4 ms·

Vote for republicans => get red state policies. Trump won the popular vote. America is trying very hard to become one big red state. Red states have had the w

Vote for republicans => get red state policies. Trump won the popular vote. America is trying very hard to become one big red state. Red states have had the worst outcomes for generations but they keep going back to republicans. The reasons escape me. The Civil War was basically southerners strongly preferring to use slaves instead of modernizing. Lots of them died for this. Make it make sense. This dysfunction goes a lot deeper than any one administration. Maybe the rise of China will motivate them to get their act together.

3cats-in-a-coat 1y ago
Not sure what Trump does could be called red state policies. There are elements of them, but it's mostly an endless chaos machine and he tries to personally profit or enjoy himself with it. But mostly profit.
- Herring 1y ago
  The overlap is extensive. Abortion, immigration, racism/DEI/trans, tax cuts, deregulation, judicial appointments, fossil fuel production, skepticism towards green energy and climate change, prioritizing conservative Christian religious preferences, restructuring/downsizing the Federal Government etc etc. Most of what he does is currently and historically very popular in red states, with predictable outcomes. Corruption is non-partisan, but they definitely turn a blind eye to it.
jmclnx 1y ago
[flagged]
- sleepybrett 1y ago
  I mean sure there is an element of both racism, both because kamala harris is non-white but also immigration fear mongering, and sexism... but also as someone who voted for her, Kamala Harris fucking sucks. Just a terrible candidate, perhaps only rivaled by Joe 'wheel me out to the community room so I can play some bigno' Biden.
- mc32 1y ago
  No, the other candidate was a terrible candidate who conspired to conceal the mental and physical decline of the then President. Don’t believe me? look at Tapper’s new tell-all; and apparently soon KJP is coming out with another tell-all. Don’t blame voters, blame the pathetic political machine that could not help itself.
  - krapp 1y ago
    >No, the other candidate was a terrible candidate who conspired to conceal the mental and physical decline of the then President. Americans seem to be trying really hard to justify voting for Trump by making it seem as if they faced an intractable choice between two terrible options - and of course many like yourself are piling on some conspiracy theory to also make it seem as if the options were equally corrupt. But no. At worst, Kamala Harris was a mainstream candidate, not even significantly leftist, certainly no less qualified than Trump, and not "terrible" in comparison to other alternatives. Americans just don't trust a non-white woman in a position of power. They would have voted for Hitler just to have a white dick and balls in the Oval Office. And Biden's mental and physical health was a subject of memes before he was even elected, and the most popular Republican President in history prior to the current one probably had Alzheimer's in office. And the current one isn't exactly at his physical or mental prime.
    - mc32 1y ago
      Check out the young turks. They will tell you that the Dems undermined themselves by trying to gaslight people into voting for Kamala and to believe that Joe was dynamic and had more stamina than his staffers. Now you have the mainstream try to say that the party pulled the wool over their eyes and fooled them. A few will say that everyone knew he was senile —but somehow still thought it was cool to trot him out till the first debate when for most people, except msnbc and kin, saw the man behind the curtain. MSNBC tried to portray the first debate as a draw. Everyone else saw how pathetic the performance was. Then the machinations began and Joe endorsed Kamala despite Obama and the rest of the mainstream dems wanting an open primary. It was doomed with word salad Kamala who could not relate with regular folks. She was stilted and unauthentic.
- achandlerwhite 1y ago
  I think red voters in this category aren't dumb but prefer a convenient lie than a complex truth when it comes to what the problems are in this country and how to fix them. I guess you could say the same about Dem voters and Biden's health but to be honest I think most Dem voters were probably just voting AGAINST Trump. Plenty of people on the Dem side want the old guard/status quo to retire for new blood.
  - Imustaskforhelp 1y ago
    Yea they were voting against trump because trump said about these stuff he is doing right now and democratic voters didn't want any of that.
  - fhdkweig 1y ago
