I don’t usually torture myself by watching presidential debates. The last time I felt it would be worthwhile to watch one was when Dr. Ron Paul was running. Ever since, I haven’t had the patience for it and instead have mostly contented myself with whatever glimpses of the fatuity would come my way. But last night, I was feeling overwhelmed by the sheer curiosity of what passes these days for a supposedly serious “debate” on issues considered important by Americans.
I thought it might be a chance to get inside the heads of most of my fellow Americans who actually participate in the whole election charade whereby a small group of narcissists and sociopaths are empowered to rule over the rest us through the threat or use of force. This is something that just boggles my mind. Why do that? Why choose servitude? Why choose to be robbed by a gang of thugs? Why choose to perpetuate the criminal organization in Washington, DC? Why choose to legitimize its criminal activities? Why not just stop doing that?
So, to try to satisfy that curiosity, I decided to watch the “debate” between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris on ABC News. It certainly illuminated the idiocracy that passes for a government and a society these days. The total unseriousness of it all is just mind-numbing. Watch for yourself, if you dare, or just skip to my comments briefly but sufficiently dispelling the illusion that Americans are being presented with any kind of real choice in this coming election.
As I watched, I tweeted my comments on the inanity. Here are my tweets, er, “X” posts — (follow me on Twitter/ “X” here) — with corrections and/or elaboration where needed:
9:03 pm — Gonna torture myself by watching the Harris Trump debate. Comments to come in real time (as long as I stay awake for it).
9:05 pm — First question Harris was asked: are Americans better off than four years ago? Her choice not to answer the question says everything.
9:08 pm — Trump should hardly talk about inflation since the trillions created out of thin air to paper over the lockdown harms started under Trump.
9:10 pm — And Harris just blamed Trump for the consequences of lockdown policies Biden continued with far greater fervor after Trump actually started to fight them. ?♂️
9:11 pm — Harris brags that the banks like her economic plan. ?♂️
9:15 pm — Harris arguing (rightly) that tariffs harm American consumers. Then not being able to explain why Biden continued that policy. ?♂️
9:25 pm — The federal government has no business whatsoever being involved in the issue of abortion. Ironically, Harris basically makes that argument while criticizing the Supreme Court under Trump for sending it to the state governments. ?♂️
9:27 pm — Harris refusing to say she wouldn’t support abortion in the ninth month of pregnancy. ?
9:30 pm — Harris pledges to put me first. How insulting to my intelligence!
9:33 pm — Harris bragging about neocon war criminals supporting her…?♂️
9:43 pm — Harris saying she will explain her flip-flops on issues, e.g. fracking, then refusing to actually do so… ?♂️
9:50 pm — Harris claiming Capitol Police were killed by a “mob” incited by Trump. Bets the mainstream media won’t fact check that one?
[Note: Zero Capitol Police officers were killed by Trump supporters on January 6, 2021, when rally-goers entered the building. One officer died the following day from natural causes (a stroke).]
9:52 pm — Trump’s answer to everything: the Democrats opened the border!
[Why doesn’t he have more to criticize from the Biden administration? Could it be their policies aren’t all that dissimilar in the grand scale of things?]
9:57 pm — Reminder: Russiagate was a hoax but the Democrats and Deep State really did interfere in the 2020 election.
[For more on that, see my recent article “Zuckerberg Admits Facebook Censored Truth for the Government“.]
9:59 pm — Harris describing genocide as “self-defense.” Then lying that the Biden administration has been working “tirelessly” for a ceasefire.
[For an explanation of how the Biden administration has, to the contrary, utilized the public relations claim that it is working to achieve a ceasefire to help Israeli Prime Minister block any progress toward a ceasefire and thus to facilitate Israel’s continued genocide in Gaza, see my recent article “Why Do Americans Trust Either Trump or Harris?“]
10:01 pm — Trump criticizing Harris NOT for defending Israel’s genocide but for not being supportive enough of Netanyahu as he perpetrates genocide.
10:02 pm — Who you gonna vote for: genocide supporter A, or genocide supporter B?
10:11 pm — ABC News of course asks no serious questions about the US-backed genocide in Gaza. Moving on… Nothing to see here…
10:13 pm — “You’re not running against Joe Biden, you’re running against me.” Who refuses to explicitly distinguish what she would do differently from Biden! ?♂️
10:15 pm — “the greatest military alliance the world has ever known” — Harris describing NATO and defending the broken promise to Russia not to expand it eastward
10:19 pm — “Israeli forces strike safe zone in Gaza” — Ticker tape on ABC live as the debate goes on after brushing off the issue of the US support for Israel’s genocide that is supported by both candidates.
