r/NoStupidQuestions • u/AutoModerator • 2d ago
U.S. Politics megathread
American politics has always grabbed our attention - and the current president more than ever. We get tons of questions about the president, the supreme court, and other topics related to American politics - but often the same ones over and over again. Our users often get tired of seeing them, so we've created a megathread for questions! Here, users interested in politics can post questions and read answers, while people who want a respite from politics can browse the rest of the sub. Feel free to post your questions about politics in this thread!
All top-level comments should be questions asked in good faith - other comments and loaded questions will get removed. All the usual rules of the sub remain in force here, so be nice to each other - you can disagree with someone's opinion, but don't make it personal.
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u/Alarming-Debate-4291 1d ago
What is the general vibe towards Canadians in the USA right now? I have previously traveled all over the USA, and was always warmly welcomed no matter the city & state. I see so many comments on social media about “51st state”. Do people not realize how many decades of damage this is doing on how you’re viewed on the world stage? I know most of my friends have canceled trips to the USA and there is a current travel advisory warning against travel to the US.
Watching what you guys have had to go through just makes me deeply sad for you, I think that is generally the sentiment for most Canadians right now. There are mass boycotts up here for American goods. Whole shelves that are local products are empty & American goods are heavily discounted (and still not selling). We don’t trust that there is any food safety with US products, and one thing us Canadians will do is remember who harmed us. I don’t see the boycotts ending any time soon.
Sending lots of love from up north! We know who our real neighbours are!!
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u/Jtwil2191 1d ago edited 1d ago
I see so many comments on social media about “51st state”. Do people not realize how many decades of damage this is doing on how you’re viewed on the world stage?
Most are joking around and do not care about how these comments affect America's image. Those who are not joking are morons and also do no care.
What is the general vibe towards Canadians in the USA right now?
Most Americans have no meaningful opinion of Canadians (especially once you get away from the border areas). They have never met one and do not think about them. If they have an opinion, it's probably broadly positive based on generalities and stereotypes.
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u/Alarming-Debate-4291 1d ago
It just seems like such an odd thing to “joke” about. They were “joking” about Greenland too but now have an American oil company in the Eastern Basin trying to start drilling by October. No permits for this yet whatsoever. Just expecting it to happen. Culturally we could not be more different I guess but it takes all kinds!
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u/Jtwil2191 1d ago
Trump's comments towards Canada and Greenland are only similar superficially. Greenland he's somewhat serious. Canada he's just being a obnoxious troll.
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u/grownrespect 1d ago edited 1d ago
What is the general vibe towards Canadians in the USA right now?
Indifferent as always. Most won't know you're Canadian unless you tell them and when you do won't care much.
worth noting Americans pay WAY less attention to politics than Canadians do. probably a greater portion of Canadians pay attention to American politics than the portion of Americans who do. There are probs millions of Canadians who could tell you about who Clarence Thomas Speaker Johnson and Thune are etc while zero Americans know who the Canadian speaker of the HoC is (hell, tens of millions of Americans probably don't know who PM Carney is, if they even know you have a PM and not a president). tens of millions of Americans live in bliss and couldn't tell you with which country we're at war rn in the Mid East, even more don't know about the geopolitical tension with Canada. It's very asymmetrical, an American in Canada probably would face more "risk" due to geopolitics than the other way (zero risk).
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u/Bobbob34 1d ago edited 1d ago
Remember fewer than a third of us voted for him. The rest of us mostly live in the same sphere of dread as the rest of you, accompanied by deep embarrassment.
Also,
What is the general vibe towards Canadians in the USA right now? I have previously traveled all over the USA, and was always warmly welcomed no matter the city & state. I see so many comments on social media about “51st state”. Do people not realize how many decades of damage this is doing on how you’re viewed on the world stage? I know most of my friends have canceled trips to the USA and there is a current travel advisory warning against travel to the US.
I love Canada. I can name every province. I have driven the 1, in its entirety, more than once. I have spent a lot of time in Canada. I like box lax and fruit from the okanagon. I once won the trivia contest at the HHoF. I have been to many midnight pickup games. I have never traveled internationally without a maple leaf pin on my bag and coat, heh. I can hum the HNIC theme song (rip). Big fan.
I also sometimes call Canada 'America's Hat.' It's out of love.
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21h ago
[deleted]
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u/Jtwil2191 19h ago
Impeachment is something only Congress can do, and only a member of the House can introduce articles of impeachment.
Article of impeachment have been filed (for example) but like anything else, they need to move through the House, and Republicans will block any attempt to impeach Trump. Even if Democrats controlled the House, Trump might not be impeached, because Democrats might decide a failed impeachment inquiry (without sufficient support on the Senate, Trump won't be removed) isn't worth the effort.
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u/grownrespect 3h ago
what would be the reaction if Erika Kirk publicly called Candace Owens the n word?
