6 ms·

Trump, yes. The millions of people that voted for him multiple times despite no shortage of reports and credible allegations that he was a scumbag... Will not.

Trump, yes. The millions of people that voted for him multiple times despite no shortage of reports and credible allegations that he was a scumbag... Will not. Trump isn't the problem, he's a symptom.

datsci_est_2015 9mo ago
The rest of the Republican Party is completely devoid of charisma, especially the kind that drew so many voters to Trump. There is no drop-in replacement. Lots of money will be spent trying to manufacture a replacement, though. That will be fun to watch. If you thought the last-minute rally around Kamala was tough to watch…
- backpackviolet 9mo ago
  But what the republican party has, is a lot of isolationist voters who cannot be moved by appeals to markets or international trade. They don’t care about that stuff. Sure, the republicans will look hilarious trying to replace Trump for a while … but those Americans aren’t going anywhere and will gladly vote for the next Trump whenever they show up, same as they voted for Reagan and Bush II. The American attitude driving this current period is much deeper and wider than one man, and people thinking it will all go away when one old man steps down are going to be “surprised” when we’re dealing with this again in ten years or twenty years or three years.
  - datsci_est_2015 9mo ago
    Don’t get me wrong, I’ll be the first to jump up and say there’s a deep cultural rot in America that, if it weren’t for the fortune of incredible financial success, would have us be seen as a hellhole of antisocial maniacs. That being said, I just don’t buy into the notion that the strategy of the party from 2016-2024 (maybe 100 Trump rallies per year?) can carry over into the late 2020s / early 2030s. If anything, this is me saying everyone is aware that the current window for reactionary politics in America is closing as Trump loses his vigor and gets closer to being too old to do what he did between 2014 and 2024. The reactionaries in the government and behind the scenes may make one last desperate grab at maintaining power.
    - XorNot 9mo ago
      That's not the point: the point is America did this twice. The world is not going to deal with America radically flip flopping every policy position every 4 years, and escalating that every time. The US has just finished (maybe?) threatening to invade a NATO allied country. The occurrence rate of that has gone from "never" to "at least once". The delta change on that is infinity: there will never be a world in several generations where that is not a strategic risk the world has to deal with every 4 years.
      - datsci_est_2015 9mo ago
        > That's not the point: the point is America did this twice. The world is not going to deal with America radically flip flopping every policy position every 4 years, and escalating that every time. I’ll admit, I’m becoming confused about the point of our back-and-forth. All I’m trying to express is that probably by the end of 2026, and definitely by 2028, the people who are trying to enact reactionary change (Stephen Miller, PayPal Mafia, Heritage Foundation, etc.) will have to adjust their strategy. They are losing their charismatic leader, if not because of constitutional limits on presidential terms, then by his very obvious reduced vigor (he will not be able to do 100 rallies in a calendar year again). On the world stage, yes, America has stumbled. Maybe even worse, some international folks are realizing that the America that they thought existed was just a Hollywood mirage, and that we were always one recession and a few thousand votes in Florida from becoming a global pariah.
    - sooheon 9mo ago
      The weird cousin of "This time it's different": "That time was different"
- actionfromafar 9mo ago
  Can't all that be solved by posting ICE guards around all polling stations?
  - SpicyLemonZest 9mo ago
    There's no law of nature that proves democracy can't be overthrown, but ICE is currently struggling against popular resistance to merely enforce immigration law in a single medium-sized city. Right now there's not much indication they have either the desire or operational capacity to pull off nationwide voter suppression. (And a number of special elections over the past year have defeated regime-backed candidates without ICE involvement.)
    - watwut 9mo ago
      If they tried to merely immigration law, they would had no issue. They were successful at creating fear and making conflict avoidant people stay home. Despite large amount of protesters, that is real effect. And it would create real vote suppression. You would had people not voting out of fear. And the opposing side having less votes (even if they win, they win less)
      - SpicyLemonZest 9mo ago
        You, I, and regime officials know that they're trying to do more than merely enforce immigration law. But that's not the story they're telling the staff. Your average immigration enforcement officer still believes they're doing nothing more than executing warrants on people who are unlawfully present in the country - indeed, even with all the chaos and murders, there may not even be a majority of officers who've personally performed any misconduct. I'm not saying they're "good apples", but neither will they necessarily go along with an election subversion scheme that has no plausible fig leaf. Equally importantly, this is not an operation that could be planned in secret or at the drop of the hat. If the Trump regime tries to do something like this, we'll know weeks or months in advance, and there will be plenty of time to make it clear that anyone who participates will face swift and severe justice.
