More than 200,000 people had canceled their digital subscriptions by midday Monday, according to two people at the paper with knowledge of internal matters. Not all cancellations take effect immediately. Still, the figure represents about 8% of the paper’s paid circulation of 2.5 million subscribers, which includes print as well. The number of cancellations continued to grow Monday afternoon.

  • Jure Repinc
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    21924 days ago

    It would hurt this sociopath Bezos a lot more if people also canceled Amazon services en mass

      • @[email protected]
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        24 days ago

        Great argument. How about buy your shit from actual stores, whether online or brick and mortar. Believe it or not, we actually managed to get by for millennia without amazon

        • Cyborganism
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          7124 days ago

          A lot of those stores actually closed down because of Amazon.

          Many that offer specialized equipment are located in locations that are far or difficult to access and/or have opening hours that are the same as my work hours.

          I do my best to buy local and from physical shops, but sometimes nobody had what you’re looking for and Amazon can get it to your door in 24 hours.

          I hate the company but fuck is it practical. They need a serious competitor but nobody wants to even try with the amount of money Bezos got.

          • @[email protected]
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            1023 days ago

            Use Amazon, only when you have no other option.

            Not “no other option with 1 day shipping”

            Not “no other option that delivers to my door”

            Not “no other option that doesn’t cost $10 more”

          • @[email protected]
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            524 days ago

            also the amazon truck drives by my house every day anyway. it’s far more efficient for them to drop off another package on their route than me making a special trip to a physical store.

            • Cyborganism
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              3024 days ago

              But I mean we all get why this is wrong. It’s becoming a major monopoly. And that’s not good.

        • @[email protected]
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          2124 days ago

          I bought some 3D printing filament direct from the manufacturer. It got shipped to me by… Amazon. From an Amazon warehouse. I guess that’s how they do fulfillment. 🤷‍♂️

        • @[email protected]
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          1524 days ago

          Huh. In my large city I have difficulty finding things in brick and mortar stores. Want a silicone tray for your air fryer? Walmart’s website says they have them, but when you call the stores, they confirm they absolutely do not. Hobby lobby has it for 5x the price. No local stores come up as stocking them period, None other listed locally. I have this issue quite commonly. Maternity clothes sections just don’t exist locally with any variety or consistency with sizes. Baby necessities, toys, and clothing is truly hit or miss in stores. You drive to the one store you think will have what you need and they closed two weeks ago.

          I don’t live in the boonies. If you live in the US, you’ve heard of my city. I am constantly running into the issue that things are only available online, and then Amazon is always the quickest shipping, and almost always the least expensive.

          Fuck bezos and screw Amazon, but unless you’re able to wait a week or three for everything you need, you don’t have any good substitutes. I’d love to run out and buy it same day, but it’s just not reliable to go to the store anymore.

          • @[email protected]
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            223 days ago

            I just bought a bunch of onesies and toddler clothes directly from Carter’s and the Children’s Place. They do seasonal sales and loyalty points so I actually got a better deal than on Amazon. Got the packages within 5 days each. I bought diapers from Target, they came in two days and I got a $20 giftcard as part of the deal. Next time you need something, try going directly to the brand’s website, or literally any other retailer. Amazon spams search results but they aren’t the only store on the internet.

        • billwashere
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          924 days ago

          I wish I could. Most of the stuff I buy from Amazon I can’t find anywhere else. They’ve become the Walmart of online stores and driven everything else out of business. He’ll even Walmart doesn’t have what I want 99% of the time. It sucks. I hate contributing to Wish version Lex Luther …

        • BoofStroke
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          724 days ago

          AWS is the big one. And they are indeed somewhat unique in the scale and flexibility that they offer. You could leave them, but then you have to build those services and data centers yourself.

            • andyburke
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              1924 days ago

              At better prices, with better service and APIs.

              It’s like people enjoy the abuse? 🤷‍♂️

                • @[email protected]
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                  122 days ago

                  No way in hell you’re trying to compare digital ocean to GCP or AWS.

