Both sides are not the same. Republicans are the ones who don’t want to help the workers and lower/middle class. Tax the rich and the big business. Make public college free, make healthcare free, make child care free. How? Tax the rich and big businesses. They have hoarded all the money we generated for them. (They are using it to create space ships for fun and buying up EVERYTHING). If they want to do business in the USA tax them. Stop voting for republicans, they don’t care about our democracy. Get more liberal justices on the supreme court to fix what republicans have done to our rights. Money shouldn’t be speech and corporations are not people.
I’m sure that Republicans right now are trying to stop student debt relief, again. Stop voting for them. They have no policies to help the workers. Only tax cuts for the rich and hate, i.e. woke, i.e. minorites, LGBT, women, non Christains, and diversity.
I’m sure that Republicans right now are trying to stop student debt relief, again
lol what happened to Biden forgiving debt??
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There is one party that’s literally, not metaphorically, trying to get student debt relief. And reproductive rights. Other isn’t.
They say that and do nothing when it’s slapped down. Do you honestly think they care about that? It’s like a fucking abusive relationship where they tell you what you want to hear, spend one day doing said thing and then completely drop it until you kick up a fuss at election time, then they say more words you like to hear and dont follow it up with any action. rinse and repete. Republicans are such an easy scapegoat, and you lick it up like the good little dem you are.
Like at some point you have to realize that they won’t do what you want. They’re full of fucking air.
What exactly (and be specific) do you expect them to do when our system of governance strikes down their attempt?
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Yeah and they’re still warmongers.
Which one made promises for 50 years and did nothing?
Remind me cuz I seem to have forgotten which party recently busted up a union strike, which one refused to repeal Trump’s tax cuts for the wealthy, and worked directly with McConnell to make the bush tax cuts for the wealthy permanent, who was the one that forced for profit health care system on us and then mandated everyone participate? Which one was it? That should have gone through the higher education act to eliminate student debt but followed a route that was destined to fail? Which one is it that is now overfunding cops to the extent of pushing and funding cop city in Atlanta, to further subjugate minority communities, which party passed a far overreaching crime bill that specifically targeted black males, and the for-profit prison system that he’s used to house them in? Which party had the crime bill that was so restrictive that it went too far for even Reagan, and he had to insert it into the violence against women act so people would not vote against it, which party was that?
All concessions to Republican control. Don’t blame the party stopping progress, blame the progressives. What a joke.
I blame the party, they are the ones in control, or in most cases, not in control. They are shit for governing while blaming everyone but themselves for incompetence.
The Democrats aren’t responsible for the impedence of a Republican owned house, senate, and supreme court you fucking moron.
Since its hard to keep up sometimes:
Which party busted up a union strike? Democrats Which one refused to repeal Trumps tax cuts for the wealthy? Democrats Which one worked directly with McConnell as VP to make the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy permanent? Biden Which party forced everyone to participate in protecting healthcare profits under the guise of healthcare? Democrats Which party should have gone through the HEA to eliminate student debt because it already had provisions to allow canceling student debt, but they didnt so it would get challenged and fail? Democrats Which party is over funding oppressive cops and is now pushing for ‘cop cities’ all over the country so they can subjugate uniformly? Democrats Which party passed a crime bill so unpopular with the public and Congress they had to sneak it into the Violence Against Women Act so it would pass? Democrats Which party help increase the federal use of for profit prisons to house the targeted black males using their crime bill? Democrats Which party fundraised via fear mongering over Roe for 50 years while promising to codify it into law, then did nothing resulting on it being challenged by SCOTUS? Democrats Which party talks about climate change but issues more drilling permits than any other President before them, and further increases funding to the world’s largest polluter, the military? Democrats
Do you see a trend now? All these things were done without the controlled opposition republicans
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What he is doing is called gish gallop and has soured all forms of debate in America. Its… textbook. You just give out so many arguments, no matter the merit, that it’s a complete slog to counter each of them. Where it falls flat is if you press them on one fucking thing, doesn’t even have to be about the shit they listed and you can easily win any argument with these ass hats.
It’s funny, cause when you do press them and they see their bullshit isn’t working they go, “no fair.” Pricks, all of em.
Easily my favorite roast I’ve seen in quite a while. I love it cause it’s true
You got your shit rocked, take the L with dignity, no need to stoop to the level of personal insults if you’re so smart.
