It feels like Harris has to run a damn near flawless campaign just to BARELY beat this guy. Yeah you can bring up the current state of the country, but Trump mishandled COVID, there were over 200k deaths, BLM protest and was 2x impeached. And yet, Joe Biden BARELY beat him.
Trump is a convicted felon, liable sexual predator, caused an insurrection on the Capitol Hill, tried to steal the 2020 election (find me 11,000 votes), constantly kisses Russia’s ass, has more pending court cases and gets sentenced next month and overall has been the main driving factor in America’s division.
Yet, this race is STILL either 50/50 or a slight tilt (Harris leads the polling aggregate right now). Harris gets destroyed by the corporate media for almost anything, yet Trump is still lying and saying the most outlandish shit and nobody cares.
Why does it feel standards are much higher for Harris than Trump?
Because too many people treat politics like a sporting event. You root for your team no matter what, and against the other team. You have to do it this way, because if the other side wins that means your side loses.
So there are too many people who view Trump as “Their Guy”, and are “rooting” for him. Anything they hear that might portray Trump in a negative light (like a criminal trial, for instance) must be the Other Side trying to cheat to win unfairly.
I remind people that Roger Ailes was Nixon’s media consultant, and the lesson he learned from Watergate was that Nixon could have gotten away with it if the media was more sympathetic. He then went on to be the CEO of Fox News. That’s no accident. There is a direct line from Nixon to Trump, and Roger Ailes drew it.
the lesson he learned from Watergate was that Nixon could have gotten away with it if the media was more sympathetic.
Then we got Reagan, Bush, and Trump, and he proved it.
The media almost singlehandedly bringing Watergate to the average American’s attention was why Murdoch created Fox News. It was created specifically so they could force control of the narrative to their advantage.
And then we allowed every other media corporation to be bought and do the same once they saw it worked so well.
The media almost singlehandedly bringing Watergate to the average American’s attention
If you really get under the hood of Watergate, it had all the fingerprints of a soft coup. Nixon was a shit and made for an easy fall guy, but also Trumpian in his stubbornness and his refusal to go whole hog on the Cold War. Ford toed the line - installing Bush Sr to clean Kennedy’s liberals out of the CIA, promoting Greenspan and Rumsfield to the Republican inner circle, and tapping the breaks on our openness with China.
There was no real reason to break into the Watergate given that Nixon was beating McGovern in a landslide. But it did a lot of favors for the movement conservatives like Goldwater and Reagan to get Nixon’s ass out on the curb.
The WaPo (a hotbed of spooks even back then) played a big roll in that for a reason. Ffs, Woodward was an agency man going back to his time in Naval Intelligence. He broke Watergate less than a year after joining the paper.
Woodward going on to not reveal Trump’s admission that Trump knew exactly how dangerous COVID was and was purposefully downplaying it until Woodward published his book on Trump couldn’t be anymore revealing of capitulation to power while claiming to speak truth to power.
He was celebrated as a whistleblower for releasing it long after the news was worth more than court gossip.
The man is the poster child for why American major news media is absolute dog shit. We see the same pattern with Bush Iraq War fuck ups sat on through to 2005. And all the banking scandals squelched during the thick of the OWS protests. And the Theranos woman misdiagnosing hundreds of patients with her hoax machine while parading around as a business celebrity. And the Bitcoin scams hushed up until the biggest players had exited the market.
Whether it’s Bob Woodward or Micheal Lewis or Judith Miller, there’s a cast of these characters who exist to hoodwink people into thinking they have a free press.
And the Theranos woman misdiagnosing hundreds of patients with her hoax machine while parading around as a business celebrity.
Although, to be fair, this story has at least one comical bent. She was obsessed with those fucking dogs that she did absolutely nothing to care for. Combine that with the fact that she didn’t just hoax her patients, she also hoaxed investors. My favorite is knowing at some point she was buttering up Kissinger while those dogs were dropping big steaming piles of shit in the same room. Kissinger nodding along, seriously, while dogshit smell permeates everything.
It’s fucking comical how stupid some of the ostensibly smartest and most important people are.
Combine that with the fact that she didn’t just hoax her patients, she also hoaxed investors.
