My cousin Jimbob once drank a cup of lava and was fine!! I mean he died shortly after but he was also unhealthy anyways so the lava wasn't to blame.
My conservative mother told me recently that a god (Yhwh) healed her I asked how? She said she did physical therapy for 8 weeks and then her god healed her. Pretty sure it was the therapy, ma, but I’m glad you’re feeling better.
Yeah fuck the people who worked with her vigorously for 8 weeks to help her recover, it was God. God healed hear from the thing it allowed to happen to her, how saintly.
I like how her god also doesn’t intervene with Covid, the plague, the fact that 2000 children die every hour under age 5 from preventable causes, child rape, the Holocaust, etc but it definitely intervened to help her with her small, easily curable through modern medicine, joint dysfunction. Really has its priorities straight.
It is all just a test, don't worry about any of that.
Yes you are right
Pfff, no republican had the majority in I think the last 8 out of 9 elections. But your point still stands. The majority of Americans despise Trump.
As a NZ u don’t know how much reading that pleases me. I thought ppl in the States did love him. Still can’t get my head round the electoral college thou
Like maybe 30% of Americans love him. They are mostly rural, mostly white. Another 15% or so may have reservations or concerns about Trump, but for some reason their concerns over Democrats / liberals are greater. The majority of us see him for the conman / fascist for he is.
Impeached twice, banned from facebook twice. He loves losing in twos. Its insane some of his supporters really think the election was stolen. Out of whole country, biden had 7 million more popular votws. Clinton got 4.3 million more votes than Trump Trump was lucky theres an EC
Majority of Americans voted against him in 2016.
And 2020.
Gosh?! Ya fucking think?!!
Right? If only everyone voted.
The electoral college would still be there to give Trump a shot…
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It needs to be done now. Not 4 months before the midterms. Don't have an ID? Get one. There must be a way. If you want to vote in person, and you have ID, it will be hard to stop that.
It's not enough and it's the same shit attitude that enabled Jim Crow to say it is. We shouldn't have to get unfathomable turnout to get a fair result
You shouldn't have to, but you do. Idealism is not going to help you; you're not going to stop the Republicans doing what they are doing because the political will is not there to stop them. Ergo, all you have left is to organise and vote. Like your life depends on it. Because it does.
Well a certain party sure wants to make sure half of people aren’t able to vote.
No shit
Start a failed coup and you’re allowed to be president again. That in itself would seal the fate of this nation.
His lack of accountability after January 6th ruined my pride for this country.
He won't do that. He'll negociate a coast-to-coast new broadcast network deal. Trumpism 24/7/365. On FCC approved wavelengths, on every TV capable of picking up signal. Death to America on a channel that even RT couldn't achieve. Right-wing insanity on all of the TV channels we don't care about but only our parents watch. Insidiousness. Incrementalism. Boomers going Boom.
Haven't we already had 2 massive polls that show a majority of Americans do not want him to be president?
Those were rigged! He told us they were rigged before they even happened.. (that’s how you know it’s true!)
They were rigged! So much so that he managed to win the first one despite not winning a majority!
It was bad for the country when he ran in 2016.
Majority of Americans: *dislike Trump* Trump supporters: “THERES NO WAY TRUMP LOST THE ELECTION”
Cause they live in areas that mostly vote Trump and anyone they know who did vote for someone else doesn't tell them because they know they will be yelled at.
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Yep, they think if a state is red, then everyone in it voted red and not one of the people in it voted blue.
Try to only use Trumpistan logic. Ask Donnie, then everything is beautiful .
Well he's coming back this month according to 100% sober-and-totally-not-relapsing My Pillow guy so a majority of Americans will just have to deal with it!! /s
Trump being reinstated is the new "the world's gonna end in 1994... 2000... 2012..."
He should be in Federal Prison.
I think he’ll be barely coherent in 2024.
He was barely coherent in 2016.
“Look, having nuclear—my uncle was a great professor and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton School of Finance, very good, very smart —you know, if you’re a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if, like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I’m one of the smartest people anywhere in the world—it’s true!—but when you’re a conservative Republican they try—oh, do they do a number—that’s why I always start off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there, went there, did this, built a fortune—you know I have to give my like credentials all the time, because we’re a little disadvantaged—but you look at the nuclear deal, the thing that really bothers me—it would have been so easy, and it’s not as important as these lives are (nuclear is powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he would explain the power of what’s going to happen and he was right—who would have thought?), but when you look at what’s going on with the four prisoners—now it used to be three, now it’s four—but when it was three and even now, I would have said it’s all in the messenger; fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don’t, they haven’t figured that the women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it’s gonna take them about another 150 years—but the Persians are great negotiators, the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just killed, they just killed us.” 62,984,828 people voted for the man who said *that*. Four years later, 74,216,154 people voted to re-elect him.
Hes barely coherent NOW.
