TheHiddenCatboy

Right. I like meat. Not going to lie – I can be convinced to eat more plants and less meat, but I’ll fight you if you try to take my meat away.

My father and I can’t be further apart on politics. He’s a Goldwater Republican, old-school hard-core conservative that doesn’t like Trump the man, but loves Trump the politician. He runs his big truck on >>Earth Day just to spite the Environmentalists.

Sounds like you guys have a lot in common behaviorally despite your professed political differences.

And you wonder why you get so many downvotes and pushback. You stand in judgement over what somebody else wants to eat. It’s not enough for you to meet half way. If they don’t capitulate 100% to you and subjugate themselves at your feet, you spit bile at them. You automatically assume the worst about other people, hurl invectives at them, and wonder why it is your candidate of choice doesn’t win. Thanks for illustrating that ‘my way or the highway’ isn’t just Republican territory.

Because your phrasing is disingenuous. You imply nefariousness where none exists. He ran thinking he was the best choice, until he flubbed the debate, and … get this…he got the majority of delegates. 14 million people voted for him. And he won the Primary. Are you saying you and your ilk are more important than the 14.5 million people who cast their ballots for him (you couldn’t manage 2 million votes between your three alternatives to Biden…), and the 3.9k delegates he won? That their expressions of preference should be thrown out so you can have a bruising 4 week primary in August while Trump just uses your various attacks against each of the candidates and racks up hundreds of millions of campaign contributions that he doesn’t have to spend until September? And at best, we just use up Biden’s campaign warchest trying to fend your candidates off, and at worst, we have to start over with some relative unknown with a depleted warchest, and no access to the Biden/Harris warchest? And go through the whole rigamarole of qualifying for state ballots so close to election day? Not to mention the extra costs of running a second set of primaries because you couldn’t accept the fact that you lost?

We had a primary. Biden won that primary. There’s no nefarious plan to install Harris. And the only reason that Harris has to run at all is because you lot showed up here and shat all over Biden over and over and over and over and *four hours later * over again. You lot being sore loser hard-leftists, Greenies pissed that they don’t have more of a say in government, paid actors and disinformation peddlers hired by Republicans and Russians to fragment the Left coalition like has happened time and time again (stupid ‘fall in love’ party), and of course those same Russians and Republicans who directly inject BS into our political discussion. And just to be clear, I’m not speculating on which you are, just pointing out that’s what your coalition is, and that’s why we’re here where we are right now.

What does your answer have to do with tee9000’s question?

Americans make it a past time to hate on other Americans, and don’t think this is limited to Left vs. Right. I like meat. Not going to lie – I can be convinced to eat more plants and less meat, but I’ll fight you if you try to take my meat away. For that, I get called vile things by fanatic vegans who can’t seem to accept that I have my own life and make my own choices, despite the fact that I agree with them on a variety of other things, including having a lighter touch on the planet, being responsible stewards of our resources, treating animals with respect and kindness, and of course things like civil rights. Watch this; I expect them to be along shortly to prove my point.

My father and I can’t be further apart on politics. He’s a Goldwater Republican, old-school hard-core conservative that doesn’t like Trump the man, but loves Trump the politician. He runs his big truck on Earth Day just to spite the Environmentalists. Tee9000’s question speaks to my dad’s and my relationship. If I follow your pattern, I cut him out of my life and leave him high and dry. And trust me: there have been times when I wanted to do exactly that. But what would it accomplish? I’d be disowned by my dad, he’d die old and alone (mom died 5 years ago, I’m his only child), and we’d just hate each other. And I’d never have learned that he swapped out all his incandescent bulbs, which he swore the government would have to pry out of his cold, dead hands, for LED lighting, because…*gasp*…environmentalists listened to the criticisms of CFLs and replaced them with something that matched the quality of lighting from his favourite lights.

You can accomplish far more by listening and cooperating than you do by vilifying and hating on people. That’s Tee9000’s point.

Now, I’m not saying that you should put up with people misgendering you. Far from it. Stand up for your rights. But maybe instead of cutting people out of your life, you should make inclusion in your life contingent on respect. “You used masculine pronouns to refer to me despite knowing that I prefer feminine pronouns. Unless and until you respect me, I will not interact with you any more.” works far better than “fuck you, good bye.” It makes it clear on them that they have to respect you, and maybe, just maybe, you’ll actually change a few minds. I think that’s what Tee9000 is trying to say here.

