6 ms·

ridiculously how Americans are agitating for Oprah as the best chance to save us from Trump...just goes to show the sad state of affairs in US. Oprah and Trump

ridiculously how Americans are agitating for Oprah as the best chance to save us from Trump...just goes to show the sad state of affairs in US. Oprah and Trump are two sides of the same coin.

oceanghost 9y ago
The American media in no way represents the American public.
- cmurf 9y ago
  Based on what data? Most of the American media is privately owned, and for-profit. Someone's paying for that. If it's not the American public, who is?
  - oceanghost 9y ago
    You just answered your own question.
tdb7893 9y ago
The much more common sentiment among my liberal friends is that after Trump they want someone who knows what the hell they are doing and Oprah is not that person. Maybe it's just the liberals I know but they have so far all been hostile to her running.
- Lazare 9y ago
  Fingers crossed, but then again, all the conservatives I know detested Trump too, and yet here we are. If the field is fractured, a surprisingly small group of fans can push a highly disliked candidate to the top of the heap, and once that happens, the inexorable logic of the electoral system can make it difficult to reverse. (I'm thinking here of Trump, of course, but Clinton is almost as good an example.)
  - cmurf 9y ago
    2018 Jan 1-7 87% of Republicans approve of Trump, 5% of Democrats approve, 32% of independents approve http://news.gallup.com/poll/203198/presidential-approval-ratings-donald-trump.aspx http://news.gallup.com/poll/203198/presidential-approval-rat...
    - aidenn0 9y ago
      Trump was polling at 3.6% among republicans as late as June 2015...
      - deleted 9y ago
        [deleted]
    - Lazare 9y ago
      Right, but the situation was very different prior to and during the primaries. Only once he became the nominee and (especially) president did Republican's start to come round. As, I'm sure, most of the Democrat's asking Oprah not to run would do so if she won the nomination. My point is, if popularity 2+ years before the election was any guide, then we would probably be talking about how weird it is to have a third President Bush right now (I still remember headlines from 2016 about "Bush surges to 2016 GOP frontrunner"). A year later and Jeb was an embarrassing fizzle.
      - cmurf 9y ago
        The point of my citation is to contrast with the anecdote about conservatives detesting Trump. Overwhelmingly Republicans (not necessarily conservatives) approve of what he's doing. It'll be vaguely interesting to see if these numbers weakend meaningfully after the most recent week's episodes of Celebrity Chaos Clown.
- dashundchen 9y ago
  Same - could be a bubble but I haven't seen anything supporting her running, just pieces on why it would be terrible if she did - which I agree with.
  - DashRattlesnake 9y ago
    > I haven't seen anything supporting her running I have. More specifically, I've seen a bunch of posts criticizing the criticism of her potential candidacy, basically for ruining the good vibes from after her speech. This might be another filter-bubble effect, too. I know a lot of people who are a certain kind of progressive activist.
- arduanika 9y ago
  Speaking from the center, yes, I'd love to see someone who knows what they're doing. (But worst of all would be someone who knows what all of us our doing. If forced to vote in a Winfrey vs. Zuckerberg primary, I suppose I'd choose her).
  - mc32 9y ago
    Oh, good god, yes. There is no way in hell I'd vote for a technocrat who believes he knows more than Obama thought he knew.
Johnny555 9y ago
I think it's more the sad state of America's 2 party system - elections are less about voting for the "best" candidate, and more about voting for the least bad of the only 2 viable choices. A vote for a 3rd party candidate is effectively a vote against your favorite of the main party candidates. I think some sort of ranked voting system would be better.
- oldandtired 9y ago
  As long as you have "first past the post" and voluntary voting, you won't really get anything better. The compulsory voting and specifying the order of who want in is, somewhat better, in that there can be non-major candidates that end up getting elected. Isn't perfect, but then again, what is?
  - hinkley 9y ago
    It also signals that someone who got 60% doesn’t necessarily have a “mandate”. People may have just really hated the other front runner. If 20% cast a ranked vote for a more centrist or extreme 3rd party candidate you know which way you have to lean your policies within your comfort zone to do what you meant to without tanking your approval rating.
    - refurb 9y ago
      With more than two parties the likelihood of a President having a mandate is even lower.
- beebmam 9y ago
  The 2 party system is a product of a lot of things, but when it comes time to vote for president, almost all large American cities have literally 0% say in who gets elected. The electoral college system is an absolute joke
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
maxxxxx 9y ago
Yes, let's trade one narcissist for another who is on the cover of every issue of her own magazine.
SmirkingRevenge 9y ago
I'm not sure that they are? Nobody asked for it, but the media started talking about it, for some reason. I think part of why it still has some life, is that it is so outlandish to even think about (like Trump) - its great click bait.
IkmoIkmo 9y ago
Are there really Americans calling for Oprah though, really?... I mean, who of your friends or family actually said that Oprah should become president? All I'm familiar with is the media that keeps talking about how not Oprah, but 'insiders' keep saying she should run. It's an absolute joke. To me it seems obvious that Oprah wants to run, and that there wasn't anyone calling for that until she started a media campaign of anonymous-insiders talking about her run for presidency. I hate these self prophesying stories. You can hardly not respond to this nonsense, but responding to it doesn't seem to help either.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > I mean, who of your friends or family actually said that Oprah should become president? Several people in my social media circles almost immediately after the speech, before any media traction from it. Since then, several more, often reposting/sharing/retweeting others outside my circles.
dragonwriter 9y ago
> ridiculously how Americans are agitating for Oprah as the best chance to save us from Trump It's actually not uncommon even in normal times for a bried “so and so for President” thing to pop up after a particular speech or event that has large viewership in which someone has a performance which resonates with a segment of the population. While I’m mildly concerned about it, I’d be cautious to give it much weight unless it doesn't fade in a couple of weeks.
badwulf 9y ago
Save you from this? https://www.google.co.uk/search?safe=off&dcr=0&source=hp&ei=oGhcWoXwOMP3kwW8jIXwBA&q=dow+jones+index&oq=dow+jones&gs_l=psy-ab.3.1.0l10.614.2153.0.3177.10.6.0.3.3.0.186.186.0j1.1.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..6.4.199.0...0.RXbgteSWtgY https://www.google.co.uk/search?safe=off&dcr=0&source=hp&ei=...

