• Hazdaz@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I’m so sick of these headlines.

    They remind me of the endless headlines over the years (decades, actually) of how the Republican party is ready to collapse or implode or explode or insert-other-ominous-word-here.

    As with all those failed predictions of the GOP going the way of the dodo bird, until I see Trump in an orange jumpsuit I won’t believe any of the shit they claim will happen.

    • monsterlynn@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      @Hazdaz I kind of feel like the GOP has imploded, though. Since Trump especially (and really I think this strain of anti-democracy conservativism dates back to the 2000 election where they saw that they could just bully their way into stealing elections), there doesn’t seem to be much of the Republican Party that preceeded him left. Now it’s all antidemocratic fascists and nutjobs. Just because they call themselves Republicans and win elections doesn’t mean their politics really has anything to do with what their party stands for on paper.

      I think it’s more a case of being careful what you wish for. Yes, they imploded. Yes, they don’t really exist anymore. What has supplanted them is so much worse

      @YoBuckStopsHere

      • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I really hate this perspective. It’s just plain wrong.

        Trump DID NOT change the Republican party. He only made them think the mask was no longer necessary. They’ve been pro war, pro tax cuts, pro business, pro rich, pro racism, and anti-democracy… for literally decades.

        Now that they’re not using platitudes and not couching their rhetoric in obvious lies it’s suddenly evil?!

        • Alien Nathan Edward@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Trump did not change the Republican party

          Hell, he wasn’t even the first time they rioted after losing an election. That happened in 2000, when paid republican operatives disrupted the recount that would have confirmed al gore as president long enough for the supreme court to step in and award the state (and, therefore, the presidency) to dubya without counting the votes at all. Google ‘brooks brothers riot’, several Republican staffers openly acknowledge that they were there to use violence in order to stop the votes from being counted despite initial claims that they were only there to observe the process and ensure that it was fair. This includes congressman John Sweeney, who said “What I essential told my people was ‘You’ve got to stop them.’” Trump thought he could get away with this because Bush already had gotten away with it. They even planned copycat riots in Arizona and Nevada in 2020 because it worked the first time.

          In the last 30 years Republicans have won the presidency 3 times despite having only gotten more votes than the other guy once. They have had two riots after elections, one of which successfully delayed counting votes long enough for the Republican to be installed as president, and one which failed to delay certification long enough to install the Republican. They are against democracy and in favor of violence. They consistently act with those values in mind. They are enemies of democracy and freedom.

          • appel@lemmy.ml
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            1 year ago

            That happened in 2000, when paid republican operatives disrupted the recount that would have confirmed al gore as president long enough for the supreme court to step in and award the state (and, therefore, the presidency) to dubya without counting the votes at all. Google ‘brooks brothers riot’

            It just completely blows my mind that this happened and, more so, that it was allowed to stand after the fact. I think I read somewhere that Gore decided not to contest it in order to not mess with the peaceful transfer of power, but man…

            Just imagine how world events had played out if Al Gore had been president on and after September 11th, 2001. Imagine the progress we could have made on climate change 24 years ago. I understand that it’s pure speculation, that he could have been a lukewarm president. But come on, he would have been loads better that GWB even if all he did was twirl his fingers.

            • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              MLK Jr DID warn everyone about the complacency of the comfortable… Too bad people suck at listening to difficult but good advice.

        • Isthisreddit@lemmy.world
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          Absolutely based post. I’ve recognized what they truly were 20 years ago. There is a slight distinction - the republican party always had 4 stools (people used to say three stools but I never agreed).

          First stool is the wealthy just wanting to make more money (tax cuts, tax welfare, regulation capture, etc). This is the true stool in power pulling the strings of all the other stools. They know they can never win a popular vote (why would the workers vote to lower their own wages?). They ride the Santa sled with the big bag of money, the reigns are connected to the lesser stools, and they ride that sled into the bank

          Second stool is the religious vote - really captured by Reagan I believe with the invention of the abortion issue, but they go as far back as Goldwater I believe, because he warned about them. These are the reindeer of the money sled

          Third stool is the racists, the KKK types in the south. These are also the reindeer

          Fourth stool is what I consider the conspiracy theory crowd - they sort of share the stool with the uneducated morons who can’t seem to figure out what their best interests are (“get gobernment off my Medicare, vote republican”). This stool might fall under the “undecided” crowd by some metrics, but they fall victim to the usual right wing lies and propaganda all the fucking time, so I don’t see why we can’t just label them as they truly are, the useful idiot voters of the republican propaganda arm

