she's 98, minimum.

The voting age didn't drop to 18 until 1971. 80 years ago was 1945, and it was 21 then.
Possible, but I'll bet she meant she was 80.

Until the real republican swamp is gone.

That would be win.

Fuck off, Country Karen.

eff her and the horse she rode in on. Insufferable old fart votes for him twice and now cries wolf. Disgusting and predictable.

(Not that she heard that, but ideas and attitudes are catching.)

She spoke from her heart. She rejected how hateful the administration is and what it is doing to Americans.

What is that saying, “you ultimately become the one/what you hate.” (― Elia Maxwell)? This worries me about myself and about us.

They became hateful, and the risk for us is to become like them in that. They lack empathy. They withhold compassion. Falling into becoming like them, when we hate what they are, leads us to hate ourselves too. And that is the least of the harms.

Last edited Tue Jul 29, 2025, 11:57 AM - Edit history (2)

Beyond that, it's the same old bleating I've been hearing from tighty-righties for the last forty fucking years.

America needs to "come together" (with Republicans and reactionaries and fascists) and "unify this nation" (by obeying what they tell us to do) and by kneeling to the same malignant fundie bullshit they believe (Bible Bonus Points!).

Fuck that.

I hope to one day have a country where we are not constantly rubbing the other half of the country's face in the dirt and insisting they grovel forever and a day, but one where we work towards restoring our values (liberty and justice for all, e pluribus unum, civil rights, the common good) to what we hold in common again. I'm pretty sure many of us do.

It will be incredibly difficult and require both sides to acknowledge fault – and no one is blameless here.

I'm well aware of the great harm many have done, and that tragedies have occurred because of their actions. I hold them culpable, but when I realize the extensive propaganda directed toward them from radio, television, news media, social media, pundits, members of Congress going back at least into the 1980s, I can't help but hold the propagandists and exploiters far more responsible. The deliberate brainwashing and manipulation by those Murdoch types for power and money has infected so many of our fellow citizens, their families and friends, with group think. It is no wonder they're unthinkingly following along. If South Africa could foster healing in spite of the horrors of apartheid actions of the regime, I think it is possible we can. No guarantee.

I'm not insisting that they abandon their conspiracy fantasies about Democrats and liberals and secular Americans as baby-eating lizard people, or at a bare minimum as somehow less "American" than they are, but I will demand that they stop supporting politicians more than willing to maintain that delusion.

Do they want to live in a fantasy world where ivermectin cures AIDS, where Joe Biden has his finger on the button of the Big Liberal Tornado Machine, and masking during an epidemic makes kids trans? Fine, but if you think I'm going to "come together" with them as their chosen leaders gut NOAA and privatize the National Weather Service, stack NIH with anti-vaccine nutbars and go out of their way to destroy health and scientific research on everything from climate to cancer, then you've got another thing coming.

Do they want to spend their Sunday mornings crawling around on a Valvoline-slicked church basement floor with water moccasins in both hands as they beseech God to cure lower back pain and hangnails, before heading to work at the GSA on Monday morning? Fine, but now that King Turd has decreed that they're free to preach and pressure-convert their colleagues, and that churches are free to endorse political candidates (but only the right kind, hint hint hint), how long before they show up with Valvoline, water moccasins (and guns, of course) at my door or at my workplace?

Again, they want to be cruel, crazy and stupid, and I want to live in a country with a government that doesn't arm and mobilize their cruel, crazy stupidity.

"It will be incredibly difficult and require both sides to acknowledge fault – and no one is blameless here." Really? Feel free to elaborate how Democrats are at fault for their insanity and how liberals are to blame for their stupidity.

I'll wait.

Where I think we made ourselves vulnerable to the division and contributed to it is in our open judgmentalism and display of contempt and feelings of superiority.

Ultimately I think the more who we can peel off who are in the fact-based world but who don’t like our attitude the better. That’s what it will take to have a functional country again one day.

The only question is why they haven't earned yours?

