Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
And yet people keep telling me that Biden needs to lose so that Democrats can be "taught a lesson."
Ah yes! Enlightened Centrist and Libertarians. They will always vote GOP no matter how horrible the candidate is with some shit reason to not vote Democrat. OR they will vote for some numbnuts third party candidate with an equally shitty reason.
The common talking points these days are either, "DeMoCrAtS aRe FaScIsTs, ToO!" or, "DeMoCrAtS nEeD tO eArN mY vOtE!"
And I'm sure the next generation will thank them for taking an ideological stand right as Fascism is trying to take over. /s
Democrats are fascists, too
Special emphasis on "too", of course
Don't vote Democrat, vote third party I hear! Me, I'm like well with first past the post voting this is impractical and could help empower fascists to take over, but let's see what options we got.
/opens box of third party candidates, before gently closing it and walking away
Yeah no, Biden still best option, these guys are nutters. It makes sense though, a sensible candidate would run in the democratic primaries, rather than hurting their own purported causes by running in the general in a first past the post election. It's why you saw Bernie Sanders, an independent, running in the democratic primary, and not out there helping to siphon votes to fascists by running as a third party in the general against Biden.
Anyways, let's focus on continuing to empower politicians that want to improve our voting system (usually has been democrats, though with an exception in Alaska). This starts at the local level, but we're getting more and more federal offices now with ranked choice voting. Once you have that, then better quality third party candidates will follow, knowing they can fairly safely run without harming their own causes.
I do worry that Biden will lose though. He was far from a popular candidate to begin with and his support of Israel's genocide of Palestinians has made him even less so. In many ways the best outcome might be for him to die in office prior to the election or for him to lose the primary. It would hurt the Democrats to have a non-incumbent running, but possibly less than running Biden. The real wildcard though is if Trump will even end up on the ballot considering his legal issues.
I do worry that Biden will lose though.
Good. Everybody should think this. Thinking Trump can't possibly win is how he won in 2016.
We need to behave as if it's a real possibility, even if you feel optimistic about next year.
Non English speaker: inevitable means it will happen no matter what. They way i see it, its used wrong here correct? It should maybe have been 'increasingly realistic' or maybe 'increasingly plausible' but inevitable assumes that voting for someone else won't stop it from happening
The title is a bit clickbaity, but the subtext is that if he is elected, dictatorship is increasingly inevitable.
And the 'increasingly' modifier further shows it's only a potential outcome.
The author isn't the most self-aware... Robert Kagan was a Republican strategist until 2016, he's an interventionalist neocon, thinks the GOP "lost it's way" rather than contributed to this by design.
It's only inevitable if we do nothing
So pretty much inevitable then. :(
As a non American I can't understand how anyone could vote for Donald twice.
As a free-thinking human being, I can’t understand how anyone could vote for him once.
As an American I can't understand how anyone could vote for him once.
As a Canadian, I can absolutely understand how someone less informed in politics and (rightfully) angry at the political establishment would vote for Trump in 2016 just to flip the bird to Hillary. Americans need to understand why he won to make sure it doesn't happen again.
My in-laws voted for him twice. They are pro-life, and that's all that matters to them. Otherwise they support progressive policies like single-payer healthcare. But when it comes to abortion, they will vote for a literal anti-Christ to make it illegal. Funny that they are Catholic.
People who say they are pro-life will vote for the most pro-death policies, it's crazy.
There are graduating seniors in high-school this year. That group of unregistered voters needs to be coaxed to register, and vote. They need easy, step by step directions. They need to understand their new power of citizenship. They can be tried as adults. They should know who the sheriff is. They should know its an elected position. They need to learn this shit, and most likely it's not gonna happen in school. Please ticktock or whatever. Make it viral.
I still don't understand why people have to register to vote. Everyone should automatically be registered to vote.
Perhaps we should have a way to flag opinion pieces.
