Rubio compares the audaciousness of American colonists rebelling against the British empire and creating the world’s first modern democracy, and the US landing on the moon…to UFC creating a successful fighting company.
Rubio knows this is nonsense. He is lying for Trump. Rubio used to be a respectful Senator, now he drinks Trump’s fluids from both sides every day on national television.
Don’t get me wrong, UFC is cool and I respect the sport and business that they built, but the audacity of creating the world’s first modern democracy, rebelling against the greatest empire on Earth, and landing on the moon…are incomparable to creating a cool sports fighting business.
When people said false things about Obama or had exaggerated fears, John McCain corrected the falsity and tamped down the fears. Donald Trump on the other hand, spreads falsehoods and stokes unbased fears.
Unbased fears and falsehoods are a natural part of society. Responsible leaders tend to correct falsehoods and tamp down unbased fears. Irresponsible leaders stoke them.
Obama was handed the worst economic circumstances in a long time, and the other party in a two-party system gathered and explicitly decided to stand against him on everything–a full court press.
Obama deeply wanted bi-partisan healthcare reform, but Republicans refused to play ball. Maybe if some of them did, we could have got a better reform.
Obama made some basic comments about an older black man being arrested while trying to get into his own home, and the right exploded, calling Obama racist and saying he had a problem with white people.
Gerrymandering has existed for a long time. It is an act of disenfranchisement where politicians choose their voters rather than voters choosing their representatives. A few states created independent commissions to have neutrally drawn maps, but many draw them to maximize one party’s success, biasing elections against what people actually voted for.
Trump escalated gerrymandering by pushing Republicans in states they control to gerrymander shortly before an election, rather than after a census brings new data. This is Trump trying to win the midterm elections by way of changing lines on maps rather than by convincing people to vote for his party. Democrats retaliated by also gerrymandering before the mid-terms. For the midterms, Republicans are predicted to net 7 to 10 extra seats due to changing the maps, rather than convincing voters to vote for them.
Proportional representation may be a better way to elect representatives.
Democrats have a difficult media arena because Republicans have a synergistic bullshit ecosystem that globs onto the same messages and is naturally integrated from biased news to biased think tanks to biased pundits and influencers. It even ropes in people whose content isn’t focused on politics, but they fall for the bullshit, and then become bullshit spreaders themselves, like Joe Rogan.
People say don’t clickbait, but they only click the clickbait, so they are voting with their clicks.
“Economics creates the conditions — insecurity, a sense of decline, distrust of elites. But immigration (framed as cultural threat, not just economic competition) is what converts that grievance into a right-wing populist vote. The slogan “It’s the economy, stupid” famously explained Bill Clinton’s 1992 win. For right-wing populism, researchers are now saying almost the opposite: it’s the culture, not just the economy.”
American Olympians were asked what they thought of Trump’s policies. They said they didn’t agree with a lot of what’s going on but they are still here to compete for their friends and family. Trump and some Republicans attacked them viciously.
Respected general arrested by Chinese President Xi may have written a letter describing the problems with Xi’s rule and warning of where Xi is taking the country. He may have not actually written this letter.