I think what the commenter says is more dire than that. Even after this administration, this is going to keep happening until a major event happens. It's not just about the ghouls in there now, it's about the ghouls that will follow.
A lot of people seem to think this is an anomaly, but they thought that about the first Trump term.
Fundamentally Trump is a symptom. When he goes, all the voters that voted for him will still be there, and they’ll still have all the reasons they voted for him.
That’s what really depresses me. What’s the point in fighting this stuff when half the voters think it’s ok? It’s one thing to take down an unpopular leader causing trouble, quite another to take down tens of millions of people.
For sure. It took about two seconds after USAID got wrecked for people to come out of the woodwork saying “oh yeah, USAID was notoriously corrupt, everybody knew that forever.” When I’m pretty sure they didn’t know the place existed the previous day.
Hearing your average Joe suddenly start talking about USAID using the same talking points and tone as a Twitter Marxist Leninist tankie was indeed wild
The most ironic part about the entire USAID debacle was the complete failure of the new right to understand why American soft power was engineered that way, and what it was doing.
It was like an even more hamfisted change management process than the neocons upsetting their apple carts, before they understood how things were balanced on them.
Not to say anything shouldn't be changed, but jesus... folks need to have a little humility and curiosity -- try to understand what the folks before them were attempting to do and how.
Much of the DOGE-driven chaos is just executing Project 2025 objectives. The justification of course is retroactive. The objectives are domestic and political.
"Government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem" has been a Republican cornerstone for decades. None of the DOGE stuff should be the least bit surprising, and to say that they fail to understand what these agencies do is to miss the point entirely. They don't care. Government agencies are axiomatically bad and shutting them down is axiomatically good, that's it.
IMHO, Fox News just plays to their anger for profit, but the underlying reasons they are angry are valid and not being dealt with. My theory is the underlying issue is capitalism failing society, but like the church, they aren’t allowed to question it.
It is more dire than that. The south was basically completely forgiven for starting the civil war and fighting for slavery. Then as soon as they were given a little bit of leeway they enacted Jim Crow laws, began erecting statues of the losers of the Civil War, and started the KKK to drive out black people they could no longer use as slaves.
Many of the people you see in films and photos furiously protesting the civil rights act, picketing with signs against MLK Jr, lynching people during that time, putting glass in the seats of children because the schools were forced to end segregation, etc are still alive. Trump was grown and had started college when the Civil Rights act passed.
Its time to start just forgiving them because they never seem to forget.
> When he goes, all the voters that voted for him will still be there, and they’ll still have all the reasons they voted for him.
IMO this is a problem with the Democratic party not connecting with voters. Voters voting for Trump don't feel represented by Democrats, and that is something Democrats should be solving for.
It's many things, and that is certainly one of them.
But a crazy percentage of voters thought the economy was literally in a recession. Not even that it was doing poorly, but that there was a recession. Some people just live in an alternate reality.
I agree partially. But there is a large part of the MAGA movement who hate anyone that is not a Christian White Straight male getting ahead. The Democrats will never get those people.
The Democratic Party is not blameless. They are seen as being soft on immigration now. Obama deported more people than Trump.
They forgot the lesson that allowed Bill Clinton to win - “It’s the Economy Stupid”.
And no matter how you feel about it. There is a large part of the United States, even among the LGB crowd who don’t want biological men in women’s sports.
DEI the way it is framed is toxic to millions and I as a Black guy rolled my eyes at much of the indoctrination and “ally” nonsense I had to endure during my stint at BigTech.
No matter how you feel about this either, it takes a remarkable amount of lack of self awareness by the DNC not to know how toxic this attitude is to a large swath of American voters.
> The rules specify that when we have a gender-nonbinary candidate or officer, the nonbinary individual is counted as neither male nor female, and the remaining six officers must be gender balanced
Out of curiosity: how come only LGB? I'm trans, and I'd be quick to complain about how bad the narratives are there. Especially in terms of people over-focusing on such a small issue when hardly any trans people are in competitive sports and there's issues 1000x more important to our daily lives and safety that need to be handled sooner than "competitive sports teams".
