Not at all what I said. The Democrats are operating on something called truth and reality. They’re not lying their way into office and blocking people from voting for their opposition. What would you have them do, then? Becoming the enemy is not the same as winning.
I remember how history remembers Winston Churchill saying “what? The Nazis are the bad guys. I said it. What more do you want? No, we’re not doing anything to stop them. You’re an idiot for thinking I should do something” or when Abraham Lincoln wrote a note to the south reminding them that secession was illegal and declaring war on the United States was bad, but of course doing absolutely nothing, because the bad guys were at fault and therefore the opposition is under no obligation to stop them.
I would have them use the powers of fucking government to prosecute crimes against the US. I would use the bully pulpit to make America aware of the machinations of the Republicans to attempt to undermine our democracy.
Jan 6 was a declaration of intent. The official Republican party line is The Big Lie. And they’re winning without a fight. No one was punished for insurrection. No one was punished for attempting to deny the legitimacy of the elections of the United States. The Republicans are actively, currently, unambiguously pursuing the end of democracy and no democrat has even made a fucking powerful speech about it, let alone action.
The Democrats are basically the Washington Generals. They make a token effort to give the Harlem Globetrotters an opponent to walk all over but only ever fail. And people like you just excuse them of even the obligation to try to fight for this country as the only opposition party in a two party system and insult anyone who actually wants them to do their duty.
I get your anger. And your worry. I’m not an American, but ever since Jan 6 2021 the Weimar /beerhall putsch analogy seems to hold up. From what I’ve read, this is how democracies end, with one party no longer abiding by the underlying principles and rules of a democracy, and the other party/parties being hampered in their actions because they DO play by said rules. The point right now, IMHO, is that if the Democratic party would also decide to chuck the playbook, they would be the ones starting the war. At least it would look that way. So they don’t, at least not yet. But it’s not looking good, from the outside at least.
I didn’t say anything about throwing away the playbook. Theres so much they could be doing within the rules now, the main thing is to stop pretending what’s going on right now is within the normal realm of politics and scream from every rooftop exactly what was happening. Almost everyone is acting like what’s happening now is within the normal realm of politics. We’re just going to let a coup happen right out in the open because Americans would rather believe it can’t happen here right up until it’s too late.
Given that war is politics by different means, that might even be true.
But I get your point. At the same time, I think they’re trying the best they can at the moment, just that it isn’t enough. And shouting from the rooftops what’s happening will just be met with “oh yeah, well that’s just, like, your opinion, man.” I don’t think it will help, tbh. Republican voters/MAGATs have stopped listening to reason a long time ago, plus they don’t seem to care as long as they’ll win.
As for the others, it’s very hard to imagine the unthinkable. That’s what many Bosnian refugees told me over the years as well. You see it coming but you don’t believe it could really happen until it’s too late. People from Syria tell me the same.
I wish I had a more uplifting conclusion, but I’m worried as well. It took Europe two World wars and the war in Yugoslavia to put this cat back into the box, and it’s started gnawing its way out again already. I pray your country will step back from the abyss in time, but I agree it doesn’t look good.
Who’s pretending it’s normal? The Republicans are falling over themselves to kowtow to the worst of the worst and thus get more votes in their next election. They’re not even pretending it’s normal. They see their base loves it and thus continue the downslide–all in the name of getting votes in their next election. The Democrats are condeming them for that and are getting their votes in their traditional strongholds.
You may have heard of a little thing called the Electoral College. That’s designed to screw up the popular vote. So long as we still have that antiquated asininity, the Republicans will still manage to carry states where their voters are in the majority. And, of course, that can cause the Electoral vote to swing to the candidate who did not win the popular vote.
Step One in fixing the current mess is to eliminate the Electoral College. Step Two is to stop the gerrymanding. Step Three is to block passage of discriminatory and restrictive voting laws or rescinding such where they have already been passed.
And, my personal favorite, which will never happen: declare today’s Republican party a domestic terrorist organization.
Is that currently possible to achieve within democratic means?
Step One? Yes, via constitutional amendment.
Step Two? Yes, via a nonpartisan oversight committee created by law.
Step Three? Yes, via the normal legislative procedures of the state and federal legislatures.
Where do you want them to say it? They say it in press conferences, they say it in interviews, they say it in day to day briefings. They even tweet and facebook. What is it that you want them to do?
If you aren’t hearing it, it’s because you aren’t listening.
Sure, sure… says the person who claims to want to see people do things that they are doing, but then refuses to watch as they do what they said they want them to do.
That’s due to the media that people choose to consume, not based on what they say.
If what you say is true, then you must have seen the very things that you claim to not be seeing.
Well, really politics is based on words. She is not asking them to take over, she is asking the people of our country to not allow one. But that falls on deaf ears to people who claim to not hear it.
You want her to bring in a gun and start shooting her opposition? That’s pretty much the alternative to using words. If words aren’t enough, then what is?
It’s not so much that you are being unreasonable, but instead, being ignorant and irrational.
All of us want to fight for it, but we are trying to do so without violence. If it comes to violence, we have all lost.
What is it that you are wanting here? Will stronger words mollify you, or is violence the only answer that you will find acceptable?