          As a whole, these groups are the same pieces of shit that love Trump because he’s talks to them with a bullhorn, not through dog whistles like previous republicans, that’s the difference some of you might not appreciate

          Edit - one distinction I think is needed is the people who fell for the dog whistles were usually of the authoritarian/fascist type. For example, There were pretty decent religious people or business people who felt the wrong message was being presented by the republican party, but the authoritarians/fascists always fell in line behind the republicans/conservatives. Still the case today

          • paddirn@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Your fourth stool I think probably should be combined with gun owners & 2nd amendment folks as well. There’s been a persistent conspiracy theory that gets trotted out every year or so that Democrats are coming for their guns, though it’s not exactly a conspiracy, but the way it’s portrayed is as if it’s the first stage of Democratic Socialist Fascists kicking in your door and raping your grandma.

            • Isthisreddit@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Yes, I think the 4th stool is shared by the single issue voter crowd - it’s sort of an umbrella, but it still in major part are the people who fall for the propaganda; say 2nd amendment issue, or trans bathroom issue, or Critical Race Theory (although that might be more of a 3rd stool strategy), or whatever the next wedge issue the right wing media industrial complex thinks of - these people will fall for it EVERY SINGLE TIME. Just major inability to understand nuance and complete lack of critical thinking, whatever the case may be (I’m sure we can talk about this 4th stool a lot. I would love to find a way to cogently sum them up)

        • paddirn@lemmy.world
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          Yeah, I feel like the Republican Party has evolved (or devolved) into what they are now, but it’s not like they hadn’t already been moving in this direction anyways, he accelerated it if anything. Trump took advantage of a Party that wanted a “strongman”, he brought the racism, billionaire businessman background, toxic masculinity and performances you might normally see in wrestling back room drama or talk radio, and a feigned devotion to the Church (that was probably his weakest trait, thus Mike Pence). He brought together a lot of elements of the Republican Party that were already all there, just not really ever focused in one person with such a shitty moral compass and motivation to take advantage of the GOP. Pre-Trump, the GOP has mostly had boring business people like George Bush, Mitt Romney, Bob Dole, and Newt Gingrich and others, nobody really “inspiring” to them like Ronald Reagan.

          • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            They would’ve done the same things, especially if they got the supreme court stacked like Trump did but without the extra drama.

            It’d just be Mitt Romney spouting about protecting marriage and family values from erosion by all those miscreants instead of ol’ Marge TG spouting off about the drag queens grooming your kids at the library.

            If anything, it’s actually a blessing Trump pulled the mask off. Now, only the truly dense or selfish fail to understand or admit how vile the Republican “leadership” is.

              • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                They’ve gotten more bold, yes, but it is CRITICAL to remember that these are the same conservatives with the same values they’ve had all along. They NEVER actually supported democracy. They just wanted to stay out of jail, and Trump made them think they might actually get away with it.

    • chem_bpy@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      The countless headlines of trump being indicted?

      This past few weeks were the first time he is actually having any legal consequences. Nothing like the headlines of old.

      • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        And yet, he still walks free and his allies still sit in power.

        Do not mistake the shadenfreud for actual justice being served. That ship sailed years ago.

        • UristMcHolland@lemmy.world
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          He is not as free as you might think. For example: If attempted to leave the country right now, he would be arrested. He cannot go anywhere without a secret service detail and he isn’t legally allowed to drive himself anymore. He is being watched and monitored all day, every day.

          Hopefully, when he sentenced he will actually be put behind bars and not on “house arrest” in a mansion.

          • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            He is more free and privileged than any person in the entire country who works a job and pays rent. House arrest for him is a vacation to 98% of Americans.

            That should never be acceptable so long as anyone else would suffer in a cement cell prison until they were executed for this.

    • SCB@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      The GOP absolutely imploded. That’s why they went from “compassionate conservative” to full on fash.

      • Hazdaz@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        They were never compassionate about anything other than money, guns and jebus.

        Just because they have shifted their branding doesn’t mean squat about them supposedly imploding. That couldn’t be further from the truth.

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          Not trying to be an asshole but how old are you?

