#i hate biden. and if i have to vote for him its going to make me physically sick

[qqueenofhades]

I just feel like even if we all vote and Biden wins, Trump won't accept the loss, and eventually they'll just put him in anyway. And then there won't be another real election. Even if Biden wins and somehow is actually confirmed (which again, I think is unlikely) we're going to have to do this for 30 more years because of the SC, and that isn't at all sustainable.

All this isn't to say I won't vote but I just think people are being way too optimistic about what happens if Biden wins. I don't think him winning will keep Trump out or the horrible fascist future at bay.

Look, I get the fear. I do, I do... but this is also one of the times when you have to ask if it's actually telling you something true, or if it's just preying on that generalized feeling of doom to make everything seem hopeless even if we win again. And that is... there is absolutely no actual mechanism for Trump to be installed as president if Biden wins the Electoral College (since as we have repeatedly seen, the popular vote is immaterial). SCOTUS is horrible and evil and are trying to interfere as much ahead of time for Trump as they can, but part of that is because they can't simply issue an order for Biden to be removed and Trump to become God King By Fiat. That is not how it works. If Biden wins in November, he will be president until his term ends, he steps down, Kamala takes over, or anything else.

Trump tried a coup with all the entire overwhelming might of the US government as the sitting president last time; fortunately, it failed. Reforms to the Electoral Count Act have been made to prevent another January 6. The Department of Defense and the military are still under (and would be on another January 6) Biden's command, not Trump's. That's not to say that Trump won't try some shit with his insane cult followers, but he is just a late 70s conman from Queens out on bail and under sentence for a criminal trial, who is already the biggest and most disgraced loser and asshole in American political history. He is so desperate to cheat his way back into power because in a real sense, this IS the last-chance saloon for him. He can't put off the legal proceedings, however long they take, for another four years. He's losing his marbles at a rapid rate. I'm just saying: we don't know what or when, but there will be (and already have been) real consequences for him. That is why he is scrabbling so hard.

"Even if we vote, nothing matters and Trump will win anyway" is another of those insidious lies that works to make you feel as if the battle is endless and pointless and none of its victories matter. Of course it will not all be magically fixed forever if Biden wins. We will still have to figure some godforsaken fucking way to expand SCOTUS or kick Alito and Thomas off it. But we will have bought ourselves, our democracy, our country, and the world time to do that, and put another nail in Trump's coffin. That matters. It matters a lot.

Fascism wants to present itself as overwhelming, irresistible, inevitable, and ready to happen no matter what you do, and that's what your brain wants you to buy in now. But that's not the case, Trump is not inevitable or some all-powerful monolith (in fact, another of the debate takeaways seemed to be that Biden looked bad but people still hate Trump too much for it to really shift anything). He is a loser, a fraud, a conman, a liar, and a crook, and he WANTS you to fear him like an almighty god. Don't give him or the MAGAGOP the satisfaction.

Frankly, having to endure another four months of this might kill us all, and I know that we are tired and scared (me too). But IT IS NOT INEVITABLE THAT WE ARE DOOMED. Not at all. Let's hang onto that and tell that anxiety doom voice to shove it.

Hugs.

[fairuzfan]

I never claimed Biden's policies never hurt anyone, but it is unfair to blame Biden for Covid when Covid began under the Trump administration and it was Trump's actions that led to its severity and damage. Biden at least attempted to mitigate Covid during the first year of his administration, but by then the damage was already extensive and the politicized culture around it made it impossible for Americans to cooperate and regulations to have any real affect. But blaming Biden for Covid is like blaming Hoover for the Great Depression.

Don't get me wrong, I hate Biden too. But no matter how awful our 2024 presidential choices are, they are our only possible choices for president. Our voting systems are messed up. 3rd party votes only work against us and lots of people also just opt out of voting, which is about as equally affective. The electoral college was founded on literal racism and slavery and is still imposed to this day. But that's the system we have to work with. It's rigged. It's awful. I KNOW.

And like I said voting is not the end all of political action, and reading some of these comments, I can understand your anger. For most elections, yes, a vote IS an endorsement and support for a politician. But presidential elections just don't work that same way. When you vote 3rd party, you might as well just handed over your right to vote to your representative. And I guarantee you your representative is either going to vote for Trump or Biden.

The presidential election is NOT the only election on the ballot. And all other elections in the US make it possible for 3rd party candidates to win. I will vote 3rd party wherever possible locally, and I encourage you to do so too.

Still, reading through all these comments, I have yet to hear an actual solution to this problem that is achievable by November. Our choices are Biden or Trump. That's it. I hate it too, but if you have any better, feasible ideas, please let me hear it.

Except it is an endorsement. Biden literally thinks "they'll get over it" (it being the genocide of palestinians) by the time election comes. He thinks that we will vote for him anyways so he'll do whatever he wants. That's literally an endorsement. The reason the Vote Uncommitted campaign is gaining traction is to threaten Biden into doing something. If he doesn't feel threatened, then he assumes we are going to vote for him no matter what. So that means it's an endorsement.

If Biden doesn't listen to us, that's on him for losing the election. Not on the people who want him to do something else. And I don't want trump to win. I don't. But I will never vote for a person who so brazenly killed my friends and family, lied to my face, and was so unbelievably arrogant in that he thinks he can do whatever the fuck he wants. Feel free to vote for Biden. Just don't say it's for anyone else.

[navree]

You keep saying refusing to vote for Biden on moral grounds because of Palestine is ineffective because Trump would be worse, but that really isn't the point. Largely (with the exception of a few extremists and a contingency of people who wouldn't have voted anyways) the philosophy of a movement that has people withhold their vote is to force a significant policy change that wouldn't have changed otherwise. Its a form of protest. I understand from your perspective, election-focused and pragmatic, it is a threat to whoever is running, but if Biden had wanted the votes being withheld he would have capitulated.

Not that this isn't a moot point since he's out, but whatever.

See, this is intensely fucking dumb.

"force a significant policy change" it would not. One, because Biden is the president of the United States, and Israel is not one of those states. Short of sending the CIA to, idk, assassinate Netanyahu in his bed, which most of these people would be against I think because of how much they bitch and moan about US foreign policy at any given opportunity, he cannot actually make an independent foreign power do what he wants and what is electorally convenient for him. Like, I'm very sure Biden would love it if Netanyahu and his partisans stopped acting like fucking freaks for five minutes, if only so that it would stop being a PR nightmare for him. But that's not happening, because he cannot control what Netanyahu does. He could vastly reduce the support the US is providing Israel, and in my view he should, but that's not going to stop what Netanyahu and the Israeli government is doing. Because, I hate to break it to you, but the reason they're carpetbombing Gaza is because they want to be carpetbombing Gaza, and even without US aid they will continue to do it, even it just means with older and less effective weapons. Ultimately, the change that leads to a ceasefire and an end to the war is going to come from the actual parties involved, not Joe Biden.

