https://www.statista.com/statistics/1351276/wage-growth-vs-inflation-us/
Trump fucked it, Biden unfucked it better than any other country in the world after Covid, and Biden got the blame.
As is tradition. Universally. It's one of the few things in American politics that always happens in exactly the same way, with no real wiggle room depending on how you want to measure things or who you ask for the explanation.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._economic_performance_by_presidential_party
Both rich people and working people do better under Democrats, and both rich people and working people do worse under Republicans. Always.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1351276/wage-growth-vs-inflation-us/
Like I said: Trump fucked it, Biden unfucked it starting in January 2021 and got it under control. And, because the media laps up a good narrative like no other, Biden got the blame for what Trump did, when the US recovered better from Covid inflation than pretty much every other country in the world.
If you're struggling now, and "holding your vote in protest of the Democrats," then I withdraw a little bit of my sympathy. You're going to get it right up the ass very hard in the next few years, if you did that, and although it won't be completely your fault you will have helped make it happen.
The media literally told the voters what to do if they didn't want whatever new law enforcement Trump invents kicking down their door to take them away, and they didn't do it.
There's some blame to apportion on a few different sides.
"It is Nixon himself who represents that dark, venal and incurably violent side of the American character that almost every country in the world has learned to fear and despise. Our Barbie-doll president, with his Barbie-doll wife and his boxful of Barbie-doll children is also America's answer to the monstrous Mr. Hyde. He speaks for the Werewolf in us; the bully, the predatory shyster who turns into something unspeakable, full of claws and bleeding string-warts on nights when the moon comes too close… "
"If the current polls are reliable... Nixon will be re-elected by a huge majority of Americans who feel he is not only more honest and more trustworthy than George McGovern, but also more likely to end the war in Vietnam. The polls also indicate that Nixon will get a comfortable majority of the Youth Vote. And that he might carry all fifty states... This may be the year when we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it — that we are really just a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable. The tragedy of all this is that George McGovern, for all his mistakes... understands what a fantastic monument to all the best instincts of the human race this country might have been, if we could have kept it out of the hands of greedy little hustlers like Richard Nixon. McGovern made some stupid mistakes, but in context they seem almost frivolous compared to the things Richard Nixon does every day of his life, on purpose."
-Hunter S. Thompson, 1972
And that was Nixon. Trump is infinitely darker, more twisted and dangerous.
I was so confused because the voting pattern on this comment is so dramatically different than it was on the comments early on in this exact same discussion here, or in other posts where we've been discussing basically the exact same thing.
Sort the comments on this post by "old" and you'll see what I'm talking about. You won't see everyone claiming that the Democrats did nothing at all for the economy for the last 4 years. It won't be all the other way, either, but you'll see a healthy interplay between a couple of different main points of view. It won't be all one way.
I don't usually come to the big communities on lemmy.world for pretty much this exact same reason, so like I say, I was just confused. I looked back on some of my other comments in other communities, where there's actually a large-scale consensus that yesterday's tragedy was largely the fault of the people who were holding out voting for the Democrats because they hadn't done enough to fix everything up, including for example the economy from the last time the Republicans broke it all.
One thing that I suddenly realized is that some of those comments with that very-different-from-this consensus are on Beehaw, which while it still has representation on it from the socialists and anti-liberals, whatever you want to call it, has defederated from sh.itjust.works and lemmy.world because they were at the time too infested with troll accounts. And I used some of my magic powers to look at who's been voting for this comment with all these universal upvotes...
And lo, I was enlightened.
Edit: Another funny thing happened. The parent comment that this is in reply to was the top comment, 3 hours old, when I made this comment, which was the only reply at that time. Now, in just the last half hour, there are suddenly 7 other comments and replies competing for space at the top of the page, instead of it just being the parent comment and this one as a reply. A lot of those are some variety of "Democrats fucked it" comment.
My guess is that there will be a flurry of continued conversation, and then once things die down, it will all somehow coalesce into there being a few "Democrats fucked it" comments all the way up at the top of the page, with a whole bunch of upvotes, creating a narrative. I'm not sure. But that is how I would guess, if I had to guess.
Edit2: Called it. Look at the default-sorted comments now.
It doesn’t particularly matter. It’s over at this point. But it’s interesting to look at one particular microcosm on one particular platform of one thing that made it happen, I think.
Obama won his election after being a good bit to the right of either Biden or Harris. I think most of what's changed since then is the awesome power of the influence operations which succeed at creating alternate realities for people where Trump is important to vote for, and Harris is important not to vote for, depending on the person being targeted.
I'm not trying to be closed-minded about it, and maybe my meme as applied to you was unfair. I'm a little bit on edge when talking with the "what the Democrats did wrong" crowd on Lemmy, since a lot of them also like to make up imagined sins for the Democrats, helping to create that alternate reality, to go alongside any well-intentioned criticism they are giving.
The bottom line is, the Democrats lost for a variety of reasons some of which were their fault and some weren't, and we are thoroughly fucked as a result. I don't think people realize how bad it's going to be.
We may see military or militarized police knocking down doors.
We absolutely will. What did you think mass deportations meant?
Do you think that every one of these millions of "illegal" persons being deported or otherwise detained will get due process to prove that they are actually a citizen? They barely get that now.
Do you think it won't expand beyond the immigrants who are on that list, once it gets going and no one's put a stop to it when it was "immigrants"?
I talked to someone in my family today who said he's probably safe, because of certain reasons and the category that he's in. I'm not convinced that he is.
With sympathy, panicked thoughts about what to do next, and quite a bit of horror? Absolutely.
With a casual blaming attitude, waiting for someone else to make it better? Sure, they're allowed to, just like I'm allowed to tell them to go fuck themselves.
I wasn't talking about Hasan Piker, really. I don't agree with him, of course. Let me put it this way: If he'd flipped it around and talked about what a good strategy it was for Trump to get all his followers heated up on lies and ready for violence, get billionaires and media to go in the tank for him, and coordinate with enemies of the US to destabilize our democracy in order to get elected so he could keep kicking out the safeguards and guard rails once he's back in and firmly above the law, seize on any imperfection or compromise in the Democratic side and play it up to the point that a whole bunch of suckers on the left buy into it and depress the vote so he can win, and unfold whatever's coming now... well, if he'd said that, then he wouldn't be wrong. But looking at it purely from a standpoint of strategy, in this context, is missing a massive other aspect. Talking about the Democratic strategy, which I think Piker is probably doing sincerely here, is missing the point in the same way. Even talking about how elected officials can get the support of the voters seems like it'll probably be almost a moot point by 4 years from now.
What I was talking about was OP and the little gang of people who've been spreading the narrative that the Democrats are the worst thing, basically indistinguishable from fascism, and are now having trouble hiding their eagerness to double down on assuring everyone that it's all the Democrats' fault and this whole thing was inevitable. If any of you guys are inside the United States and honestly believe this, have been withholding support until something more to the your liking comes along, thinking that is a good way to make progress... oh my brother, just you wait, and I hope it's not too bad for you, when it comes.
That's why I posted the meme. If OP's really in the US and on the left, they're going to be learning a whole bunch of new songs to sing over the next couple of years, I think.
"Don't blame your allies."
Proceeds to blame his allies, picking out the one wedge issue which the opponents used to greatest effect to split the left in this election.
Nothing in particular that would help anyone pick up the pieces, or figure out what happens now or what to do.