4 ms·

I've had the same thought and it sickens me that we've come to this point. As someone who has made the transition from teenager to young adult during the Trump

I've had the same thought and it sickens me that we've come to this point. As someone who has made the transition from teenager to young adult during the Trump era, I feel like I've lost a game I never even had the chance to play. We have clearly gone so far off course but very few seem interested in steering us back to reality (between the impeachment "trial", the primaries, and our handling of COVID-19). After four years of the disaster that is the Trump administration, any establishment Democrats like Biden elected to office will be praised no matter what they do, simply by virtue of not being Trump. But that's not real progress. They'll continue to neglect wealth inequality / infrastructure / privacy / technology issues. And Trump isn't the problem, he's just a convenient distraction from the fact that big money controls both parties. It's just that establishment Democrats more or less want to maintain the status quo, while conservatives are using Trump to brazenly roll back regulations. Four years from now, we'll have even more damning evidence about the true long-term economic/social/environmental damage done during his term (as if it weren't clear enough). If he's not in office long enough, this will all be blamed on the next president, adding more fuel to the fire for a likely 2024 run. Or worse: Someone more cunning but just as evil comes along, charming voters while more adeptly covering up their true intentions. Our only hope this that enough voters get really pissed off enough to vote in every local, state, and federal election consistently enough for the next couple decades so that we can start to heal. Biden's not going to inspire that. Bernie, maybe, had the chance to. Trump will do it. And if we can't survive another four years of Trump, we don't deserve to.

JSavageOne 6y ago
I agree, but at least it seems like we're incrementally moving in the right direction, even if at a glacial pace. The fact that a 27-year old AOC was elected shows that people are fed up with establishment politicians and change is possible (prior to being elected she was a bartender with no money or connections, who ran on a grassroots campaign of being fed up with politicians taking corporate money and serving corporate interests over their citizens, and beat a Democrat who'd been in power for ~15 years). Once the older generation dies out and the younger generation takes over, we'll start to see some real progress. Imagine where we could be if more of our politicians resembled people like Andrew Yang - young normal uncorrupted people who grew up in the internet generation. The problem is that most of our politicians are too old (average Senator is 61 years old) and are completely removed from the real issues facing Americans.
- kelnos 6y ago
  The problem is that when the older generation dies out, the younger generation is no longer young, and their attitudes have changed. Not quite to the same exact conservative/anti-progressive place that their parents and grandparents occupied, but definitely more conservative than they were when they were younger. We'll see progress, to be sure (and that's good!), but it won't be as dramatic as you think. It'll likely be similar to the last several generations of progress.
  - JSavageOne 6y ago
    That's true to an extent, but I think this time is different because the millenials have had to endure so much obvious hardships as a direct result of the baby boomers' incompetence (eg. student debt), and because millennials grew up with the internet and all the information that gives one access to. Politicians like Bernie and AOC are more in line with how millennial stand (my Boomer dad doesn't understand what they're so angry about), and if those policies were implemented, that'd be a massively different society than today.
taylorhou 6y ago
I feel like there are many more folks that would vote for Trump in spite of Biden "winning" the Democratic nod. 1000% agree that the next president is going to be left holding the bag of sht and get blamed for everything so might as well let it be Trump.
- jacobush 6y ago
  Trump seems immune to blaming. To his fans, everything bad is because of unpatriotic traitors.
zimpenfish 6y ago
> Bernie, maybe, had the chance to. Bernie didn't even inspire people to vote for him in the primary; how was he going to inspire people if he got nominated?
- benrbray 6y ago
  Hence the "maybe". He clearly missed his chance.
- mercer 6y ago
  Bernie had the main-stream media + the entire DNC apparatus against him. That's a ton of power and influence. I'm not saying he would've 'won'; it's quite possible he positioned himself as too much 'non-establishment', or perhaps too little. but saying he didn't inspire people to vote for him in the primary is not evident, IMO.
  - zimpenfish 6y ago
    > saying he didn't inspire people to vote for him in the primary is not evident, IMO. The fact he didn't win is evidence of that, surely?
    - mercer 6y ago
      It's evidence, but it's not evident. Those are not the same thing.

JSavageOne 6y ago

I agree, but at least it seems like we're incrementally moving in the right direction, even if at a glacial pace. The fact that a 27-year old AOC was elected shows that people are fed up with establishment politicians and change is possible (prior to being elected she was a bartender with no money or connections, who ran on a grassroots campaign of being fed up with politicians taking corporate money and serving corporate interests over their citizens, and beat a Democrat who'd been in power for ~15 years). Once the older generation dies out and the younger generation takes over, we'll start to see some real progress. Imagine where we could be if more of our politicians resembled people like Andrew Yang - young normal uncorrupted people who grew up in the internet generation. The problem is that most of our politicians are too old (average Senator is 61 years old) and are completely removed from the real issues facing Americans.

kelnos 6y ago
The problem is that when the older generation dies out, the younger generation is no longer young, and their attitudes have changed. Not quite to the same exact conservative/anti-progressive place that their parents and grandparents occupied, but definitely more conservative than they were when they were younger. We'll see progress, to be sure (and that's good!), but it won't be as dramatic as you think. It'll likely be similar to the last several generations of progress.
- JSavageOne 6y ago
  That's true to an extent, but I think this time is different because the millenials have had to endure so much obvious hardships as a direct result of the baby boomers' incompetence (eg. student debt), and because millennials grew up with the internet and all the information that gives one access to. Politicians like Bernie and AOC are more in line with how millennial stand (my Boomer dad doesn't understand what they're so angry about), and if those policies were implemented, that'd be a massively different society than today.

taylorhou 6y ago

I feel like there are many more folks that would vote for Trump in spite of Biden "winning" the Democratic nod. 1000% agree that the next president is going to be left holding the bag of sht and get blamed for everything so might as well let it be Trump.

jacobush 6y ago
Trump seems immune to blaming. To his fans, everything bad is because of unpatriotic traitors.

zimpenfish 6y ago

> Bernie, maybe, had the chance to. Bernie didn't even inspire people to vote for him in the primary; how was he going to inspire people if he got nominated?

benrbray 6y ago
Hence the "maybe". He clearly missed his chance.
mercer 6y ago
Bernie had the main-stream media + the entire DNC apparatus against him. That's a ton of power and influence. I'm not saying he would've 'won'; it's quite possible he positioned himself as too much 'non-establishment', or perhaps too little. but saying he didn't inspire people to vote for him in the primary is not evident, IMO.
- zimpenfish 6y ago
  > saying he didn't inspire people to vote for him in the primary is not evident, IMO. The fact he didn't win is evidence of that, surely?
  - mercer 6y ago
    It's evidence, but it's not evident. Those are not the same thing.