cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/9405812
“We are going to do something that I will say is slightly controversial but it shouldn’t be. We are going to indemnify policemen and precincts and states and cities from being sued. We want them to do their job. Our police and law enforcement has to come back and they want to come back and they want to do their job. And we are going to indemnify them so they don’t lose their wife, their family, their pension, and their job. We are going to indemnify policemen and law enforcement. We are going to tell them to get out, we love you, do your job.” – Trump, speaking last night at the New York Young Republicans Club gala.
Trump going after the tyrant vote.
Motherfucker wants a police state, but one he and his buddies are totally not accountable in, fuck this geriatric wannabe dictator.
Of all the 60+ million people who intend to vote for him next year, this ridiculous rhwtoric will dissuade exactly none of them.
Meanwhile the left needs to be cajoled and won over and made to feel special just to get them to the fucking polling station.
BuT BiDeN nEeDs To EaRn My VoTe!
If we manage to avoid a fascist takeover, it will be in spite of the naive progressive idealogues who think they have the privilege to vote their conscience.
It’s the political reality that you need the votes of people to your left who you hate. Get to it.
I’m already voting for Biden. You’ll scream at me anyway because you don’t want to treat voters you need as though you need their votes.
people to your left who you hate
I don’t hate them. I said certain ones are naive (aggravatingly so, to clarify further). Too many people talk and act as if they can choose this time and keep that ability to choose next time.
If you have the sense to see what you stand to lose in this dumb FPTP system, then we are in the same boat. I understand the desire to have your elected leaders actually do something progressive, or doing something that makes you truly proud of them.
But as someone said, voting is a chess move, not a love letter.
I don’t hate them. I said certain ones are naive (aggravatingly so, to clarify further). Too many people talk and act as if they can choose this time and keep that ability to choose next time.
in the time that I’ve been voting… the US has only slid right. The democrats have done exceedingly little to halt that.
Rear guard delaying actions, to use the military parlance, do not win wars. Biden is moderate only in consideration that the GOP are so much further to the right as to actively embrace fascism. We cannot keep acting as we always have and expect something to magically fix itself. So now is the time to start changing how we vote and the people we send to be voted for.
it’s really that simple.
It’s not. We are four years too late. We need to prevent a fascist takeover, then try to make progress.
That is what they said last time, too. Complete with a promise of “one term”
Why should anyone believe you (and Biden) this time?
in the time that I’ve been voting… the US has only slid right. The democrats have done exceedingly little to halt that.
They can’t do anything as the minority, and as the majority they need 60 Senate votes to do anything more meaningful than budget reconciliation. Our country is designed to make change difficult, as the Senate filibuster proves. We would need 50 Senate votes to change that, and Democrats fell barely short in 2020. The most change they’ve been able to do is with Obamacare when they had a 60 seat majority for 2 months. Those 2 months are the only time in recent history Democrats have had a commanding majority, but even then they were still beholden to centrists like Lieberman to maintain the 60 count.
There’s a vicious cycle in American politics. Democrats will win the majority when Republicans massively fuck up. They’ll pass legislation that can’t be more progressive unless we have more senators. Voters will be unhappy the legislation isn’t better, staying home and leading Republicans to win. Republicans see their extremism as vindicated and are emboldened. We’ve seen this happen twice already. First with the Tea Party in 2010, second with Trumpism in 2016. When Republicans win, they drive us right.
Both parties are shaped more by their wins than their losses. Romney in '12 and Trump in '16 show this really well. If we want to push the party and the country to left, we have no choice but to continue voting.
They can’t do anything as the minority
And won’t do what they campaigned on as the majority.
Our country is designed to make change difficult, as the Senate filibuster proves. We would need 50 Senate votes to change that, and Democrats fell barely short in 2020.
Democrats will always fall barely short. They will always stand in their own way. There are always enough manchins.
They’ll pass legislation that can’t be more progressive unless we have more senators
So goes the excuse, yes. No matter how great the majority, centrists always find enough no votes.