Reposting for posterity, apparently the mods are prone to removing legitimate conversation and discussion because bad words hurt their fefe’s. +20 / -2 at time of removal.
Yeah, I see a trend of ignorance and stupidity in your posts, you ignore the why and the how and the intent and the hurdles. You look at a result and ignore everything about how it got there because you’re too stupid to think beyond one layer of complexity.
Like the union strike that was broken for capitalist ideals, not progressive ideals, but Biden still negotiated and got the workers demands from the rail companies. But you ignore that. And every other item you listed has just as much if not more context that your braindead troglodyte mentally deficient self can’t comprehend because you’ve been poisoned by lack of education, lack of nutrition, and lack of social support, so you grew up functionally retarded. **
The only ignorance here are the fools that can’t see their party and its leaders are incompetent. And that you support right-wing policies and legislators
You right, let’s get rid of all the conservatives from the Democrat party.
I’m all for it
That would result in the elimination of the DNC, which Im all in favor of
Let’s do it
No, no, see, we should just roll over and take all that with our asses up because they’ll maybe try and throw a measly attempt at giving us back federal abortion rights and student loan forgiveness, maybe. And they can’t do anything but give up if the Republicans slap any of that down. “oh well, we tried! But now we’re busy starting proxy wars and throwing our young men and women into decade-long wars, so stfu and take what we give you and be thankful for it.”
"Oh,it’s election time? No, no, don’t withhold your vote from us, if you do that, abortion will be federally banned this time around, probably! Listen, we’ll do you a solid and attempt to throw another half-assed bill at the Republicans. Yeah, they’ll slap it down, and no, we won’t push back or anything, we’ll be too busy funding more wars that we don’t call wars, but, you know, at least we’re better than them. So be a good little removed and roll over and stick your ass up.
Inb4: “BoThSiDeIsM” and “nAzI!!!”
What should the Democrats do? Pass legislation with 48/100 senate votes (first two years) or without control of the house (now)? Pass things unconstitutionally via executive order and hope that the ideologicaly opposed supreme court allows their illegal action to slide? Should they tear the whole thing down and install a dictatorship like Trump wants to do?
Start holding individual representatives accountable for their actions and votes. Not one republican was willing to cross party lines to put their country first, yet people like you blame the politicians who tried to help and either withhold the votes they need to get stuff done or outright give their votes to the party whose platform is literally to harm us.
They should primary the fuckers who think if maybe we just listen to the Nazis just a little bit, it will be all ok.
Y’know, the only reason the Democrats struggle to win at all is that sometime in the post-Nixon era they collectively decided to stop standing up for labor’s buying power. When they did this, (which helped them a lot in terms of their ability to get corporate donors to finance their elections), it meant that working people would go from having 1 party represent labor to 0 parties doing that.
In the 50s an entry-level job that a high-school graduate could get would support a family, buy a home and a couple of cars, and pay out a retirement. Today, that job won’t even pay for an apartment without roommates.
That right there is the whole reason the GOP is a viable political party at the federal level- with both parties beholden to corporate donors, winning elections is more or less a matter of spending money on campaign ads attacking the other party because neither party has to do anything that voters want
As things stand right now, the GOP’s platform is “let’s pick a scapegoat to exhume the lower classes’ frustrations”, while the Democrats’ is “let’s not do that”. It’s no wonder why the Dems can only garner around ~27% of all elegible votes (vs the Republicans’ ~25%), most of their voters don’t particularly like their politicians nor their policies, they just don’t want to be governed by fucking crazies.
Unfortunately progress is making and eating gradually less shitty sandwiches until all of humanity individually decide we don’t like the taste of shit.
Most Dems do like their representatives and their policies and that’s why those representatives win primaries
In the 50s an entry-level job that a high-school graduate could get would support a family, buy a home and a couple of cars, and pay out a retirement.
While I agree with the general thrust that more needs to be done for the average worker, your comparison of these times completely falls on its face if you speak to anyone with firsthand experience. It shouldn’t be used because it is just noise, not relevant to the world we live in.
My dad grew up in the 50s and lives with me, due to his age/health. Here’s a mix of his take and current data:
Homes have tripled in size on average. Providing for a family involves machines that take on 16 hours per day of household chores, which are expensive and taken for granted. Electricity and television, to say nothing of the internet, are taken for granted. Cellular phones are taken for granted.
