US Presidential Elections - 2024 edition

[melkathi]

My money has been on Trump. But Americans seem to be deranged and will vote for any psychopath, so the Dems might surprise me.

[Hurlshort]

4 hours ago, melkathi said:

My money has been on Trump. But Americans seem to be deranged and will vote for any psychopath, so the Dems might surprise me.

Yeah. I don't understand how it is close at all. But it is, so I'll just hold my breathe. 

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

I've said it before and I'll say it again, I think Trump is going to win by peeling at least Michigan. Feels like watching a trainwreck in slow time tbh, but this has been known for over a year at this point and not only are the dems not doing some very obvious things to appeal to voters there that would cinch the state for Kamala, they're actively doubling down by refusing to meet people or kicking out former democratic politicians from events. Frankly it's baffling that Kamala and her team thought it more advantageous to pal around with Liz Cheney than bother to meet with a single Muslim when everything shows the dems are loosing Muslims, who backed Biden by a large margin last time, in droves.

But maybe I'm wrong and maybe there really is a massive base of hardcore anti-Trump conservatives out there who will come on out. Seems less likely than winning the lottery though.

[Malcador]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/25/harris-muslim-arab-michigan-support-voters-election/

I like the guy supporting Trump as he told him he'd end the war in Gaza. Somehow. 

 

[HoonDing]

[rjshae]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/25/harris-muslim-arab-michigan-support-voters-election/

I like the guy supporting Trump as he told him he'd end the war in Gaza. Somehow. 

If the Democrats had turned on full support for Muslims and Gaza, they would lose more independent votes than they would gain. It's definitely a headache for them.

[BruceVC]

2 hours ago, Malcador said:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/25/harris-muslim-arab-michigan-support-voters-election/

I like the guy supporting Trump as he told him he'd end the war in Gaza. Somehow. 

 

The irony with any pro-Palestinian American voters is Trump will support Netanyahu around any escalation around Iran and will be even less concerned about the Israeli strategy in Gaza

So they dont have to vote for Harris but then they mustn't  complain about what happens in the ME if Trump wins 

 

[Elerond]

2 hours ago, Malcador said:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/10/25/harris-muslim-arab-michigan-support-voters-election/

I like the guy supporting Trump as he told him he'd end the war in Gaza. Somehow. 

 

When there isn't any living soul in Gaza then war ends naturally, if Trump wins this outcome becomes more easily reachable when US don't anymore try to blackmail Israel to offer humanitarian aid to Gaze by withholding weapon deliveries and US will also "Blow Iran to Smithereens"  and give Israel green light to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities

So I can see why Trump is gaining support among Muslims and especially Arabs that are concerned about Israel's actions in Middle East and how people's lives there are destroyed, as he promises to rebuild Gaza best place in Israel .

 

[Pidesco]

The American political class has really sold their country down the river. If Trump wins you guys are definitely set on a catastrophic path you'll never get away from.

 

And maybe the world too.

[Hurlshort]

20 minutes ago, Pidesco said:

The American political class has really sold their country down the river. If Trump wins you guys are definitely set on a catastrophic path you'll never get away from.

 

And maybe the world too.

Nah. We already had 4 years of his train wreck. The reality if we have a solid balance of power that tends to wipe out or neutralize a lot of executive actions, for better or worse. Both progress and regression are slow.

It's also interesting how far removed the narratives are from the reality. The reality is the economy is doing great and everyone has jobs. Prices are up, but so are salaries. The craziness of national politics don't actually affect what is happening on a local level. I'm not saying things are perfect, but things continue to be better on average than then they were in previous generations.

[Sarex]

1 hour ago, Pidesco said:

The American political class has really sold their country down the river. If Trump wins you guys are definitely set on a catastrophic path you'll never get away from.

 

And maybe the world too.

Literally nothing will change...

[Pidesco]

23 minutes ago, Hurlshort said:

Nah. We already had 4 years of his train wreck. The reality if we have a solid balance of power that tends to wipe out or neutralize a lot of executive actions, for better or worse. Both progress and regression are slow.

It's also interesting how far removed the narratives are from the reality. The reality is the economy is doing great and everyone has jobs. Prices are up, but so are salaries. The craziness of national politics don't actually affect what is happening on a local level. I'm not saying things are perfect, but things continue to be better on average than then they were in previous generations.

Uh, statistics say that's just not true. The cost of living has increased a lot more than wages, and life is now costlier on average than it ever was in the post war period. This new robber baron era of extreme deregulation and lower tax revenues will only exacerbate this tendency, as the lower and middle classes lose social protections and purchasing power.

With the House and the Senate being increasingly unable to legislate anything and the Supreme Court insulating the presidency from consequences for any bad actions it may take the US are in for a really bad time, with guard rails significantly weakened.