ridiculously how Americans are agitating for Oprah as the best chance to save us from Trump...just goes to show the sad state of affairs in US. Oprah and Trump are two sides of the same coin.

oceanghost 9y ago

The American media in no way represents the American public.

cmurf 9y ago
Based on what data? Most of the American media is privately owned, and for-profit. Someone's paying for that. If it's not the American public, who is?
- oceanghost 9y ago
  You just answered your own question.

tdb7893 9y ago

The much more common sentiment among my liberal friends is that after Trump they want someone who knows what the hell they are doing and Oprah is not that person. Maybe it's just the liberals I know but they have so far all been hostile to her running.

Lazare 9y ago
Fingers crossed, but then again, all the conservatives I know detested Trump too, and yet here we are. If the field is fractured, a surprisingly small group of fans can push a highly disliked candidate to the top of the heap, and once that happens, the inexorable logic of the electoral system can make it difficult to reverse. (I'm thinking here of Trump, of course, but Clinton is almost as good an example.)
- cmurf 9y ago
  2018 Jan 1-7 87% of Republicans approve of Trump, 5% of Democrats approve, 32% of independents approve http://news.gallup.com/poll/203198/presidential-approval-ratings-donald-trump.aspx http://news.gallup.com/poll/203198/presidential-approval-rat...
  - aidenn0 9y ago
    Trump was polling at 3.6% among republicans as late as June 2015...
    - deleted 9y ago
      [deleted]
  - Lazare 9y ago
    Right, but the situation was very different prior to and during the primaries. Only once he became the nominee and (especially) president did Republican's start to come round. As, I'm sure, most of the Democrat's asking Oprah not to run would do so if she won the nomination. My point is, if popularity 2+ years before the election was any guide, then we would probably be talking about how weird it is to have a third President Bush right now (I still remember headlines from 2016 about "Bush surges to 2016 GOP frontrunner"). A year later and Jeb was an embarrassing fizzle.
    - cmurf 9y ago
      The point of my citation is to contrast with the anecdote about conservatives detesting Trump. Overwhelmingly Republicans (not necessarily conservatives) approve of what he's doing. It'll be vaguely interesting to see if these numbers weakend meaningfully after the most recent week's episodes of Celebrity Chaos Clown.
dashundchen 9y ago
Same - could be a bubble but I haven't seen anything supporting her running, just pieces on why it would be terrible if she did - which I agree with.
- DashRattlesnake 9y ago
  > I haven't seen anything supporting her running I have. More specifically, I've seen a bunch of posts criticizing the criticism of her potential candidacy, basically for ruining the good vibes from after her speech. This might be another filter-bubble effect, too. I know a lot of people who are a certain kind of progressive activist.
arduanika 9y ago
Speaking from the center, yes, I'd love to see someone who knows what they're doing. (But worst of all would be someone who knows what all of us our doing. If forced to vote in a Winfrey vs. Zuckerberg primary, I suppose I'd choose her).
- mc32 9y ago
  Oh, good god, yes. There is no way in hell I'd vote for a technocrat who believes he knows more than Obama thought he knew.

