They all thought the foreign company paid the tariff.
This is probably what Trump thinks, too. I can easily believe he is that stupid.
I’m also wondering just what the fuck Trump and co. are going to do with all the money obtained from these tariffs. Just, like, spend it all on hookers and blow or what? Remember how you all believed this was the party of “low taxes?” Yeah, guess what a tariff is, fuckers.
This is probably what Trump thinks, too.
100%. If he isn’t reading it from a script that someone else wrote, he knows nothing about the topics he’s talking about.
He even boasts about “knowing more than anyone about XYZ”, yet, it can’t expand on the subject, can’t answer questions about it, is vague, and reminds me of how really bad LLMs answer questions.
I found some additional articles on what he said about this, and he did indeed flat out say he expects the “other countries” to pay the tariffs. For instance, this.
A sweeping tariff policy will kill two birds with one stone, Trump says: It could find a new source of revenue for the U.S. government, which could offset losses from lowering or eliminating certain forms of income tax, while extracting money from rival governments.
That’s not how tariffs have worked at any point in history.
Yup. He does a great job “selling” ideas that simply aren’t grounded in reality.
Like that wall that Mexico was going to pay for. What an idiot. Did his base think the United States would just send Mexico a bill for work completed and expect them to pay it? You couldn’t make this buffoonery up!
I had a boss like this. Had all these million dollar ideas but no capacity to consider that someone else had the same idea and it either made no damn sense or it had already been done and people went to jail for it. Motherfuckers dream up grifts halfway and think everyone else is an idiot or sucker for not acting on the “golden opportunity”.
You couldn’t make this buffoonery up!
Well somebody did
And then people buy these unrealistic ideas and when they get harmed by reality, they somehow blame ‘leftists’, ‘progressives’, ‘demon rats’, ‘Obama’ or any other bogeyman for it.
When it’s returned to the feds it’s just destroyed. Federal return is just the return of debt, it’s not more money.
Yeah he’s literally said that he thinks the foreign country pays it
Don’t forget who paid for the wall … I mean Mexico totally was writing the checks…fucking idiots.
Just, like, spend it all on hookers and blow or what?
Would this honestly surprise you?
Considering the stories that came out about how they used the White House pharmacy as a drug dealer, no, it would not surprise me in the least.
They used what as what?
Huh, I half expected “White House pharmacy was running drops in Washington DC and it’s neighbouring area”.
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Is the owner of the company purchasing a year’s worth in order to keep the price they charge down, or in order to raise prices in February when their customers expect it because of the new tariffs, and pocket the difference? While having avoided paying bonuses?
Obviously I don’t know the business in question, but it’s quite possible that the company has a bunch of longer running contracts that would become a loss if the inputs become much more expensive.
Of course, businesses will use the opportunity to charge more, but sudden price hikes are a very real problem.
This is almost certainly what’s happening. The proposed tariffs will be very hard on American businesses and devastating for the consumer. It’s quite literally a fairly severe tax on domestic companies and the American people. But, honestly, we could do with a less consumerism in this country. Unfortunately, it’s likely to cause a tough economic downturn that will hurt poor people the most.
that will hurt poor people the most.
As is tradition.
Beatings will continue
Be hilarious if Trump simultaneously collapses the economy and starts a green movement built around an inherent need for a second hand economy.
Stranger things have happened. Like him getting elected, for instance.
And 20 million voters disappearing into thin air…
Well, they didn’t disappear into thin air. 12 million less people voted for Harris, so basically the democrats lost the election more than Trump won it. Trump got basically the same number of votes as he did against Biden.
Yes that’s what I meant though. Their votes disappeared. Our electronic voting machines have known first hand vulnerabilities.
I think they figured it out finally. They’ve been trying to gain access this entire time, and some Republican traitors are being prosecuted for it as we speak. Or were. I guess laws don’t matter anymore since America is finished.
