Oh jeez, even if it isn’t true, “It’s okay, I’ll be able to afford the price increase no matter what. Best of luck to you though.” is the best possible response to anyone convinced that tariffs are a good idea.
Just agree with them and say “I don’t mind paying 2, 3, even 4 times as much for groceries and other household items if it teaches China a lesson. Elon said we were going to need to make sacrifices to do this.”
Make sacrifices AND learn to endure some hardship under Trump.
absolutely not buying corporate garbage made in this country anymore. I’ll fucking import a kei truck, I don’t care.
Yeah we’re stocking up on everything we can now, so we can tighten our belts and hopefully save some money over the next few years, but also not directly give the oligarchs any more of our money. I’ve been researching local and woman owned businesses that I’d like to support for the necessities, and thankfully our grocery store is a local chain. I have a friend who is offering to make basic clothing, including underwear, in exchange for childcare, eggs, and produce. People around here are going to get creative and it’s actually giving me some hope that things won’t be as bad as we think.
Out of curiosity, what things are you stocking up on?
It’s a long list but here’s a comment I shared in another thread that might give you an idea: https://lemmy.world/comment/13394779
If you want our actual list just let me know and I can message you this evening. But it’s 2 handwritten pages 😬
Great list to start and points me in the right direction. We have two toddler and a new baby who came 10 weeks early so he’s in the nicu. Trying to get things for them as well as us and our two dogs. Good to know, thanks for the info
I want a Honda Stepwagon or Toyota Hiace.
“So, are you going to pay out of pocket for college now?”
“No, I’m getting student loans.”
“Do you know what department in the federal government does student loans? The department of education, which Trump is going to get rid of.”
“Damn it!”
They’ll just say the loans should be privatized. Because it turned out great last time we gave private companies free reign to swindle vulnerable populations into signing massive loans for societal necessities.
“It won’t happen. And if it does, it’s the Democrats’ fault.”
Yeah, that’s one of the new narratives. “Trump won’t be that bad. He lies all the time.”
They’re not at the damn it phase yet. They’re still at the trigger the libs phase.
What are all the stages of Leopards ate my face?
Not sure, but I guarantee the final one isn’t acceptance.
I have non-blood relatives with family in Ukraine. For now.
I have others with mounting medical debt that is as dangerous as the cancers.
I know victims of SA that are sure it won’t happen to any of their family or friends.
I hope I’m wrong. I hope this is the wrongest I’ve ever been.
This election proved that there are a lot of dumb-asses that need to go back to school to take U.S. Government, Civics, and Economics because they didn’t learn it the first time, or they never had to take them to graduate high school. Seriously, why in the f#ck would you entrust the economy to a dumbf#ck who bankrupted TWO casinos!! The freaking business model, of a casino, is people walk in, then over the course of two to four hours hand you all their money and then leave. You REALLY have to be a dumbf#ck to fail at that.
Americans are even dumber than that.
A few weeks before the election Donald Trump and Elon Musk had a little circle jerk podcast interview with each other. They spent time talking about how anti-union they are and how much they hate worker’s rights. Then working class Americans went out in droves and voted for those two rich assholes who openly talked about wishing workers had less rights.
We made a guy who was the first president in U.S. history to stand on a picket line with striking workers step down because he was old. Then we hired another equally old rich guy who openly talks about wishing workers had less rights.
That’s how stupid Americans are. And this election showed us that the majority of Americans are that stupid. When a majority of a society is that stupid, there are no happy endings. We’re set for a period of long decline.
Yes, I remember the reports on that podcast. (There was no way that I could listen to it.) Apparently, common sense has left the building. When I took ancient history, another student asked how or why did the Roman Empire fall. (Honestly, the answer has multiple factors.) However, we have witnessed the reason why the U.S. will fail. The republicans’ planned results of demolishing the education system has seen fruition and the plot of “Idiocracy” has come to pass.
