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Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

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Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#291

Post by stale2002 »

amanaplanacanal wrote: post #276
stale2002 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, the incorrect part of you analysis is implying that right leaning states would start the war here. Given the current state of upcoming election polls, local politics, and the supreme court, the right leaning states are going to get most of what they want. They have no reason to secede, when they are winning the current politics battles, and are likely to win future elections in the next few years.

The talk of secession is from the right leaning states. If, say, Texas were to secede, I wouldn’t be totally surprised if the US were to invade, after all that’s how the last civil war started. On the other hand, maybe they would do nothing.

> The talk of secession is from the right leaning states.

There has been rhetoric from right leaning people, for decades on this,yes.

But the point is, that from the actual on the ground political reality, the right is winning.

They are winning in the courts, local/state power, and based on current voting polls, they are going to win in the upcoming federal elections.

There is no need to secede if you simply control all the levers of government. And the recent facts are that the right is only going to get more power.

Therefore, despite the rhetoric, right leaning places have no need to secede, when they can instead just take over the government the regular way.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#292

Post by user3939382 »

watwut wrote: post #277
user3939382 wrote: post #142

Judging by the Russian and French revolutions, civil war isn't happening unless and until a lot of people are having trouble accessing food. IMHO the factors that sparked the US Civil War (extreme state independence, regional economics) are no longer relevant.

Both happened because state was weak and decomposing. The revolutionary activities in Russia were long. Neither happened primary because of famine, both were in the making for years. In both countries, pleadership seen issues years and years before but was incapable to fix them.

It's hard to separate these things but I've studied, especially the Russian revolution fairly in-depth, and the sense I get is that people were feeling extremely desperate because of the food situation, and when they saw how incompetent and aloof the government was, how unable to solve their problems, the resulting feeling of helplessness and hopelessness was the last straw. I believe if food had not been an issue it wouldn't have happened.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#293

Post by t_mann »

dQw4w9WgXcQ wrote: post #278
t_mann wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take off your tinfoil hat, Science is one of the most respected academic journals in the world, and it is a US-based publication (its twin is the British journal Nature , together they form the pinnacle of academic achievement). This specific article is about a preprint, not a Science publication yet, but do be aware that the organization behind that website has a lot of reputation to lose if they were to engage in t…

> Take off your tinfoil hat If questioning why certain people + orgs want to push/parrot a self-fulfilling narrative is "wearing a tinfoil hat", I'll gladly buy the whole tin foil aisle in the local grocery store. You don't even know which came first, the facts or the belief. Stop pretending like this is "science" when the only thing that matters is whether or not we choose to believe we can find common ground.

> questioning why certain people + orgs want to push/parrot a self-fulfilling narrative

> Stop pretending like this is "science"

The organization in question is literally called the American Association for the Advancement of Science. It doesn't really get more science-y than that in America.

And surveys in general are very much science (without quotes) indeed. Even if this one isn't peer-reviewed yet, which would be a criticism that I'd accept, but that doesn't seem to be what bothers you.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#294

Post by wishfish »

mywittyname wrote: post #274
wishfish wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes these things come from the bottom up. In some countries, a small number of violent people set the spark and the flames start. The elite do have far more power than the rest of us, but sometimes they're also caught up in a wave they can't control. Just like the rest of us. The elites of the South wanted to keep their slaves and their wealth. Many of them ended up having their plantations burned down or seize…

The Southern elites probably felt strongly they would "win" early. The sheer incompetence of the Union army in the early battles suggest to me that there were some sympathies in the Union leadership and this was probably common knowledge. They probably intended this to be a little tussle to show everyone they were serious.

Oh definitely they thought they would win early and easily. They were a bit delusional. They thought solely of heroic battles winning everything through sheer courage, cleverness, and grit. And didn't think about what it meant for a largely agrarian society to go up against a highly industrialized one.

But it's interesting how they lost control of the situation over time. Not just in the battlefield defeats and the industrial machine crushing them. But also in other ways. The Confederate government was short of everything and turned towards a centralized economy to produce what it needed. The elites found themselves constrained by the wartime needs.

By 1865, they were planning on arming black men to fight in the Confederate forces. Had this plan succeeded, it would have meant the end of slavery in the Confederacy. The very reason why the war was started by the elites in the first place.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#295

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

pupppet wrote: post #177
pupppet wrote: post #62

As long as we have Fox News serving up an alternate reality to half the US population that’s exactly where we are headed.

Hilarious this was voted down. Go look at Foxnews.com at this very moment, the entire front page dedicated to smearing everything Democrat. It's shameless.

