[Tainari88]

I find this piece very interesting. It is short. What do you think he means about why Trump became popular in the first place?

That people are sick of the lack of accountability? Do you think that is the issue? Or is it people who want to destroy the system because they blame the liberals for what is wrong? Are there even real liberals in the Senate and Congress? Jon Stewart refers to the Congress and the Senate of the US as a geriatric facility and that aids and others in American politics are the ones in there who are getting their agendas up and running because the legislature is full of cognitive decline old farts? What is your opinion?


Is there a rule of law in the USA Or is it all LIES? Political theater only?

[late]

I find this piece very interesting. It is short. What do you think he means about why Trump became popular in the first place?

That people are sick of the lack of accountability? Do you think that is the issue? Or is it people who want to destroy the system because they blame the liberals for what is wrong? Are there even real liberals in the Senate and Congress? Jon Stewart refers to the Congress and the Senate of the US as a geriatric facility and that aids and others in American politics are the ones in there who are getting their agendas up and running because the legislature is full of cognitive decline old farts? What is your opinion?


Is there a rule of law in the USA Or is it all LIES? Political theater only?

"The arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice."

He means Trump belongs in jail.

Republicans are a minority party. They attract people by appealing to their base instincts, fear, race, etc.

The result is that mentally unbalanced, incompetent, and corrupt (and often all 3 at the same time) are running the party.

That isn't quite what he said, but that's what's going on.

We have a fundamental problem. We have a government designed to be slow. We also have an economy that turns changes the world as a matter of routine. We can't keep up. Add that to the growing corruption, and you have a recipe for a lot of bad days.

[Rancid]

I find this piece very interesting. It is short. What do you think he means about why Trump became popular in the first place?

That people are sick of the lack of accountability? Do you think that is the issue? Or is it people who want to destroy the system because they blame the liberals for what is wrong? Are there even real liberals in the Senate and Congress? Jon Stewart refers to the Congress and the Senate of the US as a geriatric facility and that aids and others in American politics are the ones in there who are getting their agendas up and running because the legislature is full of cognitive decline old farts? What is your opinion?


Is there a rule of law in the USA Or is it all LIES? Political theater only?

People have a sense of a loss of agency.

[wat0n]

You should watch season 19 of South Park (2015). Then you'll understand one reason why Trump won.

[Tainari88]

"The arc of history is long, but it bends towards justice."

He means Trump belongs in jail.

Republicans are a minority party. They attract people by appealing to their base instincts, fear, race, etc.

The result is that mentally unbalanced, incompetent, and corrupt (and often all 3 at the same time) are running the party.

That isn't quite what he said, but that's what's going on.

We have a fundamental problem. We have a government designed to be slow. We also have an economy that turns changes the world as a matter of routine. We can't keep up. Add that to the growing corruption, and you have a recipe for a lot of bad days.

Jon Stewart hit the nail on the head. He stated that if you can find a politician with good faith and who responds and you get past the moat of lies and manipulations by monied interests that protect access to those lawmakers and politicians you can get things done. STILL.

But the question becomes why the American voters and their grassroots organizations and committees have to be forced to fight for a long time just to find a few HONEST and good-faith people?

The system is slow and corrupt he says.

How is that different than Mexican systems and Latin America and the corruption via money and bribes and people in power being bought off?

Isn't the US system supposed to be the example to follow? Or is all that shit just lies and fake propaganda in praxis?

What the US government system does not get is that they are not exceptional. Fights for power and corruption via money and a powerful plutocracy are very human and can be found in many governments. In different forms. But they exist.

Now, I do agree with you late. I think over time it bends towards justice. But it will never bend if the majority do not agree with all these monied interests in the moat....blocking progress...from happening. They need to get more active Late. Otherwise, they run the risk of losing the entire Republic and living in a Latin American dictatorship. Opponents are being picked up in the middle of the night, black sedans stopping the 'radicals' and the terrorists against a Trumpian autocratic regime. People are being flown to black sites and being tortured or killed to send a message to the ones challenging their power.

Reopening Japanese WWII concentration camps closed since the 1940s and putting people suspected of having Un-American thoughts or activities and not being formally charged. The SCOTUS passes autocratic laws that the Trumpian puppet Congress and Senate pass as justice.

I always have said for years in PoFo, that whatever happens in another nation with another human system can easily happen in the US system too, because it depends on the right conditions and criteria being met. All humans share similar reactions to similar events.

