Hatfort

Well, yeah, Trump won. lol People can be fooled, and repeatedly.

Man, you're making odd questions and comparisons. Americans have the potential to make their general conditions for all of them better. The upper class successfully confronts the medium and lower ones against each other, and in the meantime, they hoard the wealth. In the long run, it's bad for them too, but they can't see it, it's like an addiction to hoard more money than they will ever be able to spend. The lower class having more money is good for the economy, because unlike the rich ones, they spend it in businesses, money circulates, and this creates jobs, spiraling even more growth. Inequality is the number one issue, it takes it's sub forms in the affordability of housing or healthcare. Families are bankrupted by medical bills, how is that good for the economy? Young ones will have to pay rent for life or mortgages of fifty years for normal houses. Vacation what? I'm not asking for a revolution though, just for the Democrats to adopt more progressive approaches to help the economy and the people.

Times are changing, I forgot to mention that he was too advanced for his time, and also boomers got it better than the millennials and zoomers. The traditional media still has a huge weight, but since the Internet, it's possible to spread some messages that in the 20th century wouldn't have made even a minute of screentime, and to be insulted at best, in the traditional TV channels. When something gets too big, even the media has to address it. So it's worth trying.

For many reasons, he has been swimming against the current of an already established party apparatus with donors that oppose his policies because they go against their interests, and the traditional media work for the other side too, so they massage the candidates they like, and demonize or just completely ignore the ones like him in screen time, or cut their interventions disingenuosly. Despite of this, he got a small niche in Vermont, and make some noise in the 2010s. Did he win? No, in the end he didn't, the powers he opposed did. But he has my respect for his life work and for trying, he did change some narratives, and put the healthcare right in the discussion as well.

No i'ts not, and I haven't. You have though, you gotta twist reality into saying things like the US system is not bipartisan, or that Bernie has not tried to change the Democratic Party, and gratuitously drop peyorative califications into him and socialists in general that are not based in truth, just for the sake of insulting them. That's low-level discussion. I've made a case of why I think Democrats should adopt a more progressive approach, emphasizing in the economic issues, and that people will respond positively to that. It's important to have charismatic figures as well, someone has to step in. If they do that genuinely, they win. The problem is they are sold out to corporate donors as well. Not as much as Republicans, but quite a lot too.

I haven't commented in this thread for a while. Trump's administration chose to continue fueling Ukraine in this war. I thought he wouldn't do it, he had a chance to score a goal as the peacemaker he sold himself to be. Ukraine would have to sit and accept the loss of four territories and sign neutrality, but the war would have ended there. Nothing is easy, but there was a route. Instead, Trump chose the Biden path, and even now has threatened with nuclear submarines. Remember NATO is not officially fighting this war, it's between Russia and Ukraine, so that's crazy. But it's probably for show, kind of what he did in Iran. It's irresponsible and stupid behaviour, but that's who Americans put in the White House. For their defense, Biden wasn't better on that, and we don't have any sign to say Kamala was either. The war continues, so the battlefield will be where the maps are drawn. Russia keeps advancing, and Ukrainians have to retreat or die at the front. After recapturing Kursk, Russia has entered Sumy. Now they have also started to put feet in Dnipropetrovsk. The longer it goes, the less has Ukraine in its hand to negotiate for a less bad outcome, and the weaker their army gets, which is a further risk.

It is a two-party system in practice, Democrat and Republican, Bernie worked within the Democratic Party. I'm not going to estimate anything, Kamala didn't get the votes she needed, we all saw the results, lost every swing state. I agree with you about taxing the richest, that has to be done. The system is running, I didn't say it isn't, but it's not getting better for more people, the opposite. Some of the things you list as good like taking vacations used to be affordable for a bigger portion of people, now it's a just a no for too many. Cost of education and healthcare is bigger too. The cost of housing where there are jobs is an impossible deal. That's not happening because people now is more stupid, it's happening because the politicians are legislating in favour of the companies and the richest. There is regulation, but in their favour. The wealth that used to be in people's hands and in circulation, benefiting the real economy, now just goes to the corporations that hoard it. This has to be reversed, and I'm not asking the Republican Party to do that, they won't, I'm asking the Democratic Party to do it, and with no hesitation. Socialists are neither lazy nor envious, that's stupid. They are normal people willing to improve things for the majority, using common-sense regulations and putting limits on the corporations so they don't fuck people over.

