Is America over?

[Cyrano]

So if we get rid of the orange creature, what then?

We get Pence, a white haired Jesus Freak who tries to turn America into Jesusville.

People like Pence never go away. They don't believe in the Constitution. They spend every moment of their lives trying to turn America into (their version of) a "Christian country." In other words, a country in which everyone plays by their rules.

But first things first. The orange creature has to go before the Jesus creature can take over.

Is there something wrong with this picture. We trade in one lunatic for another?

Were something to happen to Trump and Pence at the same time, Nancy Pelosi would become president.

Don't hold your breath. The orange lunatic isn't going anywhere.

And the Jesus freak is just going to sit quietly in the background. ... Waiting.

I don't know if America is over. But at this moment, we are so fucked.

How did we get here? And, if we survive this, how do we prevent it from ever happening again?

After all, WE are the majority. And a crazed minority has taken over our country.

[redstatebluegirl]

1. I think we have to remember that the people who support these bozos are a minority.

The problem is they are a very LOUD BULLYING minority so it appears there are more of them. Plus they have been used by the one percent to do their bidding so they can get their tax cuts, regulation cuts and get rid of banking regulations they don't like. The problem is the ones being used aren't smart enough to realize they are being used.

I don't think we are screwed totally, I think it has made a lot of people wake up and smell the coffee. They see we risk losing our republic if we don't step up and fix it at the ballot box. We can't wait for Mueller, it may do something but like you said if we get Rev. Pence it will be much worse. Plus he will seem so much calmer than 45 he just might win another term without people seeing the danger of his religion.

[Larrybanal]

15. remember

when they called themselves the silent moral majority...biggest lie ever because they were loud bullies with zero morals and they were never the majority...but they know how to cheat

[Texin]

20. The problem is, this "MINORITY" is getting legislation enacted that affects us ALL.

And with the KGOP in control, especially of the Justice System and the SCOTUS, they've got built-in enforces and rubber-stampers to make this true in perpetuity. They are deadly earnest about re-making this country an American Apartheid. Make no mistake. They want perpetual white minority rule here and they will all but die (and some might be willing to do that!) to make it happen. I'm not certain Pence will survive this yet. His day may be approaching. I hope so. That said, tRump will not ever release this position. He is going to have to be bodily removed from the WH, whether it's shackled and frog marched off the grounds or it's feet first. He will never agree to relinquish this office, not through an election or from actually being criminally indicted.

[CousinIT]

23. Forcing white male conservative minority rule is what GOP is good at.

They have elevated that crap to an art form.

The rest of us are the majority - we have a LOT of power we don't use. Most Americans don't even damn vote. So there you go.

[Left-over]

27. They may ne in the minority but

They are controlled by corporate america and that includes church organizations that are nothing more than mouthpieces for right wing facists. They are all brainwashed and believe they are the only ones with rights.

[srobertss]

36. But 40% is pretty big

It just continually baffles me.

[certainot]

39. the hard core is more like 10%. moist of the 40% is soft, too apathetic or busy to look for

facts when surrounded by the buzz of 1500 radio stations and fox and the 10% dittoheads that sell it and repeat it at the bar, work, dinner table, store.

it's idiotic for the dem party and the media orgs not to poll for talk radio.

there's a reason most of his support is rural.

if investigators find limbaugh's been getting paid by trump or getting russian money for denying global warming, for instance, that base will drop to 20%. but we can't wait for that - see below

[certainot]

37. offense is needed, not just voting. it is a minority magnified with a few hundred think

tank-scripted blowhards on 1500 radio stations and ignoring that talk radio monopoly continues to be the biggest political mistake in history.

americans need offense. we cannot have any rational fact based national discussion on any topic while we ignore those radio stations and we're about to get into ones about impeachment and who is and isn't acceptable in the democratic party field.

many of those americans being used by the con billionaires and their corps will turn if the 'Left' and dems finally start challenging the talk radio monopoly which is the only major medium with no direct challenge from the other side of the political spectrum. in that sense it presents the single easiest opportunity to turn things around quickly.

fixing it at the ballot box has clearly not been enough. every election it's the same thing - GOTV and donation drives vs talk radio and russian troll and voter suppression - it's clearly not enough just doing defense.

democrats have to go on the offensive and talk radio is not only the best opportunity to make a quick difference, trump and the GOP can't survive without it.

it's success depends on being invisible. all out boycotts and protests at stations, or better yet the 88 universities that support 260 limbaugh stations, will destroy it. that will add to the fact that artificial intelligence recently made it much easier and cheaper to digitize/transcribe talk radio so it can be read, studied, and content can be associated with advertisers. that means the ad industry will have to start asking clients if they really want to support trump, racism, and global warming denial. all americans have to do is speed up getting to that point.

politicizing radio advertising will democratize talk radio and destroy the monopoly, opening up many more stations to liberals. the ad industry just needs to start seeing offense vs those radio stations, their advertisers, and the universities and pro sports teams that support them

[DownriverDem]

42. The Senate

We must take over the Senate to make sure we protect our democracy. Winning the White House would give us back our country for sure.

