Politics isn’t rational.

I wish for another wishing well.

First, that is an extremely bad-faith interpretation of my words, and you know it.

Second, historically, when countries face autocratic moments like ours, often the only way they out the autocrat is by completely abandoning the corrupt center-left party that allowed and enabled the far right authoritarians. Voters often spend several election cycles fruitlessly trying to get the center-left party to make the necessary changes to challenge the autocrat. In the end, the center left party loses more and more popularity, until it collapses completely. Their credibility is mud with the general populace; they simply have no viable path to winning an election. The party needs to collapse into nothing. Only then is there enough room for a new party that can actually challenge the autocrat to rise. They try several cycles of dutifully voting for the center-left corporate party, but it just doesn’t work. In the end they just have to let it burn.

Centrist Dems are not going to be able to defeat Trumpism. And this inability also makes them incredibly weak candidates to win elections against Trumpism. If the DNC is going to just keep forcing useless ineffectual centrists on the party, really, the quickest way to defeat MAGA will be for as many Democrats to abandon the Democratic Party and vow to never vote for them again. Centrist dems will just keep losing election after election after election. They’re losers. Weak, ineffectual losers. They can’t win elections against Trump. Biden only managed to eek out a win in 2020 due to Covid.

If Dems are going to keep forcing corporate centrists through, you are actually delaying the defeat of Trumpism by voting for them. As corporate Dems can’t win a general election against Trumpism, voting for them is as completely pointless as voting for third party candidates in 2024. Centrist Dems just aren’t serious presidential contenders anymore; you shouldn’t take them seriously. A vote for a centrist Dem is a vote for another MAGA term. Even if a corporate Dem gets the nomination, a vote for them is still a vote for a longer MAGA reign.

If they force another corporate centrist through in 2028, the 2028 election is already lost. At that point, the goal should be to make sure that the corporate candidate loses spectacularly. The corporate Dem is never going to win, but they might eek out a 45-55 loss that lets the DNC keep pretending that corporate Dems have a chance at winning the general election. At that point, with the election already lost, the goal should be to make sure the centrist Dem loses by an overwhelming, comically large 30-70 margin or similar. You need to take so much credibility from the Dems that the party collapses completely.

We’re in a fight that is going to take more than one election cycle. Accept that now. You need to think more strategically than just one election cycle in the future. Because “vote blue no matter who” can actually extend the reign of the MAGA movement.

Hopefully we won’t get stuck with a shithead corporate centrist in 2028. But if we do, I’ll be boycotting the presidential general election, only voting in the Congressional elections. I do this because I care about the country, and I want to see MAGA defeated as quickly as possible. If a corporate Dem is the nominee in 2028, then Dems have already lost the election. At that point, your thoughts should immediately move to 2032, as that will be the next chance Dems have at ousting MAGA.

I can confirm. I was there standing in the corner watching. But in a strictly nonsexual way.

The Adjuster remains at large.

You’re right. Both sides aren’t the same. One side are Nazis. The other are Nazi collaborators.

They’re objectively different, but that ain’t saying much.

We’ve been focusing on the next election for decades at this point. At some point you need to recognize the insanity of doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different result.

Voting for a corporate Dem IS voting in favor of fascism.

Corporate Dems know that the only path they ever have to power is if the alternative is Republican autocracy. They’re too unpopular on their own to have any way of winning an election based on their personality or positions. They can only win by fear. Thus, they cannot actually dismantle fascism. They can’t pass reforms stripping the presidency of emergency powers to prevent it from being abused. They can’t launch a law enforcement crackdown to finally put MAGA in the ground. They need MAGA. They want MAGA. They need a giant monster standing behind them to terrify the populace into voting for them. That is the only way they can possibly win an election. In fact, they have every incentive to make that monster as big and as terrifying as possible.

Voting for a centrist Dem guarantees eventual holocaust. The Fascists will just keep becoming more extreme and violent, even when the corporate Dems are in power. The occupants of the White House will alternate between Fascists and corporate Dems, moving further to the right each cycle. Eventually they’ll start killing people by the millions. Centrist Dems are unable to prevent this. They need fascists in order to get in to power.

Biden was the first to float that idea actually.

The problem with voting for a party simply because “we aren’t fascism” is that it produces the most perverse incentives imaginable. If the only way Democrats can win the White House is by simply not being fascist, what motivation do they have to reform the system so that fascists won’t be able to come back into power?

