But he isn’t a loser. He convinced the nation to make him their leader. The electorate is the loser.
Especially the MAJORITY OF AMERICANS WHO DID NOT VOTE FOR HIM, apparently!
He did not win the majority of voters who do not even represent the majority of Americans. Many Americans are actively having their ability to vote suppressed (in my own state hundreds of thousands of voters were purged by the secretary of state who was running for governor, most in black majority areas around blue urban areas). We also have a arcane system that is not a popular vote, that gives particular people (rural, white voters in less populous states) an advantage, which would take a constitutional amendment to change.
At least get your fact straight if you’re going to be insulting to those of us who did not vote for him, do not support them, much less the run of the mill American empire, which is not easy and takes coordinating the congress and 2/3 of state legislatures.
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The USA is a democracy. There is a collective responsibility.
You are responsible for the government that you elect by your action or inaction.
Not voting is a vote.
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I’m pretty sure the insults are the point.
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AGAIN, we aren’t just talking about non-voters. Millions more people voted for Donald Trump’s opponent than voted for him.
Not every nation that elected a monster can make this claim.
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It’s not a true democracy, or he would not be president. That’s my point.
Did you miss the voter suppresion part of what I said, or did you dismiss it out of hand as it did not conform to your views?
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We are after all the only country ever to elect a tyrant… /s
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Indeed; fascism has never swept a first world power into an inhumane death cult before now…
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And that first-world power’s electorate never let another right-wing populist party gain (checking the 2017 German results) 12.6% of the seats in parliament despite the disastrous experience of letting an inhumane right-wing death cult gain power 80 years earlier.
So, yeah, while we’re at it let’s talk about collective responsibility of all citizens for electing fascists in a democratic system that isn’t broken by such things as the Electoral College and a duopoly system.
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Only American did that! Or is doing that right now! Not like any other country, in say, Western Europe, is having pressure from the far right at all. Not a single country in Western Europe. At all. In fact, none of them were brutal imperialists at all! We invented that, you know! /s
That irritates me is not the criticism that America and Americans need to do better. We fail on many metrics and there is a lot of work to be done to improve our country and to act as a part of fellowships of nations. But its’ real fucking myopic to say that much of this is done out of democratic will entirely. Foreign policy is pretty much purely the domain of the executive, so we have far less democratic say there than we do on other things (if the House is our most democratic national institution).
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Oh but you see the real problem is those of us who voted against him and have suffered because of him just haven’t felt ashamed of ourselves enough! Sooo ashamed! I wish I was GERMAN! Boo hoo why can’t I be part of the master ra— uh — nation…
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Intentionally mendacious, even. Sounds like something someone intent on sowing discord would say…
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That is not insignificant. I would say that probably mirrors the percentage of Trump’s hardcore.
Pretty much all of the western powers need to take a good, hard look at our own internal issues, and stop trying to project our own ills onto others. Yes, the US has an outsized impact on world affairs, and as such should be criticized. But the fact is that neo-liberal post-modernity has completely failed all of us. Until we can admit that and work towards changing all of our systems, we’ll continue to get the same results. That requires being clear on what the problems are, acknowledging past failures (which is why we need historians), and working together to come up with actual solutions (not promises and Davos photo-ops). All this finger pointing at laughing at each other for failing in the exact same way is doing nothing to move us to actual solutions.
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Especially not in Germany, which knows the heavy cost of letting right-wing populist bigots anywhere near the levers of power – especially in a parliamentary system where they might be part of a ruling coalition. That showing by AfD was an absolutely shameful incident in German political history.
That said, though, I’m not going to blame all Germans for it happening. But, like you, I’m not an ultra-nationalist who’s blind to my own country’s flaws.
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Article 33: Individual responsibility , collective penalties, pillage and reprisals. “No protected person may be punished for any offense he or she has not personally committed. … Reprisals against protected persons and their property is prohibited.” Under the 1949 Geneva Conventions , collective punishment is a war crime.
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As with Trump - it’s always projection.
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And none of this is a lesson Germany learned on its own. It is a lesson that Germany was taught, through force, by occupying governments following the bloodiest military campaign in the history of the planet.
If the United States manages to oust Trump and his ilk from power this November (not yet a given, but staying optimistic) then at least we’ll be able to say we did it ourselves instead of depending on international intervention to set us straight.
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what part of losing the popular vote by 3 million votes are you unclear about. the majority of the american public emphatically did not want him to be president.
if you want to complain about the united states hideously racist and anachronistic institution called the electoral college, feel free, but get in line behind the millions who want the same thing.
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It’s worth noting that the post-war force was relatively mild considering the savage military campaign. Immediately after the war there were those amongst the Allied powers who argued for another Carthiginian peace (similar to the type that gave the fascists their opening in the 20s and 30s), with the Nazi leaders hanged without trial and collective punishment imposed. Fortunately, saner heads prevailed, and proper and open trials were held and (per @KathyPartdeux) collective punishment itself was branded a war crime. International rule of law prevailed, setting the stage for later war crimes trials.
So Germany was taught by force but, once the war was over, more importantly was taught by example. For a long time the Germans took that ball and ran with it in a stunningly admirable way. But now with the generation who lived through the war dying off, the old behaviours re-assert themselves and the lessons of the past are forgotten.
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It was the Marshall Plan that was implemented - but it most certainly wasn’t the only option considered. Germany was very generously treated.
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