news 2024 US Election Megathread 🇺🇸🏛️

[ClashAndBurn]

2 minutes ago, shelven said:

Thanks for clarifying (and sorry for my somewhat aggressive tone - I was just getting a bit worn down after I assumed I was being misconstrued again after explaining myself a few times tonight). You raise a valid point with the France example and I can see where the fear of a liberal/neocon alliance comes from. I'm just skeptical that your specific Trump example would apply, mainly because so much of center-left liberalism in the US right now is dominated by a visceral fear of and/or hatred towards Trump. I think most Harris supporters would support literally anybody over Trump (which is both a good and a bad thing ), regardless of where that alternative falls on the political spectrum. But yes, when looking at the longer term future of the Dem party, I understand (and share) your concern about where everything is going to sit once Trump is finally out the picture, whenever that may be.

The fear and hatred of Trump mostly stems from bitterness over Hillary's loss. If Hillary had lost the primary to Bernie instead, there's certainly a non-zero chance that they would have treated Trump winning as a lesser evil than Bernie prevailing and steering the future direction of the party away from their beloved neoliberalism. I find myself skeptical to believe that they would ever have actually fully gotten behind him, and I also feel they would have worked with Republicans to obstruct and undermine him from within Congress had he won in the General.

 

There's also the fact that Greens and Democrats have a genuine hatred of each other that goes beyond either's dislike of Republicans. So to me, the idea that you stated earlier (Greens winning > Trump winning > Harris winning) doesn't seem all that surprising. I've personally never voted for Stein and was never going to. So I just don't find it compelling to fixate on her behavior as a candidate when she's kind of irrelevant to begin with, and is only the candidate because nobody else ever emerged to run. People thought Cornel West was going to do it, but he bailed on them and chose to run an unaffiliated independent campaign instead, leaving the Green Party with no other choice than to run Stein again or not at all (which would spell doom for the party as a whole).

 

It's just kind of funny to me that the left hating liberals more than Republicans is seen as an unreasonable and delusional position to take but... the hatred is mutual, and liberals' cleaar distate for the left and willingness to fight the left harder than they fight against Republicans isn't seen even remotely the same way. 

[Mr. Mendes]

2 hours ago, Communion said:

I appreciate why you may feel emotional, but truthfully, statements like this show the actual basis of this conversation.

 

That none of this is about anyone actually feeling Jill "Defeat the Dem-Rep Uniparty" Stein is endorsing Trump, but emotional catharsis for Dem partisans for 8 years of having to navigate a political party that makes choices not around material reality but around contradicting whims of donors that make winning elections an uphill battle.

 

You're sitting here saying: "I'm being made to feel that I'm not allowed to have my view and that alternative view points aren't acceptable."

 

...in response, ironically, to Democrats literally using the legal powers of the state apparatus to censure and deny a 3rd party ballot access?

 

Your views are not being de-platformed. Your views are not being repressed via powers of the state. Your support for corporate Democrats is institutionally supported!

 

People who simply disagree with your support of Dems are themselves often faced with the full brutality of the police state the party in question supports:

 

You're making a great deal of assumptions about me. And I understand that I likely have about you as well, but let's clear the air on that. 

 

I am not a Dem partisan. You and I first got to be connected through our mutual criticism of the Democrats on many things from Biden's inability to make good on an agenda that should've been relatively easy to pass, to the way they have handled (or rather not handled) the situation in Gaza. I do not hold a loyalty to the party simply because they are the party. I am not registered with their party. I am not registered to any political party. 

 

This is the point that I'm trying to get at here, friend. 

 

You're assuming that anyone who is voting for a Democrat or making a critique of someone further left of themselves is therefore a Democratic partisan lapdog. I'll give you that some truly are. 

 

But some are trying their absolute damndest to vote according to the principle of harm reduction.

 

I don't believe in any shape, form, or fashion that the Democrats are going to save us all. I know better. But I am also aware that in the year 2024, we're going to have the nominee from one of only two parties entering the White House. There will be no third party winner. You know that, I know that. We can sit here all day and talk about whether that is right or wrong, and you know what, I'll bet you anything we'd agree. I don't think it's right that third parties get shafted off the ballot. I think they ought to be on the ballot if they have met the criteria necessary to do so. 

