American Politics: Discuss and Debate (Page 57 of 59)

LOL. Indeed. Let them try. With dirtbag republicans electing a 34-time convicted felon, rapist, racist with over 90 criminal charges in addition to the 34 convicted felonies, and many failed businesses, I don't want to hear one. Single. Word. From them about Hunter Biden or President Biden at this point.

Besides, Hunter is not the President. So who cares?

The only reason republicans brought bogus partisan charges against Hunter is because they had absolutely nothing on President Biden. LOL.

With all the fake outrage they are pouring into Hunter Biden, they sure are the sorest winners on the face of this planet.

All republicans deserve mockery and ridicule for what they push on FOX (Faux) News and Newsmax as real news.

Sorry, but that's reality and the truth.

I will never respect a republican. Ever. Again.

Oh I know they fully intend to. Never questioned or joked about that part for a second.

I'm simply drawing attention to the fact and joking about the fact that their fuhrer is a 34-time convicted felonious racist rapist and yet they are screaming and crying foul on President Biden for pardoning Hunter Biden when their fuhrer committed far more fouls than President Biden ever has.

I think you may be misinterpreting. I am not mischaracterizing anything. My LOL, once again, is talking about the hypocrisy of it all and republicans in general and how the army is screaming about President Biden pardoning Hunter when Trump himself is appointing a criminal he pardoned as the ambassador to France, and that republicans themselves have nothing but hypocrisy in electing an official doing that.

Never once did I levy any comments to suggest that I was downplaying any threats.

Let's recap - I tried to contribute to this discussion by talking about Trump's unreasonable pardoning power by appointing an ambassador to France whom he pardoned. I even agreed with ireactions on this - saying "LOL. Indeed..." because of the republican backlash that is ridiculous and the fact that their hypocrisy is palpable. My LOL is also referring to how predictable this a-holes (Trump's) actions are in his second term. I was not turning anything ireactions said into a joke. I have to live through a second Trump term here. I can't and don't have the luxury to escape. And I'm not allowed to LOL? Even once?

My respect comment as well was not harassment, nor was it intentionally claiming that you were demanding that I respect republicans. I was saying that I would simply never respect republicans again - in general - in response, and I haven't respected them for a long time because of their actions. Why can I not state that without it being an attack?

But, I don't even know how to convince you at this point.

I was trying to talk to you tonight and have a discussion. But yet I'm immediately accused of attacks and harassment, and turning a discussion into a joke, when I didn't do such a thing, and given a final warning. Apparently, I'm not even allowed to speak of republicans in general, otherwise I'm accused of mischaracterizing and calling ireactions a republican. When this is not what happened at all. Isn't it possible for two things to be true in a discussion at one time without accusing someone else of an attack?

Need I mention that I have also stated in my posts previously that nobody *has* to agree with me - with any of the information I posted? Did anybody forget that part?

I really can't win here. No matter what I do.

Good luck everyone. I tried.

Just my two cents here, but I would like to find a solution that doesn't involve dwindling our already-small community by another person.  I truly respect ireactions' desire to keep this moderated and respectful and not allow toxic behavior.  I also understand QuinnSlidr's fear and anger.

I would prefer if both of you took a step back and tried to read each other's posts from a different angle so we don't lose anyone (voluntarily or involuntarily).

Back to the subject at hand:

Joe Biden betrayed his promise. He vowed a separation of private concerns and public good, promising that he would not pardon his son Hunter. He broke his word.

I don't blame him at all. I totally agree with all the moral and ethical criticisms of what he has done. But given the impending Trump presidency, I cannot blame Biden for taking every step possible to protect his family from the Trump-steered Department of Justice and FBI. It's morally and ethically wrong, as laid out in the parameters set by Biden himself -- but it shows how much Biden must fear the Trump presidency and how short on options, hope, and belief in America he is at this point.

Biden has decided that the shattering of his moral principles and his political legacy at this point is happening regardless of what he does or doesn't do, and has elected to save his son. I hope all fathers would do the same for their children, but it shows how truly dark the world has become.

