this post was submitted on 21 Jul 2023
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This country will never heal unless he spends time behind bars.
It won't even if he does. Trump isn't the cause, he's a symptom. The US is probably not going to survive as a unified nation for very long, and honestly, it probably shouldn't.
Making the United States a union of sovereign territories instead of a country with a powerful federal government sounds like a familiar idea.
One our national enemies would love.
They wouldn't be national enemies anymore
Yeah, at least a third of the states would immediately cozy up to them
You mean the ones that are also headed towards total societal collapse within the next decade? Yeah, I'm sure they'll totally have plenty of resources to spare for a trans-pacific invasion when they can't grow any crops.
Who said anything about that? This country should be split up entirely. It's already completely unable to function by any reasonable standards, and for decades the harm it's caused its own people and the world at large has been increasingly outweighing any good it does. Empires are always negative forces and should always be dismantled.
No, the nazis much not be allowed to establish their reich.
That ship has fucking sailed, buddy.
Woah buddy That's a sharp edge
Yeah, Russia is significantly worse. We all know. That doesn't change the fact that the US is sprinting head first into the woodchipper, too.
Sounds like copium to me. We have a few good things going for us, but to say we're far and above every other country is insanity.
That depends on what domain and what metrics we're talking about. The US is by far objectively the wealthiest nation in the history of the world, which is nothing to scoff at. American military is far above and beyond the capability of other nations.
I wouldn't say we're a shining city on the hill that should be an example for everyone, we certainly have our issues, but we shouldn't overlook the domains where we are successful.
Like I said, there are some things we do extremely well. Sharing the wealth of the country amongst the citizens of the country is something we fail at miserably. My personal favorite thing is the first amendment to the constitution because I happen to value freedom of thought. Another thing we tend to do really well. Our culture also has a certain resilience that I appreciate. I only hate on America because I know what it could be if there was collective pushback on the oligarchy that seems to have so many of us in a trance.
The person I replied to did:
Nope, I didn't say anything about a "union of sovereign territories." That was just you.
Well it wasn't just me, it was the people that established the country.
How would you split the country? There are heavily blue areas in red states and heavily red areas in blue states.
Or do you just want chaos?
I don't have the solution, I just have the basic sense to see that what this country is is entirely unsustainable.
Your solution ignores that all we really need to do (and I say that like it's easy but I acknowledge it's not) is remove the parts of our system that prevent an accurately representative government. Stuff like the electoral college, the cap on House seats, and the dominance of plurality voting. The root problem we see here is that a minority of people have more power over the government than the majority of people.
Like I said, this is much easier typed out than done, but it is not impossible, and is much more likely to succeed than "make a fascist country and give it a humongous border with the democratic country that it views as 'the enemy'" Even if there were a clean way to split it up (there isn't: cities are blue, rural areas are red), much of the red state's income comes from the federal taxes from blue states. Do you really think that's going to end well?
Splitting the US like that would be absolute chaos and probably result in several civil wars. This would also destroy all federal aid programs and I can guarantee no states are going to step in to fill that void. Dividing the country further than it already is will not solve anything.
No one said balkanization was a good thing. Just that it happens, and is currently happening, being driven by multi-billion dollar media corporations trying to inflame a culture war to keep the lower classes occupied. They were too successful, and the wheels are starting to come off.
We might be able to fix it, but the current trajectory is pretty clear.
This country is going to implode one way or another. We can try to have it happen in a kinda sorta controlled way, or we can do your idea of sticking our fingers in our ears and just let the pressure build until it breaks in the most destructive way possible.
It's going to hurt no matter what. Trying to avoid the pain will only end in worse pain.
The Roman empire was still the most successful empire in the world at the time it collapsed. So was the British empire. And the Spanish empire. And the Mongol empire. And the Abassid Caliphate. Should I go on, or do you get the fucking point yet?
Yeah, Russia is one of the worst, most worthless shitholes in the world, far worse than the US. That doesn't nullify the situation the US is in, nor the sitiation it's headed towards. This country cannot and will not survive the already inevitable famines of the 2030's.
Fuck off, jackass. Being anti-American doesn't mean pro-Russian, and anyone with even a single brain cell rattling around in their skull knows they're both trash.
He is a cause and a symptom. Trying, convicting, and imprisoning his would go a long way, but would not stop the problem from growing.
We're better off with systemic incentives in place to dissuade the next person considering Trump-like criminal behaviors.
When you have an illness you still treat the symptoms while you address the cause so the symptoms don't make things worse.
Our very first mistake was not sending Nixon to prison. Set a bad precedent.
Our first mistake was not stomping out the confederacy hard enough.
That was a huge mistake. We are still dealing with the consequences of the failure of reconstruction. (Article is a few years old but still very relevant.) archival link
Racism was the primary motivator for Trump votes in 2016.
It was right there.
I agree with you in principle, however I don't know how we could have accomplished that without preventing Ford from using his pardon, causing a constitutional crisis.
FTFY