this is funny because it’s true that the republican party has been a threat to democracy since 1968 or so, unless you downplay black voter suppression to the point where (white) people agree it doesn’t really count
That’s been the thing about the whole debate to me. It kind of comes down to semantics and whether people should be alarmed about the expansion of racist discriminatory policy that’s been aimed at Black people forever. There aren’t any stakes in it imo except to properly categorize oppression.
And I totally get being annoyed with people who act as if Trump is the spring from which all harms have flown but I don’t understand how acting like those things are just fine and good and acceptable as regular business helps anyone.
what I would say is that Trump is rooted in traditional conservative authoritarianism, racism, and lunacy going back to the 30s (which used to be quite bipartisan), but also a major break with tradition. Dixiecrats never attempted a coup against the national government
Not against the *national* government no but they did against state governments, and part of the reason why is, they didn’t need to because they were firmly in charge. Trump is a break inasmuch white people don’t feel firmly in charge anymore so definitely an escalation.
The TNC thesis that Trump is an expression of white backlash to the Obama presidency feels right, and I don’t know why people need to link it to foreign traditions of fascism, which there are plenty of, to feel an urgency about opposing it.
Man, I didn't even LIKE Obama very much, but he's so far above any Republican candidate of the past sixtyish years that it's not even funny.
But scary black man, so GOP gonna GOP
Absolutely! He was a fairly middle of the road moderate! He even kept up the drone strikes that Republicans love so much! But his skin tone makes him a horrible existential threat to them.
And Obama wanted sooo much to be a Centrist hero. He would’ve accepted virtually anything just to pass a bipartisan bill. The Republicans could have worked him for all sorts of policy concessions in his first term but just couldn’t tamp down their hatred
I have a suspicion that Biden’s just calling their bluff on immigration. Doing so caused the Republicans to torpedo their most salient talking point ahead of the election, and he’s not forcing the issue like he is with student loan forgiveness
Here’s the thing “calling their bluff” on closing the border only makes it seem like that’s a reasonable and laudable goal for everyone and they’re not bluffing so when they get the opportunity to they’ll push for it. It’s like calling their abortion stance a bluff but they’re very sincere.
Sure. However the Republicans had won the messaging war on this. Popular opinion was already on their side. Letting the Senate bill implode has effectively killed it. The House won’t even consider writing their own bill. Barring some dramatic event it’s a dead issue at least until next term
It’s polling as the most salient issue for voters at the moment. Buying and reinforcing the conservative framing is how they consistently win on anything touching on race, immigration, poverty etc. hell “conservatives have a strong message on abortion” was the conventional wisdom until Dobbs.
The messaging war never ends and it is very much the dems responsibility to shift thinking on immigration. We must have leaders recognizing immigration as a strength and not a threat. bsky.app/profile/crai...
Everyone got more worried and that includes some democrats. We all live in a fucked up information ecosystem so that is mostly inevitable unless it is a clearly partisan issue. And I wish it were, I wish democrats would stop negotiating with themselves and recognize immigration as our strength.