My father once told me, "Son, if you robbed a bank, I wouldn't hire a lawyer for you, but I would visit you in jail." However, I'd like to think that if my dad thought I'd be targeted for more than just the crimes I committed, he'd come to my aid.

At the same time, I have a lot of room for the views of those who point out that Biden has turned his back on his own declared standards of right and wrong and betrayed the public trust with his actions.

QuinnSlidr will get an automatic email on Wednesday morning with his login details.

God help me.

Back to the topic at hand in this thread:

Regarding President Biden pardoning Hunter: I think President Biden sees the threat that the new incoming administration will be to his son and his family, and I think he made a calculated decision to pardon Hunter as a result. Was it going against what he said previously? Sure. But, and I think democrats should get a handle on this: President Biden does not deserve to be ridiculed for doing so. Former President Trump pardoned many, many people including Paul Manafort and others who don't deserve it.

In addition, Hunter Biden's case comes down to being a political prosecution. He made restitution for taxes that he owed. And the gun charge is usually only brought with much bigger cases. Hunter only had that gun for 10 days, and he never used it. He was going to kill himself with it. Not hurt others.

In addition, Hunter was not using drugs at the time so he wasn't lying and he stopped using shortly before he was just out of rehab, and he was still not using at the time.

If it's one thing republicans do, is accuse others of everything they are actually doing themselves. They have a habit of doing this.

A rumination on how Democrats have not evolved to face structural changes in states and electorate, which led to defeat in 2024 and will lead to even more if they don't make urgent changes.
https://www.thebulwark.com/p/democratic … nationally

I can wait and see if some of the dumber ideas get done. But, there have been plenty of signs over the news, hence why I am not very optimistic and why I need to continue to focus on more positive things.

Anyway, for example...

Republicans may not have a choice. Elon Musk has threatened every senator with being primaried if they vote against Trump's cabinet picks.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-team-w … 29118.html

In addition, most of Trump's cabinet picks are either authors of Project 2025 or connected to Project 2025 in some way:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/202 … picks.html

This is not going to bode well for Ukraine, either. As Trump advisors (as Trump is) are vehemently against NATO and will push for Ukraine to concede territory:

https://www.reuters.com/world/trumps-pl … 024-12-04/

While President Zelensky continues to try and get NATO to provide Ukraine with an INVITE and include all occupied territory, including Crimea. It's not explicitly stated but overtly implied through his "Ukraine must join NATO as an entire country." comments. Will pulling Crimea over the umbrella of a NATO alliance trigger war?

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn8g8ylvyldo

And you're right. It's not for everybody to not focus on the news. I prefer having at least a basic understanding of everything going on, but at this point, things are happening quite fast and they are evolving rapidly. A brief break for a couple of days would be a good idea for me. But not permanently.

I only hope President Biden and Mark Rutte are able to help get Ukraine into NATO before the current administration ends. And that President Biden's upcoming pardons are sufficient to help protect some from being unfairly targeted by Trump.

You're right. I hope it isn't permanent. There are some who claim that as soon as Trump is back in, he's not leaving the White House. Ever. Unless he dies. He has longevity on his father's side but as you have pointed out previously he eats like crap and takes far too much in the way of drugs. So perhaps things are not as dire as they seem.

The problem with Ukraine is that it's rich in natural material resources that the Russians want, and badly. And that's why they are after it because these resources will make them billions of rubles richer. After the Trump administration takes control of the White House again, there's nothing stopping Trump from destroying half the government he doesn't like and pulling us out of NATO for good.

I really want this to be one of the situations where I'm wrong. I really do. We'll have to wait and see on this one,  Slider_Quinn21.

Indeed. Let's hope that clock continues to tick!! In the meantime...

I'm not liking this new trend of dems capitulating to Trump...first Bernie Sanders praised Elon Musk and now John Fetterman has said that Trump should be pardoned...

What's going on? Bernie used to hate Elon Musk.....and John Fetterman should darn well know that the Hush Money Trial was based on fact, not political motivations.

I had some respect for Bernie Sanders before as a democrat. Although I do think he is getting up there in recent years and fit the one thing that we probably shouldn't be going after in politics - old men - the same thing we have had for every Presidency in the many many years since America was first created. What happened to having a fresh perspective and something new??? I am really saddened that he has felt the need to do this...

