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> I stated we could have mass violence in this country if the election were overturned this late after the election. "Could"? There will be a civil war if Tru

• krapp 10y ago
  >Democrats are funny people. "Mass violence is better than a Trump presidency." And yet Republicans have been using crypto-revolutionary language for years, especially after deciding to make the Tea Party their proxy in order to gin up fears of Obama's "radical marxist ideology". This isn't a matter of only one party or the other wanting bloodshed. The Second Amendment has deeply ingrained into the American political consciousness the premise that revolutionary violence is not only justifiable but periodically necessary for a free state - that ideal, coupled with the polarized political atmosphere that requires everyone to view their opponents as evil and their every political action illegitimate, makes violence seem inevitable. Luckily for our Republic, far more American armchair revolutionaries are willing to talk about watering the tree of liberty with the blood of tyrants than are willing to do the gardening themselves.
  • EdHominem 10y ago
    > the polarized political atmosphere that requires everyone to view their opponents as evil and their every political action illegitimate I think you'll find that the game theory behind a winner-take-all simple majority vote leads almost inevitably to exactly that. The one dynamic responsible is what I call "the Price is Right phenomenon". In that game show we're both guessing a price and the closest guess wins. If you bet $2 and my guess is $4, I'm still going to say $2.01 because I've captured the middle-ground. If the price is $2.04, far closer to your best guess than mine, I'll still still win. Whereas if I expressed my true beliefs I'd have lost. Note that I also win if the price is $200.04. This parallels the support you get and accept, because in a one-dimensional political system (all a single vote can express) all you have is left and right. All nuance in the other side is lost in the fact that they'll outlaw your gay marriage, or they'll let your daughter get an abortion, whichever way you swing. This leads to hypocrisy such as saying "A vote for a third party is a vote wasted" and then being upset at a party for accepting the support of unsavory characters (who you've just told not to waste their votes.) In a two-party system, which is what first past the post produces, your enemies are, by necessity, friends with your enemies. It's not people who suck, or that we deserve ourselves, it's specifically the system we use. With a broken system there is no way to properly state your preferences, and to the degree you can you may have to pull the lever one way to try to go the other. In any and all other aspects of lives we demand better. We don't let the bank or the grocery store offer us such poor options for expressing our preferences. We're doomed to live this until we have more input than 0 or 1 (and hardly that, in a swing state...) Investigate Approval Voting and push for it in all public elections in your name.
  • groovy2shoes 10y ago
    > the polarized political atmosphere that requires everyone to view their opponents as evil and their every political action illegitimate I don't recall such an atmosphere being present in prior elections. I don't recall ever witnessing so much divisiveness among Americans as I have the last few weeks. This election was particularly heated, and, frankly, I blame the Democratic party and the Clinton campaign for that. The Clinton campaign somehow managed to convince roughly half of the country that the other half are actually akin to, and just as evil as, Hitler supporters. Such thinking has no basis in fact. It's her characterization of half of the population of the US as "deplorables" that caused such enormous divisiveness among Americans. In response to the election, many democrats have resorted to name-calling (racist, sexist, etc.), fraudulent claims of violence and rape, actual violent attacks on alleged Trump supporters, and temper-tantrums in general. This reaction only serves to fuel the division. And, because of Clinton's tactic of demonizing her critics and non-supporters, her supporters feel absolutely justified in these actions. After all, if you had a chance to stop the Nazis from taking over, wouldn't you do anything in your power to do so? Hillary, whether she intended to or not, gave her supporters a free pass to be utterly ruthless towards everyone else without compromising their consciences or their morals. It seems to me like many of Hillary's supporters never even gave Trump a fair listen, given that all of their arguments against a Trump presidency seem to be counterfactual bullshit straight out of the campaign propaganda machine. There are plenty of legitimate arguments to be made against Trump, but vague accusations that he's a "white supremacist" and a "sexist" and a "Nazi" seem to be par for the course, and have no empirical foundation whatsoever. Everybody needs to take a deep breath, take off the propaganda goggles, and have a look at the reality around them. Instead of writing off your fellow Americans as bigots, give them a chance to explain where they're coming from. Seek some understanding of your compatriots instead of being so quick to deride them.
    • EdHominem 10y ago
      > It's her characterization of half of the population of the US as "deplorables" Let me help you read that quote: "you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables. Right? The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic" Half of Trump's supporters. That's roughly 20% of the country. And yes, if they're racist, sexist, homophobic, etc, they are deplorable. > Everybody needs to take a deep breath, take off the propaganda goggles, and have a look at the reality around them. Cough, yes. You really should lay off the propaganda. > Instead of writing off your fellow Americans as bigots, give them a chance to explain where they're coming from. No. If you're telling me what to do in my bedroom, I don't give a rat's ass. If you're racist, I don't care what anecdotes made you that way. If you're trying to tell me who I can marry, I don't care in the slightest why you feel that way. You don't want me in your kitchen telling you what to do, so don't pitch a fit when I don't care for you telling me how to run my life. Stop trying to control people and they'll stop pushing back. > Hillary, whether she intended to or not, gave her supporters a free pass You're equating mean words with Trump's racist scapegoating, his stated intent to kill families of terrorists, deport people born here, etc. Get a sense of scale. > never even gave Trump a fair listen A fair listen doesn't mean hang on his words, it means to listen until he's made it obvious that he's clearly unfit for the position. Maybe you believe he's smarter than all the generals, etc, but if I heard that ignorant bravado from a coworker or a presidential candidate I'd put them in the stupid pile. For years before the election he went on about Obama's birth certificate. Him and the racists. But yeah, you can tell yourself that he had a real legalistic reason for asking Obama but not Clinton, Bush, etc. > frankly, I blame the Democratic party and the Clinton campaign for that I'm sure you do.
• MisterBastahrd 10y ago
  The vast majority of Trump voters wouldn't walk past the end of their own block to protest an accurate vote count.