“The government that you elect is the government you deserve.” — Thomas Jefferson
If everyone knew U.S. Government & Economics, they would also know that there isn’t too much they president can do to improve the economy. He can make it worse quickly with bad policies, but not much on improving it. He cannot control the Fed or prices. The last president who tried to control prices was Nixon with a prices freeze, and that started the dominoes which made everything worse all the way through to the end of Carter’s term. The presidential policies that can effect the economy for good, most of the time, take a year or more to see results. Basically, that’s why the republicans get credit for improving the economy, from the democratic president before him. This is the first time that there’s been a ‘soft landing’ from inflation, if memory serves.
“The government that you elect is the government you deserve.” — Thomas Jefferson
Yup. That’s actually why I’m almost relieved in a way. The last 4 years I spent A LOT of time on social media trying to combat misinformation by spreading factual data. It didn’t matter. Americans aren’t intersted in learning. Many aren’t even interested in doing their civic duty by voting. So now I’m hands off. I’m just here to watch the slow (or maybe fast) collapse. I honestly don’t believe there’s much to be done about it at this point.
The collected data over time is there. Freely available. It clearly shows us which choice was the more intelligent choice. And we ignored that and chose poorly at a vital point in American history, despite being given all the warning signs.
We are simply a society set up to fail.
We have definitely started the slow burn of our country. We may be seeing the reason why the ‘founding fathers’ did not want and think that the ‘common man’ should be allowed to vote. Back then, the common man did not own property and was not educated. Maybe they thought that the common man lacked the knowledge and insight to understand the nuances of governing. I strongly believe that this past voting cycle showed a strong lack of understanding, emotional myopathy, and the pure racism & sexism that exists in our country.
/r/thathappened
/c/thathappened
While I despise the reminder that reddit exists, I also appreciate the depth of information you’re communicating with this simple post.
While guns, which are manufactured in the US will stay the same price…coffee and chocolate will go up a lot.
So there are going to be some edgy people with access to firearms.
Stay safe next year.
Not so sure about the prices of firearms and ammunition remaining stable. Under Mango Mussolini, the fucknut MAGATs went into full panick buying mode and demand flew past supply resulting in price increases across the board.
Variable on guns.
Mine is a Walther. Walther guns are manufactured in Ulm, Germany.
Sig Sauer manufactures here, but imports components.
Beretta has a Tennessee facility for the American market. They import some of their components.
I’m not looking up everything, limiting it to solid 9mm handgun producers.
Google is also telling me the metal used for guns is a mix of imported and domestic. So yes, it looks like gun prices will go up with tariffs.
Supply may be an issue for all of the above if the American manufacturers stop importing components and metal.
How many gun manufacturers are actually based in the US? I’m fairly sure it’s like 2. Sig and Smith & Wesson… most firearms are imported. Including Springfield, which used to be a US manufacturer.Never mind, it’s still a fair number. Lots are imported though and you’re paying a lot more for a lot of US brands.
Even if they’re assembled in the US, do those US brands have entirely domestic supply chains? If they need to import raw materials for manufacturing their products, I doubt many CEOs are just going to take the loss on margin in the name of patriotism.
We’re all set to suffer for the foreseeable future, but no one suffers more from conservative policy than poor, rural conservatives.
I, for one, will absolutely enjoy watching them suffer. They deserve it.
no one suffers more from conservative policy than poor, rural conservatives.
That’s a nice fiction, but they’re already so cut out of the fruits of the economy that its dubious at best.
The folks who suffer on net will be middle class professionals who see their economic floor drop out from under them. They’ll be forced into living like poor, rural conservatives as prices skyrocket and disposable income dries up.
I, for one, will absolutely enjoy watching them suffer
You won’t watch them suffer. You’ll watch “Lifestyles of the Crypto Billionaire” on one channel and “Bum Fights: Disenfranchised Minority Edition” on the other because that’s what the folks enriching themselves in the Trump economy want to show people.
Just was at the grocery store. Was joking around with cashier, he and the bag boy talked about the ad playing over the loudspeakers about avocados from Mexico. They seemed nice. He finishes ringing me up and I groan. He says he’s really looking forward to prices coming down in the next four years. I started laughing at him, saying that’s not how tariffs work and that we’re all fucked.