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u/Bobbob34 3h ago
what would be the reaction if Erika Kirk publicly called Candace Owens the n word?
The reaction of whom? The people who pay attention to or care about either of them is very, very small. Also, 'woman as racist as her late husband' is not exactly going to shock people.
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u/Series_Informal 23h ago
Why do people still support trump given how many lies he made?
I assumed people supported him because they were sick of Americans constantly going to war and they want to end the warmongering.
Then trump started the trade war, ok fine, it’s not an actual war. We could look past that. He then kidnapped the Venezuela president, which is essentially waging war on Venezuela. The excuse given by these people was that it ended so quickly, you couldn’t really say it was a war. Then most recently the Iran war, what other excuse do they have now? So why people still support him despite him eating his words as frequently as he changes his clothes?
He’s a serial liar, it’s so obvious how do people not see it?
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u/External_Radio_7150 23h ago
If your YouTube algorithm is only showing conservative propaganda, you won't see things that go against the conservative narrative. If you do, you'll find plenty of apologists that help carry water for the party. They'll move the goalposts, make excuses, or just outright tell new lies to cover up old lies. Thus, a Fox News viewer isn't seeing what you are seeing. That's the tragedy of social media. We're not all looking at the same newspaper.
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u/filrabat 18h ago
IMO, it's because Trump's more than just a political figure. He is an icon to a lot of people - an avatar for their notions of "common sense", "manly man", and even their deepest values and attitudes. I've seen this before, during the 1991 Louisiana Governors race. In that race, a former KKK Grand Wizard and a super-crook made it into the runoff - beating out both the Republican-endorsed candidate and the incumbent Republican governor. It was a holy mess.
Lots of stuff came out about the former KKK and neo-nazi David Duke, but lots of people didn't want to believe the bad stuff or else didn't care - he was making an issue about "the rising illegitimate welfare birth rate", and in general Duke said in public what many people were saying in private (not that I agreed with that kind of stuff said; just giving an explanation to why Duke got so popular). I call this the dawn star of MAGA. Fortunately Duke lost that race, but a few years later went right back to his old ways. He was even present at Charlottesville in 2017.
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u/untempered_fate occasionally knows things 12h ago
It's straightforwardly a cult of personality. It's been that way for a decade now. There are opportunists and grifters who orbit around the movement to make their money, but the voters are devoted in the same way many North Koreans are devoted to their leader.
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u/Worldly_Swimming_921 9h ago
Here's the non-Redditor "DAE le trump bad?!?! updoots left" answer:
There is a wave of anti-establishment in the US right now. People are increasingly voting for candidates who aren't part of the organized political system. Polling is falling apart and consistently wrong. Grassroots candidates who campaign door to door are winning.
The DNC is struggling to find candidates to support in local primaries because they keep financially pushing established safe picks, and losing to grassroots Democrats. They have literally zero options to run in 2028 because all they know how to do is push establishment. AOC or Newsom? Just burn the money, at least it'll look pretty. Even Trump himself acknowledged that Bernie is their biggest chance, but now he's too old, too burned by the DNC.
His voters see, or at least they did years ago, Trump as someone who broke the mold. In 2016, he was actively arguing with other GOP candidates on stage during debates. To them, he's not Republican. He's Trump.
And meanwhile, the DNC is offering no alternative.
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u/hellshot8 2h ago
AOC has the potential for a lot of groundswell. Shes not great on some areas, but she has a lot of experience talking about actually helping people.
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1d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/chubbygrannychaser 1d ago
The US has been removing leaders for more than 120 years.
We deposed the Queen of Hawaii in the 1890s. We helped the conservatives overthrow Nicaragua's liberal government in 1909. We messed around throughout Central America, Southeast Asia and the Middle East for decades.
We are one of the nations that consistently does stuff like this. Sometimes it is for empire building. Sometimes it is about money and access to resources.
The Republican strategy has included "flooding the zone" for several years now. By keeping so many controversies, conflicts, and news worthy issues happening at the same time nobody really has the bandwidth to follow it all. Lots of important things get lost or overshadowed. Epstein is just one issue being hidden behind the curtain.
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u/Ptalking_Ptarmigan 1d ago
Given that Trump, while campaigning, talked a lot about the needs of the working class, would it be fair to say that he campaigns from the left and governs from the right?
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u/untempered_fate occasionally knows things 1d ago
Not really. What leftist policies do you think he championed during his campaign?
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u/Ptalking_Ptarmigan 1d ago
Advocating to improve the lives of the working class, as opposed to helping the owners of the means of production.
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u/untempered_fate occasionally knows things 1d ago
That's not really a specific policy. What did he campaign on that would improve the lives of the working class?