Bernie Sanders claims DOGE boss Elon Musk ‘is right’ over defense spending

https://www.yahoo.com/news/bernie-sande … 57906.html

I also really liked John Fetterman...but not after this though. I am saddened that this is happening here too. But not surprised.

John Fetterman says Hunter Biden, Trump both deserve pardons after 'politically motivated' trials

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald … rcna183094

And all of this comes after the disastrous MSNBC debacle in which Joe and Mika capitulated to Trump and went to Mar-a-Lago and kissed the ring:

At the crossroads of news and opinion, ‘Morning Joe’ hosts grapple with aftermath of Trump meeting
https://apnews.com/article/scarborough- … 5ab94b7bf8

Most of these folks probably believe that there is no way out. That the only way forward is to kiss the ring and produce positive reporting on a 34-time convicted felon. While I understand where they are coming from, I am not happy that the honesty and integrity of the media has been completely overturned by the election of this son of a...

I can understand a lot of what those voters were feeling.  I do think white blue collar workers had pretty much been abandoned.  I think blue collar jobs are drying up, and I think those people were hit especially hard by the pandemic and inflation.  And while the stock market is doing well, I would guess that very few of those people are even in the stock market.  It's hard to buy stocks when you can't afford food.  I can understand being upset and wanting a change.

The problem is that Donald Trump isn't change.  They're also against the sorts of things that Trump has openly said that he wants to do.  He's against unions, which will further hurt blue collar workers.  His tariff plan will make costs go up further.  Extending his tax cuts won't help anyone because taxes won't actually go down - they'll stay the same (or go up).  Trump is looking to end social security and medicare which these people depend on.  If people voted for a new candidate, I think I could get all the way to understanding where they're coming from, but they chose to make their lives worse.

I do think Democrats need to spend the next two years talking to those people.  I think they need to spend money on focus groups and town halls and community groups and figure out what they want and how to get it to them.  Democrats need to get back in with union leaders and union members.  They need to say what they're going to do, and then they're going to do it.  And I think Democrats need to spend more money in small towns and rural states.  I know they can't spend money everywhere, but they can't just abandon half (the land) of the country and just let that be Trump country.  They need to start playing long games like Republicans do - plant seeds and then wait for them to grow.  We went from "there may never be a Republican president again" to three straight elections that Republicans either won or almost won.

I also think that Democrats need to be careful with black voters not to just assume that they'll vote Democrat forever.  Black people need to be listened to and helped.  I still maintain that Democrats got too excited about their shiny new toy (suburban white voters) and lost their way.  I think they need to go back to meat and potatoes issues that low-income voters care about, and they need to leave educated voters to make the pragmatic decision.  The Democratic nominee should do literally nothing to help me because a) I don't need any help and b) I'll make the pragmatic decision.

And seriously they need to start now.  They have a ton of work to do and if we're right about Trump, there are people that are going to be even angrier.  They need to be ready to welcome those people back with hard work, not empty promises or jargon or memes.

Based on press conferences from Governor Gavin Newsom and Hakeem Jeffries, I think it is likely that another conclusion could be reached as to how Democrats lost the election beyond just the working class people. There could be a deeper reason why these voters chose to vote the way they did that isn't uncovered. For example, we have a lot of folks who are contradicting each other on why Democrats lost the election. California Governor Gavin Newsom said as much on 12/5/2024:

https://www.youtube.com/live/6Ty2Uv_cTs … amp;t=2642

As California Governor Gavin Newsom said in that press conference on 12/5, he had a stack of papers in his car on that day talking about the election and why Democrats failed. And they all contradicted each other. He said to be patient and that all will be revealed. This refers to why Democrats lost.

https://www.youtube.com/live/A2qGNcWv4h … amp;t=1346

In addition, Hakeem Jeffries, the minority leader of the  House of Representatives, brings up election problems - where dems won the down vote but not the top of the ticket (President) in all of the swing states (the down vote is where voters would vote for a government candidate democratic - and all democratic ballot measures - and only voted for Trump for President at the top of the ticket). Jeffries calls into question whether Dems need a makeover at all when all of these Democratic governors were re-elected. He thinks there are questions about how and why Trump made it there "somewhat convincingly." His words. Not mine. I recommend watching the entire press conference.

