Anonymous wrote:I didn't vote for Trump. I voted for Harris, I even took a few weekends to bike around exurban Pennsylvania to knock on doors for Harris. I had a brief surge of enthusiasm for Harris mainly because she wasn't Biden.

That said, this time around when Trump won, my reaction was... "meh, whatever, we'll get through it." Not the outrage like I had in 2016. A part of me felt like the Democrats kind of deserved to lose, the DNC has been so cringe and awful in recent years, and though I personally lean left, I felt like the Dems had overreached on a bunch of woke stuff that most Americans don't care about. That, and a bunch of people I know who are immigrants and people of color had soured on the Democrats and had become Trump-curious for a variety of reasons, and I didn't want to be one of those whiny white liberals who thought she knew better than anyone else. On top of it all, Trump 1 wasn't as horrific as I thought he would be, he was mostly embarrassing and clownish, but the economy hummed along. His foreign policy was dumb but didn't cause outright disasters just yet. All in all, 2017-2019 weren't terrible years for the average American. So I didn't join any marches or protests or sew any pink hats or rant on social media. I figured, well, he's pushing 80, he's kind of nuts and also just lazy, maybe he'll spend his whole term just golfing and tweeting and nothing will happen.

I had no idea how wrong I would be. How horrible things would get and so quickly. It's so much worse than anyone ever expected. I am truly afraid. Everyone is worried for their lives and livelihoods. Everything is bad, everything is a mess, it's so obviously an authoritarian oligarchy and it is no longer crying wolf. It's absolutely unbelievable. I thought American democratic institutions were strong enough to withstand a madman and his cult, but apparently not.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Democrats just aren't appealing to anyone.

That’s overstating things given Harris lost by 1.5% despite such a short and flawed campaign and almost definitely not being who Dems would’ve nominated if there had been a real primary. “There would be a Dem in the White House if Biden had bowed out before the primary” is a simpler explanation than “Dems don’t appeal to anyone despite nearly getting half the vote.”

She was running against Trump

Harris only had 105 days. How much did Trump spend in four years running? We don't know.

And 30% of Trump voters are unreachable. They are totally fine with an authoritarian regime. They think Hungary and Russia are great. And if the remaining 7% are learning about Harris by way of Fox News and crappy internet blogs, they weren’t actually learning about her at all.

Oops. That wasn’t clear: 30% of the 37% who voted for him are unreachable.

Pretty much most of my family in the Midwest. The thing is, I’ve lost them for good, really, they’re never coming back.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Trump is the only president who can cut deficit spending and finally reduce national debt.

We are paying almost one trillion dollars only in interest every single year and our country is not sustainable without meaningful cuts to spending and no politician is up to the job. Trump is willing to tak a bullet to accomplish such cuts even in the facw of swamp creatures striking back to continue the decades long grift.

I am not sure why you would make this claim. The debt rose by 8 trillion dollars in his first term, and the GOP budget is expected to add another 6-11 trillion to the debt. DOGE firings are not saving money but in fact are costing taxpayers $135 billion dollars. Our economy is about to fall off a cliff, the world is boycotting our goods and services and our consumer costs are going up and our shelves are about to be empty.

There is nothing good happening on the economy, gdp, employment etc front under Trump.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Democrats just aren't appealing to anyone.

That’s overstating things given Harris lost by 1.5% despite such a short and flawed campaign and almost definitely not being who Dems would’ve nominated if there had been a real primary. “There would be a Dem in the White House if Biden had bowed out before the primary” is a simpler explanation than “Dems don’t appeal to anyone despite nearly getting half the vote.”

This. MAGA likes to believe that he won by 25%, but he didn't.

I think a lot of Dems also don't want Trump or Republican lite. That would be a mistake. AOC is appealing to more than the Dem base. People wanted change.

People want economic change but they don’t want illegal immigrants pouring across the border or trans swimmers setting women’s swimming records. Dems need to tack left on economics - like AOC and Bernie - but tack right on social issues - like Seth Moulten or Tester - if they want to have a hope of winning a national election.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I didn't vote for Trump. I voted for Harris, I even took a few weekends to bike around exurban Pennsylvania to knock on doors for Harris. I had a brief surge of enthusiasm for Harris mainly because she wasn't Biden.

