Summary

The Department of Transportation (DOT) has issued a memo prioritizing federal funding for communities with marriage and birth rates above the national average.

The directive, which applies to grants, loans, and contracts, also prioritizes projects benefiting families with young children.

A congressional aide criticized the policy, saying, “Considering fertility rates when prioritizing federal grants? We obviously have no idea what the full impact of that will be… It’s absolutely creepy. It’s a little ‘Chinese government.’”

The memo also blocks mask mandates and requires compliance with immigration enforcement.

  • Noedel@lemmy.world
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    19 hours ago

    This kind of sounds like government officials coming up with a more trump proof way of saying “build infrastructure in areas with predicted growth”.

  • Blackmist@feddit.uk
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    Wait until conservatives find out that communities with high birth rates are not white.

    • Critical_Thinker@lemm.ee
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      The ones actually running the show don’t actually care what skin color they have so long as they are able to work them hard with minimal labor protections and rock bottom wages.

      If you look around at the news articles out there… nobody is talking about farmhands getting picked up by ICE. It seems to be exclusively people in major cities. Maybe someone has seen some articles talking about ICE arrests at places of work, but it seems like this time the goal is to nab them at church, the grocery store or when they are bringing their kids to and from school.

  • inclementimmigrant@lemmy.world
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    21 hours ago

    “Considering fertility rates when prioritizing federal grants? We obviously have no idea what the full impact of that will be,” said this aide. “It’s absolutely creepy. It’s a little ‘Chinese government.’ [The Trump administration] would hate that comparison, but I don’t know where else I’ve seen a policy of ‘we need to incentivize baby-making.’”

    Can’t disagree there, it’s very CCP like and creepy.

  • Victor@lemmy.world
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    Me and my wife have been watching Handmaid’s Tale over the years and we’ve been saying for some years now that America is way closer than what’s comfortable to actually becoming that society. It’s actually unreal to see it unfold.

  • boonhet@lemm.ee
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    Also

    Wouldn’t that just reward areas where the babies have already been made? It’s not going to incentivize babymaking. Like what are they imagining? “Hey babe, let’s make 5 more of them, we’ll get better roads”?

    • GlendatheGayWitch@lemmy.world
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      There’s a movement in the American churches where members are told to fill their quiver, AKA have a lot of kids. I wouldn’t be surprised if an order like this came from the christian nationalists with project 2025. They are wanting to build up their own communities and spurn the areas that they aren’t populating.

      Edit: those kind of people also say that allowing donations to churches to be tax deductible is god’s way of rewarding them for tithing. They want the government to reward them for their beliefs.

    • Rekorse@sh.itjust.works
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      22 hours ago

      When people want tp have kids they usually will consider what is a good area for the next 20 years or so to raise a kid. Technically the messaging is correct but with trump its always whether he’s being honest or not.

      • boonhet@lemm.ee
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        22 hours ago

        Ah, so they’d have to move to where there are a lot of kids already, in order to have the funding benefits actually do anything by the time they need to start driving their kids to school.

        On the other hand, in an area with a lot of kids, you’d have more traffic jams so it’s still kinda counter productive IMO.

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          19 hours ago

          Generally people who are having kids want to be in areas with lots of other kids. I suppose it depends though how much a given family wants to use public services vs home schooling. Ideally you’d want walkable areas since cars dont like kids. Again it could be a good idea but coming from trump I guess we will have to wait and see what happens.

          • boonhet@lemm.ee
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            12 hours ago

            Ah I figured more funding for areas with more kids would mean more lanes for cars, so less walkability. This being the US we’re talking about

  • badelf@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    It’s not a surprise. The oligarchs are going to need more slaves after they send the army out to kill us.

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    2 days ago

    Creatives: produces warnings

    Conservatives: Hey check out this cool instruction manual I found!

    • lka1988@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      At long last, we have created the Torment Nexus from the classic sci-fi novel, Don’t Create The Torment Nexus

  • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Remember how all the protest voters told us how Harris would have been the exact same? Something about the DNC not offering a candidate that would be any better than trump?

    Yeah… Don’t believe them when they try to tell you that they didn’t go out of their way to help make this happen.

    • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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      Yep. Quite a few of them have gone quiet, I’ve noticed. Not one of them has apologized for their cloying sanctimony before the election, no matter how wrong it was.

      • WhatYouNeed@lemmy.world
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        They have gone quiet because the project is now wound down. Dufus is in the white house, so they have been moved to a new task.

        • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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          Yep. Well, most of them. Some seem to still be sticking with, and even doubling down, on the stupid and immoral position, although they frame it as being morally superior to everyone else. 🤣

          • dx1@lemmy.world
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            2 days ago

            You guys sound like the bots to me. Defending the genocidal politicians and the system that keeps them in power. That stain will never wash off, no matter what shit you try to sling at everyone else. Moral compromise like yours is why this world is broken.