I'm not the only trans person like this, so it seems odd to exclude a whole group from even the possibility of agreement.
I honestly don’t personally know anyone on personal level who is trans who would talk about the issue. I do have close LGB friends who I talk to about these issues and they are opposed to it for the most part.
I have heard my gay friends say that the issue is causing support for issues that do affect them lose support because of narratives around trans issues.
If you even look what Trump is doing, he isn’t erasing LGB teens from government websites, just everything else related to it.
No, I’m not in favor of that anymore than I’m in favor of him removing everyone from government websites that is Black.
I’m all about RealPoliticks. Obama distanced himself from radical Blacks (repeat I a black) and Bill Clinton through Sister Soulja under the bus to appeal to moderates.
True, but I think this misses the deeper dynamic nature of such things. Trump is the symptom, but these voters were also reacting in their turn. It is highly unlikely that this exact sequence of triggers will immediately repeat themselves.
In theory, Congressional investigation w/ power of subpoena and an ability to hand out prison sentences. Also in theory, if they lose office, subsequent admin needs to be able to prosecute. Assuming we can vote again in the future
We literally have a Supreme Court decision saying that the President has immunity as long as he was acting as part of his official duties. So while any clear-minded person will see that, say, running a protection racket on law firms from the White House is blatantly illegal and a crime, all Trump has to do is argue that he did so in his official capacity as president and not as a private citizen, and he is instantly 100% immune from consequences.
That's the thing. Regardless of whether or not you think the Court was unconstitutionally packed (due to the Senate running out the clock on the Garland nomination under Obama), it doesn't matter, because SCOTUS rulings are precedent and therefore effectively law. So it's no longer true even in theory, unless Trump v. US is overturned.
High-aggression is a negotiating tactic with basic goals - to intimidate the other side into thinking you are implacable, and to make you seem unstoppable.
It's a tactic. Like everyone else, they have interests and goals and needs, and they can be deterred in the same way. The problem is, nobody really tries. The Democrats keep doing the same ineffective things - a demonstration of being cowed and intimidated.
For example, the Dems have almost no ability to communicate with the public. Whatever Trump and the GOP say are effectively true because there is no counter voice (beyond some third parties). The Dems don't do anything about it; they just keep communicating in the same way.
The Dems have no talking points. A few of them are organizing now around 'economic populism' - in other words, they are completely cowed and will avoid all the major threats to freedom, democracy, the rule of law, safety; the corruption, cruelty, and hate. They are going to their safe space - economic policy!
I can't imagine what kind of talking points one needs to offer past "uh, we aren't criminals and we're not incompetent".
If the response is "yeah, we're good with those things, what else have you got?" I don't know what to say. You want bread? Maybe some circuses?
The Democrats did have plenty of policies. Realistic ones. Not the most exciting. If the public wants to be excited, and aren't picky about it, then indeed they should have that. But I'm not going to be able to provide it.
> I can't imagine what kind of talking points one needs ...
> The Democrats did have plenty of policies. Realistic ones. Not the most exciting. If the public wants to be excited, and aren't picky about it, then indeed they should have that. But I'm not going to be able to provide it.
I think it's obvious that such an approach doesn't work; does that matter to you? You seem defiant to me (though interpreting tone from text is very uncertain); who are you defying? There's nobody to defy - you either get the results or not.
It's also obvious, IMHO, that the issue isn't policies but politics and ideals - freedom or oppression, humanitarianism or cruelty, power or democratic equality, democracy or authoritarianism, etc. How many bridges to build next year doesn't measure up, and if that's what a politician talks about, they are clearly hiding from a difficult reality.
The Democrats also tried to fool the American public like “Weekend with Bernie’s” and prop Biden up for way too long and couldn’t have a proper primary. Harris couldn’t distance herself from Biden.
No, the democrat's problem is they weren’t willing to just flat out lie. They told the public the truth, basic facts like no, the president doesn’t have the power to unilaterally lower your grocery prices. And whether due to desperation, or lack of education, or otherwise, the voting public chose the proven pathological liar who said he would be the one to lower the price of eggs. Right up until the week after the election when he had to explain why the prices weren’t going down.