What a wonderful day in the neighborhood.
He says he’s really looking forward to prices coming down in the next four years.
Even absent the tariffs, its crazy to think prices will be coming down under a government that loves the idea of price gouging and speculation.
One thing I’ve learned is that Kamela Harris needed to just play a PSA explaining why the hell a Tarrif is.
I have a neighbor who voted for Trump. He relies on aspects of medicaid, to get insulin, that the GOP have directly targeted for removal from what it will cover. I told him this, he didn’t believe me. So I showed him it in writing from a GOP source. He said that Trump will find some way for people like him to get their insulin. They just want this particular way gone because it’s a bad method. I even pointed out that there was zero discussion of changing these policies, to make them more sensible, or anything like that, just an outline that they plan on stopping that coverage. He just doubled down that he won’t be abandoned, they aren’t just getting rid of the coverage, they are getting rid of THAT SPECIFIC WAY OF DOING IT because it is inefficient, or whatever.
If you explained that tariffs would hurt their income, and employment, in a way they understood, they would just assume there was something being cooked up to make sure that didn’t happen. Now that all the manufacturing companies, here, are demonstrating that there will be big losses of profit margin, and cutting compensation to workers, they are mad. However, I personally doubt they will stay mad, or mad enough, or that they won’t just end up blaming Joe Biden for it.
I don’t understand humans, they keep putting their hands on the stove and making fun of people who don’t do that, all while wondering why their hands hurt.
It doesn’t matter how much conservatives suffer from conservative policy. They will ALWAYS find someone to blame but themselves. Hell, there are parts of our country that feel like 3rd world countries when you drive through them that have been voting Republican exclusively for generations and they still don’t understand why their lives suck so much.
There are parts of the country who’s poverty level, and access to utilities, medical care, etc., literally is third world. Northern WV has a lot of that, for instances. There are whole towns without plumbing, paved roads, electricity, etc. People living in shacks, no education, no reasonable way to leave.
Yup.
You’d think suffering would lead people to vote more responsibly. But I guess it has the opposite effect. I guess maybe their lives are such shit that what’s coming isn’t going to make their lives much worse. But it certainly won’t make them better.
Before now, these programs didn’t get cut because of the checks and balances of our government. They probably think this presidency will be like the 45th. Those protections are gone and a lot of people are going to suffer and die because of it.
Those protections are gone and a lot of people are going to suffer and die because of it.
Yup. We gave all the keys to the kingdom to the crazies and we’re about to find out how bad of a choice that was.
And honestly, I couldn’t care less how much Americans suffer now. That part of me is gone. We asked for it and now we’re going to get it. Time to learn the hard way. Not that we’re going to learn.
I care. I live here.
I used to. Now I realize what’s coming is inevitable.
I applaud your optimism and support you in what I believe is a worthwhile, but ultimately futile endeavor. Good luck.
Wouldn’t have helped. Learning isn’t what Americans do. Americans like finding things to be mad about and then making decisions based on their emotional responses.
Can’t fix stupid without massively improving the public education system, and stupid Americans just elected the guys that ran on deconstructing the public education system.
We’re done.
Your first paragraph isn’t even an exaggeration. The worst part for me about being around conservative relatives and acquaintances is the negativity. They are addicted to anger and outrage and jealousy. They are always complaining about something or talking about things that other people have or how much money they make.
Yup.
I’ve never met a conservative that argued in good faith, had actual solutions to problems, or had their priorities straight.
It’s all about hate and fear. All about making up imaginary scenarios to be mad about to justify persecuting others.
And now their dream team is in total control. There’s literally no future under these circumstances that ends well.
We’re in for a long period of decline and it’s going to be rough. Especially on the younger crowd. But hey, they helped give this election to Republicans, so now they get to reap what they sow.
People wouldn’t listen, because they’ve been pre-programmed to believe Harris is a liar.
What’s more, Harris wouldn’t say this, because it would require her to take a position favorable to global trade, a thing her target voter base hates.
