On its face this sounds like an indictment of an electorate.

But I think it's actually a much deeper indictment of the incumbents who couldn't present a vision more appealing than the "madness on television".

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csoups14 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Of course incumbents are going to be supportive of the system as it was and is, they're incumbents. You can't blame a person in power for maintaining a system giving them power any more than you can blame a bee for pollinating a flower. It's in their nature. The electorate misidentified the solution to their problems. Voters squarely hold the blame in my opinion. You can't vote for an arsonist and then complain when they set fire to everything. Leftists spend their time complaining online and disengaging from the political system instead of voting in primaries against incumbents. Independents and conservatives vote against their own interests consistently while keeping in power a party that is destroying our system of government.

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bigstrat2003 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yeah, people act like everything was peachy until Trump decided to run, and then people went crazy and voted for him for some unknowable reason. No, things were pretty fucked before Trump. We had decades of our "leaders" in Washington treating the people with contempt and making decisions for personal benefit, rather than what benefits the people. We had bribery, I mean lobbying, behind a ton of the laws that got passed. And that's without even getting into the tyrannical stuff, like the Patriot act, the NSA spying, etc.

No, the government was pretty blatantly not serving the people's interests when Trump came along. That doesn't make Trump a good solution to the problem, but nobody should be surprised when people vote for an outsider who says "I'm for you, and I'm going to help you take back your country from the out of touch elites who hate you and only look out for themselves". It would be surprising if that promise didn't resonate with people.

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retsibsi 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> but nobody should be surprised when people vote for an outsider who says "I'm for you, and I'm going to help you take back your country from the out of touch elites who hate you and only look out for themselves"

Sort of, but that was always a pretty obvious tack to take, and I don't think there was ever a shortage of would-be leaders willing to play that role. So we're still left with the question of why the voters chose the most obviously untrustworthy guy to play it.

	▲	pesus 35 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		I think there is a shortage of would-be leaders like that though, that's the problem. Or at least would be leaders that gained any real traction. The only other one in the past decade was Bernie. Unfortunately for the past 3 elections, it essentially came down to the obviously untrustworthy "outsider" vs the ultimate establishment candidate. For a lot of people, it's as simple as that.

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JumpCrisscross 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> nobody should be surprised when people vote for an outsider who says "I'm for you, and I'm going to help you take back your country from the out of touch elites who hate you and only look out for themselves

Which is ironic, given Trump has been pretty great for anyone who is rich or well connected.

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lotsofpulp 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

What if the electorate is so stupid that what appeals to them is ruinous?

What if the electorate is so stupid that it simply votes against women in order to affirm their personal desires to not be at bottom of the socioeconomic rankings, however delusional those may be?