    I certainly voted that way. I'd rather the old Dem guard retire, but until they do, anyone is better than a known bad guy. And just a bit of history, sometimes voters would rather elect a dead man than a live one. Look into former Governor Mel Carnahan who was elected to Missouri senate, three weeks after he died in a plane crash. Also, Democrat Anthony "Tony" DeLuca died Oct. 9, 2022 a month before winning his seat. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=voters+elect+a+dead+man https://duckduckgo.com/?q=voters+elect+a+dead+man https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/26281/4-dead-politicians-who-still-got-elected https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/26281/4-dead-politicians...
  - mingus88 1y ago
    In a two party system, it’s always the lesser of two evils. Traditionally, both candidates needed to have a healthy amount of centrism to make sure they weren’t more evil/extreme than the other. However these days it feels like populism is the new centrism. Bernie and AOC are more popular than ever and certainly have embraced populism rather than have centrist policies.
    - Aloisius 1y ago
      There's nothing special about the number two. All systems are a lesser of evils. Representative democracy is ultimately an exercise of compromise in order to get anything done.
- Herring 1y ago
  Yeah I came to the same conclusion the answer is (probably) racism, but I’ve never hated another person/culture enough to impoverish myself (or die in a war!) so I don’t really get it…
- ignoramceisblis 1y ago
  You are a liar.
- IAmBroom 1y ago
  And sexism. We elected a black POTUS already, but not a woman one.
toomanyrichies 1y ago
> Make it make sense. There's a great book called "The One Sentence Persuasion Course - 27 Words to Make the World Do Your Bidding", which I keep thinking about with respect to Trump and his ability to sway his voting bloc. The 27 words are: "People will do anything for those who encourage their dreams, justify their failures, allay their fears, confirm their suspicions, and help them throw rocks at their enemies." Trump ticks a lot of these boxes. He "confirms" their suspicions and justifies their failures when he says their problems are caused by immigration, China, and wokeism. He helps them throw rocks at their enemies every time he invents a new petty nickname for his political opponents ("Sleepy Joe" Biden, "Crooked Hillary" Clinton, "Kamabla" Harris, etc). He encourages their dreams with his "Make America Great Again" slogan and "allays their fears" with his "Only I can solve it" rhetoric. And they eat it up because, as misguided as he is, he speaks to them on an emotional level, not a logical one. Trump's base is fundamentally fueled by grievance, and he knows it. When we stop bending over backwards to give them some noble rationale and start looking at their actions from this lens, it starts to make a lot more sense.
- JKCalhoun 1y ago
  I might be one of the few in my circle that feel their grievance is justified. It does still boggle my mind that they would rally around someone is who is in fact part of the problem.
  - username135 1y ago
    Mind elaborating on why you feel its justified? Just curious.
    - JKCalhoun 1y ago
      If they're feeling like "the fix is in" and they no longer have a voice in the big decisions happening in this country — that there is a small club of elites that are calling the shots ... well, they may not be wrong. If they're feeling overwhelmed by the pace of the change happening in our modern world/society, feeling as though they are being left behind — they're not the only ones. If they're feeling as though the contract between the wealth-holders and the laborers has been getting worse and worse for the worker, they may be on to something. Maybe they see the wealthy continuing to fail upward and are finding that just working hard and saving money seem to be less than treading water. There's plenty of things to have grievances about. And I think "left" and "right" might have common ground on these issues.
uses 1y ago
It's simply that blue states haven't been making a case that democrats know how to run things. I would seriously recommend reading Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson.
- const_cast 1y ago
  Sure, but in comparison, they're running laps around red states. Which have significantly higher levels of poverty and are overall just less developed. I mean, if you look at just about any metric from income to education, the disparities cannot be ignored. And, it should be very clear why. When you, say, de-prioritize or are even actively hostile to public education then of course your education is going to suffer. Which, in turn, makes your economy suffer, because most people who are working are now uneducated and therefore poor. So you get a lot of brain drain. There's some notable exceptions, like Texas. But, it's definitely a trend that red states just have worse outcomes across the board. It seems to me people in those states just don't care much, which... whatever. If they're fine with it then I guess it's fine.
sershe 1y ago
Red state policies (or at least a subset) appear to be popular based on the most important form of voting - with one's feet https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/how-congressional-maps-could-change-2030 https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/how-...

