#and 70 million people voted for the evil man

[beautiful-excuses]

Real sick of hearing that kamala didn't run a good campaign or should've done x y z better. She was running against an 80yr old convicted felon, rapist, racist etc etc, why on earth should she have needed anything more than a decent&normal campaign to beat THAT??

[ginnyrules27]

Look, I know right now it's probably annoying to deal with all these posts about American politics if you're not an American, but I have to say this to any and all of my American followers.

Vote. VOTE. If you are 18 or older, unless you are in a motherfucking coma or worse, VOTE!

Following the recent SCOTUS decision, it's crucial to acknowledge that a Trump re-election could seriously jeopardize the return of our democracy. With the potential for a national abortion ban and a rollback of hard-fought rights and protections, the stakes are incredibly high. We cannot afford to overlook the possibility of Trump appointing replacements for justices Alito and Thomas, both in their late 70s.

'Oh but Biden didn't cancel my student loan debt despite canceling others-' and do you think a Trump White House will do anything for student loan relief?

'Under Biden, we lost Roe' -Do I even need to explain that it was the Trump justices who gave the conservatives the power to attack the established law of Roe with unparalleled audacity?

Listen, people need to remember this: Biden's international policies may be criticized, but let's not forget that Trump admitted on national television that Putin informed him about the invasion of Ukraine before it even happened. Ukraine took place in 2022, and remember, Trump was out of office in 2021!

'Oh but they started developing a vaccine for COVID under Trump and Biden's just taking the credit-' Biden wasn't the one who defunded the department of the CDC that Obama set up after the Ebola crisis to prevent a pandemic from happening in the US. And Biden wasn't the one who told the American people to drink bleach to prevent themselves from getting COVID.

Progressives, listen up! Some of you are thinking of voting for Stein, but I need you to hear me out. If fewer people had voted for Gore over Nader or for Hillary over Stein, we wouldn't be in this mess. Progress is not always straightforward, but do you really think we'll be closer to a progressive movement if we let Trump regain power?

Biden's age is a fact that can't be argued against. Born in '42, he belongs to the Silent Generation, not the boomer generation. Trump, born in '46, is a boomer. Despite his age, Biden still garnered a significant number of votes in 2020, with 81 million people seemingly unconcerned about his age. Until we address the need to raise millions of dollars to run for president, we shouldn't expect to see many younger faces in politics.

This isn't a 'pick the lesser of two evils' scenario. This is a 'if I want change to be possible, I need to elect the team who will make change possible' scenario.

To the millennials and Gen Zs on this site: We often complain about the ways in which boomers have negatively impacted future generations by neglecting pensions and allowing the cost of living to rise while wages remain stagnant. If we eventually have children, do we want them to believe that previous generations had the opportunity to prevent a worst-case scenario but didn't take action because of personal preferences?

Last thing because this post is getting far too long, in 2017, white supremacists marched in Charlottesville, Virginia. After it happened, Trump made a speech where he stated there were 'very fine people' on both sides. I can't believe I have to say this but please let's not allow the man who said that and then tried to gaslight the country that he didn't say that even though there's video of it!

[simonalkenmayer]

This is just so absurd I can’t not talk about it, so please read this short political analysis, even if you don’t usually read these, because this is…hilarious.

This election, almost 70% of the vote below the age of 21 went to democrats. Single women by a margin of 30 points voted Democratic. Minorities (particularly black women) broke for Dems overwhelmingly, black women mobilizing over 95% of their members in some constituencies.

The GOP is taking time to analyze this, running numbers, wondering how they can appeal to young people and women instead of only angry racist old white men…and these are their solutions so far as stated by multiple pundits on FOX, and why they are stupid:

Single women vote for Dems? Answer? Men, marry these women. Literally someone said “put a ring on it”. They said “it’s easy to see why single women vote Democratic—their policies keep women single”.

Why is this stupid? Well beyond the obvious misogyny of “we should just woo and marry women and then control them so they align with us politically”? There’s the fact that because women no longer need a man, to survive, men are now forced to bring character to the table, something many men (I’m thinking the alpha males of tiktok) never had to grow because of their privilege. You cannot just send men out into the world to literally conquer a woman’s heart. They’re not stupid. They can see when they’re not dating a decent guy. That’s why they stopped marrying them.

They’ve been, I kid you not,debating RAISING THE VOTING AGE TO 21.

Here is why that’s fucking idiotic, broken into many easy parts. 1. If they can’t vote, then they cannot be taxed, nor recruited for the military, nor jailed as adults. How’s that going to affect prisons, the military, taxes?

Well there’s over 600k active duty military below the age of 25 out of 1.35 million…you tell me.

16% of our tax revenue comes from the under 25 bracket

Oh right and what are they supposed to do? They can’t go to college, since….how are they going to be able to sign contracts for student loans if they aren’t being fairly represented or given adult status? Are they going to raise the legal age of adulthood since adults age 18-21 can no longer do anything of their own accord, extend high school again to stockpile them while they’re not being busy or just recruit them straight into the terrible service jobs in which the GOP hopes they remain?

I’m telling you…there is nothing to offer but no climate, rich billionaires, more debt, less freedom, less rights, and bigotry in that party. They want to destroy education to keep people stupid. They want to use religion to control. That party is not a party. It’s an evil conspiracy. Meaning the kids and the ladies will shy away. They have nothing to offer. Nothing. So they have to cheat.

Make no mistake the the abortion ban idea was specifically to encumber these two groups with crippling debt and dependency. That party has nothing to offer. Especially with trump running it. And this they well know. Most of his candidates lost. Most. And the red wave that was expected was nonexistent. One of two things will now happen:

My predictions:

Expect lots and lots of redistributing debates to cheat, I.e. gerrymandering but that’s a given.

1. Trump is a malignant narcissist. He doesn’t care about party or the country. During this election he said “if they win I should get the credit and if they lose I shouldn’t be blamed” a “head I win, tails you lose” if ever there was one. He will run again in 2024 despite the overwhelming repudiation by voters. He will (not?) win the primary, but he will take so much of the GOP base vote with him that it splits the vote and hands Dems a second Biden presidency.

Or

2. If the house is taken by the GOP, they will bargain with him to shut down federal oversight of him (including J6 hearings) to convince him not to run. He will still likely screw them in meaningful ways.

Unless he ends up in prison because of other investigations they can’t control…so the first seems most likely.

TLDR:

The kids and women are alright. Death to the Boomers. Enjoy your avocado if you can afford it. Don’t get married. Keep voting for change and keep using these platforms to educate your peers.

[jaywrites101]

Why You Should be Voting Democrat: The Republicans are Hypocrites Against God.

This is an essay I now have to give to a person living in this house with me. Some context, they pinned a piece of Republican propaganda they received in the mail to the community posterboard with the words “why I vote Republican” written on it. I have interpreted this as an invitation to challenge their beliefs. And my response is in the essay below.

Sincerely, By Everyone in This House

Pro-life vs Pro-Choice

This argument is a messy one to argue, this is something our country is literally divided over this and each argument is so twisted it's hard for either side to understand one another. For this to be the hill you've chosen to fight on I'm going to have to assume two things—1: you believe abortions are murder, and 2: You believe abortions are a common occurrence made by lazy people who want to get rid of the consequences of their bad actions.

Both of these are common arguments made by the Republican party to defund Planned Parenthood. So it may surprise you that not a single person on the Left is trying to disprove your fighting points.

That's because this isn't about abortions at all. It's about women's rights. Abortions only play into this because it was the item that forced the issue before the courts and the public.

In 1973, Roe v. Wade was a landmark decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in which the Court ruled that the Constitution of the United States protects a pregnant woman's liberty to choose to have an abortion without excessive government restriction. This decision effectively guaranteed that a woman had the right to treat her body as her own property, meaning she could choose what she eats, who she has sex with, and, yes, whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term.

The decision ruled that the US Government has no right to decide the moral outcome of a single person's choices. Nor do they have the right to force a person to live in what they currently believe to be an ethical lifestyle.

This is the one and ONLY law in our country that explicitly gives women the same rights to life, responsibility, and authority that a man has. It also the only law that ensures a woman has the ultimate right to refuse to have sex with a man.

Republicans want to overturn Roe v. Wade and defund Planned Parenthood (not end abortions). They often cite the evils of abortions as the reasons why they want to overturn it. However, this is not their real motivation. Planned Parenthood has a multitude of other services for women and men besides abortions. They help people conceive children, provide safe-sex alternatives to reckless teens, provide both erectile stimulants and contraception, and even hormone therapy for trans people transitioning genders. They also provide pregnancy care for women just like any other hospital.

And as we've discussed Roe v. Wade is about a woman's rights to her body.

Republicans are trying to keep women from having equal rights. This much has been stated by Republicans in the 1970s and that mentality continues to today. It's blatant hypocrisy from a group of people who've only read the Bible enough to make real Christians like yourself believe they're doing God's work. And they are not shy about signaling how religious they are. God even has a Bible verse for them specifically:

 “Therefore, when you do a charitable deed, do not sound a trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory from men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward.” Matthew 6:2. (NKJV)

Government Spending

This one's actually a very easy argument to refute. Republicans are always talking about making tax cuts and spending less money. In truth, all the money they save goes straight into the military budget which increases by BILLIONS of dollars each year. We're currently spending $934 billion a year on our military budget. According to the last Discretionary Spending Audit under Obama, more than half of that goes back into the politicians in both the House and the Senat across both sides of the aisles. That's also why this issue is one many Democrats actively support; the military is giving them a kickback.

The tax cuts you experience is not the government saving an extra twenty cents by cutting out beef from their cafeteria and passing the savings to you. It's the Republican party throwing the US into more debt to artificially give you a tax break so you'll continue to vote for them, and force the Democrats to be the ones to have to put that back to normal so they look like the bad guys.

Long story short, if you want the government to save money, vote Democrat, pay higher taxes and demand a drastic decrease in military spending.

Fun Fact: If we succeed in cutting the military budget by one-hundredth of a percent, the excess funds would pay to empower EVERY SOCIAL SERVICE the democrats suggest (from healthcare all the way to free electricity.) for the next ten years.

Education (Really? This one's so backward you should know better without me explaining.)

Republicans have been so far on the wrong side of this debate I'm surprised I have to tell it to you. For decades they've cut school budget both in the public and private sectors. They happily cut millions of dollars a year from the federal grants that are supposed to help kids afford college, while also artificially inflating the price of school, school supplies, and class prices.

