Comment by kingleopold
3 days ago
No it's not simple to call "he" did this. WH people, half? of the country supporting him for 2nd time, and wealthy people that donated so much too, it's never "he". Nothing big like that is one persons responsibility. Actions have cons. ?
All elected and supported, especially AFTER how he and his supports lead the so many extra deaths in covid. I know your media does not bring facts but truth is out there.
Not half the country. Almost half of the people who voted.
IMO if you don't vote, you're tacitly agreeing with whoever gets voted into office.
(Although US voter suppression weakens this argument)
That's reasonable enough, but you have to consider it in the context that we don't vote for president, we vote for state electors to vote for president.
If you live in a 'safe' state, tacitly agreeing with your state's electors doesn't mean tacitly agreeing with the electoral college result.
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I disagree with your take. You have the right to not vote when you disagree with all parties running.
In fact, from a moral point of view voting for the lesser evil is highly objectionable because you are voting for someone who you do not even support just so that another person you support even less does not get elected.
Its perfectly fine to say, I don't agree with either and I am going to sit this one out otherwise you end up in weird political dynamics that you can see playing out in real time in France for example.
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Totally valid correction, thanks !
This! I get frustrated when i hear folks in the US claim Trump has failed them. You failed yourselves. The system is falling apart and barely half of people turn up to participate in elections? What are the rest of us expected to take away from this? Apathy is what I take away from it, and that does not earn my trust.
The legend about the sole man in charge has been carefully crafted and cultivated for ages, but it's never the puppet and always puppet masters in this clown show.
Sadly, the way people vote is more complicated than you might believe. Trump is the symptom of malfunctioning system that doesn't give people good options in the ballot box.
I'll say something controversial: Clinton and Harris were both better options than the guy who started his campaign mocking a reporter's disability. If voters had any sense it should've ended right there.
The rationalizing, the "corrupt DNC" arguments and everything else is a cop-out.
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Here's a real controversial opinion: If Clinton had won, the eventual backlash would be much greater and have elected a far more odious figure than Trump. America is lucky that Trump is kind of a bumbling oaf that channeled populist rage.
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That explains how he got almost half the votes on election night, but it does not explain the 1/3 that still to this day support him 100%. There is a pretty substantial underlying problem in play and Trump is the symptom, but the problem is deeper than a malfunctioning political system.
That explains how he got the votes on election night in 2016. A vote for Grump in 2016 was completely understandable. But he should have plainly been a one term president, after his abjectly terrible handling of Covid (for starters, we needed leadership rather than dividership). But unfortunately in our upside-down world, Covid actually handed Grump a big excuse for why his first term was such an exercise in failure. And if there is one thing Grump is good at, it's weaseling responsibility onto others - a quality that his followers greatly admire as it soothes their own consciences as well.
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As an outsider is see i culture that is based on winning. Not on cooperation. That extends to politics. Were i live we are used to many parties and they must work together to form a working political system. This working together is pervasive throughout the society. This also means that individual idiots are kept in check.
It is almost unheard of in the US for an elected politician to poll lower than 30%, it seems to be a floor. This is for both parties, and all sorts of terrible behavior.
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yes! we need ranked choice voting everywhere!
Are you saying there was a worse option than Trump?
Really?
Because unless the alternative option was a diminutive Austrian with a dodgy 'tache, I find that rather hard to believe.
The reality is America voted for Trump (TWICE!) because they wanted him. The rest of the world knows this, and is now acting accordingly.
EDIT: Downvotes coming from the brainwashed MAGA crowd!
I disagree not because "brainwashed MAGA crowd" but because people saying "it can't be worse" are almost always wrong. Unless you're starving in the ruins of your house in one of the world's war zones, in which case you're likely focussed on survival, not saying that.
Pick any of the leader's third-rate third-tier henchmen or failsons for example of a worse option. Don't dismiss it out of hand.
People in the UK voted for Brexit because "well it can't be worse, can it?" They were suckers.
I don't disagree with the "The reality is" line.
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I am not sure why you are being downvoted, because IMHO you are correct.
If Trump was an isolated incident, sure, but he is not. In Europe the far-right and far-left parties are rising in many countries and the traditional parties are crumbling.
I think there is a serious lack of trust in the institutions and in the politicians that is spreading around the world at a quick pace and many people are just fed up with the status-quo that has been in place since the fall of the USSR.
People want change, not small marginal tinkering on the edges, they want to see that things move decisively in one way or the other and they are not afraid to flip the table and see what happens.
Voters cannot be held accountable for all the specific things the person they elected do.
That much should be self-evident.
He’s doing exactly what he said he would do when he ran. People who voted for him can very much be held accountable.
Technically, he campaigned on not starting new wars... so he's doing the worst combination of what he said he would do, AND what he said he wouldn't do. Amazing!
When he ran, did he say that he'd make tariff rates bounce around like a kangaroo on speed? No, I don't think he did.
Did he say that he'd threaten to annex Canada and Greenland? Not that I recall.
Did he say that he'd start a war with Iran? No, I'm pretty sure he said "No new wars."
Look, he's a loose cannon. Everyone who voted for him should have known that. But no, he's not doing "exactly what he said he would do when he ran". Some of what he's doing is what he said, and some is completely contradictory to what he said.
(Credit where due: I stole the "kangaroo on speed" line from an unpublished short story. Don't remember the author, or I'd give them credit by name.)
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> People who voted for him can very much be held accountable.
Can you give an example of how, in practice, it would work to hold millions of voters accountable for what their elected representative does?
Worth picking not just Trump, but let's say a few other Presidents around the world, including someone you voted for.
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If you vote for a man that thinks he can "grab women by the pussy" because he's famous, and then you vote for him AGAIN, you should be held accountable for everything he does. It's patently obvious he's an absolutely awful person and completely untrustworthy.
That’s the definition of democracy. Of course voting is significant and has consequences.
> That’s the definition of democracy.
In a democracy, it is the elected officials, who are meant to represent the voter, that are held accountable. Not the voter.
> Of course voting is significant and has consequences.
Tautology but also not relevant. How do you propose the voter be held accountable?
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Anyone can be held accountable for things they are responsible for, the question is how they'll react to being held thusly.
> Anyone can be held accountable for things they are responsible for, the question is how they'll react to being held thusly.
Voters are responsible for selecting representatives, but they are not responsible for running things and making the kinds of decisions that elected officials need to and do make.
You might have a better point if the elected person hadn't made such a big show of following "mandates" from the voters. You can't have it both ways.
If they could have known or suspected those things, then yes, they bear the responsibility. And Trump's intentions were there for all to see.
> If they could have known or suspected those things, then yes, they bear the responsibility.
In a situation like this, I like to do a thought experiment where I replace "Trump" with "Republican voter" in a headline or a story to see whether that idea holds up.
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Voters can be held accountable; he demonstrated exactly what he was the first time in office and then people voted for him again.
What if they knew what they were voting for?