Bernie has been an independent, but due to the US bipartisan system, he has indeed worked inside the Democratic party, and he has tried to push some progressive policies, which is a way of improving it. He is not lazy, he has been working his whole life, neither are socialists in general like you say. No, I'm not trying to say what you wrote. What I said, and you can read, is that creating a new party in the bipartisan system of the US is inviable in practice. So the way for now is what Bernie did, try to get seats in a party hostile to them, winning the votes of the people by advocating for their rights and life improvement. Mamdami is kind of doing it now, but the challenge is huge, because they have the apparatus of the party where they are operating is against them. What I also say is that if the Democratic Party apparatus, instead of charging against those progressives, should try to integrate them and their good policies. The Democratic potential voters are more progressive than the party ever goes, but you gotta have their backs, so they got yours in exchange.

Look, Bernie lived in the time he lived, it's not on him that the good policies that he was advocating for have not been implemented, when there's everyone in the media and political establishment preventing it. It's on them, not on him. He made his choice to try to change things from inside the Democratic Party, which was the right one. It would have been good to start a new party, if the US system wasn't totally rigged against that option in practice. Maybe there will be a time to try that in the future, it wasn't on his. It's also a pain in the UK, not as much, but Corbyn grew some balls and is going for it. That won't really be splitting the left, but giving voice to it, because Starmer is rightwing. Margaret Thacher said that her best achievement was Tony Blair, which means that what was supposed to be the Labour left, integrated rightwing policies into it, which is the same that has been happening in the US Democratic Party, and in many other countries in Europe is similar too.

Most who would say that would be on the Republican side anyway, so that's a them problem. Neither Hillary nor Kamala were good candidates for different reasons. Neither of them, got the progressives on their boat. You need that to win, no matter your gender or race. Obama had it, Biden to a less degree, he kept Bernie closer instead of ostracizing him. If you get the progressive base and media enthusiastically pushing for you, you win as a Democrat, if you alienate them and have them demotivated, Republicans win, even if they get less votes than what they did before. It's a bit like MAGA base with the Republicans, they provide the enthusiasm dose needed in elections the very least. Then moderates move their asses too. The difference is progressive policies are good for the economy, unlike MAGA ones which are practically a scam, like Trump's big beautiful bill, like he calls it. It's a big ugly bill, Americans will pay the price.

That's a very superficial way of seeing this matter you have. If the person is not progressive, no matter what gender it is, it's not progressive. MTG is a woman and is not progressive. You gotta see what they run for, that's basic. Sanders was in politics for 50 years, indeed. But with very limited power, that's not being ineffective. He did what he could, advocating for the working class and denouncing the billionaire corporations and inequality. Obvioulsy it's another case of swimming against the current in his country's general politics, his own party's and not to speak about the media. Sometimes you plant the seeds, but the trees have to grow, that's what he did. He was too early, and it was too late for him when he got some success. If he had had the Democratic Party rowing with him in 2016, he would have won against Trump. When the Democratic Party puts its machinery to work for more progressive outcomes with charismatic, genuine candidates, people are going to respond, and push them to victory. It's true you some policies like M4A would face objection from the establishment and different insurance or drug companies, nobody said it would be easy, but you still fight and push. If you don't, you certainly won't get anything done. Well, I'm more progressive than what Obama showed to be, but there's indeed a limit on what he could achieve, so I'm not going to completely reject him either. Trump is destroying the economy, and has still stupid fools applauding him. If it wasn't an important matter, it would be even funny. The problem is Democrat presidents seem to go one step forward, while Republicans make two backwards. Inecuality is not being reduced if we count the last four decades, it's going up, so whatever the Democrats are doing when they are in power, is not enough. The table is getting more and more to the right, and it's not progressives' fault.

