Senate The US Politics 2.0 Discussion Thread

I thought the “Hands Off…(immigrants, social security, my body, etc)” was the main theme of this one. Not exactly revolutionary, I agree, but it did seem to be one of the core themes.

At least, that was much of the European press’s takeaway regarding a theme: https://www.repubblica.it/esteri/20...mp_e_musk_in_tutti_gli_stati_uniti-424109679/

 

Huh, fascism is in air quotes, what the hell more does Trump and co have to do to be described as what they are?

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/05/trump-hands-off-protest

 

A protest march is nothing but a glorified walk down the street. Nobody gives a crap.

 

Basically.

And I"m not saying people need to break the law, necessarily, I'm just saying more often than not, these protests go no where. Look, its great that like - what?- over a million people 'protested' across the country yesterday. Even freaking Utah saw a tremendous crowd. It's great that the usual Dem Politicans, the North East crew of Bernie, AOC, Markey, etc, attended. Good job. Now let's make a plan. A plan that's more than just standing in a government approved park on a nice Saturday with signs that autocratic fascists care not one single bit about.

And for the record, BLM is a better example. They have other goals. They have funding. They have organization and leaders within that movement. They had people in government working with the agenda. And ... they didn't just stand in pre-approved parks. Because their agenda was social change and about forcing people - white people especially - to talk about things they didn't want to talk about. So protesting and disrupting the status quo of the streets worked towards that goal. Making people take notice was the goal. And we also saw the right's response to this. An Anti-woke platform and cultural agenda that is every where right now. Once again, the right didn't picket. They put their response into action across every single platform they use to 'rally' their troops and get their change done. To the point where Trump wants to now label them a terrorist organization and are calling all DEI illegal. They're evil. But they are methodical about it. And it achieved what they wanted.

 

I think yesterday's protests were a positive sign. It felt weird and quiet. I think a lot of people are upset or scared, but they feel alone. Ever since Trump won MAGA has been louder and bolder than ever. For instance my direct supervisor who never once mentioned politics at work had been preaching to me her anti vax nonsense. People who felt alone because they are in deep red areas can now see they aren't alone. Those of us in blue areas feel connected again. Because for me it's been a really weird few months. I have to come here or go to Bluesky for a group of people that are outraged. It was nice to see people out making noise. I know one day of protests doesn't change the world. But at least we are finally talking.

 

if we have any chance for meaningful change, it will be up to Congress to move the needle.

The fact that Republicans have to stand for election next year gives me a sliver of hope; if prices are up and we are in stagflation mode coupled with a recession, they at the very least will lose the House. The Senate is a heavy lift for next year, but if they bleed at the polls, they might start to listen.

Then again, they might just continue to deny reality and try to block votes instead. Greater probability of that then them standing up to Trump as of now.

 

It was nice to be in a giant crowd of like-minded people, but I felt there were a lot of people still missing. I was on the train and a young man asked us what we were doing. I told him and invited him to join us. We talked a bit and he told me that Trump had saved Tik-Tok, a lot of people depend on Tik-Tok to make a living he said. It brings in billions of dollars for content creators. And then his friend said that it showed how savvy Trump is. He gets it. He really understands what people care about.

also I imagine a majority of green card holders in the US are afraid to protest now. The administration has done its work cowing legal residents who aren’t yet citizens. That’s 13 million people who have been effectively silenced.

 

I suspect not just green card holders, but I think also a fair number of people who have been through the naturalization process but still consider themselves vulnerable to being targeted.

 

Full blown US citizens who aren't white are afraid to protest right now. My neighbor is afraid to leave the house every morning, she looks out to make sure there aren't any unusual cars in the col-de-sac before she leaves for work. And all I can tell her is that I'm sorry. And I hate to say that, it's not my fault. But I feel bad, I don't know what to say. Just that I have her back and I'll be out there for her.

Trump might have "saved tik tok" but if he makes the price of video game consoles and smart phones and every other electronic skyrocket maybe that can sway some young people. I have to have something to hope for. There is a percentage of gen Z that is really hopeless and another percentage that isn't. We just need to get more of them to care about actual important stuff.

 

So my friend who joined us at the protest took a photo of a “Cory Booker sent me” sign at the Chicago protest and tagged Cory Booker’s instagram. His staffers reposted it.

 

I wouldn’t necessarily hold Cory Booker has someone to look up to that greatly, given his recent performative 24+ hour speech in the Senate, and then votes continually arm Israel. What the hell did that speech amount to? What kind of real impact is it going to have as it relates to MAGA/Trump?