              • dx1@lemmy.world
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                No, the fact that we had an election and the sum of you voted for a fascist and another fascist is why the country is disintegrating. See, when you make immoral choices, bad things happen as a result, that’s why the choices are immoral. You love to pretend that this logic only applies to third party voters, while ~140M of you vote for literal monsters and accept ZERO culpability. For some reason you’re all even more focused on third party voters than the literal Trump voters, despite them having 25-50x as much influence on the election.

              • dx1@lemmy.world
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                You have no idea what my situation is, and it’s irrelevant.

            • confusedbytheBasics@lemmy.world
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              2 days ago

              Palestinian leaders begged US citizens to vote for Kamala Harris. Sometimes the lesser of two evils is the correct choice.

              • dx1@lemmy.world
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                The consequence of your moral compromises is that the world is broken. Did you read my very short message where I made a specific point to say that?

                • HalfSalesman@lemm.ee
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                  No its not. That doesn’t even make any sense. Moral compromise has been a constant of human civilization.

            • Sanctus@lemmy.world
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              Look around you. The oligarchs are feasting on my country right now. Palestine is fucked as Beni snuggles up tightly in Trump’s arm. The Chancellor has been given full access to our Treasury. The only high ground that will remain is the wall mound we build around our villages to repelled incoming invaders.

              • dx1@lemmy.world
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                Biden introduced the “oligarchy” word again and now you’re all using it. Like the actual oligarchy wasn’t running this country under Biden. Like Biden didn’t just send, what, 40 billion dollars of arms to a genocide. Like Congress, who between them and the President completely control the Treasury (not just the information, mind you, but the FUNDS) weren’t completely on board with all of that. Like the federal government isn’t a frigging money laundering operation that hemmorhages 800B/yr into the black pit of military spending.

                You think I don’t see what’s happening? You think there’s been some huge shift because Trump comes into office and starts breaking everything like a gorilla? That’s because you’re getting led around by the nose instead of following through diligently on everything that’s happening. The same U.S. imperial policies are continuing uninterrupted. The “Israel” policy is proof incarnate of that. You’re focused on trying to demonstrate 1% of difference between “Israel” policy between Trump and Biden, completely ignoring the 99% of similarity which absolutely begs the question, why the fuck are the openly fascist party and the so-called “opposition” completely in agreement that they SHOULD support a genocide. None of you seem to have a coherent answer for that question! Or the ten thousand others like it that don’t make it onto CNN or MSNBC or even Reuters or AP News. Because you don’t analyze the economy, you don’t analyze the federal budget, you don’t look at the revolving door with all the federal agencies and Wall Street and military contractors and oil interests and so on - all you focus on is attention-grabbing headlines that make you completely miss the big picture. You don’t understand that the empire even exists. You don’t understand that they’re meddling with every single country on Earth to impose an economic superstructure. That’s the problem with you people. It’s never slow, careful analysis, it’s REACT, REACT, REACT. You’re armchair analysts - you react to headlines and you repeat the same theories you heard from everyone else. You’re not educated. You’re brainwashed. You’re the automatons running around the imperial core, panicking every time the TV tells you to - and worst of all, never concerned with how you affect the rest of the world, only selfishly with your own wellbeing. That’s how you move so effortlessly from “there’s not a genocide happening” to “so what if there’s a genocide happening, the genocide would be even worse under Trump.” Somehow the lightbulb never even went off in your head, “why the fuck are our politicians arming a genocide.”

                • Sanctus@lemmy.world
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                  I’ve been using Oligarchy since about 2009. I’ve been screaming at the top of my lungs since I fucken could that shit like Citizens United would lead to this and here we are. I’m not a fucken reactionary, I am exactly where I have been the last 15 fucken years. Biden didnt do any of this shit except uphold the status quo. This has been building for far longer than you or I have been alive. This is the fruition, the plan of Tzeentchian proportions coming to its fulcrum. And soon we will be nothing more than slaves if Disney State, or McDonald’s. You dont have to believe me. Look at our newly enshrined Chancellor raiding the Treasury. Be upset, good. Its how you should feel. But point that shit at the people fucking us up, not me. You dont even know who you are talking at cause my stance on the recent election was always you vote for the genocides or bring the genocide home, too. Thats the shit we were faced with. Shit and more shit because our government wanted to lick corporate asshole for half a century.

      • Rhoeri@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        I sincerely hope that each and every one of them is at least capable of feeling guilt. Because I so badly want them to suffer the guilt of having helped caused this. I don’t even care anymore that they refuse to admit it. They know it, I know it- them admitting it doesn’t make it better.

