I think your edit outlines that we are just going to disagree. The US has its flaws, no question, but I’m a far cry from calling it an imperialist hellhole. I like the US as a whole, and we may not be the “Greatest Nation In The World”™, and we’ve certainly been involved in our share of bad stuff. But I also think we’ve been on the right side of history a fair few times as well, and the average American has it pretty well off.

Now, I think this current administration is certainly going out of its way to destroy a lot of that. I agree that ICE is certainly gestapo adjacent (though not what we were talking about when I brought them up.) I agree that the rule of law is being stretched a little thin at the moment.

But, crucially, this is all stuff we’ve seen before. Andrew Jackson literally told the Supreme Court to try and enforce their ruling with whatever army they had to do so, and then kicked off the Trail of Tears. We’ve literally had a full scale Civil War and come back together as a nation afterwards. It’s nowhere near as bad off as it has been before, and we survived it, and we absolutely will again.

It requires bold leaders in the civic arena who can stand up for decency and the rule of law. Not some tribalist nonsense where we advocate for killing anyone who doesn’t wave our particular color of flag.

I’m sorry you’ve given up hope, but I promise we’ve come back from far worse as a nation. Two years from now we’ll likely have a Democrat in the White House (if the party doesn’t screw the pooch again), and we can start rebuilding. We’re already seeing a blue wave take off in the House and Senate. In a couple years we can start rebuilding. Which doesn’t diminish the damage that has been done, which is extensive.

But I think what we’re seeing is the final throes of a dying party, and once the current administration is out, we’ll see a big restructuring of the Republican party, as most of their voter base is passing on. The Overton Window will shift a good bit left, and we’ll begin seeing slow but measured and sustainable progress forward.

They were the functional equivalent of Jan6 rioters. Sure, not all of them killed a cop. But they were at minimum actively involved in the destruction of property during a riot that escalated to violence.

I’ve already agreed the elevation to terrorist charges were bad. But let’s not pretend this was the gestapo pulling people from their beds for wrongthink.

Trump surrendered power after his first term. The pendulum was swinging away from authoritarianism. Everything was on the path to “just working out.” Then the Dems screwed the pooch by putting forward crap candidates and it began swinging back. The answer to this isn’t continuing to put forward awful candidates. And I have trouble coming up with one worse than a serial rapist with a Nazi tattoo.

The people printing the magazines were directly involved in shooting a police officer. The magazines were used as evidence to paint them as terrorists to get them longer sentences.

Now, I wholly disagree with painting them as terrorists to get longer sentences. That’s definitely bad, and I hope it gets overturned on appeal.

But they were pretty involved in active criminal activity in which an officer was shot in the neck. They weren’t arrested for “just printing magazines.”

Sure. I don’t usually do edits, as I’ve already admitted to using older data deeper in the thread, but if it makes you feel better, that’s fine.

Original statement has been edited with a basic summary of the additional, more recent data.

This is what always gets me. It’s not like there aren’t hundreds if not thousands of people who want the job.

I felt this way during the Kavenaugh hearings for the SC. If someone has anything big that would disqualify them if true, even if it isn’t, why push that candidate?

It’s not a court of law. We’re not throwing them in jail. It doesn’t need to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt. They are just not getting a job they wanted.

I’ve seen people not get a job they wanted because they forgot a word during an interview. Why the hell can someone be credibly accused of rape and everyone’s like, “well yeah, but we still want them to get this job.” Just interview other candidates! There’s not a lack of people who would want to be a Senator or SC Justice or whatever. What the hell?

The stats were from both the Obama administration and the Biden administration. The Trump administration is not reflected on that Wikipedia page yet.

The Biden administration was only two years ago. It’s not like it’s ancient history.

Look man, you’re using a lot of phrases that don’t really mean what you seem to think they do.

“Dirty your hands” usually means that you’ll engage in some mud slinging or attack another candidates family or something. It doesn’t mean supporting someone who has violently raped multiple women.

To turn it back on you, using the terms correctly, are you saying that a rapist with a Nazi tattoo is preferable to a moderate Dem so long as they can pass a purity test?

Look, I don’t like Susan Collins. I’m not saying she’s a good choice. I’m saying she’s better than Platner.

If the Dems put forward someone who isn’t a rapist, I’m all on board.

At the end of the day, character matters. If I have to choose between someone who I disagree with but has morals and someone I generally agree with but is a bad person, I will pick the person with morals.

No, I just hadn’t looked at her numbers since the Biden administration and was working from memory.

Susan Collins isn’t a fascist.

I often don’t agree with her, but she voted with both the Biden and Obama administrations over 70% of the time.

And I reject that this is a “purity test.” This isn’t them not aligning 100% with some fringe ideology. This is someone who is literally a rapist. Literally raped real women by force.

If this is the best candidate we can put forward, we deserve to lose.

I’d rather have a milquetoast corporate Dem than a rapist. I’d vote for one quicker than for a rapist anyways.

Okay, calling me a liar is strong. I was going off the Wikipedia page for her political positions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_positions_of_Susan_Collins

This is what I was referring to with the 70%:

According to CQ Roll Call, Collins sided with President Obama’s position 75.9% of the time in 2013, one of only two Republicans to vote with him more than 70% of the time.

And:

During the Biden presidency, as of February 2022, FiveThirtyEight found that she has voted with Biden’s positions approximately 75.6% of the time.

A further review does show her voting close to 95% with the Trump presidency: https://votehub.com/trump-score

I do think “Trump Score” is a misleading statistic, in that not all votes are created equal, so knowing which votes someone defected on is almost if not more important than the number of votes. Look at Fetterman. He has a 40% voting rate with the Trump administration, but to hear it here he’s basically a Republican with a blue tie.

All that to say, Susan Collins has historically been very moderate, and has had reasonable and nuanced takes on important issues.

Planter has almost certainly raped multiple women.

Would I rather a solid Democrat over Susan Collins? Absolutely. But character matters. And that’s true for anybody of either party.

And painting Susan Collins as a far right lunatic is disingenuous at best.

He can step down now and the Democrats can replace him. Primaries aren’t controlled by the state. The party can do what it wants. So why wait?

He’s up against Susan Collins, the most liberal Republican Senator. She votes with the Democrats, like, 70% of the time. And, crucially, doesn’t have anyone accusing her of rape.

Edited correction: Has voted with the Democrats 70% of the time during the Obama and Biden administrations. She’s been with the Republicans 95% of the time with the Trump admin so far. But it’s a weird metric as not all votes are equivalent weighty. But is worth noting the the most bipartisan Dem this cycle (Fetterman) has only sided with the Republicans 44% of the time, so she has historically crossed the aisle more than he has.

These latest accusations are super credible. And when multiple women have come forward saying someone is a sex pest and have contemporaneous documentation corroborating that, it’s a little hard to just look past.

Why do we insist on backing the guy with multiple rape allegations and a Nazi tattoo? There’s no equally qualified candidate that isn’t a rapist?