this post was submitted on 17 Jul 2024
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[–] [email protected] 81 points 4 months ago (6 children)

How many Republicans don't care about guns?

[–] [email protected] 105 points 4 months ago (4 children)

The ones that are republicans for tax purposes.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Is that enough to matter? And is this issue enough for them to change their vote, given the tax stuff? All the other shit Trump does certainly doesn’t matter.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

The richest places in America are pretty solidly blue. A lot of rich people like good public schools and colleges, clean water, the arts, etc. and understand that taxes and charity are how those things are paid for.

Other rich people like gated communities and stopped reading books^1^ when someone stopped assigning them. They’re the Republican rich people.

^1^ Some will read a book about war or some shitty airport bookstore thing that’s 80% out-of-context quotes about how to be a leader.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Rich people don't give a fuck about public schools, lmao, they send their kids to private ones.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

Private schools often suck. Rich people aren’t smarter. They just have more money. There’s plenty of districts where the best public high school is way better than whatever private schools exist. Half the private schools are for weird religious groups or kids who got expelled.

There’s almost always good public schools in cities. That’s why there’s always loopholes that allow rich people’s kids to go to them.

And in colleges, Harvard isn’t better than UC-Berkeley or the honors programs at most state flagship institutions. It’s just older. (There have been studies that compared students who got into an Ivy League school and ultimately chose a public flagship and the Ivy grads only did better in the first few years after graduation. But then the public flagship attendees caught up.)

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (2 children)

I wonder how many of those hedge fund billionaires down on Wall Street are Democrats. I doubt that it’s many of them. Bankers? Nah. Media and Telcom? Not likely. They’re all based in NYC, the bluest of the blue cities.

They all like tax cuts and deregulation. Trump is the one who’s promising that, whereas Biden promised and already delivered more of both to them all.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 months ago (1 children)

I don’t have any desire to defend hedge fund or VC billionaires so I’ll concede the point. There’s a reason San Francisco has NIMBY policies and New York City can’t elect mayors for shit.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Yeah, because the people who own all of the businesses and real estate constantly battle those who work at the businesses and live in all that real estate, which just goes to show what a fucked up and unbalanced role money plays in our so-called democracy.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Bankers? Nah. Media and Telcom? Not likely. They’re all based in NYC, the bluest of the blue cities.

Now you're just making things up. You can't just say "nah, not likely" and prove anything. It's a lack of effort that shows you don't have evidence.

NYC is a "blue city" (whatever that means) because of these professionals. The actual working class people in NYC make up a lot of the conservatives. That's why cities are more liberal: because they have more educated people. Those people work in banking or media; they're not all artists or plumbers or something.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Hilarious. OK, where’s your evidence, then?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

EVERY group is big enough to matter. Reminder that the last two elections were determined by around 10,000 votes.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Those republicans already know he's fucking crazy and they don't give a fuck what his stance is on guns.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

At this point Donald Trump could build a shrine to and start worshipping Obama as a God.... It won't affect anything.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

And the ones that are Republicans to fuck over everyone but the rich. They'd definitely prefer "poor folk" didn't have guns at all.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

And who don't give a shit either way about guns to make any effect

[–] [email protected] 25 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Lots of them. Do you know any Republicans? None of them care about issues that don't affect them and their families. Even other "conservative" issues. They are not driven by policy.

Only Republicans with guns care about guns. And only 50% of Republicans have guns.

https://news.gallup.com/poll/264932/percentage-americans-own-guns.aspx

They don't care about each other. Liberals care about what other liberals think. Stop thinking like someone who cares about policy.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

I've had to explain this to a lot of people who naturally assume that any organization of people will be organized around some kind of shared values. Most of the time that's true, but not for Republicans.

Republicans are just a mish mash of obsessive single-issue voters, and by in large they just don't care about the other single issues that their fellow party members are going on about.

At the head of the Republican party it's people who want to minimize their tax burden, eliminate regulations on corporations, and cannibalize as much of the US government as they can into for-profit institutions. You could say that's three issues instead of one, but the overarching theme is to cater to personal greed, no matter the harm to society. These are the ones who are primarily pulling the strings in the party, at least historically.

Just below them is the military industrial complex and gun manufacturers who just want to sell guns no matter the harm to society. They like to rile up 2A fanatics with conspiracy theories that the government is out to steal all their guns so they'll be defenseless, paving the way for King Biden to ascend to his throne. The industry only cares about selling guns and the fanatics only care about having guns, and neither care about any kind of harm to society.

Then there's the radical Christians whose obsessions cover an eclectic mix of social reactionary positions and literal death cult worship (e.g. Christians who give absolute support to genocide in Palestine because they think Israel's conquest is a crucial step towards the rapture, which they believe is imminent). Broadly speaking the people in this group just want to hoist their religious doctrines onto everyone they can by any means available and no matter the harm it causes to society. They literally only care about "God's Kingdom" in the afterlife.

Then there's people who just lack any capacity for adaptation or learning. Their obsession is to feel like things are staying the same, or even reverting back to a past that they only know how to view through rose tinted glasses. They can't be bothered to comprehend the problems we're facing as a society or how the past was not the idyllic utopia that they mistakenly remember, nor can the old way of doing things sustain a growing and transforming society. These people just want to exist in comforting ignorance by feeling like they get to remain in familiar surroundings, no matter the harm to society.

There's really only one thing that truly unites them: Each one wants one specific thing no matter the harm to society, and that one specific thing that they each want IS HARMFUL to society. But they work well together because none of them care about the harm being caused by any of the others, and as long as they all tow the same line, each one gets what they want.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago

I've never met any Republicans that were pro-gun-bans. I really don't believe you'll be able to find a single one either.

This is dumb as fuck timing by Biden, but I'm sure he can't help himself because he's been super anti-gun for decades so it's probably just like a reflex at this point for him to to off about banning guns after a shooting.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago

Trump, for one

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago

How many of them will stay home or change their vote because the head of the party they're still a part of despite all the gun nuts continues acting like a gun nut?

If Biden is trying to use guns as a wedge issue for Republicans, he's the person we saw at the debate all the time.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago

Not a lot but every wedge is probably worth it

[–] [email protected] -1 points 4 months ago

The ones that are antiabortion or evangelicals who don't own guns. GOP has the most gun owners but its not even like half their voters. Vocal minorities is all it is.

The only issue the GOP is actually united on right now is how they don't like democrats.