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I’ve posted it before but the way to get “media attention” is to be controversial and a bit shameless
Republicans are great at this. “Ban immigrants”, “all weapons should be permanently legal for everyone”, “ban abortion in all cases”, “ban gays”, these extreme messages are embraced by the party. Algorithms pick up on content that is engaged upon. People engage on this content regardless of their viewpoint. Even if you hate these views you are more likely to click and view out of rage, to comment your disbelief and to say “fuck this stupid bullshit”
Democrats are terrible at this. They abhor the controversial messaging from the left. They embrace weak messaging that sinks like “maybe some mild economic reform”. They embrace weak counter messaging like “gay people are actually valid”, “abortion should be left alone”, “maybe regulate guns a little” and then it gets trampled by right wing commenters and voices.
They need to embrace the right wing formula, frankly. “90% tax bracket for income over 10 million dollars”, “state funded abortion mills”, “ban all guns”, “mandatory lgbt education in public schools”, “death penalty for oligarchs”, etc. stop softening the message because you’re worried about alienating 4% of old white voters. It’s clearly not working
I agree to some extent. But you have to realize that it isn't 4% of voters. Trump won ~77 million votes this election vs Kamala's ~75 million. That's incredibly close, mainly because she tried to pander to the majority.
There's nothing she could've really done much differently this cycle that would've clenched the election with 100% certainty. There were simply too many factors working against her, like the shitty economy and the GOP's massive disinformation campaigns promising to turn everything around. A huge chunk of voters are already admitting how "shocked" they are with some of the shit Trump's administration is doing. This is due to microtargeted advertising, meaning that the many voters get completely different political ads on social media that leave out their extremist positions. My theory is that the DNC seems to not be very good at taking advantage of this capability, choosing to just provide blanketed campaign messaging that's mainly the same for everyone.
Sorry, got a bit rambly and off track there. I'm tired.
My theory is that the DNC seems to not be very good at taking advantage of this capability.
Or maybe it's the fact that all social media platforms are in the hands of a few people who happened to stand in the front row during Trump's inauguration.
Dems don't have the capability cause their enemies control the algorithms.People like Zuckerberg only care about money and power. Meta will happily accept the DNC's advertising money.
That all being said, the DNC could've also outlawed political advertising on social media when they had the majority in the Senate and house years ago.
They support Trump cause his entire platform is "give billionaires free reign and no taxes". They'll never support Democrats over him, and never have.
And outlawing political advertising (by private actors) on social media would have been reversed by the Supreme Court. Even before it was taken over by the right. It's very clearly against the 1st amendment.
I'm well agreed, but:
“all weapons should be permanently legal for everyone”
No one is saying this, no one except liberals.
It's not a thing. I'm in all kinds of gun-owner spaces. This is not a fucking thing that is proposed. At all.
It's utterly false and makes you look disconnected from reality.
There are absolutely people who think that all weapons should be legal. You should be glad you haven't had the misfortune to meet them.
Well for one it’s a bit of hyperbole, to a degree.
I’m legally blind and back I became legally blind the state pulled my drivers license. This is something that can happen in 13 states
However, I can still purchase a gun. Granted, legally blind doesn’t mean “without vision”. I can actually still see quite a bit. I still play videogames, read books, work, etc. However, I could be completely darkness blind, like no vision whatsoever, and I am still legally allowed to buy a gun.
Back when I had a reddit account I posted this anecdote as a joke and got dozens of replies about how “of course I should be able to buy a gun” despite not having the fucking prerequisite of fucking VISION. Several of them pointed me to some blind YouTuber who had a channel about being blind and shooting guns and owning guns
Like I am technically disabled. I work with the disabled, I work for the disabled. But the huge number of people who immediately jump on me to immediately reject the idea of any kind of regulation that would suggest someone who literally cannot see the world they are aiming a lethal weapon at shouldn’t have access to it make me think that the hyperbole isn’t that far off
And for the record I actually do own a gun. Well my household does, technically. I don’t use it, obviously, but my partner is trained to do so. We both abhor guns but are of the opinion that “pandoras box has been opened” so to speak. If shit hits the fan we need to be able to defend ourselves and guns beat pretty much everything else we could possibly do. If real legislation, reform,and regulation came through I would be extremely happy to be rid of it. It is a cancer on our home.
I'd like to note that there's nothing stopping you from buying, owning, or operating a car anywhere but public roads. Operating either one in a negligent manner is a crime.
So I can still hit up track day and ruin it for everyone? Nice
I actually still own my car. I’ll soapbox for a minute here. I live in a less urban area. The closest grocery store isn’t far, about a mile, but the path to get there is completely unnavigable. It’s eastern PA and the roads are antiquated, old carriage roads that have a shoulder of about 6” on either side and no sidewalks whatsoever. The closest bus stop is, you guessed it, at the small town center with the grocery store, gas station, and a few other shops. It’s not exactly rural but it’s not that far from it
Anyway! They take your license and thankfully there are some supports and they are pretty great. The division of the blind will hook you up with all kinds of shit to help you and train you to use it. I’m fairly tech oriented so I can set up screen readers and such but they have all these neat things like bumps on my stove knobs and all sorts of tactile things.
But the nightmare situation is transportation. Thankfully I’m in a privileged position where I work from home in a position that pays me a solid wage. But if I didn’t or if I ever changed jobs I would be fucked. As mentioned I have no bus stop I can safely get to and there’s no rail service for miles here. So the solution is that I schedule rides.
This is a terrrrible solution. It means that I have to contact the dot in advance, schedule a ride, hope they show up (they have flaked before) and then they come all the way out here to pick me up for a doctors appointment or whatever. It’s super wasteful and it’s basically making the state my uber (with none of the benefits, I still end up waiting around for ages often). It also means if there is a last minute need for transportation I am fucked. In an emergency I am reliant on services like ambulances, which is obscenely expensive. (Pro tip: your local ambulance company will often have a subscription fee, if you pay it they will waive a lot of billing fees. This is a bullshit system that should be illegal. I am a medical provider. If I bill your insurance $500 and they pay me $100 I write off the $400 because that’s the contracted rate. But ambulance companies will often charge thousands over what your insurance pays intentionally and will bill you this amount if you don’t pay their subscription bullshit. It’s literally extortion of people experiencing the worst moment of their lives)
wonderful infrastructure, america #1
your local ambulance company will often have a subscription fee.
I am currently having trouble wrapping my mind around this. That's so completely fucked up.
To be fair it’s not actually a subscription but a “strongly suggested donation”. Just one with financial penalties if you don’t pay it and ever get an ambulance ride.
What makes it extra fucked up is the housing system in the USA (and many places) means that most people don’t own their homes and a large amount of people move frequently.
As a result they are completely unaware of this because often the notice that it even exists is mailed out either to property owners based on tax records (meaning renters don’t get notified), at least where I live now. People I know here who live in apartment buildings or even my next door neighbor who rents his house had no idea because they don’t get the begging letter every year
Depends on locale though, where I used to live (which was far more urban and densely populated) they just mailed it to everyone but then it just came randomly addressed to “resident” and looked like junk mail. But then they got apartment complexes and stuff. That’s how I first found out, I got it at my old apartment (funny enough a few weeks after I used an ambulance for the first time in my life and had gotten a bill for like $1700 for a 7 minute ride with some medical care but that was over a decade ago. I did have decent insurance at the time too)