This is such a bullshit take it kind of pisses me off. Let me explain.
First, the only reason democrats have as much trouble in federal elections is all the freaking time is because they do Jack shit to support local campaigns. Which, leads to republicans gerrymandering the fuck out of districts.
Also, leads to a dire lack of new and up-coming canidates to source from… leading to the same lackluster “always been around” canidates that are unappealing.
But democrats, as a voting block, are not actually minorities. But they struggle getting the vote out precisely because a) there’s little support for local campaigns and b) the federal canidates are… rather underwhelming.
There’s exceptions who’ve managed to get there in spite of the DNC/national leadership.
But they’d never get the presidential nomination because actual progressives scare the fuck out of their corpo overlords.
I don’t hate them.
Don’t lie to me. I know how you’ve responded to me in the past when I didn’t include that I was voting for Biden in my comment.
I understand the desire to have your elected leaders actually do something progressive, or doing something that makes you truly proud of them.
I very much doubt that.
But as someone said, voting is a chess move, not a love letter.
And the move expected of the progressives you hate is always “forfeit.”
And the move expected of the progressives you hate is always “forfeit.”
You said it. Not me. Lol
I know what centrists expect from progressives.
And you need the votes of people to your right who you hate. That’s the political reality of it. It’s a two way street, and both progressives and moderates see it as a one way.
I get to see that a lot because I have the same goals and desires of progressives (which is why I consider myself one), but I think we should achieve them with plans grounded in reality that are based on systems and practices we already know work. That aligns more with how the moderates do things. In short, I just want to reach the outcome in the best way possible, without any unpleasant surprises.
I expect something snarky in response to that, but I hope I’m wrong. Because as much as you may dislike me I’m the vote, directly to your right, that you need. Do you believe your words to apply fairly to everyone, or just the groups you dislike?
Edit: And just to be clear, I really see no reason for us to be adversarial. I want the same goals as you at the end of the day, and given you’re voting for Biden, I think our thoughts on the methods aren’t all that different either.
And you need the votes of people to your right who you hate.
The party has you covered. They have spent the past half a century moving to the right to appeal to the centrists and try, Chamberlain-like, to appease Republicans. If the party ever does something that its pampered right flank dislikes in the slightest, then I’ll start talking about how we need to keep their votes.
The last time that happened was when the voters overcame the party’s attempt to coronate Clinton and nominated Obama instead. The Clinton wing of the party formed a PAC to try to elect McCain and Palin. Obama, always eager to capitulate to his right, actually tried to get their votes back by selecting a moderate as his VP pick. Clinton selected the anti-choice Tim Kaine as her VP pick as a “fuck you, you’ll vote for me cause you gotta” to the left. Biden chose the war on drugs DA as his VP.
Because as much as you may dislike me I’m the vote, directly to your right, that you need. Do you believe your words to apply fairly to everyone, or just the groups you dislike?
The party does what you want already. You have a party that represents you. The left has a party that opposes them and orders them to vote for them anyway.
I already told you, I sit between progressives and moderates because I have the same goals as progressives and the same methods as moderates (or at least what would be considered a slower and measured process).
You’ve also avoided my question, I’m not talking about who the party appeals to here. There’s already plenty of discussion about what moderates do. I want to know what you think about how progressives should build coalitions. Believe it or not, I want to see progressives win. I’m asking how they should appeal to moderates and earn their votes for a general election once they win a primary – without completely capitulating to the center.
Progressives and Democrat moderates/establishment need each other to win elections, and as you’ve aptly pointed out, they don’t value that. There’s going to come a time in the next few decades where the dynamics flip though, and progressives have more power. How should we act differently then – if at all? It’s perfectly valid to say they can reap what they sow and also be taken for granted. I just think there’s a real opportunity in cooperation instead to have a strong electoral alliance.
