Well?

[millring]

Jul 9, 2024 15:11:04 GMT -5 majorminor said:

Jul 9, 2024 14:41:40 GMT -5 millring said:

"end game democracy"

Yeah, that's kinda why I still believe that 2020 was a "rescued" election.

The fear is over the top. The very party most guilty of comprising the degree to which we are a democracy are scared that the enemy will take away their appointed, insider hegemony .

Yabbut.....if you can rig the election why worry?

Nobody believes it was.

[millring]

If you truly believe Trump is Hitler reincarnate -- and they do -- and that our "democracy" is going to die with Trump -- and they do -- it would be morally reprehensible not to stop it if you had the power to do so.

[John B]

Jul 9, 2024 15:41:43 GMT -5 millring said:

If you truly believe Trump is Hitler reincarnate -- and they do -- and that our "democracy" is going to die with Trump -- and they do -- it would be morally reprehensible not to stop it if you had the power to do so.

I'm confused - "they" "our" and "you"

[howard lee]

Jul 9, 2024 16:36:47 GMT -5 John B said:

Jul 9, 2024 15:41:43 GMT -5 millring said:

If you truly believe Trump is Hitler reincarnate -- and they do -- and that our "democracy" is going to die with Trump -- and they do -- it would be morally reprehensible not to stop it if you had the power to do so.

I'm confused - "they" "our" and "you"

They are the select pronouns.

[millring]

Jul 9, 2024 16:36:47 GMT -5 John B said:

Jul 9, 2024 15:41:43 GMT -5 millring said:

If you truly believe Trump is Hitler reincarnate -- and they do -- and that our "democracy" is going to die with Trump -- and they do -- it would be morally reprehensible not to stop it if you had the power to do so.

I'm confused - "they" "our" and "you"

How so?

Are you saying that you're not hearing anyone say that electing Trump would be the end of democracy? Are you saying you haven't heard him compared to Hitler? Are you saying you haven't heard there's an immanent fascism around the corner if he is elected? Are you saying you haven't heard each and every one of those fears voiced by intelligent friends and world leaders alike?

Well, if all those people actually believe that, and they're not using the usual political hyperbole, then it would be morally irresponsible for them to not fix the election if they had the know how to do so. And it doesn't even require much if any conspiracy to do so.

[millring]

Jul 9, 2024 16:48:18 GMT -5 howard lee said:

Jul 9, 2024 16:36:47 GMT -5 John B said:

I'm confused - "they" "our" and "you"

They are the select pronouns.

They're what?

[epaul]

If you truly believe Trump is Hitler reincarnate -- and they do -- and that our "democracy" is going to die with Trump -- and they do -- it would be morally reprehensible not to stop it if you had the power to do so.

[I'm assuming the above refers Millring's belief that certain people in power "re-purposed" the results of the 2020 election in order to keep Trump from being re-elected]


You've trotted this argument out before, but it is specious.

There was no talk of "Trump ending Democracy" until Trump actually tried subvert our Democracy in his attempts to overturn the 2020 election complete with his ongoing attempts to discredit and malign every single aspect of our electoral system: our local election workers and judges; our elected state officials from both parties who oversee and certify our elections; and the entirety of our country's judicial system which, per our Constitution, is supposed to be the final word... all this uncaring damage just to service his pathological id.

Prior to Trump's attempts to overturn the 2020 election which he had just lost, the criticism of Trump was not concerned with his attempt to destroy our democracy as his attempts to overturn an election he had just lost had not yet occurred. Nope. The criticism of Trump during the 2016 and the 2020 campaigns revolved around concerns with his character, incompetence, dishonesty, ethics, and his complete lack of focus, diligence, and even interest in the parts of the job that actually required thought and preparation... in short, work.

[howard lee]

Jul 9, 2024 16:50:09 GMT -5 millring said:

Jul 9, 2024 16:48:18 GMT -5 howard lee said:

They are the select pronouns.

They're what?

