So it looks like Trump has read the fascist playbook or something. I’m not surprised. I am concerned.

Edit: After thinking about it, I guess I am surprised that he can read.

    • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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      1 year ago

      Sadly, the way the game is set up, if you don’t vote for one of the two parties then you are essentially splitting the vote and creating a void in which the party you never wanted to win will now certainly win. It’s the only way to play with the rules we currently have.

        • niucllos@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          What’s your alternative? Unless there’s a successful January 6th equivalent the options are humoring the system and making progress as best you can or reject the system and maybe engage in resultless protests while letting fascists take over the system. At that point your options become be a fascist or die.

          • t3rmit3@beehaw.org
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            1 year ago

            You can’t prevent fascism through Democracy, because fascism does not rely on Democracy to come into power.

            Fascism happens through violent seizure of power, and it can only be prevented or defeated through violence.

            The fact that rhetoric has turned to, “if Republicans ever win again, they’ll actualize a fascist takeover” just shows that we recognize that however many laws or constitutional protections we put in place do not matter; if they did, it wouldn’t matter if Republicans got back in power, because the guardrails would constrain them.

            But we all know that they’ll disregard those guardrails in order to seize power. Sadly, no one wants to accept the answer about what path that leaves us, and people will keep desperately voting as SCOTUS and the GOP Congress lay the groundwork for a full-scale right-wing takeover. Because in a 2-party system, it’s simply a matter of time before control flips.

        • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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          1 year ago

          Yeah, that simply gives the vote to who you oppose. In fact this is the same propaganda that Russia pushed leading up to the 2016 elections. It’s how Trump won in the first place. Makes me very suspect of your motives.

          • Melkath@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            Why do you people keep perpetuating that lie?

            Show me how my unused vote magically adds to someone I didn’t use it on.

            No. My unused vote represents the disenfranchised.

            Your cast vote will represent a genocidal maniac.

            Stop playing make believe. Be a grown up. Live in reality.

            • MJBrune@beehaw.org
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              1 year ago

              Dude it’s basic math.

              If person a gets 20 votes and person b gets 19 votes and if you were going to vote for person b then didn’t, person a wins instead of ties. Do that on a major scale to one party and you get a party that will never win again.

              So I don’t know where you get off on pretending I’m playing make believe. It makes me think you have to resort to these adhoc attacks because your stance is super weak and you know it.

              • Melkath@kbin.social
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                1 year ago

                You are making shit up. 1 plus 0 DOES NOT EQUAL 2.

                Here is how the actual math works. Red Fascist gets 20 votes, Blue Fascist gets 19 votes if blue party has abandoned their liberal ideals in favor for “lesser evil” progressive fascism and I’m the only one who refuses to vote for genocide. That means the voting record is:

                Model 1
                Red Fascist: 20 votes
                Blue Fascist: 19 votes
                Disenfranchised voters: 1

                If the people stop believing your made up bullshit, then they too could decide to stop voting for the death of America, stop voting for fascism, stop voting for genocide, etc.

                Then the voting record is:

                Model 2
                Red Fascist: 10 votes
                Blue Fascist: 10 votes
                Disenfranchised voters: 20

                Voter turnout is a massive factor in establishing the political ethos of the person in office. A person sitting on 98% turnout can say “I represent America” and has much better odds of pushing whatever genocide or tax break for billionaires they want.

                A person sitting on a 50% turnout is going to have “you don’t represent the people” hurled at them at every turn, and they will have a much harder time sending another funding package to the genocide.

                Under Model 1, neither fascist has anything to worry about. They have the world by the balls, their overlords are happy, and regardless of which cover the overlords put on their actions (red or blue), they will get their payout. Nothing changes. The whole system continues to decay.

                Under Model 2, the fascists have a big problem. The world can see that the people don’t approve, the people see that the people don’t approve. Now there is fire on the heels of the fascists, and they might need to consider actually not being evil sometimes to encourage more people to vote again.

                Even under a third model:

                Model 3
                Red Fascist: 20 votes
                Blue Fascist: 10 votes
                Disenfranchised voters: 10

                After a really shitty 4 years, the Blue Fascists now have a reason to stop being fucking fascists to get the 10 disenfranchised voters back. They have incentive to actually combat the Red Fascists by trying to be GOOD instead of lesser evil.

                  • Melkath@kbin.social
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                    1 year ago

                    Yes, and that was because the people wanted Gary Hart, but the DNC decided to install Dukakis instead.

                    Exactly like Hilary/Bernie, except at least for Gary Hart, there was some drama in the news to pin the decision on. For Hilary/Bernie, it was simply that Hilary is one of the overlords in the DNC.

                    So you are just highlighting a great point where the DNC didn’t listen to their constituents and paid the price. Good conscientious liberals refused to vote for the “lesser evil”. They wanted their solid candidate to vote for.

                    It motivated the Democrats to get strong on climate, social service, and fighting AGAINST genocide, and that’s how we got the Clinton/Gore years (some of the best years in moderate history).

                    It worked. We saw actual improvement. Then we got complacent again and Democrats are now funding genocide.

                    Time to do it again.

                    Argument perfectly in-tact if not stronger.