My father’s side of the family is super, duper, ultra hardcore “conservative” Trump-loving “Christian”.
They love, love, love to bring up politics at every conceivable opportunity. It’s one of those situations where I have loathed going for visits for decades and sometimes even making the obligate check-in calls plays heck on my “nerves”.
But in the past few years when the conversation turns political, I’ve started hearing big shifts in tone when it comes to opinions on the ultra wealthy in the USA. The last time I was at a family gathering around the holidays, they were berating the Luigi situation and talking about how disgusting it was that anybody would do that, let alone condone it.
That conversation literally did a 180 once I pointed out how it was interesting that the school shooting that happened that same day (or maybe it was a day or two before/after) had received a fraction of the coverage. And it was interesting how murders of people who aren’t rich don’t get that kind of coverage. Basically, when people like you and me get killed for whatever reason, you don’t hear about it. But a rich person is shot and suddenly it’s national news and top billed news for weeks. Wonder why that is?
And those conservative “I hate liberals and liberals should be shot” relatives of mine were in complete agreement.
So, whether you think it sucks or not, you need to know that if you actually want change and actually want things to improve, you’re going to have to forgive and you’re going to have to find common ground with people that you otherwise disagree with on a fundamental level. Fuck you if you say otherwise, you are wrong. And I don’t say that lightly.
There you go, dems. You know what they want.
God I wish we had elected Bernie.
Oh they know, but 98% of them consider taxing the rich to be self-persecution. The current crop of establishment dems need to be recalled or primaried, they’re too corrupted to turn a new page.
Yup! The issue is the dems are supported by, you guessed it, the rich. Aside from a few outliers who put their beliefs and morals ahead of their wallets or power, most of the dems would never turn their back on their oligarchic stakeholders.
I mean, fuck, they make $174,000 a year and work like 130 days a year. Assuming 8 hour work days, that’s ~$167/hour, before any sort of lobbying or
bribesgifts. They can just sit there and do fuck all and be happy as a cow, so that’s what they do. For some reason, we (the people) keep voting for them, usually just out of fear of the other guys getting the spot.I hate this fucking system.
For some reason, we (the people) keep voting for them
There is definitely a lot of propaganda at work in the “media”, and divisive identity politics which drive those votes. Unfortunately that stuff doesn’t matter at all when it comes to people’s material living conditions, which should be the true litmus test for elected officials.
Thankfully it seems people are starting to wake up to those cheap manipulative tricks, and it showed with the Dems’ massive loss in the last election when they refused to change tactics. If they cared about winning they’d definitely change things up now, but they only care about lining their own pockets so I’m not going to hold my breath.
One solid theory on how to oust them is that a lot of what gets someone into office is name recognition. They get re-elected because it’s that comfortable, familiar name with the correct letter beside it that voters always see at the ballot box. Perhaps primary challengers can start to win if they get their name out there across multiple election cycles, but it does take a lot of valuable time to do it that way.
It’s not lost on me that this speaks to an incredibly uninformed voting populace regarding policy positions, but it’s really hard to appreciate that nuance in the context of today’s 128 character quips or sound bytes. Hopefully we can get back to that level of interest once we have people in power demonstrably helping their constituents as opposed to simply robbing them while convincing them of something else entirely.
Hey California, New York.
Maybe start taking some notes from Nebraska. This is why when the common political wisdom claims you have to run “moderates” and blue dogs in rural districts, I puke in my mouth.
Nebraska gets one electoral vote per 400k people. California gets 1 per 731k. Nebraska gets two senators to represent 2 million people while California gets two senators to represent 39.5 million people.
Stop acting like this is some moment of Nebraska having progressive clarity. It isn’t. Had states like Nebraska with unproportional representation actually voted for more progressive candidates we wouldn’t be in this boat. But sure, bemoan the states who have tried to do something but can’t because of an antiquated system. Even though nothing would have changed since Trump also won the popular vote this go around anyways.
Also, Kamala didn’t lose because she was a moderate. She lost because she’s a mixed race woman. Not saying progressive policies aren’t my values and aren’t appreciated, but people want to look at Kamala and think we lost because she had a middle ground personality rather than the harsh reality that the voter base isn’t ready for a mixed race woman to lead the country.