          McCain vs Obama to Trump vs Biden is a much different landscape now. Republicans are a mess, stand for nothing and most voters who aren’t die hard Trumpers are lost looking for christo-fascists or “libertarians” but ideologically all these groups have no platform, plan or face in the US.

          And on top of that despite what media sells, people are sick of the clearly fake culture war. It might get the baboons screeching but most people do not care anymore

          • Hazdaz@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            It’s the same goddamn bullshit. How do you people not see this?? Since Reagan the GOP party is the same worthless piece of human garbage. They might fly a “compassionate conservative” banner this year, or pretend to be “tea party” lunatics the next, but they are the same scumbags pushing essentially the same awful policies for decades now. Pro-business, pro-ultra rich, anti-worker, anti-consumer, pro-military, anti-education, anti-abortion, pro-jebus, pro-guns, pro-limited-government-except-for-things-they-care-about-and-then-in-that-case-the-sky-is-the-limit.

            NOTHING HAS CHANGED. They can put lipstick on a pig or horse or anything in between, but the core of that awful party stays the same and in the end they vote in unison nearly every single time.

          • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            No way. Look at Bush. Protection of marriage act? The patriot act that created the NSA? They were just more polite about being the same judgemental authoritarian assh*les.

            This is like a child finding out what hotdogs are actually made of.

            The hotdogs haven’t changed no matter how grossed out you are by the truth of the matter.

        • SCB@lemmy.world
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          This is just ignorant man. The GOP, especially prior to the late 90s, was a coalition party the same way the Dems are. They now are not.

          You don’t have to agree with anything the old GOP stood for to recognize this fact.

          • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            You need to realize: Republicans were lying back then, too. Those are talking points for them, not fundamental beliefs.

            The only difference now is they’re just telling you what they mean instead of couching it in dog whistles, like “urban” (black) problems, or the Satanic Panic of the 80s and 90s…

            They’re the same judgemental pricks. They’re only using meaner words these days.

            • SCB@lemmy.world
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              They really weren’t tho. You had traditional conservatives (what, say, Trump pretends to be), small-business Chamber of Commerce conservatives, neocons, evangelicals, and some amount of neoliberals that identified as conservative, along with independents-who-trend-R like Libertarians.

              There used to be very strong pro-welfare conservatives, pro-environment conservatives, etc sprinkled throughout the entire mix.

              Those groups have been driven away or subsumed into nationalists and evangelicals.

              • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                Those other conservatives were only there because of the lies of the party.

                What kind of legislation did they pass?

                Abortion bans, protection of marriage acts, controlling sex ed in school, “patriot” acts that legalize spying on citizens, limits and controls on immigration, tax cuts and deregulation…

                They’ve ALWAYS been judgemental monsters. Stop buying their lies. They aren’t even using them any more.

    • Queen HawlSera@lemm.ee
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      1 year ago

      This…

      I’ve been hearing “This isn’t fascism these are the death wails of a dying party” Since Bush’s second term…

    • YoBuckStopsHere@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      The GOP dies with the Boomers so we still have a bit before it goes away. The DNC will become the new right but it will be because the center moves left and a Progressive Party is formed.

      • Hazdaz@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The GOP dies with the Boomers

        This is incredibly dangerous and flat out WRONG thinking. This is being beyond naive.

        • HuddaBudda@kbin.social
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          It not archaic, but the republican party will have to make shifts to survive, whether that be further gerrymandering states to favor them, or pivoting on toxic policies, but the real truth is they lost a whole generation

          They won’t die, but if they make no changes, they will be referenced like today’s green party. No one will think them capable of winning an election.

        • Tigbitties@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          I agree they won’t die but they will take a hit. As of 2021, 23% of Americans aged 18 to 29 are conservative, compared to 45% of Americans aged 65 and up.

      • theangryseal@lemmy.world
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        That’s a nice thought, it really is.

        Unfortunately it’s a very sheltered thought bud. Wherever you live, all the boomers must be the republicans.

        Where I live I see teenagers in maga hats regularly. When I meet someone who isn’t a hardline Trump supporter it literally shocks me.

        Things might go back to some sanity at some point, but it’s hard to imagine when everyone is being radicalized every day through extreme forms of media on the internet.

        When I was younger I fully believed that the world would become more progressive because, well, progress. Most of the more liberal kids I grew up with are hardcore republicans coming up on their 40s now posting liberal tears memes.

