American Politics

[trystan]

1 hour ago, Long_Before_Sunrise said:

It's like that kind of quiet that alerts you that the animals or the kids are definitely doing something they're not supposed to.

oh yes.

but on the other hand, he's exiting, knowing he's been defeated, but saying he'll be back in some form or another.  THAT'S scary.

 

1 hour ago, Long_Before_Sunrise said:

My brain is a bit confused that the top headlines aren't scandal and outrage today and doesn't know what to pick to read. 

 

 

20 minutes ago, Pinch of StarDust said:

Last night Biden had a memorial for all who have died of Covid at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.  It was touching and beautiful!

oh yes.  it was very touching.  i think someone put chopped onions on the pics online i was looking at.  i have one of those pics as my header on facebook now.  this is what compassion and empathy look like.

 

KrazyKarp - it's nothing like the last four years, i can tell you that.  even Dubya (George W Bush) was nothing like the last four years.....

 

as i told hubby - there's still work to be done... it's just that those in charge are helping to do the work, not arguing against the work.

[Astreya]

Looks like US President Joe Biden really wants to go ahead full steam from day one on. This looks very promising.

I'm looking forward to him fixing quite some of the damage Mr.Trump did right away.

[purplehaze]

2 hours ago, trystan said:

it's just that those in charge are helping to do the work, not arguing against the work.

The adults are back in charge!

That really was a moving ceremony last night for all the Covid victims. And one of the things Trump was patting himself on the back for this morning was his handling of Covid?

 

Made me kind of laugh when someone was showing a clip of the NBC coverage of the inauguration and every time Biden said anything about lies the camera panned to Pence (because of course the biggest liar of all couldn't bring himself to attend).

[trystan]

@Astreya - i just got an email from the White House* that Biden has rejoined the Paris Agreement!  

 

@purplehaze - LOL at NBC  

i didn't see the ceremony last night, but i saw all the pictures. wow.

 

*back in january of 2017, i had signed a petition on whitehouse.gov urging trump to release his taxes, like everyone else before him had done. some of the wordings sometimes were "i'm not a journalist and i want to see trump's taxes" - because somewhere along the line he said that only journalists wanted to see his taxes (whut?).  from time to time, i'd get emails and things from the White House, but it was a bunch of trump hooey.  but i'm still on the mailing list apparently, so yaay!  

[Astreya]

@trystan

And Joe Biden said he wants to get back into the WHO ASAP, too. I bet he already signed that EO, too!

[soullessheartofsteel]

Biden's just signed 17 executive orders that are gonna undo the nonsense that Trump enacted during his admin, with over 50 motions planned in the next ten days. The good thing about executive orders is that they're easy come, easy go.

 

Some worse news is that there are rumblings that Trump is planning on forming his own party. My first instinct was to laugh it off, since it would obviously be a much smaller party than the Democratic or Republican parties and a project like that takes more brains and effort than Trump has ever been willing to muster for any of his political endeavors. But if he does pull it off, Republicans are going to be desperate to keep Trump loyalists in their base because a Reuters poll and an ABC News in collaboration with the Washington Post showed that a good chunk of Republicans would be willing to leave the Republican party to follow Trump, despite a majority of them also believing that Trump should be held accountable for the insurrection. If even a fourth of their base decides to leave in favor of Trump, mainstream Republicans are going to be scrambling to keep them, and that might mean going back to going even further right to accommodate them, compromising, and jumping through hoops for Trump once again, just to maintain relevancy and not lose out to Democrats, and continuing their spiral into Trumpian insanity even though Trump isn't their leader anymore. I feel that this is a real threat because the RNC is directionless right now. Their platform for 2020-2024 was literally just "whatever Trump wants until 2024", probably because their platform was released in late August 2020 and they assumed he was going to win. No guarantees that any of this is going to happen, at least in the short term, but I won't be surprised if there's a schism in the right within the century, regardless of whether or not Trump establishes his own party.
 

