Thinking that trump is the worst president in the past 100 years just betrays either an insane privilege[1] or just ignorance. You realize the hundreds of thousands of lives lost directly or indirectly in the war on terror, a war almost completely engineered by the Bush administration, are actually real right? They were people with hopes, plans, dreams that were all wiped out, and for a lot of those who are still alive they are condemned to live in a cycle of violence caused again by the war on terror and it's ripple effects. If you compare that to what trump did in his 4 years and come up with the conclusion that hey, it wasn't as bad & Donald truly is the worst president... Then I don't even know what to tell you.
I'm Muslim and I've grown up my entire life with that war and its consequences in the background, especially since we mostly consumed arabic media. I've thankfully not been affected directly, but man do these takes completely discredit the side that keeps pushing them instantly for me.
We are at a point where even the notoriously neocon hawkish republican party and their voters are a lot more willing to acknowledge just how horrible those people were, yet democrats have no problem completely rehabilitating the old neocon crew because hey yeah they killed people but at least they were... Polite about it? I get that it's unhinged crusading politics and we just have to paint the adversary as the worst person ever to feel the rush of being morally superior but when you are at the point where you defend George W Bush to own the magahats, maybe take a step back and reflect on what you are doing.
The worst part is that now that bed has been made and apologism for those neocons became a mainstream talking point, everyone is just doubling down because admitting that trump isn't actually even close to being worst would be to admit that maybe the hysteria to score political points didn't warrant sweeping under the rug 2 enormously destructive wars.
[1] as in the privilege of not having ever been affected by the war on terror. Which in turn leads to pretty insignificant events like being concerned about the presidents tweets or feeling that you are part of some sort of feel good #resist movement for 4 years just registering as being more impactful than a region getting destabilized far away
That's a fair criticism, although you really pulled out the big hyperbolic guns. Insane? Not really. And you continue to make personal attacks even in your footnote. But hey, it's an internet discussion board, I'm guilty of the same.
The guy broke democracy and started a trend that IMHO will inevitably break the US. There's no stopping the nihilistic-right's rise fueled by an uneducated white minority bent on revenge via politics for their oppression at the hands of those they vote for. This nihilism, meaning its not that side A is correct or side B is correct: there is no "correct". That's worse than two pointless wars, IMHO, and it springs directly from Trump. A fountainhead of corruption the likes of which modern democracy has never seen. And I stand by that.
Yet that white minority is more willing to stop bombing non white across the world. It's a bit unreal but it's the truth. You ought to realize that you are also coming from an imo pretty... White-democrat point of view right? And my argument is exactly that a segment of the country, mostly white, went to such a extent to get revenge on the 2016 election that they sided with literally everyone they used to hate not even a decade ago. I'm sorry but how is that for nihilism? Your arguments are again very philosophical, but in a way just dismiss the destruction of an entire generation of Iraqi (and Syrian, by ripple effects) because a nihilistic trend of your political opposition rising? I'm sorry but come on! Like you are exactly doing what I was critizing in the first place. "those people may have died, and that region may have been hopelessly destabilized but at least Bush (who literally was elected by the supreme Court which makes this even more ironic) wasn't nihilistic?". The guy that came up with you are either with us or you are with the terrorists?
Of course it's worse than 2 wars you have never been affected by.
The entire USA had a complete meltdown over allegations of Russians rigging the elections, without any American casualty. In fact I'd bet that one of the reason you are saying trump broke democracy is probably related to those allegations. But when the US is destroying entire countries it's no big deal? I hope you can see the cognitive dissonance there or at least why your point of view is very very white centered. And that's without even getting into how the democrats attacked the integrity of the elections for years, rightly or wrongly yet I don't see how that didn't directly undermine trust in democracy. It was a dance-à-deux, and if trump ends up breaking democracy down the line it's not because one side pushed against it. My point here is that no matter how you look at it, the entire thing is related to partisan politics not a righteous crusade that couldve somehow justified arguing that 2 desastrous, decades long wars were in fact less important/bad.
But that's all unrelated. Look, I'm not American, not white and not Christian.to me it boils down to this. I don't think anything is more cynical and cold than to publicly downplay and rehabilitate a figure that caused so much more pain and suffering because that would score points. That's it.
I really didn't want to come off as insulting you, honestly. And I get that some things can't really be expressed in a non offensive way (even if that's not the intention) when it comes to heated subjects like this. That's why I'm not going to touch on some of your other points. Again, it's not because I'd have insulted you otherwise, but because I don't know how to express what the war on terror felt like from the "inside" without inevitably sounding hyperbolic.
> I'm sorry but come on! Like you are exactly doing what I was critizing in the first place.
Shit. That's an excellent point. Thanks for making me realize it. I'm being absolutely glib about 1M+ deaths. Yeah, that's totally privilege. My bad. I'll go think on that for a while. Yes, I'm a white liberal and I haven't been called out this succinctly and correctly in a long time. I responded like shit because I got angry, my apologies. Thanks again.
Hey this is actually really nice to read, and no matter what you end up concluding I think it's good to just put things in perspective.
I totally realize it's harder to get the whole picture for a lot of people who weren't really affected or involved, just like it is harder for me to relate to let's say the current Ethiopian civil war and it's very harsh effects on the local population since it's so detached from my every day life. Even as a Muslim , I'd probably have been oblivious to the war on terror if it wasn't for my parents being very into Arab politics and the family tv always tuned to Arabic news. Growing up with daily reports of bombings, suicide bombings, mothers crying on TV, and just footage of destruction everywhere is what made me realize and process how much misery was brought upon so many people. it got to the point where the opposite of the normal media sentionalism happened and a few dozen people dying in a suicide bombing/drone strike barely made it in the news. the weird part was that it somehow was never ending.from the invasion of Iraq, to the insurgency to the Iraqi surge to the afghan surge to libya to Syria to Isis to... A bit of very relative peace now? I think everyone would've felt the same if they were in the same situation I think. Even many Arabs and Muslims in the US don't fully realize that either. Cheers!
I also really hate how much people ignore the actions of other presidents and hyper focus on one mainly because of the massive amount of consent manufacturing by mainstream media. Hundreds of thousands of people are dead as a result of other presidents, and a lot of those were women and children.
I'm Muslim and I've grown up my entire life with that war and its consequences in the background, especially since we mostly consumed arabic media. I've thankfully not been affected directly, but man do these takes completely discredit the side that keeps pushing them instantly for me.
We are at a point where even the notoriously neocon hawkish republican party and their voters are a lot more willing to acknowledge just how horrible those people were, yet democrats have no problem completely rehabilitating the old neocon crew because hey yeah they killed people but at least they were... Polite about it? I get that it's unhinged crusading politics and we just have to paint the adversary as the worst person ever to feel the rush of being morally superior but when you are at the point where you defend George W Bush to own the magahats, maybe take a step back and reflect on what you are doing.
The worst part is that now that bed has been made and apologism for those neocons became a mainstream talking point, everyone is just doubling down because admitting that trump isn't actually even close to being worst would be to admit that maybe the hysteria to score political points didn't warrant sweeping under the rug 2 enormously destructive wars.
[1] as in the privilege of not having ever been affected by the war on terror. Which in turn leads to pretty insignificant events like being concerned about the presidents tweets or feeling that you are part of some sort of feel good #resist movement for 4 years just registering as being more impactful than a region getting destabilized far away