Two, you've already gotten the significant policy change. Biden has, on multiple occasions now, come out in favor a ceasefire. He has actively been working, along with the Qatari government, to try and broker some kind of peace agreement between Israel and Hamas, but those two keep on fucking it up because they're both run by bloodthirsty psychopaths who don't care one iota about the people they're meant to be governing and only on killing whoever they want. That's been open fact for months now. And it has meant fuckall. The people doing their moral purity about how they'd never vote for Biden were still doing it, just moving the goalposts on what they wanted. First it was ceasefire, then it was 'no ceasefire until [insert impossible demand here] is given', because moving goalposts is what these people do. It's the same mentality as people who saw that Biden was doing COVID stimulus, or cancelling student loans, or reclassifying marijuana, and decided that the issue now was that he wasn't doing enough of it. It's a movement that's been consistently comprised of dogs that caught the car, and are angry that they caught the car because now they can't complain, and they don't want to actually affect meaningful change, they just want to complain because that's easier. And if that's what these people have been doing for his entire presidency, why on Earth would any reasonable person suddenly believe it's different on this one specific issue?

Three, cool you're protesting, then what? Your protest is utterly unserious and completely meaningless if it's not going to have any tangible effects, so what's the next step? You've decided to make your moral purity stance an issue that the vast majority of you learned from infographics on Instagram rather than listening to the voices involved (which is why the red triangle brigade is still a thing on Twitter), so what happens now? No political party is ever going to capitulate entirely to it, because the constituency is just too small (that "uncommitted" gambit was only getting like 10% of the vote wherever it was happening, Biden won over it as a literal write-in candidate in at least one state), so other than the compromise that's already happening, the goalpost movers are gonna withhold their votes because blah blah blah my morals. And their next step is, what? Trump gets elected. And their movement, which has no thought or serious effort put behind it or any actual attempt to provide material aid to the people actually suffering, has helped put a man who is going to be far worse for it in power. The "significant policy change" is going to be that Trump gives Netanyahu whatever he wants and he proceeds to wipe Gaza off the map. The "significant policy change" is that President "Trump Heights" actively makes things worse for the people this protest is supposed to help, as a consequence of that very protest.

It's not about me only being concerned with being "election focused" or some cold hearted bitch. It's about me, as a person who thinks what Israel has been doing since the start is godawful and deeply horrendous, realizing that this entire "protest" is not only asinine but will result in deeply negative consequences and very real harm for the people this protest is purported to be for, and being sickened by that. I live in the real world, and in the real world action speaks far louder than intent. I don't have to acknowledge that the protest wants this or that outcome or what the hypothetical impossible asks that are never going to be answered are, because I understand that they will not matter. What matters is what you get out of your protest, what gains are received, how that protest actually affects change, not the change it gives wishy washy lip service to.

[luckykittysshowerthoughts]

I genuinely don’t understand undecided voters in this election. I can understand the hardcore Trumpers being too far up his ass to see what’s going on, but I truly don’t understand the outsiders and neutral parties who don’t seem to understand the stakes here. I know neither of our options are good, but the lesser evil is so obvious.

Do I trust Biden? No. Do I think he’s mentally fit to be President? No. But I’d much, MUCH rather waste four years on him helplessly floundering in our political hellscape and accomplishing absolutely nothing than see someone actively and knowingly dismantling our democracy.

Did we all just forget about the January 6th insurrection? It’s only been three years since we all saw it live on TV; were we even watching the same thing?

Are we all just ignoring Project 2025, its plans for christofascist policies and the way it ties far-right Republicans to foreign meddling?

What about every single violent, hateful, incendiary, fascist thing that’s come out of Trump’s mouth in the past eight years? Were none of us listening?

At least with Biden’s incompetence, we can rely on his cabinet members to pick up the slack. We can also rely on him to NOT further saturate the Supreme Court with far-right nutjobs if another justice dies or retires. Even just getting another vaguely left-leaning or even dead-center moderate person on the Supreme Court would make his presidency worth it in my eyes. Given the current court’s mass-overturning of important human rights precedents, I’d argue the Supreme Court is far more important than the presidency right now, and the only way to change that is with a non-extremist President.

Incompetence and lack of initiative can be compensated for. You cannot, however, fix malice. You cannot fix that Trump will go out of his way to be dangerous and fuel his ego above all else no matter what the people around him say, and that many of the people around him are either spineless enablers or actively cheering him on. You can’t fix that. That is far, FAR worse and more insidious than a bumbling fool.

And don’t lecture me on Israel and Palestine. We all know every single one of those aid bills would have still passed under Trump. he's been in Israel's pocket since long before October 7th. And he would’ve said the quiet part out loud, too; we all know exactly how he feels about Middle Easterners. I don’t say this to defend Biden; I say this to iterate that there is absolutely no world in which letting Trump retake office will make things any better in regards to the genocide in Palestine. The things our congress and Joe Biden are complicit in are absolutely despicable, but destroying our own democracy to prove a point does absolutely nothing for the people of Palestine. We unfortunately can’t help them with our ballots this year, but we CAN help our fellow Americans. And many of our own people are in genuine danger if Trump wins this election.

I don’t understand how it’s even a question. For the love of god, for the love of our democracy and our most vulnerable people, VOTE BIDEN.

[pensbitchbiome]

i dont understand how trump has any kind of lead in this election just from an outsiders perspective. apart from his bigotry and tax cuts for his billionaire pals he has no real policies and the fact women and men with daughters and some minority communities are all voting for him happily like what kind of self loathing cult nonsense is that? what is making these people vote this way??

i know voter suppression and gerrymandering exists and southern states being demonised isn’t the move given the vulnerable populations that live there still and will end up suffering the most, like the way florida voted 58% to protect abortion but didn’t get 60% so they failed despite having a majority. but ted cruz winning texas when the man left yall for dead multiple times to chill on a beach is wild.

its been heartbreaking to watch how the biden admin has bankrolled a genocide and sending bill clinton to michigan to tell people there “sorry we helped exterminate half your family sucks to be you but vote blue 🙂‍↔️” and using liz cheney to appeal to a demographic that doesn’t seem to exist is whack. but its almost comical to see how many people voted jill stein only for her to get endorsed by trump, her running mate be transphobic and pro-life and then dropping out of the race. it is being stuck between a rock and a hard place but unless yall do something like take up rank choice voting nationally, third party will never be an option and its just wasted votes.

seeing women talk about kamala not being qualified enough is crazy cuz a convicted felon who’s chummy with diddy and epstein and said he’d grab yall by the pussy is who you want representing you?

is it the illegal migrants and transgender surgeries at schools? was that what swayed a good chunk of people? republicans dont even earn enough to qualify for trumps tax cuts why the fuck are you people going off about the economy? i hate that the whole worlds situation depends upon how yalls fuck ass country votes.

