Did you vote?

[Ferno]

Did you?

[Krom]

I did, several weeks ago. Thank god for early voting.

[Top Gun]

I did, several weeks ago.

[Vander]

Last week, yes. Mail ballots are great, and every state should have the option.

[Tunnelcat]

Yep. Voted a couple of weeks ago when ballots were mailed out. Checked online the other day and it shows as received by the county.

[Tunnelcat]

Not looking good for Harris.

[Neo]

No. Voting is for people who don't want to or can't be vigilant or can't do anything against the government but think they can.

[CDN_Merlin]

How? How is it possible that he wins?

[Neo]

They're not finished counting yet. Gotta do more than vote in this evil society!

[Neo]

Okay, now they finished.

Donald Trump won x_x

EDIT: it's a projected win at the moment x_x

Why can't we talk about abortion here?

[Flatlander]

I voted by mail. I can't believe we're gonna do this ★■◆● again.

[TheWhat]

Magically there has been no accusations of a stolen election.

[Spidey]

How? How is it possible that he wins?

Never underestimate fielding a bad candidate.

[Krom]

Right wing media won this round.

Let's see how reality retaliates.

[Tunnelcat]

Propaganda always wins any rounds when deluded people full of hate want to believe it. People like that just elected a lying, cheating, womanizing, egomaniacal, criminal harboring a huge grudge back to the presidency, a thug who is now backed by the Supreme Court. Things are going to quickly go downhill in this country once his fat orange ass sits in the White House again and he starts in on his revenge campaign.

[Spidey]

Well, there is one bright spot in a Trump victory...watching pundit heads explode during the freakout is a real treat.

[Top Gun]

How? How is it possible that he wins?

Because this country is full of the dumbest bunch of ★■◆● on the planet, that's how.

[Vander]

Never underestimate fielding a bad candidate.

In your opinion, what made her a worse candidate than Trump?

[Spidey]

Never underestimate fielding a bad candidate.

In your opinion, what made her a worse candidate than Trump?

Well for one...the inability to win over people like me.

[Tunnelcat]

The only reason she lost was because of male voters. It's a tick that crosses race, ethnicity and religious lines in America. Misogyny. They just can't except that a woman can project strength and leadership and run a country. Trump used this play to get out the young male voter, especially in rural areas, and won because of it.

[Top Gun]

Well for one...the inability to win over people like me.

Actual honest question, because I need to do something else today other than spew ineffectual rage: what would she have had to do to win you over? What in particular were you looking for?

[Vander]

Well for one...the inability to win over people like me.

What, in your opinion, was worse about Harris relative to Trump?

[CDN_Merlin]

Canada will elect a PC govt in the next federal election simply because some people think Trudeau is responsible for all the bad that happens in this country. The world is heading to WW3 now.

[Tunnelcat]

People are sheep and will believe anything to fit their narrative, even if their narrative is delusional and driven by hate and disinformation.The economy was improving, inflation was down, the stock market is way up, gas prices are down, but food and housing prices have yet to drop significantly. We just emerged from a pandemic made worse by the policies of Trump. Why elect a failure again?

So Spidey, what was it about Harris that you couldn't stomach enough to vote for her? I can't see you voting for Trump either.

[Spidey]

Well for one...the inability to win over people like me.

What, in your opinion, was worse about Harris relative to Trump?

I never said she was worse than Trump, would that even be possible?

[Top Gun]

Spidey for once would you just answer the damn question in a straightforward manner instead of deflecting?

[Spidey]

Well for one...the inability to win over people like me.

Actual honest question, because I need to do something else today other than spew ineffectual rage: what would she have had to do to win you over? What in particular were you looking for?

She could have fleshed out her vision and ideas instead of simply running on "I'm not Trump".

I don't vote for joy, rainbows and impossible to keep promises.

I want to know if she did the math on her proposal to give business startups some 40 grand considering there are some 3 million startups a year in the US.

I wanted to know exactly how she planned to keep business from price gouging.

You know...just crap like that.

[Spidey]

Spidey for once would you just answer the damn question in a straightforward manner instead of deflecting?

That wasn't a deflection, I think they were both bad candidates, but Vander seems to think the only option is to compare and choose the least bad instead of actually liking one of the two.

[Top Gun]

That wasn't a deflection, I think they were both bad candidates, but Vander seems to think the only option is to compare and choose the least bad instead of actually liking one of the two.

I'm sorry for snapping at you. The thing is though, what you describe is exactly what our system is designed to produce, whether intentionally or not. A first-past-the-post, winner-take-all electoral system is inevitably going to lead to two viable opposing choices, and not voting for one is nearly the same thing as voting for the other. Like, how many people do you think were genuinely excited about the prospect of Joe Biden as president in 2020? Far less than actually voted for him, I'd wager. I would have voted for a literal stump of wood if I thought it had a good chance of beating Trump.

[Neo]

Wow, he actually apologized for once. >_>

That's what I used to do, what Spidey said about Vander.

Magically there has been no accusations of a stolen election.

I like this. One of the times Adam---or whatever his real name is---says something sensible.

Propaganda is bad in all of its forms, but the news media would have you believe that the people who report the news are "democratic" and that they don't produce propaganda or lie at all, and there's only 666 News that's "the bad guy." Then people like Tunnelcat believe whatever they hear on TV.