Johnny555 9y ago

I think it's more the sad state of America's 2 party system - elections are less about voting for the "best" candidate, and more about voting for the least bad of the only 2 viable choices. A vote for a 3rd party candidate is effectively a vote against your favorite of the main party candidates. I think some sort of ranked voting system would be better.

oldandtired 9y ago
As long as you have "first past the post" and voluntary voting, you won't really get anything better. The compulsory voting and specifying the order of who want in is, somewhat better, in that there can be non-major candidates that end up getting elected. Isn't perfect, but then again, what is?
- hinkley 9y ago
  It also signals that someone who got 60% doesn’t necessarily have a “mandate”. People may have just really hated the other front runner. If 20% cast a ranked vote for a more centrist or extreme 3rd party candidate you know which way you have to lean your policies within your comfort zone to do what you meant to without tanking your approval rating.
  - refurb 9y ago
    With more than two parties the likelihood of a President having a mandate is even lower.
beebmam 9y ago
The 2 party system is a product of a lot of things, but when it comes time to vote for president, almost all large American cities have literally 0% say in who gets elected. The electoral college system is an absolute joke
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]

maxxxxx 9y ago

Yes, let's trade one narcissist for another who is on the cover of every issue of her own magazine.

SmirkingRevenge 9y ago

I'm not sure that they are? Nobody asked for it, but the media started talking about it, for some reason. I think part of why it still has some life, is that it is so outlandish to even think about (like Trump) - its great click bait.

IkmoIkmo 9y ago

Are there really Americans calling for Oprah though, really?... I mean, who of your friends or family actually said that Oprah should become president? All I'm familiar with is the media that keeps talking about how not Oprah, but 'insiders' keep saying she should run. It's an absolute joke. To me it seems obvious that Oprah wants to run, and that there wasn't anyone calling for that until she started a media campaign of anonymous-insiders talking about her run for presidency. I hate these self prophesying stories. You can hardly not respond to this nonsense, but responding to it doesn't seem to help either.

dragonwriter 9y ago
> I mean, who of your friends or family actually said that Oprah should become president? Several people in my social media circles almost immediately after the speech, before any media traction from it. Since then, several more, often reposting/sharing/retweeting others outside my circles.

dragonwriter 9y ago

> ridiculously how Americans are agitating for Oprah as the best chance to save us from Trump It's actually not uncommon even in normal times for a bried “so and so for President” thing to pop up after a particular speech or event that has large viewership in which someone has a performance which resonates with a segment of the population. While I’m mildly concerned about it, I’d be cautious to give it much weight unless it doesn't fade in a couple of weeks.

badwulf 9y ago

Save you from this? https://www.google.co.uk/search?safe=off&dcr=0&source=hp&ei=oGhcWoXwOMP3kwW8jIXwBA&q=dow+jones+index&oq=dow+jones&gs_l=psy-ab.3.1.0l10.614.2153.0.3177.10.6.0.3.3.0.186.186.0j1.1.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..6.4.199.0...0.RXbgteSWtgY https://www.google.co.uk/search?safe=off&dcr=0&source=hp&ei=...