#right because what would you call the border and immigration politics? not fascist?

[formulapookie]

ok so Trump wants what? To ban immigration all together? All the appointments set for Political Asylum Request have been cancelled and there's no intention of giving immigrants waiting on the border any mean to cross it legally.

This is PREVENTING LEGAL IMMIGRATION, what does Trump think? That the soldiers and border patrols won't get bribed? And let someone in? Or does he perfectly know this so he's gonna use people coming into the US illegally as "proof" of them having (in his opinion) no right to be there.

He increased border controls, he wants to DEPORT people back into the countries they came from for the most various reasons, he wants to eliminate the right (written in the Constitution, 14th amendment, sec 1) of every person born/naturalized in the US to be a US citizen.

And if people ask me "Oh but you're Italian, living in Italy, how does that affect you?" Ok so first of all this is called worrying out of COMMON SENSE cause fucking hell it's absurd to even think this. Secondly US are a MAJOR example for the whole world, as I already said, and given MY country is currently ruled by a fascist party with a fascist leader, who enjoys giving out the citizenship to criminals like Milei and has direct contacts with Trump, sorry but I am fucking scared because what if we're next? You'd be shocked to know how many people here would vote for that excuse of a man.

And once again, I worry and talk about it because one cannot possibly think their country for as far as it can be from the US is excluded from what's happening or is not affected by it somehow.

[yuri-for-businesswomen]

how are the posts about the eu elections literally more annoying than the ones about us elections. didnt think that was possible. and why is literally nobody differentiating the european union and europe. so you are politically invested but dont even bother to use the right terminology even though there are 20 different countries in europe that are not in the union? oh you worry the eu is going to become fascist now when it has been such a beacon of peace and freedom before? maybe im cynical but the takes i see make my eyes roll into my head. reverse the european union back to be a trade union im begging i cant do this anymore.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Dean Obeidallah at The Dean's Report:

“Dear Democratic leaders: We need you to take the FIGHT to Donald Trump and the oligarchy he is ushering in to power. Stop being silent--or worse--looking for "common ground" with a convicted felon, adjudicated rapist who attempted a coup and incited the Jan. 6 terrorist attack. If you can’t do that, then step aside because we need fighters, not doormats for the MAGA agenda.” The above is my best effort to sum up the growing anger and frustration I have heard from fellow Democrats since the election—especially now that we are just days from Trump being sworn in. It’s also exactly how I feel.

When Presidents Obama and Biden were about to be sworn in, we didn’t hear Republican leaders declare a desire to find common ground with them. Instead with Biden, GOP leaders of Congress joined with Trump to literally attempt to overturn the 2020 election—and even after the Jan. 6 attack, nearly 150 voted against certifying the results. And with Obama, we heard people like then GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell infamously pledge, “The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”

Making the Democrats silence now even more jarring is that leading up to the 2024 election, Democratic leaders literally called Trump a “fascist” and warned he was a “threat to our freedoms and democracy.” So where are the Democratic leaders now about how they will protect our freedoms and democracy from this fascist? Where is the passionate message about the Democratic strategy to stand up to Trump in his second term?! We are not alone in sensing something is deeply wrong with the Democratic leadership. We are seeing a growing number of articles calling out the Democrats silence. Rolling Stone recently featured an article titled, “Democrats are already rolling over Trump,” noting that, “The resistance is over” as many “Democrats signal a new era of enhanced Democratic subservience.”

In Axios, the co-founders of the publication penned an column focusing on, “Trump's ever-expansive power,” noting that “Democratic opposition is weak and largely powerless.” And just a few days ago, former Republican Mona Charen wrote an article for The Bulwark slamming Democratic leaders that began with these two words in all caps: “ENOUGH CAPITULATION!” She continued that Democrats have “responded to the election with acquiescence bordering on servility.”

Yes, there are some Democratic fighters in Congress but what is lacking is a unified strategy! We, Democrats are so desperate for someone to resist that we are overjoyed that Michelle Obama announced this week she refuses to attend Trump’s inauguration. Democrats in Congress shockingly appear to be acting like Trump actually “won in a landslide” and has a “mandate” –a lie Trump and his allies keep peddling. In reality, Trump won less than 50% of the vote (33% of all registered voters to be accurate.) And instead of the GOP gaining seats in the House—which happens in real landslide elections--they had a net loss of one seat meaning they have a three seat margin, which is the smallest majority in nearly 100 years.

One of the worst Democrats in this regard is Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman who over the weekend travelled down to Mar-A-Lago to kiss Trump’s ring. It’s one thing for a Senator to meet with Trump in Washington, D.C, but Fetterman made a spectacle of visiting Trump because it helps him politically. (I wish Trump would put Fetterman in his administration, enabling Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro-who is a fighter--to appoint a real Democrat to this Senate seat.) Some of these “let’s give MAGA a chance” Democrats are supporting Trump—or the MAGA agenda on issues like immigration—because they believe it helps them politically. They have put their re-election efforts over protecting us. Please never forget who they are.

[...] But right now, we can each play a role in taking the fight to Trump from getting more involved in grassroots organizations, volunteering on campaigns and even running for office. And for those who want to do something this Saturday, there is the People’s March in Washington, D.C. and in locations across the nation sponsored by a host of groups from The Women’s March to Planned Parenthood to The Sierra Club. Will we see any national Democratic officials speak at these events?! Keith Ellison said something else in our interview that stayed with me about the next few years under Trump: “We're all gonna get tested a little bit.” He’s right. The question is how do each of us respond?! The answer must be: We stand up and fight!

Dean Obeidallah is saying what needs to be said: Democratic leaders and politicians should fight, not coddle, Trump and Trumpism.

[frogeyedape]

Omg. Fox News reporting on Trump-might-be-a-dictator news. Article one:

It's relatively colorless reporting carefully not stating whether the bipartisan No Dictators move is necessary or whether it's actually directed at Trump...until right at the very end where it quotes Joe Walsh, "a Tea Party Republican who left office in January 2013 and who has been a vocal Trump critic," as saying:

"We're locked in arms right now because we have somebody running for president who has promised to be a dictator," Walsh said. "This is a bipartisan effort every member of the House and every member of the Senate should easily sign and pledge that they don't want – we will not have a dictator as president."

As an outsider to Fox News this seems like it should be ringing Fox readers' alarm bells, but...is it? Notice the careful distancing from "former GOP Rep. Joe Walsh." Are Fox regulars reading this, not as "Trump's promises to be a dictator on day one are alarming and Congress must move to prevent an American dictatorship" but as "these crazy democrats and traitorous ex-Republicans are out of their minds, we don't even have to say how insane it is that anyone would propose legislation to prevent the US president from acting like a dictator." Genuine questions here, not just rhetorical, although they are rhetorical too! What do Fox truthers believe is being said in this article?

Oh good, 30 seconds of random (carefully selected) person saying Trump doesn't sound angry, or like a fascist or dictator.

Uh huh, calling fears that Trump threatens democracy crazy and celebrating "WOW. Some sanity on CNN!" (X-twitter tweet by Curtis Houck) after (presumably) CNN reports Clemente's statements against inflamed rhetoric.

Fox News chyron appeared to call BIDEN a wannabe dictator for what Trump claims is Biden's political persecution of Trump. Stunning reversal, yet so typical

"Saying I'm gonna be a dictator is political ploy, let me tell you why it's a ploy: I'm gonna be a dictator. I'm gonna be a dictator on day one, on day one I will accomplish 2 things that can totally be done in a single day, I will close the US-Mexico border to all illegal immigration and I will drill, baby, drill. After that I won't be a dictator." (Mostly paraphrased)

The doublespeak on this one. "Oh don"t worry I'm not gonna be a dictator except on day one. I'm not gonna be a dictator except for when I am." Is this somehow flying under the radar for Fox believers? Do they really believe that he's A) not gonna be a dictator at all (I had one gent tell me that) or that B) bring a dictator flr one day doesn't count as being a dictator??? Or what??

Notice the attempted reversal, with Trump claiming that Biden is the true threat to democracy, and NO fact checking of statements by Biden accusing Trump of saying things that Trump has said. Fact checking would lend credence to Biden's claims, after all. Are readers just expected to shake their heads and agree that Biden's a phony liar, when they're not even outright stating it? Cuz like the seeming implication is "get a load of this guy. He's crazy, he's the threat, Trump is our guy, Biden's crazy"

OMG. If you read this with a "Harris is just spewing falsehoods against our persecuted Trump" I can see how you'd think Trump was cool. The terrible thing is Trump LIES so much!!! He accuses Harris of starting 2 world wars (referencing fears that Trump will trigger World War 3), while completely fucking lying that she started 2 world wars! 2 wars are ongoing under the Biden/Harris administration, but she didn't start them and they're NOT, and especially not BOTH, wars that embroil the world in a world-wide war! "Wars in the world are world wars..." omg. Read a goddamn history book, would you?

Ok. I am. Not okay.

My goal was to try to see what Fox truthers are seeing about Trump's literal actual starements that he will be a dictator on day one. I have seen some of it. I am appalled. The complete ommission of FACT, the emphasis on rhetoric over literal things that happened...omg.

"I'm not gonna be a dictator, except on day one. After that, I'm not a dictator." They put THAT CLIP on Fox News as the denial of Trump's desire to be a dictator!!!

[mariacallous]

Last Friday, an 82-year-old woman wrapped up warm and set off on a 200-mile round trip for a meeting that she half suspected wouldn’t even let her in. As you read this, the film of her speaking that evening has been viewed more than five million times. Which is odd, because it’s not much to look at: a wobbly side-view of a woman with white hair, intense closeups of grey cardigan. Bridgerton this is not.

But it’s the words that count. Joan Salter has got herself down to Hampshire for a public meeting with the home secretary, and now it is her turn to ask a question. As a child survivor of the Holocaust, she hears Suella Braverman demean and dehumanise refugees and it is a reminder of how the Nazis justified murdering Jews like her. So why do it?

Even as the words come out, Braverman’s face freezes. The evening so far has been a Tory activists’ love-in, which, Salter tells me later, made her nervous about being the sole dissenter. But then the home secretary responds, “I won’t apologise for the language I’ve used” – and a disturbing truth is exposed about what Britain has become.