[Note: When I tweeted that, I thought the ticker tape news at the bottom of my TV screen was ABC’s, but it later occurred to me that it might have been from whatever other provider was airing it, which I hadn’t paid attention to because the debate was advertised on the TV’s home screen, and I just clicked it without noticing which app it was being provided through. So, it may not have been ABC’s, but my point remains.]
10:31 pm — Harris just promised she won’t try to take away guns from gun owners because she is one. File that one away for future reference.
10:33 pm — Harris saying “health care” is a “right” and thus proving she doesn’t even understand what a right is.
10:35 pm — Harris: “extreme weather” events prove “climate change”, i.e anthropogenic global warming. ?♂️
10:44 pm — Harris says “we’re not going backward”. My 11-year-old son’s retort: “Well, the Constitution wasn’t such a bad idea.” ?
[I was letting my son stay up late to watch the “debate” with me, figuring it would be a good educational opportunity for him to see what type of people Americans consider “leaders” and whom Americans actually want to rule over them.]
10:49 pm — “I don’t think we heard a lot of policies or plans” — ABC post-debate discussion ?
[This was such a glaringly obvious characteristic of the whole debate that even the folks at ABC managed to notice it.]
10:51 pm — She “didn’t do a great job explaining her policy shifts” — ABC News post-debate commentary. That’s an understatement! ?
10:53 pm — “she never really answered questions on abortion restrictions (i.e. in the ninth month of pregnancy)”
So, there you have it. That about sums up the so-called “debate” between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris.
The ABC news commentary went on after that, but that was about as much as I could handle, and it was past time for my son to go to bed. The highlight of the TV viewing for me was his clever joke accurately observing how we do not have a constitutional government. (He is homeschooled, in case that wasn’t obvious enough that he hasn’t been indoctrinated into the state religion by the government school system.)
My son also once came up with the acronym “COW” to describe what people call “the government”, which was a joke arising from how I tend to refer to it instead as “the criminal organization in Washington”. Yeah, that’s too long a description, so “COW” works for me! Thanks, son. I just wish the COW would get out of our way and let us instead build a civilized society.
The way I see it, if you think candidate X is the lesser of the two evils, and you cast your vote to try to keep Y out of power, then if X gets into power, you have just supported evil; and if Y still gets into power despite every vote “counting” (or so we are assured), then you have also just legitimized that wickedness. Whoops! So why not just stop choosing to legitimize it? I, for one, refuse to recognize that this criminal regime has any legitimacy. I refuse to recognize that any of these corrupt and vile — or, at best, just clueless — politicians have any moral or legal authority to rule over me through the threat or use of violence. I am sovereign.
Won’t you join me in recognizing your own sovereignty?
Here is some further relevant reading/viewing for your thoughtful consideration:
Both Trump and Harris deserve to lose. The best way to express that sentiment is to vote 3rd party not show you are so disaffected or not even paying attention so as to be IGNORED.
Yes.
I agree that anyone who feels the need to vote should vote 3rd party. However, I think the best course of action is not to vote at all, for the reasons Bretigne and I explained in the interview I linked at the end of the post.
I enjoyed reading all the way down to the end and even I already knew of your decision not to vote, I was still hoping that you might consider the Libertarian vote. Chase Oliver actually shares the same beliefs as you.
I have never been impressed with the Libertarian party. I haven’t proactively sought to learn about Chase Oliver’s positions on various issues, but our mutual belief in the non-aggression principle clearly has not led us to the same conclusions since he is participating in and hence legitimizing the system, whereas to me the logical corollary of that principle is that we should not legitimize the state.
THE DEBATE: FACT CHECK
“This is just one more example of the Democrat party and their Liberal now Leftist in the media handmaidens doing their bidding and Subjectively inserting themselves into a situation that should be Objective. Just one more perversion that the general public is being subtly manipulated by and indoctrinated by one political perspective. The powers that be in politics and the media insist they tell you how and what to think and believe. You in their opinion are not qualified to think for yourself. Political treason in my opinion.
Just how gullible are you going to remain? ”
https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/after-the-debate-fact-check
Okay so let us put together clear decentralist policies like commons rent tax shift (to land value tax and resource rent and off of labor and production) and public banks for starters and everything else we can do to build local-based economies with minimum necessary regional and global governance.
We absolutely need to decentralize and build alternative institutions. No taxation at all because it is theft. Simply facilitate voluntary exchange for mutual benefit and reorganize society around the principle of non-aggression instead of empowering a monopoly on violence.
COW, I love it! I’d certainly vote for your son for president, or anything else, but also expect he’s already far too wise to take the position. That clown show passing as a debate was certainly a good argument for anarchy, and I’m with you on that one. But I see Trump as being many times more sympathetic autonomy, being cut from that cloth himself, and therefore the far lesser of the evils, in strategic terms.
?