[e2le]

We are 1 Year and 3 months into this current administration, 2 years and 9 months remain. Despite the short period in office, so much damage and chaos has being caused by one individual and the sycophants who surround him.

It is a fact that the reputation of the USA has being damaged, perhaps not repairable for decades or more. This will have consequences.

Perhaps, I hope, Americans will take action to save the democratic norms and institutions that so many of them have claimed to cherish. Before he has dismantled and replaced too many to salvage. Or perhaps they have work tomorrow.

[temp8830]

Approximately the same things were said about Dubya Jr's war with invisible WMDs. If you've forgotten - listen to some songs that came out at the time. It's not about a particular president, it's that the US seems to have a systemic dependency on starting these wars.

[LeFantome]

Your point seems to be that the US has not changed. Regardless, the world thinks it has.

The “coalition of the willing” is not behind the US this time.

[anjel]

And so this Easter day a new oxymoron is born: the coalition of the unwilling.

Do with that, in terms of foreign policy, what you will.

[watwut]

Why is that oxymoron? You can, in fact, have a coalition focused on not doing something.

[Jensson]

Yeah, its called home owners associations, NIMBY etc.

[layer8]

The unwilling don’t particularly coalise.

[SecretDreams]

Information, both good and bad, is a lot more accessible this time around. It has been a dramatic accelerator to worldly views of America in the wake of their recent actions.

There are political similarities between the two aforementioned wars, but the social and technological backdrops are quite different, and they're working against US public perception. Furthermore, decorum is entirely gone this time around, which isn't helping.

[chaostheory]

Back then we had approval from our coalition. We also shared the spoils, which the Russians noted.

Also, none of the Bush’s ran on an “America First” isolationist political campaign. Even own base is fracturing because of this.

[kakacik]

Whole world would weep with joy if somebody like Bush jr would come into power now. Even when talking about that cocaine nepo kid of his cia chief father. I recall those times and emotions well from european perspective, not everybody here is 20-something.

These 2 are incomparable on any level. If you want to say it can always get worse that I can agree with.

[micromacrofoot]

and we're still experiencing damage from that war, and it's getting worse because of some things that it changed (patriot act, creation of homeland security, etc)

we've faced two major recessions since then and may very well be entering our third

at this point it seems we're just trying to find out where the breaking point is

[simgt]

How many people voted for that "one individual causing chaos" again? 70 million? He's also backed by billionaires and an administration that seems to be just as unhinged. It's not one person causing chaos, it's a whole country with its violent culture. The scale changed slightly, but it's also nothing new.

[villedespommes]

This. There are really two explanations here. Either the US hasn't been a democracy in the first place. Or the majority of the US voters prefer autocratic amoral psychopaths running their country.

[MarsIronPI]

> Either the US hasn't been a democracy in the first place.

Well, it really wasn't, and still isn't. It's a republic: the people decide who make the laws and who executes them. In between these choices there's never really been anything for the people to do but ask their representatives to do things.

[pas]

Brits also voted to leave the EU where they had the absurdly privileged position of picking (almost freely) which rules applies to them, while benefiting from others applying them fully.

...

Democracy is only as good as the people doing the voting, who are about as good (as the rules they don't protest againsts) and the content they consume, which is about as good as certain groups make it to be.

[WickyNilliams]

B-b-but the bananas, and the bureaucrats!!

What's particularly amazing about Brexit is that many of its chief architects have not been shamed or exiled from society for spinning a yarn that fell apart when confronted with the smallest slither of reality. No, instead, the primary advocate may very well be our next prime minister.

[rkomorn]

A slither of reality sounds snaky... and I ended up googling it and Google AI convincingly says both that it exists and also that it is confused with "sliver of reality", and its examples of "slither of reality" point to pages that use "sliver" instead.

What a time to be alive.

[WickyNilliams]

Oh lol. Good catch. Wrote that with my morning coffee in hand where it appears my brain was still asleep

[pas]

brought to you by the post-truth society!

which in turn is brought to us by the good old days of our shared delusions, like divine right of kings (thx magic sky daddy and all his faithful unbiased selfless worldly interpreters!)

[Gud]

The US is only nominally democratic. You get politicians bought and paid for. Perhaps there are counter examples, but not many.

Only democracy in the western world where there is so much money involved in the elections, is the USA.