This is not some secret thing you'll have to search hard for. They brag about it on tv every other episode of Fox News. 

The document you gave me lists education but provides no real proposals or examples of problems they hope to change, it is preying on your ignorance in this situation to make themselves look good. (What follows was not any part of the document they left, but are bullet points I thought they should be thinking about when they go to vote.)

Gay Rights

People who are gay, or otherwise not cishet WASPS should have the right to live a life of their own choosing without persecution or judgment from us. Jesus says everyone has that right amongst man. We're supposed to leave all that to God, so leave it for God.

Racism

I direct you to the current protests as proof that Racism is a thing that still exists, and has only gotten more unmanageable as time has moved on. Also, every Black Lives Matter protest since Martin Luther King Jr.

Socialism

Roads, parks, schools, and social security are all social programs funded by the government for the people. We on the Left wish to expand these capacities to healthcare, electricity, internet, higher education, and phone services, while also insisting that the government provide the minimum funding needed for people to live. (This in a time when the cost of living keeps rising higher due to unchecked capitalism.) We demand the government provide for the homeless, and regulate the supply chain of food. (because over 70% of all food in the garbage across this country is thrown away while it's still fresh.)

We have the ability to end starvation, and homelessness in this country. We argue this means we have the responsibility to do so as well.

Gun Reform

Democrats believe no civilian needs access to weapons of war. It's too easy to exploit these weapons and it results in mass killings of innocents. There are far better and more effective ways to defend yourself and your family than buying a bunch of guns and shooting anything that makes a noise in the night.

Police Reform

This is the current agenda. Police have gone unpunished for their crimes against civilians, (especially civilians of color,) and our current system 1: Encourages police to kill first, ask questions never, 2: Forces cops to take on roles they are untrained for, and 3: Gives them too much power without any reliable method of accountability. We demand all three of these things be addressed and changed in a meaningful way.

All of this without even mentioning Trump, the man actively trying to be a dictator.

[elbiotipo]

Do you really believe peronism offers progress? I’m not a libertarian (im left-leaning), but since peronism was created the country has only impoverished. They don’t take money from the filthy rich, they steal it from the working middle class and make other people believe they’re “””the rich””” while the real rich ppl stay the same. They did good things like women’s vote and derechos laborales but those things were already present or were going to come either way

Yes, I do believe Peronism offers progress. It is, in fact, the Argentine party that has done the most social progress in this nation, by far.

It was the party that gave rights to millions that were voiceless and treated as little more than serfs. It was the party that gave us free higher education, public health, workers rights from freedom of assembly to vacations, it was the party that brought Argentina back from the misery it was in after the Great Depression and the Década Infame (and no, it wasn’t a “first world country” before Peronism, at least not for most people. A country can be “rich” while having its wealth concentrated in few people, which was exactly the case. And it wasn’t a democracy by any means either).

Even now, it’s the largest party that is commited to the rights of minorities and women, scientific advancement, the development of national industry, and friendship with our fellow Latin American nations.

Sure, that is my personal belief, but I have plenty of evidence to back it up. And there are plenty of things that Peronism has done wrong in its near 80 years of history; we can talk about it. But let me talk about your other points.

A lot is talked about the “70 years of impoverishment”. And you say women’s vote and worker’s rights would have come anyways, or were already “present” (not true, or else, there would be no need for Peronism). Let me retort both points.

You know what came after Peronism?

The Revolución “”““Libertadora”“““. A dictatorship with the sole purpose of reverting every achievement of Peronism. Forget about women’s vote; there was no vote for anyone. The largest democratic party of Argentina was persecuted, even saying the name of Perón was banned (so much for liberty). The 1949 Constitution, as flawed as it was, was explicitly repealed because it enshrined worker’s rights on it. It was reactionary blodshed that started with the only air attack Buenos Aires ever experienced: by our own airforce, over civilian protesters.

And it happened again, and again. Every time Argentine democracy and workers tried to breath again, a coup choked it. Ask Frondizi, ask Illia. They weren’t couped by evil Peronists, let me tell you. The repression and violence, the supression of the will of the people, the endless attacks against the reforms that gave dignity to so many -remember, Onganía tried to privatize public education, and every military goverment did its best to undermine state institutions-, gave way to the cycle of violence* that ended in the coup of 1976.

I don’t think I need to tell you what happened then.

So, you say those rights would have come anyways. They wouldn’t, at least with no blodshed. What Perón achieved with his reforms was nothing short of a revolution (despite his famous “Sangre y Tiempo” saying) for the lower and middle classes that had lived under a oligarchy until then. The counterrevolution was not only expected, it was repeated and bloody. They wouldn’t have given away the rights you say “would have happened anyways”, they actively and violently worked to destroy them.

You want to see the true architects of Argentine misery? The true 70 years of decay? It was thanks to the military butchers, backed by the great oligarchs and the silent cooperation of conservative people, that sunk our country in an endless cycle of coups and countercoups for decades.

(Now, this is entirely my speculation, but take Argentina in the 30s and 40s. With the growing inequality and violence in those times, a revolution of some sort was almost inevitable. It could have happened democratically, as Peronism did, or it could have happened, much, much differently. And bloodier. And in such a case, our latest 80 years would have looked like an utopia from that perspective)

And also define “steal”; that’s quite a word. Because if you mean corruption, there has been no Argentine party free of corruption (and don’t think the militares weren’t corrupt either), and if you mean taxes, that’s literally how every state since the Sumerians has worked. Taxes in Argentina have a lot of problems, and some of the spending I disagree with. But I see them as absolutely necessary to maintaining our society.

*What happened in those years with Peronism itself was a bloody mess, in the most literal sense of the word and much of it can be blamed on Perón himself, which was far from the man he was in his first goverments. And that’s why, as much as I admire Perón’s achievements, I consider myself a “Justicialist” rather than a “Peronist”. I support the ideology, not the man. But it’s a semantic difference in this point of history.

[unibrowzz]

My 2020 reviews

All the cool kids were doing these so now I finally dragged my ass into doing them too lmao. 

Albania- Fall from the Sky

A song I swear cursed this whole contest from the moment it won Festivali i Këngës. Like with the shitshow this song caused I just knew the whole year was fucked. With half the fandom whining they didn’t get their first club song of the year to the other half smugly shoving it as their winner despite no other songs being around to compare it to, the whole fiasco just left me knowing that 2020 would end in tears, just hopefully not my own. As for the song, it’s lame. It’s a standard ballad with OBSCENE amounts of autotune, which is weird because the girl can actually sing pretty decently without it, so why they decided to make her sound like a damn computer is beyond me. And WHY did they translate it, haven't the past few years proven that Albania's better off leaving their songs in Albanian? 

Armenia- Chains on You

A bootleg Ariana Grande song, and a really shit one at that. The kind of song only people who think being young, gay and mean counts as having a personality would say is good.

Australia- Don’t Break Me

One of the few decent Australian entries (but that REALLY isn’t saying much coming from me, I barely care they’re in the contest by this point) but marred by a horribly untidy performance and lacklustre lyrics. At least it’s not fucking pop-opera, that’s all I can say. I’d rather listen to the sound of my face being dragged down the runway at Heathrow airport than be subjected to another Zero Gravity.

Austria- Alive

One of those pseudo-jazz dance songs, á la Olly Murs or Bruno Mars (I swear there’s a song like this in every recent contest). I mean, it’s good, but it’s just kinda meh since I’m kinda getting tired of this genre rearing its fedora-wearing head every time a new lineup rolls in.

Azerbaijan- Cleopatra

One of the “better” trashy entries this year, comprised of about five different musical genres, six ancient cultures being appropriated and absolutely zero class. Probably sounds at least 50% better when you’re absolutely steaming drunk and face down on the floor in the middle of a gay bar.

Belarus- Da Vidna

Somehow, this song sounds both very unique and original yet trite and average at the same time. I couldn’t decide whether listening to it was a new experience or if I’d heard it a million times before.

Belgium- Release Me

A song which just drones on till it ends. I would say it’s ripping off the song that won last year, but it forgot that having a chorus stops your song from being three minutes of snooze.

Bulgaria- Tears Getting Sober

A typical breathy mumble-girl song, AKA a genre I can’t fucking stand. Really don’t see the hype with this one, the melody is pretty but the vocals are out for lunch and it’s otherwise completely and utterly boring.

Croatia- Divlji Vjetre

One of the token big dramatic ballads you listen to once, enjoy, then forget about until Darius in the Discord server plays it one night whilst you’re hitting up the radio bot with requests. You’ll find that “nice, but forgettable” is a common theme for this year.

Cyprus- Running

Ironically Cyprus didn’t send a crappy Fuego knockoff for 2020, and I say ironically because a crappy Fuego knockoff would’ve actually stood out this year, and I say crappy because honestly Fuego wasn’t even all that great to begin with. "Running” itself is just one of those edgy tortured soul pop songs which, let’s be honest, would have been paired with an impressive performance which would’ve overshadowed how bland it is. Kind of like “You’re the Only One”. Or even Fuego for that matter.

Czech Republic- Kemama

Standard Afro-pop, a genre we don't often see at the contest so I'll let it pass. I feel like this is the kind of song that’s infinitely better live, and that it would’ve been one of those songs that suddenly became a frontrunner after the semi finals, but I guess we’ll never know eh?

Denmark- Yes 

The quintessential mid-10s Eurovision song. It's got guitars, happy people, Scandinavian origins… it’s just a typical radio guitar song, nothing special.

Estonia- What Love Is

I mean it's better than La Forza. Granted, the sound of someone pissing directly onto a microphone installed in the bowl of a toilet would sound better than La Forza but still. Going back to this song, it’s just... a standard Eastern-ballad with some very desperate lyrics. It feels kind of outdated, if I’m honest. Like something about this just reeks of 2011.

Finland- Looking Back

Yet another dreary, forgettable ballad. It comes to something when the best song they COULD have sent was a party song which sounded like it was from the mid 90s. At least that song was memorable. That said, this one at least has some decent lyrics. Bravo for that I guess.

France- Mon Alliée

France decides to say “fuck it” to being an underground fan-favourite and takes a leaf out of the UKs book by sending the same rent-a-Swede schlock they’ve been sending since 2015. I’m just confused as to why anyone in their right mind would choose to follow the UKs example but you do you France.

Germany- Violent Thing

A rehash of Sweden's entry from two years ago, but this time sung by Justin Bieber circa 2008. Kind of alright if you can stomach the singer's whiny voice, but otherwise pretty dull and kinda forgettable.