That was the comedy angle. The tragedy angle is that the patients never able to sue, because it was impossible for them to determine if they’d been part of the faulty test group.
Investors got their pound of flesh while folks who were actually harmed were left without recourse.
Now this a conspiracy I can get behind. Love it.
If you really get under the hood of Watergate, it had all the fingerprints of a soft coup.
Not really. The major issue was that the President got caught and there wasn’t a propaganda network out there to drum up support.
Several Republican senators visited Nixon before he resigned because it was too politically costly for them to not vote for impeachment. In contrast, there weren’t political consequences for voting against Clinton’s and Trump’s impeachments.
The major issue was that the President got caught
E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy got caught. Hunt was an old school pro and close friends with Allen Dulles. He was also directly employed by future Bush FBI director Robert Muller, before joining Nixon’s team. After committing a string of crimes for Nixon, he served a mere 33 months in a low security federal prison.
Liddy served a slightly longer 55, then got a series of sweetheart media deals from his friends in conservative media. He was the top speaker on the college circuit in 1982, three years after leaving prison.
Several Republican senators visited Nixon before he resigned because it was too politically costly for them to not vote for impeachment.
Lead by Goldwater, a major Nixon rival for leadership in the party. Ford was Goldwater’s pick for the VP slot after Agnew resigned as well.
In contrast, there weren’t political consequences for voting against Clinton’s and Trump’s impeachments.
There was a big reward for Lieberman when he voted for impeachment. Gore put him on the VP ticket.
Meanwhile, a handful of Republicans who voted to impeach Trump - most notably Liz Cheney - got primaried out of office.
How Regan didn’t get impeached over Iran Contra is baffling.
He avoided impeachment the same way Clarence Thomas survived his confirmation hearing.
Ted Kennedy and Tip O’Neal decided it wasn’t worth pursuing.
Nixon’s approval rating before resigning was 24% while Reagan only dropped to 43%.
Reagan had already lost a big midterm in '86 and should have been easy to impeach by the incoming Dem majority. With 55 seats, they could even talk about conviction.
They choose to roll the dice on electoralism instead, and gave the White House to Reagan’s (heavily complicit) VP.
Well, yeah, thanks to Fox entertainment.
Also white supremacy is a hell of a drug.
That is why I move to bigger more ethnic cities or countries where I am wanted at and dont have to put up with that shit. Just worked with a nazi/neonazi/skinhead or whatever and I while he would talk to me about his beliefs I woulld always find an excuse to walk away
As someone who is solidly left and visibly queer, but doesn’t particularly like living in big cities, that’s the question- how do you live near trees, but not Republicans?
Thanks for that info, I never about the Ailes Nixon-Trump connection. This is so frustrating to see unravel in real time.
I have heard from friends of mine that like Trump claim that since he’s a business man he is good for running the country. I could’t roll my eyes hard enough after hearing that remark.
I have also found that there is nothing you can say to sway a trump supporter.
The problem isn’t that Harris is being held to a higher standard. The problem is that Americans think of elections the same way they think of a sporting match. It’s “my team is going to win!” not “I’m going to vote for the candidate that is best aligned with my beliefs.” A huge number of the people who are voting Republican are doing so because the Republican party is their “team,” and damn it, their team is going to win even if it kills them.
Many years ago, I was discussing politics with a coworker (always a bad idea, but whatever). It went something like this:
“So, you don’t think the less-fortunate should be able to afford medical care?” “No, of course not, everyone should be able to see a doctor.”
“You don’t think gay people should be allowed to marry?” “I’m not gay, but they can do whatever makes them happy.”
“You support the war in Iraq, then?” “I support our troops, but the war is kind of a waste.”
“We definitely should legalize weed, right?” “Um, I’d smoke it if I didn’t get drug tested.”
“So why are you voting Republican, then?” “My family is Republican; we always do.”
“So why are you voting Republican, then?” “My family is Republican; we always do.”
Republican politicians would eat this person and their family if it ever came to it
After raping them all first.
Then denying any abortion.
