***Official Political Discussion Thread***

[rolaholic]

Can't really blame her for not wanting to give a speech, but Kamala just canceling her speech at Howard is...not great.

Would've been good for her dedicated campaign folks at least more than anything but yea wasn't great optics.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

Welp, this sucks.

Surpri

Real quick, I haven't been around because I don't want to. Life been tough for the last 6 months. Dealing with health issues, mom dealing with other health issues, lost a close friend, girlfriend got in a bad crash and been taking care of her, been traveling to Saint Lucia because my grandma is finally starting to slip mentally and I want to spend as much time with her while she remembers me.

I wish I were making all this **** up. All this happened so close together I logged outta NT one day when I was trading in my phone and really never had the time or interest to log back in. I don't really know when or if I will post actively again.

Anyway, regarding the election. It was better I wasn't around because I was sure Trump was gonna win.

Really by no fault of Harris, all things she ran a great campaign.

But like I was a while ago, Trump had a major advantage in that people are really upset about inflation and immigration. But the unfortunate thing is that they don't understand both, and worse don't understand what policies can get the outcomes they desire.

We see this happening all over the work. Where incumbent parties are taking major loses because people are pissed about those two things.

I still found time to do campaign work, and I saw this over and over. People just think Trump has some magic in these areas. Even though when we pulled people, they prefer Harris's policies, and had a more favorable view of her personally.

People are gonna focus on the culture war stuff, there will be a lot of finger pointing but I would suggest people wait until next spring more thorough analysis comes out on who broke where and for what reason. There will be some really nasty reasons too, but hey, a lot of voters are petty and irrational people too.

Anyway, hope everyone and their families and safe and healthy.

Because and America and the world are in serious trouble.

When stuff gets better on my end, I'll be back around.

keep your head up bro

this will be me when aepps20 and RustyShackleford comeback to NT;

 

[Cashflow]

 

[dacomeup]

I can understand why you're angry, but I assure you it's misplaced. You asked why do we have to hope and I answered with the alternative being a chicken little situation. I was not attempting to be patronizing.

If folks want to focus on the terrible things that may happen, that's their choice. I'm not saying you're wrong for believing it will happen. But I will absolutely point out that operating like that isn't a healthy way to live. And would suggest to everyone to try a different approach.

Tbh, I don’t need your advice on how to approach or live through this situation. You might not be trying to be patronizing, but it absolutely feels that way. As a lawyer, my understanding of how these systems work and how fragile they are isn’t going to allow me to have some blind optimism here. You can carry on however you need to in order to survive.

 

[atlsfinest]

She was literally out there on the trail with "Those who lean right and aren't hardcore conservatives"

And it got her NOTHING.

What is the point to keep moving center if the center just keeps moving right?

Is it even the center anymore? Those times are dead man

I think Kamala ran a great campaign, all things considered but I was always the skeptical of this approach. Getting all of these era Republicans on your side like Liz Cheney and George Bush's kids completely appointments. If anything proudly touting that you have These conservatives in your camp pushes away progressives and doesn't win over any Republicans.

Democrats wasted tens of millions of dollars funding the Lincoln Project trying to appeal to disaffected Republicans and Romneycrats. It literally didn't accomplish anything in 2020 and they dumped millions of more dollars into it this election cycle and accomplished nothing once again.

 

[freeze]

Woke up disgusted. Been up 3 hours now. Still disgusted.

 

[rolaholic]

Damn, Taylor Swift really ain't **** then. That's supposed to be the endorsement that would corral white women.

And Latino men?? It really be my own people

That's the thing, white women continuously show that they aren't voting against their interest moreso as they have most of the same interests politically as white men...

For so long folks thought that being women insulated them from the same motivational factors as men or somehow made them more progressive (like is often the case with other demographics of women) but they keep showing us that's not true.

Taylor Swift's pull wasn't gonna be enough to get them to go against their husbands

 

[mplsdunk]

Stay up RustyShackleford

 

[maldonado]

They probably hate their own mother

These dudes hate everything except other men, it’s ironic..

Even so, they got what they really wanted: to have their hierarchical status as men, as White, as straight, as cisgender, as Christian, as citizens reinforced, and to heap scorn on those they felt deserving of “punishment.”

100%

All the Latinos, women and black voters that coalesced with those folks is disgusting work

“as long as the girls soccer games don’t get infiltrated. God Bless America..”

I'm confused. Did Amber mess up her speech or twerk on stage during the republican national convention?