It just is about the right conditions and a lack of political will to make the perfect storm happen. You want to avoid it? You have to be very active from the moment you see the lack of accountability and the polarization getting increasingly more acute.

It is basically a Civil War gearing up.

[MistyTiger]

I think people want an outsider who doesn't play by the corrupt rules in government, someone who cannot be controlled by special interests. The first applies to Trump but the second part...does not. Trump can be bought. Trump is corrupt. We know he loves Putin and loves Chinese money etc. I wonder if it's impossible to find a lawmaker who really isn't corrupt, one who is resistant to any of the bad influences.

[Tainari88]

People have a sense of a loss of agency.

That is a lack of political action. Some nations force their citizens to vote. No one is allowed nuetrality. You are basically fined for that or jailed if you commit that negligence in civic duty. Lol.

But? If people hate politics in general? That is also a way of communicating. Lack of interest because of powerlessness. I won't be voting. What difference does it make? It is all bullshit.

Well, if you are a radical nationalist and every single person in the USA who is a radical nationalist is organized and votes? And a huge percentage of people who are not nationalist white power radicals and DO NOT VOTE at all? Or get organized as a block? What happens? Who wins that vacuum for power? The organized minority of White Power Nationalists in the USA? Or the ones who failed to show up or do the work of organizing a vote or a petition?

The answer is there. Do nothing. Gain nothing. Do something. Gain something.

[Tainari88]

I think people want an outsider who doesn't play by the corrupt rules in government, someone who cannot be controlled by special interests. The first applies to Trump but the second part...does not. Trump can be bought. Trump is corrupt. We know he loves Putin and loves Chinese money etc. I wonder if it's impossible to find a lawmaker who really isn't corrupt, one who is resistant to any of the bad influences.

People who do not accept PAC money or corporate lobbyist money. That only accept small individual donations and refuse to be bought off. You follow the money and you can get a list of people in the US Congress and the US Senate who are not sellouts. Unfortunately they are the minority of politicos.

So you start following the money of all the ones who are sellouts. The problem is that many of the donors to these sellout politicians have insisted on passing laws to restrict the names of who are buying out these politicians? You get a list of donors and it is blacked out like a radacted Freedom of Information page. No information is allowed to be released. They do it because they know it would DESTROY them as a business. Would you do business with a guy who sells furniture and says he hates Mexicans and hates environmental causes and wants to throw kids in cages, but buys and sells furniture in a big chain store allover the USA and hires low wage labor in China and Mexico to make a bigger profit in his furniture store in the USA? You bring out the evidence of his giving a million bucks in campaign funds to some asshole Republican in Alabama and another asshole Democrat in Delaware.

It is pointed out to his shareholders that they are a part of a scheme of bribing, the guy is playing both sides of the fence and the conversation he had with the politicians in those two states was recorded where he said, I want to be allowed to be against the Mexicans in my country, but I want high profits and to exploit the Mexican and Chinese workers low wages there in order to make more money.

I want racism at home, and exploitation in my pocket with Capitalism. Nothing wrong with that.

If that is opened up and everyone stops buying from Big American Furniture? They go out of business. So they stay quiet and behind the scenes. Making sure all the information is never publicly accessed.

[noemon]

You should watch season 19 of South Park (2015). Then you'll understand one reason why Trump won.

[Tainari88]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo7CgWH8jX4

The problem is if the PC ones who have that fuck off to the opposition if they actually have a decent agenda to help the voters out there get real goals accomplished? Or is it all bullshit and nothing getting done but pissing off the PC police?

Lol.

I did tell the ones shushing people with PC bullshit that will only accomplish getting people angry about their language policing.

They did not listen.

[wat0n]

The problem is if the PC ones who have that fuck off to the opposition if they actually have a decent agenda to help the voters out there get real goals accomplished? Or is it all bullshit and nothing getting done but pissing off the PC police?

I don't think they did circa 2015 either.

Episode 3 of that seasons provides you with an example of that, it's about gentrification.

[late]

One election expert said that if you reran that election 20 times, Trump would lose 19 out of the 20 times.

We have genuinely weird and screwed up presidential elections.

Trump got millions fewer votes, and won... Which wouldn't have happened without Russian help, Trump violating election laws, the electoral 'college'...

Hillary is intensely disliked, if it had been a better politician, Trump wouldn't have had a prayer.

[Rancid]

One election expert said that if you reran that election 20 times, Trump would lose 19 out of the 20 times.