[messyspacespades]

If Trump gets elected we're all fucked.

I'm serious. This man said at his recent Washington DC rally that "In four years you don't have to vote. We'll have it all straightened out so it will be much different"

This man is probably going to make voting insanely difficult or even get rid of it entirely. He's probably going to take away womens right to vote, and probably even black/poc's right to vote. I get y'all are upset by Palestine, and you have every right to be angry at Biden for how he's handling Palestine (I am also angry at him for how he's handling Palestine,) but when the alternative is this Hitler wannabe who's going to make it only cishet white male republicans can vote and fuck over everyone else, vote Biden. Vote blue. Please for the love of god. Plus, if Trump gets elected, he's not only going to give Israel 5 trillion dollars for their genocide, but he's probably going to give them the a-okay in their genocide. This is the man that banned muslims from entering the country, this man HATES arabs and muslims and will gladly give Israel the funds and ability to not only kill the Palestians, but wage war on the rest of the Middle East as a whole. And he will shut down any pro-Palestinian protest and possibly have those protestors shot and killed as well in the name of "protecting America from terrorists."

VOTE. FUCKING. BLUE.

Also, please check out defeatproject2025.org to get an idea of just what trump might do if he's elected. It's not hist actual agenda, but the Heritage Foundation is planning to use him to carry out this heinous agenda. They literally have a thing about what they plan to do with voting, specifically about how voter suppression is handled and its NOT GOOD. Register to vote and PLEASE vote blue not only for president, but at a state and local level. please.

Edit: Someone who runs the defeatproject2025 website gave me extra examples of how project 2025 will change voting:

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Steve Brodner

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

July 24, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

JUL 25, 2024

Tonight, President Joe Biden explained to the American people why he decided to refuse the 2024 Democratic presidential nomination and hand the torch to Vice President Kamala Harris. 

Speaking from the Oval Office from his seat behind the Resolute Desk, a gift from Queen Victoria to President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1880, Biden recalled the nation’s history. He invoked Thomas Jefferson, who wrote the Declaration of Independence; George Washington, who “showed us presidents are not kings”; Abraham Lincoln, who “implored us to reject malice”; and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who “inspired us to reject fear.”

And then he turned to himself. “I revere this office, but I love my country more,” he said. “It’s been the honor of my life to serve as your president.” But, he said, the defense of democracy is more important than any title, and democracy is “larger than any one of us.” We must unite to protect it. 

“In recent weeks, it has become clear to me that I need to unite my party in this critical endeavor,” he said. “I believe my record as president, my leadership in the world, my vision for America’s future, all merited a second term. But nothing, nothing can come in the way of saving our democracy. That includes personal ambition. So I’ve decided the best way forward is to pass the torch to a new generation. It’s the best way to unite our nation.”

There is “a time and a place for long years of experience in public life,” Biden said. “There’s also a time and a place for new voices, fresh voices, yes, younger voices. And that time and place is now.”

Biden reminded listeners that he is not leaving the presidency and will be continuing to use its power for the American people. In outlining what that means, he summed up his presidency. 

For the next six months, he said, he will “continue to lower costs for hard-working families [and] grow our economy. I will keep defending our personal freedoms and civil rights, from the right to vote to the right to choose. I will keep calling out hate and extremism, making it clear there is…no place in America for political violence or any violence ever, period. I’m going to keep speaking out to protect our kids from gun violence [and] our planet from [the] climate crisis.”

Biden reiterated his support for his Cancer Moonshot to end cancer—a personal cause for him since the 2015 death of his son Beau from brain cancer—and says he will fight for it, (although House Republicans have recently slashed funding for the program). He said he will call for reforming the Supreme Court “because this is critical to our democracy.”

He promised to continue “working to ensure America remains strong, secure and the leader of the free world,” and pointed out that he is “the first president of this century to report to the American people that the United States is not at war anywhere in the world.” He promised to continue rallying a coalition of nations to stop Putin’s attempt to take over Ukraine, and vowed to continue to build the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). He reminded listeners that when he took office, the conventional wisdom was that China would inevitably surpass the United States, but that is no longer the case, and he said he would continue to strengthen allies and partners in the Pacific. 

Biden promised to continue to work to “end the war in Gaza, bring home all the hostages and bring peace and security to the Middle East and end this war,” as well as “to bring home Americans being unjustly detained all around the world.”

The president reminded people how far the nation has come since he took office on January 20, 2021, a day when, although he didn’t mention it tonight, he went directly to work after taking the oath of office. “On that day,” he recalled, “we…stood in a winter of peril and winter of possibilities.” The United States was “in the grip of the worst pandemic in the century, the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the worst attack on our democracy since the Civil War.” But, Biden said, “We came together as Americans. We got through it. We emerged stronger, more prosperous and more secure.”

“Today we have the strongest economy in the world, creating nearly 16 million new jobs—a record. Wages are up, inflation continues to come down, the racial wealth gap is the lowest it’s been in 20 years. We are literally rebuilding our entire nation—urban, suburban and rural and tribal communities. Manufacturing has come back to America. We are leading the world again in chips and science and innovation. We finally beat Big Pharma after all these years to lower the cost of prescription drugs for seniors…. More people have health care today in America than ever before.” Biden noted that he signed the PACT Act to help millions of veterans and their families who were exposed to toxic materials, as well as the “most significant climate law…in the history of the world” and “the first major gun safety law in 30 years.”

The “violent crime rate is at a 50-year low,” he said, and “[b]order crossings are lower today than when the previous administration left office. I’ve kept my commitment to appoint the first Black woman to the Supreme Court of the United States of America. I also kept my commitment to have an administration that looks like America and [to] be a president for all Americans.”

Then Biden turned from his own record to the larger meaning of America.

