So the Trumpistas in Reddit’s The_Donald are trying to figure out just why God Emperor Trump is plunging in the polls even though he continues to draw big crowds of scary and confused white people wherever he goes.
Apparently unable to conceive that Trump’s brand of belligerent narcisissism might be starting to wear thin for many people, many in the subreddit have concluded, as one much-upvoted comment alleges, that evil cuck pollsters “are over representing democrats to discourage Trump supporters.”
One commenter suggests that this eeevil alleged strategy may backfire, thus transforming Trump’s plunging poll numbers into something that’s … GOOD FOR TRUMP.
![o2toauUT 6 points 8 hours ago It will backfire on them unless they're planning on election fraud. If people think Hillary is a shoein they won't even bother to vote because most people who vote for her don't like Hillary, they just don't want Trump. If the news shows her up by 10 they will stay home. permalinkembedsaveparentreportgive goldreply [–]LhtfootUSA 4 points 2 hours ago Wait... So, this could be an example of Trump playing 84 dimensional interstellar Slovakian guerrilla warfare tactics?](https://i0.wp.com/www.wehuntedthemammoth.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/trumpinterstellar.png?resize=498%2C387&ssl=1)
Yes, that’s right: Trump could be losing in the polls ON PURPOSE. Because he’s THAT SMART.
@sfhc
Hegelian dialectic.
Thesis + antithesis = synthesis.
Everything eventually turns into its opposite.
If you define “the new cold” as 9C, eventually that will become the established norm. Even tho, it isn’t actually that ‘cold’ at all.
Then someone else says that 8C is the ‘new cold’ compared to a hotter hot, say 100C.
Keep making the ‘new hot’ hotter, and the ‘new cold’ needn’t be that cold in comparison.
What we are seeing with politics is a ‘new right’ which is edging towards fascism, and a ‘new left’ edging towards where the ‘old right’ used to be.
@Mary
Yes!
I think you don’t understand Murican politics. I think you subscribe to a meaningless, universalist worldview. I think you place far too much weight to theoretical political discourse, while ignoring what actually fuckin is
Yes we do
You do realize that, originally, the ‘left’ (gauche in French) were those against monarchy. Literally the left side of the room was populated by those who wanted Louis XIV and all his cronies deposed, dead, or both. Seeing as basically no Muricans (barring extreme religious types) want a monarchy, that must mean we’re all leftists! Unless, of course, words change meaning with time and cultural environment. Couldn’t be…
But what if it does?
Holy shitnuggets!
@SFHC
If I could transfer some heat to your hemisphere, I would
*Missed the edit window. Louis XVI, I mean. Too many goddamn Louis, yo
So apparently, because I tend to disagree with many views held by most of the politicians here in the US for being far more conservative than I am, I actually don’t exist? And nobody else in the country could possibly have views similar to mine, because there is no such thing as a “leftist” in the US and no Liberal American is “actually” on “the left”?
Good to know; I’d been laboring under the impression that myself and others like me could eventually push the American political system to not be so far to the right, but now I know that we’re a statistical impossibility!
@Pocketnerd: Yep, I remember you. 😀
And no, It doesn’t bother me. I just remember a commenter/blogger in my circle of the internet named Thus Spake Zara, so I wondered if you had me confused with them, or if I’d missed her commenting upthread. 🙂
http://www.reactiongifs.com/r/oka.gif
On the left / right thing : democrats and republicans have *significantly* different policy on both economy and social matters. That alone is enough to say they are a left and a right ; trying to put everyone in the same bag isn’t useful here.
Also, I don’t care about which silly left schiboleth one use. Democrat is the left of America, even tho they are about on par with the French right of 15 years ago, who itself is about the same as the socialists currently in power. They are still significantly to the left of most republican of the last 50 or so year anyway. If the political landscape change, what is right and left will evolve too, but we’re not here yet.
