America might sleepwalk into bizarrely voting for something that's bad for everyone next week. There's still time to reach out to someone in your life who might be wavering, and convince them to go vote for Harris instead of staying home, despite misgivings.

Forget your MAGA-pilled relatives, they're gone. There’s two completely different kinds of people you probably know one of who are persuadable:

Normie pro-business upper-middle-class men who think Trump will be better for their personal finances, and leftists convinced some light fascism will move America towards socialism.

Both are underestimating just how bad Trump would be for their interests. Call them and talk them off the ledge.

The center-right men worry that Harris will raise their taxes, or heard from racists like Sacks that she's “stupid”. They hate Trump, but they think he'll be better for them financially.

Trump has said he wants to overrule the Fed on interest rates, risking the economy. Trump's tariff idiocy will bring back inflation, and unlike taxes a moderate congress can't stop tariffs. Tax-free social security will balloon the deficit. Deportations of workers harm the economy. These are WSJ-endorsed views.

The news about how General Milley and Matthis–old white dudes they'll respect–genuinely think he's a fascist and a threat to America maybe hasn't broken through to them. They think another Trump term will be OK like the last one because people will keep him in check, so it'll be fine. It's different now. There'll be no Gary Cohns or John Kellys. Full on fascism is bad for business.

Remind them split ticket voting is a thing. They can vote D for President, and R all the way down after that.

As for the left wing person in your life who is angry that Biden/Harris haven't done more (Roe was overturned on their watch!), the idea that a quick dose of the bad stuff will bring America home to the DSA is so off it's hard to counter. The best approach is probably to try and scare them to their senses.

Luckily the Trump campaign is provide lots of material for this. Right now at a rally for Trump in NY there are some blood and soil speeches bringing the house down.

https://x.com/atrupar/status/1850639517281034317

Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) on X

"America is for Americans and Americans only" -- Stephen Miller

X (formerly Twitter)

Rudy Giuliani to rapturous applause just told the audience:

“The Palestinians are taught to kill us at two years old. […] They may have good people. I’m sorry, I don’t take a risk with people that are taught to kill Americans at two.”

Yes, the current administration has been awful on Gaza. But there's no doubt a Trump presidency would be far far worse. Trump has publicly said many times he thinks Bibi should go further, that he has been held back.

You have to be really full-on can't look the other way racist for the NYT to break glass and call a political rally racist in a headline, instead of giving it the usual thesaurus and euphamism treatment.

Nobody can claim to be on the fence after this. No “I'm a double hater” excuses. You either accept this, or take a stand against it.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/10/27/us/harris-trump-election?ogrp=ctr&unlocked_article_code=1.VU4.0620.OmwtPKcMm4Lu&smid=url-share

Racist Remarks and Insults Mark Trump’s Madison Square Garden Rally: Oct. 27 Campaign News

Many of the speakers at Donald J. Trump’s rally in the heart of solidly blue New York struck offensive and vulgar notes, which Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign moved quickly to elevate and denounce. Melania Trump, a surprise guest, introduced her husband to the stage.

The New York Times

They’ve realized they fucked up and are trying to walk it back. The line will be that it was a single speaker who doesn’t represent the campaign.

But just shortly after, Tucker Carlson described Harris as a “Samoan, Malaysian, low IQ former California prosecutor”.

Their only mistake was misjudging how far that could take it before the inert press finally had to face reality.

For your fiscally nervous friend: Musk claimed during the rally that his new “department of governmental efficiency” (yes, doge) will cut 2 Trillion from the federal budget.

Here is the entire federal budget. Notice there is only one T. Hope they enjoy not getting their social security payments despite having paid into the fund all these years.

@airspeedswift Bold of you to assume his plan isn’t to simply crash the economy and allow Putin to take over the country by zeroing out the defense budget and repudiating all debt.

(Bold of me to pretend he has a plan.)

@jpanzer @airspeedswift I bet he’s planning to remove all of the physical buttons.
Elon Musk’s Big Business and Conflicts of Interest With the U.S. Government

Mr. Musk, who holds billions in federal contracts, wants to be in charge of the regulators that oversee him if Donald Trump wins.

The New York Times
@airspeedswift He'll make all these cuts and funnel it into his companies.

@airspeedswift given what apartheid emerald Karen did when he took over Xitter, there's a decent chance he intends to get half way there by just not paying the interest bill. Trump is hardly well-known for being studious in meeting his financial obligations, either.

@hacks4pancakes

@airspeedswift

Any idea which of those buckets holds the dept of agriculture, blm and farm subsidies?

@philsplace this is by budget function rather than department, you have to be careful because the dept of agriculture administers some income protection programs like food stamps

Farm income stabilization is less than half a percent, $32bn. Dept of the Interior entire budget is about that also.

https://www.usaspending.gov/explorer/budget_function

USAspending.gov