Should I stay in America if it has become too corrupt and too undemocratic?

[Raze]

41 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

That's absolutely not true at all.

Biden's Incumbency still is a major electoral advantage for him even in this day and age because: 

Why is Biden losing in most polls then? 

[Rafael Thundercat]

4 hours ago, Bobby_2021 said:

That's because they are kept underdeveloped by the neoliberals for extracting cheap resources and labour.

Neoliberal style capitalism is the biggest reason for why they are underdeveloped, more factually kept as such.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_republic

The amount of things you can learn only from this link is amazing. If we follow the money we will find the truth, at least the truth about corruption

[Husseinisdoingfine]

The Changing Vibe Among Young Conservatives

 

 

[Rafael Thundercat]

1 hour ago, Bobby_2021 said:

"It's popular on the left to blame capitalists."

My dude, entirety of Leftism is grounded on blaming the capitalists. 

Please make it clear which side you are on. If you defending the capitalists abroad make sure to do it at home as well, because it's literally the exact same corporations. You may even get paid by the orange guy.

If these mega corporations can corrupt the US govt, imagine what they can do to a small African govt.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackwater_(company)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackRock

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackstone_Inc.

only the tip of the iceberg

[zazen]

On 29/06/2024 at 2:05 PM, zazen said:

Mind the gap between rhetoric and reality

The Western hypocrisy in regards to democracy, free speech and human rights will have you thinking Westerners don't value their own Western values - but its the elites who don't. Every day people may have values, elites have interests. Power brokers weaponise the values of the populace as a smokescreen for their own gain. They wear these values like a cheap halloween costume.

This domestic sleight of hand shows up in Western foreign policy also. Spreading democracy and liberty is a guise for global dominion. The elites have perfected the art of harnessing the good hearts of the many to funnel power and profits into the hands of the few. Campaign promises, emotional appeals, manufactured consent with a complicit media, token gestures and scapegoating are all the tools of politics.

The tragedy is that the energy, passion, and genuine desire for positive change exhibited by ordinary citizens are real. But in the hands of cynical power, these become just another resource to be exploited. This exploitation of goodwill creates a feedback loop of polarised extremes - either despair and apathy or tribalism and anger. As people witness their efforts repeatedly twisted or nullified, they retreat from civic engagement, or become engaged in a tribalistic way full of anger against the 'other' side of the political aisle they lay blame to.

Westerners are raised on lofty notions of democracy, freedom, and human rights, only to witness their nations routinely violate these principles both domestically and abroad. This grand canyon between rhetoric and reality creates a pervasive sense of disorientation, disillusionment and disenchantment. Whats packaged to Westerners about their society, isn't whats found once the wrappers open. They struggle to reconcile the high-minded values they've internalised with the often brutal realpolitik practiced by their governments. In a cruel twist, many individuals internalise this discord, believing the fault lies within themselves rather than the system that surrounds them. This is where leftism creates a atmosphere of shame, guilt and self loathing over the West's past and current injustices.

To remedy this, its important to realise that this feeling of malaise and cognitive dissonance isn't because of you, its because of whats around you. It's not your state of mind, it's the state of affairs of the structure you live in. In light of Leo's recent video on traps, heres one to be mindful of: don't internalise the contradiction and cognitive whiplash caused by the difference between public ideals and private interests. Quite literally, you need to mind the gap between rhetoric and reality - be mindful enough to separate elite interests and actions from the peoples - or else conflating what your country does with what you or your neighbour are will lead to nihilism, confusion, tribalism and in the case of leftists, self flagellation. 

Money is the lifeblood of American politics, seeping into every corner of the system and corrupting it from within. It’s not democracy, it’s oligarchy with the lipstick of the democratic process.

- The ballot box is a suggestion box. Voting has become a hollow ritual, a pressure release valve for public discontent rather than a genuine mechanism for change. We're given the illusion of choice, but the menu is curated by two parties not allowing for anything else.

- As voting rights expanded, the relevance of those votes contracted. Allow the public to cathartically shout into a sound proof room, but let them know their grievances are heard. We've won the right to participate in a system that's been quietly hollowed out from the inside. Voting became democratised, but the power behind that vote has been diluted to homeopathic levels.

- The Supreme Court ruled corporations with personhood status alchemizing them into people and money into speech. Money literally talks, but what language? Money became words. Words became votes. Votes became commodified. It's a legal fiction that's metastasized into a political cancer. By equating money with speech, they've essentially given megaphones to the wealthy while the rest of us are left shouting into the void. It's turned democracy into an auction house where policies go to the highest bidder.

This unholy trinity - the neutered ballot box, the diluted vote, and the corporate citizen - forms the backbone of our modern oligarchy. It's a system where the appearance of democracy is maintained while its substance is stripped away, leaving us with a plutocratic skeleton wearing the tattered skin of a republic.

