American Politics

[purplehaze]

In what rational world does this happen?

77-year-old Florida man facing 91 counts of criminal charges sweeps Super Tuesday GOP primaries

[trystan]

this world isn't rational anymore. 

it wasn't a complete sweep though.... Haley defeats Trump in Vermont GOP primary

but then this happened: Nikki Haley suspends her campaign

we need to get those criminal cases moving again, so he's found guilty on all of them and gets locked up.

[blah]

I just do not understand how he is even allowed to run. Political views aside, I feel like a criminal should not be allowed to.

[purplehaze]

3 minutes ago, trystan said:

it wasn't a complete sweep though....

True. And there are indications that most Haley voters are far from a shoo-in to vote for Trump in the general election.

Still the Democrats need to get the message out there that this is a dangerous, demented man who cannot be allowed to be President again!

The press needs to stop harping on Joe Biden's age and start reporting the truth about Trump.

[trystan]

before monday, we thought the qualifications for eligibility to be president were: you had to be 35 years or older, be born in the US, and have been a resident of the US for 14 years or more.... and have not engaged in insurrection against the government after having sworn an oath to protect the constitution.

however after monday? scratch that last one.  even if you encouraged an insurrection, you can still be on the ballot. 😠

 

1 minute ago, purplehaze said:

True. And there are indications that most Haley voters are far from a shoo-in to vote for Trump in the general election.

Still the Democrats need to get the message out there that this is a dangerous, demented man who cannot be allowed to be President again!

The press needs to stop harping on Joe Biden's age and start reporting the truth about Trump.

yes, yes and yes!!!!

Edited March 6 by trystan

[requiesticat]

14 minutes ago, blah said:

I just do not understand how he is even allowed to run. Political views aside, I feel like a criminal should not be allowed to.

 

You'd be surprised. Felons have run for office before. Still, he is dangerous to society as a whole, and deserves to be locked up.

 

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/national-international/presidential-qualifications-felony-crime-convictions/3518094/

 

7 minutes ago, purplehaze said:

True. And there are indications that most Haley voters are far from a shoo-in to vote for Trump in the general election.

Still the Democrats need to get the message out there that this is a dangerous, demented man who cannot be allowed to be President again!

The press needs to stop harping on Joe Biden's age and start reporting the truth about Trump.

 

What I don't understand is why Trump's age isn't an issue to these people, but Biden's is.

[Lagie]

3 hours ago, requiesticat said:

What I don't understand is why Trump's age isn't an issue to these people, but Biden's is.

I know, right?

American politics is a scary place.

[Fuzzbucket]

16 hours ago, purplehaze said:

The press needs to stop harping on Joe Biden's age and start reporting the truth about Trump.

 

Murdoch wants Trump. Murdoch pretty much owns the press. QED.

[trystan]

5 hours ago, Fuzzbucket said:

Murdoch wants Trump. Murdoch pretty much owns the press. QED.

you sure about that?

Quote

Murdoch has privately leveled harsh criticism against Trump. And after the 2020 election, he even wrote in an email to a Fox News executive, disclosed during litigation with Dominion Voting Systems, “We want to make Trump a non person.”

https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/07/media/donald-trump-super-tuesday-rupert-murdoch/index.html

 

trump loves strongmen (read: Putin, Orban), and in some of the short videos of interviews with trump supporters, they say that's the way to go.  i see the vids on instagram on accounts like OccupyDemocrats, but i'm pretty sure these are real people out there, saying 'yeah, we need a dictator.  but only on day 1.  after that, he said he wouldn't be one!'

these vids also have people saying that trump really still is president, but it's Obama that still calling the shots in the government.  what??

[Fuzzbucket]

There is HOPE !

[trystan]

oh i HOPE so!

[dracornithologist]

I am dreading this State of the Union. Excuses for genocide, excuses for Biden continuing to run when almost any other Democrat would have a much better chance of beating Trump (in my opinion) ... it's all such scary stuff. 😞 

[trystan]

Here's what I have, no, Biden is not perfect. but he's for women's reproductive rights, he's for climate change, he has gotten a lot of things passed, including the inflation reduction act, the chips act, he's brought down inflation. Yes, Gaza is complicated, there's no excuse for what's been going on there. He's called for a ceasefire, and I've heard that he's going to mention there will be a port into Gaza, to get humanitarian aid in.  Yes, there are other people who are younger than Biden that could run, but I think in this case, against the fascists, this is "the devil you know." 

of course, this is my opinion.