But yes, let's all be nice and sing songs and eat cookies and reach out to the whackdoodles (drawing back the occasional bloody stump), while they move heaven and Earth to push this country and this planet down the shitpipe in the shortest possible time.

WTI

The propaganda system filling their environment is pervasive and dangerous. I see how unwary people could fall prey to it.

Last edited Mon Jul 28, 2025, 10:44 PM - Edit history (1)

She's been voting for 80 years but thought a racist felon with a history of sexual assault, mean spirited attacks and corruption might be worth a second try . . .

Found out.

First off, this country DOES NOT have too many immigrants.

That old biddy can kiss off to Magaland.

when she came up with that hopelessly ignorant bullshit.

"NO WE DO NOT!"

… the numbers of stupid people and assholes in the US. I loathe the assholes. Screw them. And the stupid assholes are the worst.

But I’m generally glad to see some of the just stupid people get smarter. Even when they’re 98 years old. If we hope to genuinely turn this shit around, we need more of them to come forward.

because he's a nice, smart boy. Not like that trump meany.

… she’s never going to vote republican again. Her turn about appears to be from a late recognition that their policies are inhumane. That’s different from something that affected her personally and now she’s “finding out”. She might be the rare exception to the rule,

We’ve been saying “why don’t they see him for what he is like we do” for 10+ years. Probably shouldn’t wag our finger at them too gleefully when one of them finally opens their eyes.

that resides in the core of their bigoted outlook. That sentiment that was fueled by that ghoul Stephen Miller and was the core of trump's campaign. Don't you remember that second only to the trump signs at his rallies were "Mass Deportation Now!" signs.

I have no glee in pointing this out. It's the reality - - that 10s of millions of people voted for that racist piece of shit because there's "too many immigrants from shit hole countries." Too many blacks, too many browns, too many gays...

They gotta walk the walk. And not just at Thanksgiving for show and good digestion.

of the population. Those are the hard core republican "conservative" voters who vote only to make everyone live under their strict code of conduct. Note... they're actually exempt from following this code, themselves. They have to have the freedom to act in accordance with their beliefs for other people - they, themselves, are pure as snow. These are the religious busybodies who absolutely must purge the land of unbelievers so their Christ can come back and smite everyone in one fell swoop. Of course, the busybodies believe they are going to be smite-free... they're doing all this sinning, all this morally and ethically evil in the name of the Laawd, be praised! So no matter which, or how many of the commandments they've broken, it's all good because they're doing it in the name of God.

After all this leopard face eating crap they've been going through since Jan, one of them might want to sit down, be still, and think critically. If they so misjudged their Lord and Savior, DJT, maybe they've got the wrong idea about their Jesus, too? But they'll never look that closely.

I don't know how the demographic percentages break down among the religious extremists and the mundane christians, but I would be interested in knowing. The religionists haven't gotten everything they've wanted and petitioned for yet. And we are in for such a world of hurt if they succeed in creating a theocratic nation the rest of us have to live in, but who have no free will to impact it.

… people you’ve described in the asshole category. For the most part they are irredeemable.

But there are some relatively decent people who are just politically very stupid. Very. They consume almost no news, and what snippets they pick up here and there get mangled in the process. “Too many immigrants committing crimes” would be exactly the kind of thing they would absorb, but without context.

The caller sounds genuinely upset. I can't find it in my heart to give her my usual FAFO that I feel for most magas.

The more folks like this who actively voice their opposition, the better.

Maybe her/his words reached even one other person who may join us in the streets. Maybe the dam is breaking and enough people will vote against tyranny in the midterms and '28.

and other electoral chicanery in the service of stealing the elections, once again, for DJT.

goal to break apart the US is coming true. Fuck the felon.

counting the primaries.

....and a little too late to crash it

To quote South Park - "When the bar gets lowered, we all pay the price."

It took her that long to realize how little the Republicans care about people. Now that saddens my heart.

You could have said NO a long time ago.

Probably looking back and realizing how many friends and family members no longer speak to them, and only now do they understand that their votes were responsible for this toxic environment.