Braverman labels those seeking sanctuary in Britain an “invasion”. Quite the word, invasion. It strips people of their humanity and pretends they are instead a hostile army, sent to maraud our borders. Her junior minister Robert Jenrick once begged colleagues not to “demonise” migrants; now he stars in videos almost licking his jowls over “the Albanians” forced on to a flight to Tirana. Salter is right to say such attitudes from the top fuel and license extremists on the ground. We saw it after the toxic Brexit campaign, when Polish-origin schoolchildren in Huntingdon were called “vermin” on cards left outside their school gates, as race and religious hate crimes soared that summer.

Today, the air is once again poisonous. Far-right groups have been visiting accommodation for asylum seekers, trying to terrify those inside – many of whom have fled terror to come here – often before sharing their videos on social media. The anti-fascist campaigners Hope Not Hate recorded 182 such jaunts last year alone, culminating in a petrol bomb tossed at an asylum centre in Dover by a man with links to far-right groups and who would post about how “all Muslims are guilty of grooming … they only rape non-Muslims”.

Unlike those big men in their big boots frightening innocent people, Salter isn’t chasing social media clout. The grandmother wants to warn us not to return to the times that sent her, at the age of three, running with her parents across Europe in search of sanctuary. She does make a mistake in yoking the home secretary to the term “swarms”. As far as I can see, this figurehead for the new Tory extremism has yet to use that vile word. But I can think of a Tory prime minister who has used that word: David Cameron, the Old Etonian never shy of blowing on a dog whistle, who made a speech denouncing multiculturalism even as Tommy Robinson’s troops marched on Luton. And Margaret Thatcher talked of how the British felt “rather swamped” by immigrants. In those venerable names from the party’s past lies the big picture about the Conservatives’ chronic addiction to racist politics.

Because racism is not what polite people do – and yet Tories keep on doing it, commentators will often put it behind some behavioural cordon. It’s a few rotten apples, you’ll be told, after some councillor dons a blackshirt or moans about the new Doctor Who. Or: they need to fend off the effect of Nigel Farage. Or even, as one Times commentator wrote in 2019, Boris Johnson says it but he “barely believes a word” of it. Such clairvoyance! But that’s the thing about power: other people trot behind with a dustpan and brush to sweep up the mess you keep making.

Yet there was no Ukip when Benjamin Disraeli declared that the Irish “hate our order, our civilisation, our enterprising industry, our pure religion. This wild, reckless, indolent, uncertain and superstitious race have no sympathy with the English character.” It was no rotten apple but Winston Churchill, the Tory idol, who as prime minister pronounced: “I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion. The famine was their own fault for breeding like rabbits.” The Bengal famine of 1943 is widely estimated to have killed about 2 million people.

I draw these quotes from a new book, Racism and the Tory Party, by the sociologist Mike Cole. Far from being a mere slip of the tongue, racism, he argues, “has saturated the party from the beginning of the 19th century to the second decade of the 21st”. From Enoch Powell’s “rivers of blood” to Theresa May’s hostile environment, it courses through Tory history. And it is not just words. In its online safety bill, the government wants this week to make illegal any online video of people in small boats that shows such Channel crossing in a “positive light”. Braverman still grinds on with her plan to deport asylum seekers to Rwanda, to stay in hostels with 12 toilets and five showers for 100 inmates.

For the Tories, racism is a fire that they just love to play with. The heat it throws off can be electorally useful. But it is always someone else who gets burned. The targets change – two centuries ago it was the Irish, today it is Albanians – but the strategy is always the same: pick the group, render them inhuman, then chuck them out. The mystery is why a party with such a long and inglorious history can still be lauded by the press for sprinkling a few non-white people along its frontbench.

The woman who is today Joan Salter was in 1943 a three-year-old girl called Fanny Zimetbaum. As Polish-origin Jews, her family were not granted sanctuary in Britain from the Nazis marching into their home of France. Instead, her parents had to scramble through Europe, while Joan was shipped across the Atlantic to an orphanage in America. Only years later, through much wrangling, were the family reunited in London. By then, she remembers her parents as “thoroughly broken”. When she was in her 70s and studying for a master’s, Salter went through the archives. She read a parliamentary debate from 1943, concerning 2,000 Jewish children in France refused British visas and who were then deported to Hitler’s Germany. She read foreign secretary Anthony Eden claiming “no knowledge” of the matter. Then she read the minutes and memos that proved he was lying: he was in the war cabinet meeting where the issue was discussed. Still the children were abandoned, just as her family were left to their fate.

From her own life, this remarkable woman knows that fascism is not just a one-off and racism never a mere faux pas. They are forces of evil that lurk on the political perimeter and threaten to consume our society wholesale. Joan Salter bears a warning. The rest of us should listen.

[atheistforhumanity]

Why should we take immigrants in, especially arabs and mexicans. They are a bunch of third-worlders that do no work and turn the place to a shithole, refuse to integrate and steal the taxes of hardworking citizens. How is letting them in a good idea?!

There key to having a conversation about the morality or practicality of an action is to have common goals and values. The problem between me and a person like this is that we do not share the same values. George Lakoff showed in his book Moral Politics that Republicans are made up of people with a low sense of empathy. This can plainly be seen in their politics, as every policy benefits a narrow cross section of society. 

So I’m going to start off by saying that the right thing to do is care about other human beings, regardless of where they are from. Our globe is one society, no matter how hard nationalists in the world try to fight this reality. The moral position is to care for those that are fleeing war, persecution, poverty, or just seeking a better life. 

Morality is not decided by universal agreement. You can take any widely agreed upon moral stance and still find thousands of people that disagree. For example: stealing, lying, cheating, violence, etc. We don’t sit around thinking, I wish those thugs would realize that stealing is wrong so we can declare it moral. Similarly, your agreement that all humans deserve help when in need is not needed for the morality to be evident. 

Any society on the planet is made up of a basic social contract that says if help each other we are all better off. I suspect that you feel this only applies people in our country, and likely not everyone inside either. However, you are wrong, because we are all a community. The suburbs and the inner city, one state and another state, our nation and other nations. To turn your back to those that need help is an act full of massive self-centeredness and hate, and most of all it makes all of society weaker. Whether you like it or not, living in society is a form of taking help from thousands of others to create a more comfortable, safe, and prosperous life. Your idea that this relationship ends at the borders of America is simply delusional. 

Furthermore, your complaints about immigrants are ignorant, uninformed, prejudice, and come from propaganda. This is why no one wants to listen to you, because you have no idea what you’re talking about. Everything you’re saying is the same BS that’s been said about literally every group that’s come here, and the country is never ruined. Immigrants are very hard workers and they fill a special niche in our economy that citizens refuse to do. 

It’s unbelievably ignorant how conservatives like you can rant about immigrants “taking over” the country when America is the result of Europeans doing exactly what you rant about. They came here without asking, they invaded nations’ territories, they did not assimilate, they killed all the inhabitants. Yet, you have the nerve to say that outsiders are the dangerous ones. 

The only people who make this country a shithole are Republicans like you. You’re ignorant, greedy, cruel, uncaring, immoral, uneducated, and one step away from being fascists. Literally, all your party does is fight against moral and economic progress. The entire Republican party is worthless to society and has no ground to be pointing their finger at anyone. If you don’t like living in a country where people call you out for being a bad person and fight for what’s right, then get out. I would be happy if you left.   

[racefortheironthrone]

Today's issue of Captain America by Ta Nahesi Coates came out, and it showed Steve being more concerned with "a country keeping its borders" than with saving inmigrants from murder. Don't you think it's way Out of Character for him? Also, what do you you think of Coates' run as a whole?

So I read the issue - I was a bit behind on some of my comics - and I know the page you’re talking about. Discussion below the cut.

So to catch people up who haven’t been following Captain America: 

While investigating a conspiracy whereby ex-HYDRA forces were creating clones of Nuke in order to keep tensions high via repeated terrorist attacks, Steve Rogers was framed by the villainous Power Elite for the murder of General Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross (better known as the original Hulk antagonist). 

In order to demonstrate that he was the good due-process believing Captain America and not the evil HYDRA one that a substantial chunk of the population think or fear he is, Rogers turned himself in and got sent to a private prison run by actual factual Nazi Baron von Strucker. 

While Steve was in prison, the Power Elite assassinated the HYDRA Cap so that they could spread misinformation that Steve *was* the HYDRA Cap. Sharon Carter, leading a clandestine all-female group called the Daughters of Liberty, helped to break Rogers out of prison while he was leading a prison revolt, having learned something about the nature of the carceral state on the inside.

This issue revolves around the now-freed Steve Rogers trying to find his way amidst a Daughters of Liberty plan to “remind the world who Steve Rogers is,” stepping away from the problematic focus on the mythos of Captain America and restoring public confidence in Steve as an individual. So far, so good.

Where things get a bit weird is that their first public relations mission is to protect undocumented immigrants being attacked by a racist militia with superweapons on the border - which is awfully close to the plot of the first Nick Spencer Captain America: Sam Wilson issue. The weirdness comes in with Steve’s reaction to the briefing:

This is the first moment where I feel Ta-Nehisi Coates misread Steve Rogers as a character; let me say off the bat, I think he’s done a great job up until now. (Steve does come around once he gets on the ground and ends up defending said undocumented immigrants with his new/old energy shiled while reciting Emma Lazarus’ New Colossus poem, which is very Steve Rogers.) I could potentially see Steve not being completely au fait with contemporary immigration politics, given how rapidly attitudes have shifted on immigration over the past few years even within the mainstream of the center-left. 

However, I don’t buy the idea that Steve Rogers would have a problem with the idea that either he or the Daughters of Liberty should put their own morality above the law - because if there’s one thing that’s been a running theme when it comes to Steve Rogers it’s that he is all about putting his personal morality above the law. 

Going all the way back to his origins as a premature anti-fascist, Steve Rogers is someone who routinely puts his faith in his own moral compass above the dictates of authority. He instinctively sides with dissidents against the establishment, he allies with the X-Men against SHIELD to take down Richard Nixon, and even at his lowest point he joins resistance movements of people of color against Nazi colonizers. Hell, one of the most recurring tropes in Captain America comics throughout the decades has been Rogers resigning his position in protest against right-wing governments of the day. 