If there is a free election in 2028, and if Democrats somehow manage to win, they need to act decisively. They need to pass a storm of legislation that drastically curtails the powers of the presidency. If they don’t, then we could be right back with another wannabe dictator Republican in power in 2032. We need to end the emergency powers, curtail the powers of ICE, end the mass surveillance, essentially dismantle the entire post-911 security architecture that put us at such a danger of dictatorship. It’s an evil machine that never should have been built.

This is the fatal error of wanting to support a centrist Dem in 2028. The only way such a candidate is going to get elected is if they can run against the specter of fascism and dictatorship. They have zero motivation to dismantle the tools a future dictator would use; they need there to be a threat of a future dictator in order to win reelection. If that centrist Dem wins in 2028, and makes it so dictatorship is impossible, what are they going to run on in 2032? They need there to be a credible threat of dictatorship in order to win election. A centrist Dem can never dismantle fascism, as the looming potential of fascism is their only hope of getting elected. Centrist Dems want to dangle the threat of fascist dictatorship, like a Sword of Damocles, over your head forever. Corporate Dems will never dismantle what is their only hope of getting and retaining power.

Why is it always progressives who have to compromise? Why can’t centrists for once have to hold their nose and vote for a progressive?

Honestly, considering the person behind this, it wouldn’t surprise me if this were just a cheap insurance fraud attempt. We don’t have video of this purported robbery, we just have the word of a known liar. If you’re the Secretary of Homeland Security, getting replacement IDs quickly is not going to be a problem. Proving your identity is trivial; you have staff around you 24/7 ready to vouch for your identity. And what insurance company is going to want to accuse the Secretary of Homeland Security of fraud over a few thousand dollars?

Easiest scam in the world. Feed your IDs and checks through a paper shredder. Put your purse, wallet, and medication in a trash bag, put it in the bin right before the truck arrives. Or maybe just burn those in a fireplace. You have now destroyed your purse and its contents. Call the media to report your purse has been stolen and claim in contained $3k in cash. Have your staff file an insurance claim for the purse, the value of its contents, and the $3k in cash. Have your staff do the legwork of getting all your documents restored.

Instant $3k, and you never have to lift a finger.

Do I think a Trumpist Homeland Security Secretary would be petty enough to commit insurance fraud for a measly $3k? Why yes, yes I do think they would be that petty. They would do the whole thing just daring the insurance company to call their bluff.

Easiest scam in the world.

I was going to find some extremely old racial epithet that starts with an N, so obscure it wouldn’t offend anyone anymore. But I decided I don’t want to Google “obscure ethnic slurs” today, so I decided to skip this comment.

And that’s nothing. You know how they’re pushing for washing machines, dishwashers, etc. to be internet connected? Currently they’re forcing this for data mining purposes. But I have no doubt their real goal is to eventually make these devices like printers, with expensive consumables locked in by internet-connected DRM. They’ve already gotten people used to using dish and clothes detergent pods. How long until they’re putting everything in plastic cartridges, locking things down with DRM, and charging like printer companies do?

No, the “Christians” who oppose trade clearly have never even read the Bible, or even just the New Testament. Jesus spent a lot of time telling people to love the stranger, the traveler, and the alien. To treat a foreigner in your land as kindly as you would your brother. Modern Republicans have completely abandoned the teaching of the actual historical Jesus.

I need someone to cross-stitch me this.

These people deserve to burned at the stake.

It’s easy to forget just how much money a billion dollars is, let alone hundreds of billions.

You could hire three hundred people at a very generous salary of $250k/year. 8 hour shifts, that gives you 100 people guarding you 24/7. That would $75 million/year. You could do that off the investment income from a single billion dollars. Pay them the salary more typical of a security guard, like $50k/year, and Musk could be surrounding 24/7 by one hundred thousand security guards, and it would cost him $15 billion/year. He has enough wealth to afford that if he really wanted to. The man could take a cue from ancient Rome and commission his own army if he wanted to.

We need to eliminate billionaires. No one should have this type of power.

Well, we’re going to have to figure out how to level off or shrink our population eventually. Might as well do it now while there are still some wild animal species that haven’t gone extinct.

Well, in The Sims it more involved a swimming pool and a disappearing ladder.