Edited January 21, 2021 by soullessheartofsteel

[AngelsSin]

21 minutes ago, soullessheartofsteel said:

Some worse news is that there are rumblings that Trump is planning on forming his own party. My first instinct was to laugh it off, since it would obviously be a much smaller party than the Democratic or Republican parties and a project like that takes more brains and effort than Trump has ever been willing to muster for any of his political endeavors, but if he does pull it off, Republicans are going to be desperate to keep Trump loyalists in their base because a Reuters poll and an ABC News in collaboration with the Washington Post showed that a good chunk of Republicans would be willing to leave the Republican party to follow Trump, despite a majority of them also believing that Trump should be held accountable for the insurrection. 

 

 

Lol. I see that as only benefiting the Democrats. In the past Third parties running during the Primary election draw votes away from either party. Trump has a sizable chunk of the Republican Party.

In effect it would ruin any chance of Trump's party or the Republican party from winning. And by default the Democrats would win as they likely would retain most if not all of their parties votes.

Trump was only getting so many votes cause he was running as a Republican and so most Republicans who didn't like him had nowhere else to go (in their minds anyway). That wouldn't be so if Trump establishes his own party. So, um, yay? Seems like a good idea to me.🤯🥰

Edited January 21, 2021 by AngelsSin

[Astreya]

With first past the post, Trump setting up his own party would indeed mainly lead to the Republicans imploding.

 

According to Wikipedia, the Democrats have 47.1 million members, while the Republicans have 35 million members.

 

If we look at the 2020 election, the Democrats got 51.3% of the national popular vote, while the Republicans got 46.9% of the popular vote (the number of actual voters is usually quite a bit more than party members).

 

If Trump manages to mobilise half of the Republicans to follow him, this "Patriot Party" of his, could take away, say, 17 million Republican members. I think I read somewhere, that about 40 million US Americans were fanatical Trump supporters (among them likely this half of the Republican members). As not everybody actively signs up for party membership, I would estimate that in the end you'd have the Democrats with still 47.1 million members, the Republicans with, say, 20 million members and the Patriots (if I'm generous) with maybe 30 million members.  Due to FPTP, this could well lead to a vaster majority of the Democrats in both Senate and Congress than ever before.
 

[Long_Before_Sunrise]

They're usurping the word 'patriot' so that it that it is starting to mean 'white supremacist.'  

They've sullied the image of American flag, too. But if DC and Puerto Rico become states, that traditionally would lead to proposing a new flag. 

On the other hand, just because they put their disgusting hands all over it and claimed it doesn't make them entitled to it.

[soullessheartofsteel]

You're right that parties fracturing is always a risky move, and that it does split the vote within an ideology and weaken it, but that's why I'm saying that there are a ton of Republicans willing to pinch their noses again to keep Trump's people in and save their party. They know the dangers of a schism as much as we do. Never-Trumpers like Romney and those who headed the Lincoln Project might be able to stand their ground against that sort of ideology long-term, but if Trump and his people continue to have a significant enough presence in American society, their objections might not mean much. Trump may never be president again, but there will be governors, House representatives, Senators, and judges who get elected/appointed who are loyal to his ideology, or just live in Trump country and want to hold office badly enough. And not every Republican politician has to sell out again in order for this to be damaging in the long run. It's not just about winning elections, it's about where our discourse is going to go if there's going to be a popular extreme-right party that makes up 1/4 of America's voting population.

 

But I'm not, like, tinfoil-hat convinced that all of this will happen. There's a lot of conjecture here (though these last 4 years have been nuts enough that nothing's ever truly off the table). Sometimes we get lucky. Perhaps whatever momentum Trump is carrying with him will dissolve upon his death, as his personality is a major factor in why people are loyal to him in the first place. Or maybe people will come off the power rush of being a part of something that's taken charge of the government, and people will de-radicalize themselves out of sheer boredom.

Edited January 21, 2021 by soullessheartofsteel

[Long_Before_Sunrise]

8 minutes ago, soullessheartofsteel said:

if there's going to be a popular extreme-right party that makes up 1/4 of America's voting population.

 

But I'm not, like, tinfoil-hat convinced that all of this will happen. There's a lot of conjecture here (though these last 4 years have been nuts enough that nothing's ever truly off the table). Sometimes we get lucky. Perhaps whatever momentum Trump is carrying with him will dissolve upon his death, as his personality is a major factor in why people are loyal to him in the first place. Or maybe people will come off the power rush of being a part of something that's taken charge of the government, and people will de-radicalize themselves out of sheer boredom.