So what do I think about Coates’ run as a whole? Generally, I’ve enjoyed it. My main critique is that Coates has something of a tendency to have the main character be somewhat reactive and introspective, with the plot driven by supporting characters - this happened a lot in the first couple arcs of his Black Panther run, for example - which I find makes the protagonists come off as somewhat passive. 

[accardi1921]

Lets clear up a few things that many Americans dont even know about their own Constitution, let alone those who aren't Americans. The US Constitution states nothing about felons not being able to be the president! You must be born in the US & 35 years of age. Now, if Congress,who writes the laws & decides what to pass by voting into law, must pass by 2/3 vote. It's called an amendment to the Constitution. In America, you are innocent until proven guilty. It falls on the prosecution to prove that guilt. The indictment never stated what Trumps crime is. An indictment must be specific as to the crime,this was not done & is the 1st violation of Trumps Constitutional rights. The second violation of Trumps Constitutional rights is that the prosecution failed to state what the crime is in his opening statements. Conflict of interest! This judge gives corruption a whole new definition. He should have refused to be the judge as he's donated to Biden(which is his choice)& his daughter Lauren is a huge fund raiser for demorats like "shitty Schiff" as we call him here in California because he's done nothing for my state but destroy it. Since Beijing Biden has been in office, my gas is over $5 a gallon, and my food bill is easily $125/150 more & that's just the basics! And I can't forget the border and the 7+ million here illegally that aren't vetted for criminal activity such as murder,rape,drugs,human trafficking etc. I believe when dementia Joe is voted out,my country will be better off. He's been on the government dole for almost 50 years, and like many politicians, regardless of party,has done nada! Biden is responsible for taxing our Social Security, which is our retirement money, not the governments. Prior to him pushing the bill through Congress,it wasn't! Biden is a TRAITOROUS POS! Classified documents were found at 3 of his homes, which dated back to when he was a Senetor & VP. The Constitution clearly states that only the president has that privilege. No indictment for him or Killary who paid for the Russian dossier & destroyed 33,000 E-mails,kept an unsecured server in her home as well & no indictment from the DOJ which is weaponized against the American people. Trying to put ones political opponent in prison as the Communist, Fascist, and Marxists have is not American!!! As the granddaughter of Irish & Italian immigrants,this would disgust them to see this happening here. I will do all I can to prevent it.

[classicalliberalleague]

Does PGC even post anymore or is that all the cute animals? So this is to NAC. First off. Do you vote? And if so what do you vote for? And second of all, what is your purpose on this site? You rip people a new one if they don't lick your boots and then block them. You've created a soapbox in an echo chamber. What the hell makes you think you're conservative? And why the hell do you think we have time to read the Mueller report. U read it, tell us why the President should be impeached?

Yes, shows you don’t pay much attention, but we’ll get back to that...but most of those animals are NAC.

Yes I vote.  And sadly it’s for a lot of third party candidates who don’t stand a chance because the two main parties are only offering me a choice of fascism and socialism.

“what is your purpose on this site?“ To express my opinion.  For whatever reasons I may have.  The same as any tumblr page.  You act as if I have to justify having a tumblr page.  The fuck?  Better question given that you admit to never actually wanting to learn what is you purpose in existence?  Because whatever it is you’re failing. Once long ago I had hopes that maybe tumblr would expose me to arguments more traditional outlets didn’t...boy was I wrong (just as I was wrong that the majority of Republicans weren’t racist, just as I was wrong once long ago that the FAIR tax was better than a flat tax, and certainly that before reading Federalist 42 and seeing that the Constitution gives no power to regulate immigration I thought for all it’s short coming on economics immigration rules should be followed because rule of law should be upheld and efforts should be pragmatically made to reduce them over time...but once I saw that it was unconstitutional I realized they have to go right now...we could go on for a long time on things I’ve learned I’m wrong about, but that would involve discussion what is I’m sure a foreign concept to you, learning).

“You rip people a new one if they don't lick your boots and then block them.“ I rip people a new one if they waste my time.  If you came into my house and started yelling at me I’d be well withing my rights to send you to hell you so richly deserve.  If you come to my tumblr page to spout drivel I will throw you out as well. 

“You've created a soapbox in an echo chamber. “ Soapbox, certainly.  Echo chamber.  It is presenting an opinion certainly, one biased by reason, facts, logic, and ethics.  But I don’t exist in an echo chamber.  Every day I keep up with CNN and Fox, Washington Times and Washington Post, AEI and Brookings, CATO and The Dipatch, The Bulwark and the Atlantic, National Review and Ricochet.  From the Far Right to the Far Left to the Far Libertarian.  I track down primary documents and I post some of the more interesting stuff I find. Not to mention hundreds of books from a variety of sources. So I’m not in an echo chamber.  And I don’t require that anyone else be in an echo chamber.  Please go find other sources than me.  But if you’re going to waste my time by commenting on my post with the intellectual equivalent of diarrhea don’t expect me to want to bother with you.  You and I both have the right to speak, and we both have the right to not listen.  You have a problem with my right to speak and my right to not listen, I am fully in support of both of yours. 

“What the hell makes you think you're conservative?“ A desire for small, limited government (unlike both parties at present).  A desire for free market capitalism (unlike both parties right now).  A desire for following the Constitution (both parties fail, but the democrats are vaguely in line with impeaching Trump, but I wouldn’t begin to fool myself that they suddenly believe in the Constitution...which is the documents benefits, it doesn’t always have to be believed in just followed to work).  I believe in low taxes and free trade like the Founding Fathers.  I believe in doing what works by that I mean things that in one example after another show pragmatic results that benefit everyone (capitalism, open border, free speech, freedom of religion, the right to bear arms).  I believe in personal responsibility, in defending liberty at home and abroad, at opposing tyranny at every turn.

  Can Trump or any of his supporters say the same?  No. Not on a single point.

So how do you claim I’m not a conservative?

“And why the hell do you think we have time to read the Mueller report.“ Because you as a voting citizen have a civic duty to hold your elected representatives to account and to do that you have stay informed.  It’s available for FREE at audible https://www.audible.com/pd/The-Mueller-Report-Audiobook/B07PXN468K It’s 19 hours.  Playing it at double speed or higher (Audible can get up to 3.5x speed, which is how I can get through more than 200 books a year...when was the last time you read even one?) means you’d only need about 10 hours.  Most commutes are 4.3 hours a week...so even if you only listened on your drive to work you’d be done in two and a half weeks. If you don’t have 19 hours to spare, what are you doing?  You never do chores (which can be done while listening to audiobooks?)  or is catching up on the Mandalorian so much more important than the fate of a real Republic...or perhaps given that well over half the pro-Trump blogs I have to block are mostly porn is it that you have other things that capture your attention. 

“tell us why the President should be impeached? “ You see this is why you get blocked.  There are literally hundreds of posts that are much shorter than a 19 hour read that I have posted which do that.  But you didn’t bother to read any of them.  You just attack, blindly, like the brainless twit you are.  But you don’t have to read my posts...but don’t then complain when I don’t have any respect for the filth you call an opinion.

But since you missed why Trump should be impeached, removed, convicted, tried, sentenced and imprisioned for the rest of his life.  Let’s go over it again.

There is the massive tax fraud he and his family were involved in

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/10/02/us/politics/donald-trump-tax-schemes-fred-trump.html

He is a money launder for the cartels

https://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/corruption-and-money-laundering/narco-a-lago-panama/

He has violated the emoluments clause from the first day

https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-emoluments-clause-its-text-meaning-and-application-to-donald-j-trump/

He has obstructed justice in the Mueller investigation:

“Because we determined not to make a traditional prosecutorial judgment, we did not draw ultimate  conclusions  about  the  President’s  conduct.  The  evidence  we  obtained  about  the President’s actions and intent presents difficult issues that would need to be resolved if we were making a traditional prosecutorial judgment.  At the same time,if we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the President clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state.”  I.e. Barr won’t let us charge him.  If we thought he wasn’t guilty of obstruction we’d say so.  We’re not saying so.  (I.e. he’s guilty of obstruction his handpicked Goering wannabe Barr just won’t let us charge him with the crimes he committed).

Conclusion from the Mueller Report.  https://www.justice.gov/storage/report.pdf

Is one paragraph short enough for you?

He attempted extortion of a foreign nation (I read the summary of the transcript where he said “do me a favor”, can’t read the transcript as he keep repeating because it has been illegally classified)

He did said extortion to help himself win an election a violation of his oath of office and to help his friends in Russia.  Both crimes.

And then he committed obstruction of justice/Congress by not allowing his people to testify. 

I notice also that you tried to take this back to the Mueller report because his crimes that the Democrats actually had the balls to impeach him on (a mere fraction of the crimes he is guilty of) are such an open and shut case that you prefer to take things back the Mueller Report which does requires above an elementary level of reading (which I’m guessing you, like your God-King Trump, lack). 

Now please, fascist cocksucker run along.  Don’t bother me again.  I will never concern myself with your meaningless drivel but you can shout your filth as much as you want.  I just don’t care.  Just don’t bother me unless you want to come and deal with real facts (I realize such a thing is so foreign a concept to you that you probably stopped reading long ago to go back to the porn blogs that are more you level, but still, I have to put in the request, Don Quixote that I am--that’s a reference to a book by the way, you’re supposed to read them not burn them...again I’m sure it’s a concept that goes too far for you). 

“ U read it,“ There are always of course unintentional typos and only a fool points those out on a format such as tumblr.  But “U”?  In a political argument you treat this like a high school girl texting her bffjill? And you wonder why my contempt knows no bounds.

- NAC

—-

As for me, PGC, I post once in a blue moon. Occassionally I post about my history podcast, which is only one of the many projects I’m working on that have made tumblr so very low on my priority list. Politics is no longer my main sector of interest and that was 90% of what I used tumblr for.

So yeah, I’m busy. I keep up with the news and post on twitter fairly often (@MeredithAncret aned @history_wtf, if anyone is desperate to know) but I’m starting grad school in 6 weeks (meaning my reading assignments already started), writing my podcast, and working on at least two novels and a short story series intermittantly. If someone wants my opinion they can address an ask to me and I’ll see it eventually or NAC will let me know it’s there.

[mitigatedchaos]

On Defeating Trump

Trump is not a beacon of technocratic excellence.

What, did you think I sent him?  If you want nationalistic technocrats, go scour Asia and maybe something will turn up.  