There are countless interviews with voters quoting the laughable and provably impossible promises/lies Trump spouted during the last campaign as their reason for voting for him.
If what you’re advocating is that the democrats need to embrace denying reality and lying to the public if they want to win, I can’t disagree with you. But I also think historians won’t have a tough time pointing to the end of the American experiment.
> They told the public the truth, basic facts like
Just telling people the 'truth' isn't effective communication at all (in fact, it can be dangerous) - that should be obvious to anyone with some experience in life. To tell the 'truth' and then throw up your hands because it didn't work is just being at victim.
A major political party knows all that - it's shameful and corrupt that they don't care to be effective.
I know it takes more than telling the truth. It's that voters are seeking out obvious lies. That is where I throw up my hands.
I don't expect the voters to love boring truths. But if they actively want to be lied to, and revel in getting away with lies, then democracy is not the tool for me.
Yeah, Bill Clinton is a very effective speaker; wow. Or compare people like JFK or Bobby Kennedy - look up their speeches. Or Ronald Reagan, to be bipartisan. It's like the Dems have forgotten that leadership involves vision, charisma, inspiration, courage, ...
However, I was referring to the lack of a mechanism. Whatever the Dems say, almost nobody hears it. Name a major statement by a Democrat in the last week? In the last month?
Name a major Democrat. There is none. After 3 electoral cycles when party bureaucracy each time crowned the candidate instead of a candidate rising through the primaries the party has no leaders anymore - note the difference between a leader and a top bureaucrat, the Dems have no deficit of the latter.
Yeah, but that's just a tertiary strategy. Think of it this way: The Dems are so pathetic, their best option is to try to use the enemy's communication mechanism.
They simply need to solve their problem. That they have it is absurd and makes them look pathetic, cowed, and ineffectual victims - not something people vote for. What is more important to a political party than a means of public communication?
What makes a statement "major" is the amount of attention it is given. That is out of your control.
Democrats are making many statements. If they are not "major", it is perhaps because nobody cares about statements. They care about the exercise of power, and Democrats have none. Any statement they make is easily dismissed as bluster.
> What makes a statement "major" is the amount of attention it is given. That is out of your control.
The first sentence is true, the second absolutely false. Public, political communication is all about that second issue - look how effective the GOP is. They can make absolute nonsense into a norm; they can shut down any speech they don't want.
Even when it is directly connected - ie. the people will see much higher prices copy pasted everywhere due to the Trump’s import taxes while Trump will be giving to the billionaires the tax cut financed by the tariffs - and the people will still cheer up on Trump.
Because the policy is not the issue. Trump has never been consistent or carried through much on policy; he lies to everyone. It's the politics and ideology - extreme reactionary politics of destroying 'liberals' regardless of the cost.
Coming from a UK background something I've been long curious about is is there a constitutional reason for when the opposition presidential candidate is selected.
It seems like the current way of doing things leaves the opposition rudderless through most of a presidential term, followed by a bitter fight where their own side rip each other apart followed by only a few months to try and establish oneself as leader in waiting.
Could the democrats do their primaries now? It feels like that would
1. Distract from Trump so he doesn't get run of the news
2. Mean that all the "candidate X is a bad democrat" stories could be long forgotten by the next election.
3. Give a pedestal to the actual presidential candidate as the go to person for the media to get reactions from
4. If they turn out to be genuinely terrible there's a lot of time to find out and potentially replace them.
Primaries are actually a relatively recent innovation. Before that, the candidates just appeared from the party machines. All of the ugliness went on out of public view.
For the last several elections people complained that there wasn't much difference between Obama, Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Kamala Harris. And there isn't. They are a center leftish (by American standards) bunch.
The party has a small wing further to the left, but it just isn't enough to put forth a strong candidate. That is the biggest ugliness we get now: they don't feel represented and often, they don't vote.
> Coming from a UK background something I've been long curious about is is there a constitutional reason for when the opposition presidential candidate is selected.
