In this particular election where does that lead you? Kamala? As much as I have never been a huge fan of Trump, I find the policies of Democratic party to be completely inconsistent with the a Republican form of government that values individual liberty. So the thought of the Dems agenda continuing, for me, is much worse that whatever I think of Trump.
Fair warning, this is a book. If you don't want to read it, I feel the entire Trump campaign lacks substance and isn't based in reality. It's relying on the same fear mongering we heard from him in 2020 and 2016 (and even before him from others) , although turned up a bit. I think he's not fit to handle international affairs and cozies himself up with the wrong world leaders. My status quo right now is actually quite good and I'm more comfortable having Harris continue that than I am with Trump in office. I think the GOP has completely thrown away what they once stood for to just turn themselves into the MAGA party.
I know it's going to sound like fear mongering and people will say I have TDS and all that BS, but I don't think people realize how dangerous he has the potential to be. Last night when he was talking about world leaders who he gets along with he could only name three names: Orban (who has for all intents and purposes turned Hungary into a non-democratic state), Kim Jong Un (who he literally saluted when he went to NK), and Putin. Trump was asked twice to answer with a simple yes or no if he wanted Ukraine to win the war and he couldn't do it. That's a
huge red flag to me. The stability of Europe is dependent upon not capitulating to Putin. And the stability of Europe is key to the stability of the world. It's absolutely wild to me, that in 2012 Romney (rightfully) said Russia was still our #1 geopolitical foe, Obama laughed at him, and the GOP came to Romney's defense. Now the Presidential nominee for that same GOP can't even clearly say if he wants Ukraine or Russia to win the war. And this is not to directly compare the situations, but imagine if in 1939 our main goal was just to "stop soldiers from dying" instead it being to defeat Hitler?
This will again be mocked for fear mongering, but January 6 was a disgrace. Compare it all you want to BLM or whatever other nonsense you think it was equivalent to, but that was a horrible day. And Trump is doubling down. The premise that if the roles were reversed, and those were Biden supporters rushing the Capitol, that Trump supporters would still be okay with it like they are now is absurd. It was wrong no matter whose candidates supporters did it.
Trump's entire election denial schtick is dangerous, and at this point I honestly don't know why people still believe it. He claimed the 2016 election was going to be rigged before it even happened. He claimed it was rigged after it happened and that he really won the popular vote. He claimed 2020 was going to be rigged before it even happened. Claimed 2020 was rigged after it happened. Is claiming 2024 is going to be rigged before it even happens. At what point do people who support him honestly ask why he can't ever admit he actually lost?
Literally everything that doesn't go his way he claims is because there's some conspiracy against him. He's done this before with damn reality TV shows.
So at a very minimum, given my concerns above, I would vote for Harris and deal with whatever Democratic policies I disagreed with because to me that trade off is worth not putting Trump in power again.
But on a policy point of view, to paint Harris as an extreme leftist is just not accurate. And guess what? We've heard the same exact things before about Obama, and Biden, and every other Democratic nominee and the world hasn't ended. The fear mongering gets old after a while. Trump called her a Marxist last night. I highly doubt he even knows what that means, but he knows his voters are scared of the word so he'll use it. Remember when the GOP said Obama is going to take your guns for 8 years? Did he actually do that? No. Remember calling Obama, Biden, and now Harris a socialist, a marxist, a communist? We still have the strongest capitalistic economy in the world. This country is literally run on capitalism. To act like a Democratic President of the United States, who has very little real power to actually influence the economy or to make economic policy, is going to plunge the US into marxist hell hole is just fear mongering.
Everyone keeps saying the economy was better and inflation was lower before Trump. But the President doesn't exactly control inflation. Inflation was worse in almost every western country than it was here in the US. Did Biden cause that too? I fail to see how baked in inflation as a result of Covid screwing up the entire supply chain is the fault of whoever happened to be President at the time. And if Trump won reelection and Democrats blamed inflation on him I would say the same thing. I think the Fed managed things quite well, and that Fed chair was appointed by Trump. It seems like they were able to pull off a soft landing, avoiding a recession while getting inflation under control. Given all of the above, blaming inflation on Biden, who isn't Harris by the way falls completely flat. Everyone keeps asking "are you better off now or four years ago" as if it's some sort of Gotcha. Well I'm better off now.
You mentioned individual liberty, so let's see which candidate or party is actually for that. Obviously abortion is the hot topic right now, and your definition of how that relates to individual liberty will depend on where you stand on abortion, but for me I disagree with the GOP on this. JD Vance and Trump were asked if they would veto a national abortion ban. Neither could answer the question, and instead just said the ban would never happen so it's not worth talking about. A lot of things that would never happen have happened. It was a simple yes or no answer. If it will never happen then just give your real answer and move on and you'll never have to hear about it again because well, it'll never happen, right? But neither could answer. Couple that JD Vance's comments about what the "purpose" of women is and I can draw my own conclusions about his abortion stance.
The GOP is the one who is currently ignoring the will of the voters when it comes to abortion. In multiple states voters have voted in favor of abortion via referendums and the state GOP controlled government tried or talked about how to ignore the vote. GOP controlled states are also fighting hard to keep abortion referendums off the ballot. How is the party that still claims the 2020 election was stolen from the voters going to try to take power away from voters on another topic? It's hypocritical. They know the vote won't end up in their favor and they're trying to stop it.
The transgender fear mongering is icky to me. If I know any trans people I am unaware of it, so this topic doesn't affect me or any one I know personally. But just let people live their lives. The entire obsession about drag shows being dangerous is weird. Drag shows are not inherently sexual and are a clear expression of the first amendment. Drag shows have existed in our armed forces as entertainment for almost a hundred years and maybe longer. The greatest generation that defeated Hitler and the Nazis dressed up in drag on base. Why is this all of a sudden a problem? Then you get to the whole gender affirming care bans. Gender affirming care does not equal surgery.
Calling a 16 year old named Chris Christina is technically gender affirming care. Banning it is a complete overstep by the government and a violation of personal liberty. Just let people live how they want to live. The vast majority of people are completely uneducated on what being transgender actually entails, so just leave it to people and their own doctors. I do also think it's funny how all these bans on gender affirming surgery for people under 18, which I would probably agree with, never ban circumcision, which is by the definition of the word genital surgery. To me this is just another "we'll allow it when we agree and not allow it when we don't" piece of hypocrisy.
Republicans are the ones banning books and trying to tightly control what's taught in school. Banning books has never once put you on the right side of history. The internet exists in 2024, banning a book about homosexuality from a school library isn't preventing anyone from reading it. Are book bans not a violation of individual liberty? Honestly to me the entire premise that the GOP is somehow the party of individual liberty rings extremely hollow in 2024. Trump is not directly responsible for a lot of this, but his rhetoric has certainly contributed to the views of the party at large.
Both parties run up the national debt, so I've just completely ignored that. And again, facts actually show GOP presidents have higher deficits than Democratic ones. Our last surplus was under Clinton. Our first trillion dollar deficit was under Bush. Obama spent 8 years with a deficit trend line that shows deficits slowly decreasing. Trump came in and exploded the deficit again. He was back at a trillion dollar deficit before Covid hit. They haven't been great under Biden, but again Biden is not running, Harris is.
At the end of the day, a Harris Presidency is safer to me than another Trump one. I don't think there will be any adults in the room under Trump. 40 out of 44 of his former cabinet officials have refused to endorse him this time around. Guys like Bill Barr, who were conservative darlings before Trump, have said some extremely damning things about him. Trump isn't a conservative and the GOP is no longer the Republican party it was.
