I(t used to be wherever you went the "I voted" stickers were all the same for the most part. 
That's changed with new designs multiplying like mosquitoes...


I've seen a lot with the name of the county or town on them.
 

I assumed whoever put up the sign on their property was responsible for trashing it after the election.

Yeah, you can hear a big difference in the crowd from GHWB to McCain. I wonder if McCain had chosen a normal running mate how it would have played out. It could be the angry take-over was in play no matter what.

DanaC wrote:

  the GOP has been moving further and further away from what used to be its base (as far as I can tell, looking in from the outside) for decades now. 

It is not the religious movement.  They are simply one group easily recruited.  Drive in the rural regions and listen to locat radio.  So many emotional tirades, disinformation, hate directed at other minority groups, and not one reason why any of that should be believed. 

It has increased significantly over the years.  Especially on AM radio.

Amazing how Trump will tweet a lie.  Then 140 characters becomes proof.

I don't know if it is an inability of younger generations to read more than 140 characters.  A lack of any information source that requires confirmation before it is reported.  Or even an interesting concept discovered by sociologists.  By researching n-grams is text over the past 50 years, a noted trend was a sharp drop in the word "We" and a sharp increase tin the word "I".

For example, Constitutional Rights were once a discussion about protecting the rights of peers.  That has change into "my rights; all others are not relevant".  Mask clearly demonstrate the change.  Patriots would wear a mask to protect the Constitutional  rights of all other.  Now extremist Republicans refuse to wear a mask.  Because only their rights - nobody else's - are relevant.  Entire Trump family refused to wear masks in public.  That bombastic change from "We" to "Me".

Republican party has clearly tapped into this with so much hate and a "MeMeMe" attitude.  

What else has changed?  Good reason why some documentaries are now discussion Germany 1930 to 1933.  Since so many concepts expressed then are similar in character to what is ongoing today.  Including the destruction of democracy by even denying results from this election.

Early indications of this trend appeared with the Challenger destruction.  Virtually every news magazine, newspaper, and even science based publications  (ie Astronautics and Aeronautics, etc) stated quite clearly that no engineer would say it was safe to launch.  So they launched (murdered) seven astronauts anyway.  Then repeated the same mistake with Columbia astronauts.  And still so many somehow knew it was an "accident".  And never learned what was a front page story everywhere.

Then some (even in the old Cellar) would deny the realities of Global Warming - still do today.  Since science (and immigrants, allies, trade, military alliances, threatened ethnic groups, honesty, the purpose of every business, Darwinism, etc) are routinely held in contempt.

These trends have become obviously worse.   Made obvious in the Cellar after 2000 when some were so easily manipulated by the lies about Saddam's WMD.

And now past Republican Speakers of the House and past Republican Presidents (those that won and lost) are no longer welcome speakers in that party's convention.  Unwelcome are John Boehner, Mitt Romey, George Jr,, Paul Ryan, John Hastert, etc.  since they are even labeled as liberals by many Republicans.

Ironically that same change occurred in Germany in 1930 to 1933.  Eventually some people, who worked for government and law in Germany in that period, even ended up in concentration camps (accused of being a Jew even though he was Lutheran) by 1937.

How ironic.  Powers that have changed the Republican party openly advocated torture and concentration camps (ie Guantanamo, secret CIA torture prisons called Black sites in Poland, Romania, Thailand, etc).  Renamed enhanced interrogation so as to not be identified by same techniques used by the Gestapo.

Twenty years later, democracy further demeaned by literally lying every day.  Disparaging allies. Mocking honest journalism.  Praising despots and fascists.

I would visit Christian colleges even decades ago.  They did not teach calculus or science.  Even that library did not have books on those subjects.  One class taught how to control facial expressions so as to appear honest and sincere.  The purpose was obvious.  To learn how to manipulate others.  Not by learning facts.  By targeting a person's emotions / perceptions.

So why do so many evangelicals love a man who sins daily?   He lies constantly.  He cheats on every wife.  He disparages even his own people after he fires them.  He trades in a wife every ten years for another.  He does not even go to church.  But he sure does know how to push the emotional buttons of the most easily brainwashed evangelicals.

Evangelical Christians are not the party's only major support group. It plays to adults whose manliness is somehow attached to a big gun and big pickup.  To people who feel downtrodden and therefor need someone else to blame.  Even farmers who livelihood has been so harmed by destruction of trade, and metal workers who suffered same harm - even they want to blame someone else - and not the Republicans or the destruction of international trade.  Because they are ordered what to believe.

All this is so similar to the uprising of hate in Germany that destroyed democracy.

Republicans are even trying to undo this November's election.  Similar happened in 1932 Germany elections..

The icon of democracy is now doing harm to fledgling democracies all over the world.  Despots are simply pointing to America as proof that democracy does not work.

Surprisingly, a study of the American public once determined that some 30% of Americans felt that America did not need a Congress.  In the past four years, that study reported those numbers (responses to the same questions) were up to 42% and higher.

Plenty more people should be paying attention.  In Germany most (Hans Litten was the exception) did not see it coming.

If happening in America, well the trend is similar.  So many who are supporting that movement apparently do not even see a bigger picture.  People in 1930 Germany made the exact same mistake.  then wanted to "Make Germany Great Again".

It only takes a soundbite and lying leader to manipulate so many.
 

DanaC wrote:

Most of the Americans I know or have known over the years who count themselves conservative or republican are pretty much what would at one time have been considered centre-right - they often blend a degree of progressiveness/liberalism on some issues, with conservatism  / traditionalism on other issues.

The vast majority of Americans are socially liberal and fiscally conservative. Since our two major party choices are "socially/fiscally liberal" and "socially/fiscally conservative," the decision for most folks generally comes down to whether they're currently more worried about their money or their gay/pregnant teen relative.

xoxoxoBruce wrote:

On the bright side they say 20% of the people who recover from the virus develop mental problems within three months. 

  Is that due to health reasons?  Or because they are a minority and are therefore hounded by hate from Trump tweets?

One medical condition adversely creating another?

 

Our findings here suggest that Donald Trump has perfected the art of harnessing mass media to disseminate and at times reinforce his disinformation campaign by using three core standard practices of professional journalism.

😆

Right On.

xoxoxoBruce wrote:

Arnold wants to make America great again.

Charles Lindbergh also wanted to make American Great.  That is why he strongly advocated an alliance with Hitler.
 

Undertoad wrote:

This country will not be unified. It's all over. We just have to work out how it can break with the least blood, and try/hope for that.

I'm not sure I'm ready to buy in yet. There is a winning majority among the folks who want nothing to do with politics. There are no magic bullets but Rank Choice voting would make more people feel heard and maybe sweeten the center. Short of rank choice real reform of Gerrymandering could help but if we want to breakup clean Gerrymandering may be useful. We should realize that we would hate living under the absolute rule of either of our parties, we do need each other to find a sensible way forward.

Yeah we're screwed.
 

I ordered a lot of inauguration merchandise including this inauguration fireworks magnet.   I hope this does not turn out to be ironic.