- NDizzle 9mo ago
  I think JD Vance has plenty of charisma.
  - datsci_est_2015 9mo ago
    Definitely an odd duck out in the context of Trump, Obama, Bush II, Clinton, Bush, Reagan. Also remember it’s not just being charismatic, but charismatic enough to keep people distracted from increasingly unpopular reactionary politics that defy even conservative beliefs (e.g. gun control, speech policing, deficit spending, plenary executive).
    - vkou 9mo ago
      Gun control (for minorities), speech policing (for liberals), deficit spending (when they are in charge), and a plenary executive (when Obama isn't president) are core conservative beliefs. They say that they don't like those things, but you can't listen to what politicians and talking heads on TV say. Politicians and talking heads lie all the fucking time. You have to look at what people do. They aren't stupid in not understanding the hypocrisy. We are... for thinking that they don't know that they are hypocrites.
  - kj4211cash 9mo ago
    Wait. Do you really think that or are you being sarcastic?
    - NDizzle 9mo ago
      I really think that.
      - moogly 9mo ago
        Is it the eyeliner?
- PlanksVariable 9mo ago
  Isn’t the VP generally the shoe-in nominee? Vance lacks charisma and gravitas, but he only has to be better than the Democratic candidate. For every Bill and Barack, the Democrats have also given us a Kamala, Hillary, and Al. Never underestimate their ability to pick a loser.
JackFr 9mo ago
[flagged]
- ulfw 9mo ago
  But cares about something that has zero effect on them? Trans? How many of them know a single trans person? Like somehow that's a huge thing for Trump voters but a crashing economy is not?
  - thatcat 9mo ago
    The stocks didn't really go down yet and their media sources are distraction agents.
  - telotortium 9mo ago
    Lots of people know trans people (by which I mean people that have decided to take some visible action to transition) by now - the people in the boonies and flyover states have access to the same internet as everyone else, so a lot of people outside the most progressive cities have transitioned. You have to remember that trans had been at the front of the culture for 10 years (since Caitlyn Jenner) by the time of the 2024 election.
  - PlanksVariable 9mo ago
    Crashing the economy? In the past year the S&P 500 rose 14%, unemployment is at 4.4%, and inflation is around 2.7%. There are many things to criticize Trump for but the economy has not actually crashed.
    - danaris 9mo ago
      Trump ran on an explicit promise to bring down grocery prices on day 1. Grocery prices have continued to climb. Absolutely nothing he has done could remotely be said to be aimed at bringing them down. He has also instituted massive attacks on the power of labor, and on the offices that report on things like the unemployment rate. "The economy" is not just the stock market; unemployment numbers literally cannot be trusted coming from Trump's BLS; and an inflation of 2.7% is, in fact, fairly high (it's 35% higher than the "target" rate of 2%).
YZF 9mo ago
What you're missing is that America was always like that. And it's been extremely successful. For sure there have been some changes in social dynamics, not just in the US, but worldwide. But the recipe that made the US successful has not changed much. Market economy, geography, attracting talent, innovation, freedom.
- Braxton1980 9mo ago
  >Market economy The recent massive increase in the US governments direct and indirect involvement in business decisions changes things. Trump is pushing/forcing countries and companies to invest in the US. He's added more restrictions on who they can sell their products. New significant widespread tariffs also exist that forces businesses to decide on how they can handle it while being pressured not to raise prices. Government involvement in business decisions, even if indirect, is not a market economy. In a true market economy supply and demand should determine prices and businesses and consumers make the decisions on their respective side. There's also background pressure on businesses to avoid angering Trump and this affects their decision making process. >attracting talent, innovation, Trump raised the fee for H1Bs, blocked student visas from 19 countries, and revoked 100k visas for people who were here as students, business reasons, vacation, and other. He also is removing legal status from many groups. His inflammatory rhetoric and actions have harmed the international reputation of the US. There's also a prevalent anti-immigrant mood in the US and a much smaller This decreases the pool of people who can choose to come here and for that smaller amount it increases the probability that smart and innovative people may look elsewhere to either study or start a company. There are also those that had legal status, lost it, and must leave. These are another set of groups that could have contained some talented and innovative people. Talented immigrants have done so much for our economy and standing in the world. ---- He cut government funding for many scientific research endeavors and government programs. These may or may not be replaced by private industry. It's justified to cut waste as government spending is a problem but speed and extent of the cuts makes it questionable if a proper assessment was done. ---- I'm sure you can point to similar actions in the past but I believe the quantity, speed, and intensity are significantly different than in recent times. I'm also not arguing that some changes weren't justified. I just believe it's a clear change in the ingredients for the worse.
UltraSane 9mo ago
No, Trump getting elected twice is the exact reason Fox News and the like were created.