 

But I also believe, and I'm sure you can at least in part agree, that if they were on the ballot they still would not be taking home a win this election. Their gains would be a stepping stone, not their entry into the White House because they are, at least for now, still a smaller group that does not yet have the national awareness required to win an election. I look forward to the election where we have more than two choices and that third or fourth choice actually has a really decent shot of getting it. I do, wholeheartedly, and I support any and all movement to try and make that future happen where I can. 

 

But given the state we're in at the moment, people are faced with an incredibly uncertain future at the moment. We have a major political party that is actively and loudly campaigning on a promise to roll back basic human freedoms that have been fought for for decades and only just recently earned. When you've got an election that is guaranteed to be between only two parties and one of those parties actively wants to do these things, it stands to reason that most people are going to decide to vote for the party who does not want to do those things, and in fact say out loud that they support those individuals and their right to life and freedom. 

 

Most of us are not under any delusions that voting for them will be a fix all. But there are leftists (I am not saying you as I believe you are much smarter than that) that seem to believe that Donald Trump getting into office is going to play out just the same as if Kamala Harris gets into office. That is absolutely not the case. It just isn't, friend. 

 

I have asked you this question before, and it didn't get answered because a whole separate discussion got kicked up and it got lost in the shuffle but I'll ask it again: what do you really expect or want these vulnerable, disadvantaged people to do? Why must they be so berated and talked down to and lectured to for casting a vote for the party that is the only electable opposition to an agenda that, if enacted, will destroy their lives? Why are trans people, women, people of color, immigrants, and the unhealthy being shamed for deciding that presented with the two choices in front of them--Trump and Harris--that Harris is the choice that gives them the most opportunity to escape that fate? 

 

That's what I'm talking about. There is not a single ounce of consideration given to what these people are currently going through or the fear that they're forced to live in as their country takes a dramatic cultural shift backward. They are simply spoken to or spoken of like brain deed sheep, fools, or even sometimes as if they're just evil for making a choice that they believe is going to help them? 

 

I understand that you hate the game of US politics and the rules required to play it. I know that you don't want to play that game. I respect that wholeheartedly. I don't want to play it either. Most of us don't. But, unfortunately, at this moment in time, some of us have to. We have to at the very least try to take the path of least harm for these individuals who are more vulnerable now than they have been for quite literally my entire lifetime. 

 

Just because someone is standing up to say that no, it is not okay to sit there and claim that everyone voting for a Democrat has a "derangement" (as you put it earlier). Some people are just trying to do the best that they can with what they have, and to constantly be dogpiled on by the left because their best isn't what the left wants does nothing but put those people in an even worse position. 

 

You don't know what is going on in people's lives that makes them decide to do what they decide to do in regards to politics. You don't know what they're struggling through. You don't know what personal hells they're in. You don't know the fear that they live with every single day. You don't just don't know and you could never know based only upon a message on a forum or a vote casted at a ballot box. And yet, it seems very often you just decide completely who they are by those metrics. That if someone says "no, Kamala Harris is not as bad/dangerous and not the same as Donald Trump", then they're automatically some lapdog for corporate democrats. That isn't how it works. 

 

I don't say any of this with the intention of being disrespectful to you and i hope that it does not come across that way. And i hope you can understand where I am coming from by saying all of this. 

 

I would like to see leftists gain more ground. I really would. Their policies, their desires for the future, their beliefs, I agree with so much of it all. I think there's a growing place for leftist politics in the mainstream. We're not standing as far apart in our beliefs as it appears on the surface. It's just that there are people out there, myself included, who cannot currently take the risk of looking outside the two party system right now. Not when our lives are quite literally being debated as policy. I am very glad that you can, and that you are. But I will not be called what I get called so often in all corners of discussion on these matters because my personal situation doesn't allow me to right now. 

 

I don't hate leftists. I don't want to war with them. I don't want to see them crash and burn. I don't want that at all. But the tone in which we get spoken to by leftists at times leaves it very hard to feel as if that's not what they feel or want for us. 