Also, he accuses republican gerrymandering as being among the top issues that need to be resolved for the next election.

"There were 6 battleground states that had statewide elections outside of the presidential election. Democrats swept 5, and only lost in Pennsylvania? That doesn't sound to me like we need a complete makeover."

Here are several examples of contradictions and differing opinions on the topic.

Why Democrats Lost in 2024 - Lessons from Phoenix and the Working Class

https://azmirror.com/2024/12/04/why-dem … ing-class/

This one states that the decline in non-college-educated voters were a major reason why Dems lost. Not working class voters. If we're going strictly by education, non-college-educated voters exist in every class. They can't make up a class all by themselves. It almost uses non-college-educated voters and working class interchangeably, leading to the contradiction.

This article makes the point that talking about the working class leaves out a lot of different types of voters, and that we don't talk enough about who makes up the working class when these discussions arise:

What we don’t talk about when we talk about the “working class”

https://www.vox.com/politics/390108/wor … oters-2024

Did Democrats Lose on the Economy or Culture Wars?

https://www.npr.org/2024/11/14/nx-s1-51 … s-weigh-in

In this one, one person says it's the working class. Another person says that party building actually needs to take place. Parts of the working class Dems lost, and others that held strong.

And still in this same article, another person thinks that the overall message of "what have Democrats done for me in the last 4 years" is something that can't be answered by the working-class and middle-class voters, who can't answer this question tangibly - is something that needs to be discussed.

Mitt Romney (haha) in his autobiography (of sorts) bemoans how his failed presidential campaign foolishly focused on campaigning to the 'bosses' of America. After losing and after a pleasant lunch with the re-elected Barack Obama, Romney realized that most people in America hate their bosses and he should have campaigned to the people who work for bosses instead as there are a heckuva lot more workers than bosses. "Stupid!" he says of himself.

I'd never support this guy, but I could learn a lot from him.

The media is very much to blame for Trump's re-election, and they're going to pay for it.  Like I am with Trump supporters, any suffering is on them and they have no one to blame but themselves.

If we survive the Trump era, we need a complete revamp of the media.  Right now, far too much media is controlled by right wing money.  Bezos ordering the Washington Post to cancel its endorsement of Harris was abhorrent.  So if Trump destroys the media, maybe we can rebuild it into what it used to be.  Probably not but a man can dream.

The media are not to blame.  They barely covered Trump speeches, after being blamed for giving them too much air time in the past.  Meanwhile, they spent months, years now, covering Trump civil and criminal trials.  They are obsessed with Trump.  Yes, his mental aptitude was mentioned often.  The voters did not care.  They don't care about his morality.  Nor his financial malfeasance.  Etc, etc.  They hardly spent a minute on his two assassination attempts once they'd passed a few days.  No, the media did not "normalize" him.  Joe Biden and the woke brigade just sucked so badly (for enough Americans) that it really didn't matter about Trump. 

And on cue, recent reports have claimed that Joe Biden was arguably not up to the job when he was elected.  The fact that the Democratic chairs of the House Armed Services Committee (Adam Smith) and the House Intelligence Committee (Jim Himes) expressed that they could barely get in touch with the President, as early as 2021, is ridiculous.  One of them complained that the White House stone walled them from relaying major concerns over the Afghanistan exit, terrific.  There were additional concerns by staff over Biden frequently growing tired, being forgetful.  These were relayed later by US Attorney Robert Hur, who was of course vilified (for telling the truth).  Biden has "quiet quit" since dropping out of the race in July, and from nearly day one, DEMOCRATS were given excuses as to why they couldn't contact THEIR President, as well, he has good days and bad days.  BAD days???  Excuse me?  Again, it's no wonder the voters lost total faith in this guy close to three years ago now.  Now we have reporter after reporter saying, yeah well, I should have covered Biden's decline more openly.  Too late I suppose.  Harris forget it, clearly the voters saw her as the VP to a doddering fool, and that was that.  You had to have had an open primary where the Biden handlers could be completely kicked out of the process.