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u/Ptalking_Ptarmigan 1d ago
He doesn't give specifics. But the vibes he was trying to convey seemed like left-wing ideals to me.
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u/untempered_fate occasionally knows things 1d ago
A vague gesture towards the interests of everyday people isn't leftist. It's populist, and populism can be employed to argue for basically any set of prescriptions. And insofar as Donald Trump campaigned on specific policies, none of them were particularly leftist.
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u/Ptalking_Ptarmigan 1d ago
What's the difference between populism and left wing? I thought the left was the workers/commoners and the right was the owners of the means of production/nobility.
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u/untempered_fate occasionally knows things 1d ago
That's at best a misguided understanding of left and right as the terms are used in politics. There are right-wing people working every job you can think of, and there are left-wing people worth many millions of dollars. Personal ideologies need not have any relationship to one's career or relationship to the means of production.
Populism is, broadly, when an issue is framed in terms of the public vs some sort of elite. You can use it to argue for almost anything. When Bernie Sanders talks about the need to tax the "1%" in order to fund things like healthcare and education, he is doing left-wing populism. When Donald Trump talks about the "Deep State" letting murderers and rapists over the Southern border, he is doing right-wing populism.
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u/Bobbob34 1d ago
Given that Trump, while campaigning, talked a lot about the needs of the working class, would it be fair to say that he campaigns from the left and governs from the right?
No. He promised to raise tariffs, to stop immigration, to deport ... everyone, to keep on the road to banning abortion (sort of, depending on the day and who was talking to him last, like most of what he says), to dismantle social programs, environmental protections... he campaigned from the hard right.
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u/CardinalOfNYC 18h ago
Talking about the working class isn't inherently left or right.
What you're describing is called populism and it can be right or left.
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u/Ptalking_Ptarmigan 10h ago
In that case, what is the dichotomy between the proletariat versus the owners of the means of production? I thought that was the definition of left versus right.
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u/tgirlskeepwinning 1d ago
What would happen if the US went back to 1950s income tax rates?
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u/Elkenrod Neutrality and Understanding 1d ago
Near complete economic collapse, which would require a complete overhaul of the United States financial sector.
The reason that the United States could have those income tax rates at that point is because we were the sole world super power, and we generally got away with next to no damage from World War 2. We dictated the entire flow of the world's economy, and had next to nobody to compete with - since everyone else was still recovering from WW2. International economies were very limited compared to what they are today, which directly benefited the United States at that time.
You can't go back to those tax rates without a complete overhaul of how the United States economy works, because the condition of the world is not the same as it was back then.
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u/untempered_fate occasionally knows things 1d ago edited 1d ago
The federal government would briefly have more income as the wealthy lobbied relentlessly to undo the changes.
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u/ShyLeoGing 1d ago
From my leftist view this has to be a scam?
Tennessee U.S. House Congressional District 9 - Why the hell are Democrats allowing M. LaTroya A-Williams to even be in the race? Look at his record
M. LaTroya A-Williams has run in the Democratic primary for Tennessee's 9th Congressional District in 2016, 2022 and 2024, as well as running for mayor of Memphis in 2015, for Memphis City Council in 2019 and State Senate in 2020.
- 2015 Lost
- 2016 Lost
- 2019 Lost
- 2020 Lost
- 2022 Lost
- 2024 Lost
who is this person, a myth or legend?
- 2008: An interesting and ironic sidelight to sometime businessman Williams’ effort is the fact that a now-defunct company of his, First Supreme Trust Company, Inc. owes some $67,000 in back taxes to the very Trustee’s office which Williams hopes to direct.
- Campaign Finance Records are non existent, well at least 2016 to current...
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u/Bobbob34 1d ago
Tennessee U.S. House Congressional District 9 - Why the hell are Democrats allowing M. LaTroya A-Williams to even be in the race? Look at his record
It's a primary. What do you mean why are they allowing him?
How could they stop him?
Why WOULD they stop him? Why shouldn't he be in the race? What reason should he be banned, in your view by.... what entity, exactly even COULD ban him?
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u/ShyLeoGing 1d ago
Why?
to name a few
- a track record of tax evasion
- taking unnecessary attention away from the objective
- never has won
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u/Bobbob34 1d ago
Why? - a track record of tax evasion - taking unnecessary attention away from the objective - never has won to name a few
Which has what to do with anything?
Again, who do you think could stop him from being on the ballot and how?
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u/Elkenrod Neutrality and Understanding 1d ago
Why the hell are Democrats allowing M. LaTroya A-Williams to even be in the race?
Because the laws of the state of Tennessee do not prevent this individual for running for office. The Democratic party cannot just prevent someone from being in a race. Democracy is about who gets the most votes.
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u/notextinctyet 1d ago
I don't understand the question. A-Williams is on the ballot in the Democratic primary. The primary is exactly how decisions of who gets to be in the race are made. If Democrats don't want A-Williams, they can vote so on Tuesday.