                  There are technologies that are entirely out of reach until you get to a certain size. Just because you can provision a VM for someone who gives you a credit card doesn’t make you top tier cloud provider.

                  And azure comes close, but from a technical perspective their offerings are not competitive. Like it’s 2024 and they still don’t have s3 support.

          • Noxy
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            924 days ago

            gcp, azure, hetzner, digitalocean, linode…

          • @[email protected]
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            323 days ago

            AWS is unique in its high profit margins. Have you explored the world of non-cloud hosting? It’s cheap as!

        • @morphballganon
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          524 days ago

          I’m delighted to hear that you can afford the prices of goods from modern brick and mortar stores. What about us 99% though?

          • @[email protected]
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            3424 days ago

            Idk wtf stores you’re going to, but prices are very similar between online and B&M, and where it’s not, I haven’t been to a store in years that won’t price match.

            To answer your question, the 99% of you just need to think about it for a second before parroting some dumbass take.

            • @[email protected]
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              24 days ago

              This cannot be true unless the price of commercial retail real estate where you live is next to literally $0. I have never heard of a store, online, nevermind B&M, price-matching Amazon because this is economically impossible.

              But idk, I’m not American. In the UK we basically don’t have any actual stores anymore for anything other than food and/or clothes, and they are closed after 5PM, so good luck getting there just to pay 5x the price or sell a kidney for delivery fees.

                • @[email protected]
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                  122 days ago

                  Fair, you have my envy. Here in the UK that’s definitely not a thing because we have no real competitors to Amazon.

        • Lightor
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          122 days ago

          Sure, we did lots of things for a long time. We used to send mail instead of phone calls too. But the reality is Amazon is going to offer a bigger selection, with more convenience, usually cheaper prices, and the ability to see reviews of the product. It’s got a lot of merits that make it attractive.

      • @Thistlewick
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        5724 days ago

        Just not using Amazon? Somehow I’ve managed to survive without needing to buy anything off Amazon in over a decade. How badly do you need to buy random shit online that you can just shrug at the human rights violation that is Amazon?

        • @[email protected]
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          523 days ago

          Exactly! I also haven’t bought more than ten items from Walmart in the last fifteen years.

          It can cost a little more, and requires patience, but I can think of very few times I’ve actually needed (versus wanted) some item before I could get it not via Amazon or Walmart. Even with the added expense for some individual items I’d wager I’ve spent less overall since it makes impulse purchases easier to avoid.

          It’s probably not amounting to much in the way of resisting these mega corps, but it isn’t as difficult as some folks imagine.

      • Noxy
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        2324 days ago

        bhphotovideo has been very good to me

        • @[email protected]
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          924 days ago

          Second this… If they have it available, they’ve been great to me.

          Additional to backfill more “basics”, target is at least less crap than Bezos.

          • Noxy
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            724 days ago

            Agreed. Target isn’t perfect (no corpo is) but I buy from them still

      • @[email protected]
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        1324 days ago

        I think if you had just left it at “Got a substitute?” and left off the snark you wouldn’t be downvoted into oblivion. I’ll try to give you my honest take. It’s a fair question. Amazon is a really nice service. I was a prime member for many years. About 3 years ago I cancelled because: the price kept going up, the usability of the site keeps getting worse, (alphabet soup pop up “brands” poisoning search results) and the customer service has gotten worse.

        My process now is, search for what I want with one or more search engines, or, a website with reviews I trust like wirecutter, seriouseats, rtings, gamersnexus, etc. Once I decide on the item, see if the manufacturer sells it direct. Then, I price compare using a google shopping search. If Amazon comes in at MUCH cheaper than everyone else, I might still buy from them. If it’s close, especially if it’s a small business, I try to go more direct. If your cart is over USD $35, shipping is still free but slower. If I have smaller things less than $35, I sit on them and wait until I need enough to put me over or stock up on basics like garbage bags. If I need something fast and Amazon is the only place to get it, I can still pay for shipping several times a year and spend less than I would on the prime subscription. I typically only need to pay for shipping once or twice a year.