[robocat]

The influence of money is a weakness of any democracy. Maybe look at other democratic countries. Definitely seen it here in New Zealand.

[Gud]

It is absolutely not necessary to spend billions to become president of Germany, in fact it is probably illegal...

[robocat]

I believe the influence is hidden in countries where smaller amounts have a bigger impact.

A few million can have an outsized influence in New Zealand. Which can mean other countries interfere (not just wealthy broligarches). There was a significant controversy in the 2005 New Zealand elections regarding budgets. It is alleged US fundamentalists funded the Exclusive Brethren Church to produce pamphlets in support of the National Party, by smearing both the Labour Party and the Green Party. https://wikipedia.org/wiki/2005_New_Zealand_election_funding...

Peter Thiel was given a New Zealand passport by our National Party (maybe by being chummy, although obviously his wealth helped him). The only reason he might not influence NZ politics would be if he doesn't give a shit about our politics.

The wealthiest person born in New Zealand is Graeme Hart worth ~USD10G ranked by Forbes at about #340.

For the New Zealand 2023 General Election, political parties officially spent a total of about USD8M.

There's a lot of scope for malign influence here.

[freewilly23]

exactly. and i think a lot of things have always been this way in the mighty usa. the only difference is, that the donald behaves like a brazen clown, not trying to hide anything, so it is easier for everyone to see what's going on.

[augusto-moura]

Thing is, that is not just the individual, the world lost the trust in the american vote. Trump was elected twice, it is easy to imagine that another megalomaniac might be elected next.

In a democratic system, the ruler is a reflection of the majority of the population. Of course it can change during the course of the administration (as seen in the approval ratings), but the trust is lost and most countries now believe that, one way or another, the majority of the US population agree with some of the ideas behind Trump. The damage will not stop by the end of Trump's administration, it is truly the end of multilateralism as we knew it

[jmye]

> the majority of the US population agree with some of the ideas behind Trump

And will happily vote for it again and again, provided the better next to the name is an R, no matter how they answer approval polls.

This is what happens when your entire media (social and traditional) and tech ecosystem is complicit and encouraging.

[gosub100]

My hope is that this will show weaknesses in our supposed "checks and balances" that can be patched later. If that means it takes an act of congress to even fire a single military weapon, so be it. That's just one example, but basically "they" need to backtrack and find every "hack" trump used and plug it so this never happens again.

[pjc50]

Checks and balances mean nothing when the same party controls house, senate, president, and supreme court.

[gosub100]

I disagree. Plenty of republicans are vociferously disagreeing with Trump over Iran and Epstein. But even if your premise is true, what if the two-party system were constructed or manipulated by a foreign government with the express intent on dividing us? Maybe that should be addressed as well?

[jmye]

> Plenty of republicans are vociferously disagreeing with Trump over Iran and Epstein.

Until they have to take a meaningful vote. Because it’s bullshit.

[Jensson]

And the military. Who the majority of soldiers supports matters a lot since they have the final say when leaders cannot agree. Trump does a lot to gain favor with the military, democrats doesn't do much for them.

[LeFantome]

What “checks and balances”?

The SCOTUS ruled that presidents cannot be held accountable.

The constitution is pretty clear. Trump does not have the authority to invade Iran. Yet he did. What are you planning to patch?

Despite everything, Trump has 35-40 percent approval right now. You cannot patch that out.

[gosub100]

the ones that were printed in my middle school government McGraw Hill textbook...

[ceejayoz]

“First, your return to shore was not part of our negotiations nor our agreement, so I must do nothing. And secondly, you must be a pirate for the Pirate's Code to apply, and you're not. And thirdly, the Code is more what you'd call guidelines than actual rules.”

Turns out that last bit is how the US was setup. Oops.

[freedomben]

Agreed, but the problem is that whichever party is in power wants to expand presidential authority, and only the minority party wants to reign it in. When the president flips, usually so do the parties in power. Plus you have to be enough majority to override a presidential veto. I don't see this ever workign out :-(

[iJohnDoe]

Worst case there will be another Republican president from the same tribe. We could be in for the same exact chaos and damage for another four years. This could go on for a long time.

Remember, Republicans get out and vote. They would rather suffer and destroy America just so the democrats don’t win.