I want to hope that it’s this
I sell steel, and we have been telling everyone to buy as much of their estimated annual usage as possible right now in order for us to hold the pricing, especially if it isn’t mill runs and double especially for exotic alloys.
It’s going to fuck over so hard the small machine shops that are prevalent everywhere that just do whatever jobs get called out and don’t really have the sway or size to be able to negotiate a better deal.
The same machine shops that were flying Trump memorabilia.
Large and small manufacturing companies have contracts for orders for months to years out with set prices, some of which might have wiggle room for costs but not to this extent. Plus manufacturing already tries to balance out costs across projects due to fluctuating prices for materials. If their materials double (or more) in price they will be screwed by the contracts and guaranteed to lose money on all of them.
Buying at the current prices means they will have to pay to have the materials stored in a warehouse, which will cut into their planned profits for those existing contracts. Hell, they might be buying at a higher cost than they normally would when fulfilling the contracts.
The company is getting screwed, not trying to fleece customers or their employees.
I’m pleasantly surprised how level headed the replies to that comment are.
Without having more detail I can’t speak with certainty, but, general principles of inventory management and cash flow discourage having a surplus of stock, as that ties up a significant amount of working capital in the costs of storing and handling it all - you risk not being able to pay your liabilities because you’ve sunk all your funds into inventory that hasn’t yet sold and generated more revenue.
Companies often have longer term contracts with specific prices agreed that can’t always be easily changed. Those contacts could quite easily become unprofitable if there are sudden increases to the direct costs of fulfilling them. So, rather than trying to fuck customers, this company is likely trying to stock-up at current market prices to ride-out the first year of tariffs, but in doing so, needs a large injection of working capital to cover the expenditure (hence cancelling bonuses), and also puts itself in a very vulnerable position where cash flow is concerned by tying up that capital in inventory - any further sudden and unexpected costs could lead to the business folding.
But that’s not even the point of this. It’s not the company is greedy or not, it’s this administration is causing this.
Oh I know. I was just trying to shed a bit of light on whether this company’s decision was an attempt to take advantage and screw people over, or a genuine survival measure.
The root cause is ultimately the tariffs that will be imposed by the US government.
In reality the decision will be more nuanced, and this company will likely raise prices wherever it can whilst also securing long-term stock at current prices to both avoid the tariffs and increase margins to recover the capital quicker.
But yeah. It’s all down to the government’s tariffs.
That’s the thing though, most customers don’t expect the price increase because they’re fucking idiots who believes tariffs are good for the economy.
Yeah, this seems like those redhats need a union.
But that’s socialism!
Them: Make America Great Again!
So, like the 1950s?
Them: Yeah!
When corporate tax rates and union membership were much higher?
Them: Not like that!
they’ll pocket the difference, jack up prices, refuse bonuses next year, business slows, lay off half the staff, buy material on credit–maybe siphoning some of that off, bonuses are now a distant memory, jack prices up again. business slows to a crawl, lay off more. business falters. file bankruptcy with millions of outstanding debt to write off.
just like their diaper-wearing idol would.
Well you’re 💯 correct on what Trumps would do!
As an individual small business owner however, they could have gotten caught in the squeeze between contracts and tariffs.
Does it matter? This wouldn’t have happened without Trump being elected and the looking threat of tariffs. Whether the owner is using that as cover for jacking up the prices or not, it’s still a LAMF moment.
Oh I don’t disagree! I’m just wondering if the owner is face-eaten or face-eating. Small business owners are more varied than big business leopards.
If they’re reputable enough and tend to operate in good faith, they could be giving their customers time to prepare for the incoming price hike. They’ll probably lose customers that can’t afford to operate with the new price later on but the transparency would go a long way towards maintaining healthy business relations with the remaining customers.
if anything like it happens in Turkey, most businesses will buy early, stockpile goods as prices keep increasing (increased effect of tariffs + shortage of goods in market) and release them to the market for a hefty profit
Definitely the latter.