datsci_est_2015 9mo ago

The rest of the Republican Party is completely devoid of charisma, especially the kind that drew so many voters to Trump. There is no drop-in replacement. Lots of money will be spent trying to manufacture a replacement, though. That will be fun to watch. If you thought the last-minute rally around Kamala was tough to watch…

backpackviolet 9mo ago
But what the republican party has, is a lot of isolationist voters who cannot be moved by appeals to markets or international trade. They don’t care about that stuff. Sure, the republicans will look hilarious trying to replace Trump for a while … but those Americans aren’t going anywhere and will gladly vote for the next Trump whenever they show up, same as they voted for Reagan and Bush II. The American attitude driving this current period is much deeper and wider than one man, and people thinking it will all go away when one old man steps down are going to be “surprised” when we’re dealing with this again in ten years or twenty years or three years.
- datsci_est_2015 9mo ago
  Don’t get me wrong, I’ll be the first to jump up and say there’s a deep cultural rot in America that, if it weren’t for the fortune of incredible financial success, would have us be seen as a hellhole of antisocial maniacs. That being said, I just don’t buy into the notion that the strategy of the party from 2016-2024 (maybe 100 Trump rallies per year?) can carry over into the late 2020s / early 2030s. If anything, this is me saying everyone is aware that the current window for reactionary politics in America is closing as Trump loses his vigor and gets closer to being too old to do what he did between 2014 and 2024. The reactionaries in the government and behind the scenes may make one last desperate grab at maintaining power.
  - XorNot 9mo ago
    That's not the point: the point is America did this twice. The world is not going to deal with America radically flip flopping every policy position every 4 years, and escalating that every time. The US has just finished (maybe?) threatening to invade a NATO allied country. The occurrence rate of that has gone from "never" to "at least once". The delta change on that is infinity: there will never be a world in several generations where that is not a strategic risk the world has to deal with every 4 years.
    - datsci_est_2015 9mo ago
      > That's not the point: the point is America did this twice. The world is not going to deal with America radically flip flopping every policy position every 4 years, and escalating that every time. I’ll admit, I’m becoming confused about the point of our back-and-forth. All I’m trying to express is that probably by the end of 2026, and definitely by 2028, the people who are trying to enact reactionary change (Stephen Miller, PayPal Mafia, Heritage Foundation, etc.) will have to adjust their strategy. They are losing their charismatic leader, if not because of constitutional limits on presidential terms, then by his very obvious reduced vigor (he will not be able to do 100 rallies in a calendar year again). On the world stage, yes, America has stumbled. Maybe even worse, some international folks are realizing that the America that they thought existed was just a Hollywood mirage, and that we were always one recession and a few thousand votes in Florida from becoming a global pariah.
  - sooheon 9mo ago
    The weird cousin of "This time it's different": "That time was different"
actionfromafar 9mo ago
Can't all that be solved by posting ICE guards around all polling stations?
- SpicyLemonZest 9mo ago
  There's no law of nature that proves democracy can't be overthrown, but ICE is currently struggling against popular resistance to merely enforce immigration law in a single medium-sized city. Right now there's not much indication they have either the desire or operational capacity to pull off nationwide voter suppression. (And a number of special elections over the past year have defeated regime-backed candidates without ICE involvement.)
  - watwut 9mo ago
    If they tried to merely immigration law, they would had no issue. They were successful at creating fear and making conflict avoidant people stay home. Despite large amount of protesters, that is real effect. And it would create real vote suppression. You would had people not voting out of fear. And the opposing side having less votes (even if they win, they win less)
    - SpicyLemonZest 9mo ago
      You, I, and regime officials know that they're trying to do more than merely enforce immigration law. But that's not the story they're telling the staff. Your average immigration enforcement officer still believes they're doing nothing more than executing warrants on people who are unlawfully present in the country - indeed, even with all the chaos and murders, there may not even be a majority of officers who've personally performed any misconduct. I'm not saying they're "good apples", but neither will they necessarily go along with an election subversion scheme that has no plausible fig leaf. Equally importantly, this is not an operation that could be planned in secret or at the drop of the hat. If the Trump regime tries to do something like this, we'll know weeks or months in advance, and there will be plenty of time to make it clear that anyone who participates will face swift and severe justice.
NDizzle 9mo ago
I think JD Vance has plenty of charisma.
- datsci_est_2015 9mo ago
  Definitely an odd duck out in the context of Trump, Obama, Bush II, Clinton, Bush, Reagan. Also remember it’s not just being charismatic, but charismatic enough to keep people distracted from increasingly unpopular reactionary politics that defy even conservative beliefs (e.g. gun control, speech policing, deficit spending, plenary executive).
  - vkou 9mo ago
    Gun control (for minorities), speech policing (for liberals), deficit spending (when they are in charge), and a plenary executive (when Obama isn't president) are core conservative beliefs. They say that they don't like those things, but you can't listen to what politicians and talking heads on TV say. Politicians and talking heads lie all the fucking time. You have to look at what people do. They aren't stupid in not understanding the hypocrisy. We are... for thinking that they don't know that they are hypocrites.
- kj4211cash 9mo ago
  Wait. Do you really think that or are you being sarcastic?
  - NDizzle 9mo ago
    I really think that.
    - moogly 9mo ago
      Is it the eyeliner?
PlanksVariable 9mo ago
Isn’t the VP generally the shoe-in nominee? Vance lacks charisma and gravitas, but he only has to be better than the Democratic candidate. For every Bill and Barack, the Democrats have also given us a Kamala, Hillary, and Al. Never underestimate their ability to pick a loser.