Greece- Superg!rl

Hello fellow kidz, we are hearing you like the girl power? The super heroes? The t3xt $p3ech? We made you song, please give us the votes *dabs*

Georgia- Take me as I Am

I mean… this sure is a choice. This feels like one of those songs that everyone memes on because the lyrics are kinda janky and the singer’s voice (and accent) take a bit of getting used to, but other than that it’s just one of those NQ songs for hipster fans to declare as their unironic winner at a later date. All in all this just feels like the male equivalent of one of those mid-10s fat acceptance women’s songs, only a lot shoutier and this time he has more flaws than not being skinny.

Iceland- Think About Things 

A bootleg George Ezra song, performed by a load of disinterested tumblr users in their pyjamas. Because if there’s one thing that sells me on a song, it’s being given the evils by a bunch of nerds who look like they’ll send me death threats for not agreeing with their Pokémon headcanons. To be fair, the song is kind of groovy since it sounds so 70s, but the performance is very off-putting to people who aren’t in the Eurovision loop. And also people who are, because I sure as Hell don’t see the appeal in this myself and this whole performance just feels like Save Your Kisses for Me without the charm. I feel like this would’ve come second or third, definitely with a lot of televotes but either the jury would’ve dragged it down or it wouldn’t have scored enough televotes to win.

Ireland- Story of my Life

A song that’s at LEAST ten years out of date by this point, think like an early Katy Perry, Jessie J or Avril Lavigne song. I’ll forgive it because even though it sounds like it should’ve been entered in 2013 (at the latest), it at least evokes some nostalgic memories of shitty school discos and holiday parks.

Israel- Feker Libi

The female equivalent of the Czech song. Unsurprisingly, people went wild for it when it was released. I guess only women are allowed to sing Afro-pop at this contest. Like with the Czech song, I’ll forgive it since Afro-pop is a cool genre anyway, and even though this is just another club song I can at least see myself dancing to it.

Italy- Fai Rumore

Well, at least my wish of “Italy sends a typical power ballad devoid of anything the mainstream fandom likes” finally came true. It was pretty refreshing to have a year where people weren’t shoving Italy’s entry up my nose left right and centre. In terms of my actual thoughts I can’t deny that the guy has a tremendous voice, but for some reason the song just doesn’t… click with me. I guess I like my male Italian singers a little more gruff and raspy, if you know what I mean. They gotta sound like they smoke at LEAST five packets of cigarettes a day for me to take notice.

Malta- All of my Love

Listen I am 100% rooting for Destiny Chukunyere to win this contest some day but man was this song a disappointment. It feels so… un-special and generic, like it gets the job done and that’s it. It’s not the stand-up-and-belt-it-out soul anthem I’d hoped for, it’s just… there.

Moldova- Prison

All I remember about this song is that it vaguely reminds me of that one Meccano song about the gypsy who makes a deal with the moon or something. And I’ve TRIED to remember more about what it sounds like, trust me.

Latvia- Still Breathing

The one horrible weird song you get every year which overuses strobe effects to the point it comes with an epilepsy warning. Would be bearable if it wasn't for the singer’s insistence that this is actually some feminist masterpiece when it's really just a self-empowerment club song about the singer fingerbanging herself over the fact she writes music.

Lithuania- On Fire

One of the songs everyone thought was going to win at one point, even though it seems like a surefire non-qualifier to me. It’s one of those weird entries, but not the kind of over the top, batshit insane, you’d-have-to-be-drunk-to-enjoy-it weird, the kind of subdued surreal weird. Like this is weed instead of LSD or cocaine weird. Granted my mom, who I consider to be a "typical" Eurofan, actually really liked this song when she saw it in the recaps, so who knows maybe this would have done well with televoters after all.

Netherlands- Grow

I appreciate this song for how artsy and clever it is with its structure, since it starts off acapella and the instrumental builds up with the song until it stops suddenly, symbolising a person’s growth from a child into an adult, and ending suddenly with their death (Geddit? The song’s called “Grow”). But it feels like the kind of song that would be lost on a Eurovision audience. The juries would have taken note, for sure, but the televote… let’s be honest, they’d have been too busy drunk voting for Russia to care about anything else.

North Macedonia- You

Well, it's better than the miserable dirge they sent last year, but given how I'd rather pleasure myself with a steak knife than listen to that song, that really isn't saying much. Going back to “You”, it really just feels like a diet version of Switzerland’s entry from last year, combined with Sweden’s song from 2018. What I’m saying is it’s your average “I’m a man in a club and I want to dance with and probably fuck this hot girl I just met” song, which I a new genre I just made up. You’re welcome.

Norway- Attention 

One of those songs you appreciate because it sounds nice and the singer has a good voice, but instantly forget because it’s really not all that interesting. If I sound like I'm repeating myself, welcome to Eurovision 2020.

Poland- Empires

“Rise Like a Phoenix” but sung by a wannabe Adele and not a mascara-wearing Jesus in a dress. Like a lot of other songs on this list, it’s just average across the board, likeable when it’s on, but instantly forgettable as soon as the next song comes on.

Portugal: Medo de Sentir

Pretty, but also similar to their ill-fated 2018 entry, only with a bit more energy and less pink hair. What I’m saying is this would have been another NQ unless the crowd who enjoy subtle ambience music come in to save it like they did with Slovenia's entry last year.

Romania- Alcohol You

See Bulgaria, because this is practically the same song. It’s just as dreary, just as badly sung (if not worse because holy shit this girl sounds like she’s being suffocated), and I suppose you COULD excuse that by saying she’s drunk or hungover… but I don’t want to listen to someone ungracefully mumble into a microphone for three minutes.

Russia- Uno

A classic big camp party song, the kind of song people who haven’t watched Eurovision since 2003 think wins on the regular. I can see why people would like it (especially in this boring year lmao, I applaud Russia for taking the opportunity to loosen their corset and just send a complete mess instead of their usual clinical vote grabs), but it’s just not something I enjoy. It's the song that plays into the misconception that Eurovision is just a clown show for drunk people, like this is just here to be that one flash-in-the-pan meme song that only entertains people who don’t really care about Eurovision until the day before it airs. Kind of like the old ladies they sent in 2012 (remember them?).

San Marino- Freaky!

San Marino, in true Sammarinese fashion, have yet again sent a decade-ambiguous song which sounds like it was either released in 1978 or 2003. I feel like this would have been one of those songs which could have surprised us if it had a really wacky, creative performance (think like Moldova in 2018), but this is San Marino so you know that would never happen.

Serbia- Hasta la Vista

Insert unoriginal joke about a decade wanting their shitty trend back right here. Okay maybe that’s a bit harsh, especially considering how this song is actually, yanno, unique in comparison to the rest of this year. But it still feels weirdly dated, in a way where I can’t decide whether it sounds like it belongs in 1998 or 2018. I suppose girl power ages a song regardless of when it was released.

Slovenia- Voda

Yet another standard Balkan-European power ballad which you appreciate because it’s well sung, but forget the moment it ends because it’s kinda boring. … Does anyone else have a bit of deja vu?

Spain- Universo

For some reason I feel like this song is shilling itself out to someone but I have no idea who. Aside from the horny people voting solely because the singer is moderately attractive even with that wretched Jedward haircut.

Sweden- Move

Imagine soul but… boring.

Switzerland- Répondez Moi

Imagine Arcade but… in French.

United Kingdom- My last Breath

Not the best the UK could have done, but it’s at least a modern offering unlike the residual dregs of the mid-90s that we sent throughout the 2010s. It’s definitely a bit too generic to have done any better than maybe 15th, but hey at least the cancellation means we won’t have to see it not do as well as the BBC thinks it’s entitled to do, prompting a billion clickbait articles about how Brexit somehow affected our performance.

Ukraine- Solovey

At long last we come to something you probably weren't expecting: a song I actually really like. Which is weird because I usually don't care for or don't like whatever Ukraine vomits into the contest, so I was pleasantly surprised to find a song I liked from them in such a weak year. This song isn’t for everyone, it’s white noise singing which is a very acquired taste, but this is honestly the only 2020 song I find myself coming back to over and over. And it’s in Ukrainian too, so you don’t have to put up with their usual mangled English offerings.

[a-method-in-it]

[Image ID: A tweet from Jon Fareau's blue checked account, @jon favs: The first on-term president in thirty years and the first one to lose the popular vote twice. Congrats on making history @realDonaldTrump Posted at 5:42 on Nov 7, 2020] He's also the first president since Jimmy Carter to lose re-election only one term after their party took the White House. US politics tend to be a pendulum. It's why the president's party almost always loses seats in the mid-terms. And it's why, even back in the days when Democrats had the majority in Congress for almost 50 straight consecutive years (with a few brief exceptions), the presidency still changed hands regularly. Because people get sick of the party in power after enough time. As a VERY general rule, people are reluctant to vote out an incumbent, but usually after eight years, swing voters are tired of the people in charge and want a major change because swing voters are the worst. And so when your party had the White House for 8 years, it's an uphill battle to take it again. Which is a long-winded way of saying that when HW Bush lost re-election in 1992, it was partly just the law of gravity; after 12 years, swing voters were jaded about Republicans. (And also Ross Perot didn't help the Republican cause) But to lose as a first term president who took back the White House for your party? That hasn't happened since Jimmy Carter got bowled over by the Reagan machine in 1980. As frustrating as it is to think of 70 million people voting for this man, even after everything -- and as much as we need to confront the rot and corruption and evil forces at work that made that happen -- do not forget that this victory genuinely was a huge deal. It defied political gravity in a big way. On November 3, and on every day leading up to it as people stood in lines and dropped off ballots and mailed in their votes -- during this election, we were weighted down by voter suppression and misinformation and foreign interference and a rightwing media machine and militias and police violence, and yet even with all that tied around our ankles, we still defied gravity, and we flew.

[sexydeathparty]

Female Ukrainian MPs Say 'Crazy Putin Will Fail' During Visit To Westminster

Ukrainian MPs struck a defiant tone today as they told Vladimir Putin he would never win and that their country was more united than ever in the face of his aggression.

The four female MPs, who were granted permission to leave the war-torn country to meet UK politicians, gave a stark assessment of the damage Putin’s invasion had wreaked on their nation and its people.