Unfortunately, this kind of ignorance comes from a weakening of our education system. It’s not just on them that this has happened, and its only going to get worse if we don’t try to stop it.
Hey, exactly! The fact that we are even allowing this nonsense is a true testimony to how extremely important education is! If you remain ignorant, you are more easily persuaded to believe anything because you aren’t taught what “bullshit” is, and have no real ability to think for yourself.
Education is freedom from ignorance.
And that’s why red states are slashing school budgets en masse and continue to have consistently terrible academic performance.
Don’t forget the propaganda.
This!!! I don’t actually expect our K thru 12 education system to inform the average people about macro-economic policy impacts. This is about being gullible, hearing what you want to hear, refusing to listen to opposing opinions with an open mind, and hero worship.
So if there’s anything to blame on our education system (and society culture at large) it’s a lack of critical thinking education and an excess of magical thinking education that emphasizes blind agreement with authority.
Unfortunately one of the stated plans is for trump to completely and utterly eliminate the department of education entirely.
I don’t know if this post is true or not. However, a lot of people don’t know history, civics, & economics. (This is the result of the Reagan & Bushes dismantling of the education system.) I’ve told a lot of people to look up the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930 and the impact it had on our and the global economy. Tariffs will start a trade war. That’s what happened to our farmers the last time Trump was in office. He ended up having to bail out farmers which cost more than the tariff brought into the government. The Chinese simply bought their soy beans from other countries instead of paying for ours. There were a lot of farmers that lost their farms then.
I have been told many times to feel bad for those farmers, that they aren’t idiots, etc.
I thought I ran of fucks for them but a few more just flew out like butterflies from a dusty chest.
I hope ever single one that put up those massive Trump signs loses their family farms to big corporations.
We need fewer corporate farms, which are dirty as fuck now let alone after they gut the USDA. I hope that they lose their family farm to two gay dudes from Vermont who got really into organic gardening and decided to cash in their b&b for corgis to start growing high quality produce right here in America’s heartland.
I’m sure the corporate farmers were happy to buy up that land and cut the trump admin a nice check for the convenience.
Anyone? Anyone? Raised or lowered? Anyone? Anyone know what this is?
OMFG!!! LMFAO🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 I totally forgot about that. Great memory and response!!! Line of the day!
To be honest, this kind of feels to me like the boss was just looking for an excuse to not have to pay workers.
I mean, he got it and it’s actually a good one. Uncertain finances tend to cut into bonuses of all types.
Yup, the costs of dealing with a years worth of a product is also a lot of money.
The truly enraging thing about the voters who said they voted for trump due to economic concerns is HOW IN THE GODDAMNED FUCK do they think he’s going to fix anything? To the extent that a president can change the cost of living, among the worst ideas is probably to fucking add fees to imports. This is his one idea and yet no one can explain to him the extremely simple negative effect that it would have on consumers.
This absolute fucking dope had one terrible idea for helping lower prices (which will certainly raise them) and the voters lapped it up without thinking. America is full of morons.
Studies generally show the economy does better under Democrats than Republicans, in measurements of CPI, GDP, job growth, and unemployment. Republicans however have a massive propaganda machine that has gaslit the country in believing the opposite. Frequently this is backed by short term plays that make things “feel” better but cause significant long term problems. Like a CEO firing the QA team, line goes up this quarter and by the time the consequences arrive they’re gone and blame the next guy.
They’re operating under a lot of propaganda, and no understanding of economics. They’re ignorant of the fact that Trump inherited the economy that Obama fixed, which is why at the time under Trump things were better. They’re ignorant of the fact that Trump fucked everything up with his handling of the pandemic, previous tarrifs, and in turn fucked the economy up on the way out. They’re ignorant that Biden was trying to clean up Trump’s mess, and instead assign blame to Biden.
And every after all that, there is still the added fact that the president doesn’t directly control the economy, and has limited options. But that doesn’t matter to them. They’ve been sold a simple solution to a complicated problem.
