US Politics January 2018: "You All Just Got A Lot Richer"

HOOS otm.
Also a lot of us are planning for big MLK Day marches and Women's marches coming up next week.

s-word-hole

i'll give him a swordhole

what's amazing about all this is that many people say that trump is the last racist person you've ever met

― Karl Malone, Thursday, January 11, 2018 3:36 PM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

God if only

for foreign observers who consider us complicit, I might point you to the list of US cities by population, where it should be clear that Trump's current residence is not even in the top 20; also, the gestalt position of my neighbors and I is, as we say, "crystal"

lmao at "swordhole"

xp thank you

christ he's dumb

Reason I canceled my trip to London is that I am not a big fan of the Obama Administration having sold perhaps the best located and finest embassy in London for “peanuts,” only to build a new one in an off location for 1.2 billion dollars. Bad deal. Wanted me to cut ribbon-NO!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2018

he's not going to london because they wanted him to cut the ribbon

You tell 'em Donald.

just in case you were wondering how his supporters rationalize today's events:

Which is worse: Obama publicly praising Iran and Cuba, or Trump privately criticizing Haiti and El Salvador?

— Ezra Levant 🇨🇦 (@ezralevant) January 11, 2018

OK, here is a summary:
- The president is claiming he's not going to visit a top ally because he's unhappy about a real estate decision by the Obama admin
- The decision was actually made by the Bush admin
- The decision was made for anti-terror reasons
- It is midnight

— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) January 12, 2018

yeah i was gonna say, everything about that excuse is nonsense. but also it's so brazenly, defiantly off-topic. he might as well say he's not going to london because he is not a big fan of mcdonald's shamrock shakes. yet he actually is really pleased with himself for coming up with such an awesome excuse.

Please don't drag us into this

we have shamrock shakes?

we "has" shamrock shakes.

we "can haz" shamrock shakes

"we"

thanks, now I want a shamrock shake.

I get up everyday at 6am to get my daughter to school. then I with until five, and get home to pick her up or start dinner. then it's dinner, homework, bedtime, so then i have about 2 hours to read or watch TV before I go to sleep

my wife is unemployed and her benefits ran out after six months so now I'm gonna be working for a transcription service or driving Lyft on the weekends while trying to spend time with my daughter

I guess that's why I'm not out on the street you condescending fucks

oh and we have a bunch of medical bills I don't how we're gonna pay if my wife doesn't get a job in the next 2 months I guess we sell the house or start the slide into bankruptcy

I don't think the US is complicit. It's a f'ing avalanche. No one is able to focus on any one thing because it's everything, everyday. He is driving the country absolutely mad. I no longer have a relationship with my entire family because of this administration.

it's also -23C outside

Also the US is too big. I am all for dividing this up (pipe dream).

I always wonder what all you are doing in your own countries to help people being victimized by racism and global capitalism? or maybe it's easier to enjoy our little reality show looking down on those that have to live in this every day while stroking yourselves off with pseudointellectual concern trolling

The US is fucking huge, and while we've hit the streets a few times (individually, in groups, and as a family), it's such a shit storm that hitting the streets every time something bad goes down - which is literally every day - is not possible. We donate, we have signs, we campaign, we canvass, we call, we organize. I have a couple of friends who have all but dedicated their lives to protest (at some mental cost, imo). But in the end it seems almost pointless, at least in a city/state with two Dem senators and (locally at least) a bunch of Dem reps. I've heard that described as one of the downsides of the liberal/rural divide: the cities are dense with people and Democrats, but because of that these huge voting blocks have no minds to change. Swing districts, GOP districts ... there is effective movement to be made. But here, not so much.

Anyway, in the end many of the administration's most ambitiously terrible ideas have been stopped or slowed, in part due to protest but also the way the legal system works. They won't all be wins, but it's been one year, and next year could determine literally everything, from policy to potential impeachment.

In the meantime, Trump's televised meeting competence offensive lasted, as predicted, less than 24 hours.

Also the US is too big. I am all for dividing this up (pipe dream).

― Yerac, Friday, January 12, 2018 7:53 AM (twenty-six minutes ago

oh good! We get our bimonthly let's-divide-blue-and-red-state argument!

i think all red states should be paired up with a "buddy" blue state, then strengthen those regions' abilities to raise their own taxes, and of course create a new "appellation" system where they could all compete on who makes the best barbecue

Appellation d'Appalachian

When considering the successes of mass civil resistance movements around the world in bringing down governments in the last 50 years, it's important to remember that, say, Serbia (where mass protest brought down Milosevic) is approximately the size of the state of Maine.

trump now profusely, sweatily denying the shithole comment btw

He's denying the word, not what he communicated by that word, and everybody understands that.

lol cuck

I never thought literally non-stop lying and denying could be such an effective deflection tool. Like, I understand lying deployed as an occasional strategy, but non stop ... that's a tough battle, especially when so many live in bizarro world.