Trump didn’t come to power through genius - he was selected for by the weaknesses that he exploits.  He uses a few simple strategies that his opponents' supporting structures are vulnerable to, and he monopolizes a few key issues.  That’s it.  That’s all there is to it.

If you want to beat Trump, you’ve got to take out one of those two things.

Co-opting Trump’s tactics is redundant.  People have been saying dumb shit like “we should dissolve the United States” to out-Left each other and rile up conservatives for years.  The conservatives just don’t have the cultural power now, which is why we’re not still arguing Atheism v. Christianity (Part XVI) and internet trolls have moved on to trying to meme the “OK” hand sign into a symbol of white supremacy.

Pissing off right-wing Boomers to show off how they “really” feel?  Multinational corporations do it as a marketing campaign to sell overpriced tennis shoes.  That should be our cue that it’s stale.

Copying Trump tactics won’t make Trump go away.  Just being nice to other people won’t do it either, because even if you do it, he’ll just say something more outrageous to keep Twitter occupied.  

Because Trump is neither a political genius, nor an excellent technocrat (if he were both, this one opening would have made him President for life), if you take away his issues, there’s not enough left to keep him in power.  People won’t buy the sizzle without the steak.

Is it possible?

With enough force of will, almost anything is.

The key is that in terms of how Trump acts, what he says he wants and what he “actually” wants are two different things.  (He’s operating on sharp instincts, but without the analytics to back it up.)  Further, what Trump wants and what the marginal Trump voter want are not the same thing.

The first perspective of perceiving Trump’s hardline stance on detainment (e.g. throwing unauthorized migrants in jail) is “Trump is just an evil, racist, fascist.”  This is “how the opposition want to portray Trump,” and certainly how many claim to feel about him.

The second perspective is perceiving the hardline stance as a negotiating tactic.  Since there were previous amnesties, but large-scale unauthorized migration continues, immigration restrictionists don’t have a reason to give up leverage now for a promise that there “might” be a deal on enforcement later.  They’re going to force a deal while Trump is still in power, whether Democrats want it or not.

But I think what’s really going on is a third perspective.  To stay in power, Trump needs to push the Democrats farther to left of the median voter than he is to the right, and he does that by getting Democrats do things like say stuff that doesn’t add up mathematically.  For instance, if you combine “we’re obligated to pay for medical care for anyone who crosses the border” with “we shouldn’t kick out anyone who hasn’t committed a felony” (or something along those lines), you create an unbounded financial commitment with no upper limit.  The US doesn’t actually have the money to give medical treatment (e.g. cancer treatment) to everyone in the world who has an expensive medical issue (e.g. cancer), won’t attempt armed robbery on arrival, doesn’t live in Europe, and can afford a plane ticket.  People will notice this and vote Trump due to the unbounded commitment, even if Trump’s to their right.

Current tactics appear focused on preventing Trump from getting anything he can claim as a victory, either based on perspective one (”Resist!”) or perspective two (”don’t give in to blackmail”), combined with a sort of “starve the beast” mentality where he’ll be portrayed to his base as impotent.

But Trump has instincts.  If he won’t get anything, then he can bluff as much as he wants.  He can say to himself, “let’s go paint some random small fry from a safe district in New York as the face of the entire Democratic Party.”

It’s not that sophisticated of a strategy.  It’s just that the current environment is weak to it.  

The marginal Trump voter is not going to be as far to the right on immigration as Trump is, even if they’re skeptical.  Give up on the idea of demographic change in America as positive (”diversity is good”) instead of neutral (”race is a neutral quality”), then call Trump on his bluff.

Propose a bill that

Grants amnesty to all unauthorized migrants currently in America that have not committed a felony.  This provides a temporary non-voting status that will turn into full status some number of years into the future.  This isn’t an “I automatically win the next election” button; it’s an “empties most of ICE’s facilities” button.

Does not fund Trump’s wall.

Prohibits the employment of people who do not have valid legal immigration status in America, including not only the firms doing the hiring, but the firms that receive services from those firms (to defeat corporate shell games).  Importantly, the bill also establishes a system that will tightly (and not loosely) enforce this, probably through some sort of verification system.

Something similar to #3, but for housing.

Switches legal immigration to a more merit-based system.

Restores certain programs which involve gaining immigration status through the US Military.

This has the results

Everyone gets to feel good about most of the ICE facilities closing.  (There will still be some carjackers to be held, but the whole argument from the Left/Liberals is based on the idea that unauthorized migrants are not carjackers at a rate notably exceeding that of the native population.)

Abused migrant workers can legally contest their employers, since they won’t be deported.

People mostly stop entering America without permission, because they won’t get paid, unless they really are terrified of whatever it is they’re fleeing from.  In that case, Democrats already like asylum laws.

You’ll have to give up on the $15 minimum wage, of course.  With so many people who were paid under the table, wages are going to take time to adjust.  This is why we need point #5 - integrating all those people properly is going to be expensive, and ordinarily we might cool down immigration to allow for gradual/intergenerational accumulation of resources.  That would be unacceptable to Democrats, so this plan switches to bringing in higher-productivity workers instead.

The thing is that Trump doesn’t have an answer for this.

If you have #3 and #4, you aren’t likely to need the Wall.  If you have #5, you’re not bidding down the price of native unskilled labor.  #6 is something he already tripped up on.  And while #1 is really juicy to Democrats, delaying the voting ability (the most important part being not being threatened by ICE), combined with #3 and #4 make it tougher to argue that it’s about diluting the votes of the native population.

(If you really want to troll Trump in particular, include a federal program to teach all new immigrants English.)

Pretty much the primary reason to oppose this (from the Left/Liberals) is if you think one million immigrants (an entire metropolis) per year isn’t enough for some reason - but as already discussed, there are already major issues with housing supply, so even if you wanted to increase the amount, it would be a problem not to deal with housing supply first.

Of course, I can be confident in posting this that the Democrats won’t actually do it, since charitably the people on the Left intend to use America as a lifeboat into which to empty hundreds of millions of people due to the effects of global warming, and setting this as a precedent makes that tougher.

[berniesrevolution]

In May 2016, at a conference for Germany’s left-wing Die Linke party, Torten für Menschenfeinde (“Pies for Misanthropes”) struck again. Sneaking up the side of the conference hall, a member of the anti-fascist organization threw a piece of cake at Sahra Wagenknecht, a prominent Die Linke member in the Bundestag. It was a direct hit: Wagenknecht’s face was covered in chocolate frosting, a streak of whipped cream extending from ear to ear.

Torten für Menschenfeinde targeted Wagenknecht for her vocal position against an open-border policy for Germany. Earlier that year, she challenged Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to accept more than 1 million refugees, arguing that Germany should impose limits on entry and deport those who abused German “hospitality.” The cake attack—which followed a cream-pie offensive against a member of the far-right Alternative for Germany—isolated Wagenknecht in her party, which had otherwise pledged support for Merkel’s policy.

Nearly three years later, however, Wagenknecht and her views on migration have gone mainstream, in Germany and across Europe. In September 2018, Wagenknecht and her husband, Oskar Lafontaine, founded Aufstehen (“Rise Up”), a political movement combining left-wing economic policy with exclusionary social protections. The movement has garnered over 170,000 members since its official launch; according to a recent poll, more than a third of German voters “could see themselves” supporting Wagenknecht’s initiative.

“I am tired of surrendering the streets to the [anti-Islam movement] Pegida and the Alternative for Germany,” Wagenknecht said at the launch event. Onstage, she was joined by allies in Germany’s Green Party and the Social Democratic Party. “As many followers of the political left as possible should join,” several Social Democratic politicians wrote in a joint statement.

By founding Aufstehen, Wagenknecht became a member of the new vanguard of left politics in Europe. In France, Jean-Luc Mélenchon leads La France Insoumise, a left-populist movement that has been critical of mass migration. “I’ve never been in favor of freedom of arrival,” Mélenchon has said, claiming that migrants “are stealing the bread” of French workers. He is now the most popular politician on the French left, widely considered the face of the opposition to President Emmanuel Macron and a championof the Yellow Vest movement.

In the United Kingdom, Jeremy Corbyn leads the Labour Party and offers a radical vision of socialist transformation. And yet, although he was a vocal advocate for migrant rights during his tenure at Westminster, Corbyn has expressed deep skepticism about open borders as the party’s leader. “Labour is not wedded to freedom of movement for EU citizens as a point of principle,” Corbyn said, committing Labour to a policy of “reasonable management” based on “our economic needs.”

The rise of these left-nationalist leaders marks a momentous turn against free movement in Europe, where it has long been accepted as a basic right of citizenship.

Forget The Communist Manifesto’s refrain that “the working men have no country”; the new face of the European left takes a radically different view. Free movement is, to quote Wagenknecht, “the opposite of what is left-wing”: It encourages exploitation, erodes community, and denies popular sovereignty. To advocate open borders, in this view, is to oppose the interests of the working class.

By popularizing this argument, these new movements are not just challenging migration policy in Europe; they are redefining the boundaries of left politics in a dangerous, and inopportune, direction. Over the next few decades, global migration is set to explode: By 2100, up to 1 million migrants will be applying to enter the European Union each year.

Right-wing populists have already begun their assault on migrants: In Italy, Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini has called for “mass cleaning,” while Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has proposed that recent arrivals should be sent “back to Africa.” As left-nationalist movements charge ahead in the polls, it is not immediately clear who will challenge their pessimistic view of migration and fight for the right to free movement.

In April 1870, Karl Marx wrote a letter to two German migrants in New York City, imploring them to “pay particular attention” to what he called “the Irish question.”

“I have come to the conclusion,” Marx wrote, “that the decisive blow against the English ruling classes cannot be delivered in England but only in Ireland.” For Marx, Ireland would play a decisive role because of its mass emigration—the Mexico of its time. “Ireland constantly sends her own surplus to the English labor market, and thus forces down wages and lowers the material and moral position of the English working class,” Marx continued. “It is the secret by which the capitalist class maintains its power.”

In the century and a half since, Marx’s letter has become a key reference point for the left critique of free movement. The passage is cited as evidence of a fundamental tension between the traditional goals of the left—equality, solidarity, working-class power—and a policy of open borders. “Karl Marx identified that fact a long time ago,” announced Len McCluskey, general secretary of Britain’s Unite the Union and a close ally of Jeremy Corbyn, in 2016.