Once we no longer have the possibility of a four-time indicted twice-impeached authoritarian being elected president, then we can elect a younger Democrat for president.

[dracornithologist]

It's not about younger for me, it's about the inexcusable policies (the awful treatment of kids in detention camps under Biden, the abandonment of doing anything about protecting reproductive rights except as something to hold over votes, the abandonment of doing anything meaningful about student debt, but number one for me, his wholehearted support his entire political career of supporting the genocide of Palestinians, which didn't start last year). The only thing he was doing, which caused me to vote for him last time, was being not Trump. But his chances of winning are now so low that I can't help but resent him for not standing aside and letting any other Democrat try to do better against Trump. 

[trystan]

I'd have to look into the details you list out, but quite a number of policies that any president wants to get passed need to go through the House and the Senate first. And when the Republican leadership of that House and/or Senate says they're not taking up any bills from the president, that's where it looks like the president is dragging his feet, even though the president may not be.

My understanding is he's tried to wipe out student debt, he's tried to codify Roe, but there has been opposition, which makes it look like he hasn't done anything.

 

My further understanding is that should Biden lose,  Agenda 47 and Project 2025 will make this country look unrecognizable as we watch.  As I said in 2020, a vote for a third party is a vote for trump, and I don't want another trump presidency. I may be cynical and jaded, but that's where I'm at.

[dracornithologist]

That sounds like that works for you. I think we fundamentally disagree about how culpable he is, which is fine. 

[trystan]

agreed.

[purplehaze]

Biden may not be perfect, but I seriously have seen no one else in the Democratic party who has a better chance at this point.

We simply cannot afford to allow Trump in the White House again.

58 minutes ago, trystan said:

My further understanding is that should Biden lose,  Agenda 47 and Project 2025 will make this country look unrecognizable as we watch.  As I said in 2020, a vote for a third party is a vote for trump, and I don't want another trump presidency.

This.

[trystan]

3 minutes ago, purplehaze said:

We simply cannot afford to allow Trump in the White House again.

this too.

[dracornithologist]

At this point, I totally agree, no one else has a chance of winning. I hate this fact; he could have decided to retire a long time ago and endorsed/helped build up another candidate's chance. I live in a blue state and my vote does nothing; my support for other candidates like Jasmine Sherman or Cornel West, is more about how I feel about local politics and effective community building than it has to do with a presidential race I don't feel represented in.

That speech felt like a lot of what I feared - a bunch of him saying things he'd like to do that he's been saying he'd like to do for a long while now, so I have no faith that he will. It really pained me that he mentioned Gaza only in what was clearly a votes grab. To say a "ceasefire" - but only for six weeks, when there was a 'ceasefire' before the awful events of October 7th, which Israeli occupation forces have never respected before [evidence of shooting protesters deliberately in the ankles as recently before the October 7th attack as October 4th, and a murder rate of Palestinians of overall one per day throughout 2023 before October 7th, in one of the deadliest years on record for Palestinians] was a slap in the face. Biden has said it himself: "If Israel didn't exist, the US would have to invent it." He means this literally, because he sees it as a tool to his political means. 

It's disgusting and honestly makes me sick. I hate living here, and to be direct about my feelings, it really feels bad that any time while I was actively supporting Biden's election against Trump that I brought up concerns about policies, people often told me that I was just helping Trump by doing so. It feels like it can often be used as a silencing tactic or a way to deflect honest accounting of the deep seated evil effects that the US empire has on the rest of the world. It meant that I was told for a long time "We'll hold Biden accountable after we elect him" but then failed to see any of the people telling me that make that move. 

I don't want to imply that anyone here is making me feel like I'm not allowed to criticize Biden; obviously, I feel comfortable enough posting this. But I hope this helps make sense of why I want to share this perspective. 