3cats-in-a-coat 1y ago

Not sure what Trump does could be called red state policies. There are elements of them, but it's mostly an endless chaos machine and he tries to personally profit or enjoy himself with it. But mostly profit.

Herring 1y ago
The overlap is extensive. Abortion, immigration, racism/DEI/trans, tax cuts, deregulation, judicial appointments, fossil fuel production, skepticism towards green energy and climate change, prioritizing conservative Christian religious preferences, restructuring/downsizing the Federal Government etc etc. Most of what he does is currently and historically very popular in red states, with predictable outcomes. Corruption is non-partisan, but they definitely turn a blind eye to it.

jmclnx 1y ago

[flagged]

sleepybrett 1y ago
I mean sure there is an element of both racism, both because kamala harris is non-white but also immigration fear mongering, and sexism... but also as someone who voted for her, Kamala Harris fucking sucks. Just a terrible candidate, perhaps only rivaled by Joe 'wheel me out to the community room so I can play some bigno' Biden.
mc32 1y ago
No, the other candidate was a terrible candidate who conspired to conceal the mental and physical decline of the then President. Don’t believe me? look at Tapper’s new tell-all; and apparently soon KJP is coming out with another tell-all. Don’t blame voters, blame the pathetic political machine that could not help itself.
- krapp 1y ago
  >No, the other candidate was a terrible candidate who conspired to conceal the mental and physical decline of the then President. Americans seem to be trying really hard to justify voting for Trump by making it seem as if they faced an intractable choice between two terrible options - and of course many like yourself are piling on some conspiracy theory to also make it seem as if the options were equally corrupt. But no. At worst, Kamala Harris was a mainstream candidate, not even significantly leftist, certainly no less qualified than Trump, and not "terrible" in comparison to other alternatives. Americans just don't trust a non-white woman in a position of power. They would have voted for Hitler just to have a white dick and balls in the Oval Office. And Biden's mental and physical health was a subject of memes before he was even elected, and the most popular Republican President in history prior to the current one probably had Alzheimer's in office. And the current one isn't exactly at his physical or mental prime.
  - mc32 1y ago
    Check out the young turks. They will tell you that the Dems undermined themselves by trying to gaslight people into voting for Kamala and to believe that Joe was dynamic and had more stamina than his staffers. Now you have the mainstream try to say that the party pulled the wool over their eyes and fooled them. A few will say that everyone knew he was senile —but somehow still thought it was cool to trot him out till the first debate when for most people, except msnbc and kin, saw the man behind the curtain. MSNBC tried to portray the first debate as a draw. Everyone else saw how pathetic the performance was. Then the machinations began and Joe endorsed Kamala despite Obama and the rest of the mainstream dems wanting an open primary. It was doomed with word salad Kamala who could not relate with regular folks. She was stilted and unauthentic.
achandlerwhite 1y ago
I think red voters in this category aren't dumb but prefer a convenient lie than a complex truth when it comes to what the problems are in this country and how to fix them. I guess you could say the same about Dem voters and Biden's health but to be honest I think most Dem voters were probably just voting AGAINST Trump. Plenty of people on the Dem side want the old guard/status quo to retire for new blood.
- Imustaskforhelp 1y ago
  Yea they were voting against trump because trump said about these stuff he is doing right now and democratic voters didn't want any of that.
- fhdkweig 1y ago
  I certainly voted that way. I'd rather the old Dem guard retire, but until they do, anyone is better than a known bad guy. And just a bit of history, sometimes voters would rather elect a dead man than a live one. Look into former Governor Mel Carnahan who was elected to Missouri senate, three weeks after he died in a plane crash. Also, Democrat Anthony "Tony" DeLuca died Oct. 9, 2022 a month before winning his seat. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=voters+elect+a+dead+man https://duckduckgo.com/?q=voters+elect+a+dead+man https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/26281/4-dead-politicians-who-still-got-elected https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/26281/4-dead-politicians...
- mingus88 1y ago
  In a two party system, it’s always the lesser of two evils. Traditionally, both candidates needed to have a healthy amount of centrism to make sure they weren’t more evil/extreme than the other. However these days it feels like populism is the new centrism. Bernie and AOC are more popular than ever and certainly have embraced populism rather than have centrist policies.
  - Aloisius 1y ago
    There's nothing special about the number two. All systems are a lesser of evils. Representative democracy is ultimately an exercise of compromise in order to get anything done.
Herring 1y ago
Yeah I came to the same conclusion the answer is (probably) racism, but I’ve never hated another person/culture enough to impoverish myself (or die in a war!) so I don’t really get it…
ignoramceisblis 1y ago
You are a liar.
IAmBroom 1y ago
And sexism. We elected a black POTUS already, but not a woman one.