But critics of free movement often neglect to mention Marx’s conclusions: “Given this state of affairs,” he wrote, “if the working class wishes to continue its struggle with some chance of success, the national organizations must become international.”

Marx’s analysis of mass migration did not lead him to advocate harder borders. Instead, it made him support international mobilization to protect workers’ rights in a world of free movement.

After all, Marx himself was a triple émigré: He fled Prussia to Paris, faced exile from Paris to Brussels, and—after a brief incarceration by the Belgian authorities—found his way to London. And he was hardly a model immigrant: Poor, sick, and a notorious procrastinator, Marx was much more of a scrounger than a striver, leeching off the largesse of Friedrich Engels.

As such, Marx had little sympathy for the “ordinary English worker,” who “hates the Irish worker as a competitor who lowers his standards of life.” The solution to the Irish question was not to bow to these prejudices, he argued, but to dissolve the antagonism between the various camps of the working class. “A coalition of German workers with the Irish workers—and of course also with the English and American workers who are prepared to accede to it—is the greatest achievement you could bring about now,” he advised.

Following Marx, the concept of left internationalism came to be associated with support for free movement on both ethical and strategic grounds. Ethically, open borders gave equal opportunity to workers of all nationalities. More important, the movement of people across borders created new opportunities for a coordinated challenge to capitalism. Internationalists like Marx supported free movement for the same reasons they supported free trade: It hastened the pace of history and heightened capitalism’s contradictions.

“There can be no doubt that dire poverty alone compels people to abandon their native land, and that the capitalists exploit the immigrant workers in the most shameless manner,” wrote Vladimir Lenin in 1913. “But only reactionaries can shut their eyes to the progressive significance of this modern migration of nations…. Capitalism is drawing the masses of the working people of the whole world…breaking down national barriers and prejudices, uniting workers from all countries.”

Back in Lenin’s day, a very similar debate over the merits of migration was roiling through the European left. But while the pessimistic view of Wagenknecht and other left nationalists has now taken hold in many parts of the continent, Lenin’s, at the time, prevailed.

At the 1907 Congress of the Second International in Stuttgart, Germany, leaders of the Socialist Party of America introduced a resolution to end “the willful importation of cheap foreign labor.” Morris Hillquit, a founder of the party, argued that migrants from Asia—the “yellow races,” unlike those from Europe—amounted to a “pool of unconscious strikebreakers.” The convention rejected the resolution: “The congress does not seek a remedy to the potentially impending consequences for the workers from immigration and emigration in any economic or political exclusionary rules, because these are fruitless and reactionary by nature.”

Lenin would never forget the incident. In a 1915 letter to the Socialist Propaganda League of America, he called out the American socialists for their efforts to restrict Chinese and Japanese migration. “We think that one can not be internationalist and be at the same time in favor of such restrictions,” he wrote. “Such socialists are in reality jingoes.”

By the time of Lenin’s letter, of course, Europe’s great powers had been whipped into a frenzy of nationalist violence. In the First World War, British soldiers sang “Rule, Britannia,” the Germans sang “Deutschlandlied,” and they all marched to their deaths. Even the Social Democratic Party of Germany—a key player in the Second International—voted in favor of the war. Citing the need for national self-defense, large swaths of the European left abandoned the cause of open borders.

But by the end of the next world war—which left another 80 million people dead and 60 million more displaced—support for free movement had moved from the margins of the left into the heart of the postwar political establishment. When the United Nations convened in Paris to draft its Declaration of Human Rights in November 1948, the committee consideredmobility a matter of “vital importance.” “Freedom of movement was the sacred right of every human being,” commented the representative from Chile. “The world belongs to all mankind,” added the representative from Haiti.

(Continue Reading)

[jade-refraction]

So what does this have to do with Democrats? Well, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz is the current Vice Presidential nominee on the Democratic ticket. For a pinko commie like me, he was a far better choice than many of the others that were being floated around, most pertinently because his rhetoric is 1) more to the point than most Dems and 2) less filtered. Bernie Sanders he is not, but it says a lot about the current Democratic party that someone saying "yeah we're feeding schoolkids regardless of cost, why are you against that, what the hell is wrong with you" is refreshing. He was, in fact, the one who started the whole thing where Ds called Rs "weird" for like a month and a half, and Rs spent a lot of time and effort to try to prove that they're not weird, that they're cool and normal, and in the process proved themselves deeply weird (derogatory). Which was again, refreshing. Democratic leadership still loves to venerate like the concept of Republicans existing ("a bird has two wings" or whatever) - Pelosi said at one point "we need a strong Republican party". Which to someone who has observed the Republican concentration of hitler particles per person increase exponentially is a wild statement. Hell, Harris touts the endorsement if Dick Fucking Cheney. How.

In short, Ds like to try and maintain decorum, to take right wing framing at face value, to see a man claiming that immigrants are causing all our problems and engage with that on its terms, pulling out statistics about how immigrants actually do less crimes or worse, saying that they would actually implement Trump's draconian border policies. We can't disrupt this framing, we can't say that the emperor is naked, that one party is full of delusional sheep at best and malicious fascists at worst.

When Shimura and Sakai assaulted Khotun Khan in his castle, Shimura sent dozens of fighters across a bridge to a chokepoint. In response to which Khan blew up the bridge. Shimura spent the night ordering his forces to patch it up for another assault, while Sakai poisoned their food.

And while Sakai was in the keep, he saw that a frontal assault would have led into a trap, a killzone full of explosives and flame.

The Khan turned the samurai code and tendencies against them, but he wasn't prepared for the Ghost flouting all of it effectively.

Tim Walz calling right-wingers 'weird' sent them into a multi-week meltdown the likes of which we'd not seen for a while. But on the VP debate stage he made a point of saying that he and the fascist "agreed" on a bunch of things. Reasonable and civil and boring and useless.

Obviously, a debate isn't an election, this didn't move the needle at all, and elections aren't even the whole of politics. But this frustration is something that stems from Democratic Party behavior in general. Can't get rid of the filibuster, it's a tradition of the senate (that came from a bug created by a dude who literally shot our first treasury secretary and tried to become president in a shitty coup). The parliamentarian can't be fired or ignored, so we can't pass this bill, except wait the Repbulicans ignored the parliamentarian during his term. Speaking of Bush 2, the SCOTUS gave him the election, but it's totally okay because they said that this ruling shouldn't be used as precedent, and we all know that SCOTUS justices are never swayed by partisan considerations even when they're declaring the president a king.

Sure, you lose while "playing by the rules", and you claim that the rules are all separating us from chaos...while chaos runs free. Maybe these rules aren't as good at preventing chaos than you think, and maybe your "honor" isn't as important as, you know, the material consequences of losing, especially losing without even trying.

Who knows, maybe in Act III Shimura will accept the Ghost. But I'm not holding my breath for Democrats to start actually fucking fighting.

I ended up finishing Act II of Ghost of Tsushima on the day after the Vice Presidential debate, and my thoughts on Shimura's dumbassery and Democratic uselessness have become this unholy chimera that I will now inflict on all of you. You're welcome.

(This was probably already said better by Innuendo Studios in his Alt-Right Playbook series, but still)

(Also spoilers for a four-year-old game I guess)

(Also also if you're gonna yell at me for "making it political" 1) stuff it 2) war is politics with weapons)

So Shimura is an old-guard samurai, honor, order, justice, announce your name before a duel, etc etc. And (feudalism aside) the samurai did end up bringing some semblance of order to Tsushima in the past. And when the island was in its backstory civil war, it's implied that they won that war "as samurai" ie with frontal assaults, duels, and the most subterfuge employed is troop deployments.

Enter the Mongols, who make landfall at Komoda Beach and are met by Shimura's allied force of five clans. And they get their asses obliterated. But not just that - it's shown from the start that the Khan has studied the samurai. He knows their code, their ideals, their tendencies. So when Shimura tells his best swordsman to "go break their spirits" by presumably dueling the Mongols' best warrior, defeating him, and therefore showing how outmatched they were, Khotun Khan walks up, douses the man in alcohol, and lights him on fire. In the ensuing battle, the clans are routed. Shimura is captured, and our protagonist Jin Sakai barely survives because a thief nursed him back to health.

So now the Mongols have control of the island and are pillaging and assaulting. The instant Sakai gets his sword back, he makes to challenge the nearest Mongols to an honorable duel (sidenote, the fact that the iaido standoff is a game mechanic is incredible. Inspired), but Yuna the thief warns him that Mongols like to kill prisoners at the slightest provocation. So now Jin has a choice - follow his code of honor and fair duels, or take some levels in NIN and start shanking Mongols in the back? Given that Sakai becomes the Ghost of Tsushima, it's obvious what he picked.

And Shimura hates it. To him, Jin was just trying to win by any means, becoming no better than the Mongols, acting as an honorless monster. But to Jin, Shimura was privileging his code of honor over the many, many, many lives that would be thrown away for his "honorable" win - or his crushing defeat, as the Khan keeps outmaneuvering Shimura.

[tessatechaitea]

Teen Titans Spotlight #11: The Brotherhood of Evil

Judging by the last few issues starring Robotman, Beast Boy, Mento, and the Brotherhood of Evil, this series could have been Doom Patrol Spotlight On:.

Warp might be the most intelligent super villain in the DC Universe!

