What?

You can’t tax an economy into prosperity, you can’t regulate a nation into prosperity, and you can’t export your industry and become prosperous.

The Democrats and Republicans since about 1965 have worked in concert to offshore industry, tax and regulate domestic businesses out of profitability, printed more money then you can imagine - driving inflation. And the crowning jewel of all of this was killing to gold standard, with a nice improvement to the display of the crown through implementation of Free trade.

If we had a Fair trade arrangement - that allowed for Tariffs that explicitly were put in place to undermine the value of subsidizing foreign production that is exported to your nation, we would have a very different story. If we had an explicit way or costing up production that is done to the detriment of environmental standards - China and such would have had actual pressure to clean up their environmental standards.

Lets explore something that demonstrates the missunderstanding:

I want to talk about China, It’s National Security concern, and Renewables. And yes - these three things are linked HEAVILY.

A lot of people who are pro Renewables will point to China: They can do it. And sure - they can. But what they entirely miss out on, is that to China Renewable energy is THE ONLY OPTION FOR ENERGY INDEPENDENCE. And Energy independence is ABSOLUTELY ESSENTIALLY if you want to be a global power. Energy independence allows the nation to be more aggressive without risk of embargo - for if China were to engage militarily in Taiwan, the shipping lanes in and out of china could be put under blockade, western insurers would basically kill the option to use them to ensure the ships going to/coming from the region - and that would dramatically reduce the amount of oil/gas coming into the nation. It would also limit food entering the nation.

See: A Nation like Canada, or the US, who are each are (or capable of being) food AND energy independent - you can’t exactly siege them. While the last several decades manufacturing in these nations has been lacking, these nations also have tremendous mineral resource availability if they ever choose to start exploiting it at scale again: China has none of this.

Traditionally, this is why China has a strong incentive to facilitate the power of their Empire through Trade (ex. Silk Road). Because they have such need of importing food (especially over the last couple of decades), trade is the only option China has for expanding it’s influence. China CAN NOT use military force without fear of retribution that literally starves out it’s populace of energy, and food. Basically: China is vulnerable to a nation wide siege. And China’s potential greatest Rival: The US, has the absolute means to do this.

So, in order to solve ONE of these problems, China needs Energy Security through renewable. Oddly enough - in the mid term, as China’s populace begins to shrink it will become feasible for China to become food independent as well. Once that occurs, we may very well see China become more aggressive militarily.

Now: Take that same principle and apply it to EVERY SINGLE POLITICAL ISSUE.

When you start to see the agenda’s being pushed - and start ripping down and looking at the underlying motivations which come down to “we don’t want to die” and a couple other core ideas - each of which is very immediate - what we find is both Republicans, and Democrats are prone to ignoring the details in favour of pushing their agenda.

See: Climate change is very much real - the only question is, how much is it human caused? See - the big forest fires in Western Canada/US come down to a couple of things that are piling up over the last 5 or so years. 1. Beavers killed in massive quantities through the 1700’s and 1800’s. 2. Then we have massive fire suppression. 3. Then we have clear cutting of forests. Beavers seems odd - but beavers build damns out of wood, wet wood takes A LONG time to dry, like - from green wood to dry we are talking a year of air drying in near ideal conditions per inch of thickness and the beaver damns are… wet, covered in part by silt, and it’s deep. From the time the water ways start re-routing we are probably talking like 100-150 years for that material to dry out, break down and rot, and otherwise cease helping to maintain moisture in the area. When you suppress fires heavily - underbrush builds up and as it dries, becomes perfect fuel for a forest fire. Then you have the clear cutting which accelerates the drying of the area out. Look at the time lines and: Yep, forest fires will probably remain a problem for another decade or so.

What is going to fix the forests is: Removal of artificial damns (more fish in the water ways), Recovery of Beaver populations (they slow water ways and redirect them - they don’t stop them and control them the same way artificial ones do), and ceasing clear cut in favour of selective cuts and thinning (doing it this way does cost more per log, but - it actually can help the forest grow more lush, and a more limited area of forest support more life as more shrub and such is capable of growing in a way that allows safe spaces for wild life while providing food sources in the form of berries etc).

You know what WILL NOT fix the forest fire situation? Fighting carbon emissions. But that is exactly the argument.

I don’t see republicans, or democrats arguing for sensible long term models for dealing with the problems in a sensible way that can actually solve the problem. I see radical climate denial, and radical human caused arguments - and they aren’t useful, nor helpful but it’s what the media focuses on, it’s what gets spouted, because: It’s easy.