Oh. Sorry.

pronouns : any of a small set of words (such as I, she, he, you, it, we, or they) in a language that are used as substitutes for nouns or noun phrases and whose referents are named or understood in the context

www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pronoun

[millring]

Jul 9, 2024 16:59:04 GMT -5 epaul said:

You've trotted this argument out before, but it is specious.

There was no talk of "Trump ending Democracy" until Trump actually tried subvert our Democracy in his attempts to overturn the 2020 election

Yes there was. Yes, it's at a new fever pitch, but it's always been there.

Photos of Mussolini were everywhere. The idea that he promoted fascism was everywhere.

[millring]

Jul 9, 2024 17:02:12 GMT -5 howard lee said:

Jul 9, 2024 16:50:09 GMT -5 millring said:

They're what?

Oh. Sorry.

pronouns : any of a small set of words (such as I, she, he, you, it, we, or they) in a language that are used as substitutes for nouns or noun phrases and whose referents are named or understood in the context

www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pronoun

Thanks.

[Cornflake]

"Well, if all those people actually believe that, and they're not using the usual political hyperbole, then it would be morally irresponsible for them to not fix the election if they had the know how to do so. And it doesn't even require much if any conspiracy to do so."

I disagree with pretty much every link in that chain. I certainly don't believe that Trump is Hitler reincarnated, nor do I know anyone who does. I do have concerns that democracy might not survive a second Trump term; but I don't "believe" that. It's a possibility that concerns me. I think Trump has displayed some characteristics that could fairly be called fascist. That's not the same thing as thinking that fascism is imminent.

I'm worried about the prospect of a second Trump term, but I don't think it's morally irresponsible not fix the election. I think it would be immoral to do so. It would also be enormously difficult. Unless some states are much sloppier about elections than I suspect, it would be hard to fix the outcome in even one state, much less a sufficient number of states to change the result in the electoral college. It would take a complicated conspiracy with a lot of players. The chances of such a conspiracy avoiding detection are remote. IMO.

[aquaduct]

Jul 9, 2024 17:45:38 GMT -5 Cornflake said:

"Well, if all those people actually believe that, and they're not using the usual political hyperbole, then it would be morally irresponsible for them to not fix the election if they had the know how to do so. And it doesn't even require much if any conspiracy to do so."

I disagree with pretty much every link in that chain. I certainly don't believe that Trump is Hitler reincarnated, nor do I know anyone who does. I do have concerns that democracy might not survive a second Trump term; but I don't "believe" that. It's a possibility that concerns me. I think Trump has displayed some characteristics that could fairly be called fascist. That's not the same thing as thinking that fascism is imminent.

I'm worried about the prospect of a second Trump term, but I don't think it's morally irresponsible not fix the election. I think it would be immoral to do so. It would also be enormously difficult. Unless some states are much sloppier about elections than I suspect, it would be hard to fix the outcome in even one state, much less a sufficient number of states to change the result in the electoral college. It would take a complicated conspiracy with a lot of players. The chances of such a conspiracy avoiding detection are remote. IMO.

It only took 6 voting districts last time.

[epaul]

Pretty sharp people to know which six to put the fix to and that those six would be enough. Couldn't have been Democrats. Must have been those Chinese dwarves Trump told us were hiding in the voting machines. Sneaky little buggers.

[John B]

Jul 9, 2024 17:02:12 GMT -5 howard lee said:

Jul 9, 2024 16:50:09 GMT -5 millring said:

They're what?

Oh. Sorry.

pronouns : any of a small set of words (such as I, she, he, you, it, we, or they) in a language that are used as substitutes for nouns or noun phrases and whose referents are named or understood in the context

www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pronoun

I know how write, Howard. I do it often.

[billhammond]

Jul 9, 2024 18:33:20 GMT -5 John B said:

I know how <to> write, Howard. I do it often.

[John B]

Jul 9, 2024 18:39:44 GMT -5 billhammond said:

Jul 9, 2024 18:33:20 GMT -5 John B said:

I know how <to> write, Howard. I do it often.

