this post was submitted on 20 Nov 2024
285 points (98.3% liked)

politics

19120 readers
3799 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

  1. Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

  1. Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
  2. Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
  3. No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
  4. Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
  5. No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

Register To Vote

Citizenship Resource Center

Congressional Awards Program

Federal Government Agencies

Library of Congress Legislative Resources

The White House

U.S. House of Representatives

U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

News

World News

Business News

Political Discussion

Ask Politics

Military News

Global Politics

Moderate Politics

Progressive Politics

UK Politics

Canadian Politics

Australian Politics

New Zealand Politics

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 20 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (1 children)

Wrestling fan for over 40 years.

Honestly, given the options that Trump could dredge up from the 9th circle of hell, this isn't the worst choice.

Linda McMahon sat there for 50 or so years and did nothing while her husband committed all sorts of atrocities. And she deserves everything she gets for doing that. All the criticism surrounding that is 100% valid. But I want to point out the key words there. "Did nothing." Because that's pretty much Linda McMahon's resume.

As CEO, she did nothing. Vince called the shots. She just signed the paperwork -- at best. Her position was mainly a figurehead position just to ensure McMahon's power in the company was that much more entrenched. She has all the charisma and personality of cigarette ash, and her on-air persona was literally to sit in a wheelchair and say nothing because she wasn't capable of better acting.

She had a cabinet position during Trump's first administration, and did a whole lot more nothing.

I would expect the same thing here. Linda McMahon is an unqualified hack who shouldn't be in the position, but if there's a silver lining, it's this: Left to her own devices, McMahon will likely do nothing. Education won't get any better, but it won't get any worse either. She's smart enough to know when she has no idea what she's doing, and if the past 50 or so years is any indication, she'll spend the next four years doing a lot more nothing and hoping nobody notices.

Yes, she absolutely will follow Trump's directives to the letter. But Trump's attention span is worse than Linda McMahon's acting skills. I hate to say it like this, but if Trump stays focused on removing all the brown people and forcing his cronies to buy his watches, there's at least the possibility that McMahon could just keep her head down for 4 years and at least not leave the DOE worse off than the way she found it. She's got a 50 year resume showing her skills at doing nothing. Hopefully she'll continue that trend.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 3 days ago (2 children)

There's a huge issue with that, though, that seems all too often overlooked: by doing nothing, our systems will still fall behind. They will continue to decay, to lag increasingly behind our peers and adversaries. At absolute best, the inevitable death of 1,000 cuts marches on.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Well, I think did nothing and let Vince do whatever he wanted while she signed the paperwork is the more relevant and scarier bit of what you're responding to and what that person missed. There's no silver lining to a Yes Man with what these people want to do to education.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 days ago

You're missing my point slightly.

Yes, if Trump is dead-set on killing the DOE, we're fucked. You're right there. But unlike many of Trump's other yes-men, Linda McMahon is not known to have the drive to do anything by herself. Go watch any of her WWE footage or any time she's made a public statement. That woman hasn't lifted a finger in her life without calling on her assistants to check on her nails. And we all know that Trump has the attention span of a methhead with ADHD. The silver lining is that if Trump decides to set his sights elsewhere, she'll do little damage on her own, unlike a more ambitious yes-man who will take the initiative.

Think of it this way. It could have been Boebert. Or MTG. Or Jim Jordan. Plenty of cronies exponentially worse than McMahon if they were chosen, and all of which would have the initiative to do it themselves if Trump's attention was focused elsewhere.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Sure, but I'll take the thousand cuts over being shot right directly in the face, pretty much every time.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 3 days ago (1 children)

At least that would illicit a reaction out of the masses; that's exactly why these authoritarians aim to slowly strangle our safety nets. We will apparently happily let them do it, as long as it doesn't cause us immediate and perceivable harm.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Given the results of the election, that reaction may not be the one you think it is.