You likely won’t get another that isn’t a complete sham like they have in Russia

Your assignment of blame assumes that most people shouldn’t be involved in their democracies at all. But that’s kinda not how democracies are supposed to work. For the people, by the people.

No doubt, the parties and the system share a large degree of the blame and they’re extremely far away from being perfect — but the notion that politicians have to come to you and dazzle you as a citizen is not excusable either.

Looking at that chart, she would have won in Wisconsin and gotten their ten electoral votes.

What does it look like for the rest of the states?

But how do you count “didn’t vote”? And what about “voted on other parts but not for President because genocide or whatever”? That second group might be countable, but the first is like proving a negative

Now count those that didn’t vote at all.

But how else will they blame anyone but themselves?

You really should listen to them though. They are telling you exactly what they want.

Ignoring them and then being surprised and mad they didn’t show up wasn’t the play. And it will continue not being the play.

And despite that he still got millions of votes. Millions of Americans want this. We’re a country of terrible people.

It doesn’t matter. You are ignoring the rot at the core. Even if people turned out and kamala won - it Trump should have broken the Republican party. It should not have been a competition.

I’m not sure that statement can be verified at this point in time.

I think the Republican voters are to stupid or just in denial that Congress would ever vote for an abortion ban, even though they’ve clearly signaled they would. My boss is very right wing and last night he said to me that he thought it was weird all the commercials he saw for Sherrod Brown here in Ohio mentioned protecting abortion when it’s legal here. When I said a nation ban would supercede our state constitution he just straight told me Congress would pass a national ban.

I literally heard an interview with a woman who said she voted Republican because, on the one hand, abortion “isn’t that big of a deal” and ought to be left up to the states, but on the other, “doctors shouldn’t be allowed to abort babies after they’re born.”

So this person thinks that doctors are murdering babies… and that should be allowed on a state by state basis. Which… boy oh boy, I’m not sure what to even do with a mind that works that way.

Ænema

Nearly every news outlet has reported record voter turnout, but look at the vote counts from 2020 vs this year.

John Kerry? Is that you?

When are you expecting an election to happen where you can vote for this party?

Get started

Bernie Sanders set records for both 2016 and 2020.

The number of Democratic voters is reported to be around 49 million. (link) As of 9 a.m., Vice President Kamala Harris had 66.5 million votes to Trump’s 71.56 million. (link)

Plenty of the left showed up, in 2020 biden got 81,283,501 in the popular vote. That’s near 15 million disenchanted voters who didn’t return to the polls for this administration. But let’s blame the 15 million people, surely they must all be wrong and not the DNC’s strategy or anything.

Meeting Arab American voters is not “far left.” Biden actively diverted his campaign stops in Michigan to avoid meeting them and Harris campaign refused to let Palestinian-Americans endorse her on camera at the DNC.

It’s nor far left to meet Palestinian-Americans and Lebanese Americans who lost loved ones in bombings. Biden routinely met with Israeli-Americans in the White House and family members of hostages and posted photos with them on his instagram. Meeting just ONE Arab-American family is something he never did, and saying that would be a far left thing to do is frankly offensive.

Removed by mod

It really was (or at least the Democratic party’s fault). If you take every single third party voter, assign them to Kamala, she still loses.

Yeah, that’s what I meant. Its all just going to be Israel and settlers

Nah he may keep it around so the from the river to the sea crowd can screech at the dems

Pretty sure Trump once again spent less…

I voted for Harris. Roughly 60% of American voters who are eligible don’t vote.

Harris needed to convince those voters that she was either worth voting for, or Trump was worth voting against.

She failed to convince them of either, so they stayed home, along with 14 million Dem voters she failed to convince to vote blue like they did in 2020.

We didn’t. Most people did. Candidates running for office are a popularity contest. Biden has low approval ratings, Harris said she’s Biden and wouldn’t change most polices.

Trump is much much worse, and I voted for Harris in California despite knowing it didn’t change how North Carolina or Iowa could have gone.

At some point “I’m not Trump” gets tired and going “I’m just like the guy in office who was so unpopular he dropped out, but I will give Republicans what they want on border policy and appoint them to my cabinet” reads more like Diet Trump than “I will give you policies that sway people away from fascism.”

You have every right to be angry, but your anger is pointed at the wrong people. Just like the elite divide the masses with bullshit culture wars, the Democratic party elite want you to blame your fellow voters rather than their unpopular platform and abysmal campaign.

If you can vote, you’re a fucking adult. stop acting like a fucking god damned spoiled child.

I’ve seen this attitude repeated ad nauseum these last few weeks, from people discussing Harris with conflicted undecided voters. And your attitude and aggression is exactly what all of them received, and yet you all wonder why people may have stayed home?

