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naraburns  nihil supernum  6mo ago (text post)   27949 thread views

U.S. Election (Day?) 2024 Megathread

With apologies to our many friends and posters outside the United States... it's time for another one of these! Culture war thread rules apply, and you are permitted to openly advocate for or against an issue or candidate on the ballot (if you clearly identify which ballot, and can do so without knocking down any strawmen along the way). "Small-scale" questions and answers are also permitted if you refrain from shitposting or being otherwise insulting to others here. Please keep the spirit of the law--this is a discussion forum!--carefully in mind.

If you're a U.S. citizen with voting rights, your polling place can reportedly be located here.

If you're still researching issues, Ballotpedia is usually reasonably helpful.

Any other reasonably neutral election resources you'd like me to add to this notification, I'm happy to add.

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Bernie Sanders put out a statement

It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them. First, it was the white working class, and now it is Latino and Black workers as well. While the Democratic leadership defends the status quo, the American people are angry and want change. And they're right. […]

Will the big money interests and well-paid consultants who control the Democratic Party learn any real lessons from this disastrous campaign? Will they understand the pain and political alienation that tens of millions of Americans are experiencing? Do they have any ideas as to how we can take on the increasingly powerful Oligarchy which has so much economic and political power? Probably not. In the coming weeks and months those of us concerned about grassroots democracy and economic justice need to have some very serious political discussions. Stay tuned.

It's worth mentioning that Bernie Sanders is dead wrong about a lot of things.

For one, he says that inflation adjusted earnings for the average worker are down over the last 50 years. But... they're not. When we consider government transfer payments, the average worker actually makes a lot more than they did 50 years ago.

So what does Bernie want? More transfer payments of course. Which he can then continue to ignore as he trots out his entirely false theory of economic history. Communism has been tried. It didn't work then, and it won't work now.

It's worth mentioning that Bernie Sanders is dead wrong about a lot of things.

Is he really though?

Hasn't a signifigant portion of the culture war over the last 8 - 12 years been about how the "official numbers" no longer reflect reality? The powers that be assure us that inflation is below 5% and then when asked why a chicken dinner, or a tank of gas, costs twice what it did a year ago they respond with some nonsense about how "vibes" are clouding people's judgment of the "true" economy.

when asked why a chicken dinner, or a tank of gas, costs twice what it did a year ago they respond with some nonsense about how "vibes" are clouding people's judgment of the "true" economy.

Unless inflation statistics are completely falsified, there's simply no way that's actually true. Perhaps people opted for a different chicken dinner than before because they're easily manipulated.

Unless inflation statistics are completely falsified, there's simply no way that's actually true.

That would be the joke wouldn't it? That the "official" number have been manipulated or falsified is kind of the point.

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