Trump is an idiot and a dickhead, but even at his age, he can play the role just fine.  For Christ's Sake he was shot at, and bounced right up.  Joe Biden tripped and fell on the stairs to Airforce One 50 times.  Remember, I was said to be overreacting when Hur testified, and Trump was shot.  Both times I made the point that these were incredibly consequential things for public perception.  With or without media bias.

The utter collapse of MSNBC should be applauded.  Their hosts shrieked 24/7 about Trump being a Nazi, when they decided to ignore the actual anti-semitism rampant in the left-leaning universities.  They need to get rid of everyone on there, except for a few people with common sense like Michael Steele, maybe.  Go back to how it was with Chris Matthews or way back with Charles Grodin.  When actual liberals espoused American values and principles, not DEI.

With all due respect, I have no idea what news you were watching.  I think they absolutely normalized him.  Whenever I saw non-cable news, anything he ever said was heavily edited to make his speeches sound normal and traditional.  Whenever he said something wild or crazy, non-cable news didn't cover it.  He gave hundreds of speeches, and the only sound clips I ever heard were him saying stuff like "we are going to lower prices" or stuff like that.

I also think there was an amazingly small amount of coverage of Trump's economic plan which will absolutely wipe out huge number of struggling Americans.  No attention was spent on the logistics of Trump's idea to deport millions of people.  If I'd only watched those news, I would've thought that Trump was basically John Kasich - a completely normal Republican.

The media allowed Trump to take advantage of the idea that electing Trump will mean a return to pre-Covid life.  Even when he did press conferences, they never got him to clarify anything.  He got away with stuff like having "concepts of a plan" and never forced him to elaborate on anything.

People assume that all Trump voters are locked into Fox News, but Fox News is far and away the most popular cable news network and they don't even average enough viewers in primetime to cover all the people in Texas that voted for Trump.  Cable news coverage is a drop in the bucket.  Non-cable news isn't as big as it used to be, but it's still bigger than cable news.  And network news was so terrified of looking biased against Trump that they ended up being biased for Trump.  Which probably was great to the owners of the major media outlets, which were all behind Trump.

Again, Trump has all of the big media money and all the stupid people.  It's a great group of people to have.

They couldn't "point out" Trump's "decline" because it was not overtly evident.  Biden looked like awful, and was rarely seen.  Trump was out there multiple times a week, given speeches, albeit boring, dumb ones.  He gave interviews, tons of them.  Did podcasts.  Harris and Walz went into hiding post-Labor Day.  Trump being mentally demented while Biden was 100x worse was not going to stick.  Trump may have seemed nasty during the Harris debate, but mentally impaired not so much.

I view the withdrawal successful but American troops still died and thousands of Afghans were stranded.  Worse, the images on TV were so damning, and made Biden seem totally inept, as any foreign military mess will.  Multiple DEMOCRATS tried to warn him, he was stubborn and an old know-it-all, and refused to hear them.  The 13 troops who were "only killed" because a public relations mess, because their families were pissed off and continued that right through that infamous cemetery moment this fall.  Again, people SEE this stuff. 

I'll tell you what New York media has covered in the weeks leading to Christmas.  A twice illegal immigrant from Guatemala, who happened to be a jobless K2 addict and alcoholic, doused a woman on the subway and lit her on fire, to her death!!!!  This was on video.  He was deported and yet snuck in and was receiving gov't benefits!  Add that to the coverage of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua all over the country, and the other completely wild illegal-based violent crime.  All of which Biden inept policy is the biggest cause of.  Trump doesn't even need to open his mouth, he wins, or won, as it was. 