@Jedi Merkurian Yes! A huge part of the problem, too, in a lot of ways culturally, not just the day-to-day with politics, etc.

 

This is what I meant by, it cannot be 'just' right messages. It can't just be messages that feel good. There's got to be a deeper (consistent) point to it all.

The rallies are all nice. Good, let people feel a sense of togetherness instead of feeling alone. There is power in that. But...we need some freaking vision too so that our Dem leaders aren't just a listen to my nice speeches, but ignore my actual votes party.

 

There needs to be a strategy other than wait for Trump to crash the economy and then try to take back the legislative branch at the midterms. It’s a terrible strategy. Unless there are enough votes to remove Trump from office he will continue to ignore the legislative branch. Congress doesn’t have armed power to enforce rulings of the judiciary either.

The rule of law effectively ended when Trump took personal control over the justice dept.

 

Oh and an update on my neighborhood and the surrounding area. FOR SALE signs are suddenly popping up everywhere. That can't be good. I'm a 15 - 20 minute drive from DC. People are losing jobs and they are probably moving back home. Or just somewhere where it seems nice. There are entry level jobs available at my work and people are applying and asking for $120K, I'm sorry that's not what entry level pays. I know they made that much at the Govt, but even in the Govt I doubt entry level jobs pay over $100K. It's gonna get real ugly around here real quick. The snowball is making it's way down the hill and it's going to be a really big snow boulder soon.

We just don't want to admit it, we don't want to imagine. I know I don't. So I'm leaving now, to take my son to that awful looking Minecraft movie he wants to see, just to pretend, for him, that things are normal.

 

I'm not boycotting a Japanese company at this point.

That's what Trump wants us to do.

 

Why are they boycotting Nintendo? Cuz they're going to raise the price due to tarrifs?

 

Probably.

 

Pod Save America had a story today about the sole oceanographer at Coast Guard search and rescue. A quiet civil servant who developed a set of fantastic models for how people/lifeboats drift at sea that have saved hundreds of lives.

This is the kind of expertise that DOGE is plowing under right now. The amount of institutional expertise that is going to get permanently destroyed is just another tragedy on top of the human tragedy of destroying the national economy and regional economies like DC/Maryland/Virginia and putting hundreds of thousands of people out of work. It's not just them, but the independent contractors and all the people who provide goods and services to those people. This happens as the new tariff regime rains more blows down on prices and employment.

Anyway it strikes me that political journalists need to be telling these stories every day - personal stories about specific individuals who do important work as civil servants, not for money but because they're driven by doing good work.

 

Ah, but you see, the cardinal, unforgiveable sin that civil servant committed was not monetising their models, with surge pricing. Thus the Unholy Inquisition of DOGE was despatched to end their heresy.

 

Yes, that's the whole reason.

 

Yes. As someone who has spent way too much time reading the "fed news" reddit sub since January ( https://www.reddit.com/r/fednews/ ), there are so many compelling individual stories out there. Heartbreaking stories, fear-inducing stories, rage-inducing stories (e.g., details about what is really happening when DOGE shows up at these agencies). And periodically there are threads where reporters from various outlets (ProPublica, Wired, etc.) solicit affected individuals to share their stories for specific upcoming articles.

Though unfortunately there are always people that can't be reached by such stories. The sub regularly has threads where fired or endangered fed workers report encountering a complete lack of empathy from even (MAGA) people in their own families and friend circles.

 

Here's what could be a good idea to come from the Democrats:

https://democrats.org/news/dnc-chai...-counter-trump-administration-chaos-and-lies/

DNC Chair Ken Martin Launches “People’s Cabinet” to Fiercely Counter Trump Administration Chaos and Lies
April 4, 2025

“People’s Cabinet” to feature subject matter experts on policy, elevating national and local leaders, and community voices on issues impacting working families

Today, DNC Chair Ken Martin announced the launch of the “People’s Cabinet,” a new project from the DNC that will leverage a deep bench of qualified policy experts, national and local leaders, as well as community voices who – all working together – will cut through the lies and speak directly to the American people about the reality of the Trump administration’s reckless and dangerous agenda.

While Donald Trump stacks his administration with out-of-touch billionaires, Fox News hosts, conspiracy theorists, and unqualified loyalists, the People’s Cabinet will provide the American people with real facts and accurate information about the devastating impact of Trump’s agenda for working families. The People’s Cabinet will include a wide array of national, state, and local experts on the economy, health care, working families and communities, public safety, national security, and foreign policy.