 

Trump has a lot of the speech patterns of cult leaders like David Koresh and Jim Jones. Jones and Koresh, however, talked about a higher power and love. Trump talks about Trump and America and how they're both the strongest and the victimized. There's plenty of people who have Trump-like personalities... but not his world wide connections, his debts, his ugly secrets hiding behind a screen of "I'm Rich And I Live In Luxury! I'm A Successful Businessman!'  He actually has lived mostly in debt and never let it hinder him as long as he could file lawsuits and make deals that bought him more time to keep up the appearance. He even refused to pay the little girls who performed at his 2016 rallies, and he never expressed any sympathy after their promotional merchandise they brought to sell at a rally was stolen out their vehicle. Thousands of dollars were spent on travel costs, costumes, etc. and they got paid in 'exposure.' 

 

The thing that brings 'power rushes' to a halt is sobering facts like the FBI literally knocking on your door and seeing people who participated being arrested, charged, AND convicted. That's a big part of what made lynching stop: The law put its foot down and stopped playing games with white people.

[soullessheartofsteel]

For sure-- unless he can squeeze enough donations from his supporters, he's probably not going to be able to get much done,  no matter how many people he screws over and lies to. Especially now that his big financiers are no longer willing to support him after 1/6. Hopefully his circle will just shrink and shrink until all 15 of them move to Antarctica or something.

 

18 minutes ago, Long_Before_Sunrise said:

The thing that brings 'power rushes' to a halt is sobering facts like the FBI literally knocking on your door and seeing people who participated being arrested, charged, AND convicted.

 

Oh absolutely, though I'm referring more to the people who, perhaps, wouldn't be willing to storm the Capitol but definitely supported it when it happened (even if they wouldn't tell anyone that because they have enough self-awareness to know that kind of thing isn't acceptable). Aka a good chunk of his base. You can't knock them on anything, and even if you could, you can't arrest tens of millions of people, but you can certainly make it clear under no uncertain terms that they'll never have that kind of control over the country like they did from 2016-2020 and that the people around you are no longer going to bend over backwards to appease you, or awkwardly stay quiet and let you do what you want.

[purpledragonclaw]

This... is a good day. A new day. A day for hope, and change. A chance for our nation to confront the white supremacy, homophobia, and xenophobia and finally heal from its wounds. Biden was off to a good start with some of the executive orders he signed today, and I feel... relieved. I remember the dread I felt four years ago when the last president won, and it is so nice to feel a sense of calm now. I think my sleep patterns can return to normal.

 

To our international friends in this thread, thank you for your patience these past four years as we showed you the worst of what we are. Please give us a chance to show you our best. We can be better, and we will be.

 

Let's see how this goes. I'm hopeful.

[Long_Before_Sunrise]

28 minutes ago, soullessheartofsteel said:

For sure-- unless he can squeeze enough donations from his supporters, he's probably not going to be able to get much done,  no matter how many people he screws over and lies to. Especially now that his big financiers are no longer willing to support him after 1/6.

Here's the thing: He's successful at getting money, but he is no good at holding on to it. Where does it go? Even after the last 4 years, I'm not sure.

[Astreya]

1 hour ago, purpledragonclaw said:

To our international friends in this thread, thank you for your patience these past four years as we showed you the worst of what we are. Please give us a chance to show you our best. We can be better, and we will be.

Let's hope that Mr.Trump stays an aberration and now things start to normalise.

With the strengthening of China, it is more than necessary that the Western democracies stay strong and together and don't start to implode.  (Sadly the UK's Brexit disaster won't be fixed as easily.)

[Long_Before_Sunrise]

7 minutes ago, Astreya said:

Let's hope that Mr.Trump stays an aberration and now things start to normalise.

With the strengthening of China, it is more than necessary that the Western democracies stay strong and together and don't start to implode.  (Sadly the UK's Brexit disaster won't be fixed as easily.)

 

He is and he isn't an aberration. The Republicans were not unhappy with his leadership (or rather the lack of it) and grifting. They were emboldened by it. What they objected to was that he was ultimately not as biddable and compliant as they foolishly assumed he would be. He was only manageable until he got a feel for his surroundings and settled in, then he resented and fought any interference. (I'm certain he blackmailed them, too.)