[trystan]

my opinions only:

six weeks ceasefire with Gaza and Israel.... to start. release hostages on both sides, get aid that Gaza and Palestinians desperately need.  then discuss a permanent ceasefire.  Hamas needs to be dismantled. and a two-state solution needs to be worked on.

Israel does exist because of treatment of Jews from the rest of the world when they were turned away from the US and other countries before and during WW2.

but the Israel of today is totally not the Israel that was created in 1948. the US and Israel have been allies since then, but that doesn't give Netanyahu's IDF the permission, the right, to slaughter everyone they see because they might be hiding Hamas. wtf?? totally over-the-top and uncalled for.  Israel needs to answer for that humanitarian crisis, and i think the US is starting to see now what kind of country Israel really is. i could be wrong, of course.  I'll be the first one to admit i don't always understand everything in the depth that i should.

(i should point out this is a new position for me to have on Israel.... since i was brought up jewish and with the belief that everyone not Israeli was 'ganging up' on little Israel.)

[dracornithologist]

I understand that your position on this is evolving. It's extremely relatable. Personally, I'm Arab and was raised with awareness of the continuous ethnic cleansing of Palestinians that has been ongoing for decades. The US, itself a perpetrator of ethnic cleansing against indigenous peoples, and whose scientists were directly involved in inspiring the eugenics programs of Hitler in the preceding years of Israel's origin, has been propping up Israel as a deflector of it and Europe's guilt in the holocaust, for what I would say is pretty much all of Israel's history (I don't say one hundred percent because that would downplay the agency and accountability of the Jewish leaders of the Zionist movement that advocated for the creation of the Israel - which was not the mainstream Jewish movement). Jewish refugees were welcomed by Palestinians, and supported by Palestinians; but when the Western world set up the colonial power of Israel, it set of the cascade effect that's led to a deeply traumatizing conflict that I have had to be aware of as a Muslim American in a post 9/11 society my entire life. And I have seen antisemitism in my own communities, and I know it is a real problem that needs to be addressed. As someone who is not Jewish, it's something I benefit from and am capable of perpetuating, so I need to extra careful to guard against it. This is also something I've been aware of since a child. But the root of most bigotries I believe are best addressed by understanding of common humanity, a humanity that is denied Palestinians when the history of their colonization and its causes are minimized. 

I appreciate you sharing about your evolving perspective. I have really benefited from interfaith work that I've gotten involved in and friends I've made in my community who are anti-Zionist Jewish people and understand decolonizing perspectives as fundamental to their Jewish faith. I really respect the work they do, and it's community in that way that keeps me hopeful even when I watch stuff like the speech tonight and feel hopeless. A 6-week ceasefire when the initial exchange of hostages were always on the table but Israel was turning down all attempts at negotiation is not a good-faith ceasefire that will result in anything other than more Palestinian deaths on a large scale; Netanyahu has made clear that it's not about getting the hostages home (especially underscored by the Israeli Occupation Forces having been responsible for the deaths of at least several confirmed hostages already), but it's not just a Netanyahu problem. In order to address the issue, it has to be understood as a societal problem around power and race, apartheid, and colonialism. 

Edited March 8 by dracornithologist

[trystan]

20 minutes ago, dracornithologist said:

it's not just a Netanyahu problem. In order to address the issue, it has to be understood as a societal problem around power and race, apartheid, and colonialism. 

i agree with this.

not that long ago, i tried telling my mom about how Israel is an apartheid country, and she said it's not - there's Palestinians in the Knesset.  and i'm thinking 'i'm sure there are, but is it a proportionate representation?'

maybe it was too many movies, tv shows, and books - i would have thought if Israel was going after the Hamas leaders, they would have known who they were, and it would be quick and concise... not bulldozing everyone and everything.  that's just totally wrong.  israel is a bully.

 

27 minutes ago, dracornithologist said:

I appreciate you sharing about your evolving perspective.

and it's still evolving as well.

[purplehaze]

Adjudicated rapist, serially indicted fraudster, and noted coup enthusiast who incited a mob to violently halt the peaceful transfer of power clinches GOP nomination
The Republican Party is officially morally bankrupt. What a world.

[trystan]

in any previous iteration of the world, all those indictments and incitement would have done the guy in.

the world's gone insane, i want to get off....

Edited March 13 by trystan