The Second Trump Presidency

Important to remember that he has a mandate among those who voted.He does not represent or have the support of a majority of Americans.Something like 40% of eligible voters didn't show up at all.America is not dead yet. But we do desperately need candidates who aren't perceived as the lesser of two evils.

I guess perception is everything, but I think that most of the time the phrase "lesser of two evils" is not intended literally. It might be more accurately expressed as choosing the greater of two lessers.But in this case one of the candidates *was* truly evil while the other was just a normal sane person and quite arguably not a lesser. The country chose vengeance, grievance and power madness over sanity, rationality and sensibility.--Percy

Rahvin writes: Thursday, 2:40 AM, looking at the incomplete totals:
Kamala 67,927,989
shitsmear 72,623,882
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140,551,871in 2020 there were 155 million, Biden's 81 million to shitsmear's 74 million. there are more eligible votes today than in 2020. on the surface it would seem the Repugnant Party's use of voter suppression techniques worked. i was expecting a record turnout this time, so what happened? also shitsmear may still match the 2020 number as the final tallies roll in.

I get what you are saying, but that is never how mandates have been defined in the past. If you don't vote then you are tacitly handing your decision to those who do vote. It's the democratic version of the wedding phrase, "Speak now or forever hold your peace."Trump has as much of a mandate as any prior president who was elected by the same majority of popular votes. It sickens me to say that, but it's the truth.

This is a nation of laws, even for those who seem to relish in breaking them because they’re financially and politically able to get away with (most of) it. We have little choice but to do as the law intended.There not having been any great controversy in election proceedings (despite Trump and company still insisting there is (undefined unevidnced) fraud) this election can be seen to be as close to free fair and open as a modern society can make a national poll.Which means Trump won and we live a very sick society.Enlightenment v 2.0 is not progressing as many of us had expected, hoped. We are still an openly violent and stupid species and when left to our own freedoms we still love us the strong man to make war and strike at our enemies. We still feel that background rage of a savage animal in a savage world and we still fear and loathe all that we cannot count as Us.The pendulum has swung in what many of us consider to be away from the humanist progress we once saw on the distant horizon; our utopian fantasies of what a free and prosperous society could achieve. Such swings toward greed are not sudden (Reagan) and last right up to the present … and generations beyond. At this point the hate/fear/greed appears to control a major share of our population. The enlightenment is still many decades of hard struggle away.Apologies to you young ones. We tried. We failed. Maybe, if there is enough left, your kids and grandkids can put us back on track. Until then we have to survive the rise of the animal, again.

From the Washington Post: Trump allies push to punish Jack Smith in first test of retribution vowI know most people don't have access to the Washington Post, so here are a few excerpts:

Washington Post:

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Even as Jack Smith moved to wind down his federal election interference case against Donald Trump on Friday, House Republicans took an initial step toward investigating the special counsel, setting up an early test of how the president-elect’s calls for retribution will play out.
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Elon Musk, the X owner who spent more than $100 million boosting Trump’s campaign, responded to the House Republicans’ letter by posting, “Jack Smith’s abuse of the justice system cannot go unpunished.”

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Trump vowed repeatedly on the campaign trail to stop Smith’s prosecutions and use a return to power to turn federal law enforcement against President Joe Biden and other critics, Democrats and former advisers. He argued without evidence that the federal indictments he faced were politically motivated. In the final weeks of the campaign, Trump said he would quickly remove Smith and suggested deporting him.

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“He should be thrown out of the country,” Trump said Oct. 24 on “Cats & Cosby,” a conservative radio talk show.
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The next Justice Department will look “critically” at what Smith’s team did over the past couple of years to “make sure nothing like this ever happens again,” the person said.
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[Trump adviser Mike] Davis said he hopes the multiple branches of the government go after Smith. “There should be several investigations: House Judiciary, Senate Judiciary, DOJ Office of Professional Responsibility and a criminal probe,” he said.

