this post was submitted on 22 Jan 2025
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No Stupid Questions

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You'd think a hegemony with a 100-years tradition of upkeeping democracy against major non-democratic players, would have some mechanism that would prevent itself from throwing down it's key ideology.

Is it really that the president is all that decides about the future of democracy itself? Is 53 out of 100 senate seats really enough to make country fall into authoritarian regime? Is the army really not constitutionally obliged to step in and save the day?

I'd never think that, of all places, American democracy would be the most volatile.

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[–] finitebanjo@lemmy.world 49 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (1 children)

Ah fuck you really going to make me infodump I hate you sm fr


Part 1: The Two Parties

In the 1960s Civil Rights movement a deep political polarization began which results in wealthy interests backing the Republican party more and more, President Ronald Reagan in return shifted the party away from unions and towards deregulated and low tax markets and industries, and when Democrats introduced a campaign finance reform to curb the issue in 1995 it failed but was reintroduced and passed in 2002 it furthered that divide yet again, that bill was then sued by Citizens United wealthy interests and the SCOTUS sided with Citizens United as a Partisan 5-4 decision. So now we live in a world where political divide has all of the wealthy interests backing one side whose policies are actually extremely unpopular but people are easily misled into not knowing the stances of people they are voting for, or misled on the repercussions of those actions.

Figure 1: Partisanship of Congressmen

Figure 2: Partisanship of citizens


Part 2: Legislative Requirements of the USA

The USA has steps to pass laws:

  • It gets called to vote by majority leader and passes the House of Representatives, which is capped at 435 congressmen allotted very very roughly proportional to the state populations.

  • It gets called to vote by majority leader and passes the Senate with a simple majority of 51 votes, unless a handful of senators decide to filibuster it to delay the vote indefinitely, in which case the bill gets amended with concessions and sent back to the House for yet another round of voting. Filibuster can be bypassed with 60 votes which is basically impossible due to aforementioned partisanship.

  • The president signs it into law.

Now the problem here is that to remove a congressman, the president, or a supreme court judge: you need 60 votes following a successful impeachment inquiry. So it never happens.


Part 3: Foreign Interests

Influential media from the Murdochs, the Kochs, and the CCP are constantly pushing the USA further into the grave they've been digging for 50 years. China has always been a source of cheap labor and the relationship soured greatly following the Chinese influences on Korean and Japanese elections during the time those two nations were rebuilding following the World War era and were under the watchful eye of the US Military who were a central figure in the aforementioned conflict. This divide deepened with the 1984 Tienanmen Square Massacre where cities all over China were quelled by military forces being deployed on their own people. But far from being the end of it, the Pacific was still a prime trade route where the USA sought profits, and so Chinese influence continued to spread more as the days went by.


Part 4: Where We Are Now

President Obama was denied a lifelong SCOTUS nomination in an election year, giving the nomination to Donald Trump.

Donald Trump was granted yet another lifelong SCOTUS nomination in an election year. The SCOTUS was thusly deeply conservative.

His court nominations allowed him to run for office despite not qualifying under the insurrection clause, because if the courts choose not to reverse a lower court decision that he wasn't barred from office then nobody is enforcing the law.

Billionaires bought or operated their own home made social medias in the USA, the CCP deployed TikTok campaigns to elect a fascist.

This isn't just a thing that happened which we were unprepared for. It's a thing that has been happening for decades which so many of us have been desperately attempting to stop.

[–] danciestlobster@lemm.ee 1 points 6 hours ago (1 children)

This is good information, a few follow up questions:

  1. what does China gain by influencing the US to elect a fascist? It's clear what us billionaires gain, less so for China

  2. where are the breaks on choo choo train to Nazi America, based on this trend?

[–] finitebanjo@lemmy.world 1 points 5 hours ago* (last edited 5 hours ago)

USA military interventions in Asia have been a constant concern for a long time, and the USA allied Korea and Japan directly oppose Chinese expansion and Chinese allied North Korea. The USA military control of the pacific ocean is seen as a wall to be overcome. The Chinese deeply despise the existence of NATO; the world's largest mutual defence pact, and the US Government as barriers between them and their expansionist goals.

For examples, the takeover of Hong Kong and Taiwan almost failed due to US support, and their econimic use of Philippine and Australian seas have faced setbacks.

China is openly allied with other USA adversaries such as Iran and Russia.

It also helps that President Trump has repeatedly praised and admired Xi Jinping openly in public. The USA Tariffs will have no effect on Chinese trade profits at all as USA citizens will instead pay the fees. The less average faith a US Citizen has in their country and the more easily radicalized they are to harm their country, the better it is for China. They constantly predict the downfall of America and the rise of China in a single breath.

If you want evidence of all of this then look no further than the quotes of Chinese officials and the ideals of "communist parties" of the USA.

  1. The brakes would be electing 60 democrats to senate to pass campaign finance reform, public healthcare with no concessions, and tax reform. As they have repeatedly tried to do for many years but always come up short of votes. Bonus points if they expand the court, house, and senate but I dont know if its an achievable goal until after the campaign finance reform.