“I ran for president four years ago because I believed…that the soul of America was at stake,” he said. “America is an idea. An idea stronger than any army, bigger than any ocean, more powerful than any dictator or tyrant. It’s the most powerful idea in the history of the world.” 

“We hold these truths to be self-evident,” he said. “We are all created equal, endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights: life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness. We’ve never fully lived up to…this sacred idea—but we’ve never walked away from it either. And I do not believe the American people will walk away from it now.

“In just a few months, the American people will choose the course of America’s future. I made my choice…. “[O]ur great vice president, Kamala Harris… is experienced, she is tough, she is capable. She’s been an incredible partner to me and a leader for our country.

“Now the choice is up to you, the American people. When you make that choice, remember the words of Benjamin Franklin hanging on my wall here in the Oval Office, alongside the busts of Dr. [Martin Luther] King and Rosa Parks and Cesar Chavez. When Ben Franklin was asked, as he emerged from the [constitutional] convention…, whether the founders [had] given America a monarchy or a republic, Franklin’s response was: ‘A republic, if you can keep it.’... Whether we keep our republic is now in your hands.” 

“My fellow Americans, it’s been the privilege of my life to serve this nation for over 50 years,” President Biden told the American people. “Nowhere else on Earth could a kid with a stutter from modest beginnings in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and in Claymont, Delaware, one day sit behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office as the president of the United States, but here I am.

“That’s what’s so special about America. We are a nation of promise and possibilities. Of dreamers and doers. Of ordinary Americans doing extraordinary things. I’ve given my heart and my soul to our nation, like so many others. And I’ve been blessed a million times in return with the love and support of the American people. I hope you have some idea how grateful I am to all of you.

The great thing about America is, here kings and dictators do not rule—the people do. History is in your hands. The power’s in your hands. The idea of America lies in your hands. You just have to keep faith—keep the faith—and remember who we are. We are the United States of America, and there is simply nothing, nothing beyond our capacity when we do it together. So let’s act together, [and] preserve our democracy. God bless you all and may God protect our troops. 

“Thank you.”

And with that, President Joe Biden followed the example of the nation’s first president, George Washington, who declined to run for a third term to demonstrate that the United States of America would not have a king, and of its second president, John Adams, who handed the power of the presidency over to his rival Thomas Jefferson and thus established the nation’s tradition of the peaceful transition of power. Like them, Biden gave up the pursuit of power for himself in order to demonstrate the importance of democracy. 

After the speech, the White House served ice cream to the Bidens and hundreds of White House staffers in the Rose Garden.

And when the evening was over, First Lady Dr. Jill Biden posted an image of a handwritten note on social media. It read: “To those who never wavered, to those who refused to doubt, to those who always believed, my heart is full of gratitude. Thank you for the trust you put in Joe—now it’s time to put that trust in Kamala.” 

—

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[beardedmrbean]

The White House and its media allies ran a coverup for President Biden after he maligned former President Donald Trump’s supporters as “garbage” — going so far as to edit an official transcript of his remarks, to the outrage of conservatives and other critics who called out “flat out lying” by Democrats and their allies.

Democrats went into damage-control mode Tuesday night due to the president’s trash talk, claiming that Biden hadn’t intended to demonize his party’s political opponents just seven days before voters head to the polls.

“The President referred to the hateful rhetoric at the Madison Square Garden rally as ‘garbage,’” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement.

The White House in a transcript of the speech also added an apostrophe to the 81-year-old’s poorly timed criticism less than five days before the 2024 election.

“The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporter’s — his — his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American,” the transcript read.

In a follow-up X post, Biden added: “Earlier today I referred to the hateful rhetoric about Puerto Rico spewed by Trump’s supporter at his Madison Square Garden rally as garbage — which is the only word I can think of to describe it.”

“His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable. That’s all I meant to say,” the president claimed. “The comments at that rally don’t reflect who we are as a nation.”

Biden was referencing Comedian Tony Hinchcliffe’s joke at a Trump rally in Madison Square Garden on Sunday, when he referred to Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage.”

“Donald Trump has no character. He doesn’t give a damn about the Latino community,” the president said on a call with Voto Latino on Tuesday that referenced Hinchcliffe’s humor.

“They’re good, decent, honorable people. The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters,” Biden said, pausing slightly and leaning back before adding: “His demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American.”

Some talking heads accepted explanation without question, including film executive Franklin Leonard during an appearance on CNN’s “News Night” Tuesday.

Tim Walz defends Biden’s trash talk about Trump supporters as other Dems distance from ‘garbage’ comment

“As someone who had a stutter growing up, it’s very obvious to me that there’s an apostrophe at the end of ‘supporter’s’ there,” he said. 

“He was referring to the garbage spewed by supporters, not simply the supporters themselves,” added Leonard, who has donated to both of Harris’ presidential campaigns, campaign finance filings show.

MSNBC host and Politico White House bureau chief Jonathan Lemire also accused Republicans of having “seized” on Biden’s comments to claim the president was criticizing “half the country” that backs Trump.

“It’s certainly a story on the Right, who are trying to paint this as the next ‘basket of deplorables,’” Lemire said on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” referring to Hillary Clinton’s smear of Trump supporters during the 2016 presidential election.

“They’re trying to make a firestorm out of something,” added host Joe Scarborough. “Joe Biden obviously doesn’t believe that.”

“You can clearly hear Biden say ‘the only garbage I see out there is his supporters.. and .. and.. his demonization..,’” responded GOP strategist Matt Whitlock, accusing Lemire of “flat out lying here and spreading a dishonest transcript.”

“They edited it to say ‘his supporters’ demonization,’” Whitlock said. “Shameful gaslighting.”

Politico scribe Jonathan Martin went even further to argue Biden did not alienate “half the country.”

“Sure, Trump topped out at 47% and a good third of that vote is folks who aren’t enamored w[ith] him but loathe Dems more,” Martin posted on X. “So it’s not remotely half the country.”

The New York Times declared in another headline: “Biden Appears to Insult Trump Supporters as ‘Garbage,’ but Quickly Tries to Clarify.”

“That’s disinformation,” independent Substack journalist Michael Shellenberger fired back to the Gray Lady’s editors. “What Biden said is clear from the video. And now the White House has altered the official transcript in a potential violation of the Presidential Records Act.”

When reached for comment, the White House also refused to tell Axios national political correspondent Alex Thompson whether they had confirmed with Biden that he misspoke.

“Did they talk to Biden to ask him what he meant?” Thompson said he asked the president’s aides before relating: “The spokesperson asked to go off the record. We declined. They didn’t comment further.”

