I feel like I'm living through a horror movie

[Pototan]

Last edited Sat Oct 5, 2024, 01:17 AM - Edit history (1)

In the old story of the frog in the boiling water, this 10-year journey through the Trump years is eerily similar to a horror movie. The fact that 45% of American voters are OK with this is scary. Now we have an additional villain joining Trump at the top of this adventure; the world's richest and most unstable man, Elon Musk.

It's similar to the "Invasion of the Body Snatchers". Amazingly, men (and some women, like Nikki Haley) will support a person who publicly insulted their intelligence, their looks, their family members and their spouses. This was unheard of in my day. A Senator touting a candidate who insulted his wife on twitter and accused his father of assisting in the JFK assassination. A Senate Majority leader who is insulted in public and whose wife was insulted with the most racist tweets. Nikki Haley, who was called a "bird brain" and whose husband was denigrated for being deployed. I could go on and on, with the most recent being Brian Kemp.

This is not normal. I come from a time when a politician would hold a grudge for his seating assignment at a fundraiser, let alone a public insult of his or her spouse.

Family members (mostly male cousins) who I thought were intelligent and tolerant turn out to be racists and bigots who feel free to let everyone know now that Trump has given them cover.

If you told me 10 or 15 years ago that this would be America today, I would not have believed you. But, unlike a sci-fi thriller, this nightmare may never end, at least not in my lifetime (72 years old).

[The Roux Comes First]

1. It Is Truly Astounding, I Agree

Most folks of our generation are probably hard-pressed these days to even come up with an insult that could leave a mark!

[appalachiablue]

2. K/R

[young_at_heart]

3. I know my time is nearly up and I feel profoundly sad

I pray every day that the nightmare will end before I have to go. I would like to have a little bit of peace and hope at the end!

[littlemissmartypants]

7. ❤️

[0rganism]

4. I wish it had better acting and the screenwriting is preposterous

I've walked out of better flicks than this one. Soon enough, I guess...

[markodochartaigh]

6. When our reality entered the

Onionverse the screenwriters were on strike. Our reality is being scripted by 10,000,000 angry chimpanzees who had been used in laboratory experiments.

[Figarosmom]

5. I dont get it either

All I can figure is they and their families are being threatened, like Russia does it. I think the Chaney's are fighting him because he threatened them and pissed off Dick.

The people themselves, the magas. I don't know what they are seeing in him other then hate and giving them permission to openly hate.

[JoseBalow]

8. May you live in interesting times

[slightlv]

9. After watching my Mom decompensate

with dementia, I recognize what's wrong with trump. Mom is a narcissistic personality type, although not a dark triad like trump. But as she decompensated, she got downright mean. She'd hurl insults, racial insults, she'd even get physically violent. We got mom where she could be helped by people who understood and knew what to do with her tirades. And she's now so much better than she had been.

It's just a shame that no one in trumps family loves or cares enough for him (and our country) to do for him what I did for my Mom. He absolutely needs it, but he can't and won't recognize it for himself, and every maga and maga politician will look away and deny it happening (just like my brother did).

The only thing we can do is vote Kamala in with as large a margin as possible. It will worsen trumps condition, but better that than see our country headed by someone who could order a nuke strike on CA and not think a thing wrong about it! His marbles ain't all there, and it's no help that there's opportunistic Vance waiting to take over when they finally 25th Amendment trump.

[Otto_Harper]

10. As a fellow Septuagenarian

I have long thought that if this horror show does not end this November, then I will most certainly finish my days in the midst of a post dystopian horror landscape. I have lived through much and seen much, but, I really had never thought that the country that I lived in and cherished would be destroyed around me by a marching hoard of brain-dead zombies.

[jfz9580m]

11. I know how you feel

Here is something off-topic to cheer you up as it cheered me up:
https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20240930-the-only-place-where-whales-come-to-watch-you

A model for community-driven conservation
Gray whales were nearly hunted to extinction during the 18th and 19th Centuries, and as a result, the animals tended to act aggressively towards humans – so much so that local fishermen even dubbed them "devil fish" and avoided them. But in 1972, a man named Francisco (Pachico) Mayoral was out fishing in Baja when a whale surfaced and lingered by his boat. Curiosity compelled him to put his hand in the water. The whale rubbed against Mayoral and stayed by his hand.