        Knowing they feel the full weight of guilt pressing on them for being partially responsible for everything that will happen as a result of their ignorance?

        Yeah… That does make it a little better.

        • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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          The trolls, etc., on places like Lemmy? I doubt many of them were even genuine in this kind of sentiment - I’m sure some were even foreign actors working to stir up division everywhere, most especially on the left. And if they really hold this position, I have no idea.

          It’s the people I know IRL that are the ones I’d like to see wake the fuck up. And apologize for their useless bullshit and their tiresome lectures about gEnOcIdE and “bothsides” and just let it all burn down so we can rebuild America in some wholesome perfect way kind of dorm room talk. Yes, American foreign policy is shit and has been for decades before I was even fucking born, and yes, Democrats are often complicit in this. Gaza is hardly anything new, as shocking as it is. Yes, the Democrats are not offering up a perfect pretty pony for them on every single issue.

          But now we are going to be blasted with fucking sewage for the next four years, with actual harm coming to at-risk people (which is going to be nearly everyone if it gets bad enough) HERE and foreign policy is going to be much worse, and we can point at people like this and thank them for their part in making it happen.

          • Quadhammer@lemmy.world
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            Muks had/has an actual team for disinformation for x just like im sure many other companies/countries do. Welcome to a post truth society where lies make money and the division is an added bonus.

        • dx1@lemmy.world
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          Because I so badly want them to suffer the guilt

          The fact that you’re focused on attacking leftists trying to make a better world instead of the literal fascists shows how wicked you really are. The fact that you show joy in the suffering of others, no less.

          • HalfSalesman@lemm.ee
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            “trying to make a better world”

            What the fuck are you talking about how is Trump winning enabling us to make a better world? Its done the fucking opposite. Are you actually this delusional?

              • HalfSalesman@lemm.ee
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                Yes you do. You support him via advocating for a completely ass backwards promotion of third party voting.

                If a third party is to be even remotely viable in FPTP, you don’t fucking start with the presidency.

                You can’t magically drum up sufficient support for a candidate to win the fucking presidency with zero/near zero seats in congress or the senate.

                • dx1@lemmy.world
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                  “In Congress or the Senate”? Congress INCLUDES the Senate. Congress is the combination of the House and the Senate.

                  Yes you do. You support him via advocating for a completely ass backwards promotion of third party voting.

                  This is the most fucking backwards logic I’ve ever seen. I talk about “leftists want to make a better world” by using a completely different approach than voting for fascists. You frame the false choice of “anyone but fascists is impossible” again. And then by your logic, not supporting fascists is equal to supporting fascists, because “it’s like voting for fascist B, because either fascist A or B has to win!” THIS LOGIC IS NOT SOUND.

                  If you can’t actually add something that’s not completely fucking insane to the conversation, then DO. NOT. REPLY.

      • Red Army Dog Cooper@lemmy.ml
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        Still here, not going to appologize, I stand by my statement, both of them are facist, and the only two difrences between them where trajectory into utter decay, and retoric. Both of them make libs sanctamonious and tell me that I cannot call a spade a spade because the spade is actualy a hoe (it is very much a spade).

        I never said they where congurent, or exactly the same, I said they where in the long run equivelent, and I stand by that statment. I said that Harris did nothing to earn my vote, and I stand by that, I said that running on “I am slightly less bad than the other guy and because there are only 2 parties that means you have to chose me” is not a sound or acceptable electoral stratagy, and I once agian stand by that. I said that her winding down her “they are wierd” and “Its neighborly not to hord wealth and be a rich ghool” tactics, that where working, and where austensably the reasons she chose Walz as her running mate because her brother in law, an Uber Exec did not like it was moronic and I stand by it.

        Why have I decided not to keep posting about this, because your lot has stopped screaming that I have to cast a vote to someone that if I did I would not be able to sleep at night because I made an afermitive choice to suport them, because i see no significant disagreement between your view that “trump is a facist and the US is NOW facist” and mine “Wow trump as expected really plunged at a steep slope, he took some of the plausable denyability out before I was expecting, but it does not change that the Previously Facist US that is still Facist is moving down the Facism railway” so there is no god damn reason for me to post about it all the time

        And before you ask, yes I know there are lives at stake and live are being torn apart, I am aware and not unsympethetic, no I do not think that it would have accelerated this fast with Harris, no I am not an accelerationis, no I did not “want” trump, yes if only 2 options exist harris would have been the slightly better one, but agian that is like saying eat dog shit, or eat dog shit coated in chocolate, I am not going to willingly chose either of those options.

        So no, I am not sorry, no I am not gone, and no I am not “quiet” I just see no significant disagreement on the basis that I feel the need to write a comment, let alone now that election season is over you see a whole lot less trying to tell me that one would be the greatest thing ever.

