Thus my note about “social media and AI mass surveillance”. What makes insurgency so effective is the enemy of the occupier could be anyone.

The US lost in both Vietnam and Afghanistan because occupation is hard. There isn’t an army on the planet that can even come close to taking on the US military in open combat, but insurgencies are a completely different animal.

Social media and AI mass surveillance might make a difference, but I kinda doubt it.

I don’t think this is where we are headed, but it wouldn’t be an automatic win for the military. Unfortunately, the people who end up in charge after an uprising usually end up being worse than the people they replace.

As a hopelessly straight American, I second the motion.

It wasn’t rigged. Even if it were rigged, it should never have been close enough to be rigged, but it wasn’t rigged. If the DNC waited to say it was rigged, they are still waiting because they haven’t said they think it’s rigged, but their not waiting, because it wasn’t rigged.

They really thought she’d be worse?

For the love of God, please stop spreading this mode of thinking. Elections are won by enthusiasm, not an intellectual weighing of the pros and cons of each. This is the model Democrats have used for decades that got us here. Being the lesser evil is not a solid campaign strategy. The greater evil will always get more attention, and therefore enthusiasm.

I don’t think this is an exclusively American thing. Did Brits really think brexit was a good idea?

That would seem much more to point towards polling using the word ‘liberal’ being more useful than trying to apply leftist definitions

Who’s trying to apply leftist definitions? There is nothing in any definition of “liberal” that aligns it with leftism. It gets misused constantly in multiple ways, not to mention being confused with neoliberalism.

Funny that polling on specific issues and particular politicians rarely if ever translates into actual voting patterns

Tell that to Andrew Cuomo, or Joe Crowley.

even in ballot initiatives

Not true. Republicans (and some Democrats) are working hard at removing ballot initiatives because they work so well for the left.

Bernie wouldn’t have lost two fucking primaries due to the more left-leaning of the two parties rejecting him by double-digit percentages

Why would you assume Bernie being left is why he lost? Clinton had way more large money donations than Bernie, and she had corporate media in her pocket. Bernie wasn’t even making a serious run until he started doing far better than he thought he would. Half way through he completely reorganized his campaign to be a real candidate instead of an issue candidate. The fact that he was able to make that a race against someone with Hillary’s name recognition and the party blessing shows just how powerful left messaging can be.

The issue against Biden wasn’t that left politics was unpopular, it was that left politics was perceived to be unpopular. The number one issue for Democratic voters in 2020 was beating Trump. Voters thought a centrist candidate had a better chance, even though Bernie and Biden pulled almost identically against Trump. The media kept pounding on the electability argument against Bernie, and it stuck. Polling on the candidates showed voters preferred Bernie’s policies, but they didn’t know if he could win.

“THE COUNTRY IS SECRETLY LEFT-WING”

Oh, fuck you, that’s not at all what I said.

Polling using the word “liberal” is pretty pointless. Leftists and centrists have completely different opposing definitions of what it means, and most Americans don’t have a clue.

Polling on specific issues or particular politicians is the only way to get an accurate picture, and Americans, especially Democrats, are far more left than they self identity.

Campaign money is important, but it also has it’s limits. At some point, more spending has diminishing or even negative returns. We just saw that with Elon in Michigan.

Going after AOC for allegedly not doing anything for her constituents is pretty damn ignorant. You aren’t going to find many House members who are as engaged as she is, and her constituents are overwhelmingly pleased with her.

She is also one of maybe half a dozen House members with an effective social media game. You can belittle it as “performative” but engaging in public rhetoric is a big part of a politician’s job. I wish every Democrat advocated as well as she does.

It’s funny that you are attacking her on social media by criticizing her for attacking people on social media.

I think it’s far more likely she runs for Schumer’s seat in the Senate than the presidency. It’s pretty much her’s if she wants it.

Yes, if only the liberals, who make up a plurality of this country

Not even close to correct. Who are the most popular politicians in this country? Every poll I’ve seen in the past 10 years has AOC and Bernie at the top, and the only politician who can even compete with their approval ratings is Mamdani.

Liberals make up a plurality of the news media and the wealthy Democratic donors. They aren’t plurality of the people. A recent poll has 62% of self identified Democrats saying they want new Democratic leadership, and only 24% saying they like the leadership they have. People are fed up, and they are not looking for more “centrist” Democrats.

As it stands, both sides think the other side is completely insane, and to some extent violent

Um, is it at all relevant that one side literally is insane, or that one side commits 99% of the violence? Where is the Democrats alligator Alcatraz for Christians? Where are the Democratic brown-shirt vigilantes running around with masks kidnapping people?

I think Republicans are insane and violent because I see it with my own eyes. Are we supposed pretend their not? Screw that, I’d rather punch a Nazi.

There were a million reasons that people didn’t show for Harris. Why do you scold only the people who were outspoken against genocide? Can you point to any evidence that this issue swung the election?

Biden put Harris in a terrible position by holding out as long as he did. Then Harris ran a horrendous campaign. That is why she lost.

People who care about Gaza are people who are politically engaged. That not who stayed home. Politically engaged people vote third party when they want to protest, and third party votes did not sway this election. Not even close.

People who stay home are normies who have given up. A lot of people need inspiration to show up, and centrist Democrats just aren’t inspiring.

I can only suppose that your fixation on the genocide issue is because you like the genocide and were pissed off that people objected to it. That’s the only reason to bring this trash up in every damn conversation about the Trump administration.

Months. Did you somehow miss black lives matter? The rapid growth of the prison industrial complex? This is just the explosive conclusion to a pattern that was well underway long before Trump.

Anyone who has ever used that phrase un-ironically is politically tone deaf, or a Republican agent. I get the sentiment, and even agree with it, but it doesn’t communicate what people who use it think it does. The kind of people who use that phrase are the ones I blame most for gestures broadly.

The left threatens power. MAGA doesn’t.

People are taking advantage of it to do those things. Most of them just get hired by ICE. A lot less personal risk that way.

I want to see the candidates also grilled on whether they condemn the Israeli government for the genocide in Gaza. Why isn’t that one being asked? (rhetorical - we all know why.)

I’m a white man and I promise you that it’s no protection from our shitty medical system. My adult life has been a misery for at least 15 of the past 20 years because of multiple rushed and incorrect diagnoses. There are literally thousands of conditions that the system is incapable of recognizing because they involve multiple specialties, fit between specialties, or are frequently referred to the wrong specialist who won’t look for causes outside their specialty.

A lot of it comes down to the limited amount of time Doctors get with the patient. They have to come up with a conclusion in 10-15 minutes, then move on, then it’s usually several months before they see the patient again.

This isn’t the first Trump administration. This administration doesn’t concern itself with civil service protections.

We need an inverse lottery. The top 100 most wealthy Americans are automatically added to a pool and one is drawn at random each year. Then we confiscate everything they own, put them in the street, and see if they can get rich again.