Stop acting like this is some moment of Nebraska having progressive clarity.
The issue is that Democrats, and the neoliberal caucus in particular, have gone out of their way to misunderstand and therefore give up on, or to run in an entirely wrong manner, for seats that are very, very winnable.
As you point out, Nebraska has a 20:1 ratio of people to Senators relative to California. That means your electoral “dollar” goes 20x farther in Nebraska than it does in California. And as is evidenced above, they hate their Republicans almost as much as they hate Democrats, like most of America.
Also, Kamala didn’t lose because she was a moderate. She lost because she’s a mixed race woman.
Miss me with this neo-liberal fucking dipshit take. Get the fuck out of here with this. She lost 100% because of her rightward step, and sure, being a mixed race woman would have been an uphill struggle, but America elected a black man named Barrack Hussein Obama, in the fucking war in the god damned middle east, because they thought he represented what he campaigned on: change. Yes its a sexist and racist country, but far, far more-so, it is a country desperately trying to change the status-quo politics which quite literally aren’t working for anyone.
If you are so pudding brained this is the lesson you learned from 2024, you will never win another election in this country again. Before Kamala pivoted to right wing positions (prior the convention), her polling was on headed straight to the fucking moon. Why? Because the only things people had to go off of to estimate who she was, was her 2020 primary platform: And its a super fucking popular platform. Its the platform that Bernie ran on. Its the platform that got Biden elected.
She was cruising on a rocket ship to be in the range of 53-56% by election day. And then the fucking moderate Democrats stepped in. With their fucking “well reasoned” arguments about centrism and courting the “moderate Republicans”. And she stepped to the right. She cut a speaking position for a Gazan delegate to give space to a “moderate Republican”. She chose to platform Liz fucking Cheney, who lost her primary with 25% of the vote. Harris quite literally said that she would “do nothing fundamentally different” and that “nothing would change” under her Presidency.
Get to the back of the fucking bus with this shit, because if this is the political wisdom you coming to the table with, we can not afford to have you leading.
Get to the back of the fucking bus with this shit
Phrasing
Your right that I should have chose something different, but I’m not going to edit it, because I expect to be held accountable for what I say. Its an implicitly racist thing to say, and just because its something people in the communities that I grew up in say, that doesn’t mean I should be using it like I did.
I understood what you meant, it clearly wasn’t intended with any racial undertones, just thought I’d point it out given the context of the conversation.
I understand as well. And having grown up at the interface between black and brown communities and white communities, like, when my black friends say that to me its different then when we speaking online. Sometimes its cultural context, sometimes its racism, and that doesn’t always come across online.
A-fucking-men friendo
Telling someone to “get to the back of the bus” while in the same comment trying to say Race didn’t play a factor is some major yikes.
Hilary Clinton was also “cruising” at those ranges and lost too… because of the electoral college and middle America. Considering you make racist ass statements I wouldn’t expect you to understand the intricacies or Misogyny and race as a factor into Kamala. I’m not even a supporter of her. I called her losing the second they announced she was the new candidate.
Telling someone to “get to the back of the bus” while in the same comment trying to say Race didn’t play a factor is some major yikes.
You are right on the origins of that phrase. And maybe its time for white, neoliberal, corporate mediocrity to take a back seat to black, brown, and other approaches to politics within the party, considering that was the white Democrat neoliberal politics that have been continuously losing ground for almost a decade.
I’m not even a supporter of her. I called her losing the second they announced she was the new candidate.
And called her losing as soon as she was announced? Bruh you didn’t even give her a chance? I was one of the strongest voices here asking Biden to step down and as soon as I heard she was the candidate I hopped into that coconut tree. Donated, dialed, organized. She went from being at 36% in the polls to over 50% practically overnight. She had real momentum. And when she stepped away from the politics people though she had, the ones she ran on in 2020, and stepped towards conservative white voters, she began to slip, and slip continuously till election day.
You can’t keep blaming structural issues or the electorate. They are what they are, and you know what they are before you ever slip on your walking shoes to campaign. The Harris campaign made bad choices when it came to how to campaign, and what to focus on. Blaming sexism or racism is an excuse that gives Democrats more space to continue to become a whiter, less inclusive, less representative party.