        • korazail@lemmy.myserv.one
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          I’ll repeat and elaborate on something I said a few times before the election. As a preface, I fully understand your desire to not just ‘choose the lesser evil’, but the timing of your (the collective you, all the people who either sat out the election or, worse, convinced others to sit out) decision to make a stand is the part I take offense to.

          The time to choose the lesser evil is when you have only those two choices and neither are good. You did indeed have a third choice, but that third choice was to walk away and potentially let the greater evil win – which it did. In that way, you are partially responsible for that greater evil succeeding. Had you (collectively) voted for the lesser evil, we would not be slashing federal staffing, waging cold trade wars, deporting people, and letting several idiotic and vengeful toddlers run this country into the ground right now.

          The time to take your stand is actually, RIGHT NOW. If you are not engaged in trying to field a better candidate, then you are letting the “system” drive instead, and it will continue to present democratic leadership that is not aligned with your beliefs. You alone probably can’t make any significant impact, unless you happen to be wealthy and have tons of free time and want to go run for office. However, if all those people who were ‘BoTh SiDeS!’-ing in October would come back and continue to hammer on the Democratic party to put forth candidates that reflect their values, we might actually get somewhere.

          The way to do this is simple, but hard:

          1. Identify your local, precinct, Democratic party organization.
          2. Join it.
          3. (hard part) Engage and promote your values.


          Either find candidates or run for offices. Failing that --which I’d admit is challenging; public service is not lucrative and is also very unstable, which is why we generally see already-rich old people in those positions – become an advocate for your policies and rise up through precinct, district and state to reach the national stage.

          If you are not working on those goals, Shut the fuck up and vote for the lesser evil. You are not helping anyone by posting here.

          I’ve done step 2. My values mostly align with my precinct Democrats, and I helped with Get-Out-The-Vote initiatives in my area. What did you do to prevent fascism?

          Still here, not going to appologize, I stand by my statement, both of them are facist, …

          I’d also like to point you to Wikipedia’s article on Fascism and see if you can provide a few examples of where Kamala Harris espoused those particular values. For each item in that first paragraph, I could quickly find you something where trump tells you that’s him. A lie will fly around the whole world while the truth is getting its boots on, though, and maybe someone else can take over if you need examples and can’t google by yourself… Kamala was going to at least stay within the system, while trump is going to destroy it.

          • Red Army Dog Cooper@lemmy.ml
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            I mean mostly because I did not see the red lines and so I did not think to right click it, and I am generally shit at spelling

      • dx1@lemmy.world
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        I’m not quiet, my comments just keep getting deleted, and only the comments pretending I said something else get to stay.

        As ever I will not take any lectures on morality from anyone who watched a politician arm a genocide and voted for them (or their VP) anyway. We had multiple non-Trump candidates, you all picked the biggest genocidal scumbag Nazi traitor out of all of them - both in the primaries and the general - and you lost. Blame yourselves for rallying behind a monster.

        P.S., nobody said “the exact same”. You all just love rolling that out, but at the same time can’t even acknowledge exactly WHAT similarity it implies, that two “opposing” politicians both UNQUESTIONINGLY PARTICIPATE IN A GENOCIDE. Really, finally, at long last here - take a minute out of your life and seriously ask yourself - HOW THE FUCK DID THAT HAPPEN? What in god’s name brought us to that situation? Because if you can’t explain that, you don’t understand anything about what’s happening.

        • HalfSalesman@lemm.ee
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          And now the genocide will get worse.

          We had multiple non-Trump candidates

          Do you understand how first past the post works?

          • dx1@lemmy.world
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            No, somehow in my 16 years of primary education and going to college for political science/pre-law, I somehow managed to come out not understanding the most basic principles about the U.S. elections. Thanks for coming along to share that vital piece of information with me. This is really so helpful and productive and not a complete derailment of the conversation and waste of everyone’s time, that you came along to say that.

            And now the genocide will get worse.

            Let’s back up. Did you actually read what I wrote SPECIFICALLY? Because all I’m hearing is the same talking points again. Here it is, one more time:

            P.S., nobody said “the exact same”. You all just love rolling that out, but at the same time can’t even acknowledge exactly WHAT similarity it implies, that two “opposing” politicians both UNQUESTIONINGLY PARTICIPATE IN A GENOCIDE. Really, finally, at long last here - take a minute out of your life and seriously ask yourself - HOW THE FUCK DID THAT HAPPEN? What in god’s name brought us to that situation? Because if you can’t explain that, you don’t understand anything about what’s happening.