Pandering to conservatives wasn’t going to win her the election because she changed her rhetoric.
God, if only it was that easy.
These people will willfully forget the lesson within a day so they can go back to bootlicking.
That’s a generous timeline.
Yeah, usually they only feign dull surprise for the duration of the conversation.
The issue is you can’t teach someone who not only doesn’t want to learn, they react in opposition to the idea of understanding anything outside of emotional reactions.
That’s where cult deprogramming comes into play. There are people who specialize in getting people out of that kind of mindset your argument describes. The rest of us need to do our part and educate, even if it doesn’t always have the impact we hope in the moment.
There are people who specialize in getting people out of that kind of mindset your argument describes.
We have enough of those people to do this for the majority of Americans?
The rest of us need to do our part and educate
I love your optimism. But it just won’t work. We now know the majority of Americans are ignorant and uninterested in learning, even from mistakes. You can present these people with facts and stats and infallible logic all day long and it won’t make a difference.
We gleefully voted in a convicted felon and rapist who ALREADY had a failed presidency and openly talked about being anti-union and anti-worker rights who stated on national television that he had the concept of plans.
The only direction this society is going is down.
We have enough of those people to do this for the majority of Americans?
Only one way to find out.
Pessimism may feel true, but just because something feels true doesn’t make it true.
No one knows the future. But if we don’t learn from out mistakes, it’s likely we will keep making them.
But if we don’t learn from out mistakes
We already haven’t.
it’s likely we will keep making them.
We already have.
It isn’t just that we failed a test. We failed the most obvious test we could have possibly been given. This was the most blatant decision we’re ever likely to make as a society in our lifetimes. And we utterfly failed.
We already haven’t.
It’s a week since election day.
We already have.
It’s a week since election day.
This was the most blatant decision we’re ever likely to make as a society in our lifetimes.
This was the most blatant decision we’re ever likely to make as a society in our lifetimes so far.
It’s a week since election day.
You don’t understand. We ALREADY tried the Trump thing and it failed miserably. We aren’t even done living with the negative effects of that experience. We have one of the most poignant examples in history of what creeping fascism/authoritarianism can lead to. There are people still alive today that can tell us about it.
We don’t listen. We don’t learn.
This was the most blatant decision we’re ever likely to make as a society in our lifetimes so far.
We’re doubtful to ever experience a more black and white election than what we just experienced. And we still managed to fail.
Here bro, for your next tweet: . . . . . . . .
Spend them wisely
Okey, I get it now. That was funny, it just took reading the other comments first.
Can we stop with these “and then everyone clapped stories” it’s just as bad as the fake trans stories conservatives made up to make themselves angry.
I sincerely doubt most of these stories are actually happening. It’s true. But I doubt the actual interaction occurred. Seeing this same story different ways all over the internet. I live in a region surrounded by right wingers and aside from those flags and occasional hats, I hardly ever hear anyone outright talk about their politics.
I actually believe it because it’s exactly what happened in brexit. Conservatives voted to leave and then they found out what that meant.
Conservatives were so focused on winning that they didn’t bother to actually look into Trump’s “policies” and are now Pikachu faced when understanding it.
These are the same assholes that are going to completely forget two years from now that Trump raised prices and will still vote Republican in the midterms.
That’s a succinct way to put it. It’s definitely hilarious watching them bleed from their own hubris, though.
Times like these when being a petard salesperson really pays off.
As an European: The Brexiteers who “suddenly” were excluded from free travel and prolonged stays within EU due to their own voting gave a stream of similar stories. It was and is hilarious to watch.
I do believe that such dialogues are really happening and will continue to happen in the US around the clock from now on.
I particularly love the stories where they owned real estate or villas and they’re like “this doesn’t apply to meeeeee, right?!”
Narrator “It did in fact, apply to them.”
Its like, what kinda moron asshole doesn’t even hire or ask a lawyer to give them actual legal advice about this shit?
For this to be true, a MAGA diehard would have to have listened to an explanation of what a tariff is from a left leaning person they are trying to taunt, understood the explanation, and believed the explanation that left leaning person gave them that disagrees with what Trump has said.