Sadly, they would probably volunteer to be eaten so they could “own the libs”
As an outsider looking in, I’ve seen a lot of footage of rallies and events (on both sides) that are just absolutely crazy to me. Almost dystopian. People with painted faces, all kinds of merch, hollering and shouting and cheering like it’s the X Factor or a rock concert or something. You see people being interviewed outside the events and it’s like a festival in the background. It’s really, really bizarre. We have problems with our politics here too but not like that. I can’t believe that all of those people are ACTUALLY that passionate about any policies themselves, it’s just vague culture wars nonsense with a bizarre personality contest as a proxy for it.
As I say, I’m not trying to act superior. My country has its share of problems too, just a very different sort.
You have to understand, you are seeing people of VERY low intelligence. I know that’s tough to accept, but demographics are really frightening in America. Millions of voters with intelligence not very much higher than outright mental retardation. And so, the system learned long ago, you don’t bother trying to get them to think you’re right for the job, you don’t want them thinking at all. So you just get them to ally with you as a tribe, and that way they’re yours even if you’re doing the opposite of what they want.
This is why The Founders implemented a Representative Democracy. They knew half of the populace were dumber than rocks.
We call this indoctrination. Cult. And fucking sheep. Lmao
Here in Canada I’ve seen much the same behaviour for both Liberal and Conservative voters. “I vote Liberal because I’ve always voted Liberal” is a surprisingly common statement especially among the older generations, and to a small extent even the Green party has a few loyalists in BC.
Always voting the same way no matter what happens is just giving your vote away for free.
Horse race politics
Because a cult leader is automatically the purest one can be and needs no scrutiny.
I understand the MAGA cult, but do moderates not see this?
There the opposite is true. They already know that the other guy is a villain. Their candidate will have to prove themselves not to be.
Plus since they are the figurehead of the party, if they are lackluster in their proof it could affect downstream elections.
Because moderates pathological like to bring up “both sides”
Moderates are conservatives with a sense of shame.
“Moderates” are a fiction. They’re just an excuse Democrats make for pandering to corporate donors while giving only the barest scraps to their leftist base.
That only explains the cultists, and I doubt the entire media industry is in the cult.
Trump gets views. That’s why they love him.
Yes I agree, but only because they are a capitalists first and a human beings second.
They love him because they are morons, who don’t know they are engaging in self harm.
It’s sad that people of power, like for instance Elon Musk and the people behind Fox are so stupid they can’t see they are digging their own graves.
it is
Can’t believe you are asking this now. In the 70s, I don’t believe any of these yokels would have been elected. Lauren Beaubert, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Trump, they’ve all done things and said things that are so far over the line, it isn’t even funny. Nixon? Please, he would be small potatoes today.
Why? Gerrymandering. Social Media. Lack of critical thinking skills. A sense of hopelessness. Apathy. Billionaire brainwashing. The list goes on. The strange thing is, conservatives want to go back to the way things were. For them that means when women had to go to back alleys to get abortions, when gays were stoned, when blacks weren’t allowed to vote. For me it means when people didn’t justify these ridiculous notions, but instead just said, “No!”
conservatives aren’t conservative any more. they are radically backwards. the things they want are so far back, they don’t even want democracy any more. i don’t really have a say in that, but maybe the time has come to stop calling them conservative.
I’m conservative vs. most of lemmy and damned if I’ll vote anything but straight D right down to dogcatcher. I wouldn’t vote for an R even if I liked them! The message must be sent. Even if it’s a loss, your vote ends up as a percentage on a spreadsheet. It is still seen.
Yes. Dems are conservatives. Repubs are regressives.
It’s what the radical far left has been saying all along lol
i really wish more conservatives would accept this, or at the very least not back trump even a little bit, the dude who literally tried to overthrow the election, they throw so much bullshit at dems and dem controlled cities, but have literally no evidence other than “BUT BUT BLM” and “well, they’re taxes are higher” which is literally meaningless.
I know, as a conservative I get everything I asked for in the 1990’s by voting mainstream Democrat now. The parties can change all they want, I vote my views.
Yeah sadly American has no left wing party, just a right and far right.
That’s a hell of a vacuous argument. Would you rather get seen outside of a window or let into the store?
Nobody gives a shit about the non-voting numbers or third party ballots, if anything, their response is negative, not positive: They claim people aren’t exercising their right to vote, or that someone has “spoiled the election”.