[gffrd]

> They would rather suffer and destroy America just so the democrats don’t win.

This is true.

Which raises the question: could Democrats use this reality (whatever they touch is poisoned, in eyes of the other side) to steer the result a bit?

[ronnier]

I think a large part of why they do this and vote the way they do is because of comments like yours. Hacker news, Reddit, award shows, movies, universities, etc all have a constant drum beat of disdain and hate towards them. I think this motivates them into voting even if the vote is against their own interest.

[watwut]

Everything republican party do and everything republicans vote for ... are fault of the opposition. Always. Republicans are little helpless souls having no choice but cause maxinum harm as long as opposition in any for exists.

Look at what that party collectively stands for now, who they kick out and who they keep. They all stand behind trump.

[devinplatt]

I learned recently that there's actually a name for this concept. Murc's law states that in American politics, only Democrats are assumed to have agency.

Presumably democratic reforms could help change the dynamic if they changed the incentives. Right now, it's a politically viable strategy to just obstruct the other party when out of power, and politically unviable strategy for Congress to oppose a president from the same party. Both of which lead to a lot of dysfunction.

As an example, if Congress had multimember districts with an appropriate voting system (e.g. ranked choice voting for all members at the same time), then you can effectively nullify the power of gerrymandered voting districts (the current system, where effectively politicians choose voters rather than the other way around). Doing so would elevate the influence of general elections over party primaries. Then representatives would be less afraid of challenges in those primaries, which is currently one of the major disincentives in opposing the president of the same political party (fear of being "primaried").

[Jensson]

That is just progressive vs conservative, ie changing things vs conserving things, humans are biased to conserve things unless the set of changes are overwhelmingly better.

So conservatives win when progressives push for too many changes, not changing things is the default. So saying that the democrats lost the election by pushing too fast is not weird, that is just how humans works.

[devinplatt]

There's definitely an asymmetry in how the systemic dysfunction benefits the Republican party over the Democratic party. (Overall the system benefits both parties though since it entrenches partisanship.)

I'd argue that the asymmetry has less to do with change vs. no change and more to do with the Republican party currently being an "anti government" party (pivoting to that post New Deal). So less is expected of them in terms of functional governance.

With respect to change: I've heard a lot of commentary that the Republican party today is more of an instigator of change than the Democratic party (being seen as a defender of the status quo), despite the traditional alignment of Republican/conservative/no change. Democrats are seen as pro-institution and Republicans anti-institution.

In case it matters, I personally don't identify with a political party. I just want functional government and politics and I see a lot of dysfunction. I'm an engineer so naturally I gravitate towards systemic solutions to systemic problems.

[bigbadfeline]

> That is just progressive vs conservative, ie changing things vs conserving things.

Conserving distraction == wars, progressive distraction == LG, then B, then T, there are still letters in the alphabet to progress to - mandatory for school children to study in detail.

Conserving inflation same as progressive inflation, the small group benefiting form it - the same too.

Changing presidential candidates a few months before election and doing everything to let the other side win? Very progressive.

Promising no-more-wars and delivering more-wars? Very conservative.

Moral of the story - while 'progressive' and 'conservative' are used haphazardly, lacking precise and concrete definitions in terms of specific, measurable goals and commitments, using them for political analysis is just mud in the eyes.

[qwerpy]

Unironically yes. I lived in the Seattle area and witnessed firsthand the effects of state/county/city Democrat rule. Gifted programs cancelled, streets full of homeless and drug addicts. Hateful people yelling at and flipping me off as I take my kids to daycare for the heinous crime of driving a Tesla. I’m a well educated highly paid minority, the kind of voter that Democrats take for granted. I voted Republican down the ballot last election.

[wrs]

Are you familiar with the phrase “cutting off your nose to spite your face”?

[qwerpy]

Assuming that people vote a certain way out of spite is narrow-minded. Talk to people outside of your bubble and try to understand them instead of reducing them down to caricatures. I don’t judge people on the left the way that I get judged by them. I genuinely think that my choice of political party is better for my family’s quality of life.

[Nursie]

Well let me be the first to thank you for the extra dollar a litre on my fuel, the extra hundred or so dollars a month on my mortgage and the impending recession that your choice has imposed upon me here in Australia.

Thanks so much for voting in Trump and his enablers.