JackFr 9mo ago

[flagged]

ulfw 9mo ago
But cares about something that has zero effect on them? Trans? How many of them know a single trans person? Like somehow that's a huge thing for Trump voters but a crashing economy is not?
- thatcat 9mo ago
  The stocks didn't really go down yet and their media sources are distraction agents.
- telotortium 9mo ago
  Lots of people know trans people (by which I mean people that have decided to take some visible action to transition) by now - the people in the boonies and flyover states have access to the same internet as everyone else, so a lot of people outside the most progressive cities have transitioned. You have to remember that trans had been at the front of the culture for 10 years (since Caitlyn Jenner) by the time of the 2024 election.
- PlanksVariable 9mo ago
  Crashing the economy? In the past year the S&P 500 rose 14%, unemployment is at 4.4%, and inflation is around 2.7%. There are many things to criticize Trump for but the economy has not actually crashed.
  - danaris 9mo ago
    Trump ran on an explicit promise to bring down grocery prices on day 1. Grocery prices have continued to climb. Absolutely nothing he has done could remotely be said to be aimed at bringing them down. He has also instituted massive attacks on the power of labor, and on the offices that report on things like the unemployment rate. "The economy" is not just the stock market; unemployment numbers literally cannot be trusted coming from Trump's BLS; and an inflation of 2.7% is, in fact, fairly high (it's 35% higher than the "target" rate of 2%).

YZF 9mo ago

What you're missing is that America was always like that. And it's been extremely successful. For sure there have been some changes in social dynamics, not just in the US, but worldwide. But the recipe that made the US successful has not changed much. Market economy, geography, attracting talent, innovation, freedom.

Braxton1980 9mo ago
>Market economy The recent massive increase in the US governments direct and indirect involvement in business decisions changes things. Trump is pushing/forcing countries and companies to invest in the US. He's added more restrictions on who they can sell their products. New significant widespread tariffs also exist that forces businesses to decide on how they can handle it while being pressured not to raise prices. Government involvement in business decisions, even if indirect, is not a market economy. In a true market economy supply and demand should determine prices and businesses and consumers make the decisions on their respective side. There's also background pressure on businesses to avoid angering Trump and this affects their decision making process. >attracting talent, innovation, Trump raised the fee for H1Bs, blocked student visas from 19 countries, and revoked 100k visas for people who were here as students, business reasons, vacation, and other. He also is removing legal status from many groups. His inflammatory rhetoric and actions have harmed the international reputation of the US. There's also a prevalent anti-immigrant mood in the US and a much smaller This decreases the pool of people who can choose to come here and for that smaller amount it increases the probability that smart and innovative people may look elsewhere to either study or start a company. There are also those that had legal status, lost it, and must leave. These are another set of groups that could have contained some talented and innovative people. Talented immigrants have done so much for our economy and standing in the world. ---- He cut government funding for many scientific research endeavors and government programs. These may or may not be replaced by private industry. It's justified to cut waste as government spending is a problem but speed and extent of the cuts makes it questionable if a proper assessment was done. ---- I'm sure you can point to similar actions in the past but I believe the quantity, speed, and intensity are significantly different than in recent times. I'm also not arguing that some changes weren't justified. I just believe it's a clear change in the ingredients for the worse.

UltraSane 9mo ago

No, Trump getting elected twice is the exact reason Fox News and the like were created.