Comment by alopha
16 hours ago
Trump was threatening Netflix for having a democrat on the board last week. They seized 10% of Intel. They forced Nvidia to tithe 25% of China revenue into a slush fund. The FCC has been used to censor comedy. The ship has sailed and the only consequence has been hand-wringing.
Yeah the passivity of the US population will be remembered for generations. Of course it's the people talking about freedom the most that do the least, as usual, big mouths are antithetical to actions.
The US educational system has been manufacturing these dual career specialists that are competent in their careers and believe that makes them specialists in all other area, but they get played like fools constantly. The level of discourse, of public conversation, is like 7th graders. Until you get to politics, then it's "sports talk" with "winning" being all that matters, even if winning means the destruction of law and of completely corrupt forever future.
And, I believe, a sufficiently comfortable population isn't motivated to act. With social media and streaming, people aren't bored enough/are too engagingly distracted to bother.
It’s not passivity - it’s active approval. 40% of people actively cheer everything he is doing
I was checking Trump approval ratings yesterday. I didn’t have high hopes but I thought it had to be under 35% at this point (I think in a sane country it has to be <10% or at least <20% after the nonstop madness dropping everyday). But nope, every poll places him at >40% approval or ever so slightly below 40%. To me that’s definitive confirmation that “it’s on Trump and his cronies, not the American people” is nonsense. It’s on at least 40% of American people. They weren’t blindsided by false promises, they want this.
Exactly. The Trump Show is primarily a media production. Bombing Iranians is a special effect that happens to get people killed. Dead Iranians won't be on camera. The media backers, Fox and now CBS and Paramount (the Weiss empire), will support this and make sure the American people like the war. Americans enjoy their propaganda, it tells them they're the white heroes.
https://edition.cnn.com/2026/02/23/politics/trump-approval-r...
A recent report shows the approval numbers, for all americans it's at 36%. For white americans, its at 45%
1 reply →
Utter idiocy at election day is not passivity.
History will put Trumpers and Confederate at the same level of despicability.
You mean have a holiday for him? 4-8 states have a Confederacy Memorial Day.
2 replies →
Okay, if you have big actions to show off, then show us how it’s done.
You step up and start shooting at the heartless monsters running the first (US armed forces) and second (ICE) most well-funded militaries in the world. Go ahead. We’ll be right there behind you.
(Yeah, I’m burning some hn karma for this, I imagine.)
Thank you for giving an example of what I’m talking about. You’re there fantasising about armed conflict when there are a million different actions one can take.
But nope, only words, words and more words.
13 replies →
It's just weird that whenever a shooting happens anywhere else in the world, or they pass some draconian surveillance law, Americans criticize that country for not having a Second Amendment and rising up in violence against their government.
And that whenever a mass shooting happens in the US, Americans reassure themselves that gun violence is a price worth paying for the Second Amendment. And there is a run on pawn shops and gun stores because mass shootings are the best form of advertising America's billion dollar gun lobby has.
And that Americans will wax poetic about watering the Tree of Liberty with the Blood of Tyrants and Patriots any time gun control comes up, because they believe their Second Amendment is an absolute vouchsafe against tyranny and because of that, they and they alone are the only truly free country.
And they were willing to rise up in Portland.
And they were willing to rise up during COVID.
And they were willing to rise up on Jan 6th.
And they're willing to shoot up schools and black churches and gay nightclubs and mosques so often it no longer makes the news.
But now, with blatant and undeniable tyranny in their face and shooting them dead in the streets... nothing.
Not that violence would necessarily be productive (although historically speaking no social or political progress happens without it)... but it's weird that the most violent society in human history, born of genocide and bathed in blood, with more guns than people and gun violence enshrined as its second most important and fundamental virtue, the land of "give me liberty or give me death" is all of a sudden the most timid.
Like goddamn throw a Molotov cocktail or something.
4 replies →
But the Dow is over 50,000!
That is, the money doesn't care so long as it's still profitable. When the recession comes a Democrat will be allowed back in to fix things.
See Liz Truss.
No one after Liz Truss fixed anything in Britain.
I think the fix was reversing the idiotic tax cuts that Liz Truss promised. It doesn't fix every single problem ever for England but nothing ever does.
I think the solution is also obvious for the United States — higher taxes and lower government spending. We need to do both. However, you can't get elected if you promise both those things.
Yes and it stands for the Department of War now.
15%?