6 children would live in a 3 bedroom house - I know this because this is how my uncles grew up in the 50s. The vast majority of people did not have a “couple of cars.” They had one car and the entire family packed into it without seatbelts.
You can absolutely live like it’s the 50s right now. Cancel your cable, internet, and phone. Do not own a dishwasher, wash your laundry by hand, and only bulk-buy groceries in the forms of cereal grains, meat, eggs, and vegetables. Buy nothing pre-made. Mend your own clothes. Cook everything from scratch. Don’t have air conditioning.
If this sounds like a poor, miserable existence, it’s because almost everyone lives a standard of living unimaginable in the 50s except in science fiction, and that standard is expensive.
That’s why we should help people - because our standard of living rose and we no longer see the 50s as acceptable, not because tradwives and nuclear families made the world safe for one white guy to provide for his family. We are the richest country in the world and our standard of living should be a cudgel we wield in soft diplomacy.
As my dad said when I read him this post: “this going back to the past shit is about the stupidest shit in the world.”
Do not own a dishwasher, wash your laundry by hand
this ends up costing more where I live - its actually cheaper to run a dishwasher daily.
source: I own a dishwasher and my water bill is only like $30 - $40 in the US.
Sorry but I do all of that and it’s not any better at all. No washer/dryer, no washing machine, I live in a fucking garage and pay more rent than anyone in the 50s paid mortgage.
Houses that are glorified sheds in flood zones in the worst parts of town go for 300k+. I’m not even entry level and I can’t afford the cheapest garbage excuse for a house out here without becoming house poor. I can’t even “move where it’s cheaper” because WFH people did and now it’s not cheaper. The areas that are truly cheap, are so because there’s no work to be had around them. Can’t appreciate the low cost of an area when your unemployed.
I specifically said it wasn’t better. That’s what “massively increased standard of living” implies.
It is cheaper though, which is why you do it. I agree it sucks.
That we should make it easier to achieve a massively better life than the 50s is the intent of the post you are replying to.
I absolutely agree. I think the “smaller houses” bit just sent me off on a rant because I keep hearing that argument as a way to dismiss current housing price issues, but it’s just not the reality I see when I look at glorified sheds selling for 300k.
Well there’s also a dramatic under-supply of housing as well.
A tripling in housing cost resulting in average houses costing $80k or so, which would approximately align with price increase/sqft would be much more tenable for people.
Still, it’s a higher standard of living and more expensive though, and should be taken into account when looking to provide the right economic conditions for people. That’s why I brought that up.
Bottom line is, as always, fuck NIMBYism and build more. Big houses, small houses, multi-family housing, all of it.
You can absolutely live like it’s the 50s right now.
No, you can’t . You can’t send your kids to a state college or university today and expect them to work their way through on part-time minimum wage and graduate without debt. Pensions are a thing of the past. Unions have been decimated and their protections have been unavailable to most workers for decades now. Today, banks are regulated by private trade associations made up of- you guessed it- banks. Today, employers buy back their own shares (which was made illegal in the 1930s and brought back in 1982) at labor’s expense. Today’s median wage buys you less than minimum wage did then.
My post above was not a call to go back to the 50s, (fuuuuuck that) it was a call to recognize that the buying power available to labor has been squeezed so hard that the middle class as a demographic is shrinking and that in turn probably causes people to lose faith in democracy. When both major parties have worked together to dismantle labor protections and to deregulate finance, is your democracy really working for you, or for corporate power?
Yes, today it’s normal to buy things that didn’t exist then, and most fatal childhood diseases have been all but wiped out, and bigger houses and a housing inventory shortage is a thing, but that’s not the whole picture by a long shot. Raw material inputs (like lumber, and basic foodstuffs) cost more in normalized labor purchasing power terms and that’s probably largely because of corporate mergers in the supply chain and wage standards have not kept up with basic costs.
I think it’s remarkably silly that so many Americans that long for the 50s to come back think they’re gone because the Democrats embraced civil rights or because of feminism and not because they joined the GOP in dismantling the New Deal.
Roughly 50% more people go to college now than in the 50s and 60s: https://educationdata.org/college-enrollment-statistics#college-enrollment-statistics
That’s why college is more expensive now. It used to be something you paid for to go, and now there are loans. This drove up demand and changed the financial incentive structure. It’s the #1 reason why I believe college should be free for the lower three quintiles.