Gore Vidal, meanwhile, have the credibility of the french communist party about what is left and right to me. He is not dangerous, he is not a completely out of touch individual, but he is seriously fringe and for good reasons.
(and, for context, the right political groups in France since the end of WWII weren’t conservative, just right-wing. They have gone back to conservatisme since about 15 years. Another example of why one should not be too strict on its definition of left and right)
I get a little sick of hearing about how there are no true leftists here, unlike enlightened superior Europe when lots of Nazi/fascist candidates have done quite well in elections in many European countries in recent years.
The US is definitely behind when it comes to healthcare and labor rights. On issues like racism and xenophobia, we are no worse and in fact immigrants seem to be less welcome in Europe than they are here despite the anti-immigration sentiment that does exist here.
Leftists exist here but we are stuck with a system that only allows for incremental change. Anyone who has not been involved in a political cause or campaign here should not presume to splain about our existence.
Another issue besides the check and balance happy political system we have is that progressives tend to be concentrated in urban areas and a few other pockets. This creates a big conservative advantage in the legislative bodies because they’re more spread out.
@WWTH
^THISSS!!!
John Lewis, Bernie Sanders, Liz Warren, Al Franken, hopefully Russ Feingold (fingers crossed), and, yes, even Hillary Clinton are on the ‘left’ of our politics. As much as I’d like em all to be? No, but they’re all working towards a more inclusive, more equal society. The problem, I think, is that people from elsewhere mistake the Overton Window for the whole house of mirrors
Real politik. In order become President, to get progressive Supreme Court justices, to rule the right way on marriage, you say some nonsense about ‘tradition’ until the public ‘comes around’. And in order to make universal healthcare a staple of the party platform, 1st you hafta pass a milquetoast reform bill. Hillary wanted universal healthcare in the fuckin 90s. It failed, she learned to keep her yap shut about it, til an old guy from Vermont paves the way. Not ideal, but unfortunately necessary
It also might have something to do with having more than 2 major parties, but I haven’t thought that theory all the way thru yet…
@Satorui
Hiya, I’m Axe! Welcome package on the right side. Enjoy your stay 🙂
@Schildfreja: yeah, my father is still angry at SCOTUS for deciding corporations could spend as much as they want in campaigning. Gr…….
@VirginMary: ‘Liberal’ and ‘Conservative’ are both contextual. ‘Liberal’ literally means ’embracing new idea’ while ‘Conservative’ literally means ‘adhering to old idea’. When America was founded, what they called ‘Liberal’ was actually very similar to what we, in America, call ‘fiscal conservatives’. Then, those ideas were new. Now, they are old. That is all. Also, I’ve heard that in Latin America, ‘Conservatives’ refers to landed gentry, ‘Liberals’ refer to various types of capitalists, and ‘Socialist’ stands for, well, socialism. The saying I heard down there was, ‘conservatives are old money, liberals are new money, socialists are no money’.
@Axecalibur: interesting. I could have sworn the ‘left right’ thing went back to Jefferson’s habit of meeting with his cronies (who became the Jeffersonian republicans, who became the democratic republicans, who became the democratic party) on the left side of congress’ original meeting area.
@WWTH: Yep. My understanding is the US Founders wanted any significant change to take multiple election cycles. That way, We The People would have a chance to vote in or vote out supporters or opponents of particular legislation before it became law. Makes it bloody frustrating to make anything happen though, doesn’t it?
That isn’t how Hegelian dialectics work.
@joek
My point exactly.
I’ve pointed out liberals are ‘fiscal conservatives’ already, but no one seems to hear. Socialism is a different kettle of fish entirely. Maybe America should try it, give it a go?!
@Virgin Mary: Actually, I was saying that 200 years ago, what we call ‘fiscal conservatives’ were called ‘liberals’.
You consider your ‘socialists’ to be the left wing, or the ‘liberal’ idea. Maybe where you are, it is. In the US, it isn’t. Perhaps that does mean we are behind the times, but perhaps not. Our ‘liberals’ have managed to work several socialist ideas into our platform.