        You can make Amazon compete and behave better without completely cutting them out of your life. Cancel prime, and shop around.

        • @morphballganon
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          324 days ago

          I’m not aware of being downvoted into oblivion, but I have a massive block list, so that might be why.

      • @[email protected]
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        1324 days ago

        Yep, for just about everything you get on Amazon there are alternatives. You just go to the supplier that sells the thing you need instead. Amazon hasn’t had real 2 day shipping in a long time. If you really need that “everything store” experience, Ebay, Target and Walmart all have decent online marketplaces but might as well use the smaller stores. What’s keeping you on Amazon? It sure as hell isn’t its search, and tons of sites offer free, fast shipping. I have to assume it’s habit.

        • @[email protected]
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          24 days ago

          Maybe this is true in the US, but in the UK the difference in shipping is Amazon same-day or at the very latest 1-day for free, or easily £5.99+ for something between a week and never because they use the most cost-cutting human slavery looking ass parcel carriers. That’s before the fact most things just are flat-out not available outside of Amazon, and if they are, cost 5x.

          I happily pay more for local, and I basically bought clothes only on Etsy for quite some time despite being scammed a number of times, but that’s crashed too now and is impossible to use, and even before there’s no persuasive economical argument to make.

          Most suppliers only sell directly on Amazon, or also on AliExpress if it’s chinese made stuff, but that in itself is a very different beast because shipping from there is in the month+ range.

      • @[email protected]
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        1124 days ago

        I am confused by people’s shopping habits. How often are you buying online and what is it?

        Groceries and pharmacy are all local. Clothes are a local boutique (I don’t buy clothes more than one or twice a year and I like to try things on and buy quality items). Shoes are from a local redwing store that I’ve been wearing for over 8 years. Computer parts I do tend to buy online, but I’d never risk buying from Amazon. I typically buy from b&h, cdw, or directly from the manufacturer.

        • @[email protected]
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          224 days ago

          Vape supplies are 5x the price on the street compared to Amazon, I buy from some shady online retailer instead but it also takes much longer.

          For pharmacy stuff things I need are impossible to get in any pharmacy, even as I have it on prescription and should be able to get it for free in the UK, in practice it’s just never in stock, online pharmacies require bizarre kafka-esque labyrintha of consultations ans approvals, and one that I was recommended by my gf that she uses tried to selectively scam me by asking for.my card details over the phone, including CVC for the excuse that it was some third party supplier, meanwhile on Amazon it can be delivered the same day for a pretty decent price.

          For computer parts in 99% of cases Amazon is much much cheaper. Any hobby stuff like music gear all comes from Amazon because it’s much more expensive with the manufacturer (if even available directly) nevermind retailers, nevermind in store IRL. Print books (can’t stand reading electronic copies) and especially manga are almost never available outside of Amazon, where again it’s all 1DD.

          I’m in the top 20% earners in the UK so I can somewhat afford IKEA as long as I use it for many years, but for most there’s no real alternative to Amazon price-wise despite the poor quality. Same goes for kitchenware, options in stores are far too limited, e.g. plate drying racks were all too big or too small unless I got the one I got from Amazon.

          Clothing varies, if I only ever go with brands I already know and take days off to actually be able to visit the stores before they all close at 5PM, maybe, but otherwise the best way to buy any brand of clothing is prime wardrobe’s try before you buy thing if you filter to legit brands only.

          There’s just no real alternatives, even if you pay more, you wait more, you choose worse options, sooner or later you just run into a wall because those businesses that used to sell this stuff were gone by the 2010s tops.

      • @[email protected]
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        24 days ago

        What? There is no need for a substitute. The concept is insanity. Just stop being a consoomer ffs

        • @[email protected]
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          24 days ago

          We don’t all live in mom’s basement playing [insert game] on a crusty Toshiba satellite here with every whim catered to.

