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this post was submitted on 17 Nov 2025
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Leopards Ate My Face
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Focusing on cannabis since the guy is complaining about his hemp farm.
The Democrats here in Ohio have done fuck all to protect the decriminalized cannabis that we voted in support of by 60% back in 2023 (same with abortion the same day). Republicans immediatly set to work to limit home growth and how much you can buy. Did the Democrats run ads in Ohio about how they were going to protect our right to grow and consume cannabis? Did they talk about how Republicans were going to roll back the provisions we all agreed on? No. They ran ads about how they were going to help Trump hurt trans kids and "secure the border" here in Ohio. The Democrats and Republicans have lost all credibility with everyone that isn't a die-hard supporter of the parties. People stop voting when they feel like neither party cares about their interests.
Yeah, I keep hearing about how useless the dems are. I dunno what you guys can possibly do to fix things over there tbh. So I understand feeling hopeless.
Americans are odd. They complain about "both sides" but a lot of them don't participate in primary elections.
There are definitely problems with the way the parties pick candidates but the primary is by far the more important election for those that consistently vote for the same party.
It's a Charlie Brown and the football situation. You can only fall for the same bait and switch so many times before you just give up. In a democracy it leads to voter apathy. And primaries are poorly run. If it isn't a prominent one, you likely won't find much information on the candidates prior to the primary election, and for the president, they sre pretty much decided by 4th one so if you're state does a later primary, chances are that your preferred candidate has already dropped out by the time you can actually vote for them.
To my knowledge Americans have never given Democrats a chance, the Democrats haven't had a majority capable of pushing a bill through without Republican participation since 2008 and Republicans have been remarkably consistent at pulling the party together to stonewall Democrats so they look ineffective.
I mean the Democrats are often ineffective but at least punish them for the failures they make on their own merits, like the recent agreement to reopen the government.
They had a majority in the House from 2006 to 2010 and from 2008 to 2014 in the Senate. It's not like the GOP has been in power forever. And again in the Senate from 2022 to 2024 and from 2018 to 2022 in the House.
There's a reason why some people dont really believe in them
I was referring specifically to Senate, however it's a long messy history, let me go on GovTrack.us and see if I can find the senate records to explain what I mean
Edit: there it is,
The below information is a tie which effectively allowed for stonewalling. Yes if all Democratic senators, 2 independents and the vice president voted together they could push things through. However the fact of the matter is they don't tow the party line like Republicans and vote more independently. Perhaps a party failure but I see that as a tenant of a functioning democracy.
You could make the argument against an enemy willing to use those tactics not using them Is a failure to the people but I'd argue the smarter thing as individuals would be to blame Republicans and vote them out of positions of power.
And before that the last time they had a majority was 2009 to 2011
Yes of course I am not personally sympathic to GOP but at least they seem to be giving their voters want they want on their key issues. Do D do this? If you want people to want to vote for you need to give the impression, even falsely, that you will deliver and the democrats seem to have lost the ability to do that.
Agreed but it's much easier to give voters what they want when you spend billions on propaganda either directly or indirectly through Russian state actors. More like they acted in their own interest and dreamed up a narrative to convince the common man it was there's too. Now, no doubt they're effective political tools, hats off to them but it's a lot easier to align men with their own greed than a common path forward for society.
A big part of the problem is the length of the "primary season" and spreading out votes over the course of several months.
This makes it really hard to sustain a budget, especially for grassroots candidates...but also sets up frontrunners in a big way.
IMO primaries would have a different outcome if they were all held on one day and we limited primary campaign season to like 3 months tops.
I'd say something about superdelegates but the fact is that parties and primaries aren't really a part of the process. People treat the GOP and DNC like they are official government branches when really they are just more like a private club. They let us have a primary. If the bylaws say they can override the primary, that's the bylaws. If people disagree with it, then either the bylaws get changed or a new club gets founded.
The problem, then, is that our voting system ultimately necessitates no more than two major parties. Since the winner is the one with the most votes*, it's very easy for two parties that align on many fronts to actively work against each other...see Ralph Nader in Florida in 2000. And it takes a huge shift to uproot an established party.
Ah yes victim blaming. We work 60 hours or more a week to keep th slights on but also gotta figure out who's running on our exact platforms and show up to vote when we don't get paid and find the voting stations because fuck all? Yeah ok it's my bad for not voting in primaries lol
Yes.
Excuses don't change anything, the person in this meme has them too.
The Dems are primarily right of centre capitalists who think they'll win if they appeal to the "centrists" between the two parties (hasn't worked), and the Repubs are literal Nazis. So yeah, not great.
Here's the solution: Go get involved locally.
The Dems at the top are put there by the dems in the middle, and those are elected by the dems at the bottom. Find your precinct and join it. Simply being present adds weight to that precint, and then you can help choose who leads the district, and upwards until we get to the DNC chair and presidential candidates.
Feel like your choice is nazi vs meh? Getting involved lets you push the meh closer to great. Voting all the time is half the equation, but if you feel like your choices are not great, then the solution is to help pick the choices.
This seems like good advice for USians. :)
Unfortunately, running ads against all the shitty things that Republicans do would bankrupt someone as wealthy as Bezos. At a certain point, people need to take some personal responsibility in researching and making an informed vote, instead of just relying on who had the most recent snappy attack ad campaign.
Also what pisses me off enormously is that people (especially in politics) refuse to ever say what they actually think. They will say one thing while knowing full well that they actually mean something completely different. There needs to be more correlation between what people say and what they mean. Especially, i'm sick of parties only trying to get people's attention and not actually having any ideals they believe in themselves.
Trump says whatever enters his brain at any given second...
The two sides are similar, sure, but one side is hurting much more people than other.
The narrative the two sides are the same elected Trump since many shared this idea and didn’t show up to vote… MAGA for sure will go out and vote
Yeah Sherrod Brown basically threw the election. Ohio isn't as red as its democrats seem to think