I’m not an american, but man did Kamala and Biden look washed up as fuck. The same thing is happening in Europe/Romania too: washed up politicians that are tone deaf to the majority of people and then are surprised pikachu face when they lose. It boggles my mind almost no one comes up with (and is LOUD about it) things that favor the middle/working class.
And Trump isn’t tone deaf? Hillary was tone deaf, Kamala and Bidden were not.
Kamala brought back Hillary’s campaign staff. They are the same picture.
They invited Liz Cheney to their campaign…
He stormed the Capitol building in a violent coup attempt, why is this even a comparison
Trump is at least a showman and it showed that a lot of people are braindead enough to believe him. This coupled with the apathy of the other part (afaik Kamala had fewer votes overall than Biden) got us here. The democrats, as with many other parties over here in Europe are fucking afraid to SAY THINGS OUT LOUD. I don’t know if that’s because they consider themselves too god for it or not, but it’s disastrous. Here in Romania the former president had less public appearances in 10 fucking years than the interim one we have had for the past ~2 months and we were on the verge of electing a russian puppet mostly out of spite.
Trump is not really a showman, he’s a shambling corpse with zero charisma who needs to rely on saying the most bold-faced lies to generate any enthusiasm among his voters. All of the hype around him is manufactured.
People basically just support him because he has an R next to his name, because he “tells it like it is(n’t),” and because capitalism has brainwashed people into believing that businessmen should run the world. That, and he was a white man running against a colored woman, which gave him the racism votes that America still has in spades.
Listen, I hate Trump and his crowd of Nazis but saying he has no charisma is just delusional
He’s practically incoherent though. He can’t deliver clear statements or messages, and his public speaking events are always awkward and small. The debate he participated in was embarrassing. And just on a physical level, he is a gross, unhealthy person with fake hair and a fake tan.
But he has good PR that frames him as charismatic and powerful, he has a lot of high-profile sycophants who fawn over him, and most public interactions he has are staged to make him look good. There is definitely a Trump cult of personality, but it’s not a cult that was created organically by his own charisma.
Had states like Nebraska with unproportional representation actually voted for more progressive candidates we wouldn’t be in this boat.
Omaha, Nebraska is fully owned and operated by Berkshire Hathaway. The state’s legislature is fully in their pocket. The statewide representation is entirely Buffett/Munger pilled.
People will tell you these guys are liberals, then get all google-y eyed when the states put up straight fascist representation decade after decade, while the billionaire class goes on TV and says “Gee, I wish this wasn’t happening to you all.”
The Republican party’s greatest fear, taxes on the rich.
Also a lot of Democratic leadership’s
Well yeah, from Chuck Schumer to Nancy Pelosi winning the stock market with insider trading.
Anyone want to guess what is not going to happen?
Republicans:
Sorry, sirs and madames, we only sell tax cuts for the rich here.
Let me guess … the Republicans couldn’t hear a thing
Tbf neither of the established parties could give a fuck
Which is why I keep referring to the US as a one party state … the Democrat/Republican Party … which is owned and controlled by the oligarchy it is beholden to.
I’ll never understand the mindset of spending MORE on lobbying and fucking competitors over and donating to political campaigns instead of spending the same or less on taxes that directly benefit infrastructure in the whole country you partake in and your businesses use like public roads, police keeping you safe, and keeping gas cheap with soft global power and not having your lifestyle change one bit. Just the idea of allocating taxes to people who you don’t personally know is the worst offense…but also giving all your mental energy and cash to politicians is ok. Elon could have retired to blowjob Island 10 years ago and instead became a nazi competing with Trump for who can blow putin the hardest.
I wouldn’t take this as anything other than local Democrats showed up to yell at him, to be honest.
Republicans aren’t exactly known for their pro-taxation stance let alone taxing the wealthy. :/
I searched for “mike flood town hall” filtering out results after November of 2024 and found a bunch of news stories across 2023 and 2024 talking about him holding townhalls but never found any saying that he’d had a bunch of people show up to yell at him. Seems like whatever this is it’s something different.
Why is this News? Of COURSE Republicans want to Tax The Rich! But they would Rather DIE then to Vote for ANYONE OTHER then a Republican!