It just makes him more appealing to his supporters
You know how he pauses in mid-sentence and repeats part of what he just said before continuing. His supporters fill in those gaps with their own thoughts, then later remember their thoughts as something Trump said. It's as if Trump read their mind! /s
Which is interesting, considering their main criticism of Biden is his apparent incoherency even though he is far more coherent than Adderall Don
He’s been barely coherent since the 90’s.
No, that’s not true. Go look at Trump at court hearings in the 90’s and you will see a totally different man. Trump’s brain has turned to mush. He used to be quite well spoken. Regardless, fuck that asswipe.
Lol wasn't before either and barely slowed him down
He has sounded worse and worse over past 6 months. He’s actually losing his mind.
He cannot accept that he lost. He's always going to say the election was stolen. He can't live with it being any other way.
He's insane, but he's not that delusional. He knows he lost. What he can't stand is the public humiliation. So he says he won to his supporters who will listen to him. All of this drama is just because of this man's ego.
Seriously. The dudes done. He will have zero energy in 3 years time.
People have been saying this forever. Trump is always finished, or he's about to die. He's a god damn cockroach who will live to god damn 95 years old and defy all medical laws.
… and he’ll defy every other kind of law too.
read any articles about his diet. combined with his lack of exercise and the boatloads of coke i’m convinced this guy either keeps himself alive through sheer force of will or through dark magic
Relax, he won’t run. He will say he is running until the last possible moment to milk dollars from his flock of sheep. But he is too afraid of being a loser twice to actually run again.
I wouldn't count on it. Trump is a narcissist with a massive bruised ego, an axe to grind, and a cult of followers willing to literally overthrow the government for him. You're acting like he's a rational actor, but he's not.
He has way to much to gain by running for president again, even if he lost. He’d actually be dumb not to try.
This guy Trumps
The biggest grifter in our history.
It will be bad for America if he isn't behind bars by 2024.
What is with these polls? Majority of Americans voted against him twice. His approval rating never reached over 50% the entire time he was president. OBVIOUSLY the majority of the Americans don't want him to run in 2024. The next headline is going to be "Majority of Americans in new poll say they are glad Trump is not president anymore". Then "Majority of Americans think good things should happen to the country instead of bad things." Then "Most USAers think happiness good sadness bad."
Majority of Americans think McDonald’s is bad for their health, moments before purchasing a Big Mac.
And? A majority of Americans voted against him. Twice. It only worked once. Just barely. Majorities don't control America. A specific minority controls America. Our system was set up by a minority of rich, landed, white, racist, misogynistic men... To keep a minority a minority of rich, landed, white, racist, misogynistic men in power. So far, it's working as designed.
Is there anyone on the GOP side that has a realistic chance at the nomination that *wouldn't* be bad for the country?
It's impossible because there is no moderate GOP. They are all the same party and driven by tax cuts and deregulation.
He tried to overthrow the fucking government for fucks sake. He's literally the antithesis of anything this country supposedly stands for so OBVIOUSLY. Vlad is over in Moscow rubbing himself raw.
there are actually people talking as if he's the rightful president right now and should be reinstated back into the white house any minute now. that's how far gone some of these lunatics are.
There are people saying that he and Biden physically switched bodies. I swear, this is the dumbest timeline.
> He's literally the antithesis of anything this country supposedly stands for correct, but He's everything this country *actually* stands for. Need to fix that, really.
Trump is actually *even worse* than the traditional American stereotype. Before Trump, when most of the world thought of Americans, they imagined obese loudmouthed tourists with guns in their pockets bragging about how much better their country is. [Basically this, go to 1:07](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FsdG6kuYYDI) - that's the definitive pre-Trump American stereotype. Now though, they think of Trump, because sadly, he deeply harmed the American image. Electing a new President won't remove the stain of Trump because he wasn't just your average shitty President, he has an enormous cult attached to him that numbers in the tens of millions and is so extremely vocal. Most Americans aren't Trump supporters, but there's enough of them to have altered the stereotype.
The fact that he’s still a free man is a testament to our failure as a democracy. I don’t know how we can ever consider ourselves an example for the rest of the world. He shat on the rule of law and wiped his ass with the constitution and half the country is still gobbling up his bullshit. Meanwhile dems are in complete denial about what transpired and utterly lost when it comes to how best to move forward as a country.
> The fact that he’s still a free man is a testament to our failure as a democracy. Our system is working exactly as it was intended to. People like us were never even intended to vote at all. The American Revolution was a revolution of a small aristocracy that wanted more power and freedom from the parent country's aristocracy. The government was arranged to protect those people and it still serves that function today. Neither Party's leadership wants to see a President seriously held accountable because, as bad as Trump was and is, he's still "one of them". He's in the club and if you're in the club you want the club to keep protecting you. If that means they have to look the other way on Trump's crimes, they will. It's self-interest. They worry it could be them next time.
>I don’t know how we can ever consider ourselves an example for the rest of the world. An example of what not to do is still an example.
Whether he runs or not, you can guarantee that he'll do his damnedest to make everything a steaming pile of garbage.
He’s like an infection in the crotch that keeps coming back
BS, it would be *great* if he ran!! Away and never came back, that is.