 

What the Republicans were really unhappy about was Trump hung their dirty laundry out in plain sight where the whole world could see the gaping holes in it. 

[Fuzzbucket]

11 hours ago, soullessheartofsteel said:

Some worse news is that there are rumblings that Trump is planning on forming his own party. My first instinct was to laugh it off, since it would obviously be a much smaller party than the Democratic or Republican parties and a project like that takes more brains and effort than Trump has ever been willing to muster for any of his political endeavors. But if he does pull it off, Republicans are going to be desperate to keep Trump loyalists in their base because a Reuters poll and an ABC News in collaboration with the Washington Post showed that a good chunk of Republicans would be willing to leave the Republican party to follow Trump

Yes - and - 

11 hours ago, AngelsSin said:

Lol. I see that as only benefiting the Democrats. In the past Third parties running during the Primary election draw votes away from either party. Trump has a sizable chunk of the Republican Party.

In effect it would ruin any chance of Trump's party or the Republican party from winning. And by default the Democrats would win as they likely would retain most if not all of their parties votes.

Trump was only getting so many votes cause he was running as a Republican and so most Republicans who didn't like him had nowhere else to go (in their minds anyway). That wouldn't be so if Trump establishes his own party. So, um, yay? Seems like a good idea to me.🤯🥰

SoYES - split the vote.

10 hours ago, Astreya said:

With first past the post, Trump setting up his own party would indeed mainly lead to the Republicans imploding.

 

According to Wikipedia, the Democrats have 47.1 million members, while the Republicans have 35 million members.

 

If we look at the 2020 election, the Democrats got 51.3% of the national popular vote, while the Republicans got 46.9% of the popular vote (the number of actual voters is usually quite a bit more than party members).

 

If Trump manages to mobilise half of the Republicans to follow him, this "Patriot Party" of his, could take away, say, 17 million Republican members. I think I read somewhere, that about 40 million US Americans were fanatical Trump supporters (among them likely this half of the Republican members). As not everybody actively signs up for party membership, I would estimate that in the end you'd have the Democrats with still 47.1 million members, the Republicans with, say, 20 million members and the Patriots (if I'm generous) with maybe 30 million members.  Due to FPTP, this could well lead to a vaster majority of the Democrats in both Senate and Congress than ever before.

And MAYBE the end of the Electoral College.

[Pinch of StarDust]

6 minutes ago, Fuzzbucket said:

And MAYBE the end of the Electoral College.

I certainly hope so.  It would put an end to gerrymandering.

[Astreya]

1 hour ago, Pinch of StarDust said:

I certainly hope so.  It would put an end to gerrymandering.

This will only happen if you get rid of FPTP. and adopt proportional representation, as only then every vote really counts.

[trystan]

some states have ranked voting already.

and - i can't remember which state, but i'd heard something on the radio that one of the states had ranked voting on the list of ballot initiatives to vote on to adopt in said state - and it lost.

[RainDear]

15 hours ago, purpledragonclaw said:

This... is a good day. A new day. A day for hope, and change. A chance for our nation to confront the white supremacy, homophobia, and xenophobia and finally heal from its wounds. Biden was off to a good start with some of the executive orders he signed today, and I feel... relieved. I remember the dread I felt four years ago when the last president won, and it is so nice to feel a sense of calm now.

My opinion. Just speaking for myself.

 

I've spent the past 5 years in a state of fear. When I first heard Trump spouting off against women, immigrants, etc., etc., ...  I was astounded. Though I was aware that some Americans still felt that way, I actually thought that they were too smart to say them aloud in public forums, and that there were few of them. When Republican friends asked me what to do about the election, I am afraid I waffled some. While I KNEW I didn't want Trump in the Whitehouse, I wasn't convinced Hillary was the best choice to run against him and I said so. Of course I voted for her, but I might have been better served to try to convince my friends on that course, as well.

 

Over the past 4 years I have been ashamed of my government, I have been ashamed to call myself American. In 70 years that has never happened before. There were times I disagreed with things that the government did, but I was not ashamed. I wanted to stop so many of the things his administration was doing, but I didn't know what to do. This is a democracy - when the government does things WE are responsible, it's our fault when things get out of hand.