Alyona Shkrum from the Batkivschyna party urged the Russian people to stand up to Putin — whom she branded the  “new Hitler” — while Lesia Vasylenko of the Holos party said the president had “stolen the childhoods of millions of children across Ukraine”.

Russia should also be forced to pay for “all the damage” and losses it had caused in Ukraine, the MPs said.

Vasylenko said Ukrainians would not be cowed by Russia’s violence and said her message to the president was that “it will always be glory to Ukraine, glory to the heroes, the truth will always prevail”.

“Ukrainians will keep fighting united as one until the very last Russian soldier leaves Ukrainian territory and goes back to Russia,” she added.

It is now considered treason for any MP to leave Ukraine, but the speaker of the parliament granted the women permission to come to the UK where they will later meet with prime minister Boris Johnson to ramp up pressure for further military and humanitarian assistance.

The MPs spoke to journalists as harrowing reports emerged from the besieged city of Mariupol, where Russia bombed a theatre that was sheltering up to 1,500 civilians.

They said Mariupol was now “90% destroyed” and compared it to the Syrian city of Aleppo, which was relentlessly carpet-bombed by Putin alongside president Bashar al-Assad during the civil war in 2016.

Mariupol’s residents have been left with no food and have been forced to melt snow and extract from sewage systems to obtain water, they said, while babies were being born next to stockpiled bodies of wounded civilians. 

Vasylenko said that 400,000 people live in Mariupol but soon “that city will be no more”.

Shkrum also issued an urgent plea for Russian people to stop Putin, who she said wanted to destroy the “entire security architecture” of the world.

#Kyiv. 8 of March. Our soldiers at check points give women roses ❤️ just because. My incredible #Ukrainians, our defenders and wonderful soldiers… I have no words, just tears of happiness…Hate will always loose to kindness, love and humanity. Please be careful. Please be safe🙏 pic.twitter.com/UASjWGZZl3

— Alona Shkrum (@Aly_shkrum) March 8, 2022

I’m one of the 9 Ukrainian MPs who is in safety of the @PACE_News hemicycle today. Unbearable feeling, as 400 of my colleagues gather in the #Russia targeted parliamentary building in #Kyiv to vote on laws needed to save #Ukrainepic.twitter.com/42BwZYwi8N

— Lesia Vasylenko (@lesiavasylenko) March 15, 2022

“My message to the Russian people would be that you had been fighting a Nazi evil 70 years ago and now you’ve created a new Hitler.

“They need to start asking questions about where their soldiers are going because their soldiers have been lied to.

“All of that is a crazy mad man in a bunker bubble which destroys the whole world as we know it.

“He should be stopped and he will be stopped. The question is when.”

Putin has been condemned across the world for his indiscriminate targeting of civilians, and today the MPs also highlighted how his forces were committing acts of sexual violence against Ukrainian women.

Vasylenko said atrocities were being committed against the “most vulnerable of the vulnerable”, including elderly women who have been physically unable to leave their homes.

She said there had been reports of women being killed after being raped by Russian soldiers and that some had decided to take their own lives.

Vasylenko also spoke of reports of traumatised children and warned that there would be a “generation of Ukrainians growing up with the burden of war already on their shoulders”.

Many were were already experiencing panic attacks and symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Despite the destruction, the MPs said they had been encouraged by the support it had received from the international community even though they wanted more to be done.

“This is the worst of times and it is also the best of times,” Shkrum said.

“I feel super inspired having seen so much good from people, and so much bravery and so much unity.

“It has brought out the best in the whole nation.

“The feeling is completely unreal of what is going on...but I think we will become so much stronger on the other side.”

Related...

James Cleverly Says It's "Ridiculously Distasteful" To Compare Russia With Saudi Arabia

Russia Bombed Mariupol Theatre Sheltering 'Hundreds', Ukrainian Officials Say

UK Accuses Putin Of Using 'Smoke And Mirrors' In Peace Talks

from HuffPost UK - Athena2 - All Entries (Public) https://ift.tt/liDbQsR via IFTTT

[dallasareaopinion]

An open letter to all the Republicans who voted against the election certification

Dear Senator Cruz, Senator Hawley, Representative Brooks et al,

Now the obvious question is why, but lets get to a more specific why.

You have watched a certain person lie to the American public on a regular basis for years. You have watched this person insult, chide, bully, not take responsibility, point fingers, no shame or regret, and generally tell you that if you do not tow his line, there is something wrong with you.

And if you don’t, your reward is hate. Mike Pence towed the line, backed the President and when it came to a very simple job, something that was so basic and completely ceremonial, the President threw him under the bus. No responsibility, Pence did what he was supposed to do, nothing less, nothing more, but the President decided his life was not worth anything. Oops they guy who says he is pro-life, endangered lives for his ego. Only for his ego.

So what gives? Why do you think supporting him will be beneficial? As soon as you have to make a decision between Trump or something more important or something even completely out of your control such as opening envelopes on the Floor of the House, you are going to lose with him. 

This person does not care about anyone so why do you think you are different? Why do you think that if you jump on these hand grenade of lies, that you will benefit in any way shape or form? What makes you think by any stretch of the imagination that somehow if you support Trump something good will happen to you?

The headline now, right now as I write is Trump is telling his staff not to pay Rudy Giuliani’s legal fees. Right now, I wouldn’t pay his fees either the way he has been acting, however, Mr. Giuliani has been out front for the President, now that there is trouble Trumping is dropping the Mayor off the proverbial cliff. 

And do you think you are different? You think somehow that you can rise up above the fray and be Trump’s hero. You are not. You are expendable. Your support, your help, your life does not mean a damn to him. One slip, one falter and he will unleash hate upon you. He will encourage others to hate you. 

And all this for a person that is encouraging people that hate to support him. So what are your expectations? 

And for Senator Cruz specifically, this man insulted your family and now you kowtow to him. Why? You are not a man. He did not apologize, offer amends, or what, nothing, absolutely nothing and you go around touting his lies that the election was stolen, hoping some crumbs of support from hate groups will fall your way, that you won’t get “primaried” by his supporters. You represent Texas and you cannot stand up for yourself, so basically you do not represent Texas. I would say you only represent yourself, but since you are jumping on Trump, you do not even represent yourself. You are only a tail, something that clings to the rest of the body that wags when you make the head happy. You should resign and let someone who can stand up for what is right represent our state. 

Are all 70 million Americans that voted for Trump, right wing extremists? No, but enough are that any  elected Republican that supported the lie that the election was stolen is supporting hate and is complicit in destroying our Constitution. I have said it many times, that most of the Trump supporters have let themselves be mislead, but they are not evil. Unfortunately there is evil that supports Trump. The white nationalists, the neo nazis, right wing extremists that stormed the Capital or other acts of sedition do not care about Trump as a President, they like they can practice mayhem because he is President. These same people do not care that you support the President. Remember the chants about Mike Pence during the storming of the Capitol Building. The very same Mike Pence that supported the President unflinchingly for four years. In one hour all that almost went to waste as his life became in jeopardy.

And so why do you support the lie, the person? Do you think the mob that stormed the Capitol will care who you are if you are in their way? They won’t, they don’t and neither does he. He does not care about you. He only wants you to say out loud the words that protect him because he cannot protect himself. He is not person enough. And you may have noticed I have said person in many cases not man. That is intentional because I cannot call Trump a man, much less an adult. 

He has no plan, no strength except what you feed his narcissism, no values, no moral compass, no compassion, no redeeming qualities as a human, so why do you support him. He is all talk, no action, except action that benefits him.And in most cases someone else did the heavy lifting, he doesn’t even do the light lifting. Something goes wrong and it is your fault, never his, so why on God’s green earth do you think you will benefit supporting him? Or there may be a fleeting moment when the crowds cheer, but in the long run the crowds will stop cheering for him. The extremists will still exist and look for a newer more debase leader, then where do you stand? Are you asking for their support then?

Most Americans that supported Trump if told the truth will be angry, but they will come to accept the truth because it is the truth. And truth does win out. They will regroup and look for a new leader, one that actually represents their dreams. The hate groups will look for a leader that represents their dreams. So again whose support are you going to chase? If you tell the truth you will get the support you want, if you continue the lie, what does that say about you? 

So now I ask why?

[tpaigeme]

Gosh darn it!

Come on all you rebels and patriots and whistle blowers What the hell is going on?

70 million of your votes have been cast aside!

And what are you gonna do about it?

Come on all you billionaires who got rich quick. Are you feeling a little guilty? I know that some of you still have a conscience. What are you going to do about it?

This is for you! You can’t hide behind your stockbroker’s advice your financial planner’s advice and never leave room for a genuine giveaway. Always got to be something in it for you?

Well guess what, there is. More than your stinking little tax break.

How many breaks do you need do you really need all this pampering and massaging?

Step up. Do you want to get to heaven? Does that not concern you at all? The hereafter?

I’m directing this to you from God.

It’s just you and God now. And your conscience speaking to you right now.

Do you want to take care of your family? Big deal. Everybody does. How do you take care of your family? Really. Do you want to leave them something? How about a good name?

How about doing something for your fellow man? Would that not enhance your family name? Benefit your children? Don’t be stupid! You know how they talk about rich people. And for good reason.

But don’t be like lying Bill Gates. Remember this is about you and God here now.

And your conscience.

Sleep on it. But be quick about it.

It’s showtime for pony boy.

Have you looked up Numbers 7:77 yet?

😂

Here’s what I’m working on today.

****

#DeliverUsFromEvil

Visualize a throng of people circling the Capitol praying the Lord‘s Prayer..for our country...

“Deliver US from evil.”

“Hallowed be thy name.” Etc.

#TLP777

TY

🙂🙏

[badgop]

The Republican Party is a Killing Machine

Conservatism has never really been a political ideology to begin with, merely an empty screen for rural voters to project all their racism, xenophobia, hatred and angst upon and watch it unfold like the world's most horrific movie.

Their entire platform is whatever benefits the top 1% and industry. Their bizarre pastiche of libertarians, evangelicals, rural poor, working class and wealthy idiots will gladly sway whichever way the wind blows, because they have impossible visions of different Americas-that-never-can-be and happily repress the knowledge that the GOP can literally never bring any of their dystopian fantasies to fruition.

They have no good ideas. They have nothing to offer the American people. They are abject failures, the winners of popularity contests in racist sinkholes put into positions of responsibility magnitudes greater than their capabilities and are inoculated from the consequences of their continual failures and disappointments by what may be the most willfully and stubbornly ignorant population of voters ever to disgrace the planet.