I have no doubt many MAGA types could understand the explanation, but when in gloat mode, I seriously doubt much listening would happen. Even if they did listen, the chances of them believing that explanation over Trump’s seem low to me.
Just statistically they have to happen. There are millions of democrats with maga neighbors that cant shut up about shit but dont actually know what they are talking about. Whether these stories happen to the people that post about them is a different question.
There are millions of democrats with maga neighbors
Democrats be like:
🔴Cut out MAGAzis from their life.
🔴Treat MAGAzis cordially to find out how fucked they are going to be.
Believe it or not, any sufficiently large group of people will have people who behave differently within it
Find out their weaknesses for when the purge hits.
Bullets. Like most people, they are weak to bullets.
Taken from a 196 post i saw earlier
The fascists have found surprising success in choosing to make their suicides everyone’s problem. I’m not telling people to kill themselves, don’t, life is worth living even now, survival is a radical act, etc, but it is food for thought and a thing to contemplate why we let happen
Considering Democrats lost ground with every single voting demographic, it would seem to me that they’re going to have to quit being so smug and actually get on people’s level, if only by necessity.
“I put a fascist in power because people pointed out my ignorance, and I don’t want to change that.”
-Typical 3x trump voter-
You’re wrong.
And that’s why Dems lost the election.
Look at Missouri, where we voted down an abortion ban in a landslide, passed a $15 minimum wage in a landslide, and still went fully red. These aren’t bad people. They’re people that are sick of being told to be joyful when they’re working 2-3 jobs for the privilege of barely surviving in America, and it’s happening under Democrats.
“I put a fascist in power because mcdonals tripled the price on a quarter pounder combo”
-Typical 3x trump voter apologist-
I’m not an apologist.
Just pointing out simple facts, and I’d think after this last election a reasonable person would get that repeating memes isn’t terribly convincing.
I have a friend who has had success with pointing out that gutting social welfare systems means they won’t get a check anymore.
But, those people were willing to have an actual conversation about it.
I literally had a very similar experience yesterday at a bar. (See my other post.) It definitely happens.
Yeah, it’s the “the train stood up and clapped” bullshit that people post on their socials.
If these people knew anything about history they’d know about President Hoover raising tariffs, which prompted every country we traded with to do the same, making everything more expensive and worsening the Great Depression. The thing is, for all the podcasts and 24-Hour news voters in this country consume, they don’t know jack shit other than to pull the lever for whichever candidate their preferred news network tells them to.
ironically Trump’s greatest fear is becoming hoover yet his favorite word is tariff
unstoppable force, meet unmovable wall
Please, he doesn’t know who Hoover is. He thinks that’s the vacuum entrepreneur that became president President then went on to run the cia…
I’m shocked. Not only does he know anything about early 20th century American politics and economics, but also apparently the my pillow lunatic has a media channel
And yeah, I suspect that there will be a crash in the next 12-18 months. The economy is fragile but recovering and he’s looking to do massive changes that aren’t well received by experts. He will probably drive us into a depression.
Not so much worsening the great depression as triggering it.
Yes but Trump, Musk, Thiel, and other billionaires will get a little bit richer and all they had to do was tell a bunch of stupid fucking yokels that it’s okay to be bigoted trash.
If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.
- Lyndon B. Johnson
“They can have theirs (money and racism) if they let me have mine (racism).” - a stupid fucking yokel
Yes but Trump, Musk, Thiel, and other billionaires will get a little bit richer
You all still don’t get it.
It’s not that people were convinced they’d get richer. It’s that they’ve gotten significantly poorer over the last four years while Dems were in charge.
How are “Dems in charge” when Republicans have had a majority in both Congress and the Supreme Court for years now? For half the time there was also a Republican President.
It is crazy to me that when the GOP essentially ran the government and still did absolutely nothing for this country and didn’t follow through on anything they blamed the “deep state” and people still bought into it.
They see big corporations making huge profits and somehow come to the conclusion it must be the illegal immigrants who are causing the problem (?)
