• Victor@lemmy.world
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    9 hours ago

    I just feel like after a public rapist becomes president, twice, there’s no hope for Americans. It really is hopeless by now.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        The DOJ had four years to prosecute him under Biden and they dragged their heels.

        The Southern District of New York had ample reason and opportunity to prosecute him as a mobbed to businessman in the '00s and '10s, but he was friends with the mayor so they didn’t.

        The Clintons certainly knew about Epstein in the 90s and could have busted that whole thing up 30 years ago. But the donations were too sweet, so they didn’t.

        Trump is a creature of consequences.

    • Doomsider@lemmy.world
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      8 hours ago

      Think about it this way, if you disqualified politicians who engaged in some kind of sexual assault there would not be many left to govern.

      It is accepted and now normalized. If you are rich you can rape and do whatever you want.

      The problem for me is I grew up in a country that I thought was beyond that. I was apparently wrong.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        if you disqualified politicians who engaged in some kind of sexual assault there would not be many left to govern.

        I’ve heard arguments to the effect that politicians who are too clean simply don’t succeed, because people don’t want to give you big campaign checks unless they have Compromat on you.

        So you get invited to the Eyes Wide Shut party, your rich friends catalog your debauchery, and this is what keeps you loyal.

      • Sauerkraut@discuss.tchncs.de
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        2 hours ago

        If you are rich you can rape and do whatever you want.

        This is why I hate capitalism so much. Extreme power disparity is the heart of tyranny and the extreme disparities in wealth that capitalism creates only leads to extreme disparities in political power.

        I fear that the US went past a breaking point and that the US will fully be an oligarchy after Trump is done

      • FierySpectre@lemmy.world
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        3 hours ago

        The problem with disqualifying anyone based on any crimes is that it would enable the current ruling party to stick crimes on the opposition to eliminate the competition.

        Just in case to clarify, I’m not defending child rapists who most surely did commit the crime in question, just saying it’s a dangerous concept.

        • snooggums@lemmy.world
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          1 hour ago

          The problem with disqualifying anyone based on any crimes is that it would enable the current ruling party to stick crimes on the opposition to eliminate the competition.

          As an example, Trump didn’t get elected because he was convicted of 34 felonies.

          Oh wait, maybe the possibility of false crime accusations don’t fucking matter when real ones aren’t a hurdle to getting elected.

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          2 hours ago

          it would enable the current ruling party to stick crimes on the opposition to eliminate the competition.

          Don Siegelman was the last Dem governor of Alabama. Pursued on spurious charges in 2004, which were immediately thrown out by the judge of the case, then again in 2006 by a Bush appointed Judge who was more friendly with Republican prosecutors.

          I expect a lot more of this in 2025 once Trump takes office and starts settling scores.

      • Fillicia@sh.itjust.works
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        8 hours ago

        there would not be many left to govern

        Good. There is not that many positions to fill anyway.

        It’s not normal that a criminal record that would make it almost impossible to find an entry-level grocery packer job is completely OK for a politician.

        • Victor@lemmy.world
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          7 hours ago

          a criminal record that would make it almost impossible to find an entry-level grocery packer job is completely OK for a politician fucking president of a huge country

      • Victor@lemmy.world
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        8 hours ago

        I refuse to think about it that way lol. Quantity does not equal acceptance for me. We have to hold our countries’ representatives to a higher standard than being outright criminals, guilty of many, serious offenses. If there are only a handful of politicians left after such a sift, then so be it.

        Thank God I’m not in the USA. But it’s not like this doesn’t fuck over the rest of the world too.