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Scary stuff. The criminals will be running the courthouse.--Percy

I think the average American is poorly educated, leaving them unable to tell truth from lies, good information from bad. Unless you're an Elon or a Bezos trying to maximize your businesses' opportunities under Trump, you couldn't vote for him without being ignorant or dismissive of the clear consequences of a second Trump presidency.--Percy

I found a good quote for this occasion:

quote:

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When a candidate for public office faces the voters he does not face men of sense; he faces a mob of men whose chief distinguishing mark is the fact that they are quite incapable of weighing ideas, or even of comprehending any save the most elemental—men whose whole thinking is done in terms of emotion, and whose dominant emotion is dread of what they can
not understand. So confronted, the candidate must either bark with the pack or be lost...
"All the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre—the man who can most adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum. The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart's desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron. ~ H.L. Meneken

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Percy:

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I think the average American is poorly educated, leaving them unable to tell truth from lies, good information from bad.

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It was remarks like that from the elitists that caused the populists to rebel again and elect Trump. You cant assume that your intelligence is superior to mine or anyone else's (even if it is) Humility is a virtue.

When you say populists you don't actually mean populists. Trump is the populist. You're actually referring to those vulnerable to Trump's populist appeals.You must believe these people reasoned, "I'm insulted by those who say that supporting Trump must mean I don't understand that Trump is telling lies and is a threat to democracy, personal freedoms, the rule of law and the climate, so I'll show them! I'll vote for Trump!" Does that sound like a rational thinking process to you?By the way, someone who notes mistaken thinking is not an elitist. An elitist is not someone capable of simple logic and rational thinking.And most everyone *is* capable of simple logic and rational thinking, but only about those things of which they are knowledgeable and familiar. It is well understood in science that when a scientist ventures outside his own field he is often no better than a mere layperson. In the same way, many of the people who voted for Trump were making decisions involving concepts unfamiliar to them.January 6th should have been enough all by itself (not that there wasn't much else) to convince nearly everyone that Trump was a menace to democracy and woefully unqualified for high office, but it wasn't. What does that say about the 51% who voted for Trump?Or maybe I'm wrong. Maybe understanding that democracy is fragile and can be lost, indeed has been lost in a number of countries in our own lifetime, is an elitist concept. If you can't recognize democracy when you see it, you won't miss it when it's gone. Only the elitists will know it's gone, and who cares about them.As a side comment, I don't want to get into the whole thing of, "The U.S. is actually a constitutional federal democratic republic." I think most of us are aware that the U.S. actually combines characteristics of both a republic and a democracy, but constantly using that terminology would make discussion awkward and lengthy. I'm just going to keep things simple and say that we live in a democracy. Most people will know what I mean.--Percy

I refer you to the quote at the end of my signature.

I remember your signature.

quote:

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If "elitist" just means "not the dumbest motherfucker in the room", I'll be an elitist! - Get Your War On

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Lets peruse the dictionary (and wikipedia) and unpack some of this stuff, shall we? No one disagrees with the fact that Democrats in general are better educated than Republicans. Many Republicans are CEO's and business leaders. Much of the base is small business owners, many of whom never finished college. According to wiki, elitism as a group favors pluralism as a political ideal. Pluralism is seemingly favoring larger government whereas populism favors smaller government.Comments? I'm in the process of learning here.
Note the demographic makeup of our two main political parties. Trumps base is largely white, though other minorities are included based on the shared interest of business. at the DNC, every ethnicity was cheerfully on display, including the LGBQT. It seems that one side favors diversity whereas the other side favors unity at the risk of " a lack of commitment to the democratic process, disrespect for fundamental minority rights, demonization of opponents, and acceptance of political violence."

quote:

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According to wiki, elitism as a group favors pluralism as a political ideal.

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According to your quote “pluralism” is one of the views in opposition to elitism.

I hope they do investigate Jack Smith, and do a thorough job showing that there was nothing for tRUMP to be prosecuted[/s].Moose

And I hope they find the hidden entrance to the evil Illiteratii libraries and we finally learn who really is in charge of this place. I'm leaning toward the Reptilians.

Upon further investigation, you are right. I must have gotten confused by reading that pluralists favored big government.