Trump is the Republican Party, there is no distinction.
The vast, vast majority of conservatives love him and will vote for him literally no matter what he says or does.
Owning the libs is enough for them, they don't care how bad their material conditions are as long as they get that. Never Trumpers are so few in number that they might as well not exist.
Meanwhile Biden, offering literally no hope or anything worth a shit to people, will convince very few that didn't vote for Hillary 4 years ago to do so for him this time around. Not enough to win at least.
It's like Chapo said: The choices are screaming defiantly into the void as you die and hurting the people you don't like along the way, or dying quietly reminiscing about "the good ol' days".
If those are the 2 choices, the former is gonna be way more attractive to people.
I donno, I'm so mixed on who wins still. Trump fucked up and created probably the biggest tragedy for the american people since vietnam. Like shit, let that sink in. 9/11 restricted some freedoms, killed a few thousand people here and whatever soldiers fucked up and enlisted, but that pales in comparison to how much covid has restricted peoples freedom, how much its killing people domestically and how much its fucking up peoples health and livelihood. Biden has such an easy moment to seize on. But he is completely failing to do so, he hasn't offered a clear plan-perhaps out of fear of saying "we will need to shut down again" being to grim, but its the fucking reality of things.
"9/11 restricted some freedoms, killed a few thousand people here and whatever soldiers fucked up and enlisted" mountain of several million corpses smoulders in the background
well yeah but mostly not americans. horrid as it is, we're at the point where the average american doesn't give a fucking about the people we're killing overseas. They don't see it so it might as well not be happening.
well fucking golly gee, sure would be nice if you mentioned all those innocent people all the other folks keep forgetting about when you bring up the topic of the forever wars being bad for america
They're talking about events with reference to the American election, an election where most of the people voting famously barely give a fuck about their neighbors, and certainly don't give a fuck about people outside their borders. Pretty sure everybody here knows who suffers most from American imperialism.
they were listing enlisted soldiers as a casualty of 9/11, and calling vietnam the previous "biggest tragedy for the american people " with a complete casual disregard for any non-americans in that post.
so, no, they can do better.
locking down again is the capitalist fork. they lose whatever they decide to do: lock down and watch the economy crumble until there's a revolution or stay open and watch death and disease drive people to revolt anyway.
The economy is already crumbling though. There's a split in the capitalists. By being in this semi lockdown state, smaller businesses are bled out. Big businesses take a hit, but they're willing to do that since they can absorb the customers of the small businesses that are forced to close. A lockdown would probably benefit the small businesses cause a six week actual lockdown would allow them to reopen afterwards, and the only way that lockdown is being sold to people is if there is economic relief alongside it.
yup. fully agreed. relief isn't coming because that would stop the big businesses from looting the small businesses. (one of the largest effects of this pandemic will be the mass proletarianization of the petit-bourgeoisie -- they're going to be fucking pissed for decades). and so we'll sit in limbo of semi-lockdown for another year and a half until a vaccine is ready.
the split in the capitalists is also interesting because I think it's driving them towards war with each other. there's a real question of which dam bursts first -- the movement in the streets demanding a provisional government or the split in the capitalists forcing a civil war. but the collapse of energy prices in the pandemic has made this a life-or-death issue for a huge segment of the bourgeoisie.
I don't see any sort of capitalist civil war happening, or even any sort of mass recognition of the split within them because there's such a mass power inbalance. The big guys will win. I think the most visible effect will be the almost certain takeover of theaters and restaurants, but there'll almost certainly be similar takeovers across a wide amount of industries. Hell we're seeing it in the gaming industry and they're not even hurting.