 

It's a hostility that exists on both sides, absolutely. Liberals and Dems can be and are just as nasty to leftists as leftists are to them. But I am genuinely trying to extend an olive branch and have a real conversation about things, and it is very disheartening to have the response be a grand assumption of my character painted with a hostile judgement of what that character is perceived to be. 

 

I do hope that we can finally have that real, genuine, respectable discussion. I don't want to debate all the time. I want to talk about where we both stand so that if for nothing else we can understand one another better. Because, in the grand scheme of things, we both do want the same things. 

 

Edited September 9 by Mr. Mendes

[GhostBox]

This would be great 👏🏼👏🏼

 

[mylicious]

the Essays in here, can we stick to relevant news? 

[Communion]

@Mr. Mendes Sister, the Democratic Secretary of State for Nevada directly provided this form to the NV Green Party after the NV Dems originally sued and forced the Greens to have to re-validate all 29,000 signatures for ballot access a second time:

 

 

The NV Democratic Party then amended their affidavit and successfully got the Green Party kicked off the ballot because item "(6)" is incorrectly copied + pasted by the SOS's office from the language meant for referendums and not minor party ballot access despite the form being labeled as such by the SOS.

 

This sample form is still readily accessible via the Nevada Secretary of State's website:

https://www.nvsos.gov/sos/home/showpublisheddocument/10564/638266480307830000

 

Supporting Democrats is not a form of suppressed speech. There is no mass movement in action by leftists to disenfranchise people who want to vote Democratic. Not to say you believe such, but I am just making it clear what the context of the conversation is.

 

I've already said I'm not going to hold such over anyone's head and try to like personally attack anyone, whether in real life or online who votes for Harris.

 

But yet it feels like you're under the assumption I am, and even - correct me if I'm wrong - are claiming it is evidence of such that I similarly don't judge Green Party voters for hating Democrats, especially in light of things like the above, and not agreeing with the sentiment that they're a lesser evil but an equal evil to Republicans. 

 

I do not personally care how any individual votes. I am much more terribly disturbed and focused on interrogating Dems on examples of corruption like the above.

 

Ironically, Jill Stein winning 5% of the national vote would solve these issues and automatically reclassify the Green Party from a minor party to a major party and end these unethical lawsuits over ballot access that make leftists resent Democrats. One might even imagine Democrats would suddenly support rank choice voting if Green were solidified as a national party for ballot access. 

Edited September 9 by Communion

[Relampago.]

Something about "No Tax On Tips" being one of Trump's main campaign points is so funny to me. I see so many ads about it, and while I support helping service workers, it's also such a niche point to make a big point of a campaign.

 

Not to mention, I've seen so many opinions saying it's not even that helpful in the long run.  

[Harriser]

11 hours ago, shelven said:

If Harris ends up losing, there will be a lot of different thinkpieces about her campaign and what she could have done differently, but I think the actual reason will have simply been that the election was already decided over a year ago when most Americans' views on the economy and inflation became settled in. People decided that Biden/the Dems were to blame for those issues, that Trump was capable of fixing it and that his ability to fix it was more important than his threats to democracy and his increasingly unhinged behaviour.

 

To be clear, I'm not saying that is what's going to happen - I've maintained that I think voters care about January 6 and Trump's threats to democracy more than what Twitter circles would have you believe, as election denialism (along with abortion) was the main unifying thread that connected all the GOP candidates who tanked in midterm races where they should have been favoured. But in the event that Trump does manage to overcome all that and win anyways, I don't think Harris could have done much differently in hindsight to prevent it, since the takeaway will have been that voters cared more about returning to a pre-2020 economy than any other issue and they believe that Trump can do that.

Agreed. Covid lost Trump the 2020 election, but if he wins this year, it will have also be responsible. Voters have this nostalgic, rose coloured glasses view of the pre-COVID economy, which Trump is associated with, and that alone may get him over the line. It's turned what should have been a cakewalk for democrats into a nailbiter

[Armani?]

Has this grifter popped up in anyone's fyp page yet? She keeps trying to get in the Black Tik Tok algorithm 

 

[Armani?]

