And going further back, let's not forget the people who voted for Ralph Nader in 2000, thereby handing Florida and the presidency to George W Bush, who then appointed Roberts and Alito to the "Supreme" Court, because Al Gore just wasn't pure enough or some other ridiculous justification. It's definitely on them too.
The best written story about American voters I have ever seen. I have repeatedly said that it is the voters who have brought us to where we are today. Thank you.
Gwendolyn, I don't think this article is a cheap shot. I don't feel "named and shamed" - I feel vindicated. I read the article as including me in the "good guy" category and it sounds as though you are in that same category.
My daughter, a veterinarian, volunteered weekends to work on the Harris campaign, often arriving home late after a 12-14 hour day driving and canvassing. At the end of all that, what really angered her was not the voters who seemed to be acting against their self interest, but friends, affluent, educated, who choose not to vote to "make a point".
I think it's healthy from time to time to just vent, say "Urg...Americans", and then get back to work for that "just, peaceable society" you, I and the author all believe in.
What you said made resoundingly clear and truthful sense—-a quality in critical shortage, and sorely missing, in those groups you identified. I hope it isn’t so, but it’s doubtful they’ll ever “expand their awareness”, and grasp the truth. It’d be reeeeeeaal helpful, if they would!
How else can we explain how Jeffrey Epstein’s client list has transformed from credible evidence into an urban legend?
I've never been a conspiracy theorist because of words written by Ben Franklin over 250 years ago:
Three men [sic] can keep a secret..... if two of them are dead!
I may be the only person in the country who believes Oswald acted alone!
That said, Epstein's death stinks to high heaven. Here's a guy who associated with some of the best-known and most powerful people in the world, and who doubtless knew all of their deep, dark and dirty secrets. The list of powerful people who would want him dead to keep him from squealing is probably as long as a coast-to-coast bus ticket. Yet he managed to "hang himself" in a jail where he was on a suicide watch. It strains credulity.
People who voted for Trump also condoned the privatization of the commons. Degrading the social safety we share in common. Putting our public lands up for private commodification. Polluting our common environment.
It is obvious that too much of America did this while many of us could not sell our stories and candidates to the wilfully evil or ignorant others. And it just keeps getting worse.
While it's certainly true that much of the blame can be laid at the feet of American citizens, to be fair, the corporate media, formerly called the mainstream media, is largely responsible for this.
Let's not pretend that the corporate media hasn't been calling on the same politicians to tell the same lies without pushback for DECADES. Don't pretend that the corporate media hasn't been publishing misleading headlines that often imply the opposite of reality, knowing that many Americans don't read past the headline.
Don't pretend that the corporate media hasn't been pretending to "fact-check" with too little, too late separate articles or posts, which does little to counter the lies they published earlier.
Don't pretend that the corporate media hasn't framed EVERYTHING from the rightwing, Republican perspective for decades. They wrote or broadcast every story assuming that because the Republicans can't be expected to do the right thing, every problem must be the Democrats responsibility to solve.
If not for those failures of the corporate media, Republicans would NOT have been able to cripple education and poison the nation to produce people ignorant enough to vote for Don the Con.
Don't pretend that the corporate media didn't have it in for Joe Biden from day one of his presidency. The entire MSM was trying to wish a recession into existence for the entire four years of his term, and NOW they're trying to pretend that one won't be called by the third quarter of this year.
Don't pretend that the corporate media didn't treat GOP lies throughout both of Trump's impeachments, and all their fake "investigations" as if they were serious people not obviously lying for political gain.
I don't mean this as an attack on the author of this piece. The kind of journalism we're seeing here and on MeidasTouch and a few other newer outlets is the kind of journalism we've needed for ages, but is new to most people.
This article is offensive. Blaming everyone is a cheap shot. It ignores the positive efforts of those who have been working in any number of ways to build a just, peaceable society, even though they may not have sought recognition, or their numbers were insufficient to turn the tide.
If this article is offensive, it is because the truth is uncomfortable. The fact is that Trump has power because U.S. voters chose to give him that power. And the article accurately describes who those voters are.
And we can't use excuses like claiming he lost the popular vote the first time. While it's true that he did, the simple fact is that responsible, informed voters should never have resulted in a vote close enough for the electoral college to differ from the popular vote. This shouldn't have been difficult, because Trump's history and record was well-documented and his absolute unfitness for office was screamingly obvious to anyone who could be bothered to look.
At first I was thinking that way, but as I read I realized that many of us tried but too many stupid, cruel people have no critical thinking skills to consider beyond an instant and about more than just themselves.
So why not go back farther? Say, to the origins of racism in America in the centuries-long war of extermination by European colonists and their governments and miltary against the American Indians? Or to slavery as the basis of American cotton capitalism and its sequel in Jim Crow? The reaction to Obama can't be understood as separate from that history. Republicans were always the party of the very wealthy, of big corporations, and business groups. Did Americans care when they voted for Ronald Reagan? Americans never liked taxes even though Oliver Wendell Holmes commented that taxes are the price of civilization, i.e. public goods. By definition, the alternative is savagery, which is now the collective choice under a criminal lunatic as president and his gang. That savagery comes as the old doctrine that might is right. The Supreme Court majority is ideological and corrupted by big donors. The legislatures are bought. Both parties are in the pay of lobbies such as crypto and in the interests of Israel. Hardly a few politicians stand out as honest or principled. Money rules.
The reason trump’s popularity is so high is something the tv talking heads will never say out loud.
He’s so popular because there are SO many breathtakingly stupid people out there who are angry at the world about their perceived problems, fears, inadequacy, and hate of others.
These people love trump because he gives them permission to act out on those feelings.
