SinAdjetivos

It turns out the talking point of "voting 3rd party is a vote for Trump" that has been repeated for months does have the desired effect of disenfranchisement, the assumption that they would then vote Democrat is something I never understood.

Ironically my response was fueled by my frustration with that same mantra, lol.

The "solid Democrats" of the last 4+ years have been putting people into ~~camps~~ ~migrant detention centers, prisons, enhanced interregation facilities, any other euphemism for camp that doesn't come with the same baggage~, stripping legal protections and significantly reducing access to medications.

The "existential horror shit" does not stop with this election, regardless of outcome.

that allowing Trump into power is a legitimate threat to the entire system.

If only... That's literally what he is campaigning on and honestly I can not believe people are still unironically and uncritically repeating this after his administration in 2016.

Look at the time spans that nations in Asia or Europe have existed by comparison and the length of time it took to change their ways, often through drastic social upheaval. In comparison the gains in social equalities here have come at a rapid pace in the past century.

I would caution against such sweeping generalizations about world history. Yes, some nations have existed for looooong periods of time relatively coherently, but that isn't typical and "progress" isn't a one way street. Within the lifetime of the US, hell within the last century, there are countless examples of those "social equalities" moving significantly faster, and in both directions.

Also I can't quite tell what you are trying to get at with the historical side tangent. Could you clarify?

I think you are spot on with explaining the perspective of the Democratic party campaign strategists, but I would push back on some of those points.

Remember that the stock market is important to these voters (and his donors), and Trump had everything set up in his favor and still squandered it.

I don't think they see it that way and honestly using the same "objective" metrics, removing 2020-2021 due to COVID being a major outlier, there isn't much difference between the Trump and Biden presidencies from an "economic perspective". If you include 2020-2021 it looks like Trump "squandered it" and Biden had "unprecedented growth" but it's really a story of outliers and how they can be manipulated to tell whatever story you want.

It's also needs to be said that those "objective" metrics have/are becoming increasingly divorced from "objective" reality but that's a conversation for a different thread...

Corporate America does not want a repeat of this

Trump was great for Corporate America, Biden has been even better. The MAGA propaganda is that 'Trump really stuck it to corporate America and was actively working against their interests' or 'he might suck but at least he's hitting the corporations where it hurts them most' but I really haven't seen any good evidence for any of that (see the point above). If you've got some counter evidence to share I'd be interested.

convince some Republican voters who would have voted red "because that's what you do", to instead vote for Kamala.

But they won't any more than you'll convince many Democrats to vote for Trump. Those voters that the Harris campaign is targeting will be voting Libertarian, Green or (mostly) "holding their nose" and voting Trump.

Honestly, one of my biggest annoyances surrounding the Nader spoiler controversy is the assumption that all votes would've gone to Gore where the evidence does not support that conclusion and it's subsequent use as a cudgel to support duopoly instead of the more accurate warning of what happens when you sacrifice your voting block to pander to the other half of the duopoly.

it's easy to forget that just because they're Republican's does not mean they are MAGA

You're right, and within that context it may be useful to use the self identify method the house tepublicans use ("the House Freedom Caucus, the Republican Study Committee, the Main Street Caucus, the Republican Governance Group") to discuss who "is MAGA", who Harris is pandering to and play the fun game of 'which of those 5 groups is the lesser evil?' and look at the ven diagram between those...

How is Bush the counterexample reason to vote for Harris while she is actively campaigning with Dick Cheney?

We can eventually have that conversation as a nation

That's a good way to describe the last 50 years of American politics...

keeping a juvenile squirrel you’re not qualified to care for and just plopping it outside after a few months is naturally going to fail.

Yes, but the squirrel was kept because the owner killed their mother with a car on accident. This is not a case of "wanting a pet squirrel so badly" but trying to rectify a tragic accident.

This person then proceeded to get it zero medical care.

Professional medical care == medical care. Treating that sort of injury requires some training, but it's a far cry from the extensive and critical medical procedure you're trying to sell it as.

They want to be able to release it back into the wild, that’s the ideal resolution.

A juvenile squirrel without a mother to learn from doesn't have a way to learn those survival skills without human intervention which will result in "lost their fear of people".

get the education and certification you need to actually understand how to take care of them.

What education and certifications would those be?

deal with illegals

You mean be the one putting them in cages? Running the ~~concentration camps~~ immigrant detention centers? Using their legal status as leverage for the modern equivalent of indentured servitude?

It turns out people aren't very nice when they're being abused.

champagne communists

So let's stop speaking in euphemisms. When you say "illegals" that is explicitly genocidal language, little different than the usual 'insects', 'vermin', etc.

So why don't we just kill them all? Just set up a militarized zone on the border and shoot anything that moves?

I think you misread, he tried to do the "right thing" and release the squirrel back into the wild which resulted in the squirrel getting injured and coming back to him for help.

He didn't seek veterinary assistance because often euthanization is the outcome. Personally were I a squirrel I would prefer substandard medical care over execution...

Yes, dictatorships and monarchies sometimes have a petition process, but they tend only to pay lip service. Not because they care, they will do as they please becaue they have the power-- hence a dictatorship.

You're so close to getting it...

The promise is that Harris is essentially a continuation of Biden so with that in mind comparing to your list above:

Similarities ✓ the "Muslim Ban" on air travel, employing white nationalists as staffers, packing the supreme court with extreme conservative justices, giving permanent tax cuts to the rich, expanding the presence of immigrant concentration camps, cozying up to foreign dictators, directly pursuing strikes and assassination attempts against middle-Eastern military generals and diplomats, trying to start a trade war with China, discrediting his chief medical advisor on factual statements about Covid, saying Black Lives Matter protestors were "burning down cities", wanting to designate Antifa as a terrorist organization, declaring "far left radical lunatics" part of his "enemy from within", sexually assaulting over a dozen women and underage girls, being a generally abusive sleazebag, also funding a genocide (Israel has always been ethnically displacing Palestinians), also building the wall, also not implementing healthcare reform (and being against what we have), also not protecting abortion rights, and also denigrating anti-genocide protestors (but not as harshly since he wasn't the one in charge when it happened)

Differences: X Popularizing the idea of the wall in the first place, calling illegal immigrants "murderers and rapists", moving the US embassy to Jerusalem, being an avowed friend of Epstein, stating he wanted generals like Adolf Hitler's behind closed doors when his own generals refused to nuke North Korea and blame it on someone else, egging on a far-right insurrection attempt, calling climate change a Chinese hoax, calling Covid the "China virus"

They are faaaarrrr more similar than they are different as honestly some of the "differences" I've noted are just because the exact quotes aren't the same, even if some similiarly spirit quotes have been said.

Okay, nobody I can vote for will change the process. Now what?

Also dictatorships, monarchies, etc. pretty universally have some form of petition process as well, so not actually a difference...