“‘The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters.’ That’s a direct quote,” emphasized Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), Trump’s running mate.

“That’s what Kamala Harris’s boss said,” Vance said, posting a screenshot on X of how the remarks had been spun.

“Do @JonLemire, @alexanderburns, @politico have an ounce of integrity? Will they correct this obvious falsehood?”

Not all Democrats were displeased with what allies had cast as another Biden blunder, with billionaire venture capitalist Vinod Khosla saying his words were an “understatement.”

“Garbage is an understatement for MAGA extremists,” said Khosla, a major Harris donor. “Biden suggests Trump supporters are ‘garbage’ after comic’s insult of Puerto Rico.”

But Harris, 60, distanced from her former running-mate when asked by reporters on the tarmac before boarding Air Force Two for a campaign event in Raleigh, NC.

“I strongly disagree with any criticism of people based on who they vote for,” the vice president said.

Harris is trailing Trump, 78, in the seven battleground states of Arizona, Nevada, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, North Carolina and Georgia by one percentage point, according to the RealClearPolitics polling aggregator.

Both Democratic and Republican pollsters are saying the election will be a jump ball heading toward Election Day, though early indications are the GOP is outperforming past showings in early and mail-in voting.

[hollowwish]

I don't really like. Politics post much but I wanna say something. Because the 2020 election was bad. This year is already worse and it's only March

As a queer trans american (who lives in the south, no less, and has to hear the dumbest anti biden propaganda you've ever heard) a republican getting in office is actually doomsday for me. I'm literally horrified of it. It gives me horrible anxiety for days on end and makes me feel physically sick. And if it happens I will not be able to leave immediately like I would want to.

The republicans want to kill me and i have known this since I was thirteen years old and i have just had to live with it. I have to just live with the thought as long as I'm in america. They want to kill me and all my queer friends and every other minority group they hate, they already took away abortion they have already started. And they are going to if we put them in office. Please please god do not let them put Trump in office again. I do not care who is in there, anyone but a republican. I will take almost anyone else but them.

Its to the point where I don't really care that a bunch of swfities are apparently voting democrat because Taylor said so. Yeah that's fucking insane but also it keeps literally the most evil man in this country out of office. Beggars can't be choosers I suppose.

Everyone around me is so sure of a Trump victory. They want him to fix the gas prices and things like that. People I thought were my friends really truly do not care what anti lgbt laws or whatever other horrible law they would make, as long as their personal problems get fixed. And I'm really really hoping that's not the case and that his victory is not already assured because I do not know what would happen and I am scared.

Please don't put him back in office. Just. Please. It's all I ask.

[myragewillendworlds]

A lot of racists and misogynists, and a lot of people mad that eggs are more expensive than they were 4 years ago, and most no other strong political views besides these.

Eh, that's not the whole story, though. While Trump is insane and I just have no words for how baffling it is that such a massive amount of people is willing to vote for a pathologically lying, narcissistic, sociopathic, hateful, demented, criminal lunatic – there's also a reason why even the people he openly hates turned around to vote for him.

The left-wing (in much of Europe as well) has completely lost touch with their traditional working class following, having become too elitist or too expensive (attempting to revert climate change at this point comes with high costs, as scientists always predicted and warned for) for the working class to be able to identify themselves with anymore. Years of neoliberalism fucked us all over and the long-term solutions the left proposes cost too much money for the working class to be willing to bear in the short term. Meanwhile, right-wing populism promises quick, easy fixes, promises them their jobs back in dead industries, promises to make climate change go away by ignoring it, promises to lower taxes by burning some more fossil fuels, and manipulatively redirects their growing anger and frustration in the direction of whatever blameless group of people they happen to hate most at the time. Something very obvious that we've very obviously seen before, and people still run with it.

What's most hilarious about this though (or would be if it didn't come with such consequences) is that in turning away from the elitism of the left-wing, the working class decided that the non-elitist side to vote for was the born-rich, "small loan of a million dollars", wealthy business magnate and his good buddy, the literal richest man of the entire planet. Truly the side that understands and cares for your financial struggles.

What's also aggravating, because fuck it this is an essay now, is that people are too goddamn dumb to understand how anything works. Bush fucks over the economy, sends tons of people to their death, creates global chaos that will last for decades after, and Obama gets to inherit his mess. Trump fucks over the economy, lets god knows how many people die carelessly, sabotages international relations and collaborations, and Biden gets to inherit his mess. You can't turn that much destruction around and make it all okay in just a few years time. People expect the easy answers, think new leadership can just magically make it all better and if it's not immediately better, welp, time for the next populist asshole to give it a go! People blame Biden's presidency for their situations as if Trump had nothing to do with it, as if the whole world isn't currently dealing with high prices and lack of housing, and then turn around and vote for the one who created and will gladly worsen that mess in the first place. We'll never know how much worse people's situations would've been if these kind of morons had continued on their rampage, without the left-wing breaks in between that allowed for at least some normalcy to return.

TL;DR too bad that bullet missed its target.

[taylorwright27]

I fucking hate this

I keep seeing people blaming third party voters, which even if all those votes went to Harris (which there is no guarantee they were going to) She still wouldn't have won, and I just saw someone on tik tok talk about how people on the left who were critical of Harris and the party were taking the excitement out of voting. And that is complete bullshit, it is not the lefts job to make you feel good about the democratic party they should be doing that themselves. The Harris admin ran a dogshit campaign plain and simple.

People wanted Biden out, it took months but the party finally listened and replaced him with Harris, this made people excited. It seemed like maybe the democratic party was actually listening to its voters, then they picked Walz as VP and we got more excited. No more Biden and a VP who believes in free lunches for students, healthcare, abortion and education! It seemed like the party was moving a different direction. They started calling the Republican party weird, pointing out how crazy their ideas were and how actually invasive theri policies were.

Then the fucking DNC happened, they rejected Palestinian voices and gave the most bullshit fluff speeches imaginable. They made it clear that they had no intention of trying to get undecided and independent voters on their side, they just wanted republicans. They decided that the road to victory was to shift to the right. They now supported a border wall and deportations, things that would be unimaginable 8 years ago. They touted around ex-republicans that switched over, like Liz Cheney (whose father drove the country into useless wars and left the VP office with 13% approval). They decided that it was more important to adopt right wing framing on issues, then to actually listen to what their voters wanted. They sent fucking Bill Clinton to yell at Michiganders that Palestinians were going to die either way so vote for the other things on the ballot. They agreed with the narrative that illegal migrants are ruining the country with drugs and crime, when they should have been pointing out that the Haitians were here on legal status (and clearly not eating pets that was disgusting that they even allowed for that to be a talking point) that the Venezuelan "gangs" Trump was complaining about were also here legally (by Trump), not gangs, and not terrorizing the city. They did not point out the vast majority of fentanyl and other drugs are brought into the US by US citizens, that illegal immigrants commit way way less crime that natural borne US citizens, and that they pay into taxes much more than they use.