[Spidey]

That wasn't a deflection, I think they were both bad candidates, but Vander seems to think the only option is to compare and choose the least bad instead of actually liking one of the two.

I'm sorry for snapping at you. The thing is though, what you describe is exactly what our system is designed to produce, whether intentionally or not. A first-past-the-post, winner-take-all electoral system is inevitably going to lead to two viable opposing choices, and not voting for one is nearly the same thing as voting for the other. Like, how many people do you think were genuinely excited about the prospect of Joe Biden as president in 2020? Far less than actually voted for him, I'd wager. I would have voted for a literal stump of wood if I thought it had a good chance of beating Trump.

Well, in my opinion that is faulty logic, along the same lines as independents are just cowards for not choosing a side.

But if you want to blame people like me for Harris losing the race, be my guest.

[Top Gun]

Well, in my opinion that is faulty logic, along the same lines as independents are just cowards for not choosing a side.

But if you want to blame people like me for Harris losing the race, be my guest.

I'm not blaming you at all, and I don't even know if there are enough people like you out there to have swayed things anyway. But my logic wasn't faulty...this is factually what our current system is designed to promote. Even a third-party candidate who achieves any sizeable percentage of the vote total only serves to aid in one of the two main candidates winning, and they have zero chance of obtaining any power for their party in the process. Now if we had proportional representation like most parliamentary systems do, then my logic would break down, since those are designed to have multiple parties that need to caucus with each other to form a majority.

Honestly if I'm going to be mad at anyone for creating a "can't vote for either candidate" situation, it should probably be Harris, because we know there was at least some percentage of voters (especially younger ones) who refused to vote for her solely because they viewed her as supporting Israel's genocide in Gaza. If she had run on stopping all military funding to Israel on day one, I truly believe she would have gained more votes, maybe enough to matter.

[TheWhat]

What is sensible about that? Its sad, very sad that if a person loses its because of a grand conspiracy and if they win its because of greatness. Like a petulant athlete.

Im just worried that after he fills a couple of supreme court slots with 40 year olds Ill be forced to wave a flag and dress like a realator.

[Vander]

I want to know...

I wanted to know...

I mean, I guess it's ultimately the candidate's job to find a way to deliver these answers to your consciousness. Simply putting them on the campaign website apparently wasn't enough in this case.

Vander seems to think the only option is to compare and choose the least bad instead of actually liking one of the two.

I don't think liking a candidate is a prerequisite for considering them a good candidate. That probably says more about the prospective voter than the candidate. I was just hoping for more clarification than a vague "inability to win over people like me," which, again, might say more about the prospective voter than the candidate.

[Spidey]

I agree with you 100% on the idea that it says more about the voter than the candidate.

But I'm going to use my own metrics every time instead of letting someone else dictate them.

[Tunnelcat]

Well for one...the inability to win over people like me.

Actual honest question, because I need to do something else today other than spew ineffectual rage: what would she have had to do to win you over? What in particular were you looking for?

She could have fleshed out her vision and ideas instead of simply running on "I'm not Trump".

I don't vote for joy, rainbows and impossible to keep promises.

I want to know if she did the math on her proposal to give business startups some 40 grand considering there are some 3 million startups a year in the US.

I wanted to know exactly how she planned to keep business from price gouging.

You know...just crap like that.

Did you flesh out what Trump claimed his solution was for our economy? I'd like to think that you're smart enough to understand that corporations don't pay for tariffs, WE the consumers do. Do you understand how long it takes, if at all feasible, to bring back even some of the manufacturing we lost to China and other dirt cheap wage countries? Very unlikely since most Americans refuse to work for similar wages.

Sure, Harris made no claims on what she'll do once in office. She'd probably start off by picking up where Biden left off and eventually chart her own course, but it sure as hell is far better than what Trump has said he'll do. Trump is an idiot. He has more business failures than most entrepreneurs on this planet and YOU can't decide to vote for Harris just to keep HIM out of office at all costs? At least with Harris, we can vote her out in 4 years. With Trump, the prospect is extremely unlikely.

[CDN_Merlin]

On another note, I had asked this before but since trump will be president again and has the senate and maybe the house, could he rewrite the law saying people can become presidents more than 2 terms? I'm scared he will try and succeed

[Tunnelcat]

Hell, I was expecting he'd do it by fiat if he didn't have both Houses on his side. Either way, we're screwed as a democracy. The Repubs will sanctify their power and put Project 2025 into law and anyone who's not a white straight Christian male will become a second class citizen, imprisoned or deported. LGBTQ people will have to go into the closet or be murdered and more and more women will die because of their draconian nationwide abortion laws. It's already happened to 2 women in Texas. However, I think the Republicans underestimate people on the left or even the center, that we'll all just sit back and take it like a bunch of sheep. Once Trump's orange ★■◆● hits the fan, I can tell you with certainty, they will not. That anger will only metastasize over time. Something will snap.

[Vander]

On another note, I had asked this before but since trump will be president again and has the senate and maybe the house, could he rewrite the law saying people can become presidents more than 2 terms? I'm scared he will try and succeed

I would say no, as the 22nd amendment is pretty clear, but the 14th amendment is also pretty clear on barring insurrectionists from elected office, and this supreme court disallowed Colorado from removing him from the ballot.