Meanwhile, those aligned to parties are forming orderly queues and voting consistently.
Which strategy do you think is more effective, from a political science and historical perspective?
They are “regressives”.
I call them “degeneratives”. They are both degenerated, and want others to degenerate Atwell.
Atwell can’t be degenerated. his regeneration power is far too great (at least in the comics.). /s
Yeah there was a long time ago when conservatives voted to protect national parks. These aren’t those times
Conservatives are exactly the same as they have always been. It’s just that conservatives define their priorities and their values and priorities around their identity, and that means their values and priorities shift with whatever is best for the conservative at the time. There are no universally conservative values, just the generic resistance to change things conservatives like. When a conservative benefits from a strong federal government, they support it. When a conservative benefits from abortion, they support it. When a conservative is a minority, or gay, or a woman, they support equalish rights for themselves. It’s narcissism wearing the cloak of stoic preservation of their “heritage,” and it’s always paper-thin.
This also means anyone opposing the conservative is not a member of the self, but a member of the other. The other is evil, because they are outside of the self. Anything the other does in opposition to the self is evil. An other could save a busload of nuns and kittens, and the conservative would complain about the traffic caused by the other. Anything the self does in support of the self is good. Lying, cheating, stealing, killing, raping, everything is on the table if it can be justified in support or defense of the self. From the outside of the self, it looks like hypocrisy, but it’s really not, because the conservative never truly holds an opinion. They just say what they need to say to win.
It’s wild that Trump has done things far worse than watergate, and still got the nomination.
It is. The world is stranger than I could possibly ever have imagined. Sometimes I play a thought game. What if I had to explain this to, an alien.
“Yes, this is how it works. Are you going to destroy us now? Yeah, we probably deserve this.”
My game is explaining this to my dad who died in the mid-80s. Cannot even summon words.
It’s not wild, it’s the GOP plan since Nixon got nabbed.
Drumpf just happened to have that crazy crowd draw, so they yoked their hopes that he would be the first king of America, and disregarded everything else to forward that goal.
Cheetolini could eat a baby live on national television and his numbers would barely dip.
I don’t think they took him willingly, since he is a narcissistic moron. I think they were stuck with him when he managed to win over the far right radicals they have been grooming for decades. He is a racist schoolyard bully making their enemies angry, that’s all they care about.
The right wing has been actively working to undermine our educational system since the early 80’s. A poorly educated populace, particularly one without critical thinking skills, is much easier to manipulate. After four decades of underfunding, restrictive policies, and anti-intellectual propaganda, those efforts are really paying off.
Newt Gingrich and his co-conspirators have been waging war against the people of this country since Reagan was elected. And they are now dangerously close to winning that war.
I don’t think the attack on education was a long-term manipulation thing. Rather, it evolved from the question, “Why are all these educated people turning into liberals?!”
That question demands an answer. They can hardly let the appearance that they’re dumb stand! So guys like Limbaugh started attacking “ivory tower liberals”. That resonated, they rolled with it. Then the Christians saw the opportunity, got their filthy fingers into the cracks, started undermining public education in favor of their own.
They’re probably just young.
MTG would have been right at home as a Dixiecrat.
She would have neen standing beside George Wallace.
If you say so. I’m more of an 80s person. All I know about George Wallace is that he was shot.
All those things you said against Trump are actually working in his favor. His base sees it as persecution of their chosen one.
But he can’t just win off his cult votes. He has to get moderate votes too.
Not if he cheats as hard as they plan to!
Literally, the Supreme Court just made clear they’re helping promote the false narrative of “illegal immigrants voting,” which helps promote the understanding that the plan is to contest the fucking election, no matter the outcome.
That’s why they have those electioneering hooligans in Georgia and why people are fighting it.
They have zero intent to make this a fair fight. That’s why they don’t give a fuck about actual votes.
Yeah I read about the 70 electors in swing states that are Trump loyalists and election deniers. How these people are even allowed to certify votes is beyond me.
I mean, I’m still confused as to why a guy who caused an insurrection in the capital is even allowed to run for President.
Our country is a weak fucking joke.
Yeah, he should have been executed for treason.
Bring back political executions! I can see no downsides!
And its sad because kids are growing up today and have a poor taste for the US. Which is sad in itself.