Then we have the media, including ABC, MSNBC, CNN, CBS, etc. all of which thoroughly covered Trump's numerous legal cases.  As I warned multiple times, they weren't going to stick.  Sure maybe in NYC, where Trump was hated and the jury pool ready to hang him on anything.  Merrick Garland was lambasted for sitting on these cases, well there was a reason.  He wasn't stupid.  He knew that prosecuting a rival political figure was very risky, very dicey.  Especially one who could hire may lawyers, and who was going to get preference from conservative judges around the nation.  The ONLY case that had a sliver of a chance was the Jan 6 conspiracy, and that would have needed DC jurors, and he likely would have appealed that successfully anyway.  All of that was an utter waste of time.  The liberal media ate it up.

As for questioning Trump's future plans, again, it was done.  The voters DID NOT CARE!  They viewed the economy and the country incredibly negatively.  Biden was at 30-something approval thanks to Afghan mess, inflation, etc. going back to 2021.  You will NEVER win with those numbers.  Nor will your successor, who btw is now open to investigation for campaign fund misuse after spending tens of millions to apparently "buy" the support of celebrities.  All while her internal polling showed no shot of winning from the time they got in. 

People who don't like Trump, think he's probably a criminal, STILL voted for him!!!  What was the media supposed to do with that? 

It's time to put the blame where it is deserved.  Joe Biden was inept, his team and the media hid that.  His policies were a failure.  He finally had to give up on the unconstitutional and unpopular college loan forgiveness recently.  Yes, his infrastructure bill will be a good one in the years to come, but that takes years and years.  Now we have Democratic public health officials screaming for bird flu vaccines, and more lockdowns.  Enough with these people!  Biden and Harris approved of a nanny state, inflamed inflation with too much spending (most of which was basically fraud in the end), did nothing on immigration or crime, and wished to shut down debate on anything their side didn't approve of.  These are the most glaring complaints, and good portion warranted, from voters who departed their side.  Not counting the millions who voted in 2020, and didn't bother this time.  Which was rampant in the Northeast I can tell you.

We should absolutely be working on bird flu vaccines; it could be the next pandemic.

The rest is interesting opinion.

Indeed. Isn't it interesting that now Trump is coming out openly saying that it would be difficult to bring grocery prices down? He is basically saying openly that he campaigned on a lie.

Also, "President" Musk is championing H1-B Visas and MAGA does not like it one bit. Even "Vice President" Trump came out in support of Musk's H1-B Visas. I use the quotes as sarcasm because of all the social media furor of folks calling Elon President Musk and Trump Vice President Trump.

"President" Musk is also censoring accounts like Laura Loomer who is openly coming out against him. He removed her verified check mark as a punishment of sorts.

By the way...where is JD Vance? He is very very...silent?

Didn't we warn the Trumpers? We sure did. en masse.

Oh yes. I wholeheartedly agree with you, Slider_Quinn.

This is also evident with Google Trends searches for tariffs going up quite a lot after the election.

They all just wanted to "own the libs" regardless of anything else.

And they're gonna pay for it. Good.

https://www.cnn.com/2025/01/19/politics … index.html

33% approval lowest since 1992

It's been a totally disastrous start of 2025 for Democrats.  The fires in Los Angeles have shown the Governor and Mayor of LA to both be utterly incompetent, and ready to pass the buck.  California is a one-party state, and despite it's strangling regulations, it completely failed job one, to safeguard its civilians.  Multiple examples of incompetence were on display with the widespread destruction.  A major reservoir was off line.  Hydrants were often missing (due to being stolen).  The Mayor decided to stay in Africa despite the threats of massive wind, then showed up and was unable to give a press conference.  It's fire department leadership chose to prioritize "diversity" instead of function.  Bass slashed it's budget.  And then you have cases where multiple local initiatives to safeguard power lines or remove vegetation were stopped by the eco-insanity rampant in California Democratic politics.  The city of Los Angeles nearly elected centrist Rick Caruso, who SHOULD have been the choice.  Instead, career Dem Bass won out, and you have incompetence.

Within California, we also have the former and ultra-woke Mayor of Oakland, another idiot who prioritized "reforms of Oakland police."  She blew the Oakland A's negotiations, and presided over record crime that led to most retailers to leave the city in droves.  Thao was finally, mercifully, recalled by voters after less than 2 years in office.  She has since been indicted on multiple corruption charges by federal prosecutors.  I won't even touch San Francisco, a completely broken place that was once a jewel of American cities, along with Portland and Seattle, on the west coast.  All ruined.

