A point that needs to get hammered more is that the caprice and chaos with which this administration implements its bad policies will inflict serious long term harms, in addition to the damage done by the bad policies themselves.
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This is what I sent to my senators and representatives: The Democrats MUST display disapproval of Trump! THIS IS OUR SELMA!!!!!!!! You are asking us to display our outrage by putting ourselves in the path of danger. YOU MUST WALK YOUR WALK, NOT TALK THE TALK, too! WALK THIS BRIDGE WITH US!!!!!!
The former administration attempted four times to jail the leading opposition candidate so you’ll forgive my skepticism that Trump’s policies are as bad.
Agreed. Most businesses do not thrive under chaos and unforeseeable conditions... just ask any Argentine (who's dealt with caprice and chaos for the last 20+ years)
You will not get talented people willing to consider government jobs — where traditionally there’s been greater stability to compensate for the pay cut you take — when people see entire departments are always one bad ketamine trip away from annihilation.
When all of this is over I think we're going to need something like "The Reconstruction Amendments, but for Executive Branch overreach" - limit and diffuse the power of the presidency so that no president can ever do what Trump is doing again.
I’m a contractor but I’ve dreamed of getting a government job for the pension and stability. Very disheartening to have billionaires destroying the one place you could still get those. They hate workers with every fiber of their being and I hate that republicans can’t see that
Businesses can’t make stable long term plans when the costs of their inputs might spike 25% overnight because some foreign leader failed to grovel hard enough at the White House.
You cannot do meaningful diplomacy if everyone knows a laboriously negotiated treaty will be treated as toilet paper the moment an irritable geriatric decides he doesn’t feel like honoring America’s commitments.
Scientists will be cautious about launching long-term research programs when the funding from a three-year grant is likely to evaporate six months in with no rationale or explanation.
And these harms are going to persist after Trump is gone, because the American electorate has made clear we’re collectively gullible enough to elevate this sort of unstable demagogue. So we’re always, at best, going to be a few years away from another potential round of chaos.
If Trump is defeated after making things terrible, there may be an opportunity for major systemic reform. Then we can try to make rules that prevent this from happening again, to restore the needed stability.
“America has fallen. We must accept this fact. The guarantor of the post-war world order is collapsing into something that looks very much like far-right oligarchy. Even if the Democrats were to return to power tomorrow, the US is so unstable we could not guarantee this would not happen again.“
The US has to make up its collective mind if it stands with Europe and liberal democracy, or against it. It can't be an issue decided by single percentage points of the popular vote every four years!
part of my brain keeps saying, do these guys not _get_ that America is hosed if people can't trust contracts, but then I keep realizing no, these specific guys have spent their careers profiting off of NOT upholding their ends of contracts, which makes it hard to learn that lesson
After 20 years in business (start ups), I have learnt that ”trust” is everything, once you screw over one party, all others know that you are that kind of guy, and you are treated like someone with leprocy.
Of course getting rid of all talented, conscientious and courageous people from government is the goal of this administration. That’s why it’s important for Trump and Musk to go to jail.
Trump has bought in to the Soviet/Russia model that all you need are “Yes men” to carry out the policy from THE LEADER. It worked so well for the Soviets (see Chernobyl). What could go wrong here?
cannot emphasize enough that what is happening right now is an intentional crippling of state capacity, this has nothing to do with efficiency. they are building a new world order where it will be easier to pollute, grift and outright steal with complete impunity.
This regime doesn’t give a damn about process. Project 2025’s 180-Day Playbook was all about demolishing longstanding process and procedure and going straight for the throat. Vought knew that the only thing standing in the way of their Gileadesque vision was a process full of checks and balances.
I have lived and traveled in some countries that have bad bureaucracies. Mr. Trump has labeled some of these countries “shit hole countries”. Is that what he is trying to do to the US by destroying the system that is the backbone?
And there’s more nazgûl who have yet to show their true strengths. Living through bad policies and damage done is one thing, surviving another pandemic after is another. The zombie witch worm is third act shit.
For me, it has open my eyes to the weakness of law and judicial oversight. If you have enough money and power, you can bull right through and do whatever you want to before the judges, and the law can catch up to you.
Yeah. While it was sometimes true in the first term that the chaos *undermined* the evil, a lot of people wrongly decided that that was necessarily true and would continue to be true.
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It’s to keep measles away
I’d start with something like this:
It means you get some government created currency & legal rights & protection
Rather than only banks & corporations get some government created currency & legal rights & protections
Versus a UBI that subsidizes corporations who use that 💵 to pay their banks back
Which is why there was a Match on Washington for Jobs & Freedom
https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/federal-job-guarantee/tnamp/
Anyway, a stand alone UBI is just a pledge to landlords, corporations & banks
Trump ignored Trudeau's calls from the time of his inarguation and didn't even get in the phone until after retaliatory tarrifs were threatened.
Even if the Dems flip the House and/or Senate, even if they win the WH in 2028 - we can't trust you as an ally anymore.
Whether it's in our government services or in our foreign influence.
The republic has fallen.
Enjoy your "fell for it again" award Mr. Cato Institute.
"I was just following orders" will never save you.