Pensions are a crap idea and always were. Today my wife and I are straight up cashing in her pension because it’s worth more in an IRA.
Share buybacks are good for companies, workers, and the market in general - which protects 401(k)s as well. Not sure why that’s an issue for you?
Unions are expanding again and I hope that really takes off.
I definitely do not see how the New Deal was “dismantled” or that the Democrat party of today had anything to do with it. The New Deals/Great Society were a defining time for conservatives and many conservative Democrats left the party over it.
That’s why college is more expensive now.
Back then, states funded their colleges- tuition wasn’t the primary funding mechanism. But, shortly after desegregation, that funding started to dry up now that brown people could benefit and the politics of keeping college cheap became fraught (and educating a multiracial egalitarian society became ‘communism’, which nicely dovetailed with the red scares of the time).
Then, as prices went up, loans became a thing- but loans were routinely discriminatory on things like race, gender, etc. So, when they made loans less discriminatory and easier to get, that’s when your answer became accurate: we all watched an army of MBAs swoop in and become middle-management of universities that transformed themselves to capture a share of all that available money.
Yeah, college got expensive because loans got easy to get- but the reason for loans in the first place was in large part that the right wanted to gatekeep education because they saw an educated public as a threat.
I definitely do not see how the New Deal was “dismantled”
Then you’re not looking. Glass-Steagall? Repealed under Clinton. Enforceable financial regulations? Deregulated quietly on a bipartisan basis since the 90s. Labor relations? Unions have been gutted and wage protections neglected, so much so that it became difficult to form unions. Antitrust? When the Democrats swept congress after Nixon, they retired the Democrats’ expertise on antitrust enforcement. The then-new dem leadership became fascinated with pivoting towards the center, such that the Democrats stopped representing labor and became the party of professionals. With 0 parties representing the working class and both parties engaged in the project of deregulation and privatizing public goods and services, several major parts of the New Deal were quietly neglected or just not enforced.
Today, banking is to a much greater extent regulated by private consortiums composed of… yes, bankers than it was then. The same fox that guarded the henhouse prior to the Great Depression was put in charge, and it wasn’t long before we had another depression-scale collapse.
As of the early 1970s, the robust trust-busting of the 1930s onward was quietly discontinued; the ‘watergate-baby dems’ (who were elected in the wake of Watergate) weren’t excited about monopoly enforcement. On their watch, enforcement was largely defunded. Non-enforcement of The Packers and Stockyards act eventually led to today’s state of affairs, in which there are just 4 conglomerates in the market between farm and grocer. This pattern isn’t limited to the meat industry, it is happening everywhere- middlemen control supply chains, ‘vertical integration’ and mergers and acquisitions mean producers are squeezed. That’s just plain down on the neoliberals getting hold of the Democratic party and letting corporations reassert dominance.
The New Deals/Great Society were a defining time for conservatives
If by that you mean conservatives hated everything about it and called it communism and conducted non-stop red-scares and moral panics to fight it, I suppose you’re right. That bit where conservative dems left the party- yeah, that coincided with the democrats’ embrace of the civil rights movement too, and that party realignment broadly energized the American right under the GOP banner (where before that, both parties had conservative and progressive wings)
Jesus you people are fucking exhausting the way you write like you’re trying out for Last Week Tonight.
Just speak like a person. I would’ve been interested in this discussion. We’d have politely disagreed on a couple things, I’d have fixed some of your bad history, and it would’ve been fun
If you’re gonna keep writing all jackassy at least try to be funnier.
For anyone that wants to really know exactly what the conservatives plan to do against the American people, read their ”Project 2025: Mandate for Leadership."
At least read the Forward, but here’s the whole PDF:
https://thf_media.s3.amazonaws.com/project2025/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf
The rhetoric just in the Forward is frightening, disgusting, and dangerous.
We MUST vote for the Democrats if we’re going to maintain any semblance of real freedom for everyone and not just conservative white people.
(Side note, I found it hilarious that the “Forward” felt like it was 1000 pages down. And reading that much BS made me feel gross.)
Ok so, the Project 2025 thing is terrifying. Their Forward is terrifying. They have no plan for making this country better for anyone except themselves. They state very clearly they want to delete anything they don’t like.
They want to ban books and open discussions.
They want to deny racism exists or ever existed.