But no, the democratic party decided that they need the republican vote, and could do that by effectively saying "Trump was right". They did the same thing with fracking in Pennsylvania. Fracking in was not Pennsylvanians number 1 issue, not even close and the few people who would vote on that would not all the sudden see Harris as the "Fracking candidate" that would still be Trump.

They ignored popular issues like healthcare and student loan forgiveness, raising the minimum wage and instead championed a tax break for small business owners and a credit for first time home buyers. These things do not help the average american, so many more people are struggling to live off of minimum wage jobs than are small business owners, and the anyone I know who the house credit would have made it possible for them to buy a house could only do so because their parents were also able to chip in.

They also did nothing to earn the young vote. I think they though abortion was enough to carry the youth, but newsflash men don't fucking care about women. they show it time and time again, Trump went on Adin Ross and Joe Rogan (2 of the biggest pieces of shit to exist) and that won him a lot of votes. There were people at the voting booth who said that they voted for Trump because of the Rogan interview. Men were not left behind by the campaign, but Trump and Vance were able to convince them that they were.

Harris and the democratic party gave nothing for people to vote for, so don't fucking blame Dearborne Michigan for not voting for someone who said she wouldn't change anything done in the last 4 years and instead blame the Democratic party for a shitty campaign, shitty messaging and choosing republicans votes over yours.

[possessesnightshift]

i'm not an eloquent political speech person so im just gonna be direct about this

americans, please please fucking register to vote and vote for joe biden in november

and before you jump to whatever policy thing or weakness of his to counter this plea, just stop. it doesn't actually matter. trump is worse. trump is fucking so much worse

our job from here on out is not only to hold our noses and vote for biden, but also to convince all of our friends family and whoever else to also vote for him in spite of all of his flaws. yes all of them

we need to make the fucking argument that trump is so dangerous, the country would be better off with a drooling old genocide lover whose mental faculties are drying up faster than the sahara desert. we need biden voters to be keenly aware of his shortcomings and refuse to back down. there's no use in pretending biden is still sharp as ever or has this mass grassroots support (he does not). he sucks. he is probably the worst democratic candidate in the party's history.

don't care. trump is worse. he needs to be stopped from taking power by any means necessary. he needs to be STOPPED.

from a non-republican pov, democrats constantly leaning on the "but the other guy is worse" argument is frustrating as all hell. i certainly hate it myself. but what gets lost in the conversation is that the republicans are essentially so beholden to this principle nobody even notices.

i know plenty of small town midwestern republicans who were embarrassed to admit they voted for trump. they voted for him in spite of his nastiness and blatant buffoonery (not in spite of his racism bc they're likely ok with that) because he was on the republican ticket, and to them any republican is better than a woke liberal who wants to take away our gas stoves and force drag queens to read us stories at bedtime

so yeah i kinda don't fucking care at this point

biden is a laughably bad candidate for the election of 2024. any other time he could've run (including 2020) is completely different than now, when he's just too fucking old. so should we just roll over and let him lose? just for trump to finish his term, be biden's current age, and either run for a third term or just stay in power bc the supreme court is on his side and they've been preparing for this for decades? fuck that

actually i think a rotting, pulpy corpse would make a fine president compared to dumbass donald "reality gameshow host" trump. literally if biden dies the day of the election he's still got my vote because it is not for him

the left has to learn to have the tenacity that republicans have. we emulate the right in the worst fucking ways (e.g. closing the southern border for no reason) but we never emulate their pettiness. we never say 'i hate the republicans so much i will willingly vote for someone i kinda hate to spite their smug asses'

remember when trump used to be a joke? remember when he was a giant embarrassment? remember the memes about his illiteracy and his lack of awareness? (see 'covfefe' for more info) trump may have the means to become a brutal dictator, but he relies on people smarter than he is to pull it off

if trump continues to hype up his project 2025 and his fascist ambitions with the swagger and confidence of fdr running against herbert hoover, what does it signal to the rest of the world for that man to LOSE to a corpse with the stamina of a wet flounder? it could stop the fascist momentum in its tracks by associating it with weakness and incompetence (you talk up all this hype and you lose to THAT man?? i guess you must be full of shit huh)

these are fraught times. there's no way to get out of this without letting go of our ideals of a perfect candidate who responds to the political desires of the people. that candidate does not exist and never will

right now we have not just an opportunity to preserve our rotting democracy for a little longer, but something much more special. we can fucking put an end to the trump experiment once and for all. we can make trump wannabes like ron desantis scramble to dissociate their image from the toxicity of the trump administration. we can turn him back into a joke.

at this point im screaming into the wind. no person who isn't already voting for biden is gonna read this far. but i want these words to be here anyway because i think they have value. 2024, 2028, and 2032 are all going to be pivotal election years. we can't wait around. we have to act NOW.

vote rotting fish 2024. i will plug your nose with a clothes pin if you refuse to do so yourself...

[steelbluehome]

Trigger Warning: American Politics

Why is anyone voting for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party?

The New Republic

"In fact, no Green Party candidate has ever won federal office. And Stein’s reign has been a period of indisputable decline, during which time the party’s membership—which peaked in 2004 at 319,000 registered members—has fallen to 234,000 today."

Slate

"Mohamed Almawri ...decided to become part of a bloc of Arab voters and cast a “conscience vote” in Michigan. For him, that means voting for Jill Stein.

“We’re going to make history as the Muslim community standing against a U.S.–funded genocide,” Almawri told me. “We’re holding this administration accountable,” ...“The value of defeating the Democratic Party makes Trump a price we’re willing to pay,” he said"

New York Times

"“We are not in a position to win the White House,” another speaker, Kshama Sawant, a former member of the Seattle City Council, told a crowd of about 100 inside an Arab American cultural center. “But we do have a real opportunity to win something historic. We could deny Kamala Harris the state of Michigan.” ...“I like her very much,” Mr. Trump said of Ms. Stein at a rally in June. “You know why? She takes 100 percent from them.” ...figures with ties to Mr. Trump and Republicans who have worked to help Ms. Stein secure ballot access.