          Things break, things are needed, people live their lives. I don’t buy much, but when I need something there are rarely any alternatives to Amazon.

          • @[email protected]
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            24 days ago

            Sure buddy, if that makes you feel better.

            Thats just not true anywhere in europe. If you live in NA, then my condolences. Idk how it is in south america but probably depends on the country.

            • @[email protected]
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              423 days ago

              I’m in the USA and it’s totally easy not to use Amazon. The first step is buying less shit though and people are pretty addicted to buying crap they don’t need.

            • @[email protected]
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              22 days ago

              Things don’t break in Europe??? Are you insane? In the UK most people buy all their stuff from fucking Temu, it’s literally top 10 free apps on Google Play here always, it’s much worse than even Amazon.

              I’m anti-consumptuon as they come, I don’t have any subscriptions, most things I own are either 2nd hand, upcycled (repurposed), fixed by me, but you are either a sheltered baby or utterly out of touch with reality if you think it’s possible to avoid using Amazon here entirely, especially in Europe if anything, at least in the US they have some competition to Amazon but here? Nah.

              • @[email protected]
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                122 days ago

                Argos has a huge amount of stuff, is often as cheap as Amazon, and can handle same-day pickup and delivery. Saying that it doesn’t exist in the UK is definitely bullshit, especially when we are a tiny fucking island that has handled next day delivery at scale for DECADES.

      • madjo
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        624 days ago

        Plenty of alternatives, if you’re willing to look. Books? Try the library. Ebooks? Kobo. Audiobooks? Libro.fm Other products? Shop local (if you still can) otherwise, use Google to find another site that sells shit.

      • @[email protected]
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        624 days ago

        Don’t most brick and mortar stores also have websites that deliver? Just think of what store might sell what you’re lookng for and buy it from them or at least compare prices.

      • @[email protected]
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        23 days ago

        …I stopped using Amazon at all about a year and a half ago. It’s not that fucking hard. Do you know how many places want to sell you shit?

        Literally all of them.

        • @morphballganon
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          524 days ago

          I’ve used ebay before. Full of scammers. No thanks.

            • @[email protected]
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              524 days ago

              Seriously, feels like a crapshoot if I’m actually getting a quality product or garbage that falls apart. Doesn’t help that you can’t trust the reviews, fake reviews aside it feels like every other item tries to bribe you with a gift card for a 5-star review.

              • Noxy
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                424 days ago

                Open box shit sold as new, same/next/2 day deliveries getting delayed more often than not, counterfeits, genuinely dangerously unsafe products, a supply chain full of exhausted and burned out workers… Yeah it’s all so fucked. I can only hope their retail business collapses as it’s increasingly indistinguishable from aliexpress or ebay

            • @[email protected]
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              124 days ago

              What? What country do you live in where Amazon has downright scams on it? Sure you might get something that’s a bit dodgy but if you do your due diligence you can avoid it. With eBay not so much where most products live in at most the paralegal grey area space.

                • @[email protected]
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                  122 days ago

                  Fair enough. Haven’t seen this in the UK. Plenty of scams on wish and Temu but on Amazon you always get the item as described, it’s just often fairly shit.

      • I Cast Fist
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        423 days ago

        For prime video, just pirate whatever is their “must watch” show or movie. For online shopping, just stop being a spoiled bitch who can’t live with 2 day shipping. Google still works, something you want to buy -amazon.com

      • @[email protected]
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        323 days ago

        Are there hundreds of alternatives to online shopping on Amazon?

        The same with logistics. Surely there are MANY delivery companies?

        What about Amazon would you miss?

        • @[email protected]M
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          324 days ago

          This got reported, but its a joke, I think people just didn’t get it- including me. Because its a weird joke.

        • @[email protected]
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          122 days ago

          Yeah bro you’re right let me just not buy medication or replace a busted hard drive or microwave… Degrowthers need to grow some fucking braincells istg

      • catsarebadpeople
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        123 days ago

        There are thousands of online stores, not to mention brick and mortar where you can buy everything you need.