Actually I'm not quite done not talking about The Brotherhood of Evil! I don't mean to suggest that the people who fled one kind of oppression weren't the best and kindest people in the world! The only reason I said all the awesome people wound up in California is because I'm from California and my family is pretty awesome. Don't worry! I can see all of the erasure in the above statement! It's just sometimes, you're speaking about a thing and you can't get bogged down by small details like Native American genocide or blatant anti-Chinese laws enacted in San Francisco (pretty much the coolest place in the U.S. (at least before the tech boom fucking turned it into a capitalist fascist run by tech start-ups and the angels who finance them)). The main point was that some people become comfortable with a status quo that oppresses others. And instead of fighting it, people flee from it. The people who flee often do so because they have their own status quo they want to enact and it's rarely one that provides opportunity for everybody. At least in the modern view, I tend to think (and hope it's more than hope and fantasy and wishful thinking) that those fleeing small town bigotries into big cities are actually more compassionate toward the entirety of humanity. We still make lots of mistakes but the key point is that we're trying to do better. When people discuss locking up immigrants at the border, you can either fight against the injustice and racism inherent in the entire process or simply shrug your shoulders like a douchebag and try to sound super smart by saying, "Well, they should have thought about that before they came here!" As if everybody in the world has access to media that somehow preempts the two hundred years of American propaganda that we're willing to accept the hungry and the tired and those yearning to breathe free. I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area in the 70s and the reality of the world that existed around me at the time was fucking Star Trek: The Next Generation compared to what's going on in 2019. We had station ID breaks on KTVU Channel 2 out of San Francisco that would show a kid running around and playing and introducing the viewer into their world that would end with the kid saying, "I'm proud to be a Chinese American!", or "I'm proud to be a black American!" It's the kind of thing that would get so many people in a huff now and yet it was a simple and effective means to introduce younger viewers to the heterogeneity of their community. And now, in 2019, we have Comicsgate who can't stand to be reminded that people other than white people can be protagonists. It boggles my mind that people can get so upset over shit that won't make a millimeter wave on the cultural yacht they were born on. Fucking grow up, assholes. Not everything is about you. I think I was going to say more things about erasure! I don't mean to make light of it since it's absolutely a strategy used to disenfranchise groups or exclude them from social movements. But it's your go-to argument against everything you read, you're not going to make many friends. Lots of essays or articles or arguments need to be specific and they can't include every situation or group in the specific argument being made. Maybe it's tough to accept laser focused arguments on the Internet when the audience is harder to gauge. I know peanut allergies exist and they're deadly but I still stick the knife I just used for peanut butter in the preserves. Not because I don't give a fuck but because I know the audience using my apricot preserves. But if I were to mention this on the Internet, everybody who knows nothing about the context of my preserves and my audience and my entire existence would jump all over me saying things like, "That's really irresponsible!" and "You're going to kill somebody!" and "Apricot? You fucking monster!" I usually hate analogies but sometimes they're fun. The general problem with analogies is that people don't use them to help clarify arguments; they use them to try to simplify their argument into something nobody can disagree with. But by that time, the relationship between the actual argument and the analogy is tenuous at best! But I think my peanut butter allergy analogy is pretty rock solid! Hey! You know who's diverse?! The Brotherhood of Evil! They have a French gorilla and a British woman and a bald white guy (also French but what can you do? This team was all up in France and shit) and a brain in a jar. Hopefully Brain was African or Chinese or Pakistani. Maybe he was also autistic. He's enough of a cypher to allow any reader to identify with him, I guess. He's definitely gay! Unless he's into bestiality. One of those reasons is why he winds up fucking the French gorilla. Hmm, maybe not making it clear what Brain's intent was was a mistake by DC because doesn't that just amplify anti-gay sentiment by associating it actual deviant behaviors? If DC did make it clear and I'm the one who's obfuscating the matter, I should probably shut up. The Brain and Mallah are definitely gay for each other's human dicks. The fact that Mallah's dick is gorilla and Brain's dick is non-existent shouldn't hamper their love. The Brotherhood of Evil are being set up by some guy named Toulon. There was a lot of narration boxes that explained it but I was too busy thinking, "How is Brain going to suck Mallah's cock?" So all I know is that Toulon managed to fuck up Warp's powers and he teleported the Brotherhood to a strange world.

Hmm, looks like Earth-11 to me!

I know this takes place after Crisis on Infinite Earths and Earth-11 shouldn't exist but it does! Maybe this story takes place before Crisis? Maybe when the story reveals they're on Earth-11, the editor will provide a note, "*This story takes place before Crisis on Infinite Earths! -- Know-it-all Knobby!" Mallah introduces himself to Tin, the leader of the good guys, I guess?, by saying, "We're the Brotherhood!" I suppose I'd shorten the name of my organization when I met new people too if it were called The Brotherhood of Evil. Unless the new guy I was introducing myself to was like Kim Jong-un or Donald Trump or Mark Zuckerberg. I'm so tuned in to world events that I first typed "Mark Zupperberg" and couldn't figure out why it looked wrong.

Welcome to my new preschool, Tiny Tots Fucktown.

You might want to be upset with me for sexualizing young children but I'm not the fucking monster who made that advertisement. Ad Exec #1: "What if we show a guy building the model with a bunch of hot women getting wet over how well he's done it?" Ad Exec #2 Who is in Prison Now: "What if they were little kids?!" Was Earth-11 the one where DC put Tin Tin after they bought the rights? I mean, I don't know if they ever bought the rights but this guy is definitely Tintin, right?

He also rides a big white dog that he has yet to call Snowy but it's only a matter of panels.

Trapped on a world about to be destroyed (in a worse way than Tintin and his cohorts know! Crisis is coming! Or came? No, no! I sometimes forget comic books can tell tales from the past! Although weren't writers supposed to completely ignore the Pre-Crisis universe once Crisis on Infinite Earths completed? Or why even fucking bother?!), The Brotherhood of Evil decide to help Tintin and his rebels take back control from some guy called Minos. But they're only doing it for their own selfish ends. You might remember how their name has "evil" tacked onto the end.

You might have thought "cutting them down like grass" was the correct phrase and "mowing them down like paper mache" is stupid but this is Earth-11, dumb dumb.

Paper mache is how you spelled "papier-mâché" before you had the Internet. There might some other difference in this comic book due to the place in time it was written:

Fuck. Now I'm horny.

The Brotherhood help Tintin and his friends steal a space ark from their enemies so that Tintin and his friends can survive the destruction of Earth-11. Never mind what happens to the people of Earth who weren't offered the opportunity to become one of Tintin's group. In payment for their help, The Brotherhood of Evil are helped back to their own Earth where they can continue to be weird and impotent. The conclusion of the story has something to do with Doctor Mist and the Global Guardians helping make the universe a better place by saving Tintin (somehow! I mean, Crisis, right?! What the fuck?), getting some guy named Toulon killed (he's only "some guy" to me because sometimes these espionage plots are just too convoluted with too many normal characters I don't care about), and getting the Brotherhood of Evil killed. They fail in getting the Brotherhood killed but seem content with their other machinations. Plus, I'm sure Doctor Mist was happy to get a small role in this comic book to pay for his bowel cancer treatments. Teen Titans Spotlight #11: The Brotherhood of Evil Rating: B-. You know I don't put any thought into the grades I give these comic books, right? You know this isn't really a review site and just a way for me to enjoy my time reading comic books while journaling, right? You know my nemesis is still the Weird Science comics blog, right? What a bunch of squares!

[pamphletstoinspire]

The Catholic Case Against Open Borders

Support for large-scale immigration has risen dramatically in America over the past 25 years, especially among Democrats and younger people. Attitudes among Republicans and older folks have remained more stable, although they have drifted somewhat in line with the general trend.

What’s striking is that the gap on this issue between Republicans and Democrats, which has now grown enormous, only began to develop around 2006. The former retain something close to their old views while the latter have moved sharply in favor. The generational gap has also grown greatly, although not as sharply or suddenly.

Leading Democrats have gotten on board with the trend. They don’t say they want open borders, of course, but they refuse to publicly support any meaningful restrictions either. The news media fully supports the tendency, and those who speak for the Church go along with the Democrats and media (as they do on most things).

But is all this a good idea? The demand for a radical reduction of controls on immigration is very recent, and no one seems to have thought it through, even though it is (like most political issues) a matter of prudential judgement.

For starters, the Catechism states that

more prosperous nations are obliged, to the extent they are able, to welcome the foreigner … [but] political authorities, for the sake of the common good for which they are responsible, may make the exercise of the right to immigrate subject to various juridical conditions. (CCC, 2241)

In other words, authorities should be generous, but the extent to which they admit immigrants should respect the fundamental principle that legitimate authority seeks the common good of the governed.

The responsibility of government to care for the community, and the mutual obligations of citizens, make immigration a bit like adoption. Adoption is a good and generous thing, and the well-being of the child up for adoption is important, but for parents the well-being of the existing family is the first responsibility.

How would free migration work out for recipient countries — specifically the United States — and would it really further the universal common good? Of course, immigration is less fraught than adoption, since citizenship is a looser connection than family membership. But it does raise its own concerns.

For example, it often deprives source countries of people who are badly needed there. It doesn’t help Zambia if all the doctors and nurses emigrate to the United Kingdom and work for the NHS. That’s one reason several of Africa’s most prominent prelates have criticized proponents of mass migration.

What’s more, immigration necessarily separates families. Family reunification schemes can only do so much. They can, for instance, relocate a Guatemalan grandmother to be with her grandson in New York—but then her 16 other grandchildren are deprived of their Abuela. Such family bonds spread out ad infinitum, and, short of moving the entire population of South America to Brooklyn, they can’t survive the emigration process.

Immigration also means cultural disruption. For instance, a team of researchers led by Dr. Mary Adams of the University of Arizona published a startling report in 2005, which found that Hispanic teenagers who primarily speak English are more than twice as likely to be sexually active than those who are principally Spanish-speakers.

Assimilation is universally acknowledged as necessary for maintaining the social and cultural order in nations with high levels of immigration. And yet assimilation appears to make immigrants less inclined to conform to moral norms.

Cultural disruption is a problem for the recipient society as well. A big reason the cultural Left likes mass immigration, even by culturally conservative Muslims, is precisely because it’s so disruptive. Mass immigration creates a multicultural society with people attached to different ways of life with different standards. This makes it difficult to have public standards on things like family life. Progressives might not (for example) approve of Muslim women veiling in public. But calls to be “tolerant” of Islamic polygamy offer a convenient segue to normalizing “polyamorists,” who are now moving out of the fringes of the Sexual Revolution and into the vanguard.

And then there’s the problem of relations between ethnic and religious groups. Diversity is a challenge; even the Left acknowledges that. Surely, then, multiplying challenges without a strong reason is a bad idea.

From an American perspective, the practical arguments in favor of immigration mostly seem to be ethnic restaurants, economic dynamism, and low wages (a.k.a. “jobs Americans won’t do”).

But you don’t need mass immigration to grow food. We got along pretty well for thousands of years without it.

And while foreign-born, Johns Hopkins-trained physicians undoubtedly add something economically — well, we don’t suffer from a doctor shortage. Why couldn’t Johns Hopkins just educate more Americans? Moreover, as we’ve seen, these highly skilled immigrants are often badly needed in their home countries.

