US Elections 2020

Started by dsanchez, August 29, 2020, 00:34:10

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SueC

From one of the Crikey team:

QuoteHow could 71 million Americans vote for a bozo? Here's what you need to understand...

Yes nearly 71 million Americans voted for the vulgar conman, but Joe Biden nevertheless handed him an outstanding electoral rebuke.

For many Australians, last week's US election felt personal. We're steeped in American culture. We think we understand the place.

How then could nearly 71 million Americans have voted for a man who doesn't believe in democracy? How could it have been so close?

Let me comfort you.

Joe Biden's election was a resounding rejection of Trumpism. In fact this election was not very close as American elections go. Nate Silver, of FiveThirtyEight, projects Biden's winning margin in the popular vote will be north of four percentage points and possibly as high as six. Since 1996 only Barack Obama's 2008 win has been larger.

Biden is only the fourth challenger since World War II to unseat a one-term president. Democrats also flipped two Republican strong-hold states — Georgia and Arizona — and made Texas competitive. These changes would have been unthinkable two decades ago. As electoral rebukes go, it doesn't get much bigger.

Yes, Donald Trump's behaviour has been so monstrous, so destructive of democratic norms and institutions that it seems unthinkable any Americans would have voted for him, let alone 71 million. But Americans, especially Republican Americans, are more different from Australians than you think.

In 2002 I was part of an Australian 60 Minutes team that interviewed Trump — then a failing casino-owner and buffoonish fixture on the social pages — in his offices in Trump Tower, New York. We were reporting on New York's recovery from the 9/11 attacks six months earlier. Trump was bankrupt and eager for attention. The hair was an architectural marvel, but the man was unremarkable — until the camera turned on. Then we got the show, the charismatic conman who would go on to dupe millions.

I mused that Trump exemplified the difference between Americans and Australians. He was the personification of "Big Time Barry", the term my father uses for people who have more regard for themselves than their achievements merit.

Sceptical by nature, Australians are suspicious of such braggadocio. Trump would have been laughed out of the office of every prospective lender in Australia. But in America he was not only credible, he thrived. His poor business record didn't stop large banks lending him millions. And then — astounding those who knew the truth — he became the face of corporate America for 12 million viewers of The Apprentice.

Americans are not sceptical. They believe in Hollywood stories. They are not disposed to be suspicious of a character like Trump.

Republican voters are particularly vulnerable to his con. For years, evangelical preachers in red states have taught congregants wealth equals morality. Their gospel of prosperity has convinced voters that conspicuous riches, like those of Trump, are God's reward for creating wealth and jobs.

Republican voters also live in information ecosystems that resemble those of an authoritarian state. Right-wing media disinformation campaigns have exploited the deep fear of communism instilled in Americans during the Cold War. Many Trump supporters fully believe Biden will turn America into a socialist state. Any media that says otherwise is seen as part of the conspiracy.

From an Australian lens, Republican leaders have always had repugnant policies. And yet about half the American electorate always votes for them (43% of Americans did not think Nixon should be removed from office after the Watergate scandal).

Trump had some way to go before he caused as much destruction to lives and personal liberties as the last Republican president, George W Bush. Bush, a C student, was deluded by neocons Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld that toppling Saddam Hussein would install a democracy that would "send forth the news, from Damascus to Teheran, that freedom can be the future of every nation".

That ludicrous notion underpinned the US-led Iraq invasion, giving birth to Islamic State and the death and displacement of millions of people across Iraq and Syria. More than a million returned servicemen and women from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan struggled with physical and mental health injuries that became burdens on families and communities.

The Bush administration forced all men in the US from Muslim countries — including some of my journalist friends — to register with authorities. The unlucky ones were detained without charge or recourse. At least 136 Muslim men were snatched and transferred by "extraordinary rendition" to secret black sites where they were tortured out of reach of international law.

A vast state surveillance was secretly established to monitor Americans. And Bush's parting gift to incoming president Obama in 2008 was an economic meltdown that wiped out the wealth of large swathes of Americans and sparked a global financial crisis.

Every Republican leader in three decades has opposed badly needed reforms that would provide health insurance for all Americans. They routinely lower taxes to corporations and the rich while cutting the social welfare net and defending obscenely low federal minimum wages (currently $7.25 an hour). Republicans spend 15% of the government budget on the military, deny climate change and oppose reforms to address entrenched racial and gender inequities.

And yet every time, roughly half of Americans vote for them.

With his vulgarity and disregard for democracy, Trump offended our sense of our selves. But Americans are different. The backlash against Trump represented by Biden's win last week is as good as it gets.

Prue Clarke is an Australian journalist who has lived in the US for most of the past 20 years.

from https://www.crikey.com.au/2020/11/11/us-election-repudiation-of-trumpism/

Original article at that site is fully referenced, with hyperlinks to sources.

...and a reader reply that does have a point:

QuoteI love your optimism, and wish I could share in it, but Australians are almost identical to the US, just following a few steps behind. Deeply suspicious of collectivism in any form, especially taxing those who should pay, enamoured of law and order politics, fond of marching off to war for spurious reasons, and willing to vote for vacuous leaders, the depth of whose policies is 'stop the boats' and 'have a go to get a go'.