If it isn’t clear, I have no desire to be adversarial with you, just genuine discussion. I don’t agree with everything you say necessarily, but there’s enough I agree with on some level that my being a dick is getting in the way of learning your perspective. And along those lines – sorry that I’ve been a dick to you, especially with how I ignored you saying you’ll vote for Biden just so I could make witty arguments and quips. That was disrespectful and also utterly counterproductive.
I already told you, I sit between progressives and moderates because I have the same goals as progressives and the same methods as moderates (or at least what would be considered a slower and measured process).
You know, that makes you a conservative right? Slowing progress and social change is the heart of conservatism. (In reality republican “conservatives” are in fact regressive- which is why they got rid of RvW, want to get rid of Obama care, and deregulate every regulation curtailing corporates.)
Just something for you to think about.
I already told you, I sit between progressives and moderates because I have the same goals as progressives and the same methods as moderates (or at least what would be considered a slower and measured process).
The latter is designed to make sure the former never happens.
There’s going to come a time in the next few decades where the dynamics flip though, and progressives have more power.
If Democrats do not alter course, they will alienate enough of the votes that they needed and Republicans will win before that happens. Maybe not this election, maybe not the next one. But our current messaging won’t succeed forever, and it won’t carry us to the future in which progressives have any power. And we know what Republicans’ plans are. There won’t be meaningful elections after that.
How should we act differently then – if at all?
There won’t be a then if the party maintains its current heading
It’s perfectly valid to say they can reap what they sow and also be taken for granted.
It certainly is. They should sow other crops.
I just think there’s a real opportunity in cooperation instead to have a strong electoral alliance.
That opportunity exists today, and I fear it will not exist in the future. Centrists refuse to seize it, and progressives are not in a position to. If you want magnanimity, lead by example. Like this:
And along those lines – sorry that I’ve been a dick to you, especially with how I ignored you saying you’ll vote for Biden just so I could make witty arguments and quips. That was disrespectful and also utterly counterproductive.
This shows a capacity for introspection and humility that centrists are often too proud or antagonistic to display. Apology accepted.
look, you can say what you want about progressives. Just know, I think you believe you have the privilege of dictating who I vote for… which is not democracy, and you can go fuck off with trump (who, believe it or not, shares that belief.)
You want people to vote for your candidate? you should maybe not piss them off first. Besides which, right now, it’s the primary and not even about Biden vs Trump. for the DNC, it’s a question of which candidate is the best.
Interestingly enough, the DNC is actively subverting the primary elections in every state they can. They don’t want primary elections because they know how incredibly unpopular Biden is, and yet they insist he is the only one who can beat Trump. I disagree emphatically - Biden is the only one who can lose to him, and we are hurtling towards that terrible outcome due to corrupt establishment politics.
Well, I wouldn’t say Biden is the only one who can loose… There’s others right up there with him in that. but those ones are all basically the same, so I don’t know that it makes all that much in difference.
I wouldn’t be surprised to find they’ve always meddled and outright cheated in primaries to keep progressives out.
Yeah I suspect there is a long and storied history of this happening. If there’s one thing all the corporate shills in DC can agree on, it’s that progressives represent a threat to their very way of life. Imagine, politicians who would fight for regular people, instead of corporate interests. O, the humanity…
Get better messaging, then. Screaming at them ain’t gonna work.
Scream at me for pointing it out. It beats trying to get votes.
(I’m voting for Biden. “Not Trump” has convinced me. It won’t convince all the voters you’ll need to win, and you’d rather lose than stop punching left.)
It seems like it convinced enough last time around.
In concert with campaign promises that haven’t borne fruit, mainly due to Democrats getting in their own way. Now we’re down to just “not Trump”. I think relying on that message alone is doomed to fail. If you don’t think we need better messaging or even additional messaging, fine.
But don’t blame people to whom you are hostile when they don’t enthusiastically vote like you want.
Imagine being upset that your candidate has to actually have good policy proposals that voters support in order to get votes.
I mean, I feel like most people are pretty upset about it. I’m pretty upset I have to vote for Biden in order to vote against Trump, but I’m still gonna do it.
mainly due to Democrats getting in their own way.