I tell people that the president has a huge lever on his desk that he uses to set the price of gas each day.
Man, I wish. One temper tantrum away from green transit for America.
Trump’s Tariffs are BIDENS FAULT! And they’ll STILL be Biden’s Fault EVERY TIME I vote for the man who LITERALLY campaigned on creating these Tariffs!
“you won’t have to vote anymore” --the diaper, july 2024
I’m sure some of them will still blame Obama too out of habit
Maybe it’s because I took economics as far back as high school, but even just from reading high school history books I knew what a Tariff was. How the FUCK did they not know that?
I am also willing to bet that they will eventually blame the democrats for breaking the system, as they always do.
There’s a fair portion of people 21+ that have difficulty playing blackjack because they can’t add to 21. Last night I was asked by a grown man what 9+1+3 is.
You’d be surprised how incompetent some people are.
I worked in customer service for 7 years. I am aware… so very aware…
To give you an idea, when I worked for Verizon mobile, it was a few times a week that I came across a client who did not know how to hang up their cellphone calls. No joke. It took such a while to get them off the hook it wasn’t funny. And if you ask me why I wouldn’t hang up on them, it was because Verizon had a strict no hang-up policy. You were not allowed to hang up on a client no matter what. It was grounds for immediate termination.
Maybe it was a HR call to test your patience with customers
Holy shit. I never put this together.
Last time I was at a casino I kept asking myself: who honestly thinks any of this is a good idea, or thinks that any of these are “games” in the conventional sense? Now I know.
Edit: I have also been confronted with people that simply cannot do addition, period. It’s wild.
Funny you should mention a casino. Remember when Donald Trump bankrupted multiple casinos? That is actually quite impressive given how often casinos attract people even during recessions as they get stressed and desperate.
The quickest and easiest way to win at a casino is not to buy in, don’t play. You’ve got the right idea!
Even if you’re competent at arithmetic in school, those skills can definitely atrophy. I say this as someone who’s unreasonably slow at basic arithmetic despite being an ex-mathlete; I got complacent because I’ve been learning and using graduate level maths, so I thought that would keep me from getting rusty. Nope — it turns out that basic arithmetic that you’d use in daily life is a different “muscle” to the kind of maths you use in academic research (which is obvious in hindsight)
I can’t imagine how much I’d be struggling if I didn’t have a good foundation to be starting from
You aren’t alone. Historically before calculators were common, engineers and mathematicians would actually have books with basic arithmetic answers already done, or they would hire people (usually women) called ‘computers’ (no joke, that’s what the term was used for before computers as we know it were invented) to do the basic calculations for mathematicians so they can focus on the more complicated stuff.
So even a highly talented mathematician from the 1910s and 1920s would still struggle as you do.
This is only tangentially related, but I’m reminded of a thing from Plato where he was complaining that communicating through writing was a bad way of doing philosophy. His concerns weren’t just around communicating ideas between people; he was even opposed to writing as an introspective tool to help a person think through their ideas, or make notes to come back to.
"And so it is that you by reason of your tender regard for the writing that is your offspring have declared the very opposite of its true effect. If men learn this, it will implant forgetfulness in their souls. They will cease to exercise memory because they rely on that which is written, calling things to remembrance no longer from within themselves, but by means of external marks.”
- Plato, “Phaedrus” ^([citation needed])
It’s interesting because I don’t think he’s necessarily wrong about the skill atrophy angle of it. It’s just a question of to what extent we need those memory skills in the modern era.
There is a question of just how much better or worse human memory was in the old days. Some say it was better because there just aren’t that many things people need to remember, so they can remember what they consider to be important more easily.
Laws were generally far more rudementary and easier to remember. People didn’t need to remember as many numbers as we do now, and as a general rule, the amount of news and events that the average person contended with within their lifetimes was also far fewer. I remember learning a fact that the average amount of news and information a person gets in just one week today is actually more than what the typical farmer would get in their lifetimes. That is mind boggling when you think about it.