[trev]

48. It doesn't matter that they are the minority.

They keep winning elections.

[In It to Win It]

49. They're the minority with no borders that divide the states but...

it looks like they are a majority in more states.

[Hortensis]

2. Nope. We'll have to live with what we sow. 606 days to sowing day.

I do wish democracy were more than just a word to people who've never felt a shiver of fear when reminded that these posts live forever, that various interests already have files on all of us, that facial recognition software is already scary good.

[Joe941]

3. Honestly tRump is just a symptom of the problem not the source.

Its the people who support and elected him that are the real problems.

[FiveGoodMen]

4. Amen.

One in three of us is a Nazi (some of them even self-identified)

[erronis]

5. Agree, but "the people who support and elected him" may not be voters.

The supporters aren't the rabid deplorables (I'm loving that term more and more since cringing at first). They're not the fuxed-brained T.V. addlepates. The supporters are the ones with money and access to the media. They include big corpora via citizens-disunited.

The ones that elected the orange face-like-a-shithole are the powers that influenced and changed the votes. Again the moneyed US plutocrats but also foreign interests.

These are the real problems.

I do worry about the deranged people with lots of ammo and little understanding.

[marylandblue]

6. We have had a long term rot in our system that is getting worse

And will continue to worsen after Trump, Pence or whoever is gone. Because our problem is the social an economic conditions that created them - moral rot, income inequality, divisive politics, and geopolitical instability among them. Societies that have faced these problems have either reformed themselves with new ideas and systems or collapsed.

[FiveGoodMen]

22. A big part of this is lying motherfuckers telling their flocks that god is a republican

[BSdetect]

7. Pence is heavily implicated in the conspiracy. He will go too before much longer.

[Yavin4]

8. We never thought that we'd get a worse president than W, but we did in a blink of an eye.

Our institutions, government, healthcare, education, etc., are thoroughly corrupted. They gave us W and Trump, and they will give us someone even worse unless we start going after them.

[maxrandb]

9. How did we get here?

Well, you see...

President Obama didn't fix all of America's problems within a week of taking office, and even had to gall to not deliver ponies as demanded.

We decided that the way to make America "more progressive" was to sit out the 2010 Mid-term election (A CENSUS YEAR), and allow unhinged racists with tri-corner hats and Medicare provided "My Scooters", and screaming like banshees for 14 months about getting "gubmint out of my Medicare", to take over 65% of all State Legislatures and Governorships, as well as a majority of the Federal Government House and Senate.

Then, we sat back as a racist fucking orange circus clown spent the next 14 months demanding to see the first African American President's Birth Certificate. We never showed up to protest at the studios of ...NOT ONE SINGLE one of the 1,500 Hate Radio stations, (MANY BASED ENTIRELY WITHIN THE CONFINE OF 80-20 BLUE TO RED CITIES), who spewed racist birther shit 24/7.

Then, it became perfectly normal for CBS, NBC, ABC, the NY Times, the WA Post, and of course Faux News to present the entire racist birther shit as nothing more than a "he said-she said" issue.

Then we gleefully watched "Game of Thrones" and wondered how people could allow such a fucked up...but totally entertaining...leadership structure take hold in Westoros.

Then we got busy with our kids and our lives as our newly empowered T-baggers drew state and federal congressional districts that looked like a sheep fucking a housecat...we expressed a little bit of concern when all of these "snake swallowing a shriveled penis" districts ensured our new overlords could win 45% of a states voters, while getting 86% of its representation...coincidental of course.

Then we nominated a fantastic candidate, and one that was probably the most qualified ever to serve as President, but all anyone wanted to talk about was some "scandal" about some "email" bullshit...except for some of "us"...who preferred talking about how "our wonderful, started from nothing and worked her ass off to get where she was, truly historic candidate, was just EXACTLY THE SAME as an orange colored, racist freak-show, carnival barking, used-car-powered-by-snake-oil selling and serial unwanted pussy-grabbing moron".

Then, just to ensure we went completely through the Looking Glass and were using the broken shards to slit out wrists, we enabled the party of the "orange colored, racist freak-show, carnival barking, used car, snake oil selling and serial unwanted pussy-grabbing moron", to be the only check on his power.

There's something in there about some Russians doing some shit, but truly...THIS SHIT SHOW IS ALL OURS.

That's how we got here.