[Pidesco]

2 minutes ago, Sarex said:

Literally nothing will change...

That's the only counter argument I will really consider. That nothing will change because things are already irrevocably in the crapper and Trump's term already derailed things enough.

[uuuhhii]

worst of people are usually not brought out by the toughest time

french and english manage to stop killing eachother in the middle of black death

prosperity is what bring out the worst behavior

[Zoraptor]

5 hours ago, PK htiw klaw eriF said:

Frankly it's baffling that Kamala and her team thought it more advantageous to pal around with Liz Cheney than bother to meet with a single Muslim when everything shows the dems are loosing Muslims, who backed Biden by a large margin last time, in droves.

Seems pretty par for the course for the utter blight that is 'enlightened centrism'. Just look at that other saviour of the people from fascism, Macron. So terrified of lefties* he's forced- forced I say!- to cosy up to the very people he was meant to save France from.

The electoral calculus is always the same. Maybe the muslims in Michigan won't vote for Harris because she tacitly supports burning Palestinians alive in hospitals. Maybe, since she's at least 'better' than the guy who actively supports it. But if she condemns that some people who think the sun shines out of Israel's fundamental orifice will vote for Trump, and those votes aren't just lost to her- they're gained by Trump so are effectively worth double.

*Had the same thing here with Ardern. So terrified of alienating the mythical 'centre' by doing anything economically left that she ended up running off to the speaking circuit to avoid the embarrassment of having her vote literally halve in 3 years; and achieved quite literally nothing that lasted despite her unprecedented (for mmp) absolute majority. Ironically, her socially progressive stuff has almost all gone now too having frittered her goodwill away getting it passed. Even the much lauded overseas gun reforms are going. And she still got called a commie by talk back radio mouthbreathers.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

16 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

Seems pretty par for the course for the utter blight that is 'enlightened centrism'. Just look at that other saviour of the people from fascism, Macron. So terrified of lefties* he's forced- forced I say!- to cosy up to the very people he was meant to save France from.

As someone much smarter than me once said "What Enoch Powell says today, the Tories say tomorrow and Labour legislates on the day after". Kinda sad how regular this seems to be.

16 minutes ago, Zoraptor said:

The electoral calculus is always the same. Maybe the muslims in Michigan won't vote for Harris because she tacitly supports burning Palestinians alive in hospitals. Maybe, since she's at least 'better' than the guy who actively supports it. But if she condemns that some people who think the sun shines out of Israel's fundamental orifice will vote for Trump, and those votes aren't just lost to her- they're gained by Trump so are effectively worth double.

The wildest thing about that to me is that by the numbers the people who thinks the sun shines out of Israel's fundamental orifice are (white) Evangelicals who are already in the tank for Trump. The radical centrists need to learn they're never going to be enough for such folks, but at the end of the day the radical centrists are those folks with a thin sheen of decorum.

33 minutes ago, Sarex said:

Literally nothing will change...

Trump will probably accelerate things tbh, but the path of the US into a decayed empire only capable of sowing death has been set since at least the triumph of neoliberalism.

[Bartimaeus]

Anecdotal and I don't live in Michigan, but I personally know several people who are ardently pro-Israel and who I have repeatedly heard say that Palestine is little more than a terrorist state which has consistently burned bridges with just about every country that has ever tried to extend them an olive branch and which no other country in the world would ever put up with if they were right on their doorstep. They are currently content with Harris' fence-walking on the issue and will be voting for her, at least for this cycle in order to defeat Trump, so I will once again personally affirm what Zoraptor has said multiple times this year in that it's really a no-win issue for Biden/Harris and that basically being non-committal does seem likely (though perhaps not certain) to be the best approach to try to capture as many votes in the face of Donald Trump's "we're going to finally let Israel put this to rest" stance, weak-willed and lacking moral fiber it may be. Polling on the issue seems to suggest that older Democratic-leaning voters still support Israel over Palestine, while the younger Democratic-leaning voters, uh, don't, so it just doesn't seem to be something that Democrats can even bring up (much less try to address) without it immediately biting them in the butt, especially seeing as the politicians themselves seem to be divided on the issue. There's also the issue of younger voters barely showing up to vote for any level of government in the first place: if they want their beliefs to inform policy, they would need to actually start consistently showing up, which election after election (be it presidential or midterms), they really just don't. Of course, you could also say the inverse, that politicians should be pro-active in trying to win younger voters over with policies suited towards them specifically, which could make them more reliable...but I already saw how that went for Bernie Sanders in both 2016 and 2020, so I don't think that strategy is going to work.

Edited October 28 by Bartimaeus

[BruceVC]

9 hours ago, Pidesco said:

Uh, statistics say that's just not true. The cost of living has increased a lot more than wages, and life is now costlier on average than it ever was in the post war period. This new robber baron era of extreme deregulation and lower tax revenues will only exacerbate this tendency, as the lower and middle classes lose social protections and purchasing power.

