Tell me why I should vote for Trump/Harris

[sun rise]

The biggest problem I see in our country today is the fact that as a people, we Americans are selfish, self-indulgent, apathetic, and typically concerned with all the wrong things

I agree.

Thats just for starters. What would I like to see? A candidate that tells us the truth, especially about ourselves. I would like to see somebody focus the spotlight on some of the things going on in the world that we could actually fix. For example: we don't need to keep supporting child slavery in the Congo, the batteries in our cell phones don't need to be dependent on Cobalt mining. We have better options now, we're just not using them.

I agree.

So it's not that I disagree with you but I'm motivated by that aphorism "don't let perfection be the enemy of the good". I'll take incremental improvements especially given the current crop of Americans. I look at politics and compare those who at least try to appeal to the "better angels of our nature" rather than to the negativity of our beastly heritage.

I'm also extremely cynical about any politician no matter how elevated their list of promises. I look for someone who I feel has his or her heart in the right place and who appeals to those "better angels". When Americans grow out of their "selfish, self-indulgent..." natures positive policies won't be an "impossible dream" but automatically become the national agenda.

 

[Quagmire]

I agree.

I agree.

So it's not that I disagree with you but I'm motivated by that aphorism "don't let perfection be the enemy of the good". I'll take incremental improvements especially given the current crop of Americans. I look at politics and compare those who at least try to appeal to the "better angels of our nature" rather than to the negativity of our beastly heritage.

I'm also extremely cynical about any politician no matter how elevated their list of promises. I look for someone who I feel has his or her heart in the right place and who appeals to those "better angels". When Americans grow out of their "selfish, self-indulgent..." natures positive policies won't be an "impossible dream" but automatically become the national agenda.

For me, it isn't about whether or not we're making progress, or how fast.

It's about whether or not the bus is even pointing in the right direction. If it isn't, it doesn't matter who's driving.

 

[sun rise]

For me, it isn't about whether or not we're making progress, or how fast.

It's about whether or not the bus is even pointing in the right direction. If it isn't, it doesn't matter who's driving.

Fair enough. I feel like the Democratic bus is a bulwark against the Republican bus which is totally pointing in the wrong direction. One example of a positive step is allowing Medicare to negotiate prices for some drugs and other measures. Biden cancelling student loans is another. Support for green tech is a third. So from a policy perspective, I like the way his bus points.

Jill Stein is calling for government taking over some things but we know that socialism does not work. She takes an absolutist position against carbon capture etc and has other extreme measures. I don't see her bus as pointing in the right direction but maybe you do.

 

[Heyo]

You're the second person who's pointed that out to me today. It was one of the inspirations for this thread.

Most of the threads in here dealing with the election are full of people talking about how much they hate the other side and their candidate.

I'm curious to see how many positive things people have to say about their own candidate.

I don't know what's on Harris' agenda, and we don't know for sure if she will be the candidate.
So, I assume the democratic candidate will be a good conservative, i.e. mostly keep the status quo.
Iow, the positive thing to say about the dems, is that they want to keep democracy (or what you over there think that is).

 

[RestlessSoul]

Can I interest you in another option?

ALICE COOPER Launches 2024 'Presidential Campaign': 'I'm A Troubled Man For Troubled Times' | Alice Cooper

via BlabberMouth Legendary rocker Alice Cooper is gearing up for the 2024 presidential election in the only way he knows how — by running for...

alicecooper.com

Older than Biden, surely? On the other hand, possibly immortal…

 

[RestlessSoul]

I don't think I'm going to say, because in this context I'd feel like I was asking for permission or forgiveness for voting for an independent.

I had this conversation with my son, over the recent U.K. general election; he felt betrayed by the Labour Party’s shift to the right, so voted Green, in a constituency which was a straight contest between Labour and Conservative. I said I’d rather be betrayed by Labour than robbed blind by the Conservatives, and that our country simply could not afford another 5 years of criminal incompetence and profiteering at the expense of the common man and woman.