People were vocal about their complaints regarding the Democrat’s platform, and they were ignored. If democracy is so important, why the fuck couldn’t the Democratic party adopt more progressive policies?!

Like, apparently it’s completely reasonable to expect people to do what you say with no promise of even addressing their concerns, nevermind actually addressing, but it’s completely unreasonable to just choose not to participate in the system?

You’re not entitled to someone’s vote, regardless of the circumstances. Stop blaming your fellow countrymen and women for not feeling represented, and start screaming at the party who fucking refused to represent them.

Stop blaming your fellow Americans for the Democrats running a platform so unpopular, 14 million Democrats that voted in 2020 chose to stay home.

Stop blaming your fellow Americans for the DNC hiding Biden’s mental acuity issues for well over a year, humiliating himself (and our country) on stage at his debate before hastily cramming a candidate the party didn’t have a say in, and running her on policies that their constituents were vocally against.

As a trans woman, you’re damn right I’m fucking terrified, and I’m fucking angry.

But my anger is at the Democratic party, who decided that spending decades appeasing the Republicans and giving the American people nothing that they’ve been promised, who knew the consequences of this election and decided a 2016 rerun was the only viable option, who paraded Republican after Republican across the DNC stage while snubbing Palestinian Democrats from speaking, and then sending Bill Clinton to lecture the electorate about why Israel has the right to genocide Palestine.

The Democratic party had fascism at the gates, and passed all responsibility onto their voting base instead of checks notes listened to their fucking constituents.

So don’t get angry at your disillusioned and apathetic neighbor, they’re a symptom of the system being unrepresentative of the people for so many years.

Direct your anger at the DNC, demand they start listening to their base, demand that they start trying to garner non-voters with popular policies instead of moving further right to appeal to moderate Republicans.

Or better yet, send them letters regularly, like I plan to do, reminding them that all of the awfulness the American people are living through is a direct result of their entitlement and hubris. Maybe throw in their that they could probably get elected if they actually listened to the American people and ran on policy that reflected what they want.

But that’s probably too radical, let’s just keep blaming the electorate for wanting to participate in a system that represent them, not one that runs on “Please, we promise, last time we’re delaying fascism/the other guy, for realz for realz this time, we’ll totally enact all the laws, just give us more money you don’t have and give us four more years.” But, I’m clearly not as educated and smart as the people running the DNC, I mean, I haven’t lost 4 out of the last 7 elections trying to run the same playbook everytime,

They just have to run a candidate people want to vote for, not a candidate people have to vote for. But they won’t, because the DNC seems to think they know what people need better than they do. And their voting results this year clearly show that…

You’re participating in the same circle jerk.

You’ve concluded that Trump is a huge Fascist and a danger beyond all other considerations (but not the Democrats, even though they’re giving weapons to an ethno-Fascist regime committing Genocide which is literally “supporting Fascism”) and you reached that conclusion from consuming Democrat propaganda in places like Lemmy with no actual use of skepticism, so now you repeat it.

Meanwhile all those people who don’t think like you and all the posters whose posts you read here, had very different levels in the like-hate Trump scale, and the like-dislike Democrats one, and the trust-distrust what the Democrats/Republicans say scales, the politically engaged scale, the thinking that my vote makes a difference to my life scale, the what matters to me most in life scale and other such scales in human belief and behaviour that together add up to make them or not go vote and for whom they vote, which in this election also included things like the flexibility or inflexibility of one’s principles thanks to the Democrats activelly breaking a really strong set of principle for lots of people when they supported with weapons the commiting of a Genocide in first Gaza and now also Lebanon.

The “incompetence” was the Democrats with their words and actions targetting a point in all those scales that turned off a lot more people that it turned on. The 14 million less Democrat votes make it undeniable that it wasn’t Trump that conviced those votes to flip, it was the Democrats that failed at convincing enough people to vote for them, so clearly their words and actions turned off from voting a lot of people.

The “entitlement” is the idea that everybody is equally politically aware as you, trusting about what the Democrats say of Trump as you, fearful of Trump as you, trusting that voting maters as you and so on. I’ve been a member of two different political parties over the years (in two different countries) and this blindness is incredibly common amongst party members: such strongly politically active and highly tribalist people just don’t get it that most of voters don’t think like them, not even close and it gets worse when they end up in circle jerks like the one here in Lemmy during the US Presidentials - they basically just strengthen each other’s beliefs in that what’s right or wrong, what will work or not work to help their side and what people think or don’t think, all with no actual proof being involved just the say so of like minded people, a pretty straighforward “groupthink” situation.