Because it system if government was setup with certain assumptions of the time.
Only rich landowning white men would be voting. Those men had the time to stay educated on world events because of either slaves or staff running their day to day business.
Certain customs were socially enforced simply as a matter of course. Scandal often meant resignation or recusal, or you would be ostracized from society entirely. If no one would work with you, your business, and wealth would die.
And the cheating will be
toleratedpromoted because they seriously beleive the other side is cheating. “Trump got more votes in 2020 than any prior candidate” is proof enough. Certainly can’t be that he’s such a polarizing, vile piece of shit that actually scared more non-voting people to vote tod defeat him, and they certainly can’t beleive Biden actually holds the vote record (note the key use of “prior” in trump’s claim). They really think the orange coastal elite is somehow on the working man’s side. The same cheeto that has declined to pay every contractor on his towers. The same cheese puff that couldn’t sell steaks. The same crayon that couldn’t find profit in a casino.
That doesn’t seem realistic. I don’t see how you can vote for Trump 2024, and claim to be a moderate.
there is literally no world in which this happens, unless you are either fucking stupid, or so under/mis informed that you shouldnt be allowed to vote.
His base sees it as persecution of their chosen one.
yeah, cuz he’s a criminal, who did crimes, that’s normally what happens to criminals that do crimes.
Because the media are largely in the hands of the oligarchy that will stop at nothing to get another tax cut.
You must be young. Because Republicans will vote for a criminal before they vote for “communism”. Because the Republicans attempt to destroy the educational system to keep people dumb enough to vote for them has worked. Because dispite the corporate media pandering and acting like they want Harris Because that’s what their viewers want, their billionaire owners don’t. They want the republican led centrist enabled tax breaks on their money. Harris has also brought in the progressives which have zero tolerance for the centrist mindset. She is in a situation where she has to dance a dance of trying to reel in the progressives even though they are going to throw a fit when she panders to the centrists and the corporate overlords.
The system is made and controlled by the billionaires. No hard progressive that doesn’t play the game a little is going to get elected… right now. They will destroy anyone that threatens their billions. Everytime she goes a little too hard left they throw a fit.
Welcome to end stage capitalism.
No hard progressive that doesn’t play the game a little is going to get elected…
Poor Bernie…
I still Bern myself, though at least Harris’s votes have aligned with Bernie’s more than any other congressman.
I still wonder where we would be if he won in 2016
That’s a suffering trap because we all know 1) how good it would have been, and 2) A true progressive will never be allowed the nomination as long as the DNC exists in its current form.
Better to use that time to figure out what up and coming politicians have Bernie’s heart for when the future sentiment shifts.
The United States went so hard on being anti-communist that we became anti community.
Can you imagine a woman or a black man (let alone a black woman) running for president while being three-times divorced with kids from multiple partners and having cheated multiple times on top of that? Even if they were rich like Trump, it would never fly.
You forgot to add convicted felon
Obama’s political career would’ve ended the second “grab em by the p****” got leaked.
Obama got so much leeway throughout his career, shit like PRISM and Snowden, Benghazi, the invasion of Ukraine, the rise of isis, all under his watch.
Drone warfare as we know it was popularized under Obama, say what you want about trump, but when he took over he stopped bombing Somalia, Obama and Biden bombed the shit out of somalia
I was curious about this, so I looked it up on Wikipedia, and I don’t see this stopping you’re talking about. If anything I’m seeing less bombings during Biden’s term, not Trump’s.
Either you’re a troll or uninformed.
Trump is an outrage machine, and we have a media that deals in an economy of outrage.
Trump gets outrage. Outrage gets clicks. Clicks get money. It’s a pretty simple chain to follow.
We need to wake up and realize that a profit-driven instantaneous news system that leverages strong emotions is not good for anybody. Truth is subjective nowadays, (always has been, really, but it’s especially evident in the current media climate) and all that matters is getting information and narratives (not necessarily facts) out and people consuming it (and all the ads embedded with it) there, first, and right now.
I feel like a lot of people on Trump’s side don’t care and all of his issues have been documented in the press. If people cared, he wouldn’t be this close.