They want to deny that biology exists outside of their narrow minded beliefs.
They want to force a single religion on everyone.
They cite problems and point the finger at everyone except themselves.
As if it wasn’t abundantly clear at this point based on their ACTIONS what Republican rule will be… And yet we still have millions of people fully invested in that cult of hate and fear.
I’m not American, but reading the Foreword was just plain scary to me since it comes from a major party. There’s nothing about economics and all about moral outrage. You guys need to diversify your parties somehow.
Yeah, by voting 3rd party. But the vast majority are too stupid to realize that they need to be apart of the change they seek instead of voting for the “lesser evil”.
Bruh. I’m so fuckin sick of this 2 party bullshit.
“We Must vote for the Democratic party”
How about no. Fuck the Democratic & Republican party.
I’m sick of the two party system also but also recognize that’s the system in place. Requires voting reform for that to ever change, which I support. I’m still going vote for democrats in the meantime because anything else, to include third party or abstaining, is ultimately supporting the republicans whether one wants to admit it or not.
If enough people, 5% of the population, voted 3rd party in one election, it gives the 3rd party the ability to get on the ballot in every state. This goes a long way.
Neither side wants ranked choice voting. Neither side is going to give up power.
We have to vote something different to change the 2 party system. Not going to change itself.
Exactly!
I’m sick of voting which seems to go nowhere.
How about we all just do something instead.
So what’s your plan to stop the US from turning into Gilead? Wear lots of black clothes and whine about it?
I can’t speak for the previous commenter, but I know that not voting for either party is my plan. Everyone that votes out of fear of “the bad one getting elected” is part of the problem. How about something you can vote for instead of something you’re voting against?
Thanks for enabling fascists because you can’t be bothered to do the bare minimum.
Democrats almost got rid of abortion entirely.
both parties can fuck off.
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The fuck are you talking about?
No, the people enabling fascists are the ones voting for them. I don’t take that notion of enabling fascists to heart at all in this context, not sorry either. For the record, when the Democrat party undermines citizens almost as badly as Republicans, it occurs to me that they’re not my party anymore. Thinking railworker strike, trade deals, erosion of support for US jobs, and lacking the spine to push through socialized medicine. I’m also thinking about how Bernie should have won the nomination instead of Hillary but the undemocratic superdelegates supported her against the will of the popular vote anyway, with the literal explanation of the superdelegates being that they are there to stop undesired grassroots efforts from being successful…and here you’re pretending they’re somehow not fascist themselves?
Dream on, we need the two parties thrown out, and to quit bickering amongst citizens and unite against the true enemy - billionaires who want us to vote the way we have been.
Dream on, we need the two parties thrown out
I’m sure you’ll get right on that, right?
Every time I vote, and have done so for the past 6 years. Sucks that all the other sheep don’t wake up.
Thaaaank you. Looking at you getting downvoted cause idiots don’t understand we can do something better than this two party bullshit.
But you’re supposed to pick a side and be willing to literally lay down your life for them and their cause! Ra ra, go team go. Otherwise you’re just part of the problem according to either side.
I agree with you and I’ll go a step further and say fuck all politicians in general. Today, they’re all owned in some way by the money that puts them in power. They’ll all tell you what you want to hear. They’re all experts in half truths. Never trust a politician.
Politicians are owned by their constituents, who they overwhelmingly vote in alignment with.
The whole “politicians are owned” thing just doesn’t show up in any data whatsoever.
Take one look at who the biggest lobbyists in the US are. Then compare that to the most glaring issues we have in the US. I’ll wait.
Here’s a link of the top US lobbies, and I’ll go ahead and spoil that it isn’t what you’d think - for instance, no energy lobby makes the list.
Also, you’d think actual votes would be more along lobbyist lines than constituent lines but they are not.
https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/top-spenders
NAR for instance would absolutely love zoning changes that create more homes to sell. That’s a lobby we should listen to.
But again, we don’t, because getting re-elected is always of paramount importance.
You’re joking right? https://www.statista.com/statistics/257364/top-lobbying-industries-in-the-us/
From your own source. https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2023/02/oil-and-gas-industry-spent-124-4-million-on-federal-lobbying-amid-record-profits-in-2022/#:~:text=The oil and gas industry,slightly when adjusted for inflation.