And going further back, let's not forget the people who voted for Ralph Nader in 2000, thereby handing Florida and the presidency to George W Bush, who then appointed Roberts and Alito to the "Supreme" Court, because Al Gore just wasn't pure enough or some other ridiculous justification. It's definitely on them too.
The best written story about American voters I have ever seen. I have repeatedly said that it is the voters who have brought us to where we are today. Thank you.
Gwendolyn, I don't think this article is a cheap shot. I don't feel "named and shamed" - I feel vindicated. I read the article as including me in the "good guy" category and it sounds as though you are in that same category.
My daughter, a veterinarian, volunteered weekends to work on the Harris campaign, often arriving home late after a 12-14 hour day driving and canvassing. At the end of all that, what really angered her was not the voters who seemed to be acting against their self interest, but friends, affluent, educated, who choose not to vote to "make a point".
I think it's healthy from time to time to just vent, say "Urg...Americans", and then get back to work for that "just, peaceable society" you, I and the author all believe in.
Well said! Thank you!
What you said made resoundingly clear and truthful sense—-a quality in critical shortage, and sorely missing, in those groups you identified. I hope it isn’t so, but it’s doubtful they’ll ever “expand their awareness”, and grasp the truth. It’d be reeeeeeaal helpful, if they would!
How else can we explain how Jeffrey Epstein’s client list has transformed from credible evidence into an urban legend?
I've never been a conspiracy theorist because of words written by Ben Franklin over 250 years ago:
Three men [sic] can keep a secret..... if two of them are dead!
I may be the only person in the country who believes Oswald acted alone!
That said, Epstein's death stinks to high heaven. Here's a guy who associated with some of the best-known and most powerful people in the world, and who doubtless knew all of their deep, dark and dirty secrets. The list of powerful people who would want him dead to keep him from squealing is probably as long as a coast-to-coast bus ticket. Yet he managed to "hang himself" in a jail where he was on a suicide watch. It strains credulity.
People who voted for Trump also condoned the privatization of the commons. Degrading the social safety we share in common. Putting our public lands up for private commodification. Polluting our common environment.
It is obvious that too much of America did this while many of us could not sell our stories and candidates to the wilfully evil or ignorant others. And it just keeps getting worse.
While it's certainly true that much of the blame can be laid at the feet of American citizens, to be fair, the corporate media, formerly called the mainstream media, is largely responsible for this.
Let's not pretend that the corporate media hasn't been calling on the same politicians to tell the same lies without pushback for DECADES. Don't pretend that the corporate media hasn't been publishing misleading headlines that often imply the opposite of reality, knowing that many Americans don't read past the headline.
Don't pretend that the corporate media hasn't been pretending to "fact-check" with too little, too late separate articles or posts, which does little to counter the lies they published earlier.
Don't pretend that the corporate media hasn't framed EVERYTHING from the rightwing, Republican perspective for decades. They wrote or broadcast every story assuming that because the Republicans can't be expected to do the right thing, every problem must be the Democrats responsibility to solve.
If not for those failures of the corporate media, Republicans would NOT have been able to cripple education and poison the nation to produce people ignorant enough to vote for Don the Con.
Don't pretend that the corporate media didn't have it in for Joe Biden from day one of his presidency. The entire MSM was trying to wish a recession into existence for the entire four years of his term, and NOW they're trying to pretend that one won't be called by the third quarter of this year.
Don't pretend that the corporate media didn't treat GOP lies throughout both of Trump's impeachments, and all their fake "investigations" as if they were serious people not obviously lying for political gain.
I don't mean this as an attack on the author of this piece. The kind of journalism we're seeing here and on MeidasTouch and a few other newer outlets is the kind of journalism we've needed for ages, but is new to most people.
This article is offensive. Blaming everyone is a cheap shot. It ignores the positive efforts of those who have been working in any number of ways to build a just, peaceable society, even though they may not have sought recognition, or their numbers were insufficient to turn the tide.
If this article is offensive, it is because the truth is uncomfortable. The fact is that Trump has power because U.S. voters chose to give him that power. And the article accurately describes who those voters are.
And we can't use excuses like claiming he lost the popular vote the first time. While it's true that he did, the simple fact is that responsible, informed voters should never have resulted in a vote close enough for the electoral college to differ from the popular vote. This shouldn't have been difficult, because Trump's history and record was well-documented and his absolute unfitness for office was screamingly obvious to anyone who could be bothered to look.
At first I was thinking that way, but as I read I realized that many of us tried but too many stupid, cruel people have no critical thinking skills to consider beyond an instant and about more than just themselves.
So why not go back farther? Say, to the origins of racism in America in the centuries-long war of extermination by European colonists and their governments and miltary against the American Indians? Or to slavery as the basis of American cotton capitalism and its sequel in Jim Crow? The reaction to Obama can't be understood as separate from that history. Republicans were always the party of the very wealthy, of big corporations, and business groups. Did Americans care when they voted for Ronald Reagan? Americans never liked taxes even though Oliver Wendell Holmes commented that taxes are the price of civilization, i.e. public goods. By definition, the alternative is savagery, which is now the collective choice under a criminal lunatic as president and his gang. That savagery comes as the old doctrine that might is right. The Supreme Court majority is ideological and corrupted by big donors. The legislatures are bought. Both parties are in the pay of lobbies such as crypto and in the interests of Israel. Hardly a few politicians stand out as honest or principled. Money rules.
The reason trump’s popularity is so high is something the tv talking heads will never say out loud.
He’s so popular because there are SO many breathtakingly stupid people out there who are angry at the world about their perceived problems, fears, inadequacy, and hate of others.
These people love trump because he gives them permission to act out on those feelings.
On November 5, 2024, the United States committed suicide.