I couldn’t really fault his argument though; if people are put off voting on principle because their preferred candidate can’t win, those candidates will never win and nothing will ever change. It turned out okay in the end anyway, he voted Green, Labour still won, and the Conservatives are out on their ear. And the Greens did the best they’ve ever done nationally so their message won’t go unheard

 

[Heyo]

I had this conversation with my son, over the recent U.K. general election; he felt betrayed by the Labour Party’s shift to the right, so voted Green, in a constituency which was a straight contest between Labour and Conservative. I said I’d rather be betrayed by Labour than robbed blind by the Conservatives, and that our country simply could not afford another 5 years of criminal incompetence and profiteering at the expense of the common man and woman.

I couldn’t really fault his argument though; if people are put off voting on principle because their preferred candidate can’t win, those candidates will never win and nothing will ever change. It turned out okay in the end anyway, he voted Green, Labour still won, and the Conservatives are out on their ear. And the Greens did the best they’ve ever done nationally so their message won’t go unheard

The UK election was a whole other matter. It was the usual bad vs. worse in the establishment and a safe thing to vote third party. But the established parties at least agreed on the principles of democracy.
In the US, there is one candidate who said "you won't have to vote in 4 years, we'll fix that".

 

[ChristineM]

Not American so only got the international hope America does it right.
My view, any vote for Harris is a vote less for Trump which has got to be right

 

[Magic Man]

Voting for a third party candidate isn't really a protest vote for me though. I just see it as voting the way that people should be expected to vote: voting for who I would like to see in office whether she stands a chance or not.

I voted for Jill Stein years ago, so I can understand this view, but it ignores the reality. It's a protest vote because in the current situation, she and other third-party candidates stand no chance of winning. All they do is take votes from the other candidates.

I agree that ideally it would be voting the way we're supposed to: for who we really want. There are ways to make that happen, like some sort of run-off voting. But until we change the system to support that, we have to real choices, and the rest are for all intents and purposes protests.

The biggest problem I see in our country today is the fact that as a people, we Americans are selfish, self-indulgent, apathetic, and typically concerned with all the wrong things (ask a typical American college student who the Secretary of state is and 9 out of 10 times they won't be able to tell you. Now I asked them to name all of the Kardashians).

Thats just for starters. What would I like to see? A candidate that tells us the truth, especially about ourselves. I would like to see somebody focus the spotlight on some of the things going on in the world that we could actually fix. For example: we don't need to keep supporting child slavery in the Congo, the batteries in our cell phones don't need to be dependent on Cobalt mining. We have better options now, we're just not using them.

In a little while I'm going to ride my bicycle to the store. It's only about a mile away, but I'll see anywhere from 50 to 100 cars on my way there, and I can guarantee that if I bother to look inside those cars almost all of them will only be carrying one person. Something like 10 or 20% of those vehicles will have much more horsepower than the driver will ever need or ever use, which means quite a bit of the pollution they're generating (emissions and noise) will be completely unnecessary, and a lot of the money they're shoveling out to the oil companies in order to finance all the destruction and oppression they're perpetrating in the world could be better spent somewhere else (pretty much anywhere else).

I would love to see somebody put measures in place to make that kind of behavior less attractive and less convenient, whether its through enticement or enforcement.

And that goes for pretty much every aspect of our consumer economy.

I would love to see a candidate that could somehow get young people excited and optimistic about the future again by letting them know that they may actually still have one.

I know all that's pretty vague, and telling people the truth about themselves has never been a very successful political strategy (you can well get yourself nailed to a tree), but that's what we need, and that's what I'd like to see.

I would also like superpowers and a flying pony.

In my opinion our country, and our society needs a complete overhaul. I know That's not something we're going to be able to accomplish in 4 years, but since you're asking I would settle for a candidate who gives us some clue that she's actually aware of all that.

Then Harris is the candidate for you. She is a typical politician, so she won't always tell the truth, and she won't be 100% in sync with what you want, but she's far and away the best viable option for you. She and democrats care about climate change and are trying to do something about it. They support electric vehicles and working toward other types of renewable energies to help the environment. They support more public transportation, meaning less reliance on cars.

