It feels like Harris has to run a damn near flawless campaign just to BARELY beat this guy. Yeah you can bring up the current state of the country, but Trump mishandled COVID, there were over 200k deaths, BLM protest and was 2x impeached. And yet, Joe Biden BARELY beat him.

Trump is a convicted felon, liable sexual predator, caused an insurrection on the Capitol Hill, tried to steal the 2020 election (find me 11,000 votes), constantly kisses Russia’s ass, has more pending court cases and gets sentenced next month and overall has been the main driving factor in America’s division.

Yet, this race is STILL either 50/50 or a slight tilt (Harris leads the polling aggregate right now). Harris gets destroyed by the corporate media for almost anything, yet Trump is still lying and saying the most outlandish shit and nobody cares.

Why does it feel standards are much higher for Harris than Trump?

  • corroded@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    19 days ago

    The problem isn’t that Harris is being held to a higher standard. The problem is that Americans think of elections the same way they think of a sporting match. It’s “my team is going to win!” not “I’m going to vote for the candidate that is best aligned with my beliefs.” A huge number of the people who are voting Republican are doing so because the Republican party is their “team,” and damn it, their team is going to win even if it kills them.

    Many years ago, I was discussing politics with a coworker (always a bad idea, but whatever). It went something like this:

    “So, you don’t think the less-fortunate should be able to afford medical care?” “No, of course not, everyone should be able to see a doctor.”

    “You don’t think gay people should be allowed to marry?” “I’m not gay, but they can do whatever makes them happy.”

    “You support the war in Iraq, then?” “I support our troops, but the war is kind of a waste.”

    “We definitely should legalize weed, right?” “Um, I’d smoke it if I didn’t get drug tested.”

    “So why are you voting Republican, then?” “My family is Republican; we always do.”

    • nifty@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      19 days ago

      “So why are you voting Republican, then?” “My family is Republican; we always do.”

      Republican politicians would eat this person and their family if it ever came to it

    • tlou3please@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      19 days ago

      As an outsider looking in, I’ve seen a lot of footage of rallies and events (on both sides) that are just absolutely crazy to me. Almost dystopian. People with painted faces, all kinds of merch, hollering and shouting and cheering like it’s the X Factor or a rock concert or something. You see people being interviewed outside the events and it’s like a festival in the background. It’s really, really bizarre. We have problems with our politics here too but not like that. I can’t believe that all of those people are ACTUALLY that passionate about any policies themselves, it’s just vague culture wars nonsense with a bizarre personality contest as a proxy for it.

      As I say, I’m not trying to act superior. My country has its share of problems too, just a very different sort.

      • AndrewZabar@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        0
        ·
        19 days ago

        You have to understand, you are seeing people of VERY low intelligence. I know that’s tough to accept, but demographics are really frightening in America. Millions of voters with intelligence not very much higher than outright mental retardation. And so, the system learned long ago, you don’t bother trying to get them to think you’re right for the job, you don’t want them thinking at all. So you just get them to ally with you as a tribe, and that way they’re yours even if you’re doing the opposite of what they want.

        • Illuminostro@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          0
          ·
          19 days ago

          This is why The Founders implemented a Representative Democracy. They knew half of the populace were dumber than rocks.

    • CancerMancer@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      19 days ago

      Here in Canada I’ve seen much the same behaviour for both Liberal and Conservative voters. “I vote Liberal because I’ve always voted Liberal” is a surprisingly common statement especially among the older generations, and to a small extent even the Green party has a few loyalists in BC.

      Always voting the same way no matter what happens is just giving your vote away for free.

  • duckduckohno@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    18 days ago

    It’s the same when it comes to any other countries. The right always gets away with corruption because it’s expected. Whereas the left has a higher moral standpoint so it is being accused of hypocrisy and things get blown out proportion even if small scale corruption occurs. For example in UK the previous government were giving jobs and contracts to friends and family all the time and nobody cried about it. It became accepted. The new left of centre government comes in and gives a temporary pass to a donor and suddenly it’s a huge scandal…

    It’s the same if you care for the environment and ever took a taxi somewhere, or a vegetarian or vegan and have shoes made out of leather. Sure you are doing better than everyone else to help but you are still the devil and worse than everyone else somehow…

  • Swordgeek@lemmy.ca
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    20 days ago

    She is female.
    She is black.
    She is strong.
    She is not a puppet.

    She is EVERYTHING that the power structure fears, because she will be hard to control, and likely cost them a lot of money and power.

  • BaldManGoomba@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    20 days ago

    Firstly Republicans have their guy so they are just going to pick at any weakness.

    Second, all news media has consolidated and is owned by right wing rich fuckers. There is a wealth tax proposal and the ftc is super strong right now. So rich people are being cry babies

    Third, there is a genocide happening right now with bullets paid for and made with USAs stamp on it. People are super critical against it

    Fourth, left wing people always want better so you got to do something to succeed and if you do something we want you to do better since politician rarely go far enough. All the right wing people need to do to succeed is to obstruct and do nothing.

    Fifth, Democrats are courting the middle. With the military policy, fracking, border wall, immigration and the tough on crime rhetoric Kamala sounds like a moderate Republican from 8-10 years ago. Leftists have no choice but to vote Harris or we run the chance of having Trump. While some of may vote third party because Harris doesn’t go far enough if we do that in battle ground states we will be blamed again and we are strongly discouraging that. So the only voter base Kamala can pick up is republican never Trumpers and people in the middle and independents. Kamala’s rhetoric reflects that.

    Lastly Kamala is really untested. She has flip flopped and people hate that and hypocrisy. They can’t push Trump nor give him more attention so they push Kamala. She lost her last presidential run really badly dropping out before the primaries. She only had one term as senator in a very safe district to get elected in as a democrat. As an Attorney General she ran 2 elections and only served 1.5 terms. Her district attorney stuff has been her best and most notable thing followed by her AG stint. But DA and AG stuff isn’t the same policy stuff as a politician. As senator she only passed one law having lots of words about other stuff though

    • Janoose@midwest.social
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      20 days ago

      Exactly, the NYT claimed that mass deportations and Trump taxes will help solve the housing crisis.

      There absolutely no standards for Trump; the MSM have lost their damned minds.

  • Fedizen@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    edit-2
    18 days ago

    Because the media is heavily conservative and advertising driven.

    Giving republicans new things to throw at Kamala is the #1 priority of the news right now because they need a close race to sell ads.

    Years of ownership by conservative billionaires and pundits has also saturated the media environment with a broad conservative tilt. This is why you don’t see a lot of articles about why like immigration went up under trump etc.

  • RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    20 days ago

    I don’t think it’s that Harris is being held to a higher standard, it’s that trump is being held to virtually no standard.

    The people supporting trump have no standard either except for “beat the other team, even if for no other reason than to piss them off.” They don’t care if the world goes up in flames as long as it fucks over a lib.

  • zeppo@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    18 days ago

    A nice illustration is Republican media operatives are trying to attack Harris with “we checked with McDonald’s corporate and they have no record of her working there!”. For one, McD’s is franchisees and I doubt corporate tracks every burger flipper. Next, of course they’re trying to claim she’s dishonest, but what about the greater question: Did fuckin Trump ever come anywhere near McDonald’s? No, he inherited about $400 million, has misconstrued it it repeatedly (‘a small loan of a million dollars’, as if that is relatable either) and has never had any sort of normal job that required discipline or labor, ever.