CNN's Dana Bash barely suppressed a stunned laugh as she pressed Ramaswamy to explain his claim that the Trump-incited Jan. 6 riot was actually "an inside job."
Anyone who is mad about Biden should consider that Trump's people are ready and willing to nuke the entire Middle East on the chance that it will start the Rapture.
Like, it's not even a close call. And I'm still not seeing how biden's actual record isn't a factor. He's done a pretty solid job with the resources he's got. A good chunk of Congress is a terror cell at this point, the supreme Court is stacked with zealots appointed for life, and he's still managed to get a lot of good stuff done.
People keep saying this as though presidents in the past get SHIT LOADS done, when in reality most of them don't do shit and the Republican ones start wars, give money to the rich and crash the economy.
So you can't even compare him to previous presidents becuase previous Republican presidents have been DISASTERS.
So we can only really compare him to previous Democrat presidents and I'd say he's gotten more done than most of them.
I mean, that's kind of been the strategy this whole time and it's not doing very well. Conservatives are a lost cause, we should be soley focused on driving turnout of Democrat voters and people who don't vote. Those groups are all saying they want something/someone to vote FOR, not just someone to vote against. Donald Trump is clearly an existential threat to our entire democracy, but these people aren't worried about that. They're worried about paying their bills. They want someone to make their day to day lives better and Biden has done a lot of things that help every day Americans, theyve just never heard about it.
The pitch needs to be "here's what we've gotten done even with Republicans fighting against all of it along the way. Send me a solid Democratic majority in Congress and we'll get X, Y, Z done." Get Jeffries and Schumer to have legislation prepared and ready to go that the caucus will pass without a single GOP vote if necessary. Then, most importantly, follow through and pass that shit.
You aren't voting for anyone. No one is. This is a first past the post voting system. You don't vote FOR people, you vote AGAINST people. And by not voting, you're saying you won't vote against either party.
Out of curiosity: does your opposition to genocide extend to you joining protests, contacting your representatives, and encouraging others to do the same?
Or do your principles only extend as far as you not actually doing anything?
I have already contacted my congressman my senators, and wrote the White House. I encourage everyone I can use to fix the system. I do not encourage others to not vote because that is their choice to make.
Oh, I’ve never encourage anyone on here not to vote.
Only thing I am asking for is a candidate who is actually voting for and that does not support genocide.
I really do not think that is asking for too much.
I have already contacted my congressman my senators, and wrote the White House. I encourage everyone I can use to fix the system. I do not encourage others to not vote because that is their choice to make.
Oh, I’ve never encourage anyone on here not to vote.
Only thing I am asking for is a candidate who is actually voting for and that does not support genocide.
I really do not think that is asking for too much.
Let's establish the situation. There's only two outcomes of the election. Any other possibilities are so remote we can dismiss then.
Biden wins. The status quo continues.
Trump wins. More Palestinians and innocent children die.
There is a clear outcome here that is going to be worse and kill more people. You have three options on how to act:
A. Vote for Biden
B. Vote for Trump
C. Don't vote for either of them
If you pick A, 1 becomes more likely. If you pick B, 2 becomes more likely. If you pick C, 2 also becomes more likely because of the electoral college. If you pick A or B, you'll feel guilty. If you pick C, you'll (incorrectly) feel like you're innocent and not complicit.
You say you care about the people dying. That means you want the outcome with the least deaths, 1. If you want to outcome 1, you should pick A. Why are you refusing to?
No one here is delightfully voting for the genocide to continue. We want to stop it, but that isn't an option. Shouldn't we then act to minimize the death toll as much as we possibly could?
A child who survives in outcome 1 could die in outcome 2. If you don't strive for outcome 1, you have blood on your hands. Do you care more about having a falsely clear conscience, or do you want to save lives? It's very easy to say you want none of them to die. It's not as easy to take an action that you know will still result in people dying, but it kills fewer people.
If you are genuine in your convictions, and I choose to believe that you are, I am confident that you'll make the decision to try and save lives, at whatever personal cost to yourself.
Do you care more about supporting the killing of children than you actually do about the killing of children itself? You're putting your morals ahead of human lives.
I'm not pleased to pick a lesser option, but there is no realistic option that will stop all the death instantly. You don't have to like it, but you have to acknowledge reality. This is going to continue no matter how you vote. All you can do is influence how many people it'll affect, and hope that puts us on a road to outright stopping these things in the future. Do you think Israel would feel so emboldened if Trump wasn't a possible leader?
And this doesn't even take into consideration other issues. Ukraine needs to be able to defend itself from Russia. If they don't get military support, Russia will kidnap and kill even more children. Republicans don't seem to care about that, but Democrats are pushing for that military support to happen. Here there is an option for your vote to stop the death of children. I wish it was Palestinian AND Ukrainian children, but the world is a shitty place, and all we can do is try to make it less shitty.
So I ask again. Do you care more about supporting the killing of children, at the expense of the actual killing of children?
Every other country in the world other than ours sees what they are doing.
Withdraw our support and then see if Israel is still willing to keep up their actions over the last few decades.
They wouldn’t have done any of this shit because they would’ve known that they would’ve got their asses handed to them by everyone around them.
You cannot in anyway get me to support those genocidal bastards.
They are using the US aegis to do all of this and it is time we withdraw that.
Let them deal with the consequences of their own actions for once.
Maybe it will give them the attitude adjustment they need, if they want to toss around nukes then they will become an international pariah.
