“Where Do You Get Your News”
This is a second hand story about my brother in law’s experience in a Giant (TM) Supermarket checkout line (I guess he should guest post this). He saw someone checking out wearing a Trump Shirt and started a conversation (he’s like that) mentioning that he was voting for Harris. The Trump supporter said that BIden and Harris had accomplished nothing. When my brother in law (politely I’m sure) noted that he disagreed. The Trump supporters (plural including Giant employee) were not convinced. One asked if he liked an open border. He said it is now very hard to seek asylum. He was asked “where do you get your news?”
In the USA we know that we have very different opinions about facts. We know they depend on which news sources we trust. It should be possible settle these disagreements shouldn’t it (sarcasm in case it wasn’t clear). I get my news from progressive blogs and the MSM. However in this case one can check at The Whitehouse
“President Biden believes we must secure our border. That is why today, he announced executive actions to bar migrants who cross our Southern border unlawfully from receiving asylum. These actions will be in effect when high levels of encounters at the Southern Border exceed our ability to deliver timely consequences, as is the case today. ”
Should settle the question. This is a “fact sheet” not the actual executive order. This is not just, possibly false, assertion that something has been done — it is doing it (the original Feank Austin definition of “perfomative”).
www.whitehouse.gov is avaiable to Customs and Border Control agents — they see the proclamation they must obey. Of course they received the order through different channels. At this point, sticking with “where do you get your news” is real tinfoil hat conspiracy theorizing.
Also this doesn’t matter. Nor does the fact that encounters at the border have fallen in half and are now at Trump presidency levels (numbers are boring anyway)
Instead many people will be convinced by the Trump ad with alarming video of dark people streaming over the border (recorded in 2018).
But we have to try.
Good luck with that. The usual response to facts and evidence is “fake news.” This is the success of autocratic politics; you don’t have to win by convincing people of your views, you just have to breed distrust in all information. This is what Putin has done. This is what Xi has done. This is what Maduro has done. Obrador is moving in that direction. Trump doesn’t re-tween QAnon because he believes it, he just has to cultivate cynicism.
Robert:
Pleased to see you here again.
Talking about Trump, the economy, what has been accomplished, the upcoming election, the fake votes, etc. with his supporters is not fun. Maybe your brother is a big guy?
I tend to steer clear of them. Many will not understand the detail, I spew forth. Plus, it can be a cantankerous event. I mean, they are entitled to their erroneous facts even if they have no foundation and are trump fabrications. They will live the rest of their lives believing they were screwed by us.
I do not want to faceoff with them. It is not worth my time to try and persuade them when they will not accept the reality of having the orange haired one pick their pockets for his own takings and for his buds.
I am a tall guy who is not considered imposing. Not well liked either due to my knowledge. I tend to remain silent. To keep my physical capabilities, I used to lift weights until we moved to MI. In Michigan I picked up on “wing chun and wing chun do,” not to be confused with Chinese food. If kept me busy. I arrived at a Purple Belt with a black stripe. Kind of mid range in the belt arena and just below Blue.
James DeMile came for a visit to our kwoon. He developed wing chun do as a student of Bruce Lee. On two different occasions I had a chance to talk with him for a bit. My Sibok was not too happy with me that I was conversing with James.
Even then with my capabilities and knowledge, I did not feel like I wanted to discuss with trump followers Trump. It is a lost cause and not worth a discussion of what was accomplished over the last 3.5 years.
What do you say when they claim Biden did nothing?
I find it better not to engage with ignorance.
This is a big problem with American politics and society. There are very few voices on either side willing to admit that the problem is not Donald Trump but is the American people.
So we get of Trump. How do we address the 65-75 million Americans who gleefully live in their racist, theocratic world? This is not a new phenomenon; this is 250 years of American history. Educated liberals live in bubbles just like MAGA supporters; they think that just telling these people facts and scientific theories will correct a life-time of brain-washing and a culture of racism, violence and intolerance that extends back to 1607.
I am open to suggestions, but since I no longer live in the US, I am not overly concerned either. US political spats about abortion or bible study in school are parochial and trivial when compared to the existential threat that the right otherwise poses for climate change and planetary limits.
Suppose “racists and theocrats” you disagree with are not what you think they are.
Suppose they think!
I suspect their theocracy conflicts with your’s.
@Expat,
Conservatives want to ban To Kill A Mockingbird. Liberals want to ban Gone With the Wind. I want to ban conservatives and liberals. So, I get you on the historical ignorance and the socioeconomic hysteresis, but history is learnable and if those that have the means do not want to teach history to our fellows, then those that are vexed by the ignorance of our fellows must do so or remain content in their own silent suffering.
BTW, I completely agree with you on the difference between the little shit and big shit given that existentialism requires as much.
Thanks.
@rc,
What liberal group has called for banning Gone with the Wind? I missed that. Link, please.