We do have Medicare for all in Australia, and it's a good system, and I can't for the life of me understand why so many Americans are opposed to having such a system - it's fair and good value for the money we put into it - unlike private healthcare, which is all about making a shareholder profit, and therefore not good value for money.  Of course, our version of the Republicans, the Liberal/National COALition, want to dismantle Medicare, public education, our independent broadcaster of news and superb programmes on all sorts of relevant topics (the ABC), public transport, etc, and is constantly de-funding these things when they get into power.  They also share much with the Republicans in their attitudes to entrenched racism, misogyny, women's reproductive rights, environmental issues, poverty and homelessness.  Sadly, both sides of the Australian political duopoly want to continue to flog off public utilities like water, electricity, telecommunications and the postal service for privatisation, leading over the past 30+ years to increased consumer costs (to prop up the shareholders and to pay out millions in executive bonuses on top of already obscene executive salaries), poorer levels of service and little community say in how our utilities are run - and both sides continue to make laws that sign over increasing amounts of power to corporations and the big end of town, while stripping it from family businesses and ordinary citizens.

While in Australia we do have Trump supporters, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, lots of casual and not so casual bigots, men who think they should be free to rape women whenever they like and this should not be a crime but a male privilege, etc, the proportion of these loonies seems to be significantly smaller than in the US.  When some of them tried to pull stunts like "making me wear a mask is an infringement of my freedom" the vast majority of Australians felt that this was an imported American "value" which equates freedom with being able to do whatever the hell you want no matter whom you hurt or disadvantage in the process - a definition most Australians thankfully still reject.  Our "Bunnings Karen" (apologies to people named Karen!) was widely ridiculed, rather than being held up as some kind of national hero, when during a community outbreak, she threw a big "wobbly" over being asked to wear a mask in a hardware store, and started bullying and filming the store attendants while making loud and ridiculous declarations about how she was a free woman and was going to personally sue the staff.
SueC is time travelling

SueC

This was written over 30 years ago but never stopped being relevant, and makes a perfect anthem for the 2020 US election and its aftermath... because to get rid of rotten things on the outside, you also have to get rid of them on the inside and that's an ongoing attitude, not a one-off event...

SueC is time travelling

dsanchez

LOL
2023.11.22 Lima
2023.11.27 Montevideo

SueC

SueC is time travelling

MeltingMan

En cette nation [Russie] qui n'a pas eu de théoriciens et de démagogues,
les pires ferments de destruction ont apparu. (J. Péladan)

SueC

...and this was written by a Republican, mind you:

https://thebulwark.com/they-are-what-they-say-they-hate/

Also:

QuoteFinally, Biden reportedly told advisers this week that he doesn't want his presidency consumed by investigations into Trump's corruption. "Which is big of him," said Kimmel, "but what about what I want? I at least want a mugshot out of this. I want to see Trump in a jumpsuit that matches his skin."

...Meanwhile, in Washington, "the president is slowly, agonizingly going through the five stages of narcissistic grief: denial, denial, denial, denial, denial and denial. I know that's six, but Rudy [Giuliani] is demanding a recount."

from https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2020/nov/18/jimmy-kimmel-trump-late-night-tv

Finally, just for fun:

QuoteA couple of centuries and 45 presidents later, Old King Trump sits barricaded in the White House doing nothing much. His face puckered into that trademark rosebud of petulance. Barking at underlings. Pretending HE won because a lot of Democrat votes were from dead people and very illegal. His sulky-toddler folded arms, like that time he refused to say a single kind word when fellow Republican and war hero John McCain died. There's something almost majestic about Trump's utter contempt for the office of president.

Karl Marx – apparently the evil genius behind peaceful protest and Medicare – said that historical entities appear twice, "first as tragedy, then as farce". That feels about right.

from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/17/donald-trump-king-george-iii-sequel
SueC is time travelling

MeltingMan

Next try ... maybe with a little more luck. 😬

En cette nation [Russie] qui n'a pas eu de théoriciens et de démagogues,
les pires ferments de destruction ont apparu. (J. Péladan)

SueC

SueC is time travelling

dsanchez

2023.11.22 Lima
2023.11.27 Montevideo

MeltingMan

Mr. Aschen...no, it's Rudy. 😉

En cette nation [Russie] qui n'a pas eu de théoriciens et de démagogues,
les pires ferments de destruction ont apparu. (J. Péladan)

SueC

Microcosm, macrocosm...

QuoteFor years, Trump has managed to isolate his most fervent followers from reality, creating a parallel Maga world where Covid-19 is little more than a hoax, mail-in ballots don't count (unless they do) and behind every pizza place lurks a pedophile ring. And like many coercive partners, Trump refuses to let go.

Like many, Khan's immediate reaction on election night was one of suspicion and worry. She wrote that the "most dangerous time in a violent relationship is when you leave". She's still concerned that Trump's violent rhetoric is escalating rather than declining. "As someone that works daily with survivors of domestic violence and other forms of gender-based violence, I know that the risk of violence is often highest during the period of separation. People who cause harm will use anything available to them from coercive threats, lies or pleading to force the partner to stay," she says.

from https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/25/trump-trauma-experts-abusive-relationship

Also, a nice opinion piece here:  https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/24/bernie-sanders-working-class-win-back-from-donald-trump
SueC is time travelling

word_on_a_wing

I'm feeling thankful to all the people on Twitter who have made #DiaperDon go viral.

It seemed to start here with this photo
Twitter- Donny at the kids table

And then it spiralled in beautiful ways (by searching for #DiaperDon one could be entertained for hours. Plus Donny himself tweeted to oppose the trending tweet (ie he know #DiaperDon is trending) which makes it even more hilarious, and even more people getting on board 😂
I particularly liked seeing this video again (which has been around for several months)...
Twitter - #DiaperDon
"Where the flesh meets the spirit world,
Where the traffic is thin..."

MeltingMan

En cette nation [Russie] qui n'a pas eu de théoriciens et de démagogues,
les pires ferments de destruction ont apparu. (J. Péladan)

Ulrich

Oh my, what can I say but...
The holy city breathed like a dying man...

SueC

SueC is time travelling