toomanyrichies 1y ago

> Make it make sense. There's a great book called "The One Sentence Persuasion Course - 27 Words to Make the World Do Your Bidding", which I keep thinking about with respect to Trump and his ability to sway his voting bloc. The 27 words are: "People will do anything for those who encourage their dreams, justify their failures, allay their fears, confirm their suspicions, and help them throw rocks at their enemies." Trump ticks a lot of these boxes. He "confirms" their suspicions and justifies their failures when he says their problems are caused by immigration, China, and wokeism. He helps them throw rocks at their enemies every time he invents a new petty nickname for his political opponents ("Sleepy Joe" Biden, "Crooked Hillary" Clinton, "Kamabla" Harris, etc). He encourages their dreams with his "Make America Great Again" slogan and "allays their fears" with his "Only I can solve it" rhetoric. And they eat it up because, as misguided as he is, he speaks to them on an emotional level, not a logical one. Trump's base is fundamentally fueled by grievance, and he knows it. When we stop bending over backwards to give them some noble rationale and start looking at their actions from this lens, it starts to make a lot more sense.

JKCalhoun 1y ago
I might be one of the few in my circle that feel their grievance is justified. It does still boggle my mind that they would rally around someone is who is in fact part of the problem.
- username135 1y ago
  Mind elaborating on why you feel its justified? Just curious.
  - JKCalhoun 1y ago
    If they're feeling like "the fix is in" and they no longer have a voice in the big decisions happening in this country — that there is a small club of elites that are calling the shots ... well, they may not be wrong. If they're feeling overwhelmed by the pace of the change happening in our modern world/society, feeling as though they are being left behind — they're not the only ones. If they're feeling as though the contract between the wealth-holders and the laborers has been getting worse and worse for the worker, they may be on to something. Maybe they see the wealthy continuing to fail upward and are finding that just working hard and saving money seem to be less than treading water. There's plenty of things to have grievances about. And I think "left" and "right" might have common ground on these issues.

uses 1y ago

It's simply that blue states haven't been making a case that democrats know how to run things. I would seriously recommend reading Abundance by Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson.

const_cast 1y ago
Sure, but in comparison, they're running laps around red states. Which have significantly higher levels of poverty and are overall just less developed. I mean, if you look at just about any metric from income to education, the disparities cannot be ignored. And, it should be very clear why. When you, say, de-prioritize or are even actively hostile to public education then of course your education is going to suffer. Which, in turn, makes your economy suffer, because most people who are working are now uneducated and therefore poor. So you get a lot of brain drain. There's some notable exceptions, like Texas. But, it's definitely a trend that red states just have worse outcomes across the board. It seems to me people in those states just don't care much, which... whatever. If they're fine with it then I guess it's fine.

sershe 1y ago

Red state policies (or at least a subset) appear to be popular based on the most important form of voting - with one's feet https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/how-congressional-maps-could-change-2030 https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/how-...