(In fact it was my experience with canvassing and leafletting in those two parties and countries that opened my eyes to the reality that in terms of engagement and trust in politics most people are nowhere like you and me.)

Even more “entitlement” is the idea that your values, forecasts and interpretation of the world are the right ones and those of the ones who didn’t vote are wrong, then compounded with the idea that others should just do as you think they should and if they don’t they’re wrong (all of which on display in this meme and all the type of posts here blaming the 14 millions) - this a pretty straightforward “I know best and others should follow my lead”, pure entitlement.

The “stupidity” is that the kind of people that have been engaging in this sort of thinking and posture are unable to, now that it has been shown beyond doubt that is complete total bollocks, review their own beliefs, behaviour and ideas in light of it. Instead they just blame everybody else like self-deluded simpletons.

I think it would be obvious after 4 decades of Neoliberalism that you can’t deregulate your way into prosperity and in fact the very opposite happens: you end up with consumers constantly swindled, widely sold products that cause long term problems like cancer, all manner of systemic problems having grown uncontrollably (most notably Negative Externalities) and lots of markets turned into cartels and monopolies (with prices up, quality down and improvement stopped) - enshitification is the product of deregulation, as is the housing market bubble, the internet access local monopolies in large parts of the US (and associated high prices for shit service compared to the rest of the World) and a lot of other things.

“Small government” is a content-free slogan rather than a solution: absolutely, in some areas there is too much “government” (for example, the oversized military spend), yet in others there is too little (a National Health Service would literally make Healthcare in the US consume half of what it does in GDP terms so “big government” there would actually be the smart solution business-wise). It’s a problem of how Government is managed, which is a hard thing to do and solve and were the devil is in the details, not just a simple sounding “solution” of “just make it smaller” that sounds good but solves nothing.

Migration is a complex problem. I think that legal immigrants should be treated as guests because they were literally invited in, but that does not extend to illegal ones.

Immigration (as an economic strategy of a country) can indeed be a problem, especially if it’s done too fast and with low integration because whilst immigrants bring themselves as workers, they also bring their needs for products and services and that’s more works that needs to be done or in other words, more jobs - so when they arrive they are workers competing for jobs but over time they also cause more jobs to be created because they too are consumers buying products and services which have to be produced by even more workers - whilst the low integration is a problem because of cultural clashes between the immigrants and the locals (maybe more of a problem in Europe than the US) because people coming from different countries don’t have the same assumptions as the locals on how on is supposed to behave in certain situations (some being small details and other much bigger) and hence can behave in ways that other see as weird or even anti-social, which in large numbers generates conflict. With time living in a new country an immigrant will adjust to be a lot more like the locals, but if the influx of immigrants is too many in too little time there are too many clashes with those freshly immigrated who haven’t learned to behave more like the locals and people in a host country end up feeling that immigrants are unpleasant people , even bad people.

Immigration (the legal kind, approved by Governments) is being used to paper-over flaws in the way a country is being managed (for example, in my own country politicians caused massive house price inflation and other problems, mainly affecting young adults, so the end result is lower birth rates and hence an aging population, which is then made up with immigration, and this is so extreme that in this country literally half of university graduates leave the country and then they’re replaced with immigrants with much lower educational levels) plus it’s massively good for the wealthy (both because it increases worker competition for jobs when they arrive and because it eventually pushes up the size of the Economy as a whole, and whilst normal people’s prosperity relates to the size of the Economy per-capita, the wealthy are the ones taking slices from the whole of the Economy so for them and them only, growing the Economy by adding more people is a gain), so problematic Immigration is really a consequence of problems at a political level (and that includes Corruption) - the country is not being managed for the good of most people and high Immigration is both part of that directly (it makes the Wealthy wealthier) and indirectly because it’s used to paper over problems caused by that political mismanagement (like in my country young adults leaving or having fewer children because life is way too expensive for them here and salaries are low, so then immigrants are imported because there is a lack of workers).

Immigrants themselves, however (as I say, the legal kind, hence people like you and me who were invited and changed their whole lives and invested time and effort in the country they came to) shouldn’t be treated as the problem - they’re just people doing their lives the best they can in a perfectly legit way. Look at the Politicians for the people to blame for Immigration reaching problematic levels.

Anyways, the more general point I’m making is that a lot of the problems you see have been created by very much local people in positions of power doing what’s best for themselves and for those who will pay them (and most definitely politicians in the US are Corrupt as fuck), and afterwards scapegoating the problems they themselves caused on something or somebody else and the easiest target there is are the most powerless people in the country (who don’t even have a right to vote) - immigrants.