I play a game when reading Google news and avoid reading the byline when scanning headlines. If a headline is making wild accusations or pumps up an irrelevant trifle it's most likely from Fox News. I'm right most of the time.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#296

Post by gmoore »

russellbeattie wrote: post #211
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #6

Source is apparently a preprint (that is, not peer-reviewed) uploaded here: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.07.15.22277693v... > Participants: Cross-sectional nationwide survey conducted May 13 to June 2, 2022; participants were adult members of the Ipsos KnowledgePanel. 8,620 respondents, but I don't see how they were recruited or how potential bias was accounted for. Given how weird some of the interne…

In my opinion, the extreme right-wing is building themselves up to begin politicide. For the past year, we've seen daily news stories as Republican extremists don’t just say that Democrats are wrong, but that they are evil. This is a classic authoritarian method of vilifying your opponent both as corrupt and subhuman. Having just read about the Spanish Civil War, I can see how this will potentially play out. It will…

particuarly well said. People hear 'civil war' and all they can think about is grey vs blue, brother against brother....

It won't be like that. It'll be exactly what you described....this isn't new - it's the way it always plays out in authoritian regimes....

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#297

Post by chasd00 »

threatofrain wrote: post #275
chasd00 wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

even if they were politically sympathetic they would have to abandon their oath to the constitution and turn and fight the rest of the Marines. Also, there's a lot more to the party than just Marines. I doubt there would be as much hesitation by drone operators sitting in office buildings firing on any armed citizen in any city in Texas. Let alone AI feeding targets of opportunity to a queue where operators just clic…

The Constitution is strong because of the robustness of the structure it specifies via checks and balances, not because people pledge an oath. I also don't think it's obvious that the US would go to war to preserve the union.

What i meant by "oath to the constitution" is the US military doesn't pledge allegiance to an administration or ideology or region. Its only purpose is to uphold the constitution of the United States of America. That's why the military operates the same no matter which political party is in power. At the end of the day, its only purpose is to defend the constitution.

If the US didn't goto war to preserve the union then the US, as defined the US constitution, ceases to exist. There is no provision in the constitution laying out the right (or even the method) for secession.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#298

Post by BurningFrog »

School-Cotton wrote: post #164
thechao wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The voting system in the US (FPTP) is fundamentally unfair. Combine with post-red-map gerrymandering, it is becoming obvious even to the people "on the wings" that our election system fundamentally disenfranchises large swathes of the population. As a short hand, think "Democrats and Independents in red states" and "Republicans and Independants in blue states". Being disenfranchised sucks . The system is designed to…

The US actually has an additional issue on top of FPTP which as far as I know is unique among (supposed) democracies: a bicameral legislature where one of the houses requires a 60% supermajority to pass anything. This is such an incredibly fundamental part of the US political system that it amazes me that it isn't more widely talked about. It means the US is effectively not able to pass any laws that are even mildly…

This is also why we're drifting towards an "Imperial Presidency", where the president, as the only power center that can come to a decision, unilaterally dictates more and more of US policy.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#299

Post by phs318u »

the_optimist wrote: post #205
pmyteh wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These panel surveys are reasonably good. The better pollsters (like Ipsos MORI) spend a decent amount of effort recruiting a broad sample of people for their panels, and results are statistically adjusted for non-response bias etc. That said, the usual problem with political polling (that you can only poll people willing to answer pollsters' questions) applies extra here, as all respondents have agreed to be part of…

Quoted post unavailable.

Thanks for pointing out the other person’s bias. The demonstration by example in your second paragraph was particularly illuminating.

Re: Half of Americans anticipate a U.S. civil war soon

#300

Post by kokanator »

watwut wrote: post #250
bsagdiyev wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hate to "be that guy" but this ends up being a both sides issue. There was a notice sent around to some churches after the RvW appeal to be vigilant since they had received some info on people possibly acting violently towards churches since they blamed them for it. (Edit to add: Please see https://janesrevenge.noblogs.org/2022/06/26/janes-revenge-ni... -- these are pointedly anti-fascists, the opposite of the righ…

Yeah no. The political and especially terrorist acts are not two side issues, they in fact flow from right much more. It is just that right always gets benefit of doubt. But also, overturn of RoW is long term work of evangelicals.

This is a VERY bold statement to make without citing any sources.

If for instance you were to look across recent world history you will find many communist ( left ) groups/factions are exceedingly violent toward civilians and account for millions of civilian deaths.[0]

In this country very recently, "...New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio... blamed anarchists and "far-left extremist" groups, including antifa, for inciting and organizing violent riots"[1]

I am not say that violence is not perpetrated by those on the right but your statement is a gross misrepresentation.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_killings_under_communist_... [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violence_and_controversies_dur...

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