People can’t stop cracking up over the former president’s bizarre, bumbling speech.
Speaking outside Allentown, Pennsylvania, on Sunday, Donald Trump left everyone confused when he attempted to explain the Battle of Gettysburg, praised (and invented a quote from) Confederate General Robert E. Lee, and generally had no idea what he was talking about.
When his off-the-cuff remarks hit late-night television on Monday, the hosts couldn’t hide their laughter.
“You have to hand it to this guy: On the weekend before his unprecedented criminal trial begins, he somehow manages to overshadow it with this broken-brained interpretation of what happened at Gettysburg during the Civil War,” Jimmy Kimmel quipped.
He’s the red team pick, so the red team likes him. No different from whoever the blue team pick is for the blue team. I know this seems simplistic and stupid. The reason it seems that way is because it is, in fact, simplistic and stupid.
You’re right
Dichotomies provide limited options, so choose choice! Choose Ranked Choice or STAR voting or something
You asked for a rebuttal below, so here’s a quick one:
You present a clearly false dichotomy.
If your hypothesis of “no difference” was true, we should expect to see extensive Biden merchandise worn by the “blue team” and golden statues of him.
Biden isn’t beloved and worshipped by Democrats. They just think “this guy is a lot less bad than derpy Hitler” and maybe even “you know, despite inheriting a lot of lemons in his first term this old guy is pretty decent at making lemonade.”
That is markedly different from the “red team” who is photoshopping their candidate onto muscle bound bodies and desecrating the flag with that abomination which they then turn into boxer shorts to wear to rallies where they chant for the Biblical destruction of the other team.
So yeah, you’re getting downvoted. Because it’s a ridiculous false dichotomy that’s readily apparent to any objective analysis. Even if there’s a kernel of truth in there being rampant partisanship and team identity, the literal worship of the right for Trump is unique to them.
I appreciate you taking the time to write that. I think there has been some confusion. Clearly, they have differences as candidates. I have yet to see anyone claim otherwise. I was responding to a comment asking why the red players like the red team captain. I said it’s because that’s who was chosen as the red team captain and who they are told they are supposed to like. Then I went on to say that that is the same reason that the blue players like the blue team captain, because that’s who the blue players are told to like.
It may come as a surprise, but this is not how it used to be, and it’s not how it is everywhere. It used to be that people were excited when the team captain spoke. They were inspiring, the stired souls, their people loved them because of who they are, not because of who they are not. Now, we have degenerated to the point where the teams like their captain simply because they are told to and because “at least they are not as bad as the other team captain.”
It is absolutely insane that saying this stuff gets a bunch of downvotes. This is not revolutionary. Both sides are convinced that if they don’t pretend that they think their guy is great, then that makes them a horrible team member. As a result, we have two groups of people that are both backing candidates that should absolutely be in assisted living, and both groups are acting like their candidates are fantastic. You got tricked, that’s fine, it happens, but the sooner everyone can admit that, the sooner we can get back to not arguing over which clown has the most human-like features.
I get where you are coming from, but your analysis is wrong.
The right doesn’t just like their candidate because he’s the Republican candidate, they worship him.
And yes, it didn’t used to be that way. In fact, I can think of no time in American history it was that way, and need to look to places like North Korea or authoritarian regimes of days past to find parallels.
They get very excited when he speaks. Particularly about retribution.
He ends his speeches with prayer music over his words.
And it’s not just that he’s who is on the ticket. The old school Republicans that support him for the hope of a tax break may be like that, but his base is unique in the history of American politics.
You’re being downvoted because your both sides-ism ignores the severity of the present danger.
Yes, the trumpers are technically more far gone than the biddeners, but not dramatically more far gone. Not when you consider just how deteriorated biden is. Nobody ever quotes biden. Nobody ever points to inspirational speeches or actions. Everyone who has been paying attention has seen him spew long, multi-sentence, incoherent word vomits. These are not accidental fumbles, it is absolutely “we need to get grandpa to a doctor asap”, the man is not well, we have ALL seen it. Repeatedly. The best they can do it try to find 5 minute clips where he manages to string together sentences that can actually be understood, let alone inspirational.
Any rational person who feels they have to vote for their guy on either side, should be making absolute sure that their team knows how much it pains them to be doing so. By not doing this, and by quite frankly, doing the opposite, they are spreading the absurd signal that they actually think their guy is a good candidate. This does nothing but lower the expected standard even more.
People like to talk about their duty, well their duty, if they have one, is to make sure everyone knows that this is so messed up. What do they do instead? They either silently downvote, they make up absurd “both sides” defenses that make no sense, or they just tell you how much you love trump if they catch any whiff of a side-eye towards biden. Then very rarely, after much teeth-pulling, you might get someone that admits they aren’t absolitely thrilled about having a moldy wrinkled pillowcase flying the airplane.
Dude. It’s even stupider than that. It sounds like cynical ignorance masquerading as profound clarity.
LMK when the blue team guys are taking campaign notes from Nazi Germany, selling classified documents to America’s adversaries, or committing insurrections and then we can bothsides this one.