 

I am so glad we have replaced him with someone I feel I can believe in. I look forward with great hope to the next 100 days to see what progress he makes. For me one of the most important things is the removal of children from concentration camps and the return to their families. For me, of all the things this administration did, this is the worst. I hope that somehow there will be an attempt made to help them recover from the trauma and abuse of the situation they found themselves in. It seems odd that the "Family Values" party found this to be acceptable.

 

I found it odd that part of Trump's campaign was the promise of just negating every move made by the Obama administration with no regard to whether it was a good move or not. I can't think at this moment of any good moves made by our recent administration, but I hope each item will be removed or allowed to stand on a case-by-case basis, not just wholesale removal like it appears the previous administration did.

 

Yesterday, I watched the inauguration and later the "Celebration of America" that replaced the Inaugural Ball that didn't happen due to Covid. I was so uplifted and feel so hopeful.  

[trystan]

oh i totally get that, RainDear!

 

everything about trump was undoing the good that had gone before, especially if it was instituted by Obama.  trump was quite the enabler of all that simmering hatred, and he allowed it to be brought to the surface.

 

in my facebook memories, a picture of me wearing my pink cat-ears hat popped up.  i couldn't go to that first march in 2016, but i did go in 2018.  and it feels sooooo long ago, it's insane.

 

and this meme has been circulating as well, i had to share it, it's back here~

Spoiler

 

as i said on facebook, there's still work to do, it's just that now, those in power are working with us, not arguing against us.  it's a good feeling.

 

Edited January 21, 2021 by trystan
cause i wasn't finished with my post

[Long_Before_Sunrise]

23 minutes ago, RainDear said:

I've spent the past 5 years in a state of fear. When I first heard Trump spouting off against women, immigrants, etc., etc., ...  I was astounded. Though I was aware that some Americans still felt that way, I actually thought that they were too smart to say them aloud in public forums, and that there were few of them. When Republican friends asked me what to do about the election, I am afraid I waffled some. While I KNEW I didn't want Trump in the Whitehouse, I wasn't convinced Hillary was the best choice to run against him and I said so. Of course I voted for her, but I might have been better served to try to convince my friends on that course, as well.

 

Over the past 4 years I have been ashamed of my government, I have been ashamed to call myself American. In 70 years that has never happened before. There were times I disagreed with things that the government did, but I was not ashamed. I wanted to stop so many of the things his administration was doing, but I didn't know what to do. This is a democracy - when the government does things WE are responsible, it's our fault when things get out of hand.

 

I am so glad we have replaced him with someone I feel I can believe in. I look forward with great hope to the next 100 days to see what progress he makes. For me one of the most important things is the removal of children from concentration camps and the return to their families.

 

On the first part: I both was and wasn't surprised. I knew those people were around me. I knew how hard headed they were. But still... I was surprised at how many people got sucked into the Fox News narrative despite their own normal good sense, and how inflamed others were - like the euphoric mass mentality that evangelical megachurches deliberately set out to induce in congregations (See: the Jesus Camp movie). 

 

On the second part: Yes, we were hogtied. In fact, the Republicans are trying again to put new laws on protests, citing the Capitol attack, but intending to enforce against people who protest their actions.

 

On the third part: This is where I fear we're going to see insurrection again. Most of the immigrants are in private facilities and ICE/CBP have been extremely secretive about what goes on inside them and who is let inside. They turned lawmakers and governors away before citing private property. They will again, and the people who enthused over Trump will see a new cause to rally around and stand guard over, I'm afraid.

[soullessheartofsteel]

16 hours ago, Astreya said:

Let's hope that Mr.Trump stays an aberration and now things start to normalise.

With the strengthening of China, it is more than necessary that the Western democracies stay strong and together and don't start to implode.  (Sadly the UK's Brexit disaster won't be fixed as easily.)

