Mastodawn

Democracy Dies in Dumbass Oct 29

@benroyce Ahh yes, "Diplomacy"

"#US ambassador to #Canada goes on expletive-laced tirade at #Ontario’s trade representative"

ᴮᵉⁿ ᴿᵒʸᶜᵉVOTE IN THE PRIMARIES Oct 29

@ShredderFeeder

my country is going rapidly down the toilet

partly because of #MAGA #fascist #bigots

and partly because of these cringe weak "but i want perfect" #nonvoters

yes, the #USA sucked before: that's a silly observation when you realize how much worse it can suck

you get better or worse in this life. that's all you will ever, ever, EVER get

perfect isn't on the menu. never will be

#vote you dumb motherfuckers

#politics

Richard W. Woodley ELBOWS UP 🇨🇦🌹🚴‍♂️📷 🗺️Oct 29

@benroyce @ShredderFeeder

Asking for people to be better than the least of two evils is before voting for them is hardly demanding perfection. People need a system that allows them to vote for who they want not just who they don't want least.

@benroyce @ShredderFeeder

Deb Nam-Krane Oct 29

@the5thColumnist Wow, that sounds like people who regularly sit out municipal elections, where people you want are rarely if ever on the ballot. Those rare times you do find someone you want invariably end in disappointment because they *never* live up to your expectations. You vote for the least worst option anyway, otherwise you are letting a shockingly small number of people do it for you.

Choosing not to vote is a de facto vote.

@dnkboston @the5thColumnist @benroyce @ShredderFeeder

roblosricos Oct 30

"none of the above" should be an option on every ballot, and if None wins, the election must be held again, without the rejected candidates.

hell, even I'd vote.

ᴮᵉⁿ ᴿᵒʸᶜᵉVOTE IN THE PRIMARIES Oct 30

@roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

Yes I too like to go on social media and proclaim how things should be, then not do a fucking thing to make it happen, even the easiest fucking thing

@benroyce @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

roblosricos Oct 30

once again, for the people not paying attention -

i just spent 3 weeks at the ICE detention center, 24/7, being gassed and harassed, while you sat on your lazy ass at home.

i didn't get enough to eat most of that time.

i did this to stand up to fascists. as i have done my entire life.

ᴮᵉⁿ ᴿᵒʸᶜᵉVOTE IN THE PRIMARIES Oct 30

@roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

If you voted, you fucking moron, you wouldn't have to do that

Unfollow me at least, a block is preferable

@benroyce @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

roblosricos Oct 30

fuck yourself, you order-giving fascist wannabe.

ᴮᵉⁿ ᴿᵒʸᶜᵉVOTE IN THE PRIMARIES Oct 30

@roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

Oh yeah, I'm a fascist because I want you to vote 🤣

@benroyce @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

roblosricos Nov 1

no, you're a fascist because the US has been a fascist state since 1946, and you've voted to keep it that way your whole life.

ᴮᵉⁿ ᴿᵒʸᶜᵉVOTE IN THE PRIMARIES Nov 2

@roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

Well yes the point is to vote and keep fascism out

What's failing us are the morons not voting and doing call of duty edgelord fantasy life of revolution. Having not the slightest fucking clue what that is really like. They are either violent idiots or agent provocateurs out to sabotage the left

@benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

So one point about that: If you want people to vote, you have make it:

A) Worth the effort (ie: votes actually mattering)

and

B) Not make their life a living hell.

Hint: Ask a "potential swing voter" in a "swing state" how the last year before election feels.

@phloggen @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

why are we catering to people who don't care enough to understand the stakes to their own lives

in which case we're dealing with a moron, no brain (i'm not talking genius levels of political insight, but really obvious choices)

or people entitled and privileged enough that they don't care to do anything but whine

in which case we're dealing with an asshole, no heart

what do you think is actually served by such an approach?

@benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

First, I'm Danish, so I have grown up in country where 83 to 87% vote for parliament.

Second: Have you actually ever asked a friend, who is a "swing voter" in a "swing state", how many times they get accosted because of that designation and how much that can make life hell, almost constantly ?

Because if the insane voting system in USA, there is an enormous pressure on those "pivot voters", while much of the rest of the voters know that there is absolutely zero chance of their vote changing anything, because of where they live.

And the other part of it is that you dont have two-party system. You have a one-party system which cos-plays as a two-part system, and the voters are plenty smart to see right through that.

If you want to get people to vote, you have to change both of those aspects: Make all votes matter and give the voters a real choice.

@phloggen @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

"You have a one-party system which cos-plays as a two-part system"

ah, "BoTh SiDeS tHe SaMe"

Poul: that is an incredibly fucking stupid lie

you're danish?

would harris be making claims on greenland?

be honest

does it matter?

of course

so right there is something huge and concrete for your own concerns, nevermind domestic issues

so stop fucking lying Poul, and doing apologia for morons who believe really stupid lies

@benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

It's really very simple:

No matter which party you vote for, the 1%'ers get richer and everybody else gets poorer.

All the rest is just play-acting and rearranging the deckchairs as far as I am concerned.

And really, Greenland ?

You know what that is about ?

Area(USA) + Area(Greenland) > Area(Canada)

Area(USA) + Area(Canada) > Area(Russia)

Yes, an orange man with a very small and predictable brain.

@roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

@phloggen
Yes to the orange Shitgibbon it was about growing the US, but that does not answer the core question @benroyce was asking: Would Harris have done that or even said she wanted to do that?

