American Election

[BeBMan]

Classic case of spouting bull**** because you can't admit you're wrong.

It's people like you that enabled the Trump victory.

You should be very proud of yourself 🏆

[MOBIUS]

Yep, basically you're a warmongering Trump enabler, and the fact that you think it's funny says it all 👍

[BeBMan]

Post here if you found out how to avoid the unavoidable

[Dinner]

Americans made the best choice of the available candidates and that is a fact.

[MOBIUS]

You cretins assumed that Putin would have attacked anyway if he'd have got what he wanted - because you're too thick to think or imagine anything otherwise.

Congratulations, genius, your toxic stupidity is working out well for Ukraine 👍

[MOBIUS]

Americans made the best choice of the available candidates and that is a fact.

Wow, Oerdin being dangerously close to being right! 😂

It is indeed a tough sell to avoid Trump when the only credible alternative is a major part of a warmongering genocide enabling administration...

[BeBMan]

You cretins assumed that Putin would have attacked anyway if he'd have got what he wanted - because you're too thick to think or imagine anything otherwise.

Congratulations, genius, your toxic stupidity is working out well for Ukraine 👍

We don't have to assume, as you posted it was unavoidable. Freudian slip?

[MOBIUS]

It's obviously a typo, numb nuts - that's all you've got, crowing repeatedly over a typo. Get over yourself 😂

[BeBMan]

It's obviously a typo, numb nuts - that's all you've got, crowing repeatedly over a typo. Get over yourself 😂

[The Mad Monk]

Pathetic is not trying to avoid an entirely avoidable war where the Ukraine will be forced to do the very thing Russia demanded anyway, but with a destroyed country.

Pathetic is having Trump as president due to Biden's warmongering.

Pathetic is supporting Biden's warmongering - and therefore by extension Israel's genocide.

It is therefore understandable by logical extension that you support genocide.

That is what's pathetic and why you are indeed pathetic and no it's not surprising at all. 👎

Peace In Our Time!

[Elok]

I seriously doubt either Ukraine or Israel was a major factor in the utter curbstomping the Democratic party just took. I don't recall reading any surveys listing it mentioned as a top concern among any likely voters. It was probably a factor, but in the same way weather outside polling areas was a factor.

Now, I do not expect the Democratic Party to engage in significant introspection about this*, any more than the people here have. It will only be more "it's the fault of the country for being excessively racist and sexist," as if it is the responsibility of voters to recognize the moral superiority of one party and pay obeisance, rather than the responsibility of the parties and candidates to come up with a compelling vision for the future and market it effectively.

*I did expect major introspection after Hillary lost, on the assumption that getting beaten by Donald Trump would lead to some kind of crisis of faith. I was wrong.

[Lorizael]

Or maybe there's just not a lot to be done when powerful people do bad things. McConnell said he was done with Trump after January 6, and he absolutely could have made sure, for the sake of the country, that Trump was removed and barred from office during the impeachment. But he didn't. He was cowardly and selfish and couldn't think past the next election. Same is true for almost all the Republican leadership. Yes, the Republicans who did stand up to Trump (Cheney, Romney, Kinzinger) paid a price, but that's a decision you have to make sometimes if you're actually a sincere, dedicated public servant. There are almost none left in the Republican party, especially at the national level, and they represent half the country. Maybe there's just nothing you can do when that's the case.

[Elok]

Well, you can avoid covering for a senile president like it's Weekend at Bernie's for, what, a couple of years past the point where the rumors started? You could also not dig yourself into a hole by having his VP, who did poorly in the primary and was selected largely to appease the base, spend those same years sequestered like an Ottoman prince in a harem, so that she is actually ready to assume responsibility when it all inevitably turns to ****. And if you skipped those first two steps, you could avoid running ads that say, "hey, women who are considering voting for Trump? We assume you are only doing so because your male significant other is an abusive POS and you are too intimidated to form your own opinion. Certainly we, the paid representatives of the Harris campaign, cannot imagine any other circumstance. But good news! You are, in fact, free to vote for our person, who is better for reasons we will not elaborate on in this campaign ad we paid for (as we believe those reasons are obvious). So do that."

There are others, but those are a few ways the Democratic party or the White House could have taken positive steps to possibly avert this outcome, regardless of the moral failings of any or all Republicans. Also, Republicans do not represent half the country; I think less than a third of Americans identify as Republican. I read that somewhere recently. There were actually slightly more Democrats, but "independent" was still the biggest bloc.

(I am sincerely puzzled by the implication that Trump's continued existence as a candidate is the insuperable obstacle here. He's a divisive jackass, and Biden beat him purely by virtue of being different and boring. He narrowly beat Hillary, who was literally the most hated woman in America, with the help of the Electoral College. He beat Kamala like a drum because ... er, she got like two months to campaign and she did kinda meh at most of it and Americans are really unhappy right now. JD Vance commanding the legions of Trump when he dies makes me somewhat nervous, because he's only slightly less amoral and possesses an attention span.)

[Jon Miller]

(I am sincerely puzzled by the implication that Trump's continued existence as a candidate is the insuperable obstacle here. He's a divisive jackass, and Biden beat him purely by virtue of being different and boring. He narrowly beat Hillary, who was literally the most hated woman in America, with the help of the Electoral College. He beat Kamala like a drum because ... er, she got like two months to campaign and she did kinda meh at most of it and Americans are really unhappy right now. JD Vance commanding the legions of Trump when he dies makes me somewhat nervous, because he's only slightly less amoral and possesses an attention span.)

I completely agree with this, although I think we still disagree about most of politics.

JM

[Lorizael]

If inflation is low and unemployment is low and real wages are up (and up the most for the lowest earners) and the stock market is up and crime is down and the pandemic is over and life expectancy is up but people just do not believe any of that and you lose 12 million votes (and lose the election by 5), I find it really hard to believe there's one weird trick Democrats could have employed to sway the electorate.

Trump being a bad candidate just doesn't matter enough when the US is as polarized as it currently is. Every election is going to be close. There's been one "blowout" in the last 25 years and it coincided with the Great Recession and a once-in-a-generation political talent... and the margin was 7%. Every other election in the 21st century has had a margin under 5%, with an average of just under 2% (3.4% with Obama included). By comparison, the average margin from the previous 7 presidential elections is 10.7%, with only one election with a margin under 5%--Carter vs Ford in '76.

The point is, any candidate that manages to become a major party nominee is going to have a decent chance of winning the election in the current political climate, but VPs and incumbents with a recent history of inflation just historically do very badly. There was something that would have ensured Trump did not get a second term, but apparently it's silly to blame selfish cowards for being selfish and cowardly.