In Wisconsin, a lawyer who was previously involved in lawsuits seeking to overturn the 2020 election results represented the Green Party. In New Hampshire, a veteran Republican operative submitted signatures for Ms. Stein.

Jay Sekulow, who defended Mr. Trump at his first impeachment trial, has worked on behalf of the Green Party in Nevada, a rare battleground where Democrats have successfully thwarted her.

“We have never knowingly received help from Republicans,” Ms. Stein said, a claim that Democrats find ludicrous. “Now, they might have done this once or twice, having kind of snuck in under the radar.”"

U.S. News and World Report

"Stein is ...targeting voters like me – progressives, and especially Arab Americans. In the battleground state of Michigan, there are at least 206,000 registered Muslim voters ...Stein recently asserted that “under Democrats, the anti-war movement goes to sleep.” On the contrary, the anti-war movement – led by progressive organizations like ours, Common Defense – successfully pressured President Joe Biden and the Democratic establishment to end the forever war in Afghanistan; advocated for Congress to reassert its War Powers Resolution authority; and has called for a cease-fire since the war began in Gaza last year. What has Stein achieved for the anti-war cause? Nothing.

Trump has never engaged with progressives or Muslim Americans, and that won’t change if he’s elected again. When he first campaigned in 2015, he called for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.” When he became president, he signed an executive order banning people from six Muslim-majority countries from entering the U.S., blocking desperate families of refugees seeking asylum from wars and repressive governments in the Middle East and North Africa. At home, he boosted distrust and hate of Muslim Americans, repeating false claims that “thousands and thousands” of Arab Americans in New Jersey cheered on 9/11 as the twin towers came down.""

USA Today

""All you do is show up once every four years to speak to people who are justifiably pissed off, but you're just showing up once every four years to do that, you're not serious," AOC said. "To me, it does not read as authentic. It reads as predatory." ...The Green Party selected Stein as its presidential nominee in 2012, 2016, and 2024, ...Stein also ran unsuccessful third-party campaigns to become Massachusetts's governor in 2002 and 2010."

[jangillman]

Jan Gillman-Westgarth

I woke up and as I had my morning coffee, I realized that everything is about to change. No matter how I vote, no matter what I say, something evil has invaded our nation, and our lives are never going to be the same.

I have been confused by the hostility of family and friends. I look at people I have known all my life--so hate-filled that they agree with opinions they would never express as their own. I think that I may well have entered the Twilight Zone.

You can't justify this insanity. We have become a nation that has lost its collective mind!

• If a man pretends to be a woman, you are required to pretend with him.

• Somehow it’s un-American for the census to count how many Americans are in America.

• Russians influencing our elections are bad, but illegals voting in our elections are good.

• It was cool for Joe Biden to "blackmail" the President of Ukraine, but it’s an impeachable offense if Donald Trump inquires about it.

• Twenty is too young to drink a beer, but eighteen is old enough to vote.

• People who have never owned slaves should pay slavery reparations to people who have never been slaves.

• People who have never been to college should pay the debts of college students who took out huge loans for their degrees.

• Immigrants with tuberculosis and polio are welcome, but you’d better be able to prove your dog is vaccinated.

• Irish doctors and German engineers who want to immigrate to the US must go through a rigorous vetting process, but any illiterate gang-bangers who jump the southern fence are welcome.

• $5 billion for border security is too expensive, but $1.5 trillion for “free” health care is not.

• If you cheat to get into college you go to prison, but if you cheat to get into the country you go to college for free.

• People who say there is no such thing as gender are demanding a female President.

• We see other countries going Socialist and collapsing, but it seems like a great plan to us.

• Some people are held responsible for things that happened before they were born, and other people are not held responsible for what they are doing right now.

• Criminals are caught-and-released to hurt more people, but stopping them is bad because it's a violation of THEIR rights.

• And pointing out all this hypocrisy somehow makes us "racists"?!

Nothing makes sense anymore, no values, no morals, no civility and people are dying of a Chinese virus, but it’s racist to refer to it as Chinese even though it began in China. We are clearly living in an upside down world where right is wrong and wrong is right, where moral is immoral and immoral is moral, where good is evil and evil is good, where killing murderers is wrong, but killing innocent babies is right.

Wake up America, the great unsinkable ship Titanic America has hit an iceberg, is taking on water, and is sinking fast. The choice is yours to make. What will it be? Time is short, make your choice wisely!

(Not my words but very accurate and disturbing!)

Feel free to copy and paste. I did.

See 2 Timothy 4:3 and 2 Timothy 3:1-5

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Noah Berlatsky at Everything Is Horrible:

Last week, Politico ran a profile of New York House Representative Jamaal Bowman, who is facing a tough primary challenge in his district this Tuesday. Bowman is one of the most outspoken critics of Israel’s current policies in Congress. His opponent, George Latimer, has received significant funds from AIPAC, the major pro-Israel organization in the US. The Politico article therefore focused on Bowman’s Israel policy. It ended with Bowman saying this:

[When you [as Israel] say you represent all Jews, and then you behave badly, it opens the doors for people to make the connection between what Israel is doing and Jewish people, which I think is freaking dangerous as hell.]

A number of commenters, such as New York Democratic Congressman Daniel Goldman, pushed back vigorously against Bowman. Goldman argued that “Israel never ‘said it represents all Jews.’ Other commenters, like podcaster Blake Flayton argued that Bowman was blaming “Israel the country filled with Jews…[for] making the world unsafe for Jews.” Goldman and Flayton are wrong; Bowman is correct. I’m going to try to briefly explain why.

Zionists do claim to speak for all Jewish people

First, Goldman’s assertion is easy to disprove. Zionists—Jewish and non-Jewish, far right and liberal—do in fact constantly claim that Israel speaks for and represents all Jewish people.

Netanyahu, for example, Israel’s far right prime minister, has repeatedly asserted that he speaks, not just for the state of Israel, but for all Jewish people everywhere. In 2015, following a horrific antisemitic terrorist attack in France which killed four people, Netanyahu said, “[Jews] know deep in their hearts they have only one country, Israel.” That same year one of Netanyahu’s top aides said that Netanyahu is “the leader of the Jewish world.” Netanyahu is a particularly poisonous and egomaniacal figure. But these sentiments are not limited to just him. In 2006, Ehud Olmert, then Prime Minister of Israel, said Israel’s war against Hezbollah in Lebanon was “a war fought by all the Jews.” (Fact check: I am Jewish, and I was not involved in a war against Hezbollah in 2006.) The mission statement of the Israeli mission to the United Nations says, “Israel’s Permanent Mission represents the State of Israel, its citizens and the Jewish people on the global stage of the United Nations.”

