this post was submitted on 06 Mar 2025
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"Technically, the United States didn't get bad, it's always been bad! It only got worse!" isn't the flex a lot of leftists think it is.
What's wrong with the message "We should be doing better, not worse"?
Seems preferable to the "hurt people who also want the things I have" that seems the core of conservatism.
What's wrong with it is it's normalizing Donald Trump. Like, actually pointing at Trump and saying "this is normal." US democracy is on life support, and calling this business-as-usual is like telling people there's nothing to see here while he yanks and tugs on the plug.
I'm not sure I understand.
Saying "We can do better than Trump/Fascism/Corruption/Kleptocracy" seems far from normalising the current state?
Saying we can do better than trump/fascism is not what the OP is implying. The op is implying what were are doing now is the same as what we have done before. We can acknowledge that we've done bad before, but now it's for sure way worse. I agree with Bernie that now is way worse than before
What has this to do with "lefties"?
A dictatorship and dismantling everything inside the country and destroying relationships with allies can't be good either way
Or do I miss something?
Left doesn’t push this, right (or fake left ML) pushes this to same-sides left.
https://lemmy.ml/post/26685482/17035018 Since your neonazi friends at #politics have blocked me from responding to comments of my own post here it is:
Action without the "talk" means very authoritarian military like structure, where commander decides and everyone down the ladder/pyramid execute the decisions.
Talk must precede agreement and agreement must precede action for collective action. Individualist decision and action is a fascist wet dream of that something ever was done. Society has no interest in what an individual does, unless it is one in a high position of a hierarchy affecting society.
I’m sorry, I cannot trust content from ML, as that instance very much wanted Trump to win.
That can explain why I am being blocked :)
Hm. I think we can agree that "flexing" and "ooooh, we told you so" and "look at our superior moral high ground, isn't it moral and amazing" isn't exactly material to make friends in a political debate.
The problem is to formulate a political common ground position that so many people can agree on, that it's trivial to support it. And it should be very clear that "they nazi, don't pay attention to our goals btw" isn't good enough. Even if it's bernie saying it.
The problem with formulating that position is also, that it's hard to even bring the attention and time investment that is required for listening to people or to read an argument, if you don't trust the person making the argument. So a "hold on, we're going to get to the good point in 20 minutes" isn't good enough either.
Starting with something is obviously wrong like "we have always been the good guys" will destroy what little benefit of the doubt people may bring to the table. And it's not material to build that common ground.
So, try to read the "we told you so" not as a petty attempt to rub something in, but as a "this situation being wrong has been our position from the start, let's get to the real argument, please".
And that actual real argument can't be an appeal to the long, honorable, just and democratic history and patriotism, because that kind of rhetoric is what got us into this mess in the first place.
There is this mental pattern, that people look for the weakest argument and "destroy" their opponent and "win". We're not interested in the destruction, but we're also not going to support bad arguments. It takes effort to overcome, because doing that is fun.
tl;dr Bernie made a bad point here. Let's acknowledge that it was bad and move on.
The point is it isn't really worse. Yet, anyway. He's only been president for a few weeks so obviously it can get worse.
But right now, Trump is about as bad as every other president. Bad in different ways, of course, but they all belong in prison.
I disagree. No president has ever abandoned a democratic ally to invasion by an imperialist dictator for such petty, malicious reasons.
They might all belong in prison, but that's like saying a shoplifter is just as bad as a serial killer.
Well now hold on, we did that to the Kurds in... Wait, nevermind, that was also Trump.
The only reason Trump has this opportunity to screw over Ukraine is because Biden kept the war going. The previous administration pressured Ukraine to keep the war going instead of entering negotiations over territory back when Russia was in a much worse position than it is now.
The reason? At the time it appeared that the war was an opportunity to weaken Russia and let them to waste blood and treasure on an unwinnable quagmire.
Years later all they accomplished was killing more Ukrainians and Russia is stronger than ever. Biden got Ukraine here, even if Trump is the one to finish them off.
Some DARVO shit right here.
DARVO shit would be blaming Ukraine, which is what Trump does.
I'm blaming the imperial power that provoked the war in the first place and then stopped negotiations from taking place and never gave Ukraine enough aid to actually win outright. The plan was always to hurt Russia, not help Ukraine. They're the victims in all this.
The US has a lot of responsibility for the war going on this long. All presidents are criminals.
So, Russia?
Russia was not justified in its invasion, but let's not pretend the goal is just to steal land. They need a buffer state from NATO or it's only a matter of time until they get the Libya treatment. This is to protect Russians, unfortunately Ukrainians got used as pawns to threaten them when their government was overthrown by a Western coup i.e. imperialism.
Me living in a NATO country bordering Russia.
Note, I generally agree about the fact that NATO should have been dissolved after the cold war, and since then it contributed to create the risk it was useful to mitigate. That said, the key word is contributed. Russia is an imperial power and I hope you can see how populations who were already on the receiving end of that imperialism would rather choose the far empire than risking with the close one.
Your description of the maidan events also completely lefts out the popular support, the Ukrainian perspective, the way that Yanukovich had the power in the first place, the impact of russification (also imperialism) and much more. Yes, the US was very happy and supported the maidan movement, and so did many different groups with different perspectives. However, it's completely partial to paint that as an imperialisric US coup.
We have not only abandoned democracies (many of which were more democratic than Ukraine), we have actually been the ones to destroy them. Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran, Operation Condor targeting every democracy in South America, genocide in Indonesia, etc, etc. Trump's stance on Ukraine is, at worst, not doing enough to protect a democracy from external threats, but America has frequently been the external threat democracies need protection from. Don't you see how that's worse?
Bidens genocide in Gaza is far worse than this. These selective standards are all over the place.
Democrats really think they can put the mask back on after taking it off.
Let's compare Trump's Ukraine policy to Biden's Ukraine policy: It's worse.
Let's compare Trump's Gaza policy to Biden's Gaza policy: At best, it's the same. More likely, it's worse.
Who's being selective?
It worse. Israel is blocking all aid, with full Trump support. Also, Trump-Gaza. He really doesn't give a shit about civilians in Gaza.
You