this post was submitted on 22 May 2025
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Political Memes

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[–] Lucky_777@lemmy.world 89 points 1 week ago (7 children)

You could argue that Regan was the spark. 9/11 was the fire. Trump is the ashes.

[–] toy_boat_toy_boat@lemmy.world 32 points 1 week ago (4 children)

if it wasn't regan, it was the great depression. if it wasn't the great depression it was the civil war.

we didn't start the fire. it was always burning since the world's been turning.

[–] SARGE@startrek.website 21 points 1 week ago

Truth is?

Game's been rigged from the start.

[–] ExtantHuman@lemm.ee 8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

We got the new deal it of the great depression though. It took Republicans many decades of dedication to dismantle what we gained from that.

[–] toy_boat_toy_boat@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago

my post was basically just rhetorical, but you have a great point.. i wonder what "new deal" they'll come up with in the wake of this guy.

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[–] WanderingThoughts@europe.pub 17 points 1 week ago

It was the stagflation in the seventies. That's when the rich managed to switch the economy ~~back to exploitation mode~~ to neoliberalism, and Reagan was their tool.

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 13 points 1 week ago

Or Nixon.

9/11, horrible as it was, just gave them a good reason to put into law some truly undemocratic shit they probably already had waiting in a drawer for a while.

[–] x00z@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago

Trump is the fallout making us sick.

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[–] TheFriendlyDickhead@lemm.ee 46 points 1 week ago (3 children)

The day america ended:

picture of Christopher Columbus

[–] throwawayacc0430@sh.itjust.works 5 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The day Earth ended: The day when the first Eukaryotic Organism was evolved

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This is more of a political commentary on that fact that when I was politically activated, preteen, its been nothing but down hill.

[–] Meron35@lemmy.world 42 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Interesting no one has mentioned the 2000 election shenanigans yet. That was some real stolen election shit

[–] A_norny_mousse@feddit.org 12 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Florida? Yeah I heard a podcast about this, eerily similar to all that's been happening around the last 2 elections.

[–] Gismonda@lemmy.world 7 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

I lived through it - in Florida - and it was every bit as shady and disgusting as you would think, and then some.

Especially that Brooks Brothers Riot of “concerned citizens” who were actually GOP operatives demanding a recount. That fucking sickens me to this day.

(I showed my spouse an article about that a few years ago and he was horrified. He’d had no idea, although I don’t fault him for that since he was on float at the time)

[–] sugarfoot00@lemmy.ca 11 points 1 week ago

That's exactly where the timeline jumped the tracks. if Gore's election is properly counted, there's potentially no 9/11, but certainly no Iraq and probably no Afghanistan as we know it. And without Bush and the whiplash against him and those events, there's no Obama. And without the mouth breather whiplash to Obama, there's no Trump.

So yeah, I would say that the republicans fucking around in south Florida is what caused the rift.

[–] PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de 31 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I think the dawn of neoliberalism under Reagan and the 2008 crisis are essential. 9/11 was just a great sensation to focus on

[–] Pringles@lemm.ee 14 points 1 week ago

9/11 was a catalyst for forces that were already in play.

[–] ArgumentativeMonotheist@lemmy.world 5 points 1 week ago (2 children)
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[–] Headofthebored@lemmy.world 26 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I thought we all agreed it was the gorilla.

[–] ignotum@lemmy.world 14 points 1 week ago

That was but a symptom, a healthy society wouldn't have let that happen to our boi Harambe in the first place

[–] UltraGiGaGigantic@lemmy.ml 25 points 1 week ago (2 children)

"All men are created equal"

Is slave state

Always has been

[–] BmeBenji@lemm.ee 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I think this is the right place to look.

At the bare minimum, back then the founders wrote a constitution designed AND INTENDED to be amended, if not rewritten every once in a while.

As of like 80 years ago people started to get it in their head that the USA was somehow the greatest nation to ever exist and could never be better. Maybe because of how it helped out in WWII? Maybe because of how the economy boomed following the war? Who knows. But Nationalism has certainly put the nails in the coffin.

[–] thisorthatorwhatever@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

They were slave owners, who fought a violent war against a democratic country. They could have asked for representation in parliament, but they decided to go to war. Why, because England, was about to clean up the colonies and eliminate slavery. With peace between England and France in the 1760s, England's attention was once again on domestic issues, and people in England were getting sick of slavery in the colonies. The rich slave owners, most educated in law, knew slavery was about to end when the ruling of Somerset v Stewart (1772) was handed down.

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[–] wpb@lemmy.world 6 points 1 week ago

Don't forget about the genocide of the natives.

[–] 1SimpleTailor@startrek.website 18 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

No, it started with Reagan

No, it started with Nixon

No, it started with Prescott Bush

All of history is built on what came before. I think if we really want to get to the root of America's collapse, we have to look way back. Doing so, I can only conclude that the Agricultural Revolution was a mistake.

[–] Brandonazz@lemmy.world 10 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Also it was because we didn't do reconstruction, which was because the landowners were too strong.

And the landowners were too strong in the 1860s because of compromise in the 18th century, on account of their ancestors being too strong.

Actually, come to think of it, aren't those the same people that elected Nixon, Reagan, and Bush?

Perhaps it's not so much that history repeats itself as that we have had the same intractable problem for hundreds of years: aristocrats.