It might not be much, but it is a difference between the 'two parties'. But that too misses the point, if the mentally deficients had voted, perhaps we would have had Harris or even a third party president...
1/2

@benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

@phloggen
Remember, roughly 40% of eligible voters chose not to vote, that means that the rest of the candidates combined had 60%, of which Chump got 49%... AKA roughly 30% of eligible voters, meaning those 40% could have elected whoever the hell they wanted and in their stupidity chose to stay home.

@nikatjef @benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

Poul-Henning Kamp

Cursing the people who probably most desire change, for not voting in an election that would not give them any, does not make any sense.

USA needs a 3rd party which is not beholden to the 1%'ers.

Create that, and will guarantee you the 40% will come running to vote for it.

@benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

@phloggen
A very little known fact about the US party system: it is not set in stone. To create a new party simply requires starting one. And to get federal funding / support merely requires 6% voter turn-out. The US actually has more than 10 parties on the books. The libertarian party and the communist party are two of the biggest, but they tend to be a bit disorganized and fail to register their candidates properly.

Bamboy Nov 3

@nikatjef
...do you know how much money each party spends on advertising and on the campaign trail?
Huge swaths of the money for each party are from corporate donors too, to get them to invest in policies that benefit them.

Making a third party is not feasible; nobody else will be able to compete. They've already siphoned most of the money from our economy.

@bamboy
No, it's really not. The only reason the Communist party and the Libertarian parties don't get on the debate stage is that they are only competing in major races. But if they started competing down ballot, the media would start to cover them, then they would start winning mid-ballot seats and within two or three general cycles they would be on the big stage because the media would have to cover them. We have seen this happen multiple times over the last 40 years.

@bamboy
A great anti-example of this was the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh and his cult back Oregon back in the '80s

Bamboy Nov 4

@nikatjef
95% of the "media" is controlled by the same corporations/billionaires that have broken the system for their own gains in the first place.

If they choose to not cover a story, most Americans will not hear the news story. Likewise if they choose to paint bias into a story.

I'm not saying it's impossible, just very unlikely and would need drastic & broad action for systemic change.

All our systems started slowly going toward capitalistic oligarchy thanks to Ronald Regan.

Bamboy Nov 4

@nikatjef
Frankly the number of blatant lies Fox News puts out is absurd. Stomach churning.

And its not like liberal medias are *much* better. MSNBC blatantly lied about the genocide happening in Palestine and other stuff.

They all serve one thing: The state, and to keep the people reasonably focused on anything but what evils the American gov is doing at home & abroad.

It's been so for decades, only now capitalism is dying and fighting to stay alive at any cost.

Bamboy Nov 4

@nikatjef
...and a third party assumes a fair election w/ a voting system that isn't tampered with... which it 100% was in 2016 by Russia, and there's a whole lot of BS shenanigans with elections thanks to gerrymandering and our electoral college.

2024 Musk was offering a lottery for people who recruited voters for Trump. Highly illegal. He was never prosecuted. All kinds of BS like that is sliding, because:

Money = Power

✨ If you have enough money, the rules get to be different for you. ✨

@benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

@phloggen
I am not cursing them, I am insulting them for the choices *THEY* made. I have pointed out multiple times that their voting can make a difference, they chose to believe it can't... Sorry, but that is not on me, it is on them.

@phloggen @nikatjef @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

so you're depending upon people who can't reason their way out of a wet paper back, and elicit an amount of care akin to spitting on the street, and you think great passion is what motivates them?

nevermind you have NO FUCKING CLUE how our shitty fptp voting system works, but still think you have a right to comment on what you don't understand

SouprMatt Nov 3

@phloggen @nikatjef @benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder I hate to tell you this, but you don’t understand the first thing about US politics.

Thanks for the tips and advice (aka pipe dreams and vapid platitudes) but they are worthless since you can’t comprehend even the basics of our system.

PS - We had a well-funded 3rd candidate in 1992 and it only increased voter turnout by 5% from the previous election.

PPS - You’re claiming that people who most desire change don’t vote? IMO they must not desire it very much if they won’t even get off their couch. Like, if you REALLY desire change and your answer is to sit around and whine instead of AT LEAST voting? Nah you just don’t give a 💩.

@mls14 @nikatjef @benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

You seem to confuse "well-funded" and "popular" ?

SouprMatt Nov 3

@phloggen @nikatjef @benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder Ross Perot got 20 million votes, basically destroying the campaign of GW Bush for a 2nd term. He was pretty popular.

Which you’d know if you knew anything about US politics.

@phloggen @benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

James Wells Nov 4

@mls14
Perot getting 20M does not really tell the story. What does tell it is that he got roughly 20% of the popular vote and he stood on the main debate stages with Bush and Clinton.

@phloggen @mls14 @nikatjef @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

And if people don't vote all the money the plutocrats are spending to shape the turn out is working

You're not even in the USA and you're working your hardest to suppress/ divide the American left for fascism

@phloggen @nikatjef @benroyce @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

JamesBont Nov 3

We have this in Germany, and yet the opposite is true. The stupidity of non-voters and voters is even greater than that of politicians. And sometimes you wonder if democracy isn't abolishing itself precisely because of this stupidity?!
🤔

@JamesBont @phloggen @nikatjef @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

If people dont vote that is what will happen

@benroyce @phloggen @nikatjef @roblosricos @dnkboston @the5thColumnist @ShredderFeeder

JamesBont Nov 3

Seit #AFD, #BSW und dieser #Union, keine Ahnung mehr, Ben.

Hinzukommt dass die Demokraten es sich dann durch schräge Bündnisse - vor denen etliche warnen - trotzdem eingehen.

Hinzukommt dass die Medien und deren Populisten einen gewaltigen Einfluss haben und die Menschen lieber solchen Marktschreiern zuhören. Wenn die Bildung völlig im Arsch ist auch irgendwie kein Wunder mehr.