Again, she will not be your ideal candidate, and I'm sure there are things you'll disagree with her on, but overall, she would work toward the main things you want here. Trump would do the exact opposite. He represents big corporations and the wealthy, who are only interested in their bottom line and making more money. Project 2025 specifically wants to disband any efforts to address climate change. They are against public transportation and renewable energy. Voting for Trump would move things in the opposite direction you want them.

 

[RestlessSoul]

The UK election was a whole other matter. It was the usual bad vs. worse in the establishment and a safe thing to vote third party. But the established parties at least agreed on the principles of democracy.
In the US, there is one candidate who said "you won't have to vote in 4 years, we'll fix that".

Yeah, Trump has made his intentions pretty clear. The USA’s legal system and institutions of state have been pretty robust up to now though.

In the U.K. we have no written constitution to protect our democracy; everything is based on custom and protocol, and politicians behaving honourably. When Boris Johnson, on the advice of the unelected advisor Dominic Cummings, prorogued (suspended) Parliament to overcome the Brexit stand-off in the House of Commons, we got a sense here of how fragile our democracy is. Or at least those of us who were paying attention did.

Once populism and nativism become part of mainstream politics, decency and honour across the political divide can no longer be taken for granted. This is not a peculiarly American phenomenon.

 

[Yerda]

I want it to be a freaking carnival.

In the sense that I want it to be something people have a reason to celebrate.

You need to tick the box for "shift me to an alternate reality"

Personally, being a non-American member, I would actually prefer Donald Trump to be the next POTUS. Last time he served a term, he had a (relatively) peaceful reign, with not a single new war. NATO hates Trump and I hate NATO, so that's that. We need to defund all military so we can finally talk like adults instead of throwing bombs and tantrums.

One of the few things I also liked about his presidency (as a non-American) was his reluctance to start wars. He also made some progress with N Korea and withdrew from Afghanistan.

Also, how hilarious it was. I don't think there has ever been a clown-shoes adminstration to match it anywhere. From the beginning with Spicer hiding in bushes to the halfwits booking the Four Seasons landscaping business for a press conference after they got smashed in the election it was like a parody of leadership and governance.

Sadly, during all the comedy, there was the record scratch moment when Trump advised Americans not to worry about covid and led the most criminally negligent response to a public health crisis possible. He basically abandoned his responsibilities and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths. If his voting base wasn't dominated by tinfoil hat wearing lunatics radicalised by their facebook feeds he's have been forever disgraced at the very least.

Given that he would almost certainly abandon Ukraine and give full support to any psychopathy Israel wants to unleash on Gazans, I would prefer he is kept far from power. I'm not a fan of NATO either, but I find that hegemony immeasurably preferable to the alliance of oligarchs and neo-nazis that would replace it.

Separately, I'm rather fond of the Americans on here and would like them to live under a secular democracy rather than the US Christian fascist version of sharia law that Trump's team want to install. I also worry Trump would destroy attempts at international cooperation on climate change prevention, cut aid to impoverished countries (or link it to his hideous domestic agenda), and re-organise the widespread campaign of public looting by his donors.

So, I float somewhere between absolute contempt and pity for anyone considering voting for Trump at this stage. The ones who should know better are malevolent filth and would do everyone a favour if they boarded a rocket to Mars. And that is me being diplomatic.

 

[wellwisher]

Up for grabs: one shiny, barely used 2024 American vote.

This, folks, is your chance to talk me into voting for your candidate.

As it stands now I'll most likely be voting for Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate unless I can come up with a decent write-in candidate in the meantime (If only Tony Stark was a real person), but I'm open to listening to arguments in favor of voting for one or the other of the something-other-than-make-believe 2024 presidential candidates too.

So, have at.

Our non-American members can feel free to join in as well, after all it's your world that we're most likely going to wind up blowing up too.