Low wages do benefit some people, of course. George J. Borjas, a Cuban-American economist at Harvard, argues persuasively that the net economic effect on Americans of recent immigration has been the transfer of five percent of national income from lower-wage workers to the high-salary employers. In other words, mass immigration pits less skilled and lower-income workers against each other as they compete to see who will work for less pay. No wonder the Koch brothers nearly went to war with President Trump when he tried to curb illegal immigration.

It’s hardly obvious, then, that large-scale immigration has practical benefits for the world in general or most Americans in particular. Instead, the arguments in favor are basically moral or philosophical. Radical leftists and radical libertarians both believe in the free movement of peoples as a basic human right and denounce the existence of national borders as “statist,” “fascist,” or some variation on that theme.

But can the world handle such colossal shifts in our population centers? Gallup surveys show that more than 750 million people worldwide would like to move to another country if they had the opportunity. That’s 10 percent of the world’s population. Moreover, 158 million of them would choose the United States as their top destination. And the US would be an acceptable second choice for most of the 270 million who would prefer another Western or Anglosphere country.

We can’t accommodate more than a small fraction of these people. And we could do more for those truly in need — with far less disruption to both their countries and ours — by helping them where they are.

Left-wing Catholics are always demanding this country adopt “more Christlike” border policies. The infamous Fr. James Martin, SJ has gone so far as to call America’s immigration laws “sinful.” Well, then, let’s look to the Gospel for solutions.

The Holy Family took refuge from Herod in Egypt. But they didn’t move to Rome, become citizens, and apply for the bread allotment. They stayed across the border while the danger lasted, and then went back home to Nazareth.

Give shelter to those whose lives are immediately threatened; otherwise, help to improve the political, economic, cultural, and spiritual conditions of their homeland. Sound good, Fr. Martin? That’s probably what Jesus would do. It’s what He did.

BY: JAMES KALB

From:  https://www.pamphletstoinspire.com/

[if-we-are-free-tell-me-why]

I don’t know who needs to hear this and the quote doesn’t come from me but the death of democracy truly will not be televised. I recently drove by posters for our local right wing pretending to be concerned conservatives party and since it has been a few years since they first gained traction I felt almost nothing when I read their slogans. That is exactly the wrong reaction. 

Whenever I am at a family gathering I feel myself slipping into this false sense of security. Nobody really discusses European elections like they do national ones, the number of asylum seekers are dropping and they are hardly in the news anymore, LGBT issues and news are being ignored by at least my realtives so you know, I ease myself into some non political jokes, try to make the best of an otherwise wasted evening, and if the conversation truly stays away from politics and from minorities, I call it a good night. That is exactly the wrong reaction. 

It has always been hard for me to distinguish between the rise of xenophobia and just a general sense of growing up and realising that the people who you value and love have other political views than you that deem other human beings as lesser. but I now have even more growing up under my belt and the way we talk about immigrants, Jewish and muslim people and really all minorities has worsened. We have never been interested in the stories of these people as long as they did not relate to our perceived traditional way of life and that is shameful. It has now led to the point where it is now not even controversial anymore to publicly say that people who aren’t cis straight white christian and born in the country they are in now do not belong to this blury undefined group some dare to call the ‘real people’. These opinions have ozed out of the right fringes and have become part of the vocabulary of mainstream parties. At the same time right wing parties have become mainstream and it seems like all the left can do is to react to these forces, They controll the discourse. They will keep dominating it as long as people like me want to just have one nice night with their family. Because the people who say nothing have no voice. When we are truly going back to a time where you have to be afraid to say that Islam is a part of Europe, that we should not let people drown at our border then we need to stand up now And say these obvious truths before they start to become less and less obvious to more and more people. 

This is for people like me. Who have people in their lives that helped them through hard times, that they consider to be friends but who are conservative and feel things should be the way they have always been. You might not think these people to be harmful, they are not harmful towards you. But fascist ideology slides into people’s views too easily these days and when you point it out even in your head you might think you overreact. But one person who’s views remain unquestioned is a person who will never even blink when it is time to vote and the right wing option seems just this much more likeable than the old trusty conservative one. It seems like a small difference but reminding these people what they consider voting for can help fight the numbness that can spread when these parties remain a part of the political landscape for too long. And I would say if these people like you, give a damn about your opinions and you are not endangering yourself with confronting them, then it is your duty to do so. 

[dicecast]

Lack of reading Compression every prediction you make is wrong. Its like a Communist Dick MOrris, only with the exact same politics

Ok, so you will dismiss any western news article for being neoliberal centrist shrill but you are getting your news from Trumpers now? Yeah, it isn't the centrists selling out the movement

Yeah, read between the lines, its called a dogwhistle. The Article is saying that the Dems should abandone progressive social issues and chase after Bigoted White "Working Class" Midwesterners, aka the exact same strategy that Bill Clinton did. Nevermind that most poor americans voted Biden

I ackwnoelged Biden's bad border policy cause I don't see the world as a Binary, I am neither a TERF nor a Tankie. YOu seem pretty eager to reblog people who support that Border Policy, did you read what that blogger has said about immigration?

Biden did back the 90s Crime bill, big fail for Biden. He did it in order to try to go after the mythical "white working class you guys like so much" you know taking the exact same advice as the article you are posting

So you actively aligning yourself with far right nationalists and the there best friend Putin, not aligning with fascists. Biden giving a nation weapons to fight against imperialism from there former colonizer, fascist yeah. I went through your blog, did you know that you don't mention Wagner once prior to the mutiny?

"the vast majority of sources are right wing, so look i'm going to cite the official paper of the Republican Party" yeah sure, real left wing integrity, truly it is the "Liberals" who are selling out leftism

If your take on the Russian Invasion is exactly the same as tucker Carlson, then yo uare prop Putin

"I'm confident that Biden won't win in 2024 because of all the things that Biden has, and more importantly hasn't done." You predicted he would lose back in 2020, both in the primary and in the general. What fucking worth does your prediction have, at no point in your blog did you go "well, I was wrong, here is how I was wrong" you just scooted by and hoped nobody would notice

"Biden had a bad covid response" YOU KEEP CITING SOURCES FROM PEOPLE WHO THINK THE COVID IS A CHINESE COMMUNIST PLOT

"Actually cornel west would be a big help for democrats" What electoral record does Cornel West have? What political skills does he have? If he had any political ability, he wouldn't be runnign the fucking Green Party

"And that's a recipe for disaster, because even if they do manage to eke out a victory this time, maintaining the status quo is just going to set them up for electoral disaster in the next election, because things are only going to get worse, and not doing anything to mitigate that or help people is only going to make people vote for someone, anyone else, if only out of pure spite—like what happened in 2016." This is Alex Jones Logic "If i predict disaster ever year, eventually I will be right"

"They "over performed" themselves into a deadlocked congress where they continue to accomplish nothing and only just manage to hang on" Don't change the subject, we are talking about the democrats electoral ability. You said democrats would be a disaster, and in every election since 2016, democrats have dramatically over preformed. Clearly, they have gotten better at getting elected.

"This is revisionist history. As the post you linked but didn't read or understand enumerates, it's not that Biden just beat Bernie." You made a prediction, you were wrong. Just fucking own it.

. "The Democrats rigged the primary so that Biden would win. " That isn't rigging. The other moderates dropped out cause they knew they couldn't win and they endorsed Biden, which meant that he got double of the votes that Bernie did. If the situation was reversed and you had three progressives running, you'd want them to drop you, your still bitter about Warren not dropping out. Moderate candidates dropping out isn't a rig, they didn't force there voters to not vote sanders, those people did it on there own. 75% of the Democratic voters chose of there own free will to vote against Bernie Sanders. Which sucks, i'm not happy with that result, but that isn't rigging, that is losing, take the L, learn from the past and move on, maybe you will get an electoral prediction right for a change

"BLM sputtered and died" yeah, and what revolutionary activity are you doing, getting your news from National Review and whining about 6 year old primary? BLM got more done in a day than the communist movement in the US got in 4 decades

"Hey that's great and all but Hilldawg won the popular vote in 2016 too for all the good it did her." Yeah but Biden became president. You talk about reading comprehension, but didn't notice where i said "he won the electoral vote by 306 to 232"

"The reality is that Biden only barely won. In Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Nevada, and Georgia, it was neck and neck. Had the wind blown the other way the victory could have just as easily gone to Trump." So when Trump won most of those states in 2016, you didn't go "oh those could easily have gone to Hillary" you said "This is clear proof that Hillary was a terrible candidate". be consistent at least

"And just like other Democrat assumptions, it's impossible to say from a simple vote what motivated it. Were most Americans for Biden, or just against Trump?" Guess what, we have a first past the post voting system. It doesn't matter, a win is a win, that is why a loser like Joe Biden was able to kick your ass, because he understands that politics isn't about how much outrage you can muster or how much you can call on people to kill themselves, its about understanding the system

"Impressive victory?" The Democrats gained one senator and lost control of the House. How exactly did Biden "deliver" this "impressive victory?" Literally ever political observer in the United States, including far leftists, concluded that 2022 was the best midterm performance other than 2002. Dems had a really shitty map, and they won the vast majority of the races. You might not like it,

"Actually I debunk the talking points Timothy Egan brings up in his dogshit article. It was also published on January when Bernie was the clear frontrunner until the DNC fucked him." Dude I didn't think bernie could win in January, cause i don't make my political predictions based on what I want to have happen. You lost.

"That's a reposted article from another website. It says so right at the fucking beginning." If you agree with it, its a prediction, and you were wrong.

"Hm, yeah, I did. I expected Trump from 2016 to tear Biden apart like wet toilet paper, but strangely we didn't get a repeat of that performance. I wonder if cognitive impairment from covid had anything to do with it." No it has to do with a million factors that you aren't paying attention to because you have retreated into conspiracy theories rather than face difficult truths about the progressive movement in America. You were wrong about Biden in the primaries. You were wrong about Biden in the General. You were wrong about Russia invading Ukraine, you were wrong about Ukraine folding at least 4 times, you aren't good at predicting things dude, you keep confusing what you hope will happen with what will happen, that isn't how analysis works

You said here "Now that he’s presumably gone, those same violent people that at least saw in Trump some kind of kindred spirit are going to be looking for a figure to fill that void" oh wow, yeah, you really nailed that one on the head chief, you really have your finger on the pulse of the American Electorate don't you?

