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Routine Political Dystopia 2021 Edition


April

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there's so many things you could point to that show republicans aren't taking this seriously. not extending unemployment benefits, opposition towards masks, Trump suggesting injecting disinfectant will kill the virus and supporting a malaria drug that hasn't been demonstrated to work, individual governors like the ones in Texas and Florida essentially not doing anything at all to minimize the spread of the virus which lead to massive outbreaks in those states, you can look at Trump saying the virus was under control countless times during February, March, and April. Trump said in April that he had the authority to cancel shelter-in-place orders by individual states because the president's "authority is total", he called on anti-mask protestors to "liberate" Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia, he's continued to hold several rallies with thousands of people, he's against mail-in ballots during the pandemic even though fraud with them is incredibly rare, he wanted to label churches as essential, it took months to even see Trump willing to put a mask on, no eviction protections for people, contrast the measly one-time stimulus check with the economic support other countries have given their citizens.... I could point to a million other things. PPE is a good thing but the republicans have fostered a culture opposed to even using PPE to control the spread of it. masks became a partisan issue months ago.
 

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"It’s going to disappear. One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear."

 

"The Democrats are politicizing the coronavirus… One of my people came up to me and said "Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia, that didn’t work out too well. They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax that was on a perfect conversation. They tried anything, they tried it over and over, they’ve been doing it since you got in… And this is their new hoax."

 

"And then I see the disinfectant, where it knocks it out in a minute. One minute. And is there a way we can do something like that, by injection inside or almost a cleaning. Because you see it gets in the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs."

 

 

I've seen so many republicans online say the virus is fake and made up by the DNC and the media to hurt Trump's election chances, which is just baffling to me on every level. the idea that every health organization and world government conspired together to massively hurt the world economy just to spite Trump, it's so bonkers to me lol. it just feels so unbelievable to me that like the republicans can essentially say or do anything, no matter how outrageous or delusional or downright evil and their legitimacy or reputability is never thrown into question. what do they have to do? is there no bottom of the barrel? I feel like I'm constantly being gaslit by conservatives lmao. say whatever you want about dems but at least they're living in essentially the same reality as me. I can disagree with someone on what the tax brackets should be or whatever but when it's like basic facts like whether or not a deadly virus exists and if it's a threat or not or if QAnon is saving the mole children that are trapped underground by a satanic cabal of pedophiles, I don't even know any more lol.

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hell, i just saw this today. but evidence doesn't mean anything. they're not operating in good faith from the get go.

i get that there's a lot of conflicting information but i have much less benefit of doubt for people who are young enough and have been online long enough to know how to be discriminating with information. but you can even find info of trump trying to undermine faith in virus countermeasures on fucking Fox News, like i linked in my other post. mentally I place the QAnon stuff and "God King Trump" level fanatics in the same bracket as flat earthers, but i really expect more sense from peers. especially anybody Online enough to still post on refuge message boards, a basically dead online medium, 13 years after the original shut down.

Edited by Pichi
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Probably a drop in the bucket in the grand scheme of things and in terms of proximity of immediate concerns, but Trump denying science just continues to be a problem.  We've been down this road before where he combats global warming with the fact that the weather will eventually get cooler due to season change but to flat out challenge an official asking him to look at the science with a response claiming "science doesn't know" is a new low; if a new low is even possible at this point.

 

Another presidential assault on science as fires and pandemic rage

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I’ve never understood the politicization of climate change. This is something that literally impacts everyone but right-leaning people just chalk it up to a left-wing conspiracy... it’s funny because if the climatologists are wrong (they’re not but bear with me), the average person loses comparatively little by making society less superficial. But we lose everything if we don’t. And in fact, it might already be too late... All this just to save a bit of money on consumables? Or is it more because of racism? What really do people gain by being apologists for this broken system? Especially in America where most people are one hospital visit away from bankruptcy?

 

I know corporate greed and quarter to quarter thinking contributed greatly to this problem, it’s why we outsourced everything to China and places where workers were easier to exploit and environmental regulations were lower. But that they’ve so enraptured the “average Joe” with their own greedy rhetoric is really quite alarming to me. Since the average Trump supporter arguably sees less of the tangible benefits of this system than the 1% (white-privilege aside, that doesn’t account for the whole thing)... I really can’t fathom the depths of why they want to keep things this way. I know there are many reasons, many excuses... but it’s just so frustrating. People just refuse to see the forest for the trees. And now the forest is on fire!