That said, this time around when Trump won, my reaction was... "meh, whatever, we'll get through it." Not the outrage like I had in 2016. A part of me felt like the Democrats kind of deserved to lose, the DNC has been so cringe and awful in recent years, and though I personally lean left, I felt like the Dems had overreached on a bunch of woke stuff that most Americans don't care about. That, and a bunch of people I know who are immigrants and people of color had soured on the Democrats and had become Trump-curious for a variety of reasons, and I didn't want to be one of those whiny white liberals who thought she knew better than anyone else. On top of it all, Trump 1 wasn't as horrific as I thought he would be, he was mostly embarrassing and clownish, but the economy hummed along. His foreign policy was dumb but didn't cause outright disasters just yet. All in all, 2017-2019 weren't terrible years for the average American. So I didn't join any marches or protests or sew any pink hats or rant on social media. I figured, well, he's pushing 80, he's kind of nuts and also just lazy, maybe he'll spend his whole term just golfing and tweeting and nothing will happen.

I had no idea how wrong I would be. How horrible things would get and so quickly. It's so much worse than anyone ever expected. I am truly afraid. Everyone is worried for their lives and livelihoods. Everything is bad, everything is a mess, it's so obviously an authoritarian oligarchy and it is no longer crying wolf. It's absolutely unbelievable. I thought American democratic institutions were strong enough to withstand a madman and his cult, but apparently not.

Stop watching fake news.

Trump is the best president we had this century. Try to watch some real news such as independently sourced news or even Japanese, French, South Korean, Australian news outlets in English etc. They do much better job of presenting neutral and more objective news covering US.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I didn't vote for Trump. I voted for Harris, I even took a few weekends to bike around exurban Pennsylvania to knock on doors for Harris. I had a brief surge of enthusiasm for Harris mainly because she wasn't Biden.

That said, this time around when Trump won, my reaction was... "meh, whatever, we'll get through it." Not the outrage like I had in 2016. A part of me felt like the Democrats kind of deserved to lose, the DNC has been so cringe and awful in recent years, and though I personally lean left, I felt like the Dems had overreached on a bunch of woke stuff that most Americans don't care about. That, and a bunch of people I know who are immigrants and people of color had soured on the Democrats and had become Trump-curious for a variety of reasons, and I didn't want to be one of those whiny white liberals who thought she knew better than anyone else. On top of it all, Trump 1 wasn't as horrific as I thought he would be, he was mostly embarrassing and clownish, but the economy hummed along. His foreign policy was dumb but didn't cause outright disasters just yet. All in all, 2017-2019 weren't terrible years for the average American. So I didn't join any marches or protests or sew any pink hats or rant on social media. I figured, well, he's pushing 80, he's kind of nuts and also just lazy, maybe he'll spend his whole term just golfing and tweeting and nothing will happen.

I had no idea how wrong I would be. How horrible things would get and so quickly. It's so much worse than anyone ever expected. I am truly afraid. Everyone is worried for their lives and livelihoods. Everything is bad, everything is a mess, it's so obviously an authoritarian oligarchy and it is no longer crying wolf. It's absolutely unbelievable. I thought American democratic institutions were strong enough to withstand a madman and his cult, but apparently not.

Stop watching fake news.

Trump is the best president we had this century. Try to watch some real news such as independently sourced news or even Japanese, French, South Korean, Australian news outlets in English etc. They do much better job of presenting neutral and more objective news covering US.

Anonymous wrote:Trump is the only president who can cut deficit spending and finally reduce national debt.

We are paying almost one trillion dollars only in interest every single year and our country is not sustainable without meaningful cuts to spending and no politician is up to the job. Trump is willing to tak a bullet to accomplish such cuts even in the facw of swamp creatures striking back to continue the decades long grift.

Anonymous wrote:Trump is the only president who can cut deficit spending and finally reduce national debt.

We are paying almost one trillion dollars only in interest every single year and our country is not sustainable without meaningful cuts to spending and no politician is up to the job. Trump is willing to tak a bullet to accomplish such cuts even in the facw of swamp creatures striking back to continue the decades long grift.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Democrats just aren't appealing to anyone.

That’s overstating things given Harris lost by 1.5% despite such a short and flawed campaign and almost definitely not being who Dems would’ve nominated if there had been a real primary. “There would be a Dem in the White House if Biden had bowed out before the primary” is a simpler explanation than “Dems don’t appeal to anyone despite nearly getting half the vote.”

She was running against Trump

Harris only had 105 days. How much did Trump spend in four years running? We don't know.

And 30% of Trump voters are unreachable. They are totally fine with an authoritarian regime. They think Hungary and Russia are great. And if the remaining 7% are learning about Harris by way of Fox News and crappy internet blogs, they weren’t actually learning about her at all.

Oops. That wasn’t clear: 30% of the 37% who voted for him are unreachable.