Congratulations on being the first editor to catch my joke (seriously)! I thought it would be funny to leave out word. (again! I slay myself)

[billhammond]

Jul 9, 2024 19:21:18 GMT -5 John B said:

Jul 9, 2024 18:39:44 GMT -5 billhammond said:

Congratulations on being the first editor to catch my joke (seriously)! I thought it would be funny to leave out word. (again! I slay myself)

Oh, shit.

[Russell Letson]

Even if it's not a precise fit for the programs, attitudes, tactics, strategies, and intentions of many of the people who are backing Trump in this election cycle, "fascist" is a useful descriptor for their version of an authoritarian, single-party, oligarchic system of control. And the machineries they plan--or have already started--to enable (seeding the courts with ideological allies, right up to the top level; gerrymandering legislative supermajorities; converting civil-service structures into centrally-controlled servants of the party in power) have already been deployed by authoritarian regimes in eastern Europe, Hungary in particular.

The 2025 Project document is a smarmy, faux-high-minded blueprint for social control disguised as a restoration of individual freedoms threatened by "woke revolutionaries" (19). The language of the right-wing propaganda machine is all over it--"the woke culture warriors who have infiltrated every last institution in America"; "popular sovereignty"; repeated references to rights being "God-given"; "the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology and sexualization of children" is "pornography" and (watch how the pea is shifted) those "Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders." And those are just from a few pages of the Foreword. Elsewhere, experts and elites are (inevitably) enclosed in scare quotes.

There is plenty of reporting, analysis, and commentary on this document, and Trump's denial of it being his blueprint strikes me as his being shocked, shocked I tell you that the Heritage Foundation should offer such ideas. I don't know whether I have the energy to go over the entire 887 pages, but the samples I've taken strike me as concentrated essense of right-wing elitist expertise devoted to clearing the field for a corporatist state bolsterd by big doses of bigotry. Or, to use a convenient descriptor, fascism, American style. (See also Sinclair Lewis, It Can't Happen Here.)

[aquaduct]

Jul 9, 2024 19:24:48 GMT -5 Russell Letson said:

Even if it's not a precise fit for the programs, attitudes, tactics, strategies, and intentions of many of the people who are backing Trump in this election cycle, "fascist" is a useful descriptor for their version of an authoritarian, single-party, oligarchic system of control. And the machineries they plan--or have already started--to enable (seeding the courts with ideological allies, right up to the top level; gerrymandering legislative supermajorities; converting civil-service structures into centrally-controlled servants of the party in power) have already been deployed by authoritarian regimes in eastern Europe, Hungary in particular.

The 2025 Project document is a smarmy, faux-high-minded blueprint for social control disguised as a restoration of individual freedoms threatened by "woke revolutionaries" (19). The language of the right-wing propaganda machine is all over it--"the woke culture warriors who have infiltrated every last institution in America"; "popular sovereignty"; repeated references to rights being "God-given"; "the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology and sexualization of children" is "pornography" and (watch how the pea is shifted) those "Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders." And those are just from a few pages of the Foreword. Elsewhere, experts and elites are (inevitably) enclosed in scare quotes.

There is plenty of reporting, analysis, and commentary on this document, and Trump's denial of it being his blueprint strikes me as his being shocked, shocked I tell you that the Heritage Foundation should offer such ideas. I don't know whether I have the energy to go over the entire 887 pages, but the samples I've taken strike me as concentrated essense of right-wing elitist expertise devoted to clearing the field for a corporatist state bolsterd by big doses of bigotry. Or, to use a convenient descriptor, fascism, American style. (See also Sinclair Lewis, It Can't Happen Here.)

That's fairly funny from one who appears sympathetic to the political crew who engineered Chevron v. NRDC and Massachusetts v. EPA in the last 40 years leading to an unlegislated ban on internal combustion engines.

Sounds to me that that's much more indicative of fascist leanings than, "gee, Trump says mean things and makes me cry".

[Russell Letson]

Peter, if you're going to peer into my heart and read my sympathies, clean your specs.