It won’t matter soon anyway, you will get what you want, Israel will massacre tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands and after that people like you will say “ oh well, there’s nothing we can do about it now let’s just forgive them and try to move on” and then they’ll do the same fucking thing as Putin is doing over and over and over just like all of the other innocent safe killed over fucking decades and you guys still want to support them
It really depends on what a Trump reign will look like, right?
Will he be able to round up tens of millions of people and deport them, as he has promised? Will he institute another Muslim ban, as he has promised? Will he stay in office after his next four year term, as he has said he wants to? Will he use the office of the president to persecute political opponents, as he has promised? Will he "root out" all the "vermin" in the United States, as he had promised? And if yes: who will get declared to be "vermin?" How will they be "rooted out?" Will he make torture legal, as he promised? Will he bring back family separation and child detention camps? Will he threaten nuclear war again? And if yes, will some crazy regime take him up on the offer?
And if all of that or even just a fraction of that comes to pass, will you still sleep well, knowing that you might have been able to stop all of that but voting for the lesser of two evils was just beneath you?
Because ultimately, that's the decision you're making.
Yep! People like to try and pretend you can not be neutral but unless I am voting FOR trump then I am not canceling out someone else’s vote.
I won’t help you guys re-elect a genocide supporting president either way.
We keep talking about Israel is not doing enough to stop civilians and wringing our hand while on our knees sucking Netanyahu’s dick and just begging him not to cum on our face because we need to look presentable.
They openly killed journalists, on video, with physical and forensic evidence, right after the journalists switched from recording the Lebanese side to the Israeli side.
While clearly marked as being press.
Defend that, also I am still waiting for those beheaded babies that the IDF used to rile everyone up with.
You know, the one the president you want me to support said he saw and then had to walk back later.
I can support the countries that are not actively supporting genocide.
Btw bad example, as far as I can tell, only the us is actively supporting genocidal actions, but I will reject anyone who is doing so.
I would much rather them do nothing instead of supporting Israel.
Don’t get me twisted, when 10/7 happened I completely supported them and felt grief for them and their suffering, then they decided to kill a bunch of kids.
That's a pretty juvenile take. Not voting doesn't mean you disapprove of both candidates. It means they are both equal (equally good or equally bad) to you.
And if you think the two are equal because of one thing that they agree on (as bad as that thing is), you mean all the things they disagree on don't matter (like peaceful transfer of power, lgbtq rights, fascism). And even on that one thing, the two have very different approaches, and one is far more inclined to change position in the future. But apparently that wouldn't matter either, because they are both equal right now, because they both support Israel right now.
And in a first past the post voting system, like the one we have, your lack of voting mathematically increases the chances of Trump winning. That's a fact. You are voting for Trump, even if you say you're not. I'm sure you'll sleep fine at night, but all the harm he causes will be because you died on a hill that didn't even mean anything.
I think most people value aesthetics over pragmatism. If a car ran a red light most people would, in a philosophical sense, say, "Well they're in the wrong." and step out in front of the car. It's better to be right than to do good because one of those things makes us feel good, while the other is just work.
And you are okay with letting Ukraine get genocided as well just to shove it to Biden? Trump will only encourage Israel and Putin to keep going so you hate genocide but want to vote for more of it? That's fucked up.
If nothing you do matters, then the only thing that matters is what you do.
What I choose to do is to not support genocidal actions in as many ways as possible.
I can’t stop them from doing it, but I can choose not to support it myself.
Don’t worry though, they are increasing the bombings in south Gaza now as well so soon it will just be a bunch of dead people and after that it doesn’t really matter, because people will all forget in time.
If nothing you do matters, then the only thing that matters is what you do.
I do agree with this. However, voter apathy is literally doing nothing. If you are paying taxes, you are still contributing to and arguably passively supporting it.
Actions I would think might matter are things like protest, campaigning for a third party against the thing you are against, running yourself, or retreating from this government's rule.
It could be argued that just by living in the country and not actively opposing the issue, then you are supporting it. Saying "I don't support this thing so I didn't vote for anyone", then pay taxes to the government that does the thing and enjoy the rich society of the country that does the thing, you're more actively participating in the thing than opposing it.
Israel is bound by treaty to defend Israel as we are allies.
Biden is mostly trying to prevent a shooting war between Israel, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Which would 100% involve nukes and obliterate the global economy for decades. (Imagine all European - Asian oceanic trade just stopping).
That's why he's doing it. Hamas is a proxy agent for Iran they are using against Israel.
So I should support guaranteed genocidal actions now to maybe possibly prevent an event that might theoretically happen?
Also, when someone is committing genocidal acts, maybe it is time to break treaty with them.
Let Israel act however it wants without big daddy USA backing them and then let’s see their actions without the biggest military in the world backing them.
They only walk around wagging their ducks because they have backing.
Let them handle their own problems without us and then see how they act.
It is very easy to be a bully when you have a bigger friend to help.
That is unfortunately less of a social phenomenon and more of a logical result of our combination two-party/first past the post system. After years of having to strategically vote against the worst option instead of for the best, we are only left with a "lesser of two evils" decision.
I still write him at times to encourage some types of things or express disagreement with others. Trump's existence matters almost nothing in that calculus.
Same would apply to Biden. We can hold people accountable and disagree with decisions while still voting for them.
We need not become unquestioning sheep. And polls matter.
Of course. The comment was probably directed to the bots telling us we are genocidal if we don't vote third party (thereby allowing Trump to take over and oh by the way nuke Gaza or whatever)
Lemmy needs to stop confusing those two ideas. The strong reactionary misunderstandings that ensue are unhelpful and honestly... Kind of intellectually bankrupt.