The U.S. will mark the anniversary of the January 6 insurrection on Saturday, a milestone that will confer upon the reality-dwelling citizenry a grim reminder of the potency of propaganda and how quickly it can warp perception when introduced into the public square.
Just three years ago, most of the country watched with dismay and horror as a violent MAGA mob beat back authorities and stormed the country’s citadel of democracy. The Donald Trump-incited crush of disillusioned rioters, fueled by a stream of fantastical lies, believed that the 2020 election had been stolen by sinister forces working to undermine the democratic election.
Of course, not only was their belief flatly incorrect, but evidence later emerged indicating that it was Trump who, in fact, had tried to subvert democracy.
Facts, however, have little bearing on the sentiment inside the Republican Party, which has been fed a steady diet of lies and half-truths by Fox News and the rest of the sprawling right-wing media machine. To wit, the false notion that Joe Biden nefariously stole the 2020 election is now widely shared inside the GOP. A CNN poll conducted over the summer found that nearly 70% of Republicans believe Biden’s win was not legitimate, a number that has continued to tick up.
99% of our voting population is going to vote team color no matter what. They don’t care that Biden hasn’t done anything meaningful to put a stop to this, and they’ll argue with me tooth and nail that electing him is a moral imperative anyway.
Fascism is inevitable now.
Seriously though, what other choice do I have with my vote? The reality is we live in a two party system, I have zero power to change it by voting random 3rd party candidates that will never get the support, and the other guy is even worse.
This is the logic that’s given us a 40-year slide into fascism and a near total loss of power.
I’m sorry, but if you’re unwilling to change, you can’t expect things to change. You can look at the last two decades and see the results of electing do-nothing Democrats.
In fact, read up on Idaho for the next step in crises that Democrats are simply going to ignore.
This is the logic that got us Bush.
Nader’s vote total was several times higher than Bush’s margin in both Florida and New Hampshire. Him off the ballot in either of those states would’ve made Gore v Bush unnecessary as Gore would’ve been a clear winner.
It also earned Clinton’s election with Perot being the Republican spoiler for Dole in 96, though I don’t remember which states.
Third parties will always be a spoiler until voting reform happens and plurality winner-takes-all ends.
Got it, my problem is I’m not applying enough hopes and dreams that the entire system changes because I voted for a write-in.
My plan is to keep voting in local candidates for local offices that are working to make the changes I’d love to see, but until then there’s absolutely nothing I can do at a national level but try to keep the openly evil guy from winning by voting for the most likely other option. If you have a better plan that has a chance of changing anything THIS election cycle, I’d love to hear it and be educated. Honestly, I would!
This is the only power you have now, and you should absolutely vote progressive locally if a candidate actually has a progressive record. (And many Dems don’t there either.)
At the national level, it’s too late. It doesn’t matter how you vote now. The simple fact is that Biden needs many people to vote for him that are finding it too expensive to live under his governance, and as we saw with Obama trying to hand of the reins to Hillary, that kind of record isn’t something the public is going to buy. When Obama ignored the middle class, they didn’t care that Trump was a racist piece of shit. They only cared that he was the candidate of change.
They’re not going to care that Trump or DeSantis are fascist. They’re going to care that they’re not Biden, and therefore (in the minds of these voters) more likely to make a change that makes their individual lives easier.
Right, so I suck it up and vote Biden so my vote can at least try to counter someone voting the actual proclaimed dictator in the meantime, correct? We’re back to square 1 until any of my preferred local candidates can get to the national level and hopefully push some real change. In the meantime I do the best I can and talk to people about what we could be doing better. Democracy yo. 🤷♂️
If you think that’s best, sure. Your vote is your business.
If democracy is your issue, though, I wouldn’t vote Democrat, though. They cast themselves as stewards of democracy but they fight harder to keep Greens off the ballot than they do to beat Republicans in elections.
They are overtly anti-democratic, and that tendency has moved fascism along, not helped to stifle it. Democracy doesn’t mean ‘freedom to vote Democrat’. It means freedom to vote the party you want, and as a Green party supporter, they actively work to suppress my voice.
Believe it or not, Greens are a bigger threat to Democrats losing than republicans are.
Democrats are a larger threat to Democrats losing than Greens or Republicans. ‘We are not Trump’ is not a platform
Yeah but one half went to college and formed their opinions in open debate and discussion, graded work, with accomplished authors and scholars, the professors, and their peers. Republicans did their own research or went to the school of “hard knocks.”
It’s supposed to be that in the land of the blind, the one eyed man his king. In the land of Republicans they would poke out the man’s eye and claim sight is deep state propaganda. “Don’t look up!”
And then they sat through 2-4 decades of Democrats actively voting against the interests of their constituents, ignored it, and vote for them anyway despite the evidence right in front of their eyes.
Democrats aren’t our friends. They stab us in the back while Republicans stab us in the front.
We vote for Democrats because the alternative is getting Republicans. The voting system doesn’t let third parties win. I wish it did. The lesser of two evils is still less evil inflicted on me at the end of the day.
If Democrats lost because people on the left refused to vote for them, they would be forced to change. Problem is everyone claims each election is an existential crisis (doubtful) so you’re never allowed to withhold a vote or vote third party.