That's a very interesting point. On the other hand, the GOP did have a leader through the Biden administration - Trump.
Even when they don't, such as under Obama, they do have effective means (Fox, social media, etc.) and content (effective, disciplined talking points) of communication. The Dems have neither.
the problem is that running any sort of campaign that effectively reaches the continental and population scale of the US is incredibly expensive. Bernie Sanders for example raised $228M during his primary campaign in 2016. it would be hard to see how to make that happen more frequently.
Constitutional? No, except that states run the primaries.
... but when the primaries are is encoded into state law, so it would be a challenge to change it for every state if one wanted to shift when "the primaries" as a whole concept are.
> The Dems have no talking points. A few of them are organizing now around 'economic populism' - in other words, they are completely cowed and will avoid all the major threats to freedom, democracy, the rule of law, safety; the corruption, cruelty, and hate. They are going to their safe space - economic policy!
Because sadly, thats what the people respond to. When given the choice between food on the table / roof over their head / cash in the bank account and abstract values like "republican government", "rule of law" and "protecting human rights" etc. they will choose the former. Especially as long as its OTHER people's rights, and OTHER parties getting surpressed, they don't care quite so much. We've seen this play out in Russia. Granted they did not have the long history of Republican government that the US has had.
The irony with Trump is they may get neither. At least some of them. Authoritarians have way of mollifying that minimum % that actually matters. Mostly people with guns and willingness to use them. In the US we're talking as low as 25% (so 75% of us are effectively screwed). And when you have billionaires controlling the information space, it would be very difficult to organize opposition.
I'm now looking out to 2028. Trump and his cronies may be plotting to crash the system and "declare an emergency" so elections get suspended. Or the alternative, he just runs again and dares anyone to stop him. The blue/purple states should at the very least, bar him from appearing on the ballot there's a question of whether there will have enough backbone and could not be sufficiently threatened/bullied into backing down, or if he tries to pull a 2020 again with an "alternate electors", at the very least cause confusion so the election can be thrown to the House where GOP almost assuredly would have control over the state delegations. Lastly, the various Federal agencies, possibly even the military would be sufficiently "Trumpified" such that they will threaten, maybe even resort to force.
> When given the choice between food on the table / roof over their head / cash in the bank account and abstract values like "republican government", "rule of law" and "protecting human rights" etc. they will choose the former.
That's the opposite of the truth. Republican regions have long voted against their economic interests in favor of their values. Look at all the white working class people in the South that have long voted Republican over values, even as the GOP took away or blocked their benefits, education, health care, minimum wage, labor rights, etc.
They vote for their economic interests, in the sense that they vote in the way that they believe furthers those interests. Whether that vote actually furthers those interests is another matter. Republicans have been very successful at convincing people that they’re the ones who are good for the economy and everyone who works hard will prosper under their policies.
I don't think thats the way most of them see it. Right-wing propaganda has effectively convinced them that unions, government regulations, worker and environmental protections, etc. are all bad and the free market will magically solve everything.
Decades of Red Scare propaganda convinced those people that benefits, healthcare and labour rights are commie desires… and how dare you want to bring communism into America
There are a lot of Trump supporters on HN. More data points that highlight how incompetent or corrupt this administration is might eventually sway them.
Midterm and special elections are real points where negative stimuli could occur. If polling gets bad enough, swing state Republican politicians might start sweating sooner.
So maybe for you this is just obvious confirmation of what you already know. But by reporting and following up on this story, maybe some people will learn and understand something they did not before.
Trump supporters are unswayable. The same rule about negative stimulus applies. Nothing you can say makes a difference, but if they start losing money eventually they might change behavior. Or they radicalize further.
The dems paid an insanely heavy cost to appease the 1% of the population that is chronically on twitter. They lost mountains of votes to trump over that.
There’s a core cult (not pejorative) that's unswayable, but that’s not who handed him political power. It was the politically disaffected people who he managed to reach and Dems failed to.
You speak oddly of people like they are monolithic and lacking perceptive nuance (more like animals than any people I know). In the US, of all places, there is tremendous heterogeneity. What are the key elements that you know of “they”?