And for you last point about NAR, I have doubts. I could see home builders and home buyers benefitting from zoning changes. It would drive down costs of a new home, open up more choices for home buyers, and put construction companies to work. Realtors are middle men who work off commissions. The more they can sell a house for the more commission they make. Realtors have a vested interest keeping the market balanced in their favor.
Realtors with more property to sell make more than realtors with less property to sell. Do you know actual realtors? The vast majority are not selling a few multi-million houses and calling it a year.
Look at what they lobby for: https://www.nar.realtor/advocacy/federal-advocacy/all-federal-issues
A recent NAR study estimates that the U.S. has developed an “underbuilding gap” of at least 5.5 million housing units over the last 20 years. This translates into more than $4 trillion in underinvestment in housing. Even relatively modest steps taken now to reduce this gap will unleash tremendous economic activity and create millions of new jobs.
Multi-family housing proposals are a core plank of their program, for instance - and yet politicians don’t listen to them because their constituents don’t want them to
I’m not sure what you think you’re arguing when you call me out my link then share data that agrees with my link.
Your preconceived notions are incorrect, and lying about data doesn’t make it correct
I’m curious as to how being a politician is even a job? Do they get salary? If so, from what? How do they pay their mortgages?
Politicians are almost all paid (some things like city council aren’t necessarily paid). Many politicians have “day jobs” they only leave once they reach a level of office where they can live off the pay.
Speaking very broadly, the cutoff is generally “state rep or higher” or “in a big city” where you can lean on politician as your main source of income.
I like how “day job” is in quotes. That makes it seem even sketchier than I originally thought lol
what kind of “day jobs” are we talking about here? Are they in an office?
And yeah, how do they have time to be a politician if they have that day job going?
I’ve worked with local politicians in office settings, as salespeople (trained a city councilwoman as a saleswoman once), etc. They also sometimes own businesses (a bit of selection bias there because that “plays” really well to the electorate).
Most political jobs that aren’t state/federal arent very demanding of time. School board, local government, etc, is generally unpaid/low pay and very much part time. If you can carve a couple nights a week, you can work in local gov.
no no no he has it all wrong. It’s the party of the WORKING class. E.g. they are going to put you all TO WORK.
Keeping the wealth with the wealthy means you get to work for them. They’re in charge don’t you see? We’re just their worker bees. There’s enough of us that we don’t need healthcare. Education is a luxury for the children of the wealthy elite, NOT the workers. The dumber and more ignorant the worker the less they need to offer them in compensation. If you don’t know better, you don’t ask for more!
It’s all about being the smartest in the room. Why do good things for people when you can just fuck them over and have them sing your praises? This is why they want to teach that slavery taught valuable skills. They want to enslave us, and they are slowly doing that generation after generation with income disparities. Pretty soon we’ll work our whole lives just to subsist and owning a home will be only afforded to the wealthy elite. The rest of us will work for them in the form of rent and they will be our land LORDS.
It’s definitely the party of workers. More workers! Work for your owners!
BuT hOw ArE wE gOnNa aFfOrD iT!?!?!?!??!?!?!!?
the fucking pentagon can’t account, literally cannot conceive, of where more than two thirds of its budget WENT.
Of almost a TRILLION DOLLARS, 886 billion dollars, they only know where ONE THIRD of it went.
That ~600 Billion Dollars have afforded all those things.
The Pentagon does know where there money goes but they are never going to tell a committee of idiots who cannot keep a damn thing secret. If you can’t trust even the President to not run his mouth or expose classified satellite capabilities to our enemies then why would they ever tell anyone in politics where that money is going? I want a transparent govt as much as the next person but it isn’t going to happen.
They’re legally required to tell those things, and democracy is not built on secrecy.
This is the major interest point for me in UAP investigations - it looks exceedingly likely that the Pentagon is embezzling some of those funds through “pet projects” that are all legacy, ultra-secret, unaccountable, and need to produce nothing.
Legally yes. But you have to prove they didn’t simply misplace the funds. Democracy is great and I love it. However, the fact remains you can’t report something you don’t have documentation on.
Americans are wage slaves to our government
Americans are wage slaves to
our governmentthe wealthy. FTFYWeird, nobody I know works for the government.
perhaps not directly…
Where is the meme though?
There isn’t one. A subset of Lemmy users have decided to go down the Reddit path where anything and everything MUST be politically related. Ideally it would be 24x7x365 coverage of “Republicans Evil” and nothing else.