Since the start of this century, Republicans have been responsible for a truly heinous catalog of horrors. The Iraq and Afghan war. The PATRIOT act. Donald Trump. Look, we had a tape of a Republican candidate saying on tape that he could grab women's pussies because he was powerful and 60 million people with mothers, sisters and daughters voted to give that guy MORE power!

Republicans were extremely harsh on Russia... until they just simply allowed Trump to change their 2016 GOP platform to tolerate Putin's annexation on Ukraine.

They claim to be for small business, and yet they unilaterally grant extraordinary power and government protections to MASSIVE corporations that always act against the American peoples' best interest. Why revoke net neutrality? Because they were paid to! Why revoke the clean air and water protections? Because they were paid to! Why confirm Betsy DeVos to dismantle education? Because they were paid to!

They never sponsor bills that actually make life better for a majority of Americans. Single player health care would. By almost all expert opinion, single payer would be cheaper and far better for a majority of Americans. Who oppose it? Republicans.

Who oppose a common-sense minimum wage rate increase? Republicans. 

Who oppose common-sense food education for children and the public? Republicans.

Everywhere you look, in every place we fall behind the rest of the civilized world, you’ll find a Republican straining to hold us back. They do nothing purposeful. 

For eight years they opposed Obama not even on policy, but literally because it made them look better to do so. They tolerated the entire "birther" conspiracy theory simply because it was useful for them, even though it dramatically debased the professionalism of their party.

And now, Trump is an unmitigated disaster, a wrecking ball tearing giant holes in his own policy, and yet Devin Nunes and Republicans in the Senate are doing their best to delay and stall an investigation into his conduct and his very possible TREASON. Why would an American political party deny a universal consensus among our intelligence community that the POTUS is working with Putin's Russia?

There are far, far too many people caught up in the moment of this that have not yet gained the perspective to see how crazy and toxic the modern GOP is. They are a blight and a cancer on the Earth. 

There's no reason to tolerate 60 million people who vote for a demented 70 year old who accused the last President of being born in Kenya and wiretapping his tower. That's insane. That's the sort of behavior that if a normal person did it you would really consider getting him professional help. And you made him President.

How do you want the left to work with that? Why am I supposed to tolerate people who want to teach creationism in school, who legitimately think Obama was a Muslim infiltrator who wanted to steal your guns? Who think universal health care is a liberal scheme and a great evil? Who deny man-made climate change exists? Who think building a 3,000 mile long wall at a cost of billions is a reasonable solution?

These aren't ideological differences between liberals and conservatives anymore. This is a dangerous and deeply disturbing divorce from reality. This is a party parasitically consumed by conspiracy and madness and hate. Democrats are pretty much center/right leaning right now, at least compared to the rest of the world.

Conservatives by contrast are spiraling wildly into fascism. Trump asked Comey to pledge his loyalty and wanted him to help him lock up journalists. That isn't an ideological difference you can ask us to compromise on. That is a outright betrayal of every freedom America is supposed to stand for. That's treason and betrayal of the first amendment.

And that is what the conservatives are today. Trump was the champion you chose. Trump was what conservatives nominated to represent their party, and he is legitimately insane. His policies are heinous atrocities that do massive damage in broad swaths across the country. He betrays Republicans, he betrays his base, with a sort of callous disregard for the reality he lives in that is the hallmark of the truly insane.

[ktley1986]

My husband isn’t nerdy, at all.  Which is okay because I happen to be nerdy enough for both of us-I love comics, video games, Star Wars, Harry Potter, Battlestar Galactica, etc.  I love all of it, mainly because I happen to know a lot about history and world events and the main theme of history is that people are super shitty to each other, all the time, usually without very good reason.  And once you know that, sometimes the only way to stay sane is to find solace in imaginary worlds-maybe that’s not always the healthiest thing, but at least if someone is cruel in one of those worlds they usually get a satisfying comeuppance, which sadly, rarely happens in the real world.   Now that we’re all suitably depressed, Mike and I were watching The Phantom Menace the other day and he made the grave error in judgement to remark that he “didn’t remember this movie being that bad.  People like it when it came out!” I mean, is that technically true? Yes.  I definitely enjoyed these movies when they came out as a teenager (I was also afflicted with a debilitating crush on Hayden Christensen, which has since died a death of natural causes) and I will stand by that, because I didn’t know any better.  Now with the benefit of experience and foresight I realize the serious damage done to the Star Wars universe and the overwhelmingly potential of what could have been.  Because it’s fresh in my mind after having given an impromptu mini-lecture to my husband earlier, I will explain my problems with Episodes 1-3 of the Star Wars film franchise. The whole Space Jesus thing You know what I’m talking about-the fact that Anakin Skywalker doesn’t have a dad, but is basically just the product of the Force and his long suffering, cipher of a mother figure.  That doesn’t even kind of make sense and it’s so lazy and shitty as to be actually insulting.  Let’s also remember that he’ll eventually become Darth Vader, the ultimate bad guy (and if you’re currently feeling the soft and fuzzies for him, remember he did kill a whole temple full of children.)  He’s such a special snowflake, he’s totally selfless, he’s the most amazing pod racer or whatever, he’s basically Valentina from Season 9 of Drag Race, and she turned out crazy too.  He just needs to compare himself to Selena to make the transformation complete.

Obi Wan to Anakin, honestly.

My problem with that is this could have been a much more interesting story, in the hands of someone who gave a shit about storytelling or the emotional arc of a character.  What if he was just a regular person, who had a dad and a mother who wasn’t window dressing for made up emotional issues later, but maybe he was kind of a reckless dick, then they could have made a more interesting story about how some people aren’t fit to have power, even if they are technically proficient.  It could have been an interesting twist on the idea that all Jedi are totally perfect peace keeping good guys, but what if he was able to convince them he was, but in reality, he was actually a dick?  At least that would make more sense later when he in fact does turn out to be a dick.   The whole Jango/Boba Fett story arc Famously George Lucas had this whole series written out back in the 70’s but the studio was only interested in making episodes 4-6, since the storyline was more cohesive.  I believe that’s true, and I even believe that a lot of the nonsense he put into the first 3 episodes was present in those early drafts, but I can’t be expected to believe that the basis for the clones was Jango Fett, and that his clone son would grow up to be Boba Fett, kick ass bounty hunter extraordinaire.  I get that Boba Fett was a wildly popular character, despite having zero lines as far as I can recall, and getting knocked into the pit of Sarlacc to be digested slowly over a thousand years, he’s my brother’s favorite character, so by default one of mine too, but honestly?  This is endemic of a wider problem in the first three movies in my opinion which is shoe-horning in fan favorite characters rather than making new and interesting ones which serve the story.  Why the everloving fuck is young Anakin making his dirt farmer slave mom a protocol droid?  Does she have a lot of use for translations of over 6 million forms of communication?  Lucas just wanted to take what worked from the original movies and force it into the new ones, although to be fair his stab at original characters did give us Jar Jar Binks, so maybe it’s a good call after all.   Darth Vader’s reasoning for becoming Darth Vader This is where it really hits home for me how much cooler this story could have been-the transformation into one of the most iconic villains of all time was just so lame in these movies.  For one thing, the romance between Padme and Anakin is painful and embarrassing, and this is coming from someone with a fairly comprehensive crush on Anakin.  So much cringe though, seriously.  But making it about him thinking that his wife might potentially die, is just stupid, especially because he ends up choking the fuck out of her.  Again, this is where the story could have been served by establishing him as a bit of a dick from the beginning, instead of a heroic space Jesus type character.  I mean, I am very much in love with my husband, probably irrationally so, but it would take a lot more than the premonition that he might, maybe, potentially die to make me murder an entire Jedi Temple full of younglings. And I don’t even like kids.  And then he just hates Obi Wan for not letting him live his best life or whatever, I mean they could have gone the route of him thinking there was a relationship between him and Padme, although I find the whole turning into an evil warlord over a lady to be one of the tired-est tropes on the planet.  It could have been so much better! Midi-chlorians Just no. So much politics and talk about trade negotiations. Oy! I get that George Lucas doesn’t really get how to write strong female characters, and I guess it’s kind of flattering that he thinks women’s strength is in the political arena, but man I do not give a fuck about trade embargos in the real world, so I definitely don’t give a fuck about trade negotiations in space.  I watched these movies for the first time as a young person and I could not have told you one thing about why the Nemoidians were doing, or what exactly was going on in the space Senate.  The beauty of the original trilogy is that things were simple, motivations were clear and no one had to put anything to a vote.

I don’t think the whole thing is awful-Darth Maul is pretty sick, General Grievous is cool, Christopher Lee is always a welcome addition to any movie, now that I’m older I can definitely appreciate young Ewan McGregor

I need to resolve my feelings about bearded Ewan McGregor

Now I’ve stalled out. Huh.  I know there are probably parts of it that are redeemable, but I can’t remember any, and I can’t be bothered to actually watch it again.  My point being is that it could have been so much better, if they were interested in telling a great story instead of making millions of dollars in merch.  Does anyone else remember all the merch associated with this, you couldn’t even buy a bag of chips without Jar Jar Binks dumb face looking at you.  While this isn’t something I would normally say, but I’m glad that Disney has the reins now, and they’ve already made some great Star Wars movies, sans mention of midi-chlorians which personally leaves me excited again to visit a galaxy far, far away.

My Epic Retcon of Darth Vader’s Backstory

Okay, so he’s just a normal kid, who has a mother AND a father, both of which are fleshed out characters, and he gets selected for Jedi training in a normal, non-mystical space Jesus way.  He turns out to be super great, a special snowflake, blah blah but then (plot twist!) he falls in love with another Jedi, and they have a clandestine affair until she gets pregnant with their baby.  Now, we all know Jedi aren’t supposed to have attachments blah blah, but they never explore what happens if you did, so it could be an interesting way to explore that idea.  So, the female Jedi (which really shouldn’t we get some female Jedis by now? Seriously?) refuses to tell the council who the father is, and she gets banished, without Anakin being aware of it until it’s already over.  She dies in childbirth, totally not the Jedi’s fault, but Anakin doesn’t know that, and that’s why her children are taken away and given to other families.  Anakin either finds out that Obi Wan took his children and that’s why they have their big battle where Obi chops his legs off and roasts the rest of him once he realizes that Anakin is the father and he’s so pissed at this point that he is going to try to kill him.  See, I literally just pulled that out of nowhere and managed to shoe horn a lady Jedi (which this series badly needs, come on!) and no mention of midi-chlorians! Is it a perfect story, no, but does it contain no mention of trade negotiations and Jar Jar binks, yes!