            Or in one sentence. WHY. DO. BOTH. OF. THEM. SUPPORT. A. GENOCIDE. You want to pretend you have some grand strategy to shape this society in the future? OK - THEN EXPLAIN HOW THIS HAPPENED, AND EXPLAIN HOW VOTING FOR PEOPLE SO IMMORAL THAT THEY SUPPORT GENOCIDE CAN EVER POSSIBLY RESULT IN FIXING IT. You wanna pretend you’re strategic, then explain your understanding of the situation, and assuming it has any relation to reality, explain how you you think your approach will fix it.

            • HalfSalesman@lemm.ee
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              Having a strategy doesn’t guarantee ideal outcomes. It also clearly doesn’t guarantee you avoid the worst ones either. We were never inevitably going to the promised land. The key was to maximize good and minimize bad. We’ve maximized bad.

              It doesn’t matter that much anymore. I’m not advocating we continue any strategy because I think we’re doomed now. We’re on a sinking ship and you are arguing over whether we can swim across the entire ocean to safety.

              The new goal is to not die due to a fascist take over the United States. A lot of us are about to fail that. Maybe me, maybe you. We’ll see in 4 years.

              • dx1@lemmy.world
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                So you don’t have a strategy then. Then sit the fuck down. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on and I guess we’ll just try whatever the fuck” is not a strategy.

                • HalfSalesman@lemm.ee
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                  That’s not what I said. I had a strategy, it was to put my energy into an election outcome that would prevent the fascist from winning. I don’t view Kamala Harris as a fascist like you seem to, shes at worst a typical neo-liberal. I’d rather fight against a neo-liberal than a fascist. She lost, and all available non-passive options are now awful and I am not motivated to do much other than openly hate almost everyone even slightly responsible in this outcome.

                  Available strategies now include: Hunker down and survive an indeterminate number of years, flee the country, or die in a doomed rebellion. All knowing the earth is cooked at every corner anyway so who gives a flying fuck.

                  I’m not doing that last strategy, you can have fun getting shot in the street by fascists if you want. I’m going to just try my best to not die.

      • supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz
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        If you all are going to keep repeating these lazy narratives I demand you back them up with data.

        Further, I demand you hold leaders like Biden and Harris accountable for failing to listen to voters, just because you don’t like our opinions doesn’t mean you can simply ignore us and expect to form a functioning coalition.

        Centrism and neoliberalism are dead, everybody has abandoned this category of politician and politics, it is an extinct belief system that brought about an environment it could not survive in. People either want genuine hope and working class politics rooted in a proud sense of leftism/solidarity with the average worker or they want fascism and not the diet kind centrist liberals serve up, a very small amount of people want cowardly, spineless status quo managers who are unable to do anything but try to convince people they are less bad than the really bad guy.

        Also, I voted for Harris, all the leftists I know did. You are yelling at random people with intimate connections to Palestinians who couldn’t bring themselves to vote for someone who wouldn’t even let a Palestinian voice speak at the DNC. That is the fault of the DNC for failing to understand people won’t vote for them if they refuse to do ANYTHING of substance to stop a genocide that could have been stopped with a single damn phone call from Biden if he grew a spine or a heart. Leftists recognized the catastrophic consequences of this strategic blunder and attempted to steer the bus away from the cliff but centrists just completely and utterly ignored leftist and Palestinian voices and actively worked to discredit and silence them, often as jeering insults told in the company of Republicans as a way to try to get them to like them for being centrist, as if Republicans would ever vote for a Democrat in any significant number?

        1000 facepalms

        Centrism and neoliberalism failed, stop trying to pretend like y’all own the narrative, your strategy and description of how things would pan out failed miserably, and actually nobody else really cares about you whining and blaming others for not voting for a shitty candidate.

        Trump is worse than Biden or Harris would have been, we know. We knew that before. You aren’t listening if you think that is a big GATCHA to us?

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          All leftists absolutely did not all vote for Harris. I’ve literally seen “A vote for Harris is a vote for genocide” propaganda spread around with posters/banners. And that shit almost certainly moved fence sitters.

          We can blame multiple groups at the same time. Its just left accelerationists and protest voters/non-voters are legitimately stupid and evil and yet are more likely to start arguments on Lemmy because they’re self righteous and think they actually have the big brains or whatever.

          Neolibs/Centrists think they’ll be fine and are going to get the bag regardless (thinking the fascists wont come for them) and the apolitical types don’t even want to engage because they’re not paying attention anyway nor want to. They don’t engage.

          The blame is equal. Its just it gets louder between left leaning people because of the frustration.

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            Let me ask you a question, if you had family or personal connections to people in Gaza and had to watch them get brutally exterminated one by one by the IDF while Biden and Harris refused to address it, what exactly do you think kind of impact on that person is an annoying leftist going to have raising their voice?