Socialism, unlike ‘liberal’ or ‘conservative’, is a term for a particular ideology, and for a particular platform, irrespective of culture. The same could be said for ‘monarchism’ or ‘capitalism’ or even ‘liberal capitalism’. These all have meaning beyond the specific context. ‘liberal’ and ‘conservative’ do not.
Its rather similar to the way some names translate from one language to another, while others do not. If my name is ‘dances with wolves’, say, than it would sound different in English or French. If my name is ‘Jon’, than my name sounds the same no matter what language I am speaking.
Also of note, I’ve run across a few English people refer to the desire to abolish the British Monarchy as ‘republicanism’. Words change meaning depending on context.
@joek
Yep, you’re correct.
I am a republican, small ‘R’.
@Mary:
The issue (EDIT: that I take, at least) is that you’re acting as if nobody in the US agrees that socialism isn’t A Bad Thing and that our politicians are not actually fully representative of our ideals. As someone who already believes that our political system is pretty screwed up, I would appreciate if you would stop ‘splaining American politics to Americans. At least on this website, of all places. I don’t presume to speak for anyone else, but from what I’ve seen the people around here don’t tend to think that everything is perfectly A-OK here in the US.
I apologise if, as a Brit, I’ve majorly misunderstood some nuance of US politics, but the way it looks to me is this:
To get elected as President you have to get at least name recognition and ideally some understanding of your platform across all 50 states. Without any requirement for state-funded political broadcasts (which exist here, but no one watches because they are boring AF) this costs bucket loads. So candidates either need to be independently wealthy and/or seek funding from wealthy sources. This embeds the political class into the wealthy class, by definition, because you need money to run.
Trump has had a go at the (British) 19th century argument that rich guys make better politicians because they can’t be bought. He – in my view – has failed because he has used toxic sound bites to get media, but sound bites can’t deliver thought out policy (not that he’s shown any sign of having this anyway) and the toxicity drives away bank rollers who might have funded a message delivery otherwise.
The criticism from both left and right that Clinton is establishment bewilders me. In the system that you’ve got, how is a realistic candidate supposed to be anything but?
ETA Just seen dslucia’s post above. I jumped in without reading the full comment thread, so sorry if I’ve pushed anyone’s buttons here. Feel free to ignore a Brit’s opinion when deciding how to vote.
@dslucia
OK, sorry about that.
Socialism is a Good Thing, but the bogeymen of the McCarthy years I think still haunts a lot of older Americans. In Britain we have always had a strong Labour movement (until very recently with the Blairite reforms) powerful trade unions, and well educated Marxists. The rise of a grass roots movement like Momentum is a sign that people want the old Worker’s Party back. Bernie had an opportunity to stand up for Socialism, but kinda chickened out. I hope he has sown some seeds tho, what we have seen from the Occupy movement etc, there are people eager to change what is essentially a defunct and corrupt system of governance.
Don’t get me wrong, I am not criticising ‘progressives’ or ‘liberals’ but a system which still favours big money above the worker, women, LGBTQI+, the disabled, the person of colour, the elderly and dispossessed. Once you fix the system, you solve the problem.
Trump has been an agitator for the forgotten masses, because they need someone to blame for their predicament. He seems to be the man with the answers, pointing the finger at all the wrong targets. They want rid of ‘Big Government’ but this is just handing control to the corporations on a plate. He talks about building a wall to keep out Mexicans and banning Muslims from entering the country, so they won’t steal your jobs or take your tax dollars in benefits. He’s going to give the biggest businesses tax breaks to boost the ‘trickle down’ economy. He will not solve the problems of homeless, unemployment, pollution, climate change, lack of universal healthcare, privatised schools and prisons, job insecurity and alienation. But he offers an alternative to those who believe his rhetoric, because they think he’s ‘different’. People do not trust politicians, but for some strange reason they trust businessmen. Snake oil is on offer today, buy one get one free! And they love bogeymen to blame for all society’s ills, because it takes the focus off of themselves.