This is the “only Democrats have agency” thing, yes? To blame them for failing while ignoring all the Republicans who actively oppose progress.
I don’t expect Republicans to vote with Democrats. I don’t expect Democrats to vote with Republicans. Just enough Democrats do anyway.
It’s easy, the Right are fanatics doing fanatic things, the Left haven’t had something to be “fanatical” about since Obama, Biden has done a great job for the most part, obviously with some disappointment here and there, no presidency is perfect, but Old man Biden just doesn’t excite people, and it’s only Trump keeping him running, if Don the Con would go to prison and stop running we’d be able to hopefully elect somebody under 60, and most of those Republican candidates are just as scary as Trump, and bless Chris Christie and Liz Chaney for finally committing political suicide by fighting against the fascism in their party, especially after enabling it for so long.
And only when it was no longer going to benefit them.
Both sides actually are bad, just not in the way we assume.
And Biden is now training that police state with proposed cop cities all across the country.
There is precisely one “Cop City.” In Atlanta. And it is not a federal training facility, it’s being run by the Atlanta Police Foundation, so I’m not sure why you think Biden has anything to do with it.
I am very doubtful that the Atlanta Police Foundation even has a lot of Biden voters in its ranks.
Site Jan Biden expanded federal funding for police has helped find these ventures. Pigs don’t need to support Biden to take government money
Your evidence of cop cities being built all over the country is a proposal to build one? And it’s Biden’s fault because he gives police money but doesn’t in any way tell them how to spend it?
None of that makes any sense.
When the entire country is calling for defund the police, this motherfucker seriously expands federal funding to police, but what else would you expect from someone that authored the crime bill and has incarcerated millions of black men? Selected a cop for a vice president, and has always been authoritarian
When the entire country is calling for defund the police
The furthest left sliver of the Democratic party can sometimes agree on defunding police based on a definition of that that most other people don’t even know. Nothing you said bears any relation to reality.
And yet, black voters strongly supported him in the primary and election. Why do you think that is?
Like Democrats love to say about Republicans, voting against their own self interests
I love how the man continues to give reasons to not vote for him every time his mouth opens.
And yet millions of people still want to vote for him! It’s baffling!
That’s because they think it’ll only apply to “those other people” that they don’t like. For example, with police brutality, the white, straight, Christian right thinks the police will only beat “black thugs” so it’s perfectly fine in their book.
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Academia notwithstanding, common knowledge doesn’t generally need to be cited unless it includes statistics. Asking the guy to cite his source for that statement would be like me asking you to cite a source when you claim that water is wet. It’s just kind of obvious, you know?
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I did eventually get it, but you might have been better off saying “Jan 6” instead of MM/DD format.
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They want to vote for him because they agree with him.
It is not baffling in the least.
They think they’ll be the one with their boot in someone’s face.
Not the one being “put in their proper place”
He’s laying out his fascist plans in a bid to win fascist votes, and his odds are not terrible. His supporters will see how he failed last time and work to correct course next time. This whole police state thing and all his dehumanizing characterization of political opponents and his authoritarian leadership tendencies, align with mainstays of fascist rhetoric. This includes his narrative about domestic political subversion and his vow to suspend the Constitution, as well as his engagement with the QAnon wing of the MAGA movement.
https://news.yahoo.com/trump-hiding-fascist-plans-plain-110001819.html
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/donald-trump-fascist-vermin/
For us, it’s a warning, for them, it’s a selling point.
“When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” -Maya Angelou
Or, and hear me out, reasons to vote for him.
You are everything wrong with this country
How do you know? You don’t even know my personal views.
I struggle to understand why any common person would ever want less police accountability. Do you like being abused by people in positions of power? Is it some sort of sexual masochism?
So they are not afraid to do their job. The police need to have the freedom to do their job most efficiently and effectively.
You believe police need more leeway in their ability to brutalize people for them to police effectively?
That’s ridiculous, obviously.