In part, yes.
I’ve seen it myself as the son of a roofing contractor who votes Republican because when he was younger and his business was thriving, his bids were undercut by other companies using illegal labor. Now he’s in his 80’s and driving for DoorDash, because that’s the only job he can get and Biden and Co. aren’t going to do anything to help his situation if he doesn’t find a way to make money.
I’m just one person in America, but there are millions of stories like this. It really can’t be denied that while there are many positive effects of immigration, there are also negative effects, and those can become more pronounced when illegal immigration numbers increase as dramatically as they have in the past four years.
With that said, nearly every working class American is struggling on some level, having watched their grocery, utility, and rent costs double and triple over the last four years. They may not even give a shit about immigration, but they do care that they’re working 60-80 hours a week (or more) and their pay isn’t sufficient to deal with the cost of living.
And Dems wasted months of the campaign telling struggling people to be joyful.
“Increase as dramatically as they have in the past four years” But have they really. The numbers I’m seeing don’t seem to support your point:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/646261/unauthorized-immigrant-population-in-the-us/ Shows that generally the number of Unauthorized immigrants increased from 1990 at 3.5 million to 11.31 in 2006, and have bounced around 10.49 to 11.75 (2016) up to 10.99 in 2022.
https://www.factcheck.org/2024/02/breaking-down-the-immigration-figures/
https://usafacts.org/articles/what-can-the-data-tell-us-about-unauthorized-immigration/
because that’s the only job he can get and Biden and Co. aren’t going to do anything to help his situation if he doesn’t find a way to make money.
What’s Trump going to do for his situation?
“Our guy is as bad as their guy” isn’t the blistering retort you think it is.
Harris wasn’t as bad as Trump, that’s the galling thing.
But really, it doesn’t matter now and I’m done arguing about it.
We’re all going to suffer, but the fire that will warm my heart for the next four years is all the calories I’ll burn telling Trump voters. Stein voters, and non-voters that they are getting what they voted for.
We’re all going to suffer, but the fire that will warm my heart for the next four years is all the calories I’ll burn telling Trump voters. Stein voters, and non-voters that they are getting what they voted for.
I mean, pretending you’re better than everyone else is definitely a choice. Democrats used to be the party of the working poor but they’ve morphed into the party of ideological superiority.
I must admit I’m a tad shocked watching you folks double down on all your mistakes after this last election.
The economy moves slowly. The impacts on your pocketbook over the last 4 years were a direct result of the tariffs trump imposed during his previous stint in the White House, his absolutely abysmal reaction to Covid, and several other things he and his cronies did during that time.
Biden fixed much of that, and as a result, inflation in the US slowed so it was less than in other countries that were impacted by many of the same market forces. It was already too much to completely reverse, but it was far better than it would have been otherwise.
But instead of understanding what actually happened, loads of people seem to think the president can just flip a lever and the whole economy will turn on a dime – despite decades and decades that show that the economy is always better under democrats. Because democrats fix things, so the next republican administration looks good for a few years, then republicans break things, so the next democrat administration looks bad for the first few years. The economy is as nimble as the Titanic.
So now, the US has voted the same guy back in who wrecked the economy that we’re still feeling the effects of, so he can reverse Biden’s improvements and instead make it far, far worse.
People’s inability to learn the absolute basics of how the economy works is about to fuck us all.
e: formatting
Biden fixed much of that,
Fixed it how, exactly?
What precisely did Biden do that affects the working class and poor, who from where I’m sitting, are convinced they’ve been abandoned. They’re convinced of this because their expenses have doubled and tripled, and if they’ve gotten better pay at all, it hasn’t kept up with the cost-of-living increases.
You can discuss economic theory until you’re blue in the face. Biden had a mandate for real change and failed in the most basic way, and Americans are working 2-3 jobs to scrape by in this country.
8 Ways the Biden Administration Is Improving the Lives of Service Workers
Biden’s Unheralded War on Poverty
And previously:
The Biden Boom: Economic Recovery in 2021
And more recently:
Bidenomics Is Starting to Transform America. Why Has No One Noticed?