“I’ve been traveling across the country nonstop since I started this job, and what I hear over and over is that Americans want us to challenge Trump’s unimpeded lies, confront his reckless agenda, and offer a better alternative,” said DNC Chair Ken Martin. “Trump has stacked his Cabinet with out-of-touch billionaires and know-nothing loyalists who are wreaking havoc on the lives of working people across this country, with total disregard for the harm they’re causing our families – from stripping away their health care coverage, to jacking up their costs at the grocery store, to putting the lives of service members at risk. The People’s Cabinet is made up of experts, leaders, and everyday Americans from across the country who will equip communities with the reliable, accurate information they need to fight back against the worst of the Trump and Republican agenda.”

In order to reach the American people, the Cabinet will conduct briefings with media and coalition partners, speak directly with Americans across the country at town halls as part of the DNC’s People’s Town Hall initiative, produce digital content to reach Americans across the platforms where they get their news, engage in rapid response to counter the lies and disinformation from the Trump administration, and serve as thought leaders for the Democratic ecosystem on effective strategy and tactics in countering the worst of the Republican agenda.

The DNC will continue to announce additional members and programming in the coming weeks.

Initial programming from the People’s Cabinet includes:

• Press briefing on the Trump-Musk attacks on Social Security last week with former Social Security Commissioner Martin O’Malley to detail the devastating impact of DOGE cuts to Social Security for millions of Americans.
• Jobs Day and economic press briefing today with former Labor Secretary and co-founder of Inequality Media Civic Action Robert Reich and Former Acting Labor Secretary Julie Su to highlight the Trump administration’s reckless economic agenda and attacks on labor.
• Content and programming with former Virginia Delegate, and national security and cyber security expert, Hala Ayala.
• Content and programming from former Wisconsin Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes outlining the impact of the Trump administration’s policies on local communities.
• Virtual roundtable on the impact of Trump’s economic agenda on farmers and rural communities with former U.S. Senator from North Dakota Heidi Heitkamp and farmer, rural advocate, and co-founder of The Back Forty Will Westmoreland.

​

 

I've been reading some articles about just how easy or difficult it would be for the Trump administration to make his tariffs a practical reality -- things like, how customs officials will go about inspecting containers, how the ports will be affected, how the new rules will be interpreted (i.e. how to tariff a car assembled in Mexico with Chinese parts), etc.

The answer is that the administration is almost completely unprepared to implement Trump's tariffs in almost every way, and their inability to process goods will have such a huge negative impact on the economy that those difficulties on their own will likely throw the country into a recession.

The vast majority of the staff of Customs & Border are doing border-related work right now, and not customs work, because immigrants - yuck! As a consequence, the enforcement of Trump's tariffs will require the hiring of thousands of new customs officials who would subsequently need training. Even today, the shortage of staff at ports causes delays processing imported goods, and it's only going to get far worse.

According to one article I read, even if Customs had the proper manpower, it would face the challenge of "managing a flood of product classification disputes, origin verification challenges, and tariff compliance actions with no significant increased systems and technological capacity, or time to prepare for execution." Hiring and then training new customs agents will make these challenges even worse, and cause a further slowdown in processing imports.

Trump's placing unique tariff levels on each country makes the job even more difficult. This would require inspecting more cargo -- and thus the hiring of even more customs staff -- so that they can be sure the goods coming from each specific country end up being tariffed at the proper rate for that country. Since customs will be overwhelmed some countries will try to game the system. Other countries will find loopholes, like sending their goods through countries with lower tariff rates. These counter-measures other countries implement will make the job even more confusing for customs, slowing things even more.

Working through these administrative issues will take months if not years, and if Trump doesn't put a pause on his tariffs until these issues are solved, then all the supply chain issues that we saw during the pandemic will occur again. Container ships will be left waiting outside of US ports as customs attempts to make sure that the imports are being tariffed at the correct rates. Shipping containers will then be put in improper places because ports lack the extra space to deal with this kind of backlog, ultimately leaving the majority of the shipping containers blocked by other shipping containers, and unavailable to truckers. Supply chains will become totally disrupted, and deliveries will be delayed and and their times unpredictable. For instance, car factories won't receive smaller parts needed to construct larger components when expected. Shoe stores will be half-empty because the newest models are stuck on a dock or in the middle of a warehouse. Etc.

Trump will certainly ignore any warnings from his staff of these impending supply chain issues. So, lines of cargo ships moored outside of ports will have to become a reality before Trump will even consider delaying his tariffs, but it will take time for this backlog to pile up, so at that point, much of the damage from his tariffs will already be done, even if he agrees to put them on hold, which is a big "if" in itself.