Women running is inevitable at this point in history. Hillary won her primaries, but Bernie was the progressive candidate. Kamala wasn't even chosen in primaries, but she was the VP when Biden showed his decline. Neither of these women were progressive in what matters, policy. Being a woman politician doesn't make you a progressive, look at Nikky Haley or MTG. You gotta see the content the figure provides, that's what matters. No progressive woman, gay, black or latino person rejected Bernie for being an old white straight man. There is support for many progressive policies, Medicare for all for instance, but you have the Democrat establishment fearmongering about it like it's some kind of monster for start, so progressives have to swim against the current, and finally they get tired or even drown. Why does the establishment do that, because they work for their donors instead of for the people they should, not to talk about the media, same bosses. You are making a mockery about some progressive figures and how they only campaign for something because it's right, and that's all their messaging, which is just not true. There are books written about M4A, how much cheaper it is and how doable. Obama implemented his halfass ObamaCare, things can get done once in power. Look, I'm not sure how much student loan relief Biden provided, but what I remember about that is that in the real moment he hesitated and let a legal loophole prevent it from happening. If he did something in January 2025, I didn't even hear from it, so there's a messaging failure there. Weren't the elections in November anyway? It's true progressives are the underdogs, so they have to concede more, and they do. But if the moderates pretend to win without them, they are not going to. Kamala didn't do a good job, you are trying to minimize a disastrous result. Fooling people like Obama did promising a change that never pretended to provide is going to work less and less.

There's always some wearing and backlash every term, and people take for granted the little economy healing that happens more under left-leaning policies in such an individualistic society that the propaganda media encourages, so they turn to the right again, but then reality bites. In both cases, Trump won against a woman, there's a factor of antifeminism that a lot of men buy, that was more clear in the 2016 one, but it was Hillary's fault, because she made it more about that, and Trump gladly did too. Hillary didn't integrate Bernie votes, Biden did. Biden didn't forgive the student loans in the end, he should have, he lost thousands of votes there. Then he supported Israel no question and lying to the face of everyone, saying he personally saw the 40 beheaded baby pictures that never existed and was called Genocide Joe. He also supported the war in Ukraine, liberals liked that, but not progressives. He could have taken a way out of that that liberals would have bought if he wanted to. Trump was ambiguous enough to sell that for his benefit too, although he is continuing Biden's path on both fronts in the end. Kamala represented a continuation of Biden, and she was a weak personality candidate on top of that. Hakeem Jeffries will never win anything, he's worse than Kamala, what a bland man, there's nothing genuine about him. He has made it to the top positions of the party by being a yes-man to its establishment, but there's no way he can appeal to the people to generate any real movement that winning an election requires. He should be put on the backside because he is not public figure material. He is a cryptonite to winning elections, just hear him speak. Kamala didn't appeal to enough people, she lost all the swing states, even if the third parties didn't get that much, it's clear she didn't either. Trump fooled a lot of people once more, many have regretted their vote already, and more will do, because he'll keep breaking the economy, as well as he already has. It's true he talked about the tariffs in his campaign, but people is not informed enough to understand how these policies will affect, which is negatively. Tax cuts for the corporations and billionaires so they multiply their hoarding, in expense of the real economy of the people, that will see some consequences in services like medicare and in job destruction. A lot of farmers already regret their vote, you see, some of the cuts of the food aid the US was providing to the third world was also what was sustaining US production, the food was going out, but the money was staying in the US farms. There has not been any saving anyway, it's all spent in the military industry and billionaire tax cuts as said. All the tariff wars, China knows it has an upper hand too, soy is one of the things they stopped buying from the US, instead they get it from Brazil, well done, Trump. Latinos for Trump are not happy either, they have a target in their back now, that will affect Florida votes, indeed.

Yeah, it's crazy, Trump is stretching their historical and current allies. If they find themselves in need, they may have to knock on China's door in the end. They want Europe to spend its coin on US weapons and military industry 5% of their budget, and also to have them energetically dependent. European leadership is sold or they are stupid, because they are conceding so much. Germany should be a case of study, because Biden directly stated that the Nord Stream would end, and Trump also took credit for that, and in fact happened, but they still kiss the ring. Ursula Von Der Leyen with Trump was pitiful to see last week.