I think it’s safe to say that there is severe overfitting and pattern matching behavior involved. When I come across someone who says something so broadly judgmental and unfounded, I become immediately intrigued as to how this person is either exploiting or exploited, one of which is assured. I hope you are doing okay.
Here's this "macho tough guy" that wears a diaper, lifts, and makeup...who's famous for bankrupting a casino (twice), and was known for decades as a cartoon character, a clown, a moron. They hear the "on day 1" promises that won't ever get resolved. They see what happened the last time this guy took the wheel.
And they want more of it? Unswayable indeed.
I thought America was immune from fascism because it generally took the form of an idiotic leader that had charisma. I thought my fellow countrymen and countrywomen were smarter than that. Of all the people to succumb to, it's this fucking guy? Seriously?
If people you respect are swayed, ask yourself (or better: them) what they see that you don't. I doubt it's a matter of intelligence, so much as perspective.
If no one you respect has been swayed, you should know: the other side is making the same baffled judgements about you.
If a political party ships innocent people off to concentration camps without due process and promises to take over allied nations by any means necessary — and someone supports that party despite, or even because of, those policies — then there is nothing left to see or to understand. You hate {DEI|taxation|government waste|woke culture} so much that you're willing to upend democracy and centuries-old alliances just to see it gone? OK. It's a matter of axiomatically incompatible worldviews at that point.
Moreover, cults of personality are shockingly common. Many people simply do not reason themselves into their political positions. Probe their beliefs beyond surface level and there's no consistency beyond "ingroup good, outgroup bad."
Or many of them are some combination of racists, care about gun rights over everything else, religious folks who think that protesting Isreal will result in the second coming of Christ, anti-choice, and something something woke.
When people sincerely believe that if the country gives gay people rights that it will cause the nation to burn in hell, there isn’t any convincing people.
The usual answer is some mix of, I like his policies, he tells it like it is, and the Democrats are worse.
Sounds good but makes little sense. He contradicts himself constantly. Anyone will find policies of his that they can agree with, because he covers the spectrum. You want strict gun control and universal government health care? He’s your guy. You’re a 2A absolutist and think health care should be totally unregulated? Trump is your man! Likewise with “tells it like it is.” I’m convinced that his popularity is mostly due to the fact that he just spews so much crap. If you manage to only hear the parts you like, you’ll think he’s great.
“The Democrats are worse” could be sensible, but it’s almost always based on a notion of Democrats that’s completely disconnected from reality.
Do you anticipate that someone is going to tell you, specifically, that they do not support rabid DEI, some of the highest tax rates in the world, widespread and severe drugs, poverty, and homelessness, endless war, vote dilution through importation of new voters, calling a random sample of political nemeses rapists and racists, and now, painting Swastikas on vehicles? Do you truly both believe that is disconnected from reality, and that someone would reveal this in a conversation with you?
I’ve heard most of that. And yeah, it’s pretty disconnected from reality.
Rabid DEI? Mythical.
Highest tax rates in the world? No we don’t. And did you notice that this guy just enacted a massive tax hike? Voting Trump for lower taxes is idiotic.
Drugs, poverty, war? Trump has no effective plan to fight any of these.
Importation of new voters? Why do Republicans assume immigrants are automatic Democratic votes? Hispanic culture is pretty socially conservative. Those millions of people coming in over the southern border should be an easy demographic for the Republican Party to recruit.
Rapists and racists? When you support a rapist and racist to run the country, expect that to be criticized. And aren’t Republicans supposed to be all about “free speech”? But oh no, somebody called me names, it’s awful.
My brother in christ......Donald Trump wears makeup. How many actual "tough guys" do you know that wear makeup?
Back in the days of my parents, a fat guy with lifts and orange makeup would have been called a (anti-gay slur) and would have been the butt of every joke.
He's bankrupted 2 casinos, failed to sell football steaks airlines and liquor to Americans, he shits himself and wears a diaper, and is so intellectually deficient that me, an autistic guy, could run circles around him in debate.
Yet somehow, he's seen as a "business genius". HA!