Maybe you sure worry about understanding one side before trying to stretch your brain to something as big as “both sides”. You are miles away from being able to contribute anything resembling an constructive discussion, hop back on csgo or whatever bs you’re flushing your life away with.
You became extremely mad because all you have available is the “both sides” shit. It falls apart when you notice one of the side is literally insurrectionists trying to dismantle the country. You then fall back to insults because you have nothing of substance to say.
Sorry if I hurt your feelings. Not everybody who can see the world isn’t black and white is wrong. At least you are trying.
Will do. I’m sure 10,000+ dead Gazan kids agree with your perfect blue hypothesis. Nobody is perfect you ignorant, self-righteous fool. Just because it’s impossible to see anything when your licking the insides of your own small intestine, doesn’t mean nothing is happening. Here’s an image of what your infallible blue team is spending money on since words seem to be a bit tough for you to grasp.
Yeah I’m sure “finish the job” “Muslim ban” Donald would have done a much better job with this conflict. Repubs are going to expand this genocide the first chance they get.
Ya know what, I bet he would have done a worse job. Believe it or not, it is possible for someone to simultaneously not like multiple options. I know, crazy, right? This is what you have to look forward to if you ever start thinking for yourself, you’ll be able to actually have a nuanced point of view. It’s unlikely that you will though, because first you’re going to have to confront the fact that maybe you and your team aren’t always perfect.
So you’re the bothsideser pretending it is a team sport but as soon as someone points out one side is rationally choosing the less awful option you scamper away screeching insults. I mean, you admitted you were incorrect several time already, good enough for me. Not worth trying to get you to calm down and think about what you’re writing.
Your reading compression is very bad. I don’t even know what you are taking as me admitting that I was wrong about. Maybe I did, I don’t know, I don’t see change of opinions as something to be ashamed of. I’m not surprised that you see that as a bad thing or as a way to try to attack someone.
Even outside of politics, the realisation that you can be something other than 100%/0% on views in general, will help you tremendously at being able to get a more realistic view of the world. I understand that it can seem simpler to just go all in on things, but simpler isn’t always better.
I don’t know why you’re getting downvotes, it’s true. The DNC and RNC railroad unfit picks to the ballot every damn time based on criteria that are NOT GOOD FOR YOU, ONLY THEM. All y’all who don’t see this are blind.
I agree with CaptainSpaceman. Choose CHOICE!
Oh, he’s getting downvotes for being a bothsider.
The dems have changed profoundly between Obama and Biden. Doesn’t even take any kind of deep political knowledge to see that. No, they haven’t become a revolutionary socialist party, but sorry, democracy doesn’t mean getting exactly what you want all the time. The party is vastly different. Maybe not as different as the Republicans from Bush to Trump, where they abandoned all pretense of Liberalism and switched to being a fascist cult of personality, but different nevertheless.
The bothsiders like you and he pretend political parties never change and aren’t influenced by their voter at all, contrary to evidence that anyone who had even PRETENDED to follow news and politics during their life would have seen. Then use that complete nonsense premise to justify the argument that it doesn’t matter who you vote for, it’s all the same, you shouldn’t bother.
It’s just a brain-dead political take. One that actively and constantly suppresses political turnout, hands elections to the far right, and prevents the exact progress you claim you want.
You’re interpreting my take as brain dead when you haven’t read it. These parties do have better candidates and they never make it to the ballot. The DNC and RNC are directly to blame.
You jumped into this comment tree defending someone claiming elections are meaningless team sports.
Hey silent downvoters, nobody is surprised that you can’t come up with a rebuttal that you’re not too embarrassed to even anonymously type. At least dip your toe in the water to see how having dignity feels. It may not be as uncomfortable as you fear. Stand up for what you “believe”.
Lmao please, there are political conversations literally all over Lemmy. There are only so many times one can type out a response to some troll repeating the demonstrably false line “both sides are the same.” You assuming your tired thought is worth more than a downvote…the vicarious embarrassment is painful
Wow, I wonder if someday people like you are going to evolve out of repeating that one line whenever anyone critics the blue team. Seriously, we get it, everybody understands that there are differences between the two teams. For real. Now that that is settled, is there anything that you have to contribute? or is repeating a single, irrelevant line really what it looks like when you perform at the top of your intelligence? I used to think that surely there was more to people like you, but you’ve really got me doubting.
Some day you are going to grow up, and it will be on you to form opinions, you might as well start practicing now.
Lmao you literally said “both sides are the same”
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The system is such that nobody gets a choice on either side. This doesn’t mean that both sides are the same. For example, clearly the blue team is better for poor people, and the red team is better for the rich. This isn’t difficult english. This is what happens when you don’t strive to do anything beyond repeating what you think you are supposed to repeat.
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Do you genuinely think you would vote for Biden if they told you to vote for someone else? Do you honestly, feel deep down, that you are choosing who you support so strongly? Is that truly your subjective experience? I’m genuinely curious.
The idiocy here is too thick to spread on magma. They told you “you like biden” so you say “I like biden. Anyone who insults biden is an idiot. This was my own thought because I’m so smart.”. Guess what. They did that to the red team too, and it worked equally well on those morons. This isn’t a mystery. They just know you are an idiot. That’s all.
