Trump made a mockery of American democracy. Why are Americans shrugging this off? | BY THE MIAMI HERALD EDITORIAL BOARD - eviltoast

Donald Trump faces four indictments, 91 criminal charges and hundreds of years of maximum prison time combined.

This is a former president who — according to the latest grand jury indictment in Fulton County, Georgia — participated in a “criminal enterprise.” Trump and 18 co-defendants are accused of trying “to unlawfully change the outcome of the election” in 2020. Among the 13 felony charges he faces is one count of violating the Georgia RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations) Act and two counts of conspiracy to commit forgery.

Most of those charges are related to a fake elector scheme by the Trump campaign in which a slate of “alternate” electors in Georgia would cast electoral votes for Trump instead of Joe Biden. The president of the most powerful democracy in the world allegedly tried to steal an election.

We can’t say it often enough: This is serious. Americans cannot shrug this off or normalize it, no matter how many times Trump gets indicted. Yet it feels like business as usual. Not only is Trump favored to win the GOP presidential nomination, he’s also neck and neck with President Biden in the 2024 general election, according to a July poll by the New York Times/Siena Poll.

MORE THAN A CULT

Trump’s support cannot only be explained as the product of the cult-like power he has over his MAGA base, which accounts for roughly 40% of Republican voters who believe those indictments are nothing but a conspiracy against him.

more: https://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/editorials/article278265068.html

  • bauhaus@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Nobody is shrugging this off. Those left of center are freaking out while the Nazis on the right are cheering him on.

    Nobody is shrugging this off

    • fiah@discuss.tchncs.de
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      1 year ago

      Nobody is shrugging this off

      except the millions upon millions of people who can’t even be bothered to vote. I know the systemic vote suppression probably counts for a significant part of it, but honestly most of the rest are skirting their civic duty

        • SnowdenHeroOfOurTime@unilem.org
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          1 year ago

          How about a pile of dog shit? If Trump had literally just let the medical experts speak instead of constantly downplaying COVID 19, thousands of people wouldn’t be dead now. A pile of dog shit would’ve at least had the courtesy of shutting the fuck up.

        • Honytawk@lemmy.zip
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          1 year ago

          Literally every alternative is better.

          Even corporate bootlicker sleepy joe is making heaps of improvements in the US compared to Trump.

              • LoopingRiver@lemm.ee
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                1 year ago

                Ah, the “neither side is the ideal option so just vote for Trump” angle. Not sure what your point is unless you’re pro-Trump. Is Biden the ideal candidate? No, but here in reality where the options are Trump or Biden, there really isn’t a valid argument where anyone left of alt-right wouldn’t vote for Biden.

                  • LoopingRiver@lemm.ee
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                    1 year ago

                    Abstaining from voting is basically giving Trump the win, ergo it is a vote for Trump. Again, either these are ignorant comments or you’re just a troll.

    • SnowdenHeroOfOurTime@unilem.org
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      1 year ago

      Tell people’s conservative parents everywhere that. I know for sure mine are shruggers. At this point anything short of “damn it looks like you kids were right, I’m voting Democrat if I have to” is a shrug.

      • PickTheStick@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Context matters. When they’re in a conversation with another person that they care for and are face-to-face, who is talking about a contrary point of view, logic and thinking is present in some small amount in their brain. They’ll actually think about the other person’s point, and then make the mental shrug about Trump and his crimes and their effect on his viability/reasonableness as a candidate.

        If they’re in a group of other supporters, or on the internet, they very quickly do the republican/conservative thing of ‘falling in line’ and will try to publicly demonstrate (virtue signaling, aye?) how much they are part of the group and follow its standards.

        I’ve had several conversations with my parents. When it is just me and one of them, I get a semi-reasonable conversation, but if another person is present, suddenly it’s like having a conversation with a fox news talking-head.

        • SnowdenHeroOfOurTime@unilem.org
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          1 year ago

          You are lucky honestly. I think my parents double down because it’s me talking :/

          And I’m definitely more disappointed and upset because it’s them, the people who supposedly raised me to be good.