lemonaz

They care to a point. Most people want a populist anti-elite approach to politics and messaging but that’s off limits. In reality, what you see is the following dynamic:

• Republicans get their cues by testing various talking points on their base to see what sticks. They respond to the response of their base and double and triple down on the most popular. So in a sense get their policy cues from their base, but I left out one crucial thing: they’re extremely disingenuous about it because the talking points are mostly just culture war tabloid style outrage bait — moral panics filled with lies and half-truths. Still, to the common Republican voter, this seems like a dialogue.
• Democrats could do the same thing but with real stuff. Even appeals to emotion are fine as long as you’re being truthful, because a lot of the time you need to meet people where they are. But Democrats do not talk to their voters at all, they despise them and feel entitled to their vote because hey, look how bad the Republicans are. But then where do they get the policy if they don’t talk to voters? Oh, why, the Republicans of course! They triangulate a “common sense” position between their ivory tower ideas (mostly just “civility”), the Republicans and the (pre-programmed) Republican base. Except for the populism, you see, because that’s “going low” and they’re going to be the adults in the room who “go high”.

I hate this worthless octogenarian club of a party, sometimes more than the Republicans.

(I apologize that this turned into a rant. I do want Dems to win, I just want them to stop being, you know, them.)

I’m with you. Too much baggage with these terms. I’d rather extract the actual policies from them and run with those directly. Call it “supercapitalism” for all I care (although realistically I think “demsoc” would sound like an intuitive next step after “socdem”).

I also agree with the previous person that it’s a time for revolutionary change. It’s clear the current system needs to fundamentally transform to be stable, either by doubling down on capitalism at the expense of democracy, or by doubling down on democracy at the expense of capitalism. It’s clear now that the two cannot coexist.

You’re right. But they also need hope alongside what you said. Specifically, hope that there’s a future to fight for and that they’re not alone.

Pathetic

Then there must be pushback from the people who know better. Raising the alarm is not brainwashing — the brainwashing is when MAGA types tell people there’s no threat.

Also, Europe needs to get its shit together and stop pulling punches with regard to helping Ukraine.

Yeah, to them it’s not a threat — it’s empowerment.

I want to add that the people in charge of these policies have repeatedly made statements showing that their true feelings/intent aren’t about legal/illegal status:

• Stephen Miller said in public that the 9-0 Supreme Court ruling to bring back Kilmar Abrego Garcia (whose deportation to a modern day concentration camp was, by their own admission, an “administrative error”) actually said the opposite of what it did. He’s made a lot of off-hand statements about migrants, usually to avoid mentioning their legal status, to the tune of “they don’t look like you” or “you wouldn’t want him as your neighbor” which is literally just racism.
• Tom Homan “border czar” said in an interview that to prevent family separation, they can just deport the whole family.
• Kristi Noem has made few appearances but each time it seems like she’s “cruelty is the point” personified. For instance, she recently did a photo op at CECOT with prisoners behind her with the classic “this is what you get if you come here illegally” speech. But to me the worst part is when, totally unforced, she wrote in her book about how she killed her puppy with a bullet to the head because it wasn’t keen on killing animals on its first hunting trip and wanted to play instead. When asked about it, she said that “that’s just what you do on the farm” and started listing other animals she’d killed for mild annoyances.

These people are psychopaths. They saw it’s easy to suck up to Trump and convince him to support their ideas in exchange for treating him like dear leader. I maintain that Trump is the only one in that admin who isn’t a soulless demon, but he’s so easy to flatter.

The ones in the article mentioned two comments above:

Here’s a small sampling but there are many more. I couldn’t find a comprehensive list and it might not exist.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/detained-or-deported-growing-list-of-immigrants-with-legal-status-caught-in-crackdowns/ar-AA1BedZ6

even though intensive media brainwashing no one even seriously believe Russia will attack us (well, maybe except the usual tinfoil brains)

I’m getting flashbacks to Jan-Feb 2022. That’s what people thought about Ukraine despite intelligence reports warning that Putin is making moves.

Of course, Poland is in EU and NATO, so it’s definitely in a better position, but keep in mind that all deterrents have limits — as we speak there’s a full-on war being fought between two nuclear powers.

The promises of an alliance treaty are, at the end of the day, just that: promises. Posturing to scare off potential attackers. Just because we’ve never seen someone actually call that bluff, doesn’t mean it will never happen.

A guy like Putin could gamble that NATO countries won’t send troops to Poland because they’ll make similar calculations as towards Ukraine: that it’s not worth risking nuclear war. He already sees how NATO countries right now are behaving, pussyfooting around giving aid to Ukraine, so he could believe they will approach Article 5 with the same limp attitude. Especially now that USA is talking about leaving NATO and antagonizing Europe like never before.

Plus, all the “why should we help Ukraine” type rhetoric coming out of the European MAGA-aligned sphere is easily adaptable to Poland: “Why should we help Poland? Just because they’re in NATO? I’m not a globalist, I look after the interest of my own country first because I’m a patriot. I don’t want to send my people to fight NATO’s wars. I refuse to die for the globalists!”

I agree. The difference between the two is stark.

Surprised I had to scroll so long for this article. This is probably the best example (recent history too) of Bill’s actions killing kids.

I’m still glad he called Elon out. Let them fight.

Yeah, there’s a lot of that going around. As if capitalism will collapse precisely into fully automated luxury space communism as opposed to straight-up Mad Max (i.e. the manifestation of America’s collective id).

These people don’t realize (or well, maybe they do and are lying, I can’t read their minds) that asking people to not meaningfully participate in voting is like asking people to not participate in capitalism.

The argument that there’s no ethical consumption under capitalism — something all leftists agree on and understand they still need to buy food, clothes, electronics etc. despite them being unethically sourced — is the same as the argument that there’s no ethical voting in FPTP (and capitalism). It’s literally the same argument, just centered on voting.

So these people end up doing a kind of unironic “you say you’re a leftist yet you own an iPhone” but for voting — while probably typing all that from an iPhone.

Not just Heritage. There’s so many of them it’s hard to keep track. Sourcewatch.org tries to. But you can definitely start with the cosigners of Project 2025 and all the companies (especially media companies) that those people are on the boards of. (I think that should catch things like Rumble, Daily Wire, Victory Network, etc.)

Oh, I see. Yeah, a net worth that’s perpetually in the millions is insane. You could basically live off the interest at that amount and not even need to touch the original money. It’s crazy and frankly should be illegal.

Same. I was only pointing out that over a human lifetime, it adds up: a total of $1m would be equivalent to living 80 years (rough average lifespan) on $12.5k a year. It’s not a lot.

Allegedly! The evidence is slim. It’s reasonable to assume the killer is still out there…

Alas, I think they found a new one in nihilistic young men who want to burn it all down.

For your whole life, $1m is cutting it close — I think for the entirety of a good life in a country like the US or Western Europe, $10m is plentiful. $10m for your whole life, with current cost of living. Anything beyond that should be taxed to oblivion.

I’m stealing this.