[Rafael Thundercat]

@Hardkill The very Tone of this youngs are the same of some I see in Brasil Rigth Wing. Is all survival. they see an oportunity for them financialy on supporting this ideas. The Brasilians I know are connected to a plataform called Brasil Paralelo link below. as far as I know the founders of this plataform are young investors, guys who play in the Financial markets and drive money to drive their agenda. They even are doing Movies retelling the story of Brasil Colonization painting the Colonizers as not so bad and trying to reflame the Patriotic Fire on people.

https://page.brasilparalelo.com.br/seja-membro/?src=97804e5e10c845e59061eed150828c75&utm_source=bing&utm_medium=ads&utm_campaign=ppt_geral&utm_term=00 - [KW] Brand&utm_content=Responsivo&msclkid=f96b9c2f16bd1a5d7394fab4dc630be1

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brasil_Paralelo

Brasil Paralelo affirms that the production is done independently, non-partisan, exempt and based on a large information collection analyzed by specialists. According to the company, all resources come from the sale of subscriptions, which allow access to additional content.[30]

"The interpretation of the founding partners is rigid in the fact that Brazilian culture has declined because of the interdependence with the State. This is exactly what limits the freedom of the media.

From the first moment, even taking out loans from private banks, the partners decided not to be partisans, not to campaign politically, not to benefit from public notices, incentive laws or any source of public money. They already predicted that these relations with the State would diminish the company's credibility.

- Writing by Brasil Paralelo, February 15, 2021."[30]

However, divergent information was published by the newspaper Le Monde Diplomatique Brasil, which argues that since its origin the producer has been linked to a series of privileges in the coverage of political personalities not accessible to ordinary people, in addition to benefiting from the facilitation in raising funds from the National Film Agency (Ancine) for the production of a documentary on the election of Jair Bolsonaro.

 

Edited July 20 by Rafael Thundercat

[Nemra]

1 hour ago, Husseinisdoingfine said:

The Changing Vibe Among Young Conservatives

 

The PragerU part was unsettling.

[Hatfort]

2 hours ago, Hardkill said:

Biden really is the only one (or Harris if Biden resigns the presidency to her) who run on all of the historic accomplishments he has achieved for the whole country. Someone like Newsom can't claim any credit for any of those accomplishments:

Yes he can, Newsom has been a man of the team. All he has been doing, and would have to continue if taken the torch, is praising Biden's term and his accomplishments, which there are. He in fact speaks in behalf of Biden better than Biden himself, I watched his debate with DeSantis. He is not perceived as a rival of Biden, because he really is not.

Biden is too old, he has declined more than expected, that's the reality. I was with Bernie back when they had their primaries, but Biden won, so got in his boat against a greater evil. I was still going to support him now, I thought Cenk Uygur was wrong when he was asking for a replacement, I thought Biden could give the race. But that illusion fell in the debate, it was really a before-and-after moment, we've seen the king without clothes, or whatever that phrase is. Ideally, he would have retired with grace and let the primaries happen, but that train is gone. It's in moments of crisis when the Democratic party, or anyone, have to prove they can come up with solutions.

Edited July 20 by Hatfort

[Rafael Thundercat]

3 hours ago, eleanor said:

Am afraid Europe is in a bad way as well. I live in the UK and unfortunately, if you are trying to get away from US, not a good idea to come here as we follow the US 'shoulder to shoulder' even against our own best interest. 

I left the US thirty years ago so don't think that was the best solution as inevitably same/similar issues are now here. 

Perhaps creating an online community, (what I'm thinking now) as there really will be nowhere to run. Take a stand wherever you are with an online community to support well-being. 

This is some Movement from UK

https://soundcloud.com/user-622675754/joy-white

[Hardkill]

2 hours ago, Raze said:

Why is Biden losing in most polls then? 

Poll more than 1 month out from an election are prone to many errors and have no predictive value. 

[Hardkill]

35 minutes ago, Hatfort said:

Yes he can, Newsom has been a man of the team. All he has been doing, and would have to continue if taken the torch, is praising Biden's term and his accomplishments, which there are. He in fact speaks in behalf of Biden better than Biden himself, I watched his debate with DeSantis. He is not perceived as a rival of Biden, because he really is not.

Biden is too old, he has declined more than expected, that's the reality. I was with Bernie back when they had their primaries, but Biden won, so got in his boat against a greater evil. I was still going to support him now, I thought Cenk Uygur was wrong when he was asking for a replacement, I thought Biden could give the race. But that illusion fell in the debate, it was really a before-and-after moment, we've seen the king without clothes, or whatever that phrase is. Ideally, he would have retired with grace and let the primaries happen, but that train is gone. It's in moments of crisis when the Democratic party, or anyone, have to prove they can come up with solutions.

But it’s not his accomplishments. Most people don’t know who is and don’t trust him outside of California to run the presidency.