\

Agree with Long_Before_Sunrise that Trump wasn't an aberration, he's a symptom of a greater disease: a desire for fascism and strongmen in the wake of decades of disenfranchisement. The middle class has been hollowed out, blue-collar work like farming is disappearing, debt is everywhere, wealth is concentrating in the hands of a few powerful companies (hello, Facebook, hello Amazon, Walmart, Google, Nestle, T-Mobile/Sprint...). Some of this you can pinpoint (hello, Reagan, another TV star president who cut taxes and social programs, and allowed an epidemic to go unchecked). Other things come from longer, more subtle processes like increased military spending, the shift to becoming a service-based economy, and the stagnation in wages. People are dissatisfied with this country, they feel wronged and they have been wronged, and it's very easy for someone to come along and prey on that frustration by offering simple solutions to complicated problems. No jobs? Hordes of brown people who speak strange languages and eat strange food have been taking them! Deport them! No money in the federal budget? These billions are going to lazy teacher's unions, welfare queens, and abortion clinics! Cut their funding!

 

The government didn't glitch to make Trump appear. As problematic as the electoral college is, it was ultimately the people who willed this to pass, as college voters generally reflect the popular decision of their constituents. 63 million, then 74 million people voting for Trump in 2016 and 2020 may not have been enough to win the popular vote, but it certainly isn't an aberration. He appealed to the working- and middle-class white people, those without college degrees, those who might have once had access to generational wealth and privilege but were beginning to lose it, and delineated their problems along the lines of race and political party. He, born into a wealthy family, bragging constantly about the money he pretended to have, unabashedly assaulting women and committing adultery and paying adult film stars hush money, nevertheless managed to appear to his base as a working-class hero, the Platonic ideal of American business, a Christian bastion against 'godless' liberal ideology, or all of the above.

 

People will keep following Trump, and people like Trump, so long as they're feeling resentment and distrust towards the government. And if I'm going to be honest, they have good reason to feel that way. Most Americans don't have $400 to cover a single emergency. A college education, which is now the equivalent of a HS diploma thanks to academic inflation, saddles young people with unbearable debt just as they're beginning to launch their careers. Dental insurance is rare. The federal minimum wage is $7.25. This is shameful, for what is one of the wealthiest countries in the world. No country is perfect, but we can certainly do better than this.

 

We can absolutely celebrate Biden's presidency as a step in the right direction. I certainly am, and I don't deny that he's generally a good, kind person with enough braincells to keep this country from running itself into the ground at the astounding rate it was under Trump. His undoing of Trump's executive orders will be a huge weight off our back, as will his covid response and efforts to raise the minimum wage to $15 nationwide. But the work to prevent another Trump has just begin, and Biden alone won't be able to fix it. We've got to stay engaged and not get complacent now that we have a "normal" politician back in office. "Normal" isn't working, and "normal" is what got us to this point. Biden's a centrist, as are a lot of his cabinet members, and we have to make sure he doesn't compromise his way into letting ur-fascists pull us over the edge again, like nearly every mainstream Democrat has been doing in the name of being the "big tent" party. It's not enough, not anymore, and unless Trump's base is deradicalized and they understand that calling to lynch Democratic leaders and "disloyal" Republicans belongs in the Stone Age, they are going to be a big problem for a very long time.

 

EDIT: Apparently Trump had a diet coke button???????? Oh my God????

Edited January 21, 2021 by soullessheartofsteel
saw this; lost my mind; didn't want to double post

[Astreya]

21 minutes ago, soullessheartofsteel said:

He appealed to the working- and middle-class white people, those without college degrees, those who might have once had access to generational wealth and privilege but were beginning to lose it, and delineated their problems along the lines of race and political party. He, born into a wealthy family, bragging constantly about the money he pretended to have, unabashedly assaulting women and committing adultery and paying adult film stars hush money, nevertheless managed to appear to his base as a working-class hero, the Platonic ideal of American business, a Christian bastion against 'godless' liberal ideology, or all of the above.

And this is what I really don't understand - why on earth can working class people be duped to worship a (seemingly) super-rich person who mainly inherited the wealth from his father (who originally gave him some millions to start his career, too), who is flaunting his wealth,  looks down on "losers", assaults women (the "women for Trump" I can understand even less, btw), pays workers no money for their work, has no Christian morals whatsoever etc?

  

21 minutes ago, soullessheartofsteel said:

unless Trump's base is deradicalized and they understand that calling to lynch Democratic leaders and "disloyal" Republicans belongs in the Stone Age, they are going to be a big problem for a very long time.

I guess the problem is that the US education system doesn't really reach people, particularly as there is no mandatory school attendance. IMO many people in the US need some proper education about ethics where people can't opt out.

Edited January 21, 2021 by Astreya