Is anyone honestly confused as to whether or not it's an opinion piece? I find that very hard to believe, but I guess you never know...
If you've ever wondered why no one killed Hitler on his rise to power, now you know.
The main difference is, in 2023, we know how Hitler rose to power. In 1933, Germans didnt.
What should we do about it? Other than vote and try to talk people out of voting for Trump.
Basically, this coming election will be decided by the margins because almost everyone who follows politics–at all–knows who they're voting for already.
Think about the number of people who follow politics and then understand that those people are already not the demographic that will likely decide the outcome. It's the people who are surprised they Joe Biden and Donald Trump are on the ballot that matter.
It isn't worth trying to pressured persuade either the right or the left. What we need is to activate and engage the non-participating section of the electorate. This is hard, but achievable. It's people who work multiple jobs and don't have time for politics that need to know it matters if they vote. Civil rights are not a given and 2024 will be hugely consequential.
Take your friends with you on election day! Register for vote by mail and bug your friends too! Take about it and don't leave easy points on the table. Yes the options are terrible. Yes one of them will make the possibility of improving it ever infinitely more difficult.
The people saying it doesn't matter do not understand what they stand to lose. It is so so much harder to build something than tear it down and our imperfect institutions will not save us. Politics matters and the luxury of not caring, will lead to co-optation and the loss of rights that are easy to take for granted now.
Young people need to register. Help them!
This is stupid fear-mongering horse s*** that ignores all the steps Americans are taking to fight against Trump being elected, and ignoring that they voted him out 3 years ago.
Stupid b*******.
People took steps against him in 2016 as well. And voting him out previously gives no guarantee of anything.
https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/
Polling is bullshit, but to the degree that it isn't, it isn't looking great. This isn't some guarantee that Trump will lose. The boomers that vote republican do so EVERY election. The people who vote against them aren't so reliable in comparison.
You're on the internet. Censoring yourself makes you look childish. Just cuss. Also, it's not fear mongering. The GOP has announced their intentions if they win.
It's a good piece and I think the analysis is largely accurate. But there's one thing I think Kagan missed: Trump isn't the only would-be dictator who could take power. He lists DeSantis and Haley as the closest competitors to Trump within the Republican Party, but he doesn't point out that even if, by some miracle, one of them becomes the party nominee, they would assume the very same dictatorial powers Trump is threatening to wield. Neither of them is going to defend democracy when offered the reins of tyranny, and both could easily hold power for decades. Trump maybe has a single decade at most.
The problem isn't simply Trump wanting to be President for Life. The problem is that the path has been cleared for any Republican to assume that role the next time one is elected. Project 2025 won't work for Trump only. The next time we have a Republican President, expect it to be the last time we have a fair election.
Well, bezos, it's because you don't actually care about a dictatorship as much as you care that your money pile gets bigger! What are you yelling at me for shitbird? You guys have the money n power! If you're counting on my broken ass to fix the world you're in deep shit
Stop sucking Trump's cock, www.washingtonpost.com. There's nothing inevitable about Trump but lies, treason, and bullshit.
As with Napoleon, who spoke of the glory of France but whose narrow ambitions for himself and his family brought France to ruin, Trump’s ambitions, though he speaks of making America great again, clearly begin and end with himself.
As the author keeps comparing Trump to Napoleon and Hitler, I can't help but wonder if maybe the US is due a conflagration. At what point do we admit that the American experiment returned a null result?
In the cases of France and Germany, the answer was violence. Oppression has never been defeated with pacifism. If history is our guide and conservatives are our oppressors, soon we may have to make some very difficult life and death decisions.
Conservatives have already embraced violence as part of their ideology, which I think makes the path out of their oppression more clear.
I think it's more that human societies are very rarely stable across 3 or more generations. The US has had a number of major crises through its history, it's definitely due for another. Repeating the dead line about a failed experiment is kind of needlessly deaf to that history.
All you can do for now is stand up and fight it.