Watching it in real time, I still don't understand it. I could see how Trump won the first time around; Hillary Clinton was unpopular with most people outside of her party's leadership, but the second just seems insane. The kinds of things that would happen were obvious to me, and I am no expert.

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dylan604 11 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Two party system. As many people didn't like Hillary, clearly there were a lot of people unhappy with Biden->Harris. When you don't like the current admin's direction and/or their party, there's only one other party to select. I think there were plenty of voters that truly did not believe this would be the result of that protest vote.

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mikkupikku 11 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Protest votes are probably overstated, I think most of it comes down to people staying home. Everybody in America already knows what side they're on, and they either vote for that side or not at all. Virtually all political messaging is either trying to moralize your side or demoralize the other, to manipulate the relative ratios of who stays home on election day.

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dylan604 11 hours ago | parent [-]

> I think most of it comes down to people staying home

Obama was able to get people motivated. Neither Biden nor Harris had anywhere near that motivating ability. I don't know that the Dems have anyone as motivating as Obama line up. The Dems seem to be hoping that enough people will be repulsed by the current admin to show up.

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8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

[deleted]

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mikkupikku 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Newsom is an extremely strong candidate. Vance has several critical vulnerabilities that can demoralize right wing voters if the election is handled properly, and the Republicans really don't have anybody else. Rubio maybe, but Rubio won't be able to get ahead of Vance.

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SV_BubbleTime 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> Newsom is an extremely strong candidate.

For what office? President? Do you live in California?

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dylan604 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Trump had more than several critical vulns as well which did not dissuade voters. The electorate isn't as predictable as many try to make it sound

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mikkupikku 10 hours ago | parent [-]

Trump was able to moralize his voters, despite his weaknesses, by using a kind of charisma that Vance utterly lacks.

	▲	actionfromafar 10 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I think Vance isn't planning on using charisma, but violence.

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Zak 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Prior to 2020, I usually voted for third parties so I do understand that kind of thinking. The danger Trump represented was not obvious until well after he took office; it seemed early on like congress and institutional norms would restrain him. To swing the popular vote in the 2024 election, almost all of the third party votes would have needed to go to Harris, so I don't think that's sufficient to explain it.

By the end of his first term, the danger was hard to miss, and the attempt to remain in power after losing the election should have cemented it for everyone.

I was unhappy with Biden and Harris. I voted for them in 2020 and 2024 anyway because I understood the alternative.

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dpkirchner 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> The danger Trump represented was not obvious until well after he took office

I don't get it, was there anything surprising about him after his inauguration? He sure sounded dangerous on the campaign trail.

	▲	Zak 7 hours ago \| parent [-]
		The norm in 2016 was that candidates didn't make a serious attempt to do the more outlandish things they talked about in their campaign. When they did, advisers would usually talk them into a saner version of it, or congress wouldn't allow it.

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dylan604 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> The danger Trump represented was not obvious until well after he took office;

I just do not understand this sentence at all. The writing was clearly on the wall. All of the Project 2025 conversations told us exactly what was going to happen. People claiming it was not obvious at best were not paying attention at all. For anyone paying attention, it was horrifying see the election results coming in.

	▲	Zak 10 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Project 2025 did not exist in 2016. We are in agreement about 2024.

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mikkupikku 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Not the second time, the third time. Remember that Biden whooped Trump's ass once and could have whooped his ass a second time, but the donor class (career retards) got cold feet when they were forced to confront his senility, and instead of letting the election be one senile old man against another senile old man, they replaced Biden with the archetype of an HR bitch. I hope nobody thinks it a coincidence that the two times Trump won were the two times he was up against a woman. Americans don't want to vote for their mother-in-law, nor for the head of HR. And yes, that certainly is sexist, but it is what it is.

I just pray they run Newsom this time. Despite his "being from California" handicap, I think he should be able to easily beat Vance by simply being a handsome white man with a white family. Vance is critically flawed and will demoralize much of the far right IFF his opponent doesn't share those same weaknesses.