            Our words were to warn the rest of y’all that you can’t ignore those people, and we were right. I am sorry this isn’t a pleasant thing for you to have to recognize about your own politics.

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              They weren’t completely ignored by Harris. She could have done a lot more (in particular to distance herself from Biden), but she did try to appeal to them at least once.

              The problem is that even doing that wasn’t going to help much because the propaganda campaign to paint her as the pro-genocide candidate was already floating around enough that low information tik tok voters were likely nudged primarily against her.

              Regardless, if my family was being butchered in that situation IDK how I’d react but I know the rational decision was still to prevent the fascist that actively hates Palestinians from winning.

              But obviously voters are not rational.

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                The problem is that even doing that wasn’t going to help much because the propaganda campaign to paint her as the pro-genocide candidate was already floating around enough that low information tik tok voters were likely nudged primarily against her.

                I consider it a necessary act of non-violence to point out the cynicism of this viewpoint, especially because there is an avalanche of evidence and common sense that points to the fact that democrats at the top never even really gave voters a chance to prove the cynicism of this viewpoint wrong which I think it is reasonable to argue necessitated the conditions where the only outcome remaining possible was to prove the cynicism of this viewpoint right.

                to be clear, fuck Trump, I know republicans are worse, that isn’t the point.

      • Clent@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        They just moved back into their underground slayers where naysayers are immediately banned.

        They will never apologize because they insist they are right and we’re wrong. Further they hold the actual left wing voters responsible and claim we are allowing this to happen, we are complicit and we need be held to account. I’ve been assured that liberals are The Enemy.

        For all intents and purposes they need to be placed among the cult of the right. They aren’t a logic based lovely. They are not progressives. They are a flavor or authoritarian. They literallly believe their flavor of idealism is the only valid flavor.

        They actually remind me of libertarians, where everyone has maximum freedoms for to as they wish so long as they don’t use that freedom to form a government. Neither has any doubt. They are 100% they are correct and as any inllectual has told us, that’s 100% nonsense.

        • CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world
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          For all intents and purposes they need to be placed among the cult of the right. They aren’t a logic based lovely. They are not progressives. They are a flavor or authoritarian. They literallly believe their flavor of idealism is the only valid flavor.

          There is a reason that horseshoe theory is a thing. Though I don’t think these people were necessarily on the left, per se, but just maybe more attracted to giving hot takes on nearly everything, politics included, and maybe for a time were associating themselves with leftists.

          I can think of at least one person I know who was down for all things crunchy when it came to “health”, or getting chakras aligned and going to seminars on the latest guru pitching something about past lives or whatever and kind of generally supported the Green Party (they said, but I’m not sure if they actually voted? I remember asking if they went to the polls, decades ago, and they were like, what?? So I know they didn’t vote that time anyway).

          And ever since 2015, she has been a full-on, 100% maga zombie. Watching Faux, believing Qanon, all of that shit. She really does think that Hillary and Obama were sex trafficking little kids. She’s extended family, but ever since that - she’s been cut out of all events, because it’s all she wants to talk about. No one can deal with her, not even other Republicans - even if they voted for donvict, too. The irony? She is almost 100% reliant on government handouts.

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        How many more times do republicans need to win before protesters decide to get off their ass and participate?

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          Bullshit, the Democratic party blocked every non-establishment candidate and never once took a stand against the Republicans. It’s just not my party, I guess so they won’t be getting my vote in the future. Assuming fair elections will even be able to be held again.

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          Right or not, 6 million democrats/left leaning people stayed at home.

          I get that people want to vote for a candidate they actually believe in. I never felt more motivated than when I voted twice for Bernie Sanders in two primaries.

          I also felt damn good to vote against Donald Trump. I don’t understand why people just let this happen. I really don’t.

          I don’t want to blame voters, but SIX MILLION sat out this election that voted in the last.

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            The previous, COVID election was an outlier. Trump lost with a huge turnout. Biden had even more. Biden had the largest turnout ever in history. Biden.

            He’s not the second coming. He just happened to run in a very opportune election. Tons of people voted, especially by mail.

            COVID. This last election wasn’t apathy. It was a return to the norm. Statistics.

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              Well that fucking sucks too. You’d think someone would have made Election Day a federal holiday and maybe we’d be alright now. Gah.

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      Yeah, this is all the voters’ fault!

      Quite the naive take you have there, playing right into the divide and conquer strategy which fascists love to employ.

      Many of those protest voters have been intensely pressuring the DNC to make serious changes to their leadership to signify they do actually intend to learn something from their defeat and do better next time. So far, Dems have largely refused to do so. In fact Dems seem intent on making the same mistakes again in the next election cycle - so buckle up for an even more devastating loss next time. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if they somehow find a way to forego a democratic primary again in ‘28, if we make it that far. It will be alright though, for them - they have been assured the donor checks will keep coming, and they can continue grifting with insider trading through the next term. Just like these fossils have been doing for the past 50 years.