You’re opinion is not an obvious fact. My opinion is not an obvious fact.
And no, I do not believe that. But many people do. And it’s all, just opinions. Just the opinions of of bunch of hapless great apes with too much consciousness.
There are few obvious, objective facts that can be discerned by human beings. And the few that can be, are not known by all. As a matter of fact human beings know very little about reality. Including the smartest of us.
Almost all of us are deeply ignorant and just cannot know much about reality. Yes, I include myself. But I don’t fool myself with thinking that how human apes run their affairs is anything other than preferences.
Guarantee Trump learned the word “indemnify” right before that speech.
Just wait until he learns about qualified immunity.
I had to Google it, not going to lie. It just convinced me even more that he doesn’t know the word or that his fan base would.
It’s a simple meaning, I should have come across it a lot by now if it were common language.
“we’re gonna get all of the cops nice new uniforms and badges, cool badges with skulls on them, and we’ll teach them all to march around the streets and round up all the undesirables!”
How about the capitol police who responded to the January 6th riot? Did he even think the whole statement through?
Did he even think the whole statement through?
Come on man, you know the answer to that.
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Imagine explaining to someone in 2016 that by mid 2021 the FBI wouldn’t be considered cops by the right.
“Back the blue! Except those blue.”
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Rather like the Watchmen television show.
The Watchmen tv show was set in Tulsa? TIL.
Opens on the Black Wall Street massacre too, the location is very poignant to the story and themes.
PLEASE TREAD ON ME
NoOo It’S tHe DeMoCrAtS tHaT aRe ThE fAsCiStS!
/wrist
This would be setting fire to the first amendment.
Besides freedom of speech, of and from religion, the 1st recognizes our right to get redress from the government for grievance.
The government CAN NOT do whatever they want to us. That rule has been there the whole fucking time.
If Trump gets another term there won’t be a constitution any more.
And you will be assassinated for even mentioning exactly that. No prison. No court.
Trump and his supporters are so gross.
Trump continued:
“And so we can distinguish our brave police who have taken up our indemnification, we’ve designed a new uniform for them. They will have brown shirts and ties. i like brown, you like brown, everybody loves brown. And we will want a really good name, the best name for our brave Brownshirts. I was thinking something like the Storm Division. What do you think, isn’t that the greatest? I think it’s the greatest.”
but some pepple dont like division because it divides people. i dont agree but some say this. maybe it can be a team or a squad, like squad cars or storm squad. they can have a cool storm logo with a lightening bolt and use S S for super sexy, because thats what they are.
Only if it uses the cool S
Red shirt and brown pants are the best combo. Hides the stains if they ever get into an actual conflict
That sounds too close to Schutzstaffel to me (SS)
thatsthejoke.png
EDIT: I’m not 100% sure that it’s not a real Trump quote and am second guessing myself
Nein, es sind völlig getrennte Wörter. Bist du George Orwell /s
There’s a lot to unpack in this statement, but the short of it is that he’s thinking like a terrorist- that the role of police is to instill fear and the thing keeping them from fulfilling it is that they fear being sued. He’s telling his supporters that he wants cops to do crimes with impunity
So pretty much keep the situation as-is? I mean it’s really not THAT far off right now.
Yes, dude. Things can indeed get very much worse.
I know, I know. Just saying US police is already fucked up bad right now
Let’s hope he loses and you don’t end up eating those words.
I think you were missing the point that US police is already horrible to begin with. Yeah it can be a shit tonne worse, I know, but that doesn’t mean it’s peachy right now
This is the problem with ACAB. Losing sight of what worse looks like
I’m not an acab guy, believe me. U was just trying to say that US police in general is already pretty horrible compared to any other western civilized country
Sorry, didn’t mean that to be the point of my thoughts, if it came out that way. I’d actually have to think about whether I feel that way. I also don’t know what western civilized means these days.
Buuut… the data shows this is a very American problem. Police murdering people is only pandemic here. Brutality, killing pets, racism… def universal… but executions… mmmmerica way ahead #1. Another accolade alongside school shootings…
Things are bad, but they could always be worse, so let’s accept the way things are…?