I mean, I understand lying's historical effectiveness, but that is often in places where calling out the lies can be a punishable offense. Here, everyone seems to know he's lying, and he blatantly lies about such dumb stuff, again and again.

I still contend that Trump only 'succeeds' with these ploys because most people don't have direct experience dealing with a psychology like Trump's and are thusly learning on the fly. Some people will always be knocked for a loop and uncertain how to respond but I think a lot of people will slowly develop appropriate coping/deflection mechanisms through repeated exposure.

https://static.simpsonswiki.com/images/thumb/7/7d/I_Didn%27t_Do_It%21_Volume_III.png/250px-I_Didn%27t_Do_It%21_Volume_III.png

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=li9UWIdqEjg

I, my family, my friends, and my colleagues have been "in the streets" plenty. I was in antiwar protests in 1990-91 and 2003-04. Various GATT/WTO/NAFTA/World Bank stuff in 1995-97. I was involved in driving an enormous inflatable beaver around the Beltway for reasons that I don't even remember. I experienced both the Million Man and Million Mom Marches. The ultimately trivial Stewart/Colbert thingy. Counterprotesting antiabortion demos, counterprotesting Contract with America and Tea Party demos. I stayed home from the Women's March to enable others to go, but nearly everyone I know was there. I missed Occupy but know plenty of people who were there.

I've lived in the DC area for 35 years, and someone is almost always "in the streets." And it almost always does fuck-all. The problem is not that people aren't in the streets enough - the problem is that it rarely accomplishes significant, sustained change. Of course it's good for morale, for solidarity, for drawing battle lines, for making sure that certain positions are seen and known to be viable.

And like others upthread, there is a bit of nagl in the "why aren't you guys aren't out in the streets every weekend" stuff. First, yeah, jobs/kids/lives. Second, the idea that if only we'd protested MORE, then things would be better is unproven.

trump now profusely, sweatily denying the shithole comment btw

only denying that he said it about Haiti, apparently because he did specifically say it about African countries

truly, the day he became microscopically accountable

I think rushomancy has the right idea: it's important (even crucial) to acknowledge that there are many routes to positive change beyond direct protest action, and it's equally important to conserve your own personal energies for the long fight (see JiC's mention of activists who burn hard until they themselves out, which is not uncommon ime).

I don't think President Goldfish Brain is in a position to confirm or deny anything he said or did more than fifteen minutes ago. And even then I'd double check with a raft of fact-checkers and whichever recording devices might have captured a given exchange (fake video cameras!).

Lunch/rush/Josh: Agreed. I saw a lot of activist burnout during my time as a professional environmental advocate, and also a lot of vicarious traumatization (if you can't even go out to a movie because The Salamanders Are Dying, then you're not doing yourself or the salamanders any good service).

Obviously most of us are likely to keep going out there. Hey hey ho ho and all that. Giant puppets, yadda yadda.

But the real place everybody needs to get out to is the voting booth.

I mean I honestly think it can be as simple as, for example, figuring out how to leverage whatever it is you currently do for a living into something that better promotes positive change, or volunteering for something that utilizes your strengths, or even just making the concerted effort to be kinder and more open to other people. Trump et al are trying to effect a paradigmatic change on multiple fronts and we have to do likewise.

I never thought literally non-stop lying and denying could be such an effective deflection tool.

there's a sort of Prisoner's dilemma thing going on here. by never admitting fault and continuing to lie profusely about anything and everything he's actually sort of got a leg up on news organizations who will admit when they make a mistake. not to mention you get the advantage on 'moderate' Dems who only promise unexciting incremental improvement while you get to boast about building walls (that you won't have to pay for) and throwing out 2 million immigrants within your first hour on the job

plus, look at the difference between supporters - this was all telegraphed early on, when Berniebros yelled and screamed throughout the entire DNC while everyone at the RNC gleefully chanted "LOCK HER UP!" at every speech

xpost (Not to mention the fact that there are plenty of people who are never going to be swayed one way or another by public demonstration.)

(But yes also voting is an absolute necessity, if you do nothing at all beyond that.)

Wow, I'd thought the shithole comments had been made only with his cabinet or something, but it was a bipartisan meeting and he was responding to a Democrat. This guy is mentally unstable.

Sorry if you all knew this :)

meanwhile, the context for the denials is what is by his standards an epic-length tweetstorm on his rejection of the "so-called bipartisan" DACA proposals. i am positively shocked to discover that president dealmaker couldn't make it happen. must have been nefarious mustache-twirling sabotage by the democrats. "Dirty Dick Dastardly must go down! Many people are saying this, Muttley and many others. VOTERS WILL FIX!"