[peterinpa]

The LYING Illegitimate President

Why is it that the mainstream media keeps referring to The Donald's lies as "falsehoods" and allowing them to continue promulgating "alternative facts"? This is absurd! He may be president by accident, but holding that office does not allow one to lie every day, every hour, to anyone that will listen, and then have us sugarcoat it as a "falsehood". He has changed the narrative around the office and around how we are governed. Unless he and his lilly white Trumpettes are held 100% accountable, eventually his alternate reality will become our reality. We have allowed the creation of double and triple standards because of him, and are institutionalizing the rigging of the system he railed against. But he was right. Except it was rigged FOR him. Does one person out there really believe that The Donald would be silent if Barack Obama refused to release his tax returns? Or if Obama Tweeted about his half brother's sales business? Hell, the man had a birth certificate but the ass harassed him for 6 F**KING YEARS about it, then blamed Hillary as the one who questioned his birthplace and kept the issue alive. As Donald himself would say: WRONG! As for Mrs. Clinton, I am despondent. What a phenomenal opportunity we had, and blew it for all the wrong reasons. The Clinton Foundation did nothing except provide important resources around the globe to combat things like, oh, AIDS. No quid pro quo was ever established beyond the lunatic ravings of jealous white guys like Trump. And let's not forget -ever- that Republicans in Congress spent HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS investigating everything about both of them, from the suicide of Vince Foster, which they suggested was murder for hire by the Clintons, to hundreds of thousands of emails to and from Hillary as Secretary of State, to who paid for Chelsea's wedding. And they discovered that Bill lied about getting a blow job in the Oval Office and then blamed Hillary for that. Puhleaz! And now when we know the Russians conspired to elect Trump; when there is evidence that the Trump campaign pressured and forced the FBI to make a false and derogatory statement 10 days before the election; when there is substantial, irrefutable evidence that Republican efforts to SUPPRESS voter participation in urban, low income areas by means nearly as insidious as poll taxes SUCCEEDED; when Trump LIES about massive voter fraud to set the stage for even more voter suppression; when he maligns and creates not so subtle veiled threats against every level of the judiciary; when he and his minions promote his daughters for profit products in clear violation of ethics standards and potentially breaking laws and he himself reaps profits, the magnitude of which we will never know because he ignores nearly 50 years of tradition by refusing to release his tax returns: what do we do? Do we launch independent investigations to determine just how corrupt the individuals associated with him are? Do we try to find out why there were so many campaign officials with ties to the Russian government and Putin? HELL NO! There isn't enough there to investigate, our Republican "leaders" tell us. We must rally to prevent that evil Elizabeth Warren from reading a letter from Correta Scott King and defend our racist friend who now holds the highest law enforcement position in the land. So what do we, what do I do? Continue to protest publicly in the streets every action he attempts to "make America great again" (really code for make America 1950 again, when racism was institutionalized and white men made huge corporate profits, their women washed and presses their clothes and provided their wifely "duty" every Saturday night, and everyone else cleaned up after them for below poverty wages)? HELL YES! We take to the streets EVERY TIME! Prove that we are not 'hired' by the liberal elite to protest. Prove that we are patriotic Americans who will stand up to this abomination of a man-boy who, at age 70, is so insecure about himself that he must pay people to travel with him and give him standing ovations. And call our city council member, state representative, state senator, governor, US Congressperson, US Senator, party committee person in our precinct. Call them. Call them again, and again, and again, and show up when they hold "town hall" meetings. They and their staff must know us by name and by sight, and we must tell them over and over that what he is trying to do us WRONG. It is NOT America. That he must be stopped from implementing the policies that a majority of Americans rejected in November. Yes. A majority of Americans REJECTED! We must change the system for it IS broken. He is unstable and clearly suffers from mental health problems. Eventually, he will cross a line that even the hypocrite Republicans cannot ignore, and he will be forced from office. Only we the people can provide the absolute check against this abomination. We have some support from the judicial branch, but judges generally provide wide latitude to presidential authority, so they are likely to only halt the most egregious atrocities. It is up to us, and the first few weeks of this disaster shows he cannot tolerate those who disagree, even as a form of comedy. Ask yourself this: if Hillary had done only a small fraction of the divisive and unethical things he's done, just a few, wouldn't we already be hearing calls for impeachment? And if you voted for him, can you REALLY look yourself in the mirror every night and tell yourself that he is better than her? This is our gut check moment. We can't go back and change what has happened. But we can limit the damage he can do, and we can make sure a demagogue like him never makes it again. Follow your conscience; our love of this country must prevail. The alternative is unacceptable, and that alternative is one Donald J Trump, Apprentice and Imposter.

[vhalyria]

Adolf Hitler and Donald Trump - a dangerous parity?

I’m worried. I’m so worried that I can barely sleep at night, and it’s giving me stomach cramps. Because we’ve been here before, and we need to talk about this. 

So, my unprofessional, biased ass sat down for a few hours and tried to collect everything it knew about Hitler and Trump, in order to see if it’s just a bad feeling that I’m having, or if my fear is justified.

As I said, I am not a journalist or anything else, I simply did some research alongside the stuff I still remembered from my history classes and books. Sources can be seen at the end, although many of them are in german, sorry.

I won’t go much into the reasons behind Hitler’s and Trump’s behavior, because I don’t care what turned them into the people they were/are. Also, I tried to keep this as neutral as possible, only relying on facts (and no, those aren’t alternative). There are probably a few things I’ve forgotten about, but feel free to add them!

1.) Where did they come from?

Hitler: Adolf Hitler was the oldest of three siblings, born in Austria in 1889. Growing up, he started to care less and less about school and eventually dropped out without graduation. After that, he applied for a place at an art school, multiple times, but got rejected every time. He has spent a few years in poverty until he joined the army in WWI. After that, he joined the NSDAP and eventually became their leader. The rest should be known.

Trump: Donald Trump was born in 1976, as the fourth of five children. His father, the son of german immigrants, was a real estate businessman. After graduating from High School, Trump studied economics and eventually took on his father’s business. He joined the Republicans in 1987, and became their candidate for the election in 2015.

2.) How was it possible for them to become so popular/get voted?

Hitler: Hitler made the people like him because he was using their anger and their fears for his own means. After WWI, Germany was financially and socially destroyed. The Treaty of Versaille asked them to pay a lot of money for reparation, they had to reduce their military force to an absolute minimum and due to the high sanctions and the new yorker stock crash, an inflation came over the country, causing many people to lose their homes and all their savings. The people were scared about their future and felt betrayed by the government, because it was them who had to pay for everything. Radical groups arised and Hitler not only recognized those fears; he built his policy on them. He promised to create many new jobs, that the countries that won the war will pay them back because they were the guilty ones in his eyes, that no one will have to be homeless and hungry anymore. He promised to take revenge on those countries, even if that meant starting another war. Hitler promised to “give Germany its pride back”, and people believed him.

Trump: The rich are getting richer, the poor are losing what little they have left. That’s how people in the US felt when Trump got voted. They didn’t trust their government, even having multiple jobs wasn’t enough to pay the rent anymore and on top of that, terrorists kill people all over the world. The citizens were afraid and worried, they wanted to find a way out of their misery and feel safe. And that’s what Trump promised to provide them; he promised to make “America great again”, to create work for the american people so that no one has to be poor anymore. He said he would lead the fight against terrorism, and his people wouldn’t have to be scared anymore. Trump promised “America comes first”, and the people believed him. 

3.) Personality traits that made people like them 

Hitler: The one thing that every history book and every documentation about Hitler never leave out; he was a great rhetoritian. He was able to inspire to people, to make them believe everything, to cheer for anything he says. He was confident and determined.

Another thing that made him popular, was that he gave his people someone else to blame for their misery than themselves or the government; the jews. According to Hitler, they were at fault for everything bad that has ever happened in Germany, and people felt comforted by that thought. It takes the blame from them by assigning it to someone else; it made living easier.

By that, Hitler also managed to make the germans feel like a community; united by hate towards a minority, but united, still. He fed them the illusion that he would lead them to wealth and happiness, and that everything will be turning out greatly for them, as long as they’re supporting him.

Trump: Trump is a rich man, someone who calls himself a successful businessman. He made it to the top, and that inspired the people. He makes the American Dream seem still alive, and on top of that, he promises that he will be the one to lead the United States into a bright future, with lots of work, wealth and unity. He is a confident person and by talking like the common people, he makes them feel like they could relate to him. Like Hitler, he uses the fear of the people and unites them in hate towards minorities; the mexicans are to blame, the people of color and the muslims. They are the reason for misery in the US, but he can change that, he can throw these people out of the country and “make America great again”.

4.) A list of the exact things they promised:

Hitler: 

- “Deutschland über alles” (”Germany above everything”)

- to overturn the Treaty of Versailles and stop reparation payment

- to “give Germany its pride back”

- to re-arm Germany and to enlarge their military force

- to create jobs (by expanding the army)

- a strong government and stability

- a better life for the lower and the middle class

- to make Germany “a power country” again

Trump:

- “America First”

- “Make America great again”

- to cancel Obamacare to reduce costs

- to build a wall to Mexico

- to send immigrants back to their countries so that american citizens can have their jobs

- to send troops back into war zones and to enlarge the military force

- banishment of muslims

- tax reduction

- to bring back manufacturing jobs

- to step back from several international trading agreements

- to lead the fight against ISIS

5.) Foreign policy

Hitler: Hitler wanted Germany to become a global leading power again and to expand the german territory. He worked on an intense connection to fascist Italy, while he had an anti-russia policy. Promised other countries freedom while already planning to take over Europe, Hitler eventually declared war to Poland, which led to WWII.

Trump: Trumps goals when it comes to foreign policy are to work together closely with Russia, to step back from several international trade agreements, to impose penalties on several branches of import, to fight against ISIS and to support Israel in their conflict with Palestine, to name a few of the endless plans he talked about

6.) The role and value of women

Hitler: Hitlers policy understood women as barely more than birth machines. His propaganda made it look like being mother to (the more, the better) aryan children is the best thing to ever happen to a woman. It was socially unacceptable for a woman to go to work, they needed to stay at home to look after the children and to keep the house clean for their husbands. Women were a thing to be owned, their opinion didn’t matter. Emancipation was seen as something “evil” that the jews brought into Germany.