@Joel,
Sorry about the delay, but I am not much in the blogosphere these days. Also, I titles are often misleading as I do not believe either the book or movie were ever actually banned despite entreaties to do so.
https://collider.com/gone-with-the-wind-movie-based-on-banned-book/
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/14/movies/gone-with-the-wind-battle.html
The Long Battle Over ‘Gone With the Wind’
The 1939 blockbuster once symbolized the ultimate in mass entertainment. But African-Americans have protested against it from the start, even if white America didn’t want to hear it…..
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/jun/13/gone-with-the-wind-hollywood-racism
Gone With the Wind and the damaging effect of Hollywood racism
The temporary removal of the Oscar-winning drama is renewing a conversation about the film industry’s murky past and its effect on society at large
here is a scene in 1974’s underground blaxploitation-era film The Spook Who Sat by the Door where a group of black militants comically mock the ubiquity of Gone With the Wind-like imagery that is so embedded within American culture. As the others laugh out loud at the performative racism essential to this historical representation, the film’s main character, Freeman, expounds on the larger meaning of such things: “You have just played out the American Dream. And now we’re going to turn it into a nightmare.”…..
@rc,
I’m sure if you look hard enough, you’ll find people who would object to nearly every book or film. That’s not the point. My question is what evidence there is for any organized effort on the left to ban GWTW. I see you couldn’t find any either. Whereas, the right is trying to at least ban certain books, like To Kill a Mockingbird, from public schools. Both sides don’t do it.
Have we forgotten the attempted overthrow of the nation by trump? Those 65-75 million seem to quickly forget it. I believe the numbers you cite are smaller. It is a cantankerous minority who believe they are being taken advantage of by others. No doubt we are in who the nation really favors, a much smaller minority in the economic strata.
I do not live in a bubble. Indeed, we were from the lower economic strata. A father who never finished grade school. This is oversight stuff. The nation was ready for its version of a hitler which came in the form of trump. Except many of us were not willing to follow him.
The well was poisoned by Repub leaders right from the beginning upon the election of Joe Biden. Any number of Repub senators began to advertise open borders in their commentaries stating they were open for immigrants, and they came. It is interesting, this was immediately after the attempted overthrow by trump’s followers. A more serious issue than open borders. How quick they changed the dialogue.
If that was not a serious issue and neither is a woman’s right to control her own physical being, why would “the existential threat that the right otherwise poses for climate change and planetary limits” be more so?
It floors me when Robert’s brother engages with a conversation with a trump-supporter as they are notoriously bad mannered and will not engage in a polite conversation. That they claim Biden did nothing??? We were on the edge of another 2008 collapse of the economy mostly impacting the likes of people like us. And they do not recognize what was done by Biden and Dems to avoid such a collapse?
And citizen trump is still advocating such events as am overthrow in our presence which many take no issue with him doing so? Is there to be such a conversation to meet in the middle to accept an insurrectionist?
So much to worry over.
paddy:
It is called a foundation . . . which is open to a critique.
What is “foundation”?
I don’t do business with Republicans. It’s easier than you’d think
I am barely restraining the ugly stereotype. Yeah, that one. I spit back
The only reason I haven’t gotten into a fight this round is I just don’t go into places anymore where I am likely to encounter a bunch of drooling half-apes parroting the kool-aid
There’s a couple high-end places I can shop that given WalMart and Albertsons’ price-gouging really aren’t that much more expensive …
@Ten,
Found this post in the trash. Neither Bill nor I put it there.
The NYT paywall prevents me from reading the link, but the graph shown has Trump administration encounter data (FU 2021 through Jan 2021) entirely below the data that comes after, including the final point in July 2024. The highest point on the graph is Dec. 2023, so I lean against the Trump data having much of a seasonal effect since it covers the same part of the calendar as the absolute peak. Joe Biden becomes President on Jan. 20, 2021 and the data goes up a lot, bounces around, but always at levels exceeding early FY 2021 data, including its low point.
FY…
My conversation with a tRump supporter typically goes like this. I ask them what tRump did to directly improve your life. I usually get an answer like “he tells it like it is” or “he secured the border” or “he owns the libs”. I ask them again how did that specifically make your life better. Then they usually ask me how Biden made my life better. To that I reply “the tax credit from the inflation reduction act made it cost effective for me to invest in solar panels on my roof, a mini split AC/heat pump, and a pellet stove. My annual energy costs savings is about $5000 per year. I will have recouped my investment in 5-6 years and after that it is all money in my pocket”. At this point I usually get called an expletive woke liberal expletive as they walk away.
@Mark,
In other words, Trump improves their lives by making them feel less inadequate/impotent. They can’t monetize that, so they get frustrated and hostile.
Weird.
Mark:
“Woke” as compared to aware or sensitive to the issues? It is great to be aware, sensitive, and cognizant of the issues facing everyone including the
accuserswhich the ones accusing you of such apparently do not know how they are labeling you. Wouldn’t an “awakened liberal” descriptor be more on target?My conversations about Gaza genocide most often ends when I ask “why is U.S. sending bombs, guidance kits, parts, intel, and now $25 billion more stuff?”
Both sides have positions that need debated, with respect..