Move east to Chicago, where sadly they continue to be led by an utter fool in Brandon Johnson, who can no longer raise money.  He's that unpopular.  Like several Western cities, Chicago's Johnson will attempt to fight Trump's ICE on sanctuary city status.  The voters there don't want that.  Really almost everywhere now, they're sick of it.  The November electoral gains by Trump in urban areas proves that. 

And then good grief we get to New York, where a Democratic super-majority set greater NYC on the road to lawlessness and violence with Cuomo's insipid bail reform legislation 6 years ago.  Current Gov Kathy Hochul is easily the most disliked politician around, even worse than Trump.  Her revised congestion pricing tax is absolutely despised by anyone but the rich, lefty transplants who have taken over Manhattan and sought to banish the working class from their sight.  The Mayor of the city, who is currently groveling to Trump, in order to avoid near-certain federal indictment (for bribery), has worsened the crime in the city.

These are in total, absolutely cringeworthy examples of Democratic incompetence and corruption.  These are the most TAXED areas in the country, and what are the citizens getting?  Money wasted at every turn, and basic civic functions are simply broken and unreliable.  Each time, there HAVE been centrist Democrats who have tried to win back these cities.  The lunatic left who vote in droves, have barely stopped it.  I have to assume the tide is turning.  One cannot imagine the Mayor of LA will survive an almost-predictable recall.  Newsom might be the most inept looking Governor in America now. 

Diversity, equity, inclusion.  This is what the Democratic brand has supposedly morphed to become.  No, it should have been MERIT, COMMON SENSE, and COMPETENCE.  Unbelievably frustrating. 

Trump will take a victory lap for the Gaza Hostage deal, followed by "solving" the Tik Tok ban and bringing that back.  Followed by the start of a perhaps chaotic but largely popular migrant round up.

This is what most of the right wing channels are all preaching. And not all of it is fact.

What the right wing channels fail to address is the fact that the fires were so powerful and widespread that they were impossible to contain. No right wing community could have done better. Any winds over 55 mph, and planes are unable to effectively fly and put out the fires. This has nothing to do with state or city governance. It wouldn't have mattered if the reservoir was full or how many full fire hydrants we have, if they are not close to where the fires burned and raged or it's physically impossible to do. Conditions have coalesced into the driest winter on record, with little rain. If you combine that with the overall speed of the winds, and the embers that were flying all over the place, it's the recipe for a perfect disaster.

It doesn't matter whether you're democrat or republican: nature will treat you the same way. No republican would have been able to do it either.

Trump's victory is the absolute narrowest ever in history. It also was never a mandate as he erroneously likes to present it as. Like Hakeem Jeffries, the U.S. House of Representatives Minority Leader has stated previously - "I don't think that this requires major reform of the party."

Diversity, equity, and inclusion are not anyone's enemy here.

But the right sure wants people to think so.

Simon Rosenberg, ever since the election, has issued mea culpa upon mea culpa and admitted that he has far more questions than answers. I'm hesitant to post what he has to say, but I appreciated his admission that he was wrong and he has lost a lot of certainty, and he is hesitant to give a definitive summary of how things turned out so very, very, very badly. At the same time, he has noted that there is a lot to be done and that needs to be done in the second age of Trump.

Slider_Quinn21: How much good will do you think that Trump threw away today with all of his executive orders?

My guess: 250%. And then some.

We're not part of the Paris Climate Accords anymore as of today.

Thankfully, at least, the clown is unable to will away birthright citizenship because it is a constitutional right.

God help us all.

I would love to chime in, but I have no idea what Trump did yesterday.  I paid no attention to his inauguration - I only found out it had been moved inside in passing.  I took my kids to a basketball game and watched no news.  As my wife watched the news this morning, I listened to a comic book podcast while I helped get the kids ready for school.

I don't know what Trump did, and I'm going to do my best to not find out on my own.  Anything I learn might come from here.  I'm not adverse to knowing, but I'm not going to allow that man any more headspace for me.  If he wants to burn the world down, I'll enjoy whatever time I have left.