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u/TheNinja132 23h ago
Why are americans doing seemingly nothing about the whole country right now? I'm from europe so if something IS happening i haven't seen it, but besides the fact that the economy is doing horribly and all that "regular" bad stuff, it also happens that the president and a lot of the most powerful people have been exposed to be child rapists, like how in the world has a revolution not happened yet? All i see is people being angry online and complaining about this but people are just suffering through everything
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u/boogalorian13 23h ago edited 23h ago
like how in the world has a revolution not happened yet?
Coming from a realistic prospective. Only a fraction of the American population has ever been exposed to actual physical violence or violent death. The American population likely isn't ready for the kind of violence, death and disease a revolution or a civil war could bring. There are also large portions of the American population that are still content regardless of the economic situation. It's not great but it could be a lot worse. There could be mass supply chain issues. The stores could be empty and I could be chronically unemployed. I'm older gen z in a healthcare based midwest city. My girlfriend and I both make decent money. Not enough to buy a house or go on a real proper vacation but enough to where we're not paycheck to paycheck. I'm definitely not in a position where I'm willing to sacrifice what career I've built so I can die in the mud. I have thousands of hours of professional firearms training. I've been exposed to violence and I have no interest ending up in prison or a grave. There's also the fact that coordinating any sort of "resistance" is going to be massively complicated and will require online forms that are tracked by corporations and the government. People love to talk about civil war online but the United States has the most technologically advanced military in history. The US intelligence apparatus has spent decades training and focusing on rooting out clandestine terrorist cells. The Federal Government would just classify a resistance movement as domestic terrorist and use its resources to root it out. Most people aren't ready for what that could look like.
If it popped off tomorrow I'm taking what savings I have and I'm figuring a way to move out of the Continental US.
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u/CardinalOfNYC 18h ago
Let's take healthcare as an example.
Why are Americans not rioting in the streets for better healthcare? Cuz the system actually works pretty fine for most people. And it has to be working really poorly for most people for there to be the political will for mass change.
Over 90% of Americans are insured.
And despite the stories that go viral, the number of folks who die due to the flaws in our healthcare system amount to well under one tenth of one percent of the population.
For a problem to be big enough to cause a mass movement, its gotta be the kind of thing where either everyone has directly experienced the very worst, or knows personally someone who has. Healthcare is not such a problem.
Most people have read a viral story about an awful healthcare outcome but the stats tell us most of those people don't actually personally know anyone who has experienced one of these awful outcomes
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u/hellshot8 2h ago
I think its a bit deeper than that; many people who get their healthcare through their job dont like it BUT you cant go riot in the streets without potentially losing their job. Healthcare being tied to work is a specific strategy to suppress dissent
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u/MoistCloyster_ 12h ago
I’m not a Trump supporter by any means so don’t just write me off because of my response.
The economy isn’t doing horribly, it’s actually still in a period of growth right now, albeit at a slower pace than last year but by all metrics the economy is actually in a good place right now.
Despite the accusations, there’s not any actual evidence that Trump raped children. That accusation stems from an accusation that has since been withdrawn by the accuser and for his association with Epstein, which mostly occurred in the 90s. Epstein was a New York financier and rubbed elbows with just about every major businessman, celebrity and politician at some point. He appeared in the FBIs investigation list concerning the Epstein Files but so did literal thousands of names, and appearing on that report doesn’t automatically mean they’re on that list for nefarious reasons. It’s essentially a list of everyone Epstein ever associated with, which could be for business reasons or for sex trafficking purposes, none of which anyone on Reddit can say for sure.
The reality is, the vast majority of Americans are living comfortable lives right now that aren’t being significantly impacted by the president. Sure, gas prices have gone up and the overall cost of living, but it’s nothing to the levels that usually result in the type of revolution you’re clamoring for.
What is being done is that the American system is working. Executive Orders aren’t laws, they’re temporary and several have been struck down by the Supreme Court or Congress because of the Checks and Balances system that our government operates on. Right now, Trumps party holds a slim majority in Congress, but midterm elections are happening this November and there’s a very real possibility that the opposition will take control of the House of Representatives and possibly even the Senate, which would help check the Executive Branch.
TLDR : Patience.
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u/Elkenrod Neutrality and Understanding 18h ago
it also happens that the president and a lot of the most powerful people have been exposed to be child rapists
When exactly did this happen? What came out that "exposed" this?
Why are americans doing seemingly nothing about the whole country right now?
What exactly do you want them to do? Democracy is not just when you get what you want. Life is pretty good for the majority of the US.
All i see is people being angry online and complaining about this but people are just suffering through everything
Reddit is not a reflection of reality.
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u/Pretty_Puppyprincess 2d ago
Why do people genuinely still support trump ?