BTW, I think most people on here know I’m a British communist and a member of the IMT.
@Virgin Mary,
The choir: you’re preaching to it.
The reason Clinton has 800+ employees and tens of thousands of volunteers is to get people out to vote even when she is up 20 on election day. This is how well-run campaigns work.
Also, too, the Senate and House matter. A lot. And all the Clinton people know it. We want a drubbing, not just a victory.
Random thoughts on different names for political leanings: I used to think (when I was very little) that US ‘Republicans’ must be on the left, precisely because of the French (and English) republicans i.e. anti-monarchists. Again, I was little, ok?! 🙂
And here in Aust. the ‘Liberal’ party is the right-wing one (well, the more right-wing one). So Liberal (with a capital) means conservative/right. And the Labor party drops the ‘u’ that we would normally put in ‘labour’.
I was once at a pub with some friends from a socialist party, who were yelled at by members of another socialist party for being “Stalinists”. All I could think of was that scene from Life of Brian:
Finally, it’s been handy to read the various comments on third-party and minor party problems here. We have a preferential voting system rather than FPTP so how to cast one’s vote is a somewhat different debate, given that smaller parties can exercise considerable power, especially in the Senate.
It’s very simple: they’re not. Once you go above a certain level of position (usually local, possibly state in some areas), you essentially need the establishment. Politicians get around the stigma of being “establishment” either by completely ignoring or refuting that stigma (see Clinton), by lying about it (see Bush Jr.*), or by being establishment while absolutely no one notices (see Sanders).
Personally, I blame William Henry “Log Cabin and Hard Cider” Harrison. Jackson may have had the reputation for anti-intellectual support, but Harrison directly profited off it in his campaign.
* I like the way the first Daily Show book put it (paraphrased): “This Ivy League-educated, multiple-term governing son of a former president successfully ran for office as a political outsider. Historians are still figuring out how the f*** he pulled that off.”
Hello.
From the article :
I do not want to play bad omen bird here, but something close had been happened in France in 2002. Sure, the election system is different, but it is maybe not good to rely only on the surveys/polls to be relieved.
There have been 3 main candidates for the first turn : Le Pen (far-right), Chirac (right, already president at this time), Jospin (left). Plus many “small” candidates. Jospin was first in the polls if i remember right, so he made a minimal campain. A fair quantity of people who would have vote for him if there had been some kind of “danger” he lost then choosed to vote for minor candidates they were liking more, or not to vote, thinking others will do it. Consequently, Jospin finished third and thus retire from candidacy in order to avoid a possible victory of Le Pen.
So, beware of the false feeling of security that may give favorable polls.
(er, i hope it does not look like i want to give you a lesson about politics. It is just a reminding that polls are just… polls)
Have a nice day.
@Mish
The Australian Liberal thing confused me when I 1st heard it (honestly still does). Over here, ‘liberal’ is most often used as a snarl word for people who aren’t sufficiently dedicated to tax cuts and Jesus. The kind of people most likely to use it pronounce it ‘librul’ with a certain twang on the 1st syllable. After a few years of hearing that constantly, nobody’s confused about which party they belong to and which they’re denigrating. Common language, eh?
@occasional reader
That kinda sorta happened to Romney (Republican) last time. He was so sure he’d win, he didn’t write a concession speech. Karl Rove and other Republican ‘political operatives’ convinced him the election was gonna be close, but that he’d take it in the end. Turns out, it wasn’t that close, and he didn’t take it
Clinton ain’t the type to let the presidency slip outta her hands 2x. She’s got a massive war chest, and she’s gonna use it
That was a very informative lesson, thank you. Didn’t know about that. Also, did some googling. The ‘right wing’ party is called the Republicans now? I wonder if, even unconsciously, that has something to do with our Republicans…