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Math anxiety is real tbf, I can add that up real fast without the pressure of someone looking at me waiting for me to solve it, but the second another person is watching I can’t even think about the math I just obsess about how I should be solving it faster and how they now think I’m dumb because instead of doing the math I’m thinking about this bullshit and it’s taken 10 whole seconds which is a lot longer than it sounds…
One thing that fascinates me is that Trump’s definition of tariffs seems more like the definition of kickbacks.
As he was (is?) a landlord, he may also think of it as seeking rent, like how malls get rent from the stores inside.
As a foreign asset, I think Trump is just actively performing a proxy war to drain the US of money, power, and resources for Russia. If you think he’s going to be doing anything else - lol.
It can be both. Lying is more convincing when it’s felt as truth by the liar.
Or a tax?
Extracting rent can be seen as private taxation. He’s not a “career politician”, so I’m trying to understand how he’d see it from the private realm.
An entry fee, a toll, a tax, a rent - whatever. In the end, the cost will be added to the products going in. It’s not a usual tariff, but the outcome is the same. Maybe he thinks that this trickery helps avoid problems with “free trade” conventions.
Maybe thr PA education system didn’t include things like the great depression
Hold MAGA voters accountable for their choices. Every. Single. Day.
Thanks Trump.
I’m about to print off about a million of those “I did that!!” stickers that the magats loved to stick on gas pumps. You better believe those things are going everywhere.
I don’t want to put blame directly on individual voters, in the sense that they might be able to learn in 4 years, and “Trump did that” only addresses the symptom of the problem. “MAGA did that” sounds apt to me.
They didn’t learn in 2016, why would they now?
I’m already too optimistic but perhaps a more direct awareness campaign on how climate denialism, economic isolationism and anti-immigration stances hurt themselves, their friends family and neighbors, and directly make their lives worse.
It has to be kept simple, and packaged like a low-effort meme. Anything too wordy or think-y won’t go viral in the circles that need targeting.
Maybe we need some fake Facebook pages. Start by reposting crap you already know they’ll share. Once the audience is there, start slowly slipping actual facts into things. It’s gotta start slow, though. The “long con.”
“This price brought to you by the Republican Party”
Make sure to get pictures of the prices before and after and then toss them on the products with the new price.
Just need a price with a date and an arrow that points to the current date.
I think guillotine stickers everywhere would make a point.
I mean the whole point is paying a tariff so American companies make the goods instead for less.
But if paying Chinese poverty wages and tariffs is still less than paying Americans to do it, then guess what they’re going to do?
It’s also dumb to just assume that foreign companies can just flip a switch and start building/assembling whatever they sell in America. You need facilities, you need to hire employees, you need to train employees. You can’t just pick up your factory, drop it in Kansas, and just slot people into the building to work it right away.
Also, unless your plan is to exclusively export to the US, then it’s less cost effective to open up new facilities in the US. You just raise prices and and have the consumers take the hit for the tariff. There’s also the problem of logistics for raw materials for whatever products your manufacturing. Those also tend to cost more to acquire stateside.
The worst part is that policy is only a single bullet in the policy foot gun Trump has loaded. It gets even more expensive when the low cost labor is suddenly deported and/or put in camps. Which I realize isn’t even the worst thing about the immigration policy, but just pointing out that it too has consequences to these same people.
What do you mean my car is now valued for so much less? Well see all the parts are all manufactured overseas, so we have to pay tariffs to acquire the parts and they cost much more. Higher repair costs, lower value. Also, your car insurance just went up.
Repairs on any products you currently own, more expensive.
Don’t worry, in 10 years these prices will stabilize and we’ll still have 8 dollar an hour minimum wage, but a new car only cost 80,000 starting. Well that’s MSRP, Desantis banned direct sales of ICE cars without going through a dealership, so they need their cut.