[Raze]

3 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

But it’s not his accomplishments. Most people don’t know who is and don’t trust him outside of California to run the presidency.

No President with a job approval as low as Biden has ever won an election 

[Raze]

6 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

Poll more than 1 month out from an election are prone to many errors and have no predictive value. 

That’s not true, in both prior elections the dem candidate had a lead by this point that shrunk as we got closer. 

[Hatfort]

23 minutes ago, Hardkill said:

But it’s not his accomplishments. Most people don’t know who is and don’t trust him outside of California to run the presidency.

That's fixed with a good campaign. There's still time.

He would have two jobs, one acknowledging Biden's accomplishments you talk about, and two establishing a further continuation of those himself as a candidate. Sorry three, he has to keep pointing out how bad Trump is.

Edited July 20 by Hatfort

[kguirnela]

@Hardkill You ever thought about volunteering politically? Someone told me that helps him deal with the politically ish thats going on lately 

[Hardkill]

1 hour ago, Raze said:

No President with a job approval as low as Biden has ever won an election 

Harry Truman did in 1948. Every pollster back then mistakenly thought he would lose to his GOP opponent Dewey. Truman was also about as unpopular as Biden has been.

The polls have very likely underestimated Biden’s true strength. Do you understand that the polls have greatly underestimated the strength of virtually every Democratic candidate since 2022? The polls were off in 2020, 2022, 2023, and 2024.

Even pollsters and pundits have conceded that polling has been a crisis!

[Bobby_2021]

4 hours ago, Rafael Thundercat said:

The amount of things you can learn only from this link is amazing. If we follow the money we will find the truth, at least the truth about corruption

Different places, same playbook.

[Raze]

2 hours ago, Hardkill said:

Harry Truman did in 1948. Every pollster back then mistakenly thought he would lose to his GOP opponent Dewey. Truman was also about as unpopular as Biden has been.

The polls have very likely underestimated Biden’s true strength. Do you understand that the polls have greatly underestimated the strength of virtually every Democratic candidate since 2022? The polls were off in 2020, 2022, 2023, and 2024.

Even pollsters and pundits have conceded that polling has been a crisis!

No, his approval was 70% prior to the 1948 election.

https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/statistics/data/harry-s-truman-public-approval

Polls actually overestimated how well Biden would do in 2020.

https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/president/general/2020

The polling average slightly underestimated Republicans in 2022 

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/2022-generic-congressional-vote-7361.html

I don’t understand what polls were off in 2023 and 2024 as the election hasn’t happened yet 

Edited July 20 by Raze

[Staples]

8 hours ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Simply answer, US never allowed them to develop, with implicit (sanctions, coups, slavery) and explicit (bombings) means.

Imagine bombing the Scandinavian countries to fuck in the 1900s and saying "they never developed themselves in the first place" lmao.

Well, if you first agreed to stop bombing it to fuck, then maybe they could have developed.

Ask yourself why North Korea is so underdeveloped. Because they are under crippling sanctions by from the rest of the world. Same with Iran and now Russia.

There are also a few cases of geography being too harsh for development, but this isn't the norm.

Following the WW2 the US engaged in a systematic bombing campaign on all the allies of the USSR and infringed on their sovereignty  by overthrow their liberal democratic governments, bombing them, and sanctioning them.

These countries were far more developed until the US intervened in their domestic politics for exploitation of natural resources like oil, food and cheap labour.

For example this is women in Iran walked around. The USSR was also incredibly progressive in women's rights and education.

https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/iran-before-revolution-photos/

But US overthrew their *democratically* elected leader which led to significant opposition from the general populace which led to the Islamic revolution of 1979. 

Notice that higher developed countries often do not have aggressive military to fend of the neocolonial capitalist machine of the US. So they were sitting ducks for CIA coups, bombings by the military and financial exploitations by Americans the and intentionally destabilizing entire continents in the name of Freedooomb and dumbocracy lmao.

Yes, exploitation is one factor limiting cultures. However this is a very short term and incomplete perspective.

The cards were dealt many thousands of years ago which shape the current societal developments across different nations.

Consider other factors like:

- Access to resources like metals, oil

- Ability to farm

- Landlocked vs sea based

- having war prone neighbouring societies

- Natural disaster prone areas

Societies develop is the same way you might learn a new skill, they must constantly tackle new challenges and problems that are just within their reach to overcome. If there are no threats, they do not develop. If the threat is too dangerous, they get squashed. It's called the local maxima, leo shared a good video on the blog about it.

Europe has had the best balance in the last 500-1000 years for societal development, prior to that the middle east had some good conditions.

What to live in the most developed and good trajectory country right now? Look to Australia, New Zealand and Scandinavia. Literally go to the world corruption index and pick a country with low corruption and you will be fine.

[Leo Gura]

Leftist critiques of capitalism are delusional. A leftist doesn't understand economics nor business.