"They refuse to abolish the fillibuster, whih is actually in there power to do". Dude...look how how hte Senate works for gods sake

"Uh oh, looks like I'm guilty of further thoughtcrimes 😣" No, but I worry about your relationships IRL not gonna lie

"Communism is th only hope BLM sputtered and died"Communism can't win if all you guys do is whine and reblog rightists, at this point it looks like "Communism" is just going to be come conservatism with extra help

Stalin did nothing wrong" Stalin would have you killed for reblogging the National Review

Honestly at this point, I have probably read more of your blog than any human being, certainly more than you have, and I see a person who is afraid to change. Somebody who has set in there mind about how the world is "supposed to work" and every time it fails to deliver, rather than admit where you went wrong and try to grow as a person or learn from your mistakes, you just double down in more into bittern conspiratorial copium

Btw, you didn't vote for the Dems in 2016 or 2018, or 2020, or 2022. So why would they bother trying to court your vote in 2024 rather than instead courting somebody reliable?

Stalin was a the worse thing to happen to the left

Russia Invaded Ukraine because they were imperialist

Ukraine just made a major advance in the last 24 hours which you didn't predict

Democrats lately have been basking in good news. The fourth Trump indictment! Continued success for abortion rights (the defeat of the Ohio referendum)! Good news on “Bidenomics”  (slowing inflation and strong job creation)!

The sentiment seems to be: we got this! How could we lose to a candidate (assuming it’s Trump) who’s under a blizzard of legal scrutiny for undermining democracy and represents a party that wants to take away women’s right to choose—especially when we, the good guys, are doing such a great job with the economy?

This “how can we lose?” attitude is uncomfortably reminiscent of Democrats’ attitude in 2016. Then too they thought they couldn’t lose. And yet they did.

Perhaps it’s time to take out an insurance policy. It may be the case that a multiply-indicted Trump is now toxic to enough voters and abortion rights such a strong motivator that even a candidate with Biden’s weaknesses will beat him easily. But it might not and that’s where the insurance policy comes in.

Consider that right now the race looks very, very close. The RealClearPolitics poll average has Biden ahead of Trump by a slender four-tenths of a percentage point. If that was Biden’s national lead on election day, he’d probably lose the presidency due to electoral college bias that favors Republicans.

In the latest Quinnipiac poll, Biden has a one-point lead over Trump consistent with the running average. Among white working-class (noncollege) voters, he’s behind by 34 points, considerably worse than he did in 2020. If Trump (or another Republican) does manage to prevail in 2024, we can be fairly sure that a pro-GOP surge among these voters will have something to do with it.

States of Change simulations show that, all else equal, a strong white working class surge in 2024 would deliver the election to the GOP. Even a small one could potentially do the trick. In an all-else-equal context, I estimate just a one-point increase in Republican support among the white working class and a concomitant one-point decrease in Democratic support (for a 2-point margin swing) would deliver Arizona, Georgia and Wisconsin (and the election) to the Republicans. Make it a 2-point increase in GOP support and you can throw in Pennsylvania too.

So an insurance policy to prevent such a swing is in order.

The problem: these are very unhappy voters. In the Quinnipiac poll, white working-class voters give Biden an overall 25 percent approval rating versus 70 percent disapproval and 72 percent have an unfavorable opinion of him. On handling the economy, Biden’s rating is even worse—24 percent approval and 73 percent disapproval. Just 20 percent say the economy is excellent or good, compared to 79 percent who say it is not so good or poor. By 63 to 16 percent, these voters believe the economy is getting worse not better. Evidently they haven’t yet heard the good news about Bidenomics.

The temptation among Democrats is to ascribe the stubborn resistance of these voters to Democratic appeals and openness to those of Trump and right populists to misinformation from Fox News and the like and, worse, to the fundamentally racist, reactionary nature of this voter group. The roots of this view go back to the aftermath of the 2016 election.

As analysts sifted through the wreckage of Democratic performance in 2016 trying to understand where all the Trump voting had come from, some themes began to emerge. One was geographical. Across county-level studies, it was clear that low educational levels among whites was a very robust predictor of shifts toward Trump. These studies also indicated that counties that swung toward Trump tended to be dependent on low-skill jobs, relatively poor performers on a range of economic measures and had local economies particularly vulnerable to automation and offshoring. Finally, there was strong evidence that Trump-swinging counties tended to be literally “sick” in the sense that their inhabitants had relatively poor physical health and high mortality due to alcoholism, drug abuse, and suicide.

The picture was more complicated when it came to individual level characteristics related to Trump voting, especially Obama-Trump voting. There were a number of correlates with Trump voting. They included some aspects of economic populism—opposition to cutting Social Security and Medicare, suspicion of free trade and trade agreements, taxing the rich—as well as traditional populist attitudes like anti-elitism and mistrust of experts. But the star of the show, so to speak, was a variable labelled “racial resentment” by political scientists, which many studies showed bore a strengthened relationship to Republican presidential voting in 2016.

This variable is a scale created from questions like: “Irish, Italian, Jewish, and many other minorities overcame prejudice and worked their way up. Blacks should do the same without any special favors.” The variable is widely and uncritically employed by political scientists to indicate racial animus despite the obvious problem that statements such as these correspond closely to a generic conservative view of avenues to social mobility. And indeed political scientists Riley Carney and Ryan Enos have shown that responses to questions like these change very little if you substitute “Nepalese” or “Lithuanians” for blacks. That implies the questions that make up the scale tap views that are not at all specific to blacks. Carney and Enos term these views “just world belief” which sounds quite a bit different from racial resentment.

But in the aftermath of the Trump election, researchers continued to use the same scale with the same name and the same interpretation with no caveats. The strong relationship of the scale to Trump voting was proof, they argued, that Trump support, including vote-switching from Obama to Trump, was simply a matter of activating underlying racism and xenophobia. Imagine though how these studies might have landed like if they had tied Trump support to activating just world belief, which is an eminently reasonable interpretation of their star variable, instead of racial resentment. The lack of even a hint of interest in exploring this alternative interpretation strongly suggests that the researchers’ own political beliefs were playing a strong role in how they chose to pursue and present their studies.

In short, they went looking for racism—and they found it.

Other studies played variations on this theme, adding variables around immigration and even trade to the mix, where negative views were presumed to show “status threat” or some other euphemism for racism and xenophobia. As sociologist Stephen Morgan has noted in a series of papers, this amounts to a labeling exercise where issues that have a clear economic component are stripped of that component and reduced to simple indicators of unenlightened social attitudes. Again, it seems clear that researchers’ priors and political beliefs were heavily influencing both their analytical approach and their interpretation of results.

And there is an even deeper problem with the conventional view. Start with a fact that was glossed over or ignored by most studies: trends in so-called racial resentment went in the “wrong” direction between the 2012 and 2016 election. That is, fewer whites had high levels of racial resentment in 2016 than 2012. This make racial resentment an odd candidate to explain the shift of white voters toward Donald Trump in the 2016 election.

Political scientists Justin Grimmer and William Marble investigated this conundrum intensively by looking directly at whether an indicator like racial resentment really could explain, or account for, the shift of millions of white votes toward Trump. The studies that gave pride of place to racial resentment as an explanation for Trump’s victory did no such accounting; they simply showed a stronger relationship between this variable and Republican voting in 2016 and thought they’d provided a complete explanation.

They had not. When you look at the actual population of voters and how racial resentment was distributed in 2016, as Grimmer and Marble did, it turns out that the racial resentment explanation simply does not fit what really happened in terms of voter shifts. A rigorous accounting of vote shifts toward Trump shows instead that they were primarily among whites, especially low education whites, with moderate views on race and immigration, not whites with high levels of racial resentment. In fact, Trump actually netted fewer votes among whites with high levels of racial resentment than Mitt Romney did in 2012.

Grimmer and Marble did a followup study with Cole Tanigawa-Lau that included data from the 2020 election. The study was covered in a New York Times article by Thomas Edsall. In the article, Grimmer described the significance of their findings:

Our findings provide an important correction to a popular narrative about how Trump won office. Hillary Clinton argued that Trump supporters could be placed in a “basket of deplorables.” And election-night pundits and even some academics have claimed that Trump’s victory was the result of appealing to white Americans’ racist and xenophobic attitudes. We show this conventional wisdom is (at best) incomplete. Trump’s supporters were less xenophobic than prior Republican candidates’ [supporters], less sexist, had lower animus to minority groups, and lower levels of racial resentment. Far from deplorables, Trump voters were, on average, more tolerant and understanding than voters for prior Republican candidates… [The data] point to two important and undeniable facts. First, analyses focused on vote choice alone cannot tell us where candidates receive support. We must know the size of groups and who turns out to vote. And we cannot confuse candidates’ rhetoric with the voters who support them, because voters might support the candidate despite the rhetoric, not because of it.

So much for the racial resentment explanation of Trump’s victory. Not only is racial resentment a misnamed variable that does not mean what people think it means, it literally cannot account for the actual shifts that occurred in the 2016 election. Clearly a much more complex explanation for Trump’s victory was—or should have been—in order, integrating negative views on immigration, trade and liberal elites with a sense of unfairness rooted in just world belief. That would have helped Democrats understand why voters in Trump-shifting counties, whose ways of life were being torn asunder by economic and social change, were so attracted to Trump’s appeals.

Such understanding was nowhere to be found, however, in Democratic ranks. The racism-and-xenophobia interpretation quickly became dominant, partly because it was in many ways simply a continuation of the approach Clinton had taken during her campaign and that most Democrats accepted. Indeed, it became so dominant that simply to question the interpretation reliably opened the questioner to accusations that he or she did not take the problem of racism seriously enough.

We are still living in that world. Scratch a Democrat today and you will find lurking not far beneath the surface—if beneath the surface at all—a view of white working-class voters and their populist, pro-Trump leanings as reflecting these voters’ unyielding racism and xenophobia.

This is neither substantively justified nor politically productive. Democrats desperately need that insurance policy for 2024 and getting rid of these attitudes toward 40 percent of the electorate (much more in key states!) should be part of it. Think of it as a down payment on the “de-Brahminization” of the Democratic Party. This attitude adjustment might irritate some of their activist supporters, but considering the stakes, that seems like a small price to pay for a potentially vital insurance policy.