I actually don’t mind that. Life is inherently political, and Republicans truly do suck. I’m more upset that something is labeled a meme when it’s not a meme at all.
This is not a meme.
“Oh no no no, you misunderstand, we’re the party of WORKING the lower CLASSES to death, gotta read that fine print”. - Lionel Hutz, GOP Supreme Court Justice Candidate
It never was 🌎 👩🚀🔫👩🚀
It’s just do much more obvious now. The only real values holding this shell of a “party” together are fear and hatred. Emotions >> platforms/issues in modern politics. It’s pathetic, and this complete death grip on a two party system will ultimately kill American democracy.
I’d argue that right up until the three way brawl that was Taft V Roosevelt V Wilson, the Republicans were very much the party of the people. Roosevelt split the party, and all the lefties left the party, mostly to become Communists. Then the 1950s and 1960s happened and the Republicans leap frogged over the moderate right wing Democrats to leap head long into right wing extremism.
Admittedly that was only the first 50 or so years that the party existed.
Image Transcription:
X/Twitter post by user Robert Reich @RBReich reading: "The Republican Party is against:
- National paid family and medical leave
- Universal childcare
- Universal pre-K
- Tax increases on the wealthy and corporations
- The expanded Child Tax Credit
- Student debt relief
Doesn’t sound like the party of the working class to me."
[I am a human, if I’ve made a mistake please let me know. Please consider providing alt-text for ease of use. Thank you. 💜]
I’m not American, so I curious why they have only two parties?
Their election system (basically winner-takes-all) pretty much guarantees that it will converge in a two-party system with roughly 50/50 share and people voting for “the lesser evil” rather than their favourite. If a third challenger appears, it will split the voter base of the more close candidate and guarantee a huge victory for the farther candidate (the opposite of what the challenger stands for). So essentially it’s doomed to be a bipartisan circlejerk unless the election system itself is changed.
Ranked choice voting seems to be the solution
However, both parties are against it because neither want to give up power
Some states have switched over to ranked choice for some if not all of their elections. Alaska is a big one - nearly every election on the ballot is ranked choice.
Maine also allows it for their presidential elections. Originally, it would have been used for their gubernatorial, state legislature, House, and Senate elections, but the state Supreme Court ruled it was unconstitutional since the state constitution required a plurality to win.
Nevada is also likely to approve it for their primaries.
Many other states use it to some degree at the local level. Unfortunately, we’re unlikely to see much progress nationwide without a major shift in politics.
Correct. Also worth saying that because it was designed by rich white male British colonists over 200 years ago who deliberately made it almost impossible to change, our system is hopelessly outdated and very difficult to upgrade. This is especially true when there are certain demographics that get a ton of over representation through the existing system.
There are more parties than two, they just aren’t very popular
That’s a common fallacy. There’s really just one party with 2 factions that pretend fight but really fight when any other party tries to pop in.
The Republican Party is against:
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Republican party agains “free” (whatever that means) stuff.
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Oh no! How will you ever
survivekeep your foot on the necks of those less fortunate than you?deleted by creator
No, free means it’s for the wealthy, only
Yeap, exactly
They don’t understand how paying for things works.
They also don’t understand how incompetent the government actually is.
They think that if you fund the government more, they won’t have any worry again. Just give the government more money and all your problems will be solved.
They also think ‘someone else’ will fund the government, and not them. They’re living in a fantasy land
What they don’t understand is that this ends with everyone being broke and the government still being absolutely incompetent meaning everyone is now even worse off than they were before.
The money needs to stay in the peoples pockets and the governments reach into your life needs to stay as minimal as possible. Trust the people, not the government.
Fund the people, not the government.
Give us our money back and leave us alone
The government is incompetent. Vote for me and I’ll prove it!
-every conservative ever elected
You’ve had 12 years of Democrat leadership with 4 years of Republican squished in there. Are things better now?
Of course not.
Things seemed pretty good with republicans in office to everyone. Now that the democrats are backed, everything’s quickly gone to shit again
Who the fuck thought things felt good when Trump was in office? When did we actually have a Democrat run government? Even right now GOP has thrown a wrench in everything. Who is it everytime the debt ceiling needs to be raised threatens to shut down the government? Even when Biden had the senate and house CONSERVATIVES stopped the Dems agenda. No, no, no, you don’t get to be obstructionists then say, “well why didn’t democrats stop us from shitting on Americans?”