I vote based on job competence and consistency in ideals. It has to be the person who can better deal with the current set of problems like the economy and illegal immigration. It makes little sense to vote for someone who helped create the problems; border Czar. That would be irrational.

The Democrat approach is more like a merger of Madison Avenue meets Hollywood, repackaging their candidate, as though a new box for the old soap powder, will make the same old soap, sell better. Shallow people respond well to that. I like to look deeper and prefer competence based on actual job performance. The gossip and realty TV stuff is irrelevant to me, since that is not job related.

Trump, like him or hate him, remains consistent. He is not being rebranded, to fake out people to vote for him. Harris is now being rebranded as moderate to help her avoid discussing her actual tangible Liberal record and her involvement in the many problems caused by illegal immigration and poor economic policies; too much spending on biased ideas that ignored the needs of citizens and half the country.

This new scam by the DNC; rebrand Harris, reminds me of the gender scam where boys pretend to be girls so they can compete and win at women's sports. There is no scientific validity in terms of DNA; look deeper. Fooling yourself and to fool others is shallow and subjective and is not ot a good way to pick a leader. You cannot DEI a President since their actions have far reaching consequences for the country and the world. We need the most qualified person, in reality, and not just in theory or sentiment. There are so many people who lecture on science but vote in the shallows. Something is not kosher due to this obvious inconsistency.

If the Democrats had not run their non stop fake news Russian Collusion scam, against Trump, sabotaging him anyway they could, the reality of the Trump's first term as president would be more objective to all. But they tried to repackage him as the villain, even though they were the one's committing crimes and deception like the villains. Obama and Biden even did what Nixon never did, which is to use Federal Intel people to spy on a political opponent. That was worse than Nixon and Watergate and they deserve the credit or blame in the history books.

More recently, President Biden who had earned 14 million Democratic votes in the Democrat primaries, was forced out of office by a coup; Swamp, and a Harris puppet was installed all without any votes for her, by the Democrat Party voters. Why vote for the crooks and puppet who stole your vote? Their base is now ready to fall in line and buy the Harris illusion, given to them by the crooks that stole their vote. Could anyone explain why you were not mad or concerned? Why condone this crooked and undemocratic behavior? Much of this has to do with them accepting the Trump illusion given to them by the same crooks; lessor of two evils?

Yesterday in the news cycle, Trump and Harris were invited to speak at a Black Journalist Conference. Hiding Harris was a no show, since she cannot yet back up her new fake mask other then pose. Trump held his own against the ambush the swamp set for him. The Journalist who attended the conference had mixed reactions, better than expected. Trump is strong and consistent because he is real and being real makes that easier.

 

[PureX]

Vote always. If for no other reason than to show the politicians that you will. Because when you don't they can and will happily forget that you exist. Because you don't exist in their world.

 

[ChristineM]

Vote always. If for no it reason that to show the politicians that you will. Because when you don't they can and will happily forget that you exist. Because you don't exist in their world.

I also feel if you don't vote you have no right to complain.

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

Voting for a third party candidate isn't really a protest vote for me though. I just see it as voting the way that people should be expected to vote: voting for who I would like to see in office whether she stands a chance or not.




The biggest problem I see in our country today is the fact that as a people, we Americans are selfish, self-indulgent, apathetic, and typically concerned with all the wrong things (ask a typical American college student who the Secretary of state is and 9 out of 10 times they won't be able to tell you. Now I asked them to name all of the Kardashians).

Thats just for starters. What would I like to see? A candidate that tells us the truth, especially about ourselves. I would like to see somebody focus the spotlight on some of the things going on in the world that we could actually fix. For example: we don't need to keep supporting child slavery in the Congo, the batteries in our cell phones don't need to be dependent on Cobalt mining. We have better options now, we're just not using them.