We were going to subsidize vegetable based meat substitutes to drive the cost of food down, but instead we decided we should ban lab grown meats from existence, and not subsidize the vegatable based meat because if I I don’t know if I’ll like it, NO ONE else is allowed to try it!
Welcome to America, home of our grave
You can’t just pick up your factory, drop it in Kansas, and just slot people into the building to work it right away.
This was demonstrated in Springfield, OH. That whole thing about Haitian immigrants? A large factory opened there, but they couldn’t find Americans who wanted to work there for wages that would make them profitable, so the mayor sent out a call welcoming Haitian immigrants to the town. They were invited specifically for this reason.
What happens when immigration is halted and people are deported? Where do they expect to find Americans willing to work for wages that will have to be even lower to make up the costs the tariffs will cause?
It takes only minutes of thought to realise how stupid and doomed trump’s plan is (which is obviously more than his supporters can manage).
Global trade drove the cost of supplies and goods down to the lowest available prices, so while setting tariffs may encourage local production because it makes overseas less attractive, the price of goods still goes up on both scenarios.
If moved locally, there will be more local labor required for production but it’s not clear if that is a net benefit.
Hypothetically under globalism more developed countries shed their “dirty manufacturing labor jobs” and move more people upmarket. Of course this is matter of nonstop debate among economists because as we all know the whole population of a country can’t move upmarket together and a lot of people were/are screwed because of lack of education and opportunity to develop themselves.
In an ideal implemention of this, more people would be moving to the arts, self expression, and technology, while fewer are involved in survival activities like shelter and food.
I think the unsolved problem now is that average people believe way too much of that wealth went to the top while the middle class is working harder than ever and getting less.
I mean the whole point is paying a tariff so American companies make the goods instead for less.
So American companies make the goods at the current prices which are now relatively lower than the imports, but still the same or more than they are priced now.
Tariffs always increase prices overall.
Correct, tariffs increase prices.
Ideally to more than what they would be if they were made by American workers in American factories. Otherwise there’s no point and you’re just increasing prices out of spite.
But we’re relying on a lot of landlords to go “fair enough, we’ll lower our rents so you can buy those American goods at their new higher prices” rather than going “no, go fuck yourselves”. And I feel that’s unrealistic.
But whatever, turkeys voting for Christmas is not a new thing and I’m sure they’ll find a way to blame it on immigrants or gays or something.
Rationally implemented tariffs to keep people employed by countering foreign imports is the goal, since it is hard to complete on price with slave labor that is common in things like clothing manufacturing. It doesn’t have anything to do with landlords.
Obviously Trump is not proposing rationally implemented tariffs.
Raise the tariffs?
Sure, but the whole concept relies on Americans being too wealthy and need to pay more for their stuff. They’re lazy and need more work to do.
And with all the poverty about, people working multiple jobs, the gig economy turning minimum wage evasion into “well you chose to do it”, I’m surprised that over half the country agreed with the billionaire about that.
The people I talked to thought tariffs would nt change prices. Also thought they were for a free market.
Guise, I’m struggling. Part of me says…let them all burn for their “fuck around and find out”.
But I know that isn’t completely right. I just, am, so, angry (and sad).
Will probably choose the let them burn route.
On the other hand, there’s nothing you can do anyway, so the only option is to let them burn.
You. I like you.
The anger stems from their ignorance.
“Fuck around and find out” is literally the only way to learn in “basal” levels of intelligence.
Hmmm basal or basilar? I would have said basilar but now am not sure.
Basilar seems to be the medical “Hardware” Term while Basal is the psychological “Software” Term… now I want to know how the neurologists coin their Term.
I’m just making popcorn for the show when leopards start eating faces
And there will be more people lining up to have their faces eaten, too. They will love it.
I say let it rip.
I say you can enjoy watching the fire, since you didn’t light it up.