Get out, you fucking disgrace.
When did we actually have a Democrat run government?
The first two years of Obama is when Democrats controlled both houses and the white house. It’s the only reason we were able to get Obamacare and even then the Republican’s obstruction prevented a public option. Republicans even shut down the government trying to avoid paying for it.
Are things better now?
Yes they are actually. We’re out of the pointless war Bush started. Unemployment is at the lowest it’s been in decades. Obamacare is a first step toward socialized medicine. Infrastructure is finally getting properly funded and fixed. The largest road blocks have been that 4 years squished in the middle that saw tax cuts on the rich and the republicans in the Senate refusing to raise taxes on the rich.
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Right, our current metrics for prosperity in armerica are absolute shit. Economy, unemployment, and stock market mean nothing to the majority of Americans which are living pay check to pay check with 50 years of stagnation in wage increases.
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The poorest of Americans got fucked when the affordable care act got rolled out because red states REFUSED aid! All by design to undermine the policy.
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Democrats keep putting forward legislation to help infrastructure and the GOP keeps hiding behind a God damn self imposed culture war.
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Things absolutely did not seem pretty good with republicans in charge
Remember when they got together and rewrote the tax code to help corporations? Remember when they pulled us out of the green new deal? Remember when buddied up to North Korea and Saudia Arabia? Remember when they told us to drink bleach and shove a light up our ass to stop the spread of covid? Remember when they handed out government loans to companies with zero regulation then forgave them? Remember when they put another sexual predator on the Supreme Court? Remember when one broke into the house of the minority leader and attacked her husband with a hammer? Remember when they marched with torches on Charlotte? Remember when they attacked the capital?
The list goes on.
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The government never does anything for you. Vote for me and I’ll make sure it does even less!
I actually need the government to ‘help’ me less.
Much much less please. Just let me take care of myself and my family and stay the fuck out of my pockets and my life.
None of us are an “Army of One”, none of us can do it all alone. We need each other. We’re stronger together, than apart.
And part of that means we tithe to each other for common cause, to “lift all boats”.
And we should definitely have intellectually honest conversations to decide what is needed to ‘lift all boats’.
But if one side is just trying to constantly throw wrenchs into the machinery to prevent having to tithe to the common good, then the center will not hold.
I’d rather pay taxes and get healthcare, education, roads, safety nets, social security, armies, research, etc. This can happen. Other countries do it.
Republicans are the ones that say government doesn’t work…and when they are elected they work hard to make sure this is true.
Biden tried to give the working class student loan forgiveness. Republicans stopped it. He is trying again to make this happen for the working class. And I’m sure Republicans are trying to stop it.
Other countries do it.
And the U.S. is subsidizing their defense. So of course they have money to spend on these things.
But you are paying taxes and not getting those things.
I don’t even know how student loan forgiveness would even work, won’t other generations also have student debt? What about people who already paid for their schooling? Will they get a rebate? Will my kids get their student loans paid for too?
It’s such a ridiculous policy, it makes no sense whatsoever.
Can I get mortgage forgiveness?
We’re paying taxes and could be getting more of these things if republicans didn’t try so hard to stop them
You don’t understand how fiat currency works.
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I’ll never understand the sentiment of “our government sucks, so get rid of it”, you’re literally playing directly into the conservatives hands.
Vote better people in to fix the fucking thing
Since you deleted the post where you called me stupid, you should really learn what a Kender is before you spout off about even more shit that you know nothing about.
I have no idea what a kender is
Have you tried using a dictionary? Most people know what it means so it seems your education has failed you most spectacularly.
Have you tried being less deliberately obtuse?
You forgot unions outside of ones held for public servants. It’s no coincidence the strongest unions and best worker protections are for judges, police and firefighters.
Most people on the left aren’t willing to talk openly and honestly about why we lost and continue to lose so much of the working class.
The answer is almost always something to the effect that it’s because they’re stupid brainwashed rubes, which is highly counterproductive.
The truth is that the elites and elite institutions in this country have utterly failed the working class in every way. The right uses this to stoke class and regional resentment while steadily pushing exploitative policies, while much of the left takes only half measures and views much of what’s important to the working class with basically open contempt.
One of the above tactics has been far more effective than the other.