In a little while I'm going to ride my bicycle to the store. It's only about a mile away, but I'll see anywhere from 50 to 100 cars on my way there, and I can guarantee that if I bother to look inside those cars almost all of them will only be carrying one person. Something like 10 or 20% of those vehicles will have much more horsepower than the driver will ever need or ever use, which means quite a bit of the pollution they're generating (emissions and noise) will be completely unnecessary, and a lot of the money they're shoveling out to the oil companies in order to finance all the destruction and oppression they're perpetrating in the world could be better spent somewhere else (pretty much anywhere else).

I would love to see somebody put measures in place to make that kind of behavior less attractive and less convenient, whether its through enticement or enforcement.

And that goes for pretty much every aspect of our consumer economy.

I would love to see a candidate that could somehow get young people excited and optimistic about the future again by letting them know that they may actually still have one.

I know all that's pretty vague, and telling people the truth about themselves has never been a very successful political strategy (you can well get yourself nailed to a tree), but that's what we need, and that's what I'd like to see.

I would also like superpowers and a flying pony.

In my opinion our country, and our society needs a complete overhaul. I know That's not something we're going to be able to accomplish in 4 years, but since you're asking I would settle for a candidate who gives us some clue that she's actually aware of all that.

I have no argument with anything you wrote. None. And it is well though out.

The only argument I can make for whether you should vote for Harris or Trump is this: however you vote -- even if you write in "Man in the Moon," you will get either Harris or Trump for President. If you get the latter, you will achieve diametrically the opposite of everything you said above. If you vote the former, you'll get some, certainly not all you'd like, of your wish list.

This is simply the reality of the situation in which you live and vote. So if you do write in Man in the Moon, and you get Trump by just 1 vote, you may regret it very, very much indeed.

 

[Magic Man]

I vote based on job competence and consistency in ideals.

He says before going on to make a case for Trump, who is the most incompetent president we've had in modern times (even if you don't dislike him), and against Harris, who is at least competent, even if you disagree with her goals.

In other words, you don't actually care about competence. You just pretend to.

 

[Nakosis]

Up for grabs: one shiny, barely used 2024 American vote.

This, folks, is your chance to talk me into voting for your candidate.

As it stands now I'll most likely be voting for Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate unless I can come up with a decent write-in candidate in the meantime (If only Tony Stark was a real person), but I'm open to listening to arguments in favor of voting for one or the other of the something-other-than-make-believe 2024 presidential candidates too.

So, have at.

Our non-American members can feel free to join in as well, after all it's your world that we're most likely going to wind up blowing up too.

Vote for neither or either or flip a coin.
The POTUS isn't that important. It is only important to the individual parties as their political power/financial benefits are at stake.
For those who don't benefit from their political power, it's not going to make a lot of difference.

 

[Kathryn]

For me, it isn't about whether or not we're making progress, or how fast.

It's about whether or not the bus is even pointing in the right direction. If it isn't, it doesn't matter who's driving.

Amen to this.

 

[anna.]

Hiding Harris was a no show, since she cannot yet back up her new fake mask other then pose.

That's a 'keep her in her place because she's uppity' falsehood.

Harris could not speak in person at the convention due to logistical reasons, including the funeral of Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-TX) and finalizing a vice presidential nominee, the source said. She offered to appear for a virtual fireside chat during the convention or an in-person conversation at a later date, but the convention’s organizers declined. NABJ did not immediately respond to a request for comment.​

​

Black Journalists’ Association Says Yes to Trump but Snubs Harris

NABJ bosses declined Harris’ request to speak at the convention virtually because of logistical matters, while members are outraged that Trump will appear at the Chicago event.

www.thedailybeast.com

Trump held his own against the ambush the swamp set for him.

A poised, articulate woman asked him hard questions and he melted into a petulant puddle. What an embarrassment.

 

[Pogo]

For me, it isn't about whether or not we're making progress, or how fast.

It's about whether or not the bus is even pointing in the right direction. If it isn't, it doesn't matter who's driving.

Well as you said describing Trump to a tee.
"The biggest problem I see in our country today is the fact that as a people, we Americans are selfish, self-indulgent, apathetic, and typically concerned with all the wrong things"

Voting against him is the least any of us can do to reorient the bus.