My sense is Trump will try to make Snap benefits permanently end during the shutdown,” she said. “I’m dumbfounded by the cruelty.”
That’s the inevitable outcome of what they are doing, less money for billionaires is thier concern.
Grand Rapids, Michigan resident Bill predicted he “will have to go without many things that I ordinarily purchase” and borrow money from his family.
“How do I feel about it? I curse Donald Trump and his entire party of sycophants and lickspittles to the seven[th] circle of hell, now and for all time,” the 71-year-old said.
I like Bill’s attitude :)
I heard a take today that it’s a purposeful provocation, in an attempt to elicit the ability to use martial law, I assume to keep himself in power. He needs the people to revolt, with violence. I dunno what I think about it.
I think escalation and violence from one side or another is happening regardless.
On one hand, if this is the game he will play he can make things worse and worse and just say “but if you react, I get what I want”. Then he ruins programs and gets what he wants. On the other hand he has made things worse and more violent by lying and claiming that there is already a violent response… and he gets what he wants.
Win win for fascism either way.
People that are dumbfounded just haven’t been paying attention.
it’s so incredibly frustrating reading americans thoughts on this stuff. like you just stroll over to virtually any reddit thread regarding anything the administration is doing and it’s always “this must be illegal” or “it’s happening” and what have you. Like they still don’t get it. “I can’t believe they’re doing what they said they were going to do, I hope someone stops them” - proceeds to keep doom scrolling.
And then you have the democrats that insist the system isn’t broken, insist that if they continue to play by the rules than the other side will also eventually decide that the rules should be followed…no, that’s not how this work. A cheater doesn’t suddenly have a come to jesus moment and thinks “you know…I really shouldn’t cheat anymore.”
Completely agree. I am in America, and it is incredibly frustrating. People, I think, are just kinda milling about until we hit an extremely obvious tipping point. There’s been far too many “lines in the sand” that we’ve left far behind us. Couple that with the average person who either has been conditioned to not want to think about politics or is “too burned out to care” (so frustrating), we end up where we are.
It’s certainly by design that republicans are constantly pushing villainizing critical thinking and institutions which teach it, even though they themselves all have degrees.
It doesn’t help that the vast majority of us are locked to our jobs for healthcare, and well over half the county lives paycheck to paycheck now and that’s only getting worse with inflation and wealth concentration at the top.
Losing SNAP benefits could be a tipping point. Once those millions of people run out of food (the largest group of recipients are, guess what, idiot trump supporters in red states), we might see some change. But not before (even more) people start to die, unfortunately.
Yes, and we will be dumbfounded how quickly they forget.
Hard to forget when you can’t eat.
They’ll forget who was at fault and blame the dems while giving the fascists a free pass.
Imagine, army troops guarding grocery store exits.
It wasn’t long ago that they were protecting cars.
Imagine being those fascist simps with all those guns and you’re like “yes, preventing the wrong people from getting food is my purpose”
And were privileged enough to only pay attention now
This is actually a huge part of the issue. While the move hurts white participants as well, proportionally it’s much lower.
White people will largely shut up if they witness violence because they do not want to alter their racial privileges (and in doing so they avoid class solidarity).
Lickspittles
They’re just surprised that the hatred they voted for is affecting them too
These respondents were self-selected Guardian readers. Doubt many voted for Trump.
Yeah that’s what kept coming to mind: All these people are The Guardian readers so they probably already dislike Trump and likely blame him for this loss of benefits.
I would have liked to see The Guardian interview actual Trump voters to see what they feel about things.
There does seem to be a sentiment of wanting food stamps gone, because that’s a program abused by non whites and immigrants, but SNAP must remain because they depend on it. Then being shocked it’s the same thing and it’s all gone now. Same with Obamacare and ACA.
My ex-wife turned our baby sitter onto the ACA and she was ecstatic! “At least it isn’t that damned Obamacare!” Wife: “It’s the same thing.” Wish I had been there to see her face.
Honestly though, anyone surprised by this is a fucking idiot. This was in the plan that they wrote and made publicly available years ago. You are not allowed to be surprised by this.
This was in the plan
It’s also generally where our government operates. Under Clinton we watched the social safety net get cut. Under Dubya it was cut further. When the poors tried to revolt Obama stood by and let the NYPD brutalize them and let the banks con and rob them. Biden and Trump I also got in on the fun of making life harder for the poors, by standing by and doing nothing as the cost of living has doubled and tripled while wages stayed stagnant. (And for added fun, Biden and Trump have done nothing while homelessness is increasingly criminalized.)
It’s who we are at a cultural level. We ARE a cruel people.
It’s easy to forget that Trump won the popular vote, and that this is his second term.
America has a cruel president because Americans are cruel. That’s what they want.
He didn’t win the popular vote the first time. He lost by 3 million votes, but a Democrat has to win by a lot more than that because of the handicap set up by Republicans to favour Republicans. He lost by 8 million to Biden and that was enough for a Democrat to be appointed by the “Electoral College”.
George W. Bush also lost the popular vote in 2000, but was appointed.
I don’t know if Trump actually won the popular vote in 2024. At this point it doesn’t really matter. The rich and powerful are just going to appoint who they want, they don’t give a fuck what the people vote for. The popular vote is an opinion at best, and it’s not considered. Americans don’t elect presidents, the ruling elite does.
It’s too easy to blame those who voted for Trump. Instead blame the millions who didn’t vote against him. Those who sat by and did nothing hoping the collective good would win. And then when it didn’t, they wash their hands and say “you can’t blame me, I didn’t vote for that monster.” Thing is, they were hedging their bet. They didn’t care who won. They figured, no matter who won, any time anything bad happened, they could say “well I didn’t vote for the president, don’t blame me.”
Blame those who didn’t vote. Blame those who were fooled into voting for a third party, dividing the progressive and human rights voters. There are two kinds of people: those who voted against Trump (cast a vote for Harris) and those who voted for Trump (everyone else). They all own an equal share of the blame. And if their benefits are cut, or those of people they care about, I can’t muster a lick of sympathy for them. This is what they voted for.
And sure, the president isn’t voted by the people but rather appointed by the powerful, but I’m pretty sure if the people voted 2:1 or some other overwhelming amount, they would have appointed the winner of that vote. Only when it’s close do they pick the one they actually want, even if he loses the popular vote (George W. Bush, Trump the first time).
Isn’t a vote for Trump still worse effect-wise than a third-party vote or not voting?
In theory, maybe.
In practice, it has the same result. If everyone who did not vote for Trump, voted for Harris, we would not be where we are.
Most people who voted for Trump stand by their vote, for one reason or another. You can ask them to apologise but they won’t. It’s the ones who didn’t vote for Harris and hedged their bet and are now saying “not my fault! I didn’t vote for him!” who are the real problem. Because they didn’t want Trump but they also laid down and let Trump have the victory, for some reason or another.
Look, for fucking decades my mother would not vote. She saw Kennedy killed (and/or heard about it) when she was 9 and she swears he was the last good president. (I didn’t like Kennedy all that much. My “last good American president” was Franklin Delano Roosevelt.) Anyway, after Trump’s first term, she voted in both the last elections. For Biden in 2020 and Harris in 2024. She wanted Clinton to win in 2016 but did not go vote, she figured enough people would vote for her over Trump. When Trump won, she stopped sitting on the fence and started getting out and voting. And she’s like 70-something. Granted she’s retired. But if you have the legal right to vote, you should. I strongly believe that. And if you don’t vote, I absolutely believe you don’t get to sit there and say “well I didn’t vote for the guy who won.”
Yes, although they are still both to blame.