      Dems/Liberalism can not save us from fascism.

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        Ninety million people didn’t vote. That’s over one third of the voting body of the country. Third party votes made up another three million. Don’t even try to offload the responsibility non-voting had in the mess we’re in.

        And don’t pull that “divide and conquer” bullshit here. We all tried to get you to join us in solidarity against trump. You refused. So no, that shit isn’t going to play here at all and you should be embarrassed for even thinking about mentioning it.

        Hypocrite.

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            I don’t blame just third party voters. I blame people that entrenched themselves within their blind stupidity and refused to try and stop a tyrant felon and ignored him when he told them what he would do.

            • I blame people that willfully plugged their ears from the months and months worth of warnings of what would happen if they didn’t stop their entitled stubborn bullshit.\
            • I blame the idiots that spread propaganda freely to one ignorant child to another.\
            • I blame the idiot children that believed the propaganda.\
            • I blame the people who stayed home with folded arms while the rest of us tried to do everything we could to save the a lot of American citizens from becoming political targets- from becoming less-than.

            I don’t give a fuck that the DNC propped up a lame duck. I don’t give a fuck what they thought was going to happen. They were warned by people that know better what will happen if trump won. And they were told what they could do to stop it.

            They didn’t.

            So they can take a bow. They fucking did this.

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              Why is it that warnings of what would happen weren’t taken seriously enough by Democrats to try to earn people’s votes? Voters warned them what would happen if they stuck to the same policies they had been running on. If the elites of the party are going to make all decisions for the rest of us, they can accept all the blame when they lose.

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                Why is it that warnings of what would happen weren’t taken seriously enough by Democrats to try to earn people’s votes?

                Because when threatened by piece of shit Naizs like trump- we don’t get to have that luxury of entitlement. We needed to do what was necessary to stop trump and that was it- pencils down, the test is over.

                And now, because a bunch of people that clearly had nothing to lose- decided for everyone that none of this was worth their time because the democrats didn’t jump perfectly through their hoops, we ALL get to suffer.

                Congratulations. You did NOTHING.

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                  You don’t know how voted or what privileges I have and don’t have. But knowing that I’m a nonbinary tran person who voted for Kamala won’t change the fact that people don’t vote for candidates out of duty. That’s never been how people vote. So you can absolutely keep pretending that your position is noble and that it’s your fellow citizens who failed you, but at the end of the day, Democrats were running on a message that he was the worst thing possible, but weren’t willing to do everything possible to stop him. They had a responsibility to deliver policies that solved the problems people were encountering, to respond to their base when their base said “we don’t want to fund genocide”. Lying to people about the economy as those same people couldn’t afford the same amount of groceries anymore definitely hurt them. Allowing Republicans to scapegoat trans people and Kamala not even saying the word trans throughout the campaign, allowing the other side to control the messaging surrounding the issue isn’t likely to have earned them any votes.

                  But pointing these things out to Democratic cult members to yourself is tantamount to heresy because you’ve lost any iota of self reflection. You don’t care that Democrats are Republican-light. In fact, you probably think that’s a good thing.

                  Newsflash: the antidote to fascism is not liberalism. It is economic populalism. Democrats can’t afford to keep backing capitalism if they ever want to win again. Democrats got us into this mess, they aren’t the ones who were ever going to save us.

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              Do you realize that compared to 2020, Dems lost more voters than the total amount of third party voters in ‘24? By about 3 times. It made 0 difference. Those voters exercised their constitutional right to vote for the party they thought best represented them. What right do you have to demand they vote democrat instead?

              It is the responsibility of the party to win the votes, not the responsibility of the voter to support “their team.” You coming on here and attacking people for not wanting to further entrench the oligarchy’s grip on our society is precisely the divide and conquer effect I’m talking about. I get that you’re upset because of how things are going, but you have to realize that demanding something different is our only way out of this mess.

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                No amount of side-stepping your refusal to do a simple thing like voting is going to absolve you of your responsibility in helping get trump elected.

                Regardless of how you twist things around, you’re not the victim here. You’re the cause.

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                It’s the responsibility of the voter to vote for the least awful option to prevent the most awful option from winning.

                In this case, doing anything other than voting Harris directly elected Trump.

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        🤣 Well, I see someone has learned no lessons.

        Anyway, YES, it IS the fault of some of the voters. Absolutely. Just because you don’t get a pretty pony doesn’t mean you absolve yourself of everything.

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        I hope you’re right, but I’d rather see a new party.

