enbyecho

"The end justifies the means" is the standard excuse of dictators everywhere. And once you go down that road you don't really come back.

There is an excellent interview on this topic with Laurence Tribe that is really worth watching: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z06TJAMY-bo

I fully acknowledge just how much this sucks and how dangerous the situation is. I'm trans and live in a MAGA-infested area. That's only one dimension of the danger but it definitely opens one's eyes.

But throwing up our hands and grasping at bad options that make things worse is not the answer. We have far far more power than people realize. I don't entirely share Tribe's faith in our constitution and laws but to just say "oh it didn't work lets throw it away" is not going to make things better. It would literally be throwing away what power and ability to effect change we still have. It would destroy our country and you can bet it won't be remade as some progressive paradise.

It's not about Biden it's about setting a precedent that it's ok for any party to break the rules because they believe themselves to be "good" and "right" and "just".

I commend you for just how far you had to dig for that false equivalency. Well done!

If you want me to listen you should probably say something beyond vague platitudes and "your argument is terrible".

What astounds me is that you expect me to be completely consumed with what's important to you while you are completely dismissive of what's important to me. As if somehow the ONLY issue that mattered in this election was the Palestinian people. As if every horrible horrible thing that is going to happen under Trump to American people has to take back seat to YOUR cause. That's the definition of virtue signaling and it's incredibly offensive to me.

Feel free to have the last word but I won't engage with you further.

Your premise is based on this: "Almost everyone in north Gaza will be dead by new years. "

Which is clearly and obviously false. Check back with me on Jan 1.

"Do you think Trump will kill them a second time?"

The Trump administration will enable the complete erasure of the Palestinian people and their land. Huckabee has said as much already. Israelis have said as much too. I believe them.

Finally, do you think nothing else matters? Do you think the consequences of a Trump administration beyond Palestine don't matter? If so, I'd encourage you to spend less time virtue signaling and more time checking your privilege.

Am I? If you don't think we get more genocide with Trump you are willfully not paying attention.

But you're ok embracing Trump genocide?

"nobody that could change anything did a fucking thing"

Actually, things did happen. Many things happened. Your ignorance of them doesn't mean they didn't happen.

In this case we have an incoming chaos presidency. Government by chaos doesn't work well and tends to return to stasis not least because people tend to want to do their jobs. Musk will disappear onto his next ADHD and excessive wealth-fueled adventure, probably Vance will have Trump shuffled quietly to the side (or maybe out a window) and the infighting among cabinet members and political appointees will ensure that few of Trump's "promises" are kept.

There will be lots of damage, many people will suffer, and recovery will take a long time. But out of that things will change.

Didn't see this coming from about 136 miles away. Oh no...

What do you mean validate they don’t give a crap. The alt right isn’t going to become less relevant because we refuse to use their tactics against them. The choice is do things by the book, keep our precious moral high ground and most likely lose or get dirty and have a fighting chance.

Actually they do give a crap. It often doesn't look that way because many of the most visible and vocal MAGA cult "leaders" want to push their members to enable their authoritarianism. But that's the top-level power grab. If we do that ourselves we further enable it and allow those leaders to say "Look! See! They are doing it so we HAVE to do it!"

Talk to MAGA cult members and you will find that if you strip away all the hyperbolic rhetoric and bring it down to the nuts and bolts level they pretty much want the same things we want - fair wages, affordable cost of living, decent affordable healthcare, bodily autonomy, etc etc. A recent Wapo article highlighted this - that if you present Harris' policies to Trump supporters absent the party they came from, those policies are very popular.

Why would I respect someone who’s grand philosophy is scapegoating and crowning a king?

You don't have to respect their ideas or behavior, but if you do not respect them as people how can you expect them to respect you? When a child steals a toy from another child, do you beat them senseless or do you use educational tactics to ensure they understand and absorb the central lessons of sharing.

I also think it's important to recognize the limits of this "grand philosophy". The average MAGA cult member doesn't really have one. They want a gallon of milk to cost $2 and a be able to get a 30 pack of Miller Lite every week without going bankrupt. Because they are poorly educated and too damned tired to care they want a silver bullet (see what I did there) to solve their problems, which this week means crowing a king. They don't think beyond that, so why would you make the same mistake?

clawing out the political and cultural power back from their sweaty hands

And how do we accomplish that? It's not a single line of effort but a combination of tactics: 1. Work harder to win at the ballot box which partly means: 2. Hold our mainstream party leaders to account and push them toward policies that will win elections. I happen to be aligned with Sanders on this and believe that to be policies that are progressive in nature but not in name; 3. Educate and inform. You can't pull people away from MAGA thinking by shouting at them. f

I believe the best framework for approaching this is to acknowledge the MAGA "movement" as a cult. It's members are often less educated and have not developed critical thinking skills nor the mental resilience to resist the brainwashing. This is only sometimes a question of intelligence - I do believe that processed food and exposure to pollutants has lowered average intelligence in particularly unjust ways, but I don't think that's the central issue here. Mainly it's a question of education and the only way to successfully educate people is to meet them where they are and to open minds, not close them.

The issue is that people confuse opinion with truth and in general are too lazy or uneducated to proactively make the distinction clear.

What good things that Trump did promise?

Flying cars.

I'm not joking.