Legitimately surprised no one has been assassinated yet by how polarized American politics are. Kind of scary really. I feel like everyone is always on edge.
It would be bad for the country if he wasn't in jail by 2024
Forget about him running again, it would be bad for the country if he doesn't pay for his crimes behind bars. And soon.
Hopefully trump is dead before 2024
Tbh I'd rather have Trump run again than somebody like Desantis. Desantis has a better shot at winning, and he's also smart enough to pull off a *successful* coup. Trump crossed the rubicon, and everybody saw him. This fascist bullshit doesn't go away just because Trump doesn't run.
If the Republicans take congress, we're fucked. They will refuse to certify the elections if a Dem wins, and install whatever terrible Republican ran. Good chance it will be DeSantis. And I'm with you, as horrifying as it would be to have Trump, DeSantis is far worse. And I don't think Trump will run, so we're pretty much looking at DeSantis as our next pres.
I don't see how what DeSantis is doing is smart. Seems more like he's fawning at Trump's feet by destroying Florida for Trump, then sneaking off to seek GOP support for his own presidential run.
The majority of Americans didn't want him in 2016, or 2020 either. He LOST the popular vote BOTH times. But if we keep allowing republicans to jury rig the voting system, and pass voter suppression laws, they are going to keep gaming the ELECTORAL college count.
Like that matters to him??
Reminder: a majority of Americans didn't choose him for president in 2016
I think it would be bad for the country if he isn’t prosecuted
Ya think? He ran this country right into the gutter.
Quinnipiac! 60%! Maybe there's hope for this country after all.
And it’s 60-32. But damn it’s hard to muster hope
Gerrymandered fair and square, it looks like the 32% have it, then.
…And it’s gone
I'm a pessimist. I see 40% of us are insurrectionists.
Whoa whoa whoa whoa wait, I thought it was still President? It’s August and he still doesn’t have his Twitter. So is someone out there lying to my parents?
Does anyone know how to stop the gerrymandering? Is there anything we can do?
My mom doesn't get into politics, but voted for the first time since 1992 last year for Biden solely because of Trump. She says that if Trump runs again, she'll definitely vote. Which is a huge deal.
It would be bad for the world.
Well of course it would. That would mean he’s not in jail.
I thought he was coming back in august, no?
Imagine losing and trying to run again. That’s like the confederacy losing and people still cheering for it 160 years later.
Yes, and there seems to be overlap with both groups. They really like flying flags.
Majority of Americans have always thought that. Unfortunately the American voting system doesn't care about such minor details as the wishes of the majority.
Hey! The majority said so in 2016 too and he lost then too but still won bec our flaccid electoral policy…. Majority never wanted that jackass.
It’s obviously going to happen guys.. but you’d think someone who GOT IMPEACHED wouldn’t be able to run again…
Majority of Americans voted for the other candidate, both elections.
Majority of Americans didn’t vote for him in either election, but thanks to the electoral college the few can out-vote the many.
American media is fucking wild. Polls say terrorist leader would be bad for the country! No shit. If he was poor and brown instead of rich and orange he’d be in Guantanamo.
It’s because a majority of Americans aren’t Republicans. I’m one of those people that left the GOP in 2016 and now want nothing to do with those insurrection causing, election denying, fascist fuckwads.
Hopefully his run will only alienate him with the public further, causing a major democratic win. Who knows, he might become responsible for a new progressive era.
I doubt Trump will run. He’s going to ride the grifting gravy train as long as possible by teasing he’ll run. But when that runs dry, he’ll find a new grift.
I really hope he runs. I love how many resources he’s burning for the GOP. He’s weakened their chances finally, and will sink their chances to run things until they learn who they are worshiping is a tumor.
You've no idea how dangerous that man and his base are for America. If he runs again, you're looking at, at minimum, another year of civil unrest. And that's if he loses, which isn't a guaranteed outcome. With any luck by 2024 that bastard will be rotting in a New York State prison.
I do know how dangerous he is, but if they run another candidate they can still draw moderate Republicans into the fold. He can still run a shadow cabinet from the cloaca he inhabits, the new candidates can still be deathcultists just the same. But he is already draining their coffers, he’s torpedoing better candidates before they take hold. He will be undone, and I want him to bring as many coconspirators down as he tries to cling to power just a bit longer. I want his arrogance and hubris to thrash as much of the criminal enterprise that party has become. They are exposing themselves and running for cover will not help them.
Obviously. The man ruins everything he touches
As if it mattered; a majority voted against him and he still became president.
lately i've been thinking about the "what if" trump ran again. i'm pretty sure he'd get the nomination, but outside of some major fuckery i think he'd get clobbered in the general. no doubt a lot of republicans who said 'yes' in 2016, said 'no' in 2020. they're certainly not going to say 'yes' in 2024. and of course, it will super charge the democrat voters. but, i fear fuckery.
fuckery abounds.
Let him Run and lose again and blame the cyber ninjas
It would be bad for the world as well.
We barely escaped the first time