I don’t have time right now to go through and create a short bullet list from these, but I highly suggest you read them. The information is there. I have many more lesser-reported policies, and I can make a summary list tomorrow.
I’ll do that, thanks for the info.
I’m going to be hard to convince. I had to loan my car to my 80 year-old parents in April, because if they don’t drive for DoorDash they’ll be homeless. Further, at least in my social circle, most of the people I know have cut back tremendously due to this economy.
That’s hard for me to digest, especially after seeing the Federal Government come down hard on people who created scarcity and then overcharged for PPE during COVID. It’s just no secret they can do more.
I was angry about Biden in 2020, but between the infrastructure act, the chips act, and the soft landing, while I’ve had a difficult few years I actually liked his leadership (for what it was). I saw him as an old centrist who did a lot of bad things in the senate, and yeah that’s probably what’s in his heart of hearts. And while his pushes towards American sustainability were not as good as I wanted but better than we’ve had in a long time. He focused on long term and stabilizing policies to prevent recession, something we all expected that never came. He also put a lot of emphasis on not ignoring the things that needed done but had been put on the back burner for years like the bridges that former DOT officials refused to use. There’s also his FTC, with Lena Kahn being an aggressive advocate for the American people and being the only person in his administration that brought the energy that we needed.
I don’t think Biden will be remembered highly. His economic strategies were of the “build long term stability through slow and methodical action” variety in a country devastated by decades of short term economic thinking. But more than that, he repeatedly insisted on an outdated style of governance, one based on the assumption that bipartisan cooperation was possible. He didn’t commit Ford’s sin, but he was too soft handed with the J6ers. More than anything, as the nation crumbled he acted as though sound economic policy and diligent justice that prioritized appearing nonpartisan would save us. Also his waiting to step down and placing his VP who did just terribly in the primaries he only won by mass dropout as his replacement was not good.
I suspect he will be remembered alongside the likes of Calvin Coolidge and Andrew Johnson. But yeah, I was surprisingly impressed by his economic and infrastructure policies, even though they were more slow than ideal.
Please do, and thanks for being open-minded. I’m going to copy part of a comment I made from the other day so you know where I’m coming from:
I’m fully disabled, and most of my friends and family died within the last few years, so I have no support network.
I’m already struggling to survive, having to choose between food and medicine, and am overdrawn every month. All my savings are gone. I have literally no money to my name, and have been barely staving off homelessness for months. I rely completely on social services now, which trump has vowed to cut.
I will not survive this administration. My fellow Americans have voted for me to die.
I’ve spent a lot of time truly learning about how all of this works, because it affects me more than most people. I am not kidding that I’m pretty sure I won’t survive another trump administration. That’s based on objective fact. Things will be getting a lot worse for your parents soon, too, and I’m very sorry for that. We were on track to actually recover and improve our conditions, and that progress will now be reversed.
I really wish US voters weren’t so susceptible to misinformation and propaganda, but here we are.
That all tracks. I’m sorry we’re a country that doesn’t take care of its people. I’m used to doing the good that I can with my own two hands, in full knowledge that this country won’t, but I was pleasantly surprised that my state (Missouri) voted down an abortion ban and to approve a $15 minimum wage in the election last week, so at least here it isn’t all bad. (Yet.)
I’m a Green Party voter, so both sides hate me and generally blame me no matter how the election goes, and I’ve found myself vehemently disgusted with both Democrats and Republicans, particularly over the last 30 years as both parties have become proxies for monied American business interests. Growing up the son of a self-employed roofing contractor taught me a lot about how little this country will do to help you, being part of a family that did well half the year and was dirt poor the other half.
It’s like the five stages of grief but with not knowing what the consequences of voting against your interests are.
1 - Gloating
2 - Hubris
3 - Denial
4 - Doubt
5 - Leopards ate my face
After seeing the characters the clown-elect is picking for his circus, I already see stages 2, 3 and 4, with some dim stragglers still at 1.