I could quibble about Clinton overwhelmingly defeating Sanders, but I really don’t have to. The actual numbers were 55.2% Hillary Clinton, 43.1% Bernie Sanders. Clinton won a straight majority of votes – not a plurality, a majority. And I say this as a Bernie Sanders voter who caucused (not voted in a primary, caucused, as in went to a school and stood in a classroom to be counted) for Bernie Sanders. Sanders came in second place because more Democratic Primary voters picked Clinton than Sanders. It wasn’t stolen. Clinton won that fair and square. Contrary to all the various little voices that crept out of the woodwork, and I say this, again, as a voter who caucused for Sanders, more Americans wanted a moderate candidate than risk a Progressive that could honestly be tarred as a Socialist.

That said, I would have LOVED to see Crony Capitalism vs. Euro-Socialism as an election in the USA. Too bad, it was Fascism vs. Crony Capitalism…

Kamala Harris is Joe Biden’s running mate.

Were Biden to have been incapacitated, Kamala Harris would step in for him. We made this choice back in November 2020, and it’ll hold true until January 2025.

Do you expect the Dems to have a contested Primary with less than one month to go until the General? How nice. Everyone will be tearing themselves apart in order to appeal to the various different factions that make up the Democratic Party, weakening each other until the final canidate emerges with a depleted warchest and a whole bunch of bitter people whose favoured candidate DIDN’T win? And assuming Harris, the VP and assumed successor for Biden, doesn’t win this contested primary, has to return the warchest Biden built up?

And Trump will be waiting in the wings, with a building warchest and backers setting up GOTV. Again. Does the far-left WANT Trump to win, because man, that’s what it looks like to me!

Yeah, Picard Principle at play here. You can commit no mistakes and still lose. I can argue that there are a few things that Harris could do better. Americans are stupid and cruel as a whole…you tact too hard to the Left, you piss off the moderate voters and they stay home, vote Third Party, or worse, vote Trump, and if you tact too hard to the Right, you piss off liberal voters, and while they are less likely to vote Trump, you still lose their votes.

Man, we shouldn’t even be having this conversation at all. Trump is a convicted felon. He should be in jail right now, getting ready for the next trials.

This should be seen as a violation of Rule 3 (Be Civil). The poster makes a particularly heinous claim, that Democrats as a whole are child murderers. It’s just as wrong as Republicans saying we are a bunch of baby-murderers.

This poster is not here to engage in honest open debate. It’s here to attack us and make us feel bad about ourselves, so we aren’t as comfortable expressing our political ideology. It’s here to make us ashamed of voting for the major party closest to our position. It’s here to make enough of us sit out or vote third party so that the Republicans could win. Is it doing so to serve the interests of Putin and Xi? Is it doing so because it thinks this is really the best answer to the problems that face the country? Is it doing so because it wants to see it all burn down? It doesn’t matter. Reader, if YOU want to ensure that you don’t want Project 2025 to happen, do not give this bad-faith poster what it wants and vote third party or stay home.

PS: Democrats aren’t killing kids. We actually do have problems with killing kids, but that’s just as true when it’s Hamas or Iran killing Israeli kids as it is when it’s Israelis killing Palestinian kids. We just don’t see a way out that makes this whole shitshow a fuckton worse. Keep that in mind as you read this bad-faith poster’s words.

• Restoring the Spoils System we dismantled back in the 1800s because it was corrupt and filled with cronies.
• Oppressing gays and minorities in the name of ‘eliminating woke ideology’, like what is all over Project 2025.
• Forcing Christianity down non-believers’ throats, like Project 2025 advocates for over and over and over again.
• Enabling Russia to run roughshod over Ukraine.
• Attacking people who look like immigrants, including forced deportations.
• Forcing Culture-War Bullshit down our collective threats.
• Attacks on the rights of women, transgenders, and gays.
• Ignoring climate change.
• Outlaw abortion.
• Defund PBS.
• Cut Food Stamps.
• Push a law made by an anti-masturbationist in the 1800s…

Oh yeah.

• Encouraging Israel to walk over every ‘red line’ without consequences…

Just so that you, the reader, know exactly what this poster is trying to get you to forget. They want you to throw your vote away. They are the bookish nerd girl working for the pretty but vile cheerleader to get the 51 Nerds to throw the election to the 49 Jocks by peeling off 3 of our votes. In fact, whenever you see posts like the one I’m replying to, remember. That’s what they’re trying to do. Make you one of the three dunces that let the 49 Jocks dictate to the 51 Nerds how things are going to go.

I’ve heard that several European countries are looking to replace their Twitter accounts with privately run Mastodon instances, that you can subscribe to from any Mastodon account. And given Elon’s childish insults thrown at Mastodon, I’d be happy to see that take off.

Thanks for this! Less reason to head over to Reddit! Remember to post this over on /r/Denver after it returns. We might not get everyone, but if we can move more people here, I’m all for it.