No I’m saying that by irresponsibly overusing superlatives like “all,” we remove the potency of the word. E.g., “today sucks and cops kill innocent people all the time, especially if you’re a person of color, disabled, mentally ill, or a dog. And the decent ones don’t upstand and report making them complicit for fear of self preservation, but not necessarily bastards. Good thing they’re not ALL murderers using their privilege to rampantly kill. Because that would be thousands times even worse”
It gets worse. This is not all. There is more.
The whole point of ACAB isn’t to label all police as bad people, nor to say this we’re in literally the worst situation we could be. It can always, always be worse. Americans, by and large, have an extremely limited worldview in which many have historically not seen the cracks in our foundations or been in a position where such cracks have directly affected them. The point is to highlight those cracks. Could there be more nuance? Surely. That nuance doesn’t fit well within a concise slogan of four letters, however. Unless NACBALOCAB - Not All Cops But a Lot of Cops Are Bastards - sounds good to you, haha
He wants them to blatantly mass arrest protesters, commit genocide, etc.
Alright, so, real talk, this is an appeal directly to the people in police work who are in it for the authority (spoiler: too many, unfortunately), as well as to the asset owning class that depends on the police to keep them from losing their investments or worse. The message being sent is: vote for me, work for me, and you’ll be free from accountability.
This nazi fuck needs to be thrown in prison.
You’re way too kind.
Are we the baddies?
👩🚀 🔫👨🚀
Stupid people really do think of the stupidest solutions to problems that don’t exist.
The hard thing is hearing it over and over and over again. How many times has this shit already been tried? What was the result? Oh, you don’t know? Does that not strike you as phenomenally negligent of a policy maker, to not be aware of the likely results of your fucking actions? Go die, you orange piece of shit. Or win, and take this fucking irreparable democracy with you.
Bold of you to assume he doesn’t know damn well how totalitarian this is.
Honestly, I’m 50/50. He is a controlling rich asshole and knows things like police don’t actually affect him, but he’s also a bumbling moron. It’s kind of hard to tell with him sometimes.
He’s not smart in the book sense but he does know how to play the game. For example, if you listened to the audio of his call to Zelensky which lead to his first impeachment investigation, pay attention and you might notice he avoided being explicit with his quid pro quo and spent the whole conversation beating around the bush and using weasel words to try and get what he could out of him without implicating himself. Even if the Senate trial wasn’t openly a farce, he still would’ve been found innocent because for something like this you have to be able to prove intent and that’s extremely difficult unless you blunder your way into an explicit admission of intent to commit a quid pro quo somewhere along the line, which he didn’t do in the audio of the phone call. I’m not saying it’s wrong to be suspicious because that call was obviously shady as hell, but it was never going to meet the burden of proof.
His propaganda and overall rhetorical strategy are similarly manipulative. It’s very common to mistake his lies for being stupid and obvious and assuming that’s just the end of it when in fact it’s actually a very specific rhetorical strategy called firehosing. The idea behind firehosing is to flood the entire system with too many political narratives, misdirections, pivots, red herrings, strawmen, contradictions, and controversial statements to keep up with so that everything is up in the air and the less regard for truth and consistency you have, the more effectively you can pull it off because the goal is to overcome reason with aggression while simultaneously drowning out opposing narratives and/or fact checking with sheer volume and repetition. It’s kind of like gish galloping but on a much more broad and ambitious scale, or if you’re as much of a gaming nerd as I am it’s the ‘zerg rush’ of political rhetoric. This explains why his falsehoods are so effective despite being so obvious - ironic as it looks on the surface he would actually be far less effective if he vetted his own bullshit and tried to make sure everything he said were at least semi-close to being believable.
Tl;dr, he’s a moron at some things. Manipulating millions of people and accumulating power at their expense (and ours as well even if we see through it) is, unfortunately, not one of them.