[aurareturn]

Rather than blame this voter, why don't we put some blame onto the democrats. In San Francisco, progressive democrats have wasted billions on homeless and crime but with little to show for.

Sometimes democrats do push too far left. Far left is not that much different than far right.

[nozzlegear]

You witnessed the firsthand effects of NIMBY rule, which both parties have in abundance.

[watwut]

So, you did not voted for centrists and chosen to vote for nazi salute throwing radicals ... because there are non meek leftists groups.

The only way to win against Trump voters like you is to ignore them, because people like you will choose nazi until nazi are the only game in town.

[kdheiwns]

I think we're beyond the point of "you can't criticize them. That's mean and motivates them." At what point is the line drawn? Should it be in bad taste to criticize Orban supporters because it makes them support him more? What about Erdogan? Putin? Kim Jong Un? And why is it one sided that they can't be criticized, but it's all fair and good for their own leaders to demonize everyone? It's a silly double standard and people see through it now. Concern trolling stopped being effective years ago.

[Jensson]

If you want to win elections, yes. You never convince voters by telling them that they are evil people. Its fine to say Trump is evil, its not fine to say Trump voters are evil because those voters will now be much less likely to vote for you. They can't take back their votes, they already voted for Trump before, so they will just not vote for you when you attack them like that.

[amalcon]

Republicans have been calling democratic voters baby-killers for the entire time I have been aware of what a republican is. This sort of behavior has only gotten worse over time. They still manage to win elections.

I get that there are real asymmetries here, but I really don't think there are substantial blocs of swing voters who use "who has insulted them less" as a real factor. If that were the case, Trump would not have made the gains he did in 2024.

The important thing is to make people feel welcome in your coalition. It is clearly possible to do that either with or without being nice. It's just a different skillset.

[thisislife2]

What you say is insightful and true. The west, America in particular, has a genuine problem today with its politics of polarising people to extremes. It partly has to do with how politics is done online in the internet, through the creation of "echo chambers" where no "dissent" is tolerated.

[kdheiwns]

Dems have tried the strategy of pandering to republicans for decades. That strategy in 2024 backfired and made Dems not care about the election. The whole time republicans ran a campaign saying that blue haired democrats are harming kids and they're burning down cities and someone needs to lock them up all up. Republicans had a great election year.

Again, one sided. People are tired of it. More importantly, people are growing tired of the tolerance for the people who support the current happenings. Look around about what people who stayed out of the 2024 election said and it's that Dems were milquetoast and tried to be friendly and play both sides. Look around and see why republicans were fired up to vote. It's because they loved the demonization of Dems.

The funny thing is you can criticize the supporters. It's no problem. You can criticize Bush voters and everyone will agree with you. Why? Because nobody voted for Bush. Yet he won two elections. Meaning those people regretted their vote and now completely hide that they voted for him. They also retroactively hate the Iraq War, despite supporting it in 2003 and saying anyone who opposes it is unamerican. But those people will now say Dems started the war.

Trying to pull those people over is like trying to wrestle with a greased pig. No kind words will ever be enough to grab them. They're incredibly loyal to their side no matter what, and will deny ever supporting it the moment social pressure builds up too much. But interestingly, they also respect anger and vitriol against those they feel betrayed them. Republicans loved voting for Trump because he said he was against neocons and the Iraq War and all those people who voted for them. If Trump ever falls out of favor, those people who once supported him won't be begging for leniency. They'll put on a new hat and demand revenge against him and his supporters. They don't want a both aisles softy. They'll just pretend they were always against him.

[Jensson]

> That strategy in 2024 backfired and made Dems not care about the election

Are you saying democrats didn't vote for Kamala since Kamala didn't call Trump voters evil? What are you on about? I see no reason why you should call Trump voters evil.

As I said its fine to call Trump evil, but why call the voters evil? What purpose does that serve?

[jibal]

I'm not about to bite my tongue for this absurd cowardly fallacious reason.

[yongjik]

Everything Trump has done since he was re-elected made Democrats hate him more, and more publicly, and you know what, despite that Trump's ratings have steadily fallen.

If your thesis is true, you'd expect Trump's ratings to go up.

As far as I can see, partisan hatred doesn't matter, because pretty much everybody speaking and listening to such rhetorics have already made up their minds. The battle is fought in the middle, and these people don't care about latest Truth Social posts. They care about the price of gas.