Okay. Let’s say you have a compelling and coherent argument. Where can I go to read more about each of the things you write of, and share community with like-minded people?
It’s baffling. I sort of get why some people like strongmen. Hitler and Mussolini fought and bled for their country. Stalin and Mao led armies to victory. They were bad people but I can’t deny that they were strong in some sense.
But Trump? A middling businessman and second-rate TV star nobody would have ever heard of if he hadn’t been born rich? He has zero credentials for this. What gives?
You fell for the aggression tactic - it's just a cheap negotiating / political tactic. Act hyperagressive and some will believe you are unstoppable, implacable, etc.
bingo. i have nothing to add, just chiming in to let you know theres others out there who are at the point of not reading about it any longer. if the people who are in a position to do something about it arent doing anything about it, then reading more about it is as useful as watching porn.
The far right and Trump's biggest support is people acting helpless and spreading their dogma of helplessness. It's surreal to see how effective their propaganda is - this is right out of psyops playbooks. It's truly unmaerican to throw up your hands - nobody is going to do it for you, and anything is possible. That's part of freedom.
> Just reading stuff on social media and tsk-tsking got us nowhere. We have to do more.
I think it's necessary (to a point, in a certain way) but certainly not sufficient. If you surrender social media to mis/disinformation - as the Democratic Party seems to have done - you're going to lose for sure.
But a persuasive, positive (e.g., not cynical), honest argument sets an example that those things are important and powerful - and they are - and that there is a valid point of view out there.
Does this sentiment extend more broadly than a single administration? Can we broadly expect many potentially problematic behaviors to continue until an effective negative stimulus is given?
It's interesting to me why this perspective is popular when applied a certain administration but not popular when applied to other things such as
This is what I find so funny about the oh so serious protests about the current administration that people make in these comments. When other administrations do the same thing, it's one excuse after another, or just silence. These people are just mindlessly posting based on political memes, they're simply not serious.
Which other administration filed executive orders banning specific law firms from federal buildings and their customers from winning federal contracts because the law firm once employed a lawyer who once investigated or sued that administration?
Biden went after Trump using the judicial system and I am certain you were not complaining about that. I doubt you were even aware of it. I guess you were waiting for another administration so you can start protesting again.
You mean they convinced a grand jury to charge him, and then convinced a jury of his peers to convict him of 34 felony counts, all while he had legal representation that most of us could only dream of?
Biden being the President and the DOJ charging Trump does not imply "Biden went after Trump."
There's actually no evidence Biden played any role in DOJ's decision to prosecute either for the stolen classified documents or for the election fraud. The brazen criminality was sufficient for an independent DOJ to take up the matter.
inb4 "DOJ didn't make that decision independently" which is another way of saying "I'm willing to believe things without evidence."
You can be patient and wait gently for the former Biden administration to admit what they did. I am sure you will wait a long time but who cares.
Meanwhile people who matter and people who vote can use their brains to deduce the truth that it was a politically motivated attack that made use of the judicial system.
For one reason or another, it seems that humans are able to use deductions to arrive at conclusions without having it be spoonfed to them. The people who need to be spoonfed can sit in their highchairs and be irrelevant I guess.
You're drawing a false dichotomy between believing things with no evidence (what you dishonestly call "deduction") and simply waiting for the accused to produce evidence.
I know this is mighty convenient framing to justify the conclusion you've already reached, but back here in reality there's actually no shortage of people with access to all sorts of records who are extremely motivated to find and publish such evidence. They haven't yet and they almost certainly never will.
P.S. To deduce that Biden ordered these investigations, you'd have to disprove alternative explanations including "the defendant himself and his own legal team publicly provided ample evidence of his criminality to justify investigation."
I'm not waiting. I'm actively looking for evidence. I've looked for it, I've asked for it, the problem is only that neither you nor anyone else have any.
So it's actually like I said: You're willing to believe things without evidence.
You can take pride in that if you want, but don't call it deduction.
The behavior will continue until an effective negative stimulus is given.
Then immediately stop reading. The details don't matter at this point.