Some US politicians like Marco Rubio have been directly stating that China is the biggest enemy of the US. If Russia had been defeated in this war, NATO would have continued their de facto expansion with Ukraine, Georgia was a work in progress, and who knows what else in the future. It's more difficult with China, because NATO doesn't have such a close proxy like Ukraine, The Philipines would be the closest with already a puppet, and there's interference with Taiwan too. So who knows what they would have been willing to try. All countries that were already in cold conflict with the US didn't cut their economic ties with Russia, also because of their own interest, like the mentioned China. Anyway, since Russia hasn't lost, this hypothetical scenario is not valid anymore. China and Russia have strengthened their ties, which they have the right to do so, and so have the rest of the BRICS countries.

But they do matter. Democrats will not win if they don't integrate progressive votes, and for that, they need to concede on some things, not only by word, but with real action. Figures like Mandami are getting success for something. It's different in the UK, but Jeremy Corbyn is successfully creating a new party. Although he won the Labour Party primaries some years ago, the establishment didn't accept this, and managed to kick him out. I'm all for Newsom, he has charisma, and can punch back. I'd tell him he should take notes from Mamdami's campaign. AOC would be my VP pick for him, but they need to step down from the Israrel bus, it's a pariah state doing the worst things we've seen this new century.

I've read that the Trump Administration's next move may be to make a deal with Ghislaine Maxwell so she shares some selected information they chose to appease the people that is demanding the release of the files, but exonerating Trump at the same time, in exchange for, if not a full pardon, a significant improvement of her conditions now or later. They probably have the shredder machines working full time now to erase the names they want. Trump is a pedophile, I don't say this because I dislike the man, which I do. I also dislike Elon Musk, he was in a picture with Ghislaine Maxwell, but that's not enough to accuse him of something like that. Trump had a very close relationship with Epstein for years, he even said in an interview at those times that his age limit would be 12, around 2016 a girl was going to accuse him of raping her on the island at the age of 13, but dropped the case, probably because of fear and threats, he gets nervous everytime he is asked about the files and tries to change the subject or move on as fast as possible. Trump is dirty in this case to the deepest, and the deepest is raping minor girls, that's why he doesn't want the files released and move the waters too much, because it gets as dirty as it can get with his name on it. His base, and most people wouldn't care too much if it was a case of him being with adult prostitutes, I wouldn't care, look at the Stormy Daniels case. But this is not that, this is something he can't get away with, that's why he needs silence. Recordings of these crimes may exist, but they will never see the light, because that would kill the cow of those orchestrating the blackmail scheme, and incriminate them too. It's not believable that this couple of Epstein and Maxwell could just get an island for themselves like it's nothing, recruit so many minor girls for prostitution, they are the victims, and be involved in the most influential networks of the time to bait them. There must be powerful organizations behind that backed them financially and in other ways for sure.

We probably won't know more than we already know. Jeffrey Epstein and his wife were coordinating, along with many others that we don't know, an island with sex worker minors. This is likely part of a blackmail scheme targeting wealthy, powerful, and influential individuals. We know Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton, and Donald Trump were some of the visitors. Trump is guilty. It's not only that he was in some pictures with Epstein and his wife. Trump's reactions when confronted with this matter say it all. There was an interview where he was asked about different issues like the JFK files and others, and when he was asked about the Epstein files, his tone became nervous, it's clear he is hiding a personal involvement. A few weeks ago, Elon accused him of being on the list, and he didn't even properly deny it, he didn't counterattack, he even praised Elon. The subtext of that is that he wanted Elon to drop the matter and stop engaging on it. A girl was going to denounce him around 2016, but withdrew the case. This is a guilty man, congrats America, you put a pedophile in the White House.

These numbers were published by the Harvard University Dataverse platform some days ago. Not only that, Trump gave the 1.8 million number in the press conference he had with Netanyahu after their meeting, where he proposed their ethnic cleansing plan for Gaza. Not that Trump's words are to be taken at face value, but he usually lies to bloat himself or undermine others, but why would he refer to the population of Gaza as 1.8 if it's 2, 2.1, or 2.2? That would be a weird lie, so we have to consider that 1.8 is the number Netanyahu shared with him in their meeting. Despite this, it's true we don't know for sure how many have been killed in this massacre, but it's precisely because the ones committing it are not letting the information be known, a way of misinforming, apart from targeting journalists on purpose, and blatantly lying all the time. At this point, many different organizations point out that the 50k dead number is a huge miscalculation. It's many more than that by far, unfortunately. How many people are alive in Gaza now? It's an important question to know the extent of the genocide, just by comparing it to the previous population. We need to know that.