I thought this was a new poll

 

[Lil Mistee]

The essays… can one of yall go to college for me and get me my masters ty 

[karron0624]

19 minutes ago, Lil Mistee said:

The essays… can one of yall go to college for me and get me my masters ty 

I believe we have two lawyers, one nurse, one doctor, and one phd student who consistently visit this thread. And thats people who have disclosed their jobs. A lot of us also were in politics, so you would actually be well represented if we all did a master program for you 🤣🤣.

[Blade]

3 hours ago, Armani? said:

Has this grifter popped up in anyone's fyp page yet? She keeps trying to get in the Black Tik Tok algorithm 

 

the likes...

[CaptainMusic]

9 hours ago, Communion said:

This is just going to go in circles because I think some of you don't really give thought to the idea that you're operating at a base level of some level of hypocrisy by endorsing Dems at all during their giant shift towards to the right. It's hard to believe anyone vocally championing Kamala Harris is concerned with the normalizing of Republicans.

 

 

I agree with you on many things but In all the years I've been on ATRL I swear I've never seen you once admit that you or someone you support is in the wrong.  

 

It really shouldn't be that hard. 

-

Anyway, good that Kamala finally has a policy page, less ammo for the debate. 

[khalyan]

It's such a shame Jill Stein is an awful human being and has made a mockery out of not only her party but third party in general in the US. There should absolutely be space in the US for multiple parties beyond the two we have, and a lot of the Green Party's main policies would work beautifully for a leftist party in this country, however it will never come from the current Green Party until they switch leadership and take their role seriously. Even Libertarians have been more successful, getting a stray candidate here and there in state legislature. 

[Bloo]

1 hour ago, Lil Mistee said:

The essays… can one of yall go to college for me and get me my masters ty 

No more going to school for me babe. Three degrees is enough. Wishing you the best though.  

—

The discussions around Jill Stein seem so random, for me. I think there are very legitimate criticisms to be made of the Green Party and their seasonal involvement in elections. I do think it is fine to levy criticisms towards them for, effectively, running as spoilers rather than running continued campaigns outside of presidential cycles in hopes of building an actual leftist party. There should be more visible efforts made to get ranked choice voting throughout the country so the Green Party and other non-major parties have a fighting chance and voters feel free to consider other options without having to revert to understandable cynicism.

 

However, I don't quite get why AOC made such a big splash around this. The only explanation to me is that there is internal polling that the Dems are worried about with Kamala not shoring up enough of the left like they expected. But, this isn't an issue with Jill Stein. Sure, leftists might be wanting to vote for her in retaliation. But that's only because Kamala made the choice to not run on leftist policy and has chosen to stick to the failed Biden policy platform.

 

The most naked example I've seen of just how shallow and unthoughtful Kamala's policy pitch has been is here:

 

It's a shame. But it should concern anyone who wants Kamala to win (I would count myself in that boat, because I really hate Trump) that she's pivoting to the right on immigration, refusing to run on popular healthcare ideas besides protecting Obamacare, and doubling down on defending Israel's right to commit a genocide.

[FameFatale]

 

[Communion]

27 minutes ago, CaptainMusic said:

I agree with you on many things but In all the years I've been on ATRL I swear I've never seen you once admit that you or someone you support is in the wrong.  

I need you to understand that it becomes hard to convince someone they're in the wrong while at the same time supporting a politician guilty of this:

Myself and others have had no issue criticizing former idolized figures on the left like Sanders for being in the wrong on things like Israel. For feeling like as though what we thought to be true ended up wrong. 

 

I don't know how else to say it but it just reads like people who don't fundamentally have an ideology (this isn't inherently a bad thing) and thus are more buoyed by politicians as personalities than a commitment to ideology. 

 

If I am confronted by a reality where a stance is more left wing than the one I have, I move my position leftward and take on that stance. Leftists constantly are self-critical and self-evaluating their stances. 

 

You just don't seem to agree with that myself or other leftists' self-evaluations and criticisms come out as "oh wow, I was wrong to have trust in AOC" or "Bernie Sanders isn't who I thought he was" or "I regret thinking voting could make a difference, voting doesn't actually work". The concern reads as not about leftists being stagnant and stuck in their views but an annoyance at the direction in which leftists move. 

 

For example, I know now I was 100% wrong when voting for Hillary Clinton in 2016. I feel dumb having done it and regret casting a vote for her. It was the wrong thing to do and I don't believe in the same claims that liberalism can work in tandem with progressivism that I did in 2016. 