[shanny]

11. Not quite.

The problems with the American system have been decades in the making. Decades while too many (of US) stood by, asleep at the switch. We placed our faith in elites, shouldered the burden and soldiered on when they told us there was only so much they could do right now/we can't do that/we can't afford that blah blah blah. Meanwhile our situation worsened until, finally, instead of electing the most-qualified candidate ever to run, we (enough of us) voted for a clueless, bigoted charlatan who threatened to a) fix everything or b) blow the whole thing up, depending on your preference.

But yeah, this shit show is all ours.

Personally, I don't think we are coming back from this. We will not return to the status quo ante.* Our system will either greatly improve, or implode completely.


*this, incidentally, is why I don't see Joe Biden as a good candidate. He is the past, and we can't go home again.

[ffr]

12. Holy crap, K&R.

You should post this again in the editorial section or as a "How did we get here" titled GD thread.

[IamFortunesFool]

14. Amen

Amen

[CaptYossarian]

28. You left out the horrific Electoral College. Another democracy killer.

And the fact that the "most qualified candidate ever" didn't campaign in WI, MI, and PA. That's why those people stayed home. Also, the Comey debacle didn't help matters.

You were right in criticizing those who equated Hillary with the moron.

[DRoseDARs]

30. This has been going on a hell of a lot longer than that. Modern conservatism has its rot in the 60s.

*I ran out of character space in the header, dropped an o and s from roots. "Rot" works.

It was a direct response not only to emerging cultural shifts from the various civil rights movements, but also continued Red Scare noise and rejection of Kennedy's and Carter's brighter, more liberal view of America's future. Reagan was their big political breakthrough/coup and we've been suffering ever since. The beast has evolved, but the beast is old.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

38. good rant; just left out unrepresentative Senate

The Senate was created to ensure states' rights and powers in order to get then-autonomous states to come together under a central government. The Revolutionary War and Civil War have been over for a long time, yet we still have vestiges like the Senate and Electoral College that act as if we are 50 countries temporarily allied.

[Jakes Progress]

40. Ahhh. Yup. That's it. That is exactly it.

We have met the enemy. And he is us.

[CloudWatcher]

10. On my more optimistic days ...

On my more optimistic days I believe that while Pence is horrible, he doesn't have the cult-following and status that Trump holds. So when he takes power, I'm hoping the GOP will be more willing to break from him and slightly more rationale in blocking his excesses.

On my less optimistic days, I look at the GOP and wonder if there's an uncorrupted neuron in any of their skulls. And I wait for global warming to destroy us all.

[sarcasmo]

13. We've jumped the shark.

[red dog 1]

16. "How do we prevent it from ever happening again?"

That will take new election reform legislation, and that won't happen until the Democrats take back control of both houses of Congress as well as the White House.

[yaesu]

17. America has been sick, very sick for decades but only recently has that sickness surfaced in the

form of disgusting buboes called tRumpsters. Not sure what the cure is or if there is anything that can cure it. Maybe the republican fascist disease will take its course and die off or mutate into a less lethal form.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

18. No. . . . nt

[McKim]

19. Pence Will Not Be a Problem

Pence will not be a problem as he will never be as popular as Trump, no charisma. His robotic personality will never gather enough votes to be elected.

[Pepsidog]

21. Worse, Pence is heralded as a hero who saved America by the RW media.

[TommyCelt]

24. What a question.

I half-jokingly said to my partner after Election Day 2016 that this trump would be America's last president.

HALF-jokingly because, although VERY upset by the election, I kept saying to myself
"OKOK, enough with political/campaign bullshit. SOMEhow this guy's in the White House. He'll get some people around him who'll know what they're doing, he'll tone it down, and it won't be a great 4 years...but we'll get'em in 2020!"

Fast forward to now. I had no idea then how bad this would get. I had no idea how low the bar could go. I had no idea how many people I thought decent and intelligent I would completely lose respect for (I'm accused of having Trump Derangement Syndrome).
This trump's White House residency has emboldened the most awful people's most awful tendencies and has brought them to the fore. It has made many/most people who are not awful afraid. It has run roughshod over the truth, separation of powers, dignity, and common human decency, making them all expendable in order to provide gobbets of red meat to the aforementioned awful people.

This trump's approval rating is low for any President. But the fact that he polls anywhere above single digits is horrifying to me. The fact that over 30% support him rabidly, no matter what he says or does should frighten us all. With what has been revealed about the true nature of large swaths of our society since Election Day 2016, I fear that we may have passed the point of no return. That America as a free democratic republic is indeed over.

I hope not. But I fear so.

[BlueJac]

25. We must wait and plan...

to time ruining Trump for his reelection and taking back the WH. Do not impeach this asshole, let him stew. I want the Trump crime family in jail or worse!