        This question shows you’re either a troll or a moron.

        Have you got a substitute for… A place to buy stuff? No not a single substitute? You really can’t think of any vendor other than Amazon? Be better

          • catsarebadpeople
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            22 days ago

            So, a liar and a troll. Got it. Holy shit you’re actually responding to every comment with complete nonsense. What a loser lol.

  • cabbage
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    24 days ago

    To anyone unsubscribing: Remember to subscribe somewhere else instead. If not you’re just helping Bezos achieve his goal of the death of journalism.

    @[email protected] is one good alternative.

    As others have said, if you want to hurt Bezos, target Amazon.

  • @[email protected]
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    10824 days ago

    WaPo - “Democracy dies in darkness”

    Bezos - “I can deliver darkness to everyone in America in 2 days or less”

    • @[email protected]
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      424 days ago

      “We endorse Democrats! REJOICE!!!”

      “We want to stay neutral! BURN THEM ALIVE!”

      Can’t make this shit up…

      • @[email protected]
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        4124 days ago

        WaPo editors wanted to endorse Harris.

        Bezos, who is not an editor, forced them to remain neutral.

        That’s a problem. People don’t subscribe to WaPo because they want to read Bezos’s thoughts.

        • @[email protected]
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          123 days ago

          Editors wish to use their paper to endorse a candidate, the owner of the paper does not want them to do that so their endorsement is not written. What’s the issue here?

    • Bakkoda
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      23 days ago

      I think Elon mismanaged Twitter tremendously but a very clear “this is my toy and I’ll break it if i want” message was sent and a very dangerous message it was. Gives me the same vibe. Bezos doesn’t need to own it but he does and he’ll do what he pleases.

  • @[email protected]
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    8524 days ago

    Something darkly funny to me is all the people who work there whose job it is to grow subscribers seeing their last three years of hard work flushed down the drain on the whims of the owner.

    I’d love to sit in on performance reviews for Q4’s end.

    • @[email protected]
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      823 days ago

      I’ve been there. It sucks sooooooooo much. Especially if you’ve made family sacrifices (missing events etc.) to travel to get those deals closed - just to see them just evaporate in a whim.

      That’s why I got out of Tech Sales and into management.

  • Tiefling IRL
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    7624 days ago

    Finally got around to canceling my Prime membership. I’ve been relying on Amazon to get all the shit I can’t buy in person, but I’ll figure out some other way to get those.

  • osaerisxero
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    6724 days ago

    The number of cancellations continued to grow Monday afternoon.

    200,000 so far

  • Dot.OP
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    5624 days ago

    Holy shit, that number is huge, in terms of their paid subscribers.

  • 🅿🅸🆇🅴🅻
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    4724 days ago

    Three of the top 10 viewed stories on the Post’s website Sunday were articles written by Post staffers outraged by Bezos’ decision. The top one was humor columnist Alexandra Petri’s piece, headlined, “It has fallen to me, the humor columnist, to endorse Harris for president.”

    • @[email protected]
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      1324 days ago

      This is the reason. In our fucked up country, Trump, a rapist convicted felon, has a legitimate chance of winning the presidency.

      • @[email protected]
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        224 days ago

        Why is our country fucked up? Because you think we should be a one party system? The Left has been doing everything and anything to stop Trump from running for President. But that doesn’t matter right? I mean, isn’t that what it really comes down too? Every time I come on this site, it’s about “get rid of the Republicans!!!” For what? So we all vote ONE way and have ONE belief? Isn’t that was communism is?

        • @[email protected]
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          923 days ago

          Alternate theory: You are spending a lot of mental real estate supporting a rapist and felon.