You’re arguing against a straw man. I’m not voting for Biden because someone else is telling me to vote for Biden. I voted for Bernie in the '20 primary, but he lost and threw his support behind Biden. Biden got the most votes in the Democratic primary. Rather than view that as someone “telling me who to vote for” I recognize that is the reality of our primary system and first past the post voting system.
Now the choice is Biden or Trump. I agree with Biden on 80% of issues, and agree with Trump on maybe 5%. I don’t think anyone criticizing Biden is “an idiot,” I think anyone saying “both sides are the same” is an idiot, because the difference between their political positions is incredibly stark
Okay, now I gotta know - what’s the 5%?
The tariffs on Chinese goods, not super opposed to that. It’s probably more like 2%, or 0.5%
I mean, we know he doesn’t want it because he is a criminal who is doing crimes. He should be wiretapped. He is probably selling classified documents. He’s right about the law, tho.
Well, he was right. He is backpedaling that one.
The only people I’ve seen saying the “both sides are the same” line are the ones saying it’s not true in irrelevant situations. I’ve literally not come across anyone pretending like they are both the same. It is just that so many people are so embarrassed by their own candidate that that’s the only thing they can think of to say. It is awful that the best thing Biden supporters can find about Biden is that he isn’t Trump. That is pathetic.
Correct, nobody has agency except for you, because you are special.
Believe it or not, there are actually quite a few other people that see how awful the two party system is. You just wouldn’t guess it by looking at all the mindless red and blue(mainly blue) knights galloping around here. It doesn’t have to be that everyone just gets assigned a guy and then they go about pretending how they love the guy oh so very very much.
Of course having only two major parties is awful. No fucking shit. We all know that. First-past-the-post is a terrible voting system and needs to go.
But we also live in this thing called “the real world.” Here in the real world, we can’t do anything about FPTP or the two-party system in time for the 2024 election. In the real world, we’re facing a situation where one of two ancient men will be president. One of them is a fascist rapist, the other is a relatively standard politician.
In the real world, the last time the fascist was in power he managed to secure a 6/9 majority on the US Supreme Court. He managed to undo decades of regulatory work. He tried to torch the post office so it could be spun off and privatized. He tried to ban Muslims from entering the country. He moved the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, and would absolutely be worse for Gaza than Biden.
The choice between these two men is one where there is a clearly superior choice. Pretending that because both are distasteful you’re somehow superior for voting third party is absurd. Trump is so significantly worse than Biden that voting third party is a stupid, naive move that reflects a lack of understanding.
Wow. Finally, someone can admit that Biden is also an awful choice(just a less awful choice). It’s not so hard to actually speak your mind. Now, if you were to do this at the beginning of a thread, when people would actually see it, you would be ripped to pieces. That’s the problem.
The issue is that people are so fucking scared to mention Biden’s ineptitude around here, that so many morons start to actually believe that other people see him as a good president. It is such a breath of fresh air to finally see someone admit this. Thank you so much, hopefully more people start to be willing to say this stuff straight out of the gate. It’s so frustrating to be one of so few that are willing to say that hating one doesn’t have to mean loving the other.
If you don’t believe me, then try it out in a fresh thread. Mention how awful Biden is(yet still the best choice), and watch the idiot hive mind swoop in on you.
Thanks so much, I really appreciate the help with the voice of reason. By the way, this “real world”/“it has to be this way” stuff is just a thing some places, it’s not a given for all human politics. The more people are willing to do what you just did, the more it moves the conversation to a place where maybe we can start to make real progress away from feeling doomed to a shitty system we all hate.
Good on you!
I actually don’t think that’s true, plenty of people dislike Biden. Earlier in the campaign it was all about how terrible our choices are. But the conversation has changed, and now if you don’t mention the “he’s the best choice” part, people will assume you’re part of the “vote third-party-because-both-sides-are-the-same” troll brigade that’s flooded the internet lately, which clearly either doesn’t understand FPTP, or (more likely) does understand and wants Trump to win.
To be fair, he’s not a terrible president. He’s managed to get some stuff done despite an obstructionist Congress. I wish he were farther to the left, and I wish he didn’t have the fairly awful history that comes to most career politicians. Also supporting the Israeli genocide is horrible, though given how fervently he would be attacked were he not to support them, it’s difficult. Politically he can’t really win (though of course ethically he’s absolutely doing the wrong thing).
I don’t like him. But we’ve had far worse presidents.
No shit, but it absolutely applies to this conversation and this topic and the importance of this election. Context matters.
K
Fart
Tagged you as “selfish child devoid of self-control”. It’s totally understandable that you loathe people who remind you of how pathetic your actions are. Hopefully, one day you evolve enough to at least be able to see how much worse the world is due to your current form of existence. Believe it or not, your actions have actual consequences.
Ok, who are all the anonymous upvoters? This comment was pretty shitty in any context.
Whoever is maintaining this bot, you are supposed to tag bot accounts. Also, your bot broke, it is senselessly copying irrelevant comments. There are plenty of free local LLMs that will do much better than the vast majority of this accounts comments.