[–] HasturInYellow@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago

Feed all oppressors to the Almighty Meat Grinder!

Death by a thousand cuts. No single event led to the Nazis seizing power, no single even led to the Conservatives enacting their fascist regime in the US. Yeah, some steps were bigger than others, the likes of Reagan, W, and Trump shoving things faster and further right than others, but none of them singlehandedly achieved the coup d’etat. Trump benefitted from all the groundwork laid before along with the hard work of the likes of McConnell that did everything they could to prevent democracy from working.

[–] Lv_InSaNe_vL@lemmy.world 4 points 1 week ago

My God damn great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great great grandpa wanted to distill more grain so now here I am, working a god forsaken 9-5 :(

[–] ArchmageAzor@lemmy.world 17 points 1 week ago

America ended with Reagan. It only got worse after him. The 1950s/60s were the last period in which America could be considered the greatest country on Earth.

[–] wanderwisley@lemm.ee 16 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I think the assassination of JFK was the first kill shot that signal the end of America. Nixon and Regan becoming president was the cancer that inflicted the backbone of the working class. And 9/11 helped kick off anew wave of white hatred that had been boiling since the 90s. And now we are where we are now to the point of no return. I’m 42 years old and have seen and lived through some terrible and crazy times and we are all about to head straight into a country wide car crash and idk what will happen after it or if this country will survive it.

[–] DeathsEmbrace@lemm.ee 5 points 1 week ago

Let's throw some wild cards to keep your world entertaining

[–] null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Did this attack really cause a change in trajectory though?

I think capitalism has been leading the US down this path since the second world war.

[–] njm1314@lemmy.world 20 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Is it a change of trajectory If instead of going down a long slope you turn down a road leading toward the edge of a cliff? Because while I agree about capitalism leading to inevitable horrific consequences there's really no way to argue against 9/11 ushering in an age of utter Horrors when it came to civil rights.

Of course you could also make the argument that the turn towards that Cliff was actually caused by the Supreme Court picking George W bush to be our president.

[–] null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 week ago

Yeah that's fair.

These types of events are always used as an excuse to dial up invasive powers of government.

[–] halcyoncmdr@lemmy.world 8 points 1 week ago

It didn't change the trajectory, but those attacks were much more effective than even Al Qaeda thought they would be. They provided the excuse the American fascists were looking for to further their own plans without much push back.

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[–] BlameTheAntifa@lemmy.world 11 points 1 week ago (2 children)

If we’re being honest with ourselves it goes back much further than that. It has never, at any point, been what it set out to be or what it claimed to be.

[–] Clinicallydepressedpoochie@lemmy.world 9 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Kinda hinted toward it in another post but its more about my own personal perspective. At a young age my life was mostly devoid of politics and america seemed like an ok place. Since the attack on the twin towers, for me personally, america has only gotten worse. To me, 911 marks the end of america, as an idea.

[–] DrDeadCrash@programming.dev 6 points 1 week ago

Another American here, I think it's important to be aware that those attacks happened as a direct result of evil -empire level shit the US is responsible for in the 20th century.

[–] rob_t_firefly@lemmy.world 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

I was an adult when 9/11 happened. After growing up in cold wars, Gulf wars, recessions, etc. that day was extremely horrible, but also felt like just the latest big symptom of an ongoing downfall.

My parents' generation had the Vietnam War as their One Big Important Thing, their parents had WW2, etc. Like other commenters are saying here, what seems like the One Big Important Thing to you is really just a matter of where on the running timeline you happen to be. I find the best way to gain perspective is to examine and understand the entire thing, that's the only way I think anything constructive can be done about any of it.

I think it's also important to compare America to other Western countries, and see what other paths it might have chosen.

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[–] klu9@lemmy.ca 9 points 1 week ago

I don't get it. I just see NYC rolling coal.

[–] rivan@lemm.ee 5 points 1 week ago

I blame mitochondria

[–] andybytes@programming.dev 2 points 1 week ago

The world is a global capitalist system. Other countries are outsourced to sometimes spy on Americans. I don't think people understand the security state that actually exists. Julian Assange talked about this. The United States, along with Israel and Saudi Arabia, perpetrated 911 and allowed 911 to happen. The Bin Laden family or Bin Laden already explained why he did what he did. It was because of American foreign bases. America sometimes creates terrorists in order to allow bad things to happen in which they did. The Twin Towers went down because America wanted it to happen. So 9-11 was an inside job. Tell me what happened to building 7. What's up with this motherfucker name Larry Silverstein. Why did he just say pull it? And why was it already filled with explosives? Just remember, if you ever feel a little upset, you feel like doing something. And everything seems to just be working, you know? Like, you're getting all the things you need and what not. It might be that the FBI and the CIA or somebody is setting you up to be a tool in their bigger game. This sent us to a 20-year war for nothing, all to bleed the tax bases of Europe and the United States. That's why now we're on our knees with no leverage, no power, and a failed liberalism with a fascist clown in power. The Book of History never closes. All we do is war. Capitalism will destroy the planet.

[–] match@pawb.social 2 points 1 week ago

gonna just say fuck it and say it started with the USS Maine sinking itself

[–] neuroneiro@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

The end began with the Lewis Powell Memo in 1971

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