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Comment by bigstrat2003 | Hacker News Reader

bigstrat2003

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There is no reason to think that democracy in America is going to stop.

There are lots of reasons to think this is a real possibility. The American republic isn’t going to last forever and right now we are experiencing the greatest threat to our political stability since the Civil War. Texas likes to pass resolutions calling for secession when a Democrat wins the Presidency. We’ll see the call for secession become more common in the coming years and from liberal states.

Did you miss the part where the mob that stormed the capital was fully pardoned despite the incredible violence? This is dictator shit. He's telling his supporters violence is okay against his political enemies and he will cover for you.

There’s also the part where Secret Service agents are going to schools, lying about who they are, and trying to arrest children for making statements critical of Trump:

> "We had an incident happen in Chicago on Friday where there were some federal agents that showed up at a school asking to come in to interview an 11-year-old who had posted an anti-Trump video on TikTok.

> "They presented their credentials, they said [they were] Department of Homeland Security. The school was confused and said, 'No, you cannot come in.'

> "It turned out they were actually from the Secret Service, which does not enforce immigration law, but the school activated its protocol as if it were protecting that student, and said, 'You can't come in because you don't have a signed warrant.

Of course, Trump previously threatened to prosecute any state employees that don’t cooperate with such stuff. The school administration took on a lot of personal risk to protect that kid.

https://www.npr.org/hereandnow/2025/01/27/immigration-arrest...

I am reminded of my colleague who grew up in the USSR, and said agents would come to their class and show kids pictures of western cartoon characters (Mickey, etc.) to see who had disloyal parents.

We're not far from that happening here. There is currently an attempt to discontinue students' ability to check out mobile hotspots because access to the Internet could, "censor kids' exposure to conservative viewpoints." [1]

[1] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2025/01/senator-ted-cruz...

Is this not exactly what Biden also did in his last month in office?

So far both presidents have blanket pardoned a mix of political allies, family members, and rioters right in front of the American public and no one's talking about it...

I feel like I'm going crazy, are people really this oblivious?

You're not crazy, it's both sides. They're different sides of the same coin

Sorry, which violent insurrectionists did Biden pardon? Or are you comparing this to Biden pardoning people who were already receiving threats that they would be targeted for political prosecutions from the incoming administration, or is it the non-violent offenders who were placed in jail for such crimes as having a bag of pot? Or are you talking about his son who, while I don’t agree with, I also recognize that it’s his son at the end of the day?

“Both sides” is the excuse of people too lazy to objectively look at the real differences between actions while they sit on their party line. I don’t particularly like what liberals want, but they and their real Republican counterparts go about it in a lot different way than Trumpers.

These guys maced a cop until he had a heart attack. They beat a guy nearly to death with a flagpole. Pardoning lunatics thst stormed the capital and nearly killed cops is not the same thing as Biden pardoning his son.

I think it is a very reasonable concern. The closest we've gotten was Trump, recorded on call, demanding that a Georgia election official "find" a few thousand more votes, and the attempt to "stop the steal" on Jan 6.

In response to that ... the courts have decided that the president has immunity for all acts, the insurrectionists were paroned, and a series of blatantly unconstitutional changes made including an end to birthright citizenship and shutting down all government payments despite being required to disperse them by congress.

It seems very, Very possible to me that we will have "elections" soon in the same way Russia has "elections".

That is exactly what people who believe Fox News fabrications and Trump lies say; that the “liberal” (read, “independently found to be the least biased comparatively”) media is just fear-mongering for reporting on the crooked behavior everyone knew would happen. Steps that he’s taken have all been outlined in Project 2025, which literally lays out the plan to rig elections moving forward by excluding any dissenting voices from a position of power that might resist such an overtaking of government, followed by wide spread gerrymandering. Then make excuses for why Democrats are being ousted at every level. The fact that people are so closed-minded as to believe anything he’s done is in good faith are astonishingly…gullible. I say this as someone who has voted for Republicans most of my life, until the Tea-party and the Trump-ilk poisoned the party. Worse still are, again, the gullible buying into the myriad of what are clearly, factually, lies. But, I’m sure if we all put our heads in the sand our democracy will totally be fine. At least it isn’t like one of his first actions was to attempt to prevent the exercise of constitutional rights to citizenship or anything, so I’m sure all our rights including those to a free and fair election are safe.

The problem is they believe the other side stole the election, has pizza shop child abuse cults run by Hilary Clinton, that liberals in the government are the “enemy from within” etc. etc.

With such beliefs any response becomes not only possible but reasonable.

Faith in the system is no substitute for the actual work of maintenance. Right now there are people in power actively dismantling the system -- faith is not enough.

I would say there is plenty of reason. When we stop living by the laws we put in place, stop pledging allegiance to our country, stop solving problems that the people of the country face while simultaneously start pledging allegiance to a single man [1] who breaks those laws[2] and cares little about the situation of individuals in this country[3], we are definitely on the road to ending our democracy.

[1] New whitehouse/government employees are being asked when their moment of “MAGA revelation” occurred. This. is. not. normal.

[2] Trump is a convicted felon, adulterer, conman, etc...

[3] See his response to many crises in his first term including his initial and continued denial of Covid

Thank you for a voice of reason.

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