Trump fucked with the one thing people will not forget about, because their livelihood depends on it. It's going to be... interesting.

[jibal]

That's a completely intellectually bankrupt argument that blames good people for the actions of bad people. It doesn't have a shred of fact or logic to support it.

[LeFantome]

One third of Americans voted Democrat.

One third voted Republican.

One third did not vote.

I hold the last group most responsible.

[shrubby]

One group voted for nicely speaking tax free zillionaires. Another one voted for hate speaking zillionaires.

Third one didn't want to vote for zillionaires.

Perhaps next time there'll be someone to vote not representing the zillionaire-class?

[PowerElectronix]

It's hard to blame it on people not voting for options that suck and do not represent their political stance.

[cowboylowrez]

Not me, trump should have at most received 1 to 2 percent in either primaries or the general election, even in 2016 we knew what sort of fellow he was, at least the folks who could read more than a paragraph in a sitting.

The primaries were the worst, at least the generals you get conservatives voting party lines, the primaries are where "conservatives" decided that trump was their guy. just go back and read up on republicans descriptions of trump before they had to get in line in the wake of the trump victories. I exclusively hold the trump voters in the primaries responsible. We're the sort of country of laws that traditionally says any loser can run for office, its our job as a society to keep at least a plausible set of standards for who we want in office. "Conservatives" who went trump either failed to do their due dilligence, or they are aligned with trumps value system which common decency prevents me from describing in any detail.

[ceejayoz]

Bless your heart, you're doing the cartoon.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/8/8/1786532/-Cartoon-Y...

Why are all the Democrats Fox News (and the actual President of the United States himself) does a "constant drum beat of disdain and hate towards" not doing the same thing? Why is this only a concern on one side?

[none2585]

It may even be Trump again! Wouldn't be surprised if we see some movement towards removing presidential term limits. They weren't always in place and they can be removed again.

[b0rtb0rt]

why is it that democrats always assume they are the correct side and that everyone else agrees with them?

[csa]

> It is a fact that the reputation of the USA has being damaged, perhaps not repairable for decades or more.

The MAGA base does not care about the international reputation of the US. They lean heavily towards isolationism (irrationally, imho).

[aaa_aaa]

Not one individual. You forgot the ones put the yoke.

[andy_ppp]

If you could design a perfect plan to destroy the United States, Donald Trump, probably through sheer buffoonish incompetence seems to be implementing it.

[SilverElfin]

I don’t think he’s incompetent. He’s actually quite good at extracting wealth for himself/family/donors/friends out of whatever the administration is doing.

Iran is a distraction from the Epstein files, and the fact that many from the Trump circle appear in it - Trump himself, some of his children, Elon Musk, Steve Bannon, Peter Thiel, etc.

The war with Iran is also a way to make a few more suspicious trades on the market swings, especially the ones following each speech or decision. It would be easy to time trades if you know what will happen because you’re deciding it.

The US may be destroyed but it’s because it’s just collateral damage to the billionaires and Epstein class. Not because they’re incompetent. We need to contain their wealth and power with totally new laws.

[throw310822]

You mistake for competence his greed and that of those who surround him. I don't think there was a plan to profit from the disaster; rather, they're so incompetent that they even lack the basic self-control to avoid publicly taking advantage of the mess they unwillingly caused, however bad and dangerous that might be.

[Jensson]

I imagine Trump wanted to do some fun new things when he is old and will soon die. Its not many who get to experience what it feels like to start a war and kill world leaders, and when you are gonna die soon anyway why not?

[sieste]

I think this is the correct lense. He's a malignant narcissist on his way out, with absolutely nobody to stop him.

I'm genuinely worried that he secretly wants to go down in history as the crazy guy who set the oil fields on fire and dropped a nuke on Tehran or something.

[throw310822]

Not sure what moves Trump- could be any of that or more. What we all know is that Netanyahu and Kushner found this and used it to get what they wanted. This is not Trump's war, he's not the initiator and he doesn't have goals of his own (though at times he might believe he does). It actually contradicts what he campaigned on for years.

[swarnie]

> 2 years and 9 months remain

You think.

Peaceful transfers of power are always tricky in younger democracies.

