"The butt of global jokes": who might this be? (Talk Trump)

[Svartalf]

there's a difference between competing for ballots and a true adversarial mode of politics

[Scot Dutchy]

Politics is part of the decision making process at all levels. In families, employment, clubs and associations.
Adversarial politics is the politics of conflict. There has to be winners and losers. In consensus politics there are no losers only winners.

[Animavore]

After Democrats lost the 2016 presidential election, a certain conventional wisdom congealed within the pundit class: Donald Trump’s success was owed to the Democratic abandonment of the white working class and the party’s emphasis on identity politics. By failing to emphasize a strong economic message, the thinking went, the party had ceded the election to Trump.

That explanation ignored the uncomfortable fact that Trump’s economic vision was centered on a politics of white identity, charging that immigrants and unqualified minorities were obtaining advantages the average white American could not claim. That left his opponents with a choice: Contest that vision, or let him attack those groups uncontested. In the meantime, Trump’s administration has seen that economic message almost entirely subsumed by the focus of congressional Republicans on tax cuts for the wealthy and plans to shrink the social safety net. But even as the message has shifted, there hasn’t been a corresponding erosion in Trump’s support. The economics were never the point. The cruelty was the point.

Nevertheless, among those who claim to oppose identity politics, the term is applied exclusively to efforts by historically marginalized constituencies to claim rights others already possess. Trump’s campaign, with its emphasis on state violence against religious and ethnic minorities—Muslim bans, mass deportations, “nationwide stop-and-frisk”—does not count under this definition, but left-wing opposition to discriminatory state violence does. (A November panel at the right-wing Heritage Foundation on the threat posed by “identity politics,” with no apparent irony, will feature an all-white panel. )


But the entire closing argument of the Republican Party in the 2018 midterm elections is a naked appeal to identity politics—a politics based in appeals to the loathing of, or membership in, a particular group. The GOP’s plan to slash the welfare state in order to make room for more high-income tax cuts is unpopular among the public at large. In order to preserve their congressional majority, Republicans have taken to misleading voters by insisting that they oppose cuts or changes to popular social insurance programs, while stoking fears about Latino immigrants, Muslim terrorists, and black criminality. In truth, without that deception, identity politics is all the Trump-era Republican Party has.

Read more sad, pathetic truth here; https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archi ... pU_tvGDmzw

[Scot Dutchy]

Sorry but a lot of unnecessary words. The Russians won it for him. Only the movement of 80,000 votes was required.
American politics is fucked.

[Tero]

He’s fixing things! He’s just getting started!
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... epublicans
The second voter in the article.

[Animavore]

So even as their hands are soaked in blood and the bodie pile up they still support him.

These people have stopped being human.

[JimC]

There is no clear cut division between adversarial politics and consensus politics, only a continuum. Right now, the DSA is pretty well at the far end of the continuum (not right at the end, though - that is reserved for civil wars...). Oz politics is not so far that way, but still further than I prefer.

Clearly, Dutch politics must be on the exact optimum of the continuum...

[Sean Hayden]

I'm afraid it's unavoidable. I'm probably mistaken. But consider how far behind these people are and across the board too. From technology to ethics, to religion, they are now so far behind that they are justified in feeling lost to the world. If they can't be made to conform then some violence is unavoidable. It doesn't have to be nation wrecking stuff, any more than the civil rights movement was. But they'll be brought into the future kicking and screaming for sure.

Of course, all bets are off if they keep winning the right fights.

[Svartalf]

well, France has never been a consensus politics country, at best a coalition one, but since the 70s it has become increasingly adversarial in ways and methods... the last straw was in 95 when that ass chirac decided that the legislative elections would follow the presidential ones, thus nearly certainly providing the president with a rubber stamp parliament.

Macron is a perfect example of this, he said all the existing parties were shit and went on campaign I don't know with whose money, and beat them all because we were tired of the same corrupt and inefficient morons, and he even got a full majority in parliament... I hope this is only a 5yr mistake.

[Tero]

Vanity Rallies


@FrankDangelo23
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Replying to @realDonaldTrump
The Fake President with over 5000 documented lies! Holding vanity rallies at a massive costs to the taxpayers! Crazy ass speeches! disparaging & racist remarks! Blaming the press for covering his hateful stupidity! This fucking moron conman needs to go to Prison #JailTimeSoon

[Tero]

Two Corinthians walk into a bar. "Did you hear Trump made a speech about us?
https://youtu.be/8EIgHsGZAmk

[Scot Dutchy]

Clearly, Dutch politics must be on the exact optimum of the continuum...

I wish it was Jim but we do approach the optimum better than a lot of systems which is basically due to the country and people. Dyke building and poldering has left a big indelible stain of socialism on this nation. It forced reliance on others. It denied the formation of nobility and large land owners. It created merchants, philosophers and artists earlier than most countries. It pushed us to the forefront of travel and exploration. We had and have a very large middle class which demands its say in the creation and maintenance of laws.

[Brian Peacock]

Everyone knows that Scotland was the vanguard of the Renaissance.

[Seabass]

Trump’s Caravan Hysteria Led to This

Ordinarily, a politician cannot be held responsible for the actions of a deranged follower. But ordinarily, politicians don’t praise supporters who have mercilessly beaten a Latino man, as “very passionate.” Ordinarily, they don’t offer to pay supporters’ legal bills if they assault protesters on the other side. They don’t praise acts of violence against the media. They don’t defend neo-Nazi rioters as “fine people.” They don’t justify sending bombs to their critics by blaming the media for airing criticism. Ordinarily, there is no historic surge in anti-Semitism, much of it targeted at Jewish critics, coinciding with a politician’s rise. And ordinarily, presidents do not blatantly exploit their authority in an effort to terrify white Americans into voting for their party. For the past few decades, most American politicians, Republican and Democrat alike, have taken care not to urge their supporters to take matters into their own hands. Trump did everything he could to fan the flames, and nothing to restrain those who might take him at his word.
...
As for those who aided the president in his propaganda campaign, who enabled him to prey on racist fears to fabricate a national emergency, those who said to themselves, “This is the play”? Every single one of them bears some responsibility for what followed. Their condemnations of anti-Semitism are meaningless. Their thoughts and prayers are worthless. Their condolences are irrelevant. They can never undo what they have done, and what they have done will never be forgotten.

full article:
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archi ... ws/574213/

[Animavore]

Every Trump supporter owns a piece of this.