With the House and the Senate being increasingly unable to legislate anything and the Supreme Court insulating the presidency from consequences for any bad actions it may take the US are in for a really bad time, with guard rails significantly weakened.

I dont think  most statistics or some university study should ever be more credible or relevant than actual lived experience of someone who lives in a country. Its all about context 

Politics is  typically about grandstanding and theatre and you hear complaints about things that  often dont  represent the reality for everyone 

In South Africa its common to hear things like " we the MOST unequal society in the world " as if we the worst country in the world around the reality of our economy and what that translates to for all citizens

It doesnt  really matter who  wins this US election, the US is going to be fine and still standing 4 years from now despite the " end of the USA" predictions from both sides if the other side wins 

 

 

[Lexx]

I dunno man, for me this looks pretty much like a frog in boiling water situation for the US. Americans keep telling us that everything is fine and nothing really changes, but from the outside it just doesn't look like that. Things changed a lot in the past 20 years already, and sorry but you just can't tell me that "nothing changes." You just don't notice.

What sucks the most about it is that whatever happens over there will have a ripple effect on the rest of the world.

Edited October 29 by Lexx

[HoonDing]

Yeh outside completely going off-grid there's just no way to completely ignore those morons like you can do with Argentina or Australia. 

[BruceVC]

4 hours ago, Lexx said:

I dunno man, for me this looks pretty much like a frog in boiling water situation for the US. Americans keep telling us that everything is fine and nothing really changes, but from the outside it just doesn't look like that. Things changed a lot in the past 20 years already, and sorry but you just can't tell me that "nothing changes." You just don't notice.

What sucks the most about it is that whatever happens over there will have a ripple effect on the rest of the world.

Every country changes as years go on and domestic and geopolitical  events of the time influence that and then governments respond to that 

For example the  US now is not the US of the Cold War and or the US when  9/11 happened

The point Im  making is another 4 years of Trump winning or Harris winning is not going to fundamentally change the US or the world 

But maybe give some examples so I can understand what you mean?

 

 

Edited October 29 by BruceVC

[rjshae]

19 hours ago, Hurlshort said:

Nah. We already had 4 years of his train wreck. The reality if we have a solid balance of power that tends to wipe out or neutralize a lot of executive actions, for better or worse. Both progress and regression are slow.

It's also interesting how far removed the narratives are from the reality. The reality is the economy is doing great and everyone has jobs. Prices are up, but so are salaries. The craziness of national politics don't actually affect what is happening on a local level. I'm not saying things are perfect, but things continue to be better on average than then they were in previous generations.

I think mostly what you'll see is a lot of stupid, a lot of hate, and a lot of stupid hate, not necessarily in that order. DJT just says many remarkably dumb things, which somehow makes him popular. He'll probably earn himself a couple more impeachments, and plenty of court cases. I'm not clear how all this is making America great; mostly it seems to have the opposite effect.

[Hurlshort]

20 hours ago, Pidesco said:

Uh, statistics say that's just not true. The cost of living has increased a lot more than wages, and life is now costlier on average than it ever was in the post war period. This new robber baron era of extreme deregulation and lower tax revenues will only exacerbate this tendency, as the lower and middle classes lose social protections and purchasing power.

With the House and the Senate being increasingly unable to legislate anything and the Supreme Court insulating the presidency from consequences for any bad actions it may take the US are in for a really bad time, with guard rails significantly weakened.

You are absolutely correct that there are many statistics that paint a grim portrait of the US. But there is also a tremendous amount of hyperbole that inflates the issues. 

For example, people have been railing about the US public education system for decades. It is apparently in shambles. But that misses the real complexity of the system. It isn't a federal system, instead it varies by each state, by each county, and by each school district. It has tremendous failures and tremendous successes. It's not on the verge of collapse. I'm in the trenches every day teaching these kids and I can tell you that we are going to be fine.

For another example, San Francisco is being made out as some sort of dystopian tent city filled with shuttered skyscrapers and feces laden streets. I go to SF all the time. It's a beautiful city with fantastic restaurants and amazing places to explore. Each neighborhood has its own personality. In reality, there is one area of the city that is struggling to recover, and that is the financial district. I have no idea how to fix that, but it doesn't reflect the city as a whole. Just like DC doesn't really reflects the country as a whole.

[Malcador]

https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/10/29/ballot-boxes-fire-oregon-washington/75916577007/

Must be those Antifa people.

[uuuhhii]

even 5 percent of project 2025 will change the world forever

great depression drag half of the world down with it

this time global economy are far more connected

effect will be felt anywhere someone can buy canned food