Trump: Trump treats woman without respect and like a thing to be owned. According to him, a woman’s worth it determined by her attractiveness and they should feel honored when he gropes them or makes obscene comments about them. Trumps policy is anti-abortion, he wants to take the right to decide over their bodies and lives away from american women. 

7.) The treatment of minorities

Hitler: Hitler used the jews as scapegoats for everything bad that happened. It was their fault that people lived in poverty, that women wanted to have a say about their lives, that germany lost the war etc. His party supported and encouraged violence against jewish people (the ”Kristallnacht”, for example), and they got socially seperated from the rest of the society. Sad peek of Hitler’s anti semitism was the torture and killing of millions of jews, within Germany and from other countries, in concentration camps. Over six million jews had to die. 

Homosexuals and people with disabilities often got the same treatment.

Trump: Not only once did Trump say what he thinks about Mexicans; they are rapists, criminals, they’re bringing drugs and misery into his country. “Some sure are nice, though.”, he says. He’s using them the same way Hitler used the jews; he blames them for everything. They are stealing jobs from americans, they are endangering the public safety, all they do is create chaos and crimes.

 His opinion about people of color isn’t better; he stated that he doesn’t support the Black Lives Matter Movement. “If Black lives matter, go back to Africa”, is what he said. He also believes that racism would not exist anymore. On several occasions he has encouraged his supporters to verbal and physical attacks towards people of color. He also claims that the era of slavery was a good time for the US and ignores police brutality towards poc’s.

Trump wants to ban muslims from entering/staying in the US. As we all know he already tried to do that a few days ago, but fortunately, a court declared his action to not be legal. Trump also made fun of people with disabilities.

8.) How they deal with the media

Hitler: Adolf Hitler knew how to use the media for himself. “The press is an instrument for education to bring 70 million people to an unified world view”, is one of the things he said. The principle was easy; every newspaper or radio station that wasn’t supporting him by reporting what he wanted them to report about, got banned. Resisting journalists and leader of companies got fired and also arrested in some cases. Hitlers party used the media for their propaganda, freedom of speech and press didn’t mean anything anymore.

Trump: Trump hates the media. While he enjoys the attention given to him, he can’t deal with negative reports. He calls those journalists “liars”, claims that they are spreading “alternate facts”, that only his point of view is the truth. Trumps party sees journalists as “part of the opposition”, and says they should “just shut up and listen”. Apparently, there were already plans made to ban the press from the White House. During Trump’s inauguration, the first journalists already got arrested.

(Personal) Conclusion:

Their differences:

- Hitler knew how to make the media work for him, Trump doesn’t (yet)

- Trump grew up wealthy and with academic success, Hitler grew up poorly and dropped out of school without graduation

- Trump’s politic is pro-russia, Hitler’s was anti-russia

- Hitler wanted to expand the german territory while Trump want to build a wall

- Hitler’s policy aimed to start a war

And, most importantly:

Their similarities:

- Power hungry, radical, racist, misogynistic

- use prejudices against minorities, support violence against them

- “America First” and “Germany above everything” are the same damn thing

- Unite people through hate

- mainly voted by people who aren’t wealthy, scared for their future

- creating jobs by extending the military, taking “stolen” jobs “back” from immigrants/women

- wanting their countries to be the first in everything, don’t care what it takes

- against freedom of speech and press

- enforcement of military power, getting ready for war

- give their people a minority to blame for all the existing misery

- aggressive, short tempered, determined

- no respect for human life

I don’t know about you, but I think this is terrifying.

Like I said, I have probably forgotten about a lot. Feel free to add!

Sources: x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x, x

[madamlaydebug]

American Psychosis By Chris Hedges January 30, 2017 "Information Clearing House" - "Truth Dig" - Reality is under assault. Verbal confusion reigns. Truth and illusion have merged. Mental chaos makes it hard to fathom what is happening. We feel trapped in a hall of mirrors. Exposed lies are answered with other lies. The rational is countered with the irrational. Cognitive dissonance prevails. We endure a disquieting shame and even guilt. Tens of millions of Americans, especially women, undocumented workers, Muslims and African-Americans, suffer the acute anxiety of being pursued by a predator. All this is by design. Demagogues always infect the governed with their own psychosis. “The comparison between totalitarianism and psychosis is not incidental,” the psychiatrist Joost A.M. Meerloo wrote in his book “The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing.” “Delusional thinking inevitably creeps into every form of tyranny and despotism. Unconscious backward forces come into action. Evil powers from the archaic past return. An automatic compulsion to go on to self-destruction develops, to justify one mistake with a new one; to enlarge and expand the vicious pathological circle becomes the dominating end of life. The frightened man, burdened by a culture he does not understand, retreats into the brute’s fantasy of limitless power in order to cover up the vacuum inside himself. This fantasy starts with the leaders and is later taken over by the masses they oppress.” The lies fly out of the White House like flocks of pigeons: Donald Trump’s election victory was a landslide. He had the largest inauguration crowds in American history. Three million to 5 million undocumented immigrants voted illegally. Climate change is a hoax. Vaccines cause autism. Immigrants are carriers of “[t]remendous infectious disease.” The election was rigged—until it wasn’t. We don’t know “who really knocked down” the World Trade Center. Torture works. Mexico will pay for the wall. Conspiracy theories are fact. Scientific facts are conspiracies. America will be great again. Our new president, a 70-year-old with orange-tinted skin and hair that Penn Jillette has likened to “cotton candy made of piss,” is, as Trump often reminds us, “very good looking.” He has almost no intellectual accomplishments—he knows little of history, politics, law, philosophy, art or governance—but insists “[m]y IQ is one of the highest—and you all know it! Please don’t feel so stupid or insecure, it’s not your fault.” And the mediocrities and half-wits he has installed in his Cabinet have “by far the highest IQ of any Cabinet ever assembled.” It is an avalanche of absurdities. This mendacity would be easier to repulse if the problem was solely embodied in Trump. But even in the face of a rising despotism, the Democratic Party refuses to denounce the corporate forces that eviscerated our democracy and impoverished the country. The neoliberal Trump demonizes Muslims, undocumented workers and the media. The neoliberal Democratic Party demonizes Vladimir Putin and FBI Director James Comey. No one speaks about the destructive force of corporate power. The warring elites pit alternative facts against alternative facts. All engage in demagoguery. We will, I expect, be condemned to despotism by the venality of Trump and the cowardice and dishonesty of the liberal class. Trump and those around him have a deep hatred for what they cannot understand. They silence anyone who thinks independently. They elevate pseudo-intellectuals who adhere to their bizarre script. They cannot cope with complexity, nuance or the unpredictable. Individual initiative is a mortal threat. The order for some employees of several federal agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research service, the National Park Service and the Department of Health and Human Services, to restrict or cease communication with the press or members of Congress, along with the attempt to impose 10-year felony convictions on six reporters who covered the inauguration protests, signals the beginning of a campaign to marginalize reality and promote fantasy. Facts depend solely on those who have the power to create them. The goal of the Trump administration is to create an artificial consistency that conforms to its warped perception of the world. “Before they seize power and establish a world according to their doctrines, totalitarian movements conjure up a lying world of consistency which is more adequate to the needs of the human mind than reality itself; in which, through sheer imagination, uprooted masses can feel at home and are spared the never-ending shocks which real life and real experiences deal to human beings and their expectations,” Hannah Arendt wrote in “The Origins of Totalitarianism.” “The force possessed by totalitarian propaganda—before the movements have the power to drop iron curtains to prevent anyone’s disturbing, by the slightest reality, the gruesome quiet of an entirely imaginary world—lies in its ability to shut the masses off from the real world.” Trump’s blinding narcissism was captured in his bizarre talk to the CIA on Jan. 21. “[T]hey say, is Donald Trump an intellectual?” he said. “Trust me, I’m, like, a smart persona.” “I have a running war with the media,” he added. “They are among the most dishonest human beings on earth. And they sort of made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community. And I just want to let you know, the reason you’re the number one stop [in the new presidency] is exactly the opposite—exactly. And they understand that, too.” He launched into an attack on the media for not reporting that “a million, million and a half people” showed up for his inauguration. “They showed a field where there was practically nobody standing there,” he said about the media’s depiction of the inauguration crowd. “And they said, Donald Trump did not draw well. I said, it was almost raining, the rain should have scared them away, but God looked down and he said, we’re not going to let it rain on your speech.” He has been on the cover of Time “like, 14 or 15 times,” Trump said in speaking of his criticism of the magazine because one of its reporters incorrectly wrote that the president had removed a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. from the Oval Office. “I think we have the all-time record in the history of Time magazine. Like, if Tom Brady is on the cover, it’s one time, because he won the Super Bowl or something, right? I’ve been on it for 15 times this year. I don’t think that’s a record, Mike, that can ever be broken. Do you agree with that? What do you think?” [Editor’s note: Photographs or drawings of Trump were on the cover of Time 10 times in the last year and a half and once in 1989.] Trump’s theatricality works. He forces the press and the public to repeat his lies, inadvertently giving them credibility. He is always moving. He is always on display. He has no fixed belief system. Trump, as he consolidates power, will adopt the ideology of the Christian right to fill his own ideological vacuum. The Christian right’s magical thinking will merge seamlessly with Trump’s magical thinking. Idiocy, self-delusion, megalomania, fantasy and government repression will come wrapped in images of the Christian cross and the American flag. The corporate state, hostile or indifferent to the plight of the citizens, has no emotional pull among the public. It is often hated. Political candidates run not as politicians but as celebrities. Campaigns eschew issues to make people feel good about candidates and themselves. Ideas are irrelevant. Emotional euphoria is paramount. The voter is only a prop in the political theater. Politics is anti-politics. It is reality television. Trump proved better at this game than his opponents. It is a game in which fact and knowledge do not matter. Reality is what you create. We were conditioned for a Trump. Meerloo wrote, “The demagogue relies for his effectiveness on the fact that people will take seriously the fantastic accusations he makes, will discuss the phony issues he raises as if they had reality, or will be thrown into such a state of panic by his accusations and charges that they will simply abdicate their right to think and verify for themselves.” The lies create a climate in which everyone is assumed to be lying. The truth becomes suspect and obscured. Narratives begin to be believed not because they are true, or even sound true, but because they are emotionally appealing. The aim of systematic lying, as Arendt wrote, is the “transformation of human nature itself.” The lies eventually foster somnambulism among a population that surrenders to the magical thinking and ceases to care. It checks out. It becomes cynical. It only asks to be entertained and given a vent for its frustration and rage. Demagogues produce enemies the way a magician pulls rabbits out of a hat. They wage constant battles against nonexistent dangers, rapidly replacing one after the other to keep the rhetoric at a fever pitch. “Practically speaking, the totalitarian ruler proceeds like a man who persistently insults another man until everybody knows that the latter is his enemy, so that he can, with some plausibility, go out and kill him in self-defense,” Arendt wrote. “This certainly is a little crude, but it works—as everybody will know who has ever watched how certain successful careerists eliminate competitors.” We are entering a period of national psychological trauma. We are stalked by lunatics. We are, as Judith Herman writes about trauma victims in her book “Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence—From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror,” being “rendered helpless by overwhelming force.” This trauma, like all traumas, overwhelms “the ordinary systems of care that give people a sense of control, connection, and meaning.” To recover our mental balance we must respond to Trump the way victims of trauma respond to abuse. We must build communities where we can find understanding and solidarity. We must allow ourselves to mourn. We must name the psychosis that afflicts us. We must carry out acts of civil disobedience and steadfast defiance to re-empower others and ourselves. We must fend off the madness and engage in dialogues based on truth, literacy, empathy and reality. We must invest more time in activities such as finding solace in nature, or focusing on music, theater, literature, art and even worship—activities that hold the capacity for renewal and transcendence. This is the only way we will remain psychologically whole. Building an outer shell or attempting to hide will exacerbate our psychological distress and depression. We may not win, but we will have, if we create small, like-minded cells of defiance, the capacity not to go insane. Chris Hedges, spent nearly two decades as a foreign correspondent in Central America, the Middle East, Africa and the Balkans. He has reported from more than 50 countries and has worked for The Christian Science Monitor, National Public Radio, The Dallas Morning News and The New York Times, for which he was a foreign correspondent for 15 years.