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Noami Oreskes' book Merchants of Doubt is a very useful reading for how climate change got politicized. Corporate America has created well-oiled machine of producing anti-science propaganda that was pioneered by the tobacco industry, and it's many of the same players (namely Bill Nierenberg, Fred Seitz, and Fred Singer--and of course they were all physicists :|), who manufactured doubt on all range of scientific issues on behalf of greedy corporations. As for why propaganda is so successful at holding the GOP base together, I don't know, I'm not the person to ask about that.

 

I grew up in California and I never remembered smoke-filled days being an annual occurrence when I was young; yet the last few years I was in California they were an annual occurrence. I'm not sure of the exact link between forest fires and California beyond some vague notion 'yes, climate change is making everything worse,' but the question crosses my mind often.

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Rewatched the Town Hall that Trump was involved with last night.  Very much a disaster but it's infuriating that his supporters are more concerned that he was "ambushed" with great questions that he couldn't effectively answer rather than being concerned with the fact that people asked him great questions that he couldn't effectively answer.  His response on the black experience and how MAGA relates to it was incredibly laughable.  Just the idea that he openly stated that blacks have a better experience under his administration than any others point in history is nuts to me.  But to dance around what was being asked by mentioning how great the economy was before COVID hit was a marvelous tailspin of BS that I never expected in response to what his administration is doing to address the state of living for people of color in America.

 

The woman that asked about a healthcare plan going forward and urging Trump to respond on what things will be like going forward if he's going to keep pushing to dismantle the ACA was another dumpster fire of a response.  They've had nothing effective up until this point and when called out on it basically just threw out there "we have it, it's done."  Okay... so then where is it?

 

The entire thing is a great testament to just how out of touch with the country's affairs the current administration is/has been (not new news, but still...).

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Honestly, this might be the first election where I distrust both options enough that I can't even make an argument of the devil you know vs. the devil you don't.  Normally I am a "If you don't vote, then you have no reason to complain because you had your shot to have a voice in the process" but this time...  I just don't think I can accept enough from either.

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9 hours ago, Zora said:

 

I grew up in California and I never remembered smoke-filled days being an annual occurrence when I was young; yet the last few years I was in California they were an annual occurrence. I'm not sure of the exact link between forest fires and California beyond some vague notion 'yes, climate change is making everything worse,' but the question crosses my mind often.

Thanks for the book recommendation. :) 

 

I know, even just laymen observations can demonstrate that it’s happening... Things are just so much more intense than they used to be. 
 

@Pichi That’s so sad. :( I didn’t even know Bush’s government was doing that. I know he also really pushed for a pandemic plan, which Obama’s team built on but modern GOP cut to smithereens...

 

@purple_beard I recently saw a meme that said something along the lines of “voting isn’t marriage, it’s a bus station. Don’t wait for the perfect one, get on the bus that’s going closest to your desired destination”. Might be important to keep that kind of thinking in mind.

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22 minutes ago, DranSeasona said:

 

 

@purple_beard I recently saw a meme that said something along the lines of “voting isn’t marriage, it’s a bus station. Don’t wait for the perfect one, get on the bus that’s going closest to your desired destination”. Might be important to keep that kind of thinking in mind.

 

 

Normally that is how I feel, but the games these parties and candidates are playing with the American public are disastrous in terms of belief that they are working for you.  I just can't remember a presidential election that I have had consciousness of that has been this bad.

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2 hours ago, purple_beard said:

Honestly, this might be the first election where I distrust both options enough that I can't even make an argument of the devil you know vs. the devil you don't.  Normally I am a "If you don't vote, then you have no reason to complain because you had your shot to have a voice in the process" but this time...  I just don't think I can accept enough from either.

That's how I've felt this time. That said, I'm voting for Biden to get Trump out of office. He's the bigger threat. Biden may be a status quo, corporate milquetoast option, but it's the one we're stuck with and then have to just push to get anything done if he gets elected.

Edited by Doc Brown
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4 hours ago, purple_beard said:

Normally that is how I feel, but the games these parties and candidates are playing with the American public are disastrous in terms of belief that they are working for you.  I just can't remember a presidential election that I have had consciousness of that has been this bad.

isn't that all of them? big difference right now is that, unlike previous elections, only one person is somewhat connected to reality and willing to make any kind of honest effort to tackle current pressing issues. i'm a shut-in with extremely low risk of catching corona and no connection to the west coast but i'd still prefer we not let deaths continue to run rampant before a vaccine and not ignore the conditions that has led to two countries with massive fires of terrifying scale.

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