Edited September 9 by Communion

[Armani?]

36 minutes ago, Blade said:

the likes...

It's mostly Maga judging from the comments 

[dabunique]

 

[Sannie]

4 hours ago, Armani? said:

Has this grifter popped up in anyone's fyp page yet? She keeps trying to get in the Black Tik Tok algorithm 

 

I've only seen people dragging her for being wrong and pointing out that Kamala has never made her race or gender a central point of her campaign. The people who have... Republicans, so it's clear where this is coming from.

 

1 hour ago, Blade said:

the likes...

Check the comments. Mostly white people agreeing lol.

 

38 minutes ago, Bloo said:

 

 

The most naked example I've seen of just how shallow and unthoughtful Kamala's policy pitch has been is here:

 

It's a shame. But it should concern anyone who wants Kamala to win (I would count myself in that boat, because I really hate Trump) that she's pivoting to the right on immigration, refusing to run on popular healthcare ideas besides protecting Obamacare, and doubling down on defending Israel's right to commit a genocide.

As a developer myself, copy and pasting code is quite normal and a bedrock of development lol. Definitely an oversight, but in no way indicative of "laziness". Nobody is writing new code for a website like this; they're all created using pre-fabricated templates.

 

Edit: It's been fixed lol.

Edited September 9 by Sannie

[Bloo]

5 minutes ago, Sannie said:

As a developer myself, copy and pasting code is quite normal and a bedrock of development lol. Definitely an oversight, but in no way indicative of "laziness". Nobody is writing new code for a website like this; they're all created using pre-fabricated templates.

As a computer scientist, I'm well aware copying and pasting boilerplate code is normal. However, there should be enough oversight to scrub basic things like this. And, even then, the fact that they're just simply copying and pasting crucial engagement text on policy from the Bidne campaign is a pretty symbolic representation of how little they've thought of how to differentiate themselves from Biden to make Kamala feel like a fresh candidate rather than a regurgitation of an administration people already hated.

[Sannie]

8 minutes ago, dabunique said:

 

A 4-point swing towards Kamala.

 

In this essay, I will explain how this spells doom for the Harris campaign...

[Sannie]

2 minutes ago, Bloo said:

As a computer scientist, I'm well aware copying and pasting boilerplate code is normal. However, there should be enough oversight to scrub basic things like this. And, even then, the fact that they're just simply copying and pasting crucial engagement text on policy from the Bidne campaign is a pretty symbolic representation of how little they've thought of how to differentiate themselves from Biden to make Kamala feel like a fresh candidate rather than a regurgitation of an administration people already hated.

Like, no, I'm sorry, it was just the meta data they forgot to update.

 

"...representation of how little they've thought of how to differentiate themselves from Biden" is a reach. This has nothing to do with policy or where she stands, just some underpaid web dev forgetting to do a quick QA test with the website link before pressing "publish" on the website. That's it. 

[hausofdave]

EWTN News/Real Clear Opinion poll of Catholic voters:

 

🟦Harris - 50% (+7)

🟥Trump - 43%

⬜Undecided - 6%

 

1000 LV, MoE +/-3%, 8/28-8/30

 

Catholic voters in previous elections:

2020: Biden +5 🔵

2016: Trump +7🔴

2012: Obama +2🔵

2008: Obama +9🔵

2004: Bush +5🔴

[Bloo]

7 minutes ago, Sannie said:

Like, no, I'm sorry, it was just the meta data they forgot to update.

 

"...representation of how little they've thought of how to differentiate themselves from Biden" is a reach. This has nothing to do with policy or where she stands, just some underpaid web dev forgetting to do a quick QA test with the website link before pressing "publish" on the website. That's it. 

Do you not understand the word "symbolic"?

 

I never said this example is proof she's no different than Biden. I said it's a symbolic example of how little thought has been put into her policies. The actual problem is that she has run so little on policy, that she has chosen to run a more vibes-based campaign and isn't championing popular policy, etc. The lack of policy substance is something that is being noted by journalists. I'm not saying that one text ad is the sole example of this larger issue. It's just a naked, symbolic representation of a much larger problem.