You’re right - we didn’t get an amber rose twerk sesh















We got trump giving sloppy toppy to an air glizzy

 

[elpablo21]

I’m talking in general beyond this election. Her situation was much more of an uphill battle from the jump.

But in general it’s not even so much pandering and moving to the center. It’s more finding a way to have charm and being charismatic to win back those on the fence voters, those who shifted to the right this election but don’t vote Republican every election. You’re not going to poach and push your hardcore conservatives and the MAGA crowd left. That’s a losing battle. But there’s people who voted Republican this election who are in play to be poached in 2028 the same way the GOP poached people who voted blue in 2020 this election.

I hear ya for sure the messenger has to be right and most likely not a woman and especially not a woman of color. I think there's a ton Dems get away with if that's the case and the deep dive analysis doesn't need to be that deep sometimes like for some of these ppl walk into a voting booth

I don't know the entire answer when two parties are allowed to operate on separate terms and rules.

Dems will win again like I said and Im not really worried about that but we continue to go down a path where some things can't be reversed. They'll reset, the same ppl privileged switch voters but damage to other will already be set in place is my biggest gripe in all of this

 

[Girl Thats Jules]

Love the meltdown in here.

 

[jshortt]

I mean you will be fine with all of your side gigs but don't let her bait you into doing/saying anything stupid.

Touché.

 

[flyeed]

A lot of this energy here:

Instead of the introspection of posts like these:

The key here is to still carve out your own principled policy positions and vision of the country or else you run the risk of falling into the time honored centrist fallacy of running instead as a republican-lite to appeal to the other side when we see it proven time and time again that Republican leaning voters will under no circumstances, ever vote for the half version over the genuine article.

The Obama-era coalition was a mirage that barely lasted half a cycle, gotta adapt to the current reality of the electorate.

Better off running on economic populism from the side of the other side of ideological spectrum that you're supposed to represent. Replicate their campaign strategy and message/line discipline but not the actual politics since you're supposed to be a credible alternative, not a polite version of the same thing they're already being offered.

Rehabilitating all the Bush-era neocons and ghouls led to absolutely zero gains and an actual decrease in Republican leaning voters voting Democrat from '20. That entire 'we love a strong republican party'/West Wing bi-partisan governing pipe dream line of thinking needs to be dead and buried for good of the Democrats. That's become a proven losing strategy multiple times.

Why not switch things up instead of doubling down into the abyss?

There is a global push toward fascism currently that goes far beyond the U.S., that's what people seemingly across the globe seem to be choosing. There is only one path toward recapturing people and bringing them toward the left (the same left that seemed to an oncoming juggernaut when Obama was elected in 200 and it doesn't involve consistent pandering toward an ever-shrinking center as the Dems have chosen to do.

She was literally out there on the trail with "Those who lean right and aren't hardcore conservatives"

And it got her NOTHING.

What is the point to keep moving center if the center just keeps moving right?

Is it even the center anymore? Those times are dead man

and RustyShackleford sorry for all you’re going through and appreciate you dropping your insights despite it all.

Don’t you think if you could foresee this though that in the end of the day you still have to play with the cards that you’re dealt and run a GOOD campaign accordingly? If you can notice these trends in other elections there also had to be a trend in what happens when you face these circumstances but then try to appeal to the “moderates” and center right leaning types.

I too felt like this was going to be easy pickings for DT. I’d never seen so little enthusiasm for a dem candidate in my life whereas the enthusiasm was still there for trump. But I also don’t think this was circumstantial with inflation/immigration and that as long as dems are losing the cultural war in this landscape with social media that things will only worsen, and that the answers aren’t just let’s wait for the country to get more brown with more college degrees. Being culturally just the party of abortion and LGBTQ rights isn’t cutting it either, since a lot of non-whites don’t care that much about these topics. There’s gotta be better branding and more to it.

 

[nonnative]

This all that needs to be said. Working class people feel the crunch of inflation the most, don't understand how it works, and blame whoever is in charge. It's a reactionary vote born out of frustration far more than a policy vote.

 

[Lucky13s]

You always have to resort to insults.

Cool. So then you’ll vote for me for president? Or do I also have to be racist, sexist, and a sexual abuser too?

 

[gry60]

Dismissing people as “idiots” for supporting Trump misses the point. Instead, the focus should be on understanding why they’re voting that way and addressing those concerns consistently and early on.

This narrative of Democrats living in a bubble has got to stop.