        I don’t know. Maybe we’ll get lucky. I definitely hope we do.

          • Zaktor@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            There are plenty of rightwing pipelines out there for young people, regardless of their parents. With people like Joe Rogan and Jordan Peterson, along with a much more online life so they can find and reinforce each other, I’d say it’s a much friendlier environment for right wing radicalization among young people than 20-30 years ago. The backbone of the Republican party may be old bigots, but at least some people in the movement are working very hard to generate young bigots to replace them and racism, sexism, and transphobia aren’t things only old people are prone to.

      • paintbucketholder@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The GOP dies with the Boomers

        Looking at all the MAGA rallies over the last years, it looked like most attendants were significantly younger than Boomer age. Same with the guys who fly Trump flags on their pickup trucks. Same with the January 6 crowd. Same with the Proud Boys. Same with Bikers for Trump. Same with Moms for Liberty.

        I think it’s wishful thinking to believe that the GOP will just disappear when the last Boomer dies. The GOP has already transformed into the party of Trump over the last couple of years, and it will keep on transforming.

        It would take significantly more than old people dying fit them GOP to vanish.

        • YoBuckStopsHere@lemmy.worldOP
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          1 year ago

          MAGA is made up of people who are the scum of society. Criminals, con artists, drug dealers, etc… Hopefully you don’t think that is who the majority of voters are.

          • paintbucketholder@lemmy.world
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            As the saying goes, “If there’s a Nazi at the table and 10 other people sitting there talking to him, you got a table with 11 Nazis.”

            I don’t care how many Republicans are troubled by Trump’s behavior, I don’t care how many Republicans think he’s a bit too much, I don’t care how many Republicans dislike the MAGA movement.

            Talk is cheap.

            74 million voters decided that they wanted Trump to be president for another term in 2020, decided to give Trump their vote, decided to support Trump.

            That makes them Trump supporters.

            And it makes the GOP the Party of Trump.

            • YoBuckStopsHere@lemmy.worldOP
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              Not all Republicans are sitting at the same table. There are two very different tables and only one has Nazis sitting at it.

              • paintbucketholder@lemmy.world
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                There are two very different tables and only one has Nazis sitting at it.

                The one with the Nazis sitting at it has 74 million people.

                How many Republicans are sitting at the other table, and where can I find that table?

                  • paintbucketholder@lemmy.world
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                    1 year ago

                    LOL.

                    The Freedom Caucus is the bloc that is trying to pull the GOP further to the right. The Freedom Caucus is where all the Obama hating Tea Party radical agitators ended up. The Freedom Caucus is completely aligned with Trump.

                    From your own link:

                    After hardline House conservatives aggravated GOP leaders by halting the chamber floor in protest, the Freedom Caucus — which most of the agitators call home — is growing in numbers.

                    The Trump-aligned bloc admitted two new members this week

                    Are you just not familiar with US politics?

      • tburkhol@lemmy.world
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        There are an awful lot of prominent Republicans among Gen-X and Millennials. 36-year-old grandmother Lauren Boebert; 41 year old Matt Gaetz; 49 year old MTG. Milo Yiannopoulos is 39. The “Proud Boys” founder is 39. Founder of the Oathkeepers is 57 (just barely Gen-X). College Republicans are a thing.

    • Neato@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      Trump will never go to prison. He’s a liability. He’d blab top secret info for an extra scoop of ice cream.

      • AbidanYre@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        He’d blab top secret info for an extra scoop of ice cream.

        That’s why places like ADX Florence exist.

          • synae[he/him]@lemmy.sdf.org
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            As a San Franciscan I’m not sure if I’m offended by the idea of him being that close, or intrigued by the idea of being able to hop a boat to go point and laugh at him

        • Neato@kbin.social
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          I think putting the former POTUS in solitary confinement indefinitely is probably too cruel even for his largest detractors. I mean that’s straight torture.

          Not to mention he can still blab to the guards and clearing guards is more trouble than its worth. Most likely he’ll be confined to house arrest for his sentence. Hopefully he’ll be banned from using the internet or engaging with media agencies.

          • AbidanYre@lemmy.world
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            It’s where we keep prisoners who pose a threat to national security, I don’t see why he would get special treatment just because of his old job.

            Plenty of spies have been sent to prison, having guards near them is a solved problem.