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Comment by fzeroracer | Hacker News Reader

Conservatives realized that they could effectively lock down Congress, take over the Supreme Court and then vest all power in the executive. The whole arguments against DEI, smaller governments etc are all a smoke screen because they have zero issues with nepotism and favoritism as long as it benefits them. And no issue with government overreach as long as they control it.

Unfortunately I think the only direction is balkanization of the states. And I don't think that is going to end well.

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It may be easy to get mad as the Republicans for this, but there’s a clear bipartisan precedent here. Remember DACA? Might have been a good policy if Congress had enacted it. Bad precedent as an executive action though, because it establishes that the president’s ability to make immigration policy is effectively unlimited. Today’s ICE raids are made possible by DACA.

No, ICE was established in 2003, post-9/11, way before DACA in 2012, and it was always intended to be used for this purpose.

I think the OP has a different point. I don’t think they were claiming ICE was created by DACA, but rather their actions were enabled by it.

I'm not particularly going to disagree that the Dems are useless or not part of the problem, because they absolutely are. A lot of the issues we have is because of continued attempts at bipartisanship watering down bills into oblivion, means-testing and obsession with locking out people further left.

But ultimately a lot of our core foundational agencies have been functioning well regardless. And it's only the right that's intent on tearing them down no matter the consequences. So while the Dems enable this, the Republicans enact it.

What the Democratic party did to Sanders was a disgrace. The people wanted him, the powers-that-be (donors?) didn't. He'd probably have won against Trump, according to surveys.

The Republicans did go with the (sadly) popular guy. I guess he was palatable (by the definition that matters) because there was no talk of increasing taxes on high incomes.

> What the Democratic party did to Sanders was a disgrace. The people wanted him, the powers-that-be (donors?) didn't.

More people who voted wanted Clinton and Biden. Sanders himself admitted not enough young people voted and his platform was less popular in more conservative states.

AFAIU, there were party shenanigans to decrease his chances in the primary?

Very very minor party shenanigans. Serious enough that they should be called out and punished, but not serious enough to effect the voting.

"She was given the questions tonthe debate," is the most serious accusation. But anyone with a dozen brain cells knows whats going to be asked during the debates.

There was some more stuff that I found upon researching it, but not nearly as serious as I (mis?)remembered, yeah.

I wouldn't count the Executive Orders related to ICE in the "nepotism and favoritism" group fzeroracer referred to. Those might be more of the "smokescreen." The orders for mass layoffs or encouraging quitting of civil service seen more like the ulterior motive. Allowing the president to remove "disloyal" civil servants would take us back to the spoils system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spoils_system

Then, either they use existing executive power to ensure Republicans have an insurmountable advantage in national elections, or they haven't thought things through and we'll see even larger shifts in federal regulations after each administration change.

DACA certainly pushed the limits of executive authority, but...

Immigration raids are pretty clearly an executive function, and they happened prior to DACA and prior to ICE. Executive prioritization of federal law enforcement is normal and expected.

I'm all for balkanization. It is better than the status quo.

We have pretty fixed red/blue blocks of states and Trump/MAGA has made the gap much wider.

In earlier years I would have been okay living in a red state - not my pref but no big deal. Now I’m no more willing to raise my kids in a deep red state than I am in Russia or China.

Yea, looks like the US is going full on Russian mode here. I'm not all that disappointed in Trump himself, this was no surprise. I'm disappointed at the lack of meaningful opposition. Most of the republican part have fallen in line and the Dems aren't doing much.

Question here for this group. In this day of technology, information is power seems much more relevant. I don't have clear data, but it seems from observation and analysis by others social media played a pretty key role: "fake news", info bubbles, biasing your feeds etc. What are some ideas on reliable ways to provide access to accurate information?

I agree with your broader point, but I really wish people wouldn't refer to MAGA Republicans as "conservative." Right-wing, or reactionary, certainly. But there's nothing "conservative" about undermining the rule of law and ignoring the Constitution.

By the same logic, I don't like calling far-left cancel culture "liberal." I'm afraid our partisanship has blinded us to genuine liberal and conservative virtues.

I also wouldn't label cancel culture as "far-left" because just as it isn't in any way "liberal", it isn't limited to those on the proverbial left of the spectrum. The mainstream language used to discuss politics simply lacks the ability to reflect the nuance needed in the 21st century. And that's not even getting into the discussion on what we call "cancel culture" because there is a big gulf between "that person said a thing that was a bit off" and "that person is a literal criminal/fascist" in my opinion.

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