You also have enough people left of Harris who don’t want to hold their collective noses and vote for her. They’ll complain about the Overton window shifting right, but won’t be a bulwark for keeping it from shifting right. Hell, there are people on Lemmy complaining about political utilitarianism as a reason for voting for Harris and will even complain about Bernie if he says something being done by the Biden administration is good.
it’s so frustrating. I admit I used to vote green, but the entry of Trump opened my eyes. Things like judge appointments, incremental advances in fighting climate change, and NOT having a seditionist as president are all issues we can’t afford to lose on in the next 4 years just for some rhetorical vote for the Green Party.
in a perfect world we’d have ranked choice voting, but we aren’t in that world.
Demand ranked choice voting and make sure you are doing so locally
move to maine, and you’ll have it.
Realistically, you shouldn’t move to maine, and you should popularize moving towards something like IRV instead of FPTP
Because some Democrats have standards, and Republicans don’t.
I don’t believe it’s possible for anybody to be held to lower standards than Trump.
It’s a good thing she’s held to higher standards. I don’t want anybody held to his standards running anything.
Because MAGA is the largest cult in the world and they won’t believe their great father could do anything wrong…
Because Harris’s supporters have standards.
One thing particular to Trump is the percentage of his supporters in polling that support him no matter what. Trump has maintained some of the most sustained, consistent support of any modern political candidate. His base polling numbers basically haven’t moved in like 10 years.
Trying to have his VP executed, injecting bleach, porn stars, felonies, treason, domestic use of military, anti-veteran sentiment, belittling the disabled, racist comments, sexist comments, sexual assault, etc., etc., etc. None of that meaningfully moved the needle.
You are not going to “get” Trump on anything like that. If you want him to lose support, he needs to be seen as weak, ineffective, and laughable in the eyes of his supporters. None of the above does that, because that isn’t what Trump supporters care about. They care about hurting people they don’t like or see as lesser-than. If Trump stops doing that effectively, he will lose support. But, frankly, he’s really good at it.
Yep, do we want to have 2 parties where the candidate isn’t accountable to viewers, or just the 1?
Because so many trump voters are low-information, rabid and impervious to fact and/or reason. They will vote orange even if he shoots someone on Fifth Avenue to death, or if there are 32-or-whatever felony indictments/verdicts.
Meanwhile, many potential Democrat voters are also low-information in their own way - impressionable, fickle and with little memory retention, they seem unable to act upon a clear and present danger until it punches them in the goddamned face (and by then of course it’s too late), somehow have normalized the orange threat and are easy prey to an algorithm pushing a “both parties are the same” divide-and-conquer propaganda.
The difference between a parasite-laden excrement chip cookie and a raisin oatmeal cookie, “But I wanted chocolate chip! bOtH cOoKiEs ArE tHe SaMe!”
- 34 felonies.
Genocide.
Genocide.
I respect your concern, and I am sympathetic to the people in Gaza, but I don’t understand why we’re blaming Kamala for a war on the other side of the world that’s been going on longer than I’ve been alive.
I’m pretty sure I’ve asked you this exact question multiple times, and I’m suspecting that you’re just a Russian spam bot now.
If not, I appreciate your dedication to your morals, and wanting to defend the lives in the middle east, but until you get a fucking clue about how the world actually works, nobody’s going to take you seriously.
Linkerbean is a well known troll whose only purpose is to dissuade left leaning folks from affecting the election. The concern is 100% fake. If you try to discuss what Trump’s position or the Republican party’s position is on Gaza, it won’t work, it’ll all just come back to why you shouldn’t vote for the Democrats.
“I sympathize with Palestinians but anyone who doesnt vote to Genocide them is a Russian bot”
Why do you only say that about Harris when the Republicans are way more pro genocide
Harris is doing the Genocide right now. It’s real inconvenient Trump isn’t in power because the uniparty mask slips off.
It is amazing how quickly people started pretending Harris has been the president as soon as she became the nominee
It is amazing how quickly people started pretending Harris hasn’t been the vice president as soon as she became the nominee
Literally nobody has done that, you just clearly don’t understand how powerless the vice president is.
I’m sick and tired of you absolute bottom dwelling dipshits doing so much damage to my intelligence by having to read your waste of data, good bye
Very well said
