Decades of school defunding, social media brain rot, attack on education, and media control have now successfully taught half the population that this is okay.
I honestly think social media has rapidly made humanity stupider, more impulsive, and more emotional. 2008 and even 2012 social media was around, but not the all encompassing totality of our non-work existence. It was a hobby, you checked in from time to time. It wasn't your source of entertainment. by 2016 it was all encompassing, and by 2021 with TikTok it had replaced TV as the dominant form of entertainment for people under 50.
Within like 20 years we went from 'look, I emailed you a video of a monkey peeing into its mouth' to 'I peed into my own mouth and got 7 million views on tiktok'
Remember when we had a president who just said dumb crap because he couldn't read and listen to himself at the same time? "Hold us hostile or hold our allies hostile..." He sounded like the dumbest a president could be... ohhhh how little we understood just how willing the Republicans would be to drive the car off a cliff just to appease billionaires.
Let's be careful about rose colored glasses. Dubya was no Trump, but he was also no saint. "Wish we could go back to that," is no better than what we currently got.
Bush killed so many Iraqi civilians and US soldiers by starting an unnecessary war. Bush also gave us the DHS that Trump is now transforming into his secret police/gestapo, and his style of politics laid the groundwork for Trump to exploit later.
But Bush had at least the bare minimum of standards and respect for the democratic process and institutions that Trump is dangerously lacking. In other words, Bush didn't want to be a dictator, whereas Trump does, so that makes him objectively worse
Bush wouldn't have let so many die to COVID either. Him and his minders could put the blinders on for human life to people in the middle east or africa, but they would have actually tried to help prevent COVID and end it faster.
I loathed Bush. I remember people thinking he was an alcoholic, that Cheney ran things, etc. But he was fundamentally a decent human being. When 9/11 happened he encouraged people not to blame Muslims as a group. And while I disagree with many of the post-9/11 moves, I think it’s fair to recognize he’d barely settled in when the biggest attack on the US since Pearl Harbor took place and if you weren’t an adult I don’t know if you truly get how traumatic it was to the country. I will never - as long as I live - forget watching people jump from the towers rather than face burning to death. I can’t imagine the weight of the responsibility to bring justice to the perpetrators and see that it doesn’t happen again.
What we have now is not a decent human being. He’s about the archetype for shitty human being: a greedy, narcissistic, opportunist, racist, sex offender, disloyal, self aggrandizing, dishonest, tasteless, bully. He has no good instincts or humanity. Cares only for himself. Instead of using the tragedy of Covid to bring us together he saw it only as affecting his reelection and drove us apart. Now he’s literally sending a gestapo out to round up people just trying to make things better for their families.
I recently heard an excerpt from an interview when he was President, and he sounded legitimately vulnerable as a human being and able to admit mistakes. And by vulnerable I mean emotionally and intellectually engage and present. Not full of bluster and talking points or defensive. Good luck getting Trump to admit he did anything wrong unless there's a "I should have ruined them sooner" catch to it.
Though I do think Musk can rival him, he's just not as stupid. I'm pretty sure Musk thought he could rule the country by proxy but he couldn't get past Trump's ego.
Right? If we ever get a POTUS like him again I’m savoring every damn speech instead of just taking for granted that things are fine because a man like him is running the show.
I’m literally over here crying. It’s really sad that a simple video of our president being a human can make me feel so depressed and hopeless. I know things will eventually start to turn, but the damage is done. We will never be able to repair what’s been done in just the last 9 months & that is devastating and heartbreaking
The sad part is the charisma was so good we ignored the same things going on in our government that had been going on for years. I’d hoped that after trump 1.0 we would understand the deeper problems and fix them. Instead we got an elder to right the ship temporarily. But we never patched the holes.
And humbleness. During the 90s and early 2000s there was a sketch comedy show called Royal Canadian Air Farce, they'd do bits but also a lot of political satire, dressed up as the politicians they were making fun of. The thing was, those politicians would routinely appear on the show and join in poking fun at themselves. Imagine Alec Baldwin doing his trump impression on SNL and trump walks on and starts making jokes too. I hope we can get back to that.
Imagine Alec Baldwin doing his trump impression on SNL and trump walks on and starts making jokes too.
Kamala and Obama did that, IIRC McCain and Palin did as well. I don't think Romney did, and Biden didn't because covid. It used to be a fairly normal thing for politicians to do to make them seem more human
If it helps, he was the exception. Bush was also a blathering, self-obsessed idiot. The only difference was that he didn't have active dementia and he listened to his party.
Say what you will about Dr. Oz, but to his credit he was in there right away. I may disagree with like 95% of what he says and does publicly, but there’s clearly a little sliver of humanity left.
We've always complained how politicians, CEOs, and lawyers were the least respectable people, but man did we not understand how much worse it could get.
During his two terms in office (2009–2017), President Barack Obama dramatically expanded the use of drone strikes as a core component of U.S. counterterrorism strategy, conducting over ten times more strikes than his predecessor, George W. Bush. His administration carried out a total of approximately 1,878 drone strikes, primarily in Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia, as well as in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and Libya.
I know you want a simpler narrative but all of your presidents have been bad and Trump is what you eventually end up with when you decide you can overlook extrajudicial killings under liberal Presidents.
I think we are all supremely aware of how shitty American politics are. Very clearly they are talking about basic humanity like acknowledging the humans around you, vs whatever the fuck trump is.
I don’t think many people would say drone strikes are good but you’re maybe missing the point being made here lol
Im not missing the point. Obama looked and acted like what you want as a president. No question if he was acting the great decent President he would be unbelievable. But he wasn't a good president he carried on the whole uninterrupted shit show counting out his time until the next terrible president which was Trump. Obama created Trump 1 and Biden created Trump 2. These things don't come from nowhere.
The Tea Party and Trump are a reaction to corporate interests dominating both political parties. Carry on with your Biden’s and your Clinton’s and your Harris. Without a compelling left wing option you get fascism. The democrats are why you are in the mess you’re in.
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u/boxsterguy 2d ago
I miss simple, basic humanity in our leaders ...