That was the message I got when I attended my first Democratic caucus after leaving the republican party. I'd been growing increasingly dissatisfied with the GOP, and actually started supporting Democrats before making the change official. I'll be forever grateful that my change wasn't met with the vituperation some have exhibited here.

I'm reminded of when I posted about my mother, a lifelong boots-on-the-ground republican. She had been unhappy in the party for years but kept quiet about it while Dad was still alive; but even he, hardcore that he was, was caught in the act of throwing his newspaper at the television when W said or did something stupid again. After he passed Mom started to become more vocal about politics, but chose to remain in the party in hopes of turning the thinking of other party members. She eventually tired of banging her head against that wall; she shocked us all when she asked for a ride to the county offices where she officially withdrew from the party she had worked for over 70 years, beginning before she was old enough to vote. Her first vote for a Democrat was cast for Obama, twice, and she stated that he would prove to be the best president of her lifetime. Born within weeks of the passage of the 19th Amendment, at 97 she cast her final ballot for Hillary.

It was stunning when someone here posted a response to that post about Mom, rather viciously blaming her for every evil that ever befell the country. The nastiness was sickening, and I was struck numb for a bit. Much thanks to the kind DUers who reminded me of the blocking function.

Having recounted all that, I am thankful for ANYONE who comes to a better realization. It's not up to me how or when such awakening occurs. But it IS up to me to remember how my own change was received. So, to this woman and anyone else who comes to our door, I choose to smile and say "Welcome to the light."


.

The Never-Forgivers I encounter here and elsewhere have me worried we will never repair the breach.

We will need our own version of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, i suspect, and even then it may not bring enough reconciliation to have a functioning peaceful country again.

Maybe look back at all the hate your party has been responsible for during your 80 years. Hell, just listen to any right wing media outlet for a overdose of hate.

Trump is both the result and the perpetrator of horribleness.

Trump has not done much he did not say he was going to do.What is happening must have been ok with her in the past, when she voted for this clown. Kinda late to develop a conscience.

every 2016 Trump voter can kiss my ass. Every 2024 Trump and 3rd party voter can fuck right on off. I don't want to hear about their sob stories. NOTHING was hidden from these dips hits. Nothing!

You'll miss the worse of the things that are coming for this country. So you can just go fuck off and whine to your neighbors how none of you voted for this, when you all actually did vote for this.

One thing about Trump, he told you every single day what he was going to do, and you all liked it. Now you think you'll lose *your* SS and Medicare, so it's going to hurt you. Again, kindly fuck off and shut up.

As they say, Fuck Trump, and if you voted for him, fuck you.

Too bad you were evil when you voted for an obviously hateful, immoral cretin. Must have been glued to Fox News 24/7.

She represents a lot of people in the USA.

It may she just told us how to reach them.

Who knows? If we just fucking try, we might convince them to vote for Democrats.

It is beginning to look like the open arms of the party seem to be not so open anymore.
It's almost like we don't want to change minds and only accept people that have never voted.

The atmosphere inside the Big Tent changed after the millionaires moved in and the billionaires took over.

Don’t much hear mention of public finance of elections, universal health care, or busting up the media monopoly.

Like Paul Wellstone said: “I like Democrats from the Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party.”

This is like when the most annoying character in the movie gets shot, or bitten by the monster or whatever and you know they're about to die and you're like "Good," but then they have to blah blah blah forever and they just won't shut up.

It kept me from unloading on a real dumb 98 yr old.

They've been hateful, mean horrible people for all my voting life and I'm pushing 60. The old idiot should have been paying more attention a long time ago. Maybe we wouldn't be in this fucking mess now.

They've been hateful, mean horrible people for all my voting life and I'm pushing 60. The old idiot should have been paying more attention a long time ago. Maybe we wouldn't be in this fucking mess now.

...she's been voting for 80 years?
Wouldn't that make her at least 101? The voting age didn't change until '71.
She doesn't sound that old to me.