        Dems top candidates next election will be Harris and Buttigieg.

        Save this post, I’ll bet you money.

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          I would not take that bet my friend. New party is the way, the Dems are refusing us any alternative. Octogenarians aren’t exactly known for their adaptability to evolving landscapes. Same can be said of the establishment corporate robots

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        Intensely pressuring who?!? The DNC who think they have “good billionaire” bankers???

        Get over yourself; your deluded fantasies have no impact on reality.

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          Biden admin had 4 years to stop fascism in its tracks. They didn’t even begin to pretend to do something until 2 years in. And you expect people to vote for more of that? Interesting strategy, but sadly doomed to fail.

          Unfortunately for Dems, many Americans are no longer under the spell of mainstream media running cover for their corruption. Americans deserve actual representation in their government. Dems can either stop accepting bribe money and start fighting to improve people’s lives, or they can continue to lose. When the only choices are Hitler vs Hitler lite, the last election has shown people will just vote Hitler, or perhaps not vote at all. I’m not claiming this is a good direction for the country, rather pointing out facts concerning the election which could be useful learnings for Dems if they care about winning. Here’s another fact for you: they don’t.

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            How exactly what standard presidential powers would he use. Because lets be clear. I don’t want a leftist doing the bulashit facist abuse of power to protect us any more than I want trump to be doing it. Biden did amazing considering the congress and situation.

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    Prioritize funding for places with higher birth rates, you say? So… Communities with loads of immigrants. Got it.

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        They don’t even have to imply it!

        They can just define it with congressional districts or some arbitrary measure that clusters their desired groups and fragments their undesired groups.

        Even if this wasn’t the actual, real end to even the charade of U.S. democracy, it would take at least a generation or two to “prove” those policies are hurtful in the courts.
        What then? The damage is done. Infrastructure built. Certain groups given generational advantages, certain groups left behind.

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      They were removed from the calculation after Elon was given network access and privs to the US government.

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    “I was told there would be a medal”.

    Shamelessly clipped from History.com:

    This Day In History: December 16

    1938 Hitler establishes Mother’s Cross to encourage German women to procreate

    On December 16, 1938, Adolf Hitler institutes the Mother’s Cross, to encourage women of “pure” German origin to increase the size of their families and grow the population of the Third Reich.

    The Nazis started such encouragement early. When members the League of German Girls (a wing of of the Hitler Youth movement) turned 18, they became eligible for a branch called Faith and Beauty, which trained these girls in the art of becoming ideal mothers. One component of that ideal was fecundity. And so each year, gold medals were awarded to women with eight children or more, silver medals to women with six to seven, and bronze medals to women with five. The crosses were distributed between 1938 and 1944.

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    Not gonna fix old broken roads unless y’all fucking and making babies like rabbits. Florida? NO ROADS FOR YOU! Texas? NO ROADS FOR YOU!

    The memos of this administration will go down in history as the dumbest shit ever penned. Even worse the nupties who wrote them will get cushy private sector jobs lobbying or something later.

    • funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works
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      dumbest shit since Bush

      which was dumbest since Reagan

      which was dumbest since Nixon

      you’d better believe it can get worse.

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        If Nixon had listened to his advisors about the potential impacts of climate change the state of the world could be in a completely different place. So many people know Exxon knew about the potential impacts of fossil fuels in the 70s, but what many over look is that the White House Science and Technology advisor who approved (and it never happened) of the monitoring of greenhouse gases caused by such was Edward E. David Jr. When he left the white House he went to work for Exxon as well and set up monitoring tools on vessels from within the company. That information of course would get blanketed and kept internal to the company, but they very existence of people knowing the real dangers, asking to monitor them and getting turned down by our government for what would amount to maybe about $150m-$200m in todays costs is absurd.

        Imagine those conversations, “Sir, this could impact all life and species on earth, global changes to ocean and weather patterns, and could end in mass starvation, floods, large hurricanes, droughts and more”.

        “Yeah let’s ignore that one for now” “That would cause it to get worse faster” “Yeah let’s ignore that one for now”

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        Do you suppose Democrats will ever get better instead of chasing worse? Because I’ve pretty much lost hope.

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      Whoa! No fucking allowed, you sick fornicator. You better have those babies without any pleasure involved

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    Not that surprised. You have three options:

    1. Make babies above the replacement rate. This tends to be hard to control/enforce in general.
    2. Import lots of people from outside. This tends to cause cultural drift, reduced social trust and various kinds of other complications if you aren’t careful about it.
    3. Have an aging and shrinking populace and with it tax base, GDP, and several other things that are pretty important at a national scale.

    Since Trump is actively rejecting 2 and 3 is suicidal to a nation, that leaves 1 - promote people having kids above replacement rate.