We have genuinely weird and screwed up presidential elections.

Trump got millions fewer votes, and won... Which wouldn't have happened without Russian help, Trump violating election laws, the electoral 'college'...

Hillary is intensely disliked, if it had been a better politician, Trump wouldn't have had a prayer.

We have created a very fragile system that will often hit the odd 1 out of 20 chance thing. This is true beyond politics.

Our systems, political, economic, and otherwise are build with little robustness. All it takes it one hammer swing at the wrong time, and bam! You have a shit show.

[Godstud]

Trump was a protest vote against the status quo. Brexit was, as well.

If you ran the 2016 election 20 times, Trump would still have won 20 times. Trump won legitimately, despite what people like to pretend. It's as dumb as the people saying the 2020 election was rigged.

[late]

Trump was a protest vote against the status quo. Brexit was, as well.

If you ran the 2016 election 20 times, Trump would still have won 20 times. Trump won legitimately, despite what people like to pretend. It's as dumb as the people saying the 2020 election was rigged.

Hillary, despite all the crap Putin and his Republicans pulled, got a few million more votes.

In any other democratic election, she would have won. In our electoral college, odds are she still would have won. However, the electoral college has become a wild card.

[Godstud]

@late It doesn't matter who got more, it's where the votes are that counts. The same applies to most democracies around the world. In many she still would have lost as in many representative democracies or republics.

In Canada, if we went simply by numbers of votes, Trudeau would not be PM, right now.

[Tainari88]

@late It doesn't matter who got more, it's where the votes are that counts. The same applies to most democracies around the world. In many she still would have lost as in many representative democracies or republics.

In Canada, if we went simply by numbers of votes, Trudeau would not be PM, right now.

Well, popular votes should be the only thing that does count. The problem is getting people truly educated about the issues and not giving their votes to parties out of emotion or tradition in the family, or ignorance or bribes.

Most people respond to a knock on the door or someone talking to them about their campaigns. Once that effort is made to contact them and do for them? That is how you get results.

Jon Stewart is saying that the moat is very strong and it is full of corruption and it shields access to many people.

I think the bigger problem now is disinformation and lack of accountability. If these freaks are not held accountable? There is no real positive change or even an incentive to do the right thing politically speaking.

I did a campaign once on Clean Water Action. Go door to door and ask people for donations to help with bringing clean water to communities without clean water available in the US. In the US. Not in a foreign country. How can anyone be against clean water for all I thought?

There are people against clean water. They see it as leftist propaganda. Got one crazy with a gun threatening to shoot us due to clean water is a conspiracy of wanting to take his gun rights away.

When it gets that bad? The disinformation and distortion of what other political people are talking about?

It all is very dangerous.

[wat0n]

Hillary, despite all the crap Putin and his Republicans pulled, got a few million more votes.

In any other democratic election, she would have won. In our electoral college, odds are she still would have won. However, the electoral college has become a wild card.

This often doesn't happen in countries with a parliamentary system. An indirect election (be it by using an Electoral College like the US or by voting for members of a Parliament who will then choose the Head of Government) can perfectly disagree with the results of a direct election.

In Latin America this is actually happening often i.e. the elected Presidents would not be able to form a government if they had parliamentary systems. Instead, they are elected and run the administration but are unable to muster a consistent majority in the Legislature so they have to bargain and often can't govern effectively since the opposition in the Legislature doesn't feel responsible for how well the administration does at best or wants it to fail at worst. The GOP grandstanding regarding Ukraine and the border issue is an American example of that.

Given the current Congress, it is also very unclear which party - Dem or GOP - would be able to form a government in the first place.

Yet, parliamentary systems are hardly a panacea either. Since the executive and legislative branches are intertwined under parliamentarism, the judiciary often becomes their only actual check to their power and this can often be insufficient to stop political parties from abusing their power. Sometimes, the Head of State can also be a key check to the joint executive-legislative power but, in the long run, this is only true in monarchies that are regarded as a key component of national identity (the obvious example being the UK) or states whose national security challenges are such that they limit just how much grandstanding and internal conflict they can handle without risking their very existence.

[late]

@late It doesn't matter who got more, it's where the votes are that counts. The same applies to most democracies around the world. In many she still would have lost as in many representative democracies or republics.

In Canada, if we went simply by numbers of votes, Trudeau would not be PM, right now.

It's complicated.

Doesn't have to be, the idea of a democratic is so simple you could explain it to a 5 year old..