The only way that you would have been called an idiot if you were one of the persons clamoring for muslim leaders to disavow terrorism, while ignoring that they were in fact, disavowing terrorism, while also clamoring for Democrats to fight against the Republicans, while ignoring the fight they are having against Republicans. No one is calling an idiot here, and it is not a poster’s fault if someone chooses to apply that label to themself.
So, what you want is us to take up arms against the Republicans?
Those are the things that the people that you mention ended up resorting to, when words didn’t work.
If not, then what is it that you want?
I just want to associate myself strongly with these remarks – just amazingly insightful, particularly considering @Drsunflower1 is – if memory serves – Dutch.
The Republican party owns an unimaginably high percentage of their voters. It’s a mortal lock. They’re metaphysically ungettable right now.
And the demographic that creates the center of gravity of that group simply aren’t critical thinkers, rational people, or accomplished logicians.
They’re tribal, gullible, and relatively easily manipulated in virtually any direction. They’re ‘useful idiots’ at this point.
I truly don’t know a winning strategy to employ with/against them, and there are so many ways in which it really does feel like a certain part of Europe in an early decade of the last millennium.
And as I’ve said elsewhere, the current Republicans’ use of existential fear, jingoism, nationalism, and incredibly terse and considered messaging has estimable power.
I’m reminded of the Iraq War. Some Neocon(s), at some point, must have simply said: “If it works, we’ll get the credit. If it doesn’t, we’ll blame the next guy.”
In this demographic are the very religious, already used to swallowing no end of impossible bullshit thrice daily and thinking in cartoonish binary terms. The R’s need only use the default playbook of religion: all things good = God’s doing; all things bad = Satan.
How are you going to get through to those people, especially with fear and insecurity oozing from their DNA ?
They have targeted and groomed a very important and very valuable demographic.
They were evil, but they were not stupid.
OR maybe we’re working to change our party to what it once was. One that supported public education as the Great Equalizer. One that supported democracy because that’s what makes America great. One that believed politics was best served at the local level and that people, not governments, were the best deciders on what to spend their money on. I’m not claiming that that is the Republican Party of today but I choose to remain a Republican and fight to make my party the fiscal conservative / social libertarian party it should be. But of course the Dems on this board don’t hear that. They hear, “I’m a Republican and all of us are in lockstep with Trump. Seig Heil.” and of course ignore everything we say; which is strange because they themselves are dealing with the moderate/progressive schism and belief marginalising in their own party.
@SenorBeef You keep saying that Democrats are failing, but this contradicts the 2nd Rule of the Party: Democrats cannot fail, only be failed by their voters.
I don’t mean to pick on you personally, I know Americans of all stripes like to say these things, but it’s funny that “what makes America great” statements are almost always something America is, at best, mediocre for.
In terms of democracy, in the Democracy Matrix published by the University of Wuerzberg, the US is ranked 36th, below basically all of the Western democracies, and is no longer a “Working Democracy” but a “Deficient Democracy”.
And this analysis was in 2020, before the recent attempts to disenfranchise millions based on a lie.
You mean you’ll still vote for them, even while you can’t excuse what they’ve done?
Sorry, but that’s tribalism.
I consider myself Conservative, but no-one is guaranteed my vote, and I sure as shit wouldn’t vote for the current GOP (and, on a local level, anyone that has supported the election lies or tried to block the investigation of Jan 6th).
Basically, you fit right in with the Democratic party at this point. I’m not sure why you would be a Republican – it’s not like it’s your family that you have to stay, or your kid you who have a responsibility for.
I’m a Giants fan, but if the NY Giants advocated, say, for overthrowing the American democracy, I would probably become a Jets fan.
How old are you? The Democrats have been more fiscally conservative for decades, ever since Reaganomics. And, they have been more social libertarian since the 70s, when the Republicans started working to get the evangelicals on their side. Basically, they haven’t been fiscal conservatives or social libertarians for nearly half a century. Were you a Republican 50 years ago and are still hanging on for dear life?
I grew up in the 70’s. The days of Rockefeller and Anderson Republicans.
Did I say that? No I did not. Being a member of a party does not mean you vote for them 100%. Why? Do you Dems do that? Vote Democratic no matter who it is and their ethical issues (yeah all you Denverites that voted to re-elect Hancock)?
I vote for the best candidate and very often it is the lesser of two evils but for example in our last Senator election I voted against Cory Garner in the primary then happily voted for Hickenlooper in the general. I also voted for school funding, single-payer health care and reintroducing wolves to Colorado.
I grew up in the 70s, too, but I wasn’t voting until the 80s. Anderson left the Republican Party and ran independent, of course.
@DavidNRockies Thanks for your kind words. I’ve been following developments through this board, and I’ve been reading up on history.
This is what is frightening me the most. We’ve seen this before in Serbia, where after Tito died people were fed a steady diet of propaganda telling them the other peoples of Yugoslavia were going to destroy their way of life, their religion, their values. On that sentiment, Milosevic could come into power and lead his faction to war. I’ve just re-watched the Death of Yugoslavia documentary that was made in 1995, six months after Dayton. All the players were still there and were interviewed. The shared characteristics with what you are facing are to me - as a post WWII European - absolutely chilling. I remember the images from Yugoslavia from back then (I was a teenager when that war broke out) and I’ve spoken to a lot of refugees since. What happened there was horrific. All-out race war and ethnic cleansing. The Dutch were involved in Srebrenica on behalf of the UN and we’re still dealing with the moral injury and guilt.