Dude posted screenshots of his Trump supporter father in law. We know them because we live with them. We call them idiots because they "agree politically with Kamala's policies, but they want to teach Democrats a lesson."

These are our family members dude. We're not talking about strangers: welfare recipients who vote for less social programs; former detainees who support unfair pro-police laws.

Let's stop this nonsense.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

I take that with a grain of salt tbh. The right has a massive megaphone behind them (even larger with X) that trumpets every Democrat as being a communist, and to this point the Dems suck at combating that.

sure but like...the right always has a massive megaphone, if it can't survive negative messaging from republicans is the policy really that popular?

Meanwhile actual progressive policies such as affordable healthcare, student loan forgiveness, etc are popular.

Issue polling imo is just highly misleading. if those messages aren't with negative framing from the opposing side, i think those polls aren't worth much.

The child tax credit polled so well and was so popular, but when it went into effect, Dems saw no benefit from it. When it expired, the public had no reaction to it.

not to say that Dems shouldn't do it on principle but I think we should be very very skeptical of issue polls moving forward.

And again, where in my post did I ever say that Biden ran a politically brilliant campaign? His association with Obama did a lot of groundwork for him too — someone else who ran on progressive policies at the time

Im not saying you did. to be clear, i was more cirtisizting the implications of the tweet.

the idea of the tweet if im not misreading is that Biden ran a better campaign than Harris.

I don't even think that's true. Biden had a MUCH more favorable environment and nearly lost still.

Obama also strategically moderated a ton.

 

[elpablo21]

I think Kamala ran a great campaign, all things considered but I was always the skeptical of this approach. Getting all of these era Republicans on your side like Liz Cheney and George Bush's kids completely appointments. If anything proudly touting that you have These conservatives in your camp pushes away progressives and doesn't win over any Republicans.

Democrats wasted tens of millions of dollars funding the Lincoln Project trying to appeal to disaffected Republicans and Romneycrats. It literally didn't accomplish anything in 2020 and they dumped millions of more dollars into it this election cycle and accomplished nothing once again.

Yeah and I'm done Never Trumpers unless they want to register as a Dem and vote down ballot like one

Maybe it's time to have a conversation with those folks about moving a little left

 

[yobyellav]

What does Kamala do now?

 

[IATT]

Man, my ancestors survived being enslaved, brutally rapes, sexually assaulted, murdered by racists, and other unthinkable things on this very land, while building this country through blood, sweat and tears. I don’t need to be lectured on being chicken little or how I should hope for the best. There are practical realities to a Trump Presidency that are frightening to minorities, immigrants, women, working class people, LBGTQ people, and other groups. Trump and his people have put together a playbook for what they plan on doing this time and these policies will clearly affect these people. Democracy is fragile and ultimately upheld by the people, not by hoping. If that’s how you plan on dealing with this than go ahead. I and many others in this thread do not need to be talked to in this patronizing way.

Sadly the only hope against the degree of stupidity and cruelty, is we about to find out how far the big business interests are going allow this to go

Like the stupidity with the tariffs.. or when a state like Alabama or texas goes a little too far and it starts impacting football recruits

The BS games with Disney in Florida being a perfect example, the whole economy of central Florida is based around Disney.. that fight can only go but so far

 

[me love nutella]

Ok, yes personally I think Democrats should focus more on policy. Harris actually had a good plan regarding middle class Americans and homeownership and the only way I found out about that plan is by looking it up on her site.. This loss is completely on the Dems being out of touch with their voters..

Yup. The fact the Democrats pandered to centrists and Republicans, instead of more left-leaning voter bases. She was not going to sway them.

Another reason Kamala lost was because she had NOTHING to say about last 4 years. The Democrats constantly refuse to hit the ground running because they are no better than these right-wing idiots.

 

[ntva28]

 

[rolaholic]

This all that needs to be said. Working class people feel the crunch of inflation the most, don't understand how it works, and blame whoever is in charge. It's a reactionary vote born out of frustration far more than a policy vote.

Now those tarrifs are gonna teach a lot of folks a hard lesson unfortunately

 

[me love nutella]

Damn, Taylor Swift really ain't **** then. That's supposed to be the endorsement that would corral white women.

And Latino men?? It really be my own people

Why are we blaming the Latinos though? Like as if Kamala didn't double down on the border.

 

[osh kosh bosh]

Dems can't be the party of college educated suburbanites and shrinking black and brown voter base.

the math doesn't work.