        • @[email protected]
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          523 days ago

          Im not from America but even from an outside Perspective America is fucked up. Its the definition of a capitalistic hellscape. Meanwhile an old senile rapist is running for president threatening to remove the last bits of functional democracy and imprisoning everyone he doesn’t like and he has a legitimate chance of winning. Somewhere about 50% of the entire American population actually wants to see democracy being destroyed and people getting imprisoned unlawfully. Also Theres the problem of America being divided as fuck. Republican hardlibers being willing to kill family members because they voted blue(saw a post about someone describing this today), and Nazis being able to walk on the streets without having to fear anything. America is fucked up in so many different ways that I can’t even remember all of them right now and this will only become worse if Trump gets reelected.

        • @[email protected]
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          323 days ago

          Every time I come on this site, it’s about “get rid of the Republicans!!!”

          This is not a “both sides” thing. One side is actively trying to kill people.

          If conservatives become convinced that they cannot win democratically, they will not abandon conservatism. They will reject democracy.

          I don’t know about you but I’m not okay with that and I am personally okay with defending my vote, by violence if absolutely necessary.

    • @[email protected]
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      724 days ago

      Why do you think the billionaire bought Wapo? Like Bloomberg, as long as the left doesn’t get into power, he’s going to make money hand over fist.

  • @[email protected]
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    2224 days ago

    What do you predict Turnout being this year? 2020 was 65.9% of the VEP(Voting Eligable Population). The lowest in the internet era was 2012 at 58%. Average is 2004 and 2016 at 60.1 and 59.3 each, 2008 was the previous high at 61.1

    • @[email protected]
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      1023 days ago

      That would be an interesting pool to join in.

      It’s a million Venn diagrams of a million different problems. It’s hard to even guess what ones would be more significant.

      You’ve got his impending jail time if he doesn’t make it in. That’s likely going to activate a bunch. You’ve got the incels and misogynists. I’d say you’d have a pretty decent percent of the most ardent Gaza supporters, and certainly some of them will go third party, But knowing that if Trump makes it in he will absolutely throw as much support as possible to netanyahu… They’re in an absolutely miserable situation but I don’t know that they would be in a hurry to make it worse.

      Of course on the other side you’ve got Cheeto Jesus saying he’s going to be dictator on day one, He’s going to prosecute an imprison other people he’s threatened donors. He’s patronized Hitler’s and Hitler’s staff. He’s pretty much insulted and activated everybody on the other side to be scared to fucking death that he’s going to make it in. I have to think that all counts to activate us. I have to think that all the rambling and incoherent speech he’s giving is feeling to activate them at least a little bit on the other side.

      But the poles, their poles. I was behind a fuck nut yesterday with a Trump 2024 make liberals cry again bumper sticker. I’ve never wanted to get out of my car and scratch wahhhh snowflake on some dick heads tailgate so much

      • @[email protected]
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        323 days ago

        It’s also good to note 2008 being second highest was hard carried by Obama, McCain was not pulling record numbers. 2020 was both parties breaking their all time records(though proportionally they both fell a bit short of 2008 Obama). Personally I smell 2008 style numbers. Post-COVID means less people free that day and a bit less wall to wall election exposure, and while Harris is more charismatic than Biden she’s not Obama(Obama wasn’t even supposed to be picked in 2008, but he came in so hard and strong they gave him a shot and he mauled Hillary. Kamala wasn’t fighting her way through a primary she was never supposed to win in a trial by fire like Obama).

        Also states have shifted in one way or another. Nevada was the bluest state in 2016 and 2020, only swing state to go blue both times, only one of the modern swing states Hillary held(albeit in 2016 Virginia and New Hampshire and New Mexico were considered Swing States too). This year it’s looking to be a lot more red…hopefully…if it’s still the bluest state that’s game over already. Abortion doesn’t sell well there, state is more male, and it’s mostly older so the women there aren’t super passionate. That and they got hit by COVID and Inflation really really badly and No Tax on Tips is popular. Meanwhile Wisconsin(traditionally the reddest of the rust belt) is being reigned in by Tim Walz to a degree and has been the bluest at several points while Michigan(the bluest state Trump won in 2016) is slipping a bit due to Arab voters.

        Calling it being around 2008 Levels, but not 2020 level.