[pdsimdars]

26. Because the supposed representatives of the majority are too timid to STAND UP, STAND FIRM

[bearsfootball516]

29. No.

[onecaliberal]

31. This is why I hate the media - they blather on like it's all normal.

[democratisphere]

32. America, as we knew it, will never be the same again.

When drumpf is gone, his drumpf think supporters will still remain, probably forever.

[MarcA]

33. Both Dynamic and Structural

Dynamic: The Oligarchs got the racists, misogynists, tribal types to vote for Oligarchy;
God, Guns, Gays, Abortion, Immigrants.

Structural: On the U.S.A. tombstone it will be written that they obeyed and never abolished
the Electoral College, the undemocratic Senate and Unelected,Lifetime Judges.

[zentrum]

34. The crazed minority are pawns

The real problem is that after Trump goes, if he ever does, we are left with a corporatocracy, enforced by judges who will stand by every Federalist Society policy from now until the end of climate destruction. We are owned by a handfull Billionaires. Demorcary is all Kabuki theater now.

[fescuerescue]

44. The next President will wipe away everything that Trump did

Just as Trump wiped away all of Obama's work, and Obama wiped away Bush's work etc.

Oh sure there are remnants that will remain, but most President only leave about 10% of themselves behind.

As for the Billionaires? They have ALWAYS owned it all. No matter who the President is. I don't expect that to change ever.

[theophilus]

35. Possibly. Time will tell....n/t

[shanny]

41. Honestly? Yes, I think so.

What follows will be remarkably better, or horrifically worse...either way, we're not going back.

[fescuerescue]

43. There's an election in 2 years

Followed by another 4 years.

In November of 2016, few thought we would make it this far. But we have.

One party never holds the Whitehouse long (the only except being the 1940s)

[camelfan]

45. The overriding problem to me is that in 2 years, and especially 6 years

we'll be that much closer to environmental armageddon. I fear that all of the problems, all the posturing by the GOP, all the children in cages and SCOTUS seats being stolen, and gerrymandering, and ally alienating, and flag-hugging, and dictator embracing, and security overrides, and intelligence disbelief, and insults and lies, and fake news and witch hunts and affairs and science denying, plain old STUPIDITY, is, in the end, going to amount to nothing. We only have a few years left to make the fundamental changes to save ourselves. As Bill Maher pointed out, scientists are continually warning us that our doom is getting closer. And they revising the time we have left to take dramatic, life-saving action, shortening it almost continually, and only one party cares, and (hello senator Feinstein from my home state) even some of our own dear Democrats don't seem to care either. Trump doesn't care - he's going to die rich. Pence doesn't care - if the end comes soon, he's that much closer to meeting Touchdown Jesus. It all boils down to the fact that we are being held back by those who cannot see the fundamental truths as revealed to us all by science. Measles is back? But Jenny McCarthy and Jim Carrey say autism! Climate change? But look, I haz a snowball. Obama is an American, born in Hawaii? But Facebook and Mr. Trump say he's a Muslim! Not to worry, though. God will save us all. In the words of our supreme leader, "God blesh the United Shtates."

[fescuerescue]

46. That's coming anyway.

We should have fixed this problem 20 years ago. Along with the other 95% of the worlds population.

[AllaN01Bear]

47. they have been wanting to make a chiristian theocracy for a long time in their own image .

my late mom said that .

[Nay]

50. Even if we survive these bastards, we aren't going to survive climate change. With these

types infesting the government, we don't have a chance.

[Chin music]

51. Old Sly eye Pence.

Bush could barely pull that look off, he just doesn't have it.
Jesusville? heh heh. Ever see the movie Jesus Camp? Creepy stuff.

[Garrett78]

52. That we have a tyranny of the minority political system doesn't help.

Some day (and we might as well start planting seeds in the public consciousness) we will have to get rid of the US Senate (as the late John Dingell argued) and the electoral college, which are both terribly anti-democratic (regardless of the arguments one might make for why they were created in the first place).

[Turbineguy]

53. When we look back at the empires that have collapsed

the signs were so obvious. But many did not possess the means to see it. In this age we can see it happening. If enough embrace collapse, it will happen.

[Firestorm49]

54. "And if we survive this"

Good point. I’ve never in my life heard more well informed people state the degree of alarm we are currently experiencing. It’s frightening. And what are we going to do, sit back and watch it happen? Wait for one of our alphabet security agencies to step up in a form of revolt? Or, are they supporters of anarchy as well? What do we do when election rigging to retain power is the norm?
What do we do when, like in Russia, you can be jailed for criticizing the Leader?

I guess we can all sit back, fat, dumb and happy and say “we saw it coming.”

[Nitram]

55. People have been moaning about Pence since Trump was elected. The fact is, Pence is implicated

in a number of the Dorito's crimes. Either way, Pence would be the lamest of lame ducks.