I posted a meme last week before the election about a lot of my fellow Americans being depressingly ignorant and a bunch of people got pissed off about it.
I’m just saying…
Yeah, a lot has been said about why the ‘Democrats’ failed; sure they were/are imperfect.
Where are the articles bemoaning our stupid and/or mean citizens who have no curiosity and think being obstinate will work like a time machine? I’m frustrated to hell with apathy of my countrymen.
“Democrats” is too vague to be meaningful in this discussion. I do put a lot of blame on the DNC organization for deenergizing their base, but also the working class for not understanding basic economics and being taken by a carpet bagger.
And the huge shift right by male GenZ people. Reading posts by them specifically today: they felt marginalized by democrats and ignored. They felt like Maga cared about them, and they could belong in the Republican party. And some of them simply wanted revenge and to feel powerful.
Now this isn’t everyone, but I gotta say:
WTF are you doing thinking about feelings? And fitting in? Look at the damn effects your choice is going to make based on “feelings”. That group is going to lose consumer protection, worker protection and safety, medical coverage, relief on college tuition, housing subsidies, debt relief, small business loans. What they gain is higher prices, worse infrastructure, and possibly the nastiest thing of al:l the direct path of their income going to the wealthiest people and perpetuating generational wealth for the very few.
Because they wanted to “feel” like they were seen and heard as men. You got played!
Their ignorance is equally as valuable as your knowledge. To them, anyway.
Both sides-ism in a nutshell. Nailed it.
Just read estimates his tariffs would cost the average household 7600 annually. I told my folks and they didn’t understand why I thought it was funny. I told them they wanted this.
Wow, the turn around time on that was fast.
Life under Trump in 2024 will be orders of magnitude worse than life under him in 2016. It won’t take long for Americans to begin to feel strong consequences of the election result.
I guess I forgot some people knew what to expect from a second Trump term and would plan accordingly. It would have been nice if this guy had sat these people down and had this talk before the election.
Perhaps telling all his employees that if Trump won he’d cut their bonuses would be taken as attempting to threaten their vote?
How about a seminar on tariffs though.
Except the president also voted for Trump.
Yeah he doesn’t care to win our votes for re-election this time. It will be very bad.
It’s almost like it didn’t happen.
This tells me the information pipe to voters is broken, and hacked.
People live in their own social media realities. There has always been ignorance, but it’s never been so widely personalized. And Trump and the GoP played it like a fiddle.
And just watch, the Dems are going to learn precisely nothing from this and campaign like it’s the 1950s again, thinking policy was their problem.
The sheer stupidity of the dems is kinda astonishing. The reason why Obama won is because he had a goddamn narrative. Yes we can! Change you can believe in! It’s almost like they were onto something… then they did nothing.
Dems learned nothing and are all out of ideas!
Silicon valley: Here is a device that makes it possible to exchange information to everyone, everywhere, immediately.
GOP: Oh, you mean I can disseminate anything I want? How about lies? That’d be neat.
Silicon valley: No, not like that.
One thing that I observed is that the right wing had/has the more progressive campaign, from a technology and media use standpoint. The DNC, on the other hand, was still more or less using the same moves they had back in the 1990’s, relying on extinct concepts like the fairness doctrine, debate performance, and journalistic integrity of news outlets (fact-checks anyone?).
It’s not just the Overton Window that has moved: our information diet has completely changed too. To win at politics today, the entire landscape has shifted to propaganda, bombast, showmanship, clickbait, and leading the 24/7 news cycle by the nose. You must be louder and more interesting than the other guy. I think it’s possible to play that game ethically though, without disinformation, but what’s clear is that billionaire-owned media isn’t going to do it for you anymore.
Silicon Valley is laughing all the way to the bank enabling this.
They are the root cause, because no one told them they aren’t allowed to rot brains with relentless engagement optimization. Modern politics would still be bad, but it wouldn’t be so apocalyptic without the monsters they built.