[libertariantaoist]

Reality is under assault. Verbal confusion reigns. Truth and illusion have merged. Mental chaos makes it hard to fathom what is happening. We feel trapped in a hall of mirrors. Exposed lies are answered with other lies. The rational is countered with the irrational. Cognitive dissonance prevails. We endure a disquieting shame and even guilt. Tens of millions of Americans, especially women, undocumented workers, Muslims and African-Americans, suffer the acute anxiety of being pursued by a predator. All this is by design. Demagogues always infect the governed with their own psychosis.

“The comparison between totalitarianism and psychosis is not incidental,” the psychiatrist Joost A.M. Meerloo wrote in his book “The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing.” “Delusional thinking inevitably creeps into every form of tyranny and despotism. Unconscious backward forces come into action. Evil powers from the archaic past return. An automatic compulsion to go on to self-destruction develops, to justify one mistake with a new one; to enlarge and expand the vicious pathological circle becomes the dominating end of life. The frightened man, burdened by a culture he does not understand, retreats into the brute’s fantasy of limitless power in order to cover up the vacuum inside himself. This fantasy starts with the leaders and is later taken over by the masses they oppress.”

The lies fly out of the White House like flocks of pigeons: Donald Trump’s election victory was a landslide. He had the largest inauguration crowds in American history. Three million to 5 million undocumented immigrants voted illegally. Climate change is a hoax. Vaccines cause autism. Immigrants are carriers of “[t]remendous infectious disease.” The election was rigged—until it wasn’t. We don’t know “who really knocked down” the World Trade Center. Torture works. Mexico will pay for the wall. Conspiracy theories are fact. Scientific facts are conspiracies. America will be great again.

Our new president, a 70-year-old with orange-tinted skin and hair that Penn Jillette has likened to “cotton candy made of piss,” is, as Trump often reminds us, “very good looking.” He has almost no intellectual accomplishments—he knows little of history, politics, law, philosophy, art or governance—but insists “[m]y IQ is one of the highest—and you all know it! Please don’t feel so stupid or insecure, it’s not your fault.” And the mediocrities and half-wits he has installed in his Cabinet have “by far the highest IQ of any Cabinet ever assembled.”  

It is an avalanche of absurdities.

This mendacity would be easier to repulse if the problem was solely embodied in Trump. But even in the face of a rising despotism, the Democratic Party refuses to denounce the corporate forces that eviscerated our democracy and impoverished the country. The neoliberal Trump demonizes Muslims, undocumented workers and the media. The neoliberal Democratic Party demonizes Vladimir Putin and FBI Director James Comey. No one speaks about the destructive force of corporate power. The warring elites pit alternative facts against alternative facts. All engage in demagoguery. We will, I expect, be condemned to despotism by the venality of Trump and the cowardice and dishonesty of the liberal class.

Trump and those around him have a deep hatred for what they cannot understand. They silence anyone who thinks independently. They elevate pseudo-intellectuals who adhere to their bizarre script. They cannot cope with complexity, nuance or the unpredictable. Individual initiative is a mortal threat. The order for some employees of several federal agencies, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s research service, the National Park Service and the Department of Health and Human Services, to restrict or cease communication with the press or members of Congress, along with the attempt to impose 10-year felony convictions on six reporters who covered the inauguration protests, signals the beginning of a campaign to marginalize reality and promote fantasy. Facts depend solely on those who have the power to create them. The goal of the Trump administration is to create an artificial consistency that conforms to its warped perception of the world.

“Before they seize power and establish a world according to their doctrines, totalitarian movements conjure up a lying world of consistency which is more adequate to the needs of the human mind than reality itself; in which, through sheer imagination, uprooted masses can feel at home and are spared the never-ending shocks which real life and real experiences deal to human beings and their expectations,” Hannah Arendt wrote in “The Origins of Totalitarianism.” “The force possessed by totalitarian propaganda—before the movements have the power to drop iron curtains to prevent anyone’s disturbing, by the slightest reality, the gruesome quiet of an entirely imaginary world—lies in its ability to shut the masses off from the real world.”

Trump’s blinding narcissism was captured in his bizarre talk to the CIA on Jan. 21. “[T]hey say, is Donald Trump an intellectual?” he said. “Trust me, I’m, like, a smart persona.”

“I have a running war with the media,” he added. “They are among the most dishonest human beings on earth. And they sort of made it sound like I had a feud with the intelligence community. And I just want to let you know, the reason you’re the number one stop [in the new presidency] is exactly the opposite—exactly. And they understand that, too.”

He launched into an attack on the media for not reporting that “a million, million and a half people” showed up for his inauguration. “They showed a field where there was practically nobody standing there,” he said about the media’s depiction of the inauguration crowd. “And they said, Donald Trump did not draw well. I said, it was almost raining, the rain should have scared them away, but God looked down and he said, we’re not going to let it rain on your speech.”

He has been on the cover of Time “like, 14 or 15 times,” Trump said in speaking of his criticism of the magazine because one of its reporters incorrectly wrote that the president had removed a bust of Martin Luther King Jr. from the Oval Office. “I think we have the all-time record in the history of Time magazine. Like, if Tom Brady is on the cover, it’s one time, because he won the Super Bowl or something, right? I’ve been on it for 15 times this year. I don’t think that’s a record, Mike, that can ever be broken. Do you agree with that? What do you think?” [Editor’s note: Photographs or drawings of Trump were on the cover of Time 10 times in the last year and a half and once in 1989.]

Trump’s theatricality works. He forces the press and the public to repeat his lies, inadvertently giving them credibility. He is always moving. He is always on display. He has no fixed belief system. Trump, as he consolidates power, will adopt the ideology of the Christian right to fill his own ideological vacuum. The Christian right’s magical thinking will merge seamlessly with Trump’s magical thinking. Idiocy, self-delusion, megalomania, fantasy and government repression will come wrapped in images of the Christian cross and the American flag.

The corporate state, hostile or indifferent to the plight of the citizens, has no emotional pull among the public. It is often hated. Political candidates run not as politicians but as celebrities. Campaigns eschew issues to make people feel good about candidates and themselves. Ideas are irrelevant. Emotional euphoria is paramount. The voter is only a prop in the political theater. Politics is anti-politics. It is reality television. Trump proved better at this game than his opponents. It is a game in which fact and knowledge do not matter. Reality is what you create. We were conditioned for a Trump.

Meerloo wrote, “The demagogue relies for his effectiveness on the fact that people will take seriously the fantastic accusations he makes, will discuss the phony issues he raises as if they had reality, or will be thrown into such a state of panic by his accusations and charges that they will simply abdicate their right to think and verify for themselves.”

The lies create a climate in which everyone is assumed to be lying. The truth becomes suspect and obscured. Narratives begin to be believed not because they are true, or even sound true, but because they are emotionally appealing. The aim of systematic lying, as Arendt wrote, is the “transformation of human nature itself.” The lies eventually foster somnambulism among a population that surrenders to the magical thinking and ceases to care. It checks out. It becomes cynical. It only asks to be entertained and given a vent for its frustration and rage. Demagogues produce enemies the way a magician pulls rabbits out of a hat. They wage constant battles against nonexistent dangers, rapidly replacing one after the other to keep the rhetoric at a fever pitch.

“Practically speaking, the totalitarian ruler proceeds like a man who persistently insults another man until everybody knows that the latter is his enemy, so that he can, with some plausibility, go out and kill him in self-defense,” Arendt wrote. “This certainly is a little crude, but it works—as everybody will know who has ever watched how certain successful careerists eliminate competitors.”

We are entering a period of national psychological trauma. We are stalked by lunatics. We are, as Judith Herman writes about trauma victims in her book “Trauma and Recovery: The Aftermath of Violence—From Domestic Abuse to Political Terror,” being “rendered helpless by overwhelming force.” This trauma, like all traumas, overwhelms “the ordinary systems of care that give people a sense of control, connection, and meaning.”

To recover our mental balance we must respond to Trump the way victims of trauma respond to abuse. We must build communities where we can find understanding and solidarity. We must allow ourselves to mourn. We must name the psychosis that afflicts us. We must carry out acts of civil disobedience and steadfast defiance to re-empower others and ourselves. We must fend off the madness and engage in dialogues based on truth, literacy, empathy and reality. We must invest more time in activities such as finding solace in nature, or focusing on music, theater, literature, art and even worship—activities that hold the capacity for renewal and transcendence. This is the only way we will remain psychologically whole. Building an outer shell or attempting to hide will exacerbate our psychological distress and depression. We may not win, but we will have, if we create small, like-minded cells of defiance, the capacity not to go insane.