News of Mayoral's experience spread, and locals, much less afraid, waited patiently to experience similar friendly encounters. "Gray whales specifically are naturally curious and have never been afraid of approaching floating items in the water. Humans hurt them, and then the gray whales reacted to that interaction," Sanchez tells me. "After [Mayoral's] first peaceful contact, humans started to realise gray whales are not the scary and mad animals we thought they were."

Sanchez was the first Mexican naturalist to guide whale-watching tours in the lagoon back in the 1990s, and his own eco-tourism company now has a base camp on San Ignacio Lagoon. "As time has gone by, humans are becoming less afraid to let gray whales get closer to the point of close contact. I believe this is [also true for gray whales]."

It is good to see we don’t always have to be hideous as a species . Does one good to see a cool news item like that.

[H2O Man]

12. Recommended.

I agree with everything except the Ted Cruz part. To be accurate, the felon noted -- correctly -- that Cruz's father had known Lee Harvey Oswald. He did not say Ted's father assisted in the JFK assassination. He only hinted/implied he did.

[Pototan]

13. However

The story in the Enquire, planted by David Pecker, was done with the approval of the Trump team and on his behalf.

Trump did indicate, at the time, as I remember, that it "was worth looking into."

The evidence in the "Hush Money" trial and conviction certainly pointed to a conspiracy between Pecker and Trump on this and similar stories.

[H2O Man]

17. True!

And Ted's father is mentioned in numerous books on JFK and events leading up to Dallas.

[mahina]

14. Consider this. We are being intentionally divided by many outside forces and some within. We do not have to let that be

our lived reality.

In real life, people are mostly kind, mostly reasonable, mostly positive, want community and connection and cooperation.

Being locked to our screens and tied up in the duality feed the diversion we are being sold.

Hold the vision of being united in love please.

aloha keahi I keahi. People are mostly good. Some people are not. https://www.democraticunderground.com/100219521373

This too...the polls are half full of nonselnse. Like in 2022 but worse...intentional redpcasting plus a fact that many people are afraid of the goons and won't answer consistently with their votes. We shall see. If we work, we win.

[Pototan]

15. It's easy for us

You live in Hawaii, which is part of America, but far from the many assholes who reside stateside.

Me? I reside in the Central Philippines, where my Filipina wife and her family own 25 acres. We built our house and its amenities on this land. Filipinos are a wonderful people, and I don't encounter the same intolerance or racism that I did in the US.

I am surrounded here with love, luxury and a very good life.

However, I still wish America lived up to our expectations. After all, I do go back for a couple of weeks a year.

[mahina]

21. I read you and agree.

ps we have no shortage of mega boneheads here, to my chagrin. We are being divided especially on the West Side.

pps it's not always a part of the US - not for some

[betsuni]

16. In my case the people I knew who were brainwashed into going to the right-wing dark side did so decades before

because of hate radio and evangelical religion, then Fox News. What was "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" and very shocking to me were people on the Left, well educated, brainwashed into going over to the dark side and despising liberal Democrats and supporters. Luckily that's almost entirely over now, finally. Helped give us Trump and pointless as far as their big pseudo revolution about nothing was concerned.

[peggysue2]

18. Back in the day . . .

We thought we were immune to the craziness, thought America by virtue of her historical arc and strength, her defense of freedom and decency and progress (regardless of how slow or flawed) was a bulwark to the darkness.

The shock is knowing that was never true and the things we took for granted were always vulnerable. I can remember as a kid wondering how the Russian people could ever believe what their leaders bellowed, such obvious lies and distortions. Or how the Germans fell for the Nazi rhetoric, the propaganda or found Hitler mesmerizing.

The narrative has been repeated again and again. It has no national boundaries and now it's here.

Now we know the underpinnings for these destructive forces have always been there, that all they need is the right moment, the right voice, a small nod of acquiescence and a measure of apathy to grow into something monstrous.

Nightmarish, indeed.

This is why we fight. This is why we must tell our children:

Vigilance is forever.

[617Blue]

19. Haven't spoken to my brother in 2 years. Probably won't ever again.

I will not initiate contact.

[Elessar Zappa]

20. America's always been fucked up, it's just out in the open now.

Actually, in many ways we’re better off now, even with our fucked up politics. Certainly people of color and lbtq are better off now, even though there’s a long way to go. And violent crime is much less than it was forty years ago. So all is not lost. We need to keep electing Democrats though of things will go downhill in a hurry.