[Arubis]

My strong suspicion is that the current POTUS will leave the White House in a box. My hope is that this precedes the next election cycle.

[actionfromafar]

Do you think the ThielVance will leave peacefully?

[bebop]

They don’t have the cult of personality to hold on to power in the same way djt does.

[actionfromafar]

Who needs personality when you got your own stormtroopers with guns?

[MarsIronPI]

You need to stop the people with guns from killing you and your stormtroopers. That's what the Second Amendment is for.

[Jensson]

The standard dictatorial takeover of a democracy is to keep the elections and the presidency, but to add a supreme leader above the president, similar to what Iran or Russia or China is doing. So Trump would no longer be president, he would be supreme leader joining what the other world powers are doing.

[ceejayoz]

> add a supreme leader above the president, similar to what Iran or Russia or China is doing

This is trivially debunked.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_of_Russia

[OneMorePerson]

Honest question, which modern democracies (there's been a few different forms) besides the UK are older than the US?

The word younger is implying to me that US would be considered the youngest in a list of current democracies, which I wasn't aware of.

[KellyCriterion]

> take action to save the democratic

Im beting 1000 USD that Trump comes up with whatever story/issue/incident to "manipulate" all upcoming elections to his favour

[petre]

If the doesn't turn up as the first US president to actually be impeached. You've got other two who got assasinated. The right to bear arms mskes that sort of thing a bit easier than impeachment.

[ceejayoz]

Andrew Johnson was the first US President to be impeached.

Clinton too, then Trump twice.

[petre]

Didn't go through. None of them were removed from office.

[ceejayoz]

> None of them were removed from office.

Correct. But that's not because they weren't impeached.

Impeachment is part of the process; three presidents have been impeached, Trump twice. Then comes the trial, and conviction/acquittal.

[Cyph0n]

1. A non-trivial proportion of us voted for Trump.

2. Blatantly kidnapping and assassinating heads of state is the culmination of US foreign policy and not an anomaly. The machine is working as designed.

The only foreign policy blunders I would attribute to Trump are the completely unnecessary spats with Canada and Denmark/the EU, although neither blunder seems to have made a dent in the ass kissing.

[nozzlegear]

> Perhaps, I hope, Americans will take action to save the democratic norms and institutions that so many of them have claimed to cherish. Before he has dismantled and replaced too many to salvage. Or perhaps they have work tomorrow.

I'm going to take action by voting in November. Or are you suggesting revolution is more prudent, that I should put my life on the line right now because the global economy is a little fucky?

[vntok]

Interesting question. Do you believe that waiting is fine because the election will be fair in November?

[nozzlegear]

Yes? I've been a poll worker for every election since 2018, I have no reason to believe they won't be this time around. Do you have reason to believe that Trump isn't just full of hot air, bluster and bullshit like usual (TACO)?

[vntok]

Well yes, of course. For example this a month or so ago seems worrying: https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2026/02/14/t...

> US President Donald Trump, on Friday, February 13, threatened to try to bypass Congress and force new voting laws ahead of the November midterm elections, where his Republican Party fears losing control of the legislature. Trump said he would soon issue an executive order attempting to impose the rules if Congress does not pass a law requiring photo identification to vote and other nationwide reforms.

> "There will be Voter ID for the Midterm Elections, whether approved by Congress or not!" Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. "If we can't get it through Congress, there are Legal reasons why this SCAM is not permitted. I will be presenting them shortly, in the form of an Executive Order," he wrote.

[convolvatron]

that makes absolute sense. on one hand legally voting process is delegated to the states, and we can argue about to what degree congress might be able to impose federal standards. but an executive order has absolutely no bearing on the situation legally.

but if you believe, as many people claim to, than an executive order is actually a federal law, then if some blue state decides to ignore such an executive order, then you can claim that the election process was tainted, illegal, and illegitimate. maybe you can even round up all the ballots in order to perform an 'investigation'. maybe send federal officers to check IDs. all kinds of things.

[hackable_sand]

I think you are confused.

Yes, the mechanical process is hard to fuck up.

That is not the unfair part.

As long as I have been alive there has not been a fair election on US grounds.

[AnimalMuppet]

You're going to have to define what you mean by "a fair election on US grounds", because that statement sounds like utter BS.

[bathtub365]

The sooner regime change comes in the US, the better.