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comment by user-inactivated

Around here its worries about losing guns, frustration that Obamacare limits part time hours to 25 hrs. a week, fear that raising minimum wage will lead to job cuts, frustrations about bank and auto bailouts, concerns about abortions, and concerns about Hillary getting involved in more international issues.

When you're willing to put personal perspectives about guns, abortions, and the economy aside, you can kind of see some very real concerns there. Also, for a lot of peoplr, the deciding factor was indeed guns. I honestly think if Democrats softened their stance on gun control and openly advertised that, they'd get more votes.





goobster  ·  2699 days ago  ·  link  ·  

So, in a completely neutral and non-confrontational way (aka, ignoring our recent sparring matches), let's break this down:

    worries about losing guns

Which is a completely made up story from the right. Obama was even asked this at a town hall, and refuted it directly, and there has been zero legislation passed to limit any sort of gun ownership at all. It's all histrionics.

(Side note: I had to unsubscribe from the online gun store where I buy my ammo, because they would send out up to TEN EMAILS A WEEK with complete and utter bullshit stories about legislation that was proposed, passed, or being "pushed by Obama", restricting some aspect of gun ownership. I started digging in to the articles, researching the sources, and ALL of them were just total fabrications. Not a shred of truth behind most of them. And yeah, there were some nutty legislators from, like, Malibu, who wrote legislation to ban all guns... but that legislation had ZERO supporters, never made it to the Agenda or onto the House floor for a vote. LOTS of legislators write up wacky things to get headlines. That doesn't mean they can garner 500 votes in the house to pass a bill to the Senate, though. That's Junior High School civics class stuff, right there.)

    frustration that Obamacare limits part time hours to 25 hrs. a week

A plan has to be in place for it to be measured. Now that Obamacare is in place, we can tweak the variables to make it work better. But there has to be a baseline. You can't work 1 hour a week and expect full benefits. So maybe 25 hours a week is not the right baseline, but it can be changed. The whole program doesn't need to be scrapped because one or two adjustable variables are currently set at inconvenient numbers.

    fear that raising minimum wage will lead to job cuts

Because it's better to live in destitution, working 40-plus hour weeks, and still being unable to meet basic needs? Honestly, what is the alternative? Personally, taking Unemployment and free job training to get a better paying job that is going to actually pay for my basic living expenses seems like a better idea than just letting employers leech off the rest of the taxpayers by paying below a living wage and having their employees use welfare, food stamps, and public health services to make up for their deficient pay.

Everyone has to make a living wage. If they don't, then they are being propped up by the social systems everyone else is paying for. That's corporate welfare, plain and simple.

    frustrations about bank and auto bailouts

Which saved the jobs and homes of the hundreds of thousands of people that worked for these companies... and were all paid back in full? A bailout is a bridge loan to get you through tough times. It isn't free money. (And, BTW, those bailouts were required because the economy tanked because the Republicans repealed the Glass-Steagall act that kept the banks out of putting their customers' money in sketchy schemes. So when everyone lost their money they stopped buying new cars, thereby creating the need for a bailout in the first place.)

    concerns about abortions

It is fine to be for or against the medical procedure of an abortion. But the right paints myriad women's health care issues with a broad brush. Planned Parenthood provided far more heath care, cancer screening, and contraception information and services than abortion services. These clinics provided much of the health care that the poor needed to remain basically healthy, and continuing to be able to work at their minimum wage jobs. Eliminating their only source of health care is - quite literally - throwing the baby out with the bath water.

    concerns about Hillary getting involved in more international issues

Everyone was concerned about that. There isn't anyone more excited about dropping bombs on brown people than Hillary. However, as Secretary of State she had far more power to do that than any President ever did. And her ability to drop bombs on brown people would have been severely throttled by an Elizabeth Warren-run Senate, backed by Bernie Sanders on the Appropriations Committee.

This shows the willful ignorance of a Trump voter. The President appoints over 1900 people on the day they take office. They have always beholden to their Party Leadership (until Trump, of course), and are therefore held on a pretty tight leash. The entire system is set up to balance power so that nobody can jerk the wheel and drive the bus off the road.

Until now.

With their total domination of the Legislature, the Senate, the White House, and soon the Supreme Court, the most anarchic voices in the Republican party are now free to go off-roading in the family van without even putting Junior in a child safety seat.

None of this information is new, original, or insightful. I'm not some great and wise thinker on the topic. I have no unique sources or Deep Throat telling me secrets in dark parking garages.

This has all been known for more than a year, and was presented throughout all forms of media (left, right, and center) for the entire time.

But people chose to be willfully ignorant, and so they got what they wanted, without understanding what they were asking for.

user-inactivated  ·  2699 days ago  ·  link  ·  

I'm on lunch. I'm angry (not at you), and I can't fuxking focus. So let me just say this. We agree, mostly. Hell, we probably even vote similarly but the reasons behind our votes are probably very different. I understand exactly what you're saying here.

That said, the Republican side is loud, brash, stubborn, and unafraid to play dirty pool.

    None of this information is new, original, or insightful. I'm not some great and wise thinker on the topic. I have no unique sources or Deep Throat telling me secrets in dark parking garages.

    This has all been known for more than a year, and was presented throughout all forms of media (left, right, and center) for the entire time.

    But people chose to be willfully ignorant, and so they got what they wanted, without understanding what they were asking for.

Democrats need to start speaking the fuck up, cause their message isn't getting through.

kleinbl00  ·  2699 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  

You can shout about nuance but it won't carry the weight of a whisper about simplicity.

Truth is optional.