Non-Jewish Zionists make similar arguments. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump has said repeatedly that his support for Israel entitles him to Jewish people’s votes. In 2019, when Trump was president, he said that “any Jewish people that vote for a Democrat” exhibit “great disloyalty”—both to Israel and to Trump. He reiterated those sentiments this March, when he said that “Any Jewish person that votes for Democrats hates their religion.”

President Joe Biden never sounds as grossly antisemitic as that. But he too has suggested that Israel is core to the identity of all Jewish people. On October 12, shortly after Hamas’ 10/7 attack on Israel, Biden said, “Were there no Israel, no Jew in the world would be ultimately safe. It’s the only ultimate guarantee.” He’s made the same argument on numerous other occasions—an argument that flat out states that American Jewish people have more of a stake in Israel (it guarantees our safety!) than in their own country. In a lot of ways, finding these smoking gun quotes understates the extent of the problem. The argument that Israel represents all Jewish people is a core claim used to justify Israeli occupation and violence. It is commonplace and ubiquitous.

Israel is frequently presented as the natural, irrefutable response to the Holocaust, as if six million Jews—many of whom were adamantly opposed to Zionism—justify any and all of Israel’s actions, past and future. Jewish people who speak against Israeli policy are regularly smeared as tokens or told they don’t really understand Judaism or that their voices don’t count. Jewish identity is regularly referenced by Zionists (again, Jewish and non-Jewish) as if it is continuous with and identical with Zionism and with support for any and every Israel policy. Non-Jewish Zionist New York Congressman Ritchie Torres, for example, recently said on Twitter that he supports Israel not because he is afraid of AIPAC funding a challenger, but because he is “afraid of disappointing Jewish mothers.” (Fact check: not all Jewish mothers support Israel’s current policies.)

Treating Jewish people as a monolith is antisemitic and dangerous

There is, then, overwhelming evidence that Zionists (again, Jewish and non-Jewish) conflate Israel with all Jews in order to defend Israel and deflect criticism. And, as Bowman says, this is dangerous. Blaming all Jews for anything done by one Jew or by some Jews is definitionally antisemitism. It creates grounds for collective guilt, collective punishment, antisemitic stereotypes, and antisemitic violence. The Nazis would highlight actions by Jewish criminals (and make up criminal charges against Jewish people) in order to claim that all Jewish people were dangerous and deserved to be executed. Christians for centuries claimed that Jewish people killed Jesus, and used that as an excuse for pogroms and violence against Jewish people (often on Christmas or Easter.)  

Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY)’s comments about how Israel Apartheid State’s claim to speak for all Jews as being “dangerous as hell” were on point. Hopefully he beats AIPAC-funded George Latimer in the #NY16 primary.

[pepperstrawberry]

Pepper Rant

I'm sorry. I hate being negative. I... I'm having a hard time right now. Its been building all week. (I tried to figure out how to put a 'cut/readmore', but it seems a lot has changed with formatting since I last created a full post of my own that required more then a few quick images and text)

I know I don't post much on here, or at least no where near my old consistancy... but I am pretty happy I still see some familiar names float across my dash.

Though, right now, it feels like... like I'm lost. Trying to figure out someone to commiserate with, but I kinda don't want to burden folks and I can't remember which of the discords I'm on have spots for political rambles.

Most of my biggest fears are probably going to be very obvious.

November 8 2016, I remember being in a discord chat at the time. All the mods were off for one reason or another. Some folks were freaking out. Some weren't. This was an LGBT focused discord, so the fact that some folks were thinking things would be fine was a bit concerning. I had to use my minis to drown folks out, reminding folks that the discord in question had a specific space for that sort of topic and the main channel we were in need to be a space for just breathing. It was... a rough night for everyone I think.

Over the course of the next year plus, I would often say things like 'this feels like the sort of thing you see in history books around mid 20s - early 30s of Gernany. I wasn't sure how much I was speaking in hyperbole and how much was 1000% serious, but I do know I was leaning toward the later.

Now... here we are, on the cusp of another election, the same bastard moving for power. And I honestly feel more then ever I was at least close to the reality. It wasn't 1 to 1, mind. but it was... familiar enough.

With already some extremely disturbing actions by the SCOTUS and the like mouths before the vote is upon us gives me some chilling fears.

The unparalleled power the position of President now has is... not something to take lightly. And this time, its not a bumbling idiot that is going to be lost at how the job even works.

mind you, he is still a fool. He is still the same self centered piece of garbage. But this time, he has a team behind him already setting a lot of very very disturbing things in motion.

The 'Immunity' decision has basically cemented a path to getting everything they want. Not a little, but a lot.

I don't have the mental strength or energy. All I can feel is a tingling fear in my nerves that is slowly building. A reality I want to wake up from.

And the worst of it is: even if the Biden wins, that is *at best* a holding pattern. That guy isn't much better. Maybe he turned around several things Trump did, but it hasn't really felt like we have moved forward to anything better.

Unless something is *somehow* done about the Immunity decision, among others, then we are just going to be facing this nightmare again in the next election.

Honestly, I am not liking how next year is looking in either case. I would move out of country, but I don't even know which place would be best to run to, nor am I in nearly as 'stable' financially as I was even just a year ago.

I'm sorry, I used to keep my politic stuff on a separate tumblr... but honestly, fuck that. Things are just too fucked. I don't know how to keep my thoughts separate anymore.

I know for many across the world, what I fear is already their reality. It makes this whole mess feel even worse. I know there is good in this world. Good people and good places... but I feel like everyone I know is so spread out. Even my closest friends (aside from a couple of family members and my girlfriend) are miles away at the least and states or even countries away at most. So even if I were to find a place to run to, its going to be... difficult.

No this isn't a plea for cash or anything. At least not yet. Just right now, I need to get it out of my system on some level. Even if it ends up as 'not as bad as I fear', the fact is, it is still going to be horrible for many of us. I thought that at least the Senate and SCOTUS would at least provide a *little* barrier to the plans of that bastard and his allies. But that barrier no longer exists. I don't know what is going to stand against him doing most of not all they are planning.

Tonight, as I right this, there are still fireworks popping off. A night that was supposed to celebrate independence from a King...

I fear next year, they will be celebrating a new king... and they may not even be simulated.