It's a genocide, population estimations in Gaza before October 7 and now are what we have to compare. They were above 2.200.000 then, and below 1.800.000 now. The around 50.000 dead that are being reported are a huge underestimation, those are the ones that could be counted by body and name, but people who have disappeared under the rubble or died indirectly have not been listed. The real numbers are above 400.000 killed, half children.

Huge developments in the region, Israel attacks Iran by surprise. It seemed a decapitation kind of attack, high-ranked generals and nuclear scientists killed, many along with their families in their beds, and the unfortunate families living in the same apartment buildings. They probably tried to kill the Ayatollah too, to force a regime change and destabilize the country, but failed on that. Trump admitted to being informed about all this beforehand, maybe for bragging, maybe not, but the thing is, it was in the middle of the negotiations for the nuclear proliferation of Iran, Trump demonstrated once more to be 100% untrustworthy. It is also worth mentioning that Obama's deal with the Iranians was working well until he terminated it, but his ego couldn't approve anything that had Obama's signature, and also Netanyahu's pressure was probably another big factor. Iran's capacity to counterattack hasn't been canceled though, they responded quite strongly a day later, and both countries have been attacking each other since. Unlike other wars, these two countries don't share borders, so the war is going to be aerial, as we are seeing. Both have strong capabilities. Israel's Iron Dome is not impassable, it seems that it's weaker as days go by. We would have to see who can endure this longer. The big question is whether the US will directly attack Iran or not. If they do, the consequences could be world-scale, because the oil and energy production of the region is enormous. Iran would probably attack US bases around, their petro-allies, and go harder on Israel too. The cost in human lives would be another level.

Big guest in Bad Hasbara, Gabor Mate. Talks about Jewish trauma then and now, and total rejection of the current genocide of Palestinians and all that has been done to them for decades.

Thanks man, I read your comments with interest too!

Antagonizing all the countries in the world seems like a bad idea if you want to maintain hegemony. Trump backed off because it was a disaster, but some harm was already done, weakness and unreliability have been exposed. Still continuing the tariffs for China, that's a bad idea too, as the USA is not sufficiently industrialized and needs to buy China's products more than China needs them as buyers. China has a lot more market out there to sell, it's going to be fine. US internally, big companies will endure the losses, but a lot of more small businesses that needed trade with China will just close. Shops importing products from China can't hold three months of this, and farms selling things like soy to China are in trouble. Inflation is unavoidable, many who thought they were safe from inequality will soon join the other side. Bye job, bye healthcare, by the way. China is developing at an excellent rate, compared to how it was 40 years ago. Progress, modern infrastructures, industrial innovation, and quality of life are palpable in its advanced cities. Sometimes we hear about India being on that route too, but they are not even close to that success, and I don't see them making the same moves to be there in a few decades like China did. America is in decline, it has the potential to be more than fine, but not electing right-winger anarcocapitalists at worst, center posing neocons incapable of conceding even crumbs from the top to the bottom at best.

There has been a lot of development in this ongoing war. Russia successfully recovered the land of Kursk and weakened their opponent's army doing so, there were thousands of soldiers there. This was a bad idea from the start, Ukraine could have used this power to defend its territory, and Russia may open a new front in Sumy now. They may use that to do the exchange that Ukraine was willing to do with Kursk in future negotiations. Meanwhile it keeps advancing in the Ukrainian territory. The diplomatic route has not been great, but at least it exists now. After the resounding White House meeting, Europe said they would take over, but they've already changed their mind, and now they are talking about a ceasefire. A 30-day ceasefire agreed upon by the US and Ukraine, the only problem is that Russia had no say in that. Putin rightfully asked what would the terms of that ceasefire would be, because otherwise, it has the momentum on the battlefield, and no incentive to go along with that. There is some acknowledgment from Western leaders that some territory concessions will have to happen, but Zelensky rejects them in their totality. So there we are now.