Anonymous wrote:I didn't vote for Trump. I voted for Harris, I even took a few weekends to bike around exurban Pennsylvania to knock on doors for Harris. I had a brief surge of enthusiasm for Harris mainly because she wasn't Biden.

That said, this time around when Trump won, my reaction was... "meh, whatever, we'll get through it." Not the outrage like I had in 2016. A part of me felt like the Democrats kind of deserved to lose, the DNC has been so cringe and awful in recent years, and though I personally lean left, I felt like the Dems had overreached on a bunch of woke stuff that most Americans don't care about. That, and a bunch of people I know who are immigrants and people of color had soured on the Democrats and had become Trump-curious for a variety of reasons, and I didn't want to be one of those whiny white liberals who thought she knew better than anyone else. On top of it all, Trump 1 wasn't as horrific as I thought he would be, he was mostly embarrassing and clownish, but the economy hummed along. His foreign policy was dumb but didn't cause outright disasters just yet. All in all, 2017-2019 weren't terrible years for the average American. So I didn't join any marches or protests or sew any pink hats or rant on social media. I figured, well, he's pushing 80, he's kind of nuts and also just lazy, maybe he'll spend his whole term just golfing and tweeting and nothing will happen.

I had no idea how wrong I would be. How horrible things would get and so quickly. It's so much worse than anyone ever expected. I am truly afraid. Everyone is worried for their lives and livelihoods. Everything is bad, everything is a mess, it's so obviously an authoritarian oligarchy and it is no longer crying wolf. It's absolutely unbelievable. I thought American democratic institutions were strong enough to withstand a madman and his cult, but apparently not.

Anonymous wrote:I didn't vote for Trump. I voted for Harris, I even took a few weekends to bike around exurban Pennsylvania to knock on doors for Harris. I had a brief surge of enthusiasm for Harris mainly because she wasn't Biden.

That said, this time around when Trump won, my reaction was... "meh, whatever, we'll get through it." Not the outrage like I had in 2016. A part of me felt like the Democrats kind of deserved to lose, the DNC has been so cringe and awful in recent years, and though I personally lean left, I felt like the Dems had overreached on a bunch of woke stuff that most Americans don't care about. That, and a bunch of people I know who are immigrants and people of color had soured on the Democrats and had become Trump-curious for a variety of reasons, and I didn't want to be one of those whiny white liberals who thought she knew better than anyone else. On top of it all, Trump 1 wasn't as horrific as I thought he would be, he was mostly embarrassing and clownish, but the economy hummed along. His foreign policy was dumb but didn't cause outright disasters just yet. All in all, 2017-2019 weren't terrible years for the average American. So I didn't join any marches or protests or sew any pink hats or rant on social media. I figured, well, he's pushing 80, he's kind of nuts and also just lazy, maybe he'll spend his whole term just golfing and tweeting and nothing will happen.

I had no idea how wrong I would be. How horrible things would get and so quickly. It's so much worse than anyone ever expected. I am truly afraid. Everyone is worried for their lives and livelihoods. Everything is bad, everything is a mess, it's so obviously an authoritarian oligarchy and it is no longer crying wolf. It's absolutely unbelievable. I thought American democratic institutions were strong enough to withstand a madman and his cult, but apparently not.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's the key difference: Trump 1.0 did not expect to win, did not really want to govern, and generally surrounded himself with and listened to career Republicans who said no to his craziest ideas. Trump 2.0 needed to win to stay out of jail, surrounded himself only with yes men, and has been discovered to be a useful tool by a bunch of horrible people who are now organized and know he will do what you tell him to as long as you suck up and insult the Democrats. So, I knew it was going to be much, much worse.

All that said, I am still amazed that Congress has seemingly no spine at all.

Yes, to me, this has been the greatest shock. Congress really isn't representing the US people and has completely abdicated its responsibility.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Democrats just aren't appealing to anyone.

That’s overstating things given Harris lost by 1.5% despite such a short and flawed campaign and almost definitely not being who Dems would’ve nominated if there had been a real primary. “There would be a Dem in the White House if Biden had bowed out before the primary” is a simpler explanation than “Dems don’t appeal to anyone despite nearly getting half the vote.”

She was running against Trump

Harris only had 105 days. How much did Trump spend in four years running? We don't know.

And 30% of Trump voters are unreachable. They are totally fine with an authoritarian regime